John Bruning on LinkedIn: ‎American History Gazette: Guadalcanal: The Battle That Shaped the Marine… (2024)

Very few American photojournalists and combat cameramen made it ashore on D-Day morning to document what took place at Omaha Beach. The most famous is Robert Capa with his two Contax II bodies & Zeiss 50mm cameras. His Magnificent Eleven images from the first waves at Omaha were used as the basis for the opening of Saving Private Ryan.There was another shooter on the beach that day with the 16th Infantry, 1st ID. That was Signal Corps combat cameraman Val C. Pope, an extraordinary Soldier and exceptionally brave young man, whose images and film footage compose a large part of the visual legacy of Omaha beach.Here is his story on this 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings.https://lnkd.in/gCR9tj9P

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Major John L. Smith, skipper of VMF-223, America's Ace of Aces in 1942, and one of the greatest Marine leaders of his era. Relentless, aggressive, fiercely loyal to his men, he is seen here in October 1942, just after arriving on Oahu from Guadalcanal. He was a man haunted by the deaths of the young pilots under his command, desperately uncomfortable with the media spotlight shining his way.A decade later, when Hollywood told John L's story, John Wayne played the great Marine ace, turning him into a ruthless taskmaster whose men resented him. In reality, the men of VMF-223 loved their skipper. He was demanding, emotional, prone to outbursts of anger, but so clearly loved & looked after his green 2nd Lts that they followed him into every fight for fifty-three of the toughest days any Marine squadron has endured.The movie, which came out in 1951, is worth a watch. It contains considerable actual combat footage and gun camera clips, some of which no longer exists at NARA.For more on John L and his squadron, take a look here: https://lnkd.in/g7PyyCuN

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Imagine coming homing from 53 days of continuous combat to be told you're going to be one of the first to fly the Navy's latest and greatest bomber. It is the next generation, the plane you will be piloting when you return to war after this short interlude in the States. You've been flying a dive-bomber whose forward-firing guns rarely worked, that couldn't make more than 220 mph fully loaded, could only carry a thousand pounds of bombs, and was easy meat for Japanese fighters. Despite the deficiencies in your aircraft, you and your half-trained squadron played a key role in stopping a critical Japanese counter-offensive. Your bombs destroyed numerous ships and barges. You're a national hero, though the cost was high. Most of your pilots are dead. Those left are in Stateside hospitals recovering from wounds and trauma.A revolutionary new bomber, faster, with more firepower and more ordnance, is exactly what you wanted while leading your men against the Japanese Navy. With great fanfare, you're brought to the most modern aircraft factory in America, one the Navy invested millions in to construct, then leased back to the aircraft company for a dollar a year. You give a rousing speech to the employees who are building this revolutionary weapon of war. There in Hatbro, Pennsylvania, in front of thousands of workers, you're given the keys to the new plane to take it on a test flight and see what the future holds. That plane was the Brewster SB2A Buccaneer. And it was a complete dud. The worst aircraft produced by the U.S. defense industry during WWII. Welcome home, Marine.https://lnkd.in/gj63uXDK

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On this Memorial Day, I want to honor the men from VMSB-232 lost on Guadalcanal. Aboard the USS Long Island (CVE-1), the 12 pilots and 12 gunners of 232 were told to buy time with their lives so America could bring up more men & planes.They did far more than just that. They saved America's first offensive of WWII.The cost:PilotsFletcher BrownLarry BaldinusOliver MitchellCharley McAllisterDon RoseLeland ThomasGunners:W.R. ProffittR.S. RussellP.O. SchackmanNine of 24 KIA. Half the pilots lost. The others were all either wounded or medically evacuated, except for Dick Mangrum. After 53 days, he was last man standing, a skipper without a squadron.Not forgotten.

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Marion Carl grew up on a dairy farm outside of tiny Hubbard, Oregon. He squeaked through Oregon State, then went on to be one of the 50 fighter pilots in the pre-war Marine Corps.He was one of the 9 pilots to survive the Battle of Midway from his squadron, VMF-221. Two months later, he became the first Marine Corps ace while flying with John L Smith and VMF-223 at Guadalcanal. He returned to the U.S. to be feted as the hero of the hour, and the PR guys had high hopes for Marion, since he was tall, charismatic and possessed the winning mile you see in the photo here. They sent him out on tour with John L and LTC Richard Mangrum, skipper of the first dive bomber unit to fight at Guadalcanal.He hated the press tour. Loathed it. The reporters annoyed him, the attention annoyed him. He fell asleep in press conferences. Sat and said as little as possible in other ones, chewing his nails and counting the seconds he could get away. He wasn't made to be a celebrity. He was meant to fly and fight. In early 1943, he returned to VMF-223 as its skipper and took it out to the Solomons for a second combat tour. He should a couple more planes down, returned to the States to become one of the legendary test pilots in American history.He flew and fought through the rest of his career, from secret recon runs over China in the 1950s, to taking the 1st Marine Brigade into Vietnam in 1965, where as a brigadier general he flew combat missions in support of his men in both jets and helicopters.He retired as a major general in 1973, with over 13,000 hours in his logbook and is considered one greatest military aviators in American history.His story formed the basis of Fifty-Three Days on Starvation Island.https://lnkd.in/gTwPD_qE

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Got to hang out with the guys from Homebrew History last week and chat about the extraordinary Marine aviators found in the pages of Fifty-Three Days on Starvation Island.Had to give a shout out to Dawson Officer and 4 Spirits Distillery--> their bourbon has fueled many of my long writing nights since 2011! https://lnkd.in/geCw9weh

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If you happen to be in the Portland area June 5, please stop by and say hello!

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1942: When you're a year removed from lecture halls and your fraternity house, and you find yourself 180 miles south of nowhere in the middle of the Pacific, told to launch off a make-shift aircraft carrier with a catapult that will fire you off the deck at a 45 degree angle into a crosswind while piloting a combat aircraft you've had less than 30 days to learn to fly...and if you survive the launch, you'll fight the best combat aviators in the world who have been shooting down planes since you were on your high school JV teams. You're going to be living in the jungle, slowly starving on captured food stocks. You may be five ten, a buck fifty now, but if you survive, you'll be lucky to be a hundred and twenty pounds. When you're not in the air every day, you'll be sniped, bombed, shelled, strafed, and mortared. The enemy's ground troops are a few thousand yards away, preparing to overrun your make-shift, shell-pocked airfield that in itself is a hazard to use. You'll be exposed to jungle diseases not even known to Western medicine yet. You'll be wracked with malaria, doubled over with dysentery. Your aircraft's oxygen system will fail and poison you. A hit in the wrong place, and you'll be covered in superheated engine oil. If you get shot down, you'll face sharks at sea and death by torture at the enemy's hands in the jungle. And some light bird who doesn't know the basics of overwater navigation, who refuses to share your circ*mstances, has just told you your mission: buy time with your lives. Die hard. You have one ace in the hole: USMC Captain John L. Smith is your commanding officer. With him at the tip of your spear? All the other stuff is just noise. Fifty-three days of this to go...then you can go home. For thirty-four years, I've wanted to tell this story. Thanks to Hachette, it'll be in bookstores everywhere, Audible and Amazon this May 14.https://lnkd.in/gqHH6fkm

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