Saipan
Alan Ladd a Merchant Marine who travels the world on the Military's pre-positioning ships shares his one of a kind
finds on the World War 2 Pacific Battlefield of Saipan. Thanks Alan for sharing your story and finds! - Bob
When I got this back to the ship and rinsed it off a little better, I saw the two rows of Japanese witting scratched in under the main seam.
I have a Japanese friend who interpreted it for me. It say's...exactly as I type : TAKEN FROM THE ENEMIES BATTLE OF SAIPAN JULY 1944 The July 1944 is written as showa 19 (the 19th year of Showa's reign) which is 1944 to you and I.
Notice the JEC in block and then cursive. Going to the American monument in Garapan, I went over the 4,200 plus names of those who died on Saipan. There were five who had initials of JEC. Of course, who's to say that there were not other JEC's on Saipan that went on to other campaigns and survived the whole war.
This was another lucky find....I never would have seen it (along with an American and a Japanese hand grenade) had I not been on my hands and knees trying to beat some vegetation that had me defeated. My flash light caught the edge of this and here you have it.
Can you imagine that? I'm going under vegetation so thick that I needed my flash light on, in broad day light, to see where I was going! Again...a real lucky strike.
This was up on Mt. Tapachau...half way up on the "back side".
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Sadly the American with the initials JEC probably didn't make it off the island, after this Japanese sharpshooter filled his canteen full of holes. A good read on the Battle of Saipan from the Japanese point of view is "OBA The Last Samurai" by Don Jones. Captain Oba and his troops were the last Imperial Japanese force to surrender in the entire War and were a hold out unit on the island of Saipan long after the battle was over. |
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The green Japanese canteen wasn't deep in the boonies at all and I basically just stumbled across it. I had gone ashore, late in the afternoon for business other than boonie stomping, and some how I ended up with the use of a car.
I only had about an hour before I needed to start back to Garapan so I decided to drive north toward Suicide Cliff and do a quick "re con" along an easy access to a limestone and coral like cliff line. I didn't even have on my stomping gear...just sneakers and short pants but at least I'd be out in the boonies and enjoying the open out of doors doing something quiet and
alone..so unlike life aboard ship.
This will be no sweat...skim along the cliff line to my left, paved road to by right, dirt road to my back, go north to get back out ..I'm covered.
Easy insertion in, more rocks and limestone formation than lush vegetation to fight through and I'm now down to just 45 minutes before I need to
"reverse" course and get back to the car.
Well, you know how this goes, You get "amped" up and you just can't resist as the tidal pull of the jungle sucks you in further and further as
the terrain looks better and better with each and every step. But it's time to reverse course so I'm zigging and zagging..going up and down and
around formations and looking for the path of least resistance back...scanning like crazy...
I hop down and work around a rugged coral/limestone formation and there's a
shallow rifle or machine gun nest made from the natural overhang of this formation and rocked up in front as is so often the case. That canteen was right there....amongst the small limestones rocks, leaves and old what?
land crab shells? Always these sea shells everywhere ...maybe the same thing for you in Oki?
I couldn't believe it....what a lucky strike that was! Hard to believe that wasn't recovered by some one else long before I came along and it goes to
show you that you never can tell what's out there but you certainly are right in your DVD book that all the "good stuff" is long gone by now.
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| Does anyone have any insight on the strange Imperial Japanese Navy symbol? If so contact me so I can pass the information. |
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