_Col David M. Shoup, here as he appeared after the battle, was the
fourth and only living Marine awarded a Medal of Honor from the Tarawa
fighting._]
Colonel Shoup was 38 at the time of Tarawa, and he had been a Marine
officer since 1926. Unlike such colorful contemporaries as Merritt
Edson and Evans Carlson, Shoup had limited prior experience as a
commander and only brief exposure to combat. Then came Tarawa, where
Shoup, the junior colonel in the 2d Marine Division, commanded eight
battalion landing teams in some of the most savage fighting of the war.
_Time_ correspondent Robert Sherrod recorded his first impression of
Shoup enroute to Betio: “He was an interesting character, this Colonel
Shoup. A squat, red-faced man with a bull neck, a hard-boiled, profane
shouter of orders, he would carry the biggest burden on Tarawa.”
Another contemporary described Shoup as “a Marine’s Marine,” a leader
the troops “could go to the well with.” First Sergeant Edward G.
Doughman, who served with Shoup in China and in the Division Operations
section, described him as “the brainiest, nerviest, best soldiering
Marine I ever met.” It is no coincidence that Shoup also was considered
the most formidable poker player in the division, a man with eyes “like
two burn holes in a blanket.”
Part of Colonel Shoup’s Medal of Honor citation reflects his strength
of character:
Upon arrival at the shore, he assumed command of all landed
troops and, working without rest under constant withering enemy
fire during the next two days, conducted smashing attacks against
unbelievably strong and fanatically defended Japanese positions
despite innumerable obstacles and heavy casualties.
Shoup was modest about his achievements. Another entry in his 1943
notebook contains this introspection, “I realize that I am but a bit of
chaff from the threshings of life blown into the pages of history by
the unknown winds of chance.”
David Shoup died on 13 January 1983 at age 78 and was buried in
Arlington National Cemetery. “In his private life,” noted the
_Washington Post_ obituary, “General Shoup was a poet.”
]
_The Third Day:_
_D+2 at Betio,_
_22 November 1943_
On D+2, _Chicago Daily News_ war correspondent Keith Wheeler released
this dispatch from Tarawa: “It looks as though the Marines are winning
on this blood-soaked, bomb-hammered, stinking little abattoir of an
island.”
Colonel Edson issued his attack orders at 0400. As recorded in the
division’s D-3 journal, Edson’s plan for D+2 was this: “1/6 attacks at
0800 to the east along south beach to establish contact with 1/2 and
2/2. 1/8 attached to 2dMar attacks at daylight to the west along north
beach to eliminate Jap pockets of resistance between Beaches Red 1 and
2. 8th Mar (-LT 1/8) continues attack to east.” Edson also arranged for
naval gunfire and air support to strike the eastern end of the island
at 20-minute interludes throughout the morning, beginning at 0700.
McLeod’s LT 3/6, still embarked at the line of departure, would land at
Shoup’s call on Green Beach.
The key to the entire plan was the eastward attack by the fresh troops
of Major Jones’ landing team, but Edson was unable for hours to raise
the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines, on any radio net. The enterprising
Major Tompkins, assistant division operations officer, volunteered
to deliver the attack order personally to Major Jones. Tompkins’
hair-raising odyssey from Edson’s CP to Green Beach took nearly three
hours, during which time he was nearly shot on several occasions by
nervous Japanese and American sentries. By quirk, the radio nets
started working again just before Tompkins reached LT 1/6. Jones had
the good grace not to admit to Tompkins that he already had the attack
order when the exhausted messenger arrived.
[Illustration:
INTELLIGENCE MAP BITITU (BETIO) ISLAND
TARAWA ATOLL, GILBERT ISLANDS
SITUATION 1800 D+1
NOTE: LINES ARE GENERAL INDICATION ONLY. GAPS WERE COVERED BY SMALL
GROUPS AND BY FIRE. SECONDARY LINES WERE ESTABLISHED WHERE POSSIBLE
BEHIND FRONT LINES.