Second, Japanese stragglers and pockets of resistance in the island’s
northern sector had to be squashed. That job, for all practical
purposes, was pretty well completed on the 26th as the 2d Division
swept across the Ushi Point airfields, reached the east coast, and made
a turn to the south. (Two days later, Seabees had the Ushi Point fields
in operation for Army P-47 Thunderbolt fighters). Also on the 26th, the
4th Division had seized Mount Maga in the center of the island and had
forced Colonel Ogata and his staff to abandon their command post on
Mount Lasso which fell to the Marines without a struggle.
The third objective--to create for the drive south a skirmish line of
infantry and tanks stretching all the way across the island--was also
accomplished on the 26th. The 4th Division lined up in the western
half of the island with the 23d Marines on the coast, the 24th in the
center, and the 25th on the left flank. The 2d Division lined up with
the 2d Marines on the east coast and the 6th Marines in the center,
tied in to the 25th. The 8th Marines remained in the north to mop up.
[Illustration: _Tramping the cane was a tiring work, especially when
the direction of the advance did not parallel the rows of the fields.
Each stalk was strong enough to trip a man careless about where he
stepped. Advancing through such a field was fraught with danger,
also, from hidden trip wires attached to demolitions, and from dug-in
Japanese. In addition, the dry cane fields could easily catch fire and
trap the Marines._
Marine Corps Historical Collection
]
All this was accomplished with only minor casualties. For 26 July,
for example, the 2nd Division reported two killed and 14 wounded. The
heaviest losses since the first day and night of fighting had been
sustained by the 14th Marines, the 4th Division’s artillery regiment,
in the hours following the Japanese counterattack. An enemy shell
hit the 1st Battalion’s fire direction center killing the battalion
commander (Lieutenant Colonel Harry J. Zimmer), the intelligence
officer, the operations officer, and seven other staff members; 14
other Marines at the battalion headquarters were wounded. Virtually
all of the casualties sustained by that regiment during the Tinian
campaign were taken on this single day, 25 July: 13 of the 14 killed,
and 22 of the 29 wounded.
[Illustration: