41st Infantry Division: Fighting Jungleers

INTRODUCTION

Just like me, you’ll naturally run through my Table of Contents to find the history of your company or battalion first. But you have many other division histories to be proud of. Surely you’ll want to read Walt McKenzie’s story, Bayonet Charges at Sanananda with Bernie Marly’s back-up history. Surely you’ll want to hear again how G Co., 163rd Infantry got our division the nickname of The Butchers after they cut off the Japanese escape route up Killerton Track, and overran the Hospital Lot.

For Weapons Companies histories, you can’t read any better than D-186’s two Biak histories by Nick Wheeler and other cobbers of his association. In M Company, 162nd Infantry’s Biak saga, you have two superfine histories by machine gunner Louis Botta. Al Schacht’s four histories of L Company, 163rd Infantry in the southern Philippines are masterpieces about a rifle company in action. For scouting and patrolling, there are no better stories than Joe Bradshaw’s on Roosevelt Ridge and on Mindanao Island.

For heroism in field artillery, we have nothing greater than the story of Don Schroeder’s Yanks and natives in the Roosevelt Ridge Jungle with Japanese killers hunting them. Best history of the men behind the guns is 167th Field Artillery’s Bill Morse’s story of rescuing E Company of 186 men on Palawan. Bob Allen has thoroughly studied all of 146th Field Artillery’s actions from the Parai Defile death-trap all the way through the assaults on Mt. Daho on Jolo. Extracting 162nd Infantry from destruction in Parai Defile was the master act of Ben Saunders’ 641st Tank Destroyer Battalion with their 12 rifled 4.2 mortars.

Medic George Jackson gives us heroic tales of front-line medics at Sanananda and on Biak. Engineers Bill Andel and Tony Rohlffs have honored their 116th Engineer Battalion in combat at Nassau Bay or at Toem—or in building the great road for 186th Infantry on Biak.

I can fill many pages to glorify battles of our 41st Infantry Division. Instead, I’ll list below some important groups of the histories that you will certainly like.

1. Amphibian Engineers’ hazardous landings: Nassau Bay, Hollandia, Wakde, Biak.

2. Especially the attacks of A, B, C, E, F, and G at Sanananda.

3. Breaching Roosevelt Ridge—Herman Steenstra’s and Gaetano Di Mayo’s story on G Company 162 and Chester Young’s on F Company 162.

4. B and C Company, 162nd Infantries jungle pursuit of Colonel Oba’s raiders.

5. Results of a divided command at Salamaua—reports by Colonel MacKechnie, Colonel Sweeny, and Captain Webber.

6. The whole Battle for Wakde Island.

7. Parai Defile on Biak—162nd Infantry, 116th Engineers, 146th Field Artillery, 641st Tank Destroyer.

8. 186th Infantry’s overland march on Biak with B Company, 116th Engineers.

9. 186th Infantry’s 2nd Battalion’s closing the Great Gap on Biak (with F and G Companies 186).

10. 41st Recon Troop—Biak and Zamboanga.

11. 163rd Infantry’s war on Ibdi Pocket (Biak).

12. General Fuller’s relief on Biak (See B-3, Numbers 12 and 13 on 186th Infantry).

13. Storming Mt. Capisan (Zamboanga) and Mt. Daho (Jolo).

14. BAR men in action: Jess Fallstick at Sanananda (F163), Floyd West at Salamaua and later (E 162), Charlie Solley at Zamboanga (I 186 at Anungan).

15. Our valorous and persistent Japanese opponents in the southern Philippines.

Papua, New Guinea. Janurary 1943 near Sanananda. Hauling ammunition through the muck. (Courtesy of Arthur W. Merrick)

Hq. Co. 3rd Bn., 163rd Inf. Anti-tank Platoon. Old U.S. Army tank recaptured. Standing, L to R: Vernard McCaulley, Ernest Brodie. Sitting, L to R: unidentified, Vince (KiKi) Granato. (Courtesy of Curtis M. Huck)

163 Infantry:

Counter-Sniping from Musket Perimeter

BY DR. HARGIS WESTERFIELD, DIVISION HISTORIAN

Core of this story is 41 Division Training Note No. 3: it disappeared from Fed Archives about 1957. Luckily, 641 TD’s Capt. Bennett Saunders had a copy for me. E 163’s Don Wood and F 163’s Jess Fallstick supplied human interest stories. I also used 163’s Sanananda Journal and History. Are any former Musket snipers now reading this who can tell me more stories?

When 163’s 1/Bn. replaced Aussies in Musket Perimeter 2 Jan. 1943, we faced the chilling threat of hidden snipers from green darkness in trees 100 feet overhead. Even in this jungle swamp, snipers could kill anonymously out of nowhere at 200 yards from the greenery. For a Jap rifleman in a tree, Musket Perimeter was open ground. Our 163 perimeter was covered by vines only as high as a man’s belt or his shoulders. And our oval perimeter was just 150 yards wide and 225 yards long. Only 20-30 yards north and east of us, Jap Perimeters Q and R were a ready supply of fresh snipers and more Jap ammo.

Thus, from a tree almost anywhere around our oval perimeter, a Jap sharpshooter could choose a Yank target who had to leave his water-soaked hole. The range could be all of 200-400 yards. The keen-eyed sniper could steady his precision killing-tool on a branch and tighten the butt to his shoulder. He could take a clear sight-picture and squeeze his trigger. All 1/Bn. might hear is a Jap 25-caliber cartridge crack, like a Fourth of July cap sparked on a stone. Then a Yank cowered in a hole might hear the prolonged dying groan of a man in the next squad. Or long after a deadly silence, he might find his buddy a pale corpse with a deceptively small hole in his forehead.

Naturally, Jap sniper fire plunged down regularly at chow time, once the stoves were set up and we had to leave the holes for food. Sniper fire crackled in on us at any unexpected time in 24 hours. And at dusk, ground terrorists would probe into spots that snipers’ binoculars had observed to be less protected. Lone men or small patrols would work around our flanks or rear, empty a clip or two rapid fire, then escape.

A group of B Co., 163, men pose for a picture, displaying an enemy flag found on the body of a KIA Japanese. One 41ster is holding a Japanese rifle. Sorry we can’t identify the men in the pictures. Can somebody help us out?

Beneath the eyes of these killers, life quickly became not worth living unless we could shoot them out of the trees. Grimly the Musket garrison – 1/Bn. Hq. Co. with A, B, and D Cos and AT’s 37mm cannon – developed a system of counter-sniping. Our basic tactics consisted of three main steps – and a fourth which AT 162 added with at least three 37’s.

First, we began to deal with the most immediate threat from Jap Perimeters Q–R which lurked in holes 20-30 yards before us. We set up two-man counter-sniper teams in slit trenches on the forward edge of Musket Perimeter. While one man quietly scanned the opaque jungle with field glasses – or the naked eye if he had no glasses – the other man cuddled his well-cleaned rifle and waited. When Jap shots rang out, the observer carefully spotted the green area where the shots came from. He pointed out the direction of fire, let the rifleman observe through his glasses. Then the rifleman fired – until the Jap was silent – or Jap fire retaliated close enough to make him lie prone. Thus we secured our forward area.

Second, we sent counter-sniping teams into trees on flank and rear of Musket Perimeter. To lessen the drudgery and danger of climbing among dead branches in jungle sweat, we set up home-made ladders. Usually we made them of telephone wire with stout wooden rungs.

Once the two-man tree teams were aloft, we got to work. We shot at all trees which seemed to harbor Nippo rifles. When Japs fired, we followed our standing order. All teams returned fire. If unsure of the actual target, we engaged probable Jap trees in the general direction of the popping fire. With our M-1’s and 1903 Enfield rifles, we shot at 200-400 yards. Many men preferred the 03 rifle; they believed it more accurate than the new-fangled Garand M-1.

The Aussie outfits that 163 had relieved – and the 32 Div. men before them – evidently had never sniped back from up in the trees. In fact, the Aussies had not briefed us on counter-sniping at all. We believe that they were far too decimated after making and holding Huggins Perimeter, which we had renamed Musket, to take positive action to fight snipers – or too malarious to care.

Third, we needed still another measure, because manning forward slit trenches and trees with two-man counter-sniping teams was not enough. As soon as we had posted sniper teams in trees, we could take the offensive. We could use those teams to guide attack patrols on the ground. We sent out small foot patrols of two-three men. Under direction from tree observers, our foot patrols shot down snipers or slashed other targets on flanks of Jap Perimeters Q and R.

And the ground patrols also set booby traps – grenades tied to two separate trees and connected by a trip cord attached to the loosened firing plns. These booby traps caused Jap casualties, and once definitely effected our capture of a Jap Bren gun. Evidently the Japs had dropped the Bren gun when they fled from a grenade blast.

When we counter-sniped in these three steps, we carefully secured ourselves from accidentally shooting our 163 men. We briefed all men on our methods. We located our own sniper trees so that nobody thought we were firing on him. Most important of all, we made it clear that nobody could fire on Jap snipers – except regularly designated counter-snipers.

Fourth, with the arrival of AT 163’s 37mm cannon (at least three) we took another step against these hidden Jap killers. When F Co. passed through Musket on 9 Jan., Jess Fallstick noted that the AT-163 gun crews were hard at work, loading grapeshot into the 37mm guns.

Japanese soldiers usually carried on their person, in addition to a good-luck flag, photographs of family, girl friends, even of themselves taken in more tranquil days, dressed in their best uniforms. Shown above are a few such pictures found on enemy bodies near the Musket Perimeter: an officer, probably a colonel: a soldier with an automatic weapon: a group of kimono-clad Japanese girls.

Methodically, AT’s carefully aimed 37’s were topping the jungle trees around Musket Perimeter. For without tree cover, no snipers could operate. In BAR-man Fallstick’s opinion, the number of trees made the task hopeless, but he admitted that he saw a tremendous number of mangled trees on the horizons.

Thus did 163 Inf’s 1/Bn. counter-snipe the Nip snipers who took sight pictures on us from above Musket Perimeter. We struck back four ways: with counter-teams in forward holes, with our own tree-snipers, with ground teams that prowled forward, and with AT’s 37’s.

But how deadly was Jap sniping? And how effective was 163’s counter-sniping?

Records of how deadly the Jap snipers were are meager but suggestive. Three days after 1/Bn. took over Musket, sniper activity was recorded. On 4 Jan., Lt. Fitzgerald evidently of A Co. – reported that a sniper on the west side of Musket had wounded a Yank. We could not locate that sniper, but 163’s history states that sniping was continuous on 4 Jan.

Sniping and countering were also in full swing Jan 5. On Jan. 6, a Jap sniper was reported to be over and inside Musket Perimeter. On 7 Jan., a recon patrol at 40 yards from Musket observed a pillbox at azimuth 347 with eight snipers to guard it.

And when E Co. took over B Co’s positions to release for an attack, sniping was heavy. At dawn of 8 Jan., long before B’s attack, E’s Don Wood heard Jap snipers firing with deadly accuracy. From our own trees, 163’s snipers fired back. Wood thought that it was like a July Fourth celebration.

Somewhere Wood had heard that the Jap sniper was a poor shot. But in that sector of Musket which E had taken over from B, the sniping was surely deadly. Already, here, a Jap sniper – or his buddies – had accounted for five men, although Wood did not say whether they were killed or wounded. He asserted that the plop! of the bullet was sickening as it struck nearby – or hit flesh. Yet it was too uncomfortable to lie in a hole and be shot at from overhead. Rather than endure the shooting passively, E men often left their holes and carried on necessary shores before that fight of 8 Jan. began.

This fight of 8 Jan. occurred when B Co. made an abortive strike at Jap Perimeter R. Before it began, about 1030, E’s Wood noted that the sniping had slowed up a bit, and that B would attack at 1130. When B attacked, E’s job was to stand up and fire cover at the brush and drive snipers down out of the trees. After B withdrew, E men looked around to find McDermeit dead from a shot in the stomach. We can be reasonably certain that a sniper killed him.

On the night after B and E fought, Jap sniping was reported as unabated. And when E left Musket with other 2/Bn. Co’s to set up Killerton Road Block, Wood said that they endured a morning of sniping. Under sniper harassement. E men forced themselves to move forward by rushes from cover to cover. Often they hid from bullets behind Jap or Yank bodies.

And next day back in Musket, on 10 Jan., snipers were again reported active. The fact is that not until 163’s offensive of 16 Jan. did our history report that the jungle was clear of the snipers who had killed or wounded us.

But how effective were 1/Bn’s four counter-sniping tactics? When, as already mentioned, the Yank was wounded on 4 Jan. on Musket’s west side, 163 got to work. By 1745 that very day, Lt. Fitzgerald announced that three Jap snipers were killed in that area. On 5 Jan., AT Pltn. got credit for killing five snipers; B Co. got credit for two dead – a total of seven. On 6 Jan., a Nippo sniper was killed at 0600. These 11 sniper dead were all that 163’s Journal reported.

And perhaps Don Wood saw Sniper No. 12 dead when E entered Musket to relieve B on 7 Jan. Passing along the trail, they saw their first rotting dead sniper, slumped over his position in a tree. The vines which had concealed him still held him aloft. Wood said that these vines would no doubt support him until he became a skeleton. Wood wrote that he had a spectral look seeing nothing but knowing all that we were to know.

We can get an idea of how effective ground-team sniping must have been from the tale of an unknown sergeant who became a fine Jap killer. Although he was not then in Musket but part of a squad in a standing patrol outside Musket near Voya on our supply-trail, his story is surely like one of the many we could tell about counter-sniping teams in the jungle outside Musket.

Almost as soon as this patrol was established, snipers fired on the men. The ingenuous sergeant devised successful tactics which depended on the density of the surrounding jungle. Prowling into thick undergrowth, he carried a Tommy gun with 100 rounds. He also carried a canteen on his ammo belt, a hunting knife, and a head net against mosquitos. Wearing dyed green fatigues, he stained his face and hands with black mud.

When a sniper fired on them, he took an azimuth towards the crack of the rifle, and moved under cover in that direction. When he had closed in on the sound, he lay still until he heard another shot and spotted the exact tree the sniper fired from. In almost all cases, the sergeant then waited until he saw the target Jap with the peaked cap and the long rifle. Then his heavy .45 bullets tore the Jap from the tree. A few times when the Jap was invisible, he slashed bursts into the foliage to kill him.

When scouting for snipers in more open area, the sergeant carried his M-1 for greater accuracy at long range. Although sometimes he took two-three other riflemen with him, he preferred to work alone. He moved from cover to cover towards the firing until he located the Jap target he longed for. This sergeant claimed a kill of five Jap snipers and perhaps deterred a larger number from harassing his squad.

Effectiveness of 163’s counter-sniping was great but not 100 per cent effective without another more drastic measure. Some time evidently after 11 Jan., to judge by 163’s Journal, the sniping lessened because of our four tactics. Sniping became limited to distant, inaccurate fire limited to meal times.

But despite these assertions of 163’s Training Note No. 3, sniper fire down on Musket Perimeter never did halt completely. Only on 16 Jan. did the storming of adjacent Jap covers bring the sniping to an end.

On 16 Jan., K Co. and L Co., with two plns. each, overran Perimeter R on which many snipers were based. And on that same day, L combed the Jap areas leftward of the Motor Truck Road all the way up to Fisk. Only on 16 Jan. 1943, toward the close of the Battle of Sanananda, did 163 finally clear those fearsome snipers from the jungle around Musket Perimeter.

FORTY MINUTES TO HELL AND SANANANDA

By DR. HARGIS WESTERFIELD, Division Historian

On 30 Dec 42, Aussie planes lifted A Co 163 Inf over the Owen Stanleys into Sanananda Battle – 40 minutes to Hell. Hiding from possible Zero attacks, we flew almost touching giant jungle palms. Dropping into green Hell below, we saw an opening wide as a postage stamp, bumped into Dobadura Strip. Jungle heat struck us; explosives blasted nearby. Dizzily, we heaved packs from planes. Natives reloaded our planes with pale Yank, Aussie wounded for Moresby hospitals.

In Guinea sweat, we hiked to bivouac on Soputa Trail. At midnight 31 Dec 42, Aussie cannon barraged the Nips to celebrate New Year’s. At 0300 1 Jan 43, we marched into holes guarding the Supply Trail to Huggins (Musket) Perimeter.

A’s first 10 days was a dark time, when we patrolled the rain-forest daily and huddled in muddy perimeters at dark. A’s main body new helped garrison Huggins, while 1/Pln outposted the Supply Trail a mile back. There Hasselbring killed A’s first Nip; Coult quickly killed A’s second. Back at Huggins, Huxhold aimed a shot into the jungle. A Nip toppled from a giant tree and fell at our feet. On 6 Jan a Jap MG 50 yards E of Huggins poured bullets on an A patrol for 30 minutes – but with no casualities. McNally was first wounded – a burst of TSMG fire in the legs. When 3/Pln reinforced C Co by Fisk Perimeter. Murphy was shot in the leg. A bullet caromed off Cpl Thomas’ skull but only nicked him.

On 10 Jan, A got in deeper. After AT’s Cpl Knight found the Japs’ Perimeter Q – E of Huggins – deserted, Gen Doe thrust in 1/Pln at once. We wondered why the Nips left. Q contained a .50 HMG, 2 40mm mortars, scores rifles with ammo, grenades. Here we found the first example of Nippo cannibalism.

On 11 Jan after K Co relieved us on the Supply Trail, all A joined 1/Pln in Q – except for 3/Pln at isolated little Moore’s Post. Jap tree snipers were bad; but our own countersnipers climbed trees and silenced them. Soon Japs fired only at night. From Perimeter Q, we now probed Jap Perimeter R, east of the road.

On 13 Jan, Lt McKinney’s 2/Pln attacked Perimeter R in A’s first assualt of the war. Aussie 25-pounders and our 81s did precision firing against the Nip lines a few yards ahead, while we took cover from possible shorts and a waited orders. After much HMG, LMG drumfire, we charged with assault fire and grenades. Their pillbox slots were low; we crouched and hurled grenades at them in the bowler’s position. But entrenched Nips were too strong. Hart died in the aid station 35 minutes after they hit him. Jones, Cheney, Sgt Beesley had arm or leg wounds.

Safe at dark in our wet holes with the stench of dead Nips, we knew that we must fight R Perimeter again. After more recon patrols 14 Jan, Lt Boid planned all-out attack 15 Jan.

So when 2/Pln probed ahead for A Co at 0730 15 Jan, the scouts knew the precise location of Jap fire-lanes. McKinney’s 2/Pln crossed the road N to Perimeter R, bypassed the fire-lanes, bored into R before the Japs saw us. Despite heavy fire, 2/Pln was so skillful that only Daly took a bad leg-wound.

Then Lt Houston’s 1/Pln lunged into R, shot into the labyrinth of interlocked bunkers, firing trenches – a snake-pit 100 by 150 yards. Surely poor Jap shooting saved us. Under heavy fire, Ziegele crept up to a .50 HMG in a bunker, struck dead 4 of 5 Nips with his M1. Killed in R were Curry, Chambers, Tatarski. But by dusk, we silenced the Nips, although they still lurked in R shadows. Then K Co relieved us and with L spent 36 hours to clean up Perimeter R. Many Nips must have escaped that night, for K found just 3 alive in the final kill.

Despite our 4 KIA, 7 WIA, dysentery, malaria, battle fatigue, Gen Doe needed A Co. Finally under our own 1/Bn CO, Col Lindstrom, we joined the great 163-Aussie push of 16 Jan. A Co was to attack Perimeter S on the Jap main line N of Fisk. Specifically, we were to make a diversionary frontal attack on S through open, sunstruck kunai grass, while E took S in the rear. This diversion cost A Co 9 KIA, 17 WIA, and 20 heat evacuations — 46 lost.

Before we cleared the assembly area, a short mortar round caused several KIA and WIA. But as D Co sprayed both flanks of our advance with HMGs, A moved out as skirmishers, through tall kunai under blazing sun. On our right, a strong point enfiladed us; rifles fired from tall trees. Weapons men rushed up LMGs and sprayed down snipers. Our skirmishers crept on steadily – too steadily.

The Jap gunners let us push within 20 yards of S Perimeter. Then MGs opened up; a cross fire from 1 HMG, 1 LMG trapped us. (Some observers counted at least 4 MGs.) Instead of area firing, Nips loosed bursts at roots of any grass that moved. A men dropped dead, or shouted for Medics. Under red-hot sun without a breath of air in that kunai flat, we lost 18 men and 2 officers evacuated from heat stroke. And our LMG belts were empty; sniper fire thickened again.

Col Lindstrom sent in a B Pln to lessen pressure; but without success. With BARs, M1s, we blasted our way out again. We killed 2 MG nests, felled many snipers, forced other Nips back to holes. As dusk confused their aim, we escaped. Besides 20 heat cases, 17 WIA, we had 9 dead – Bunker, Wells, Rowland, Hardin, Belchak, Henderson. Strobach, Johnson, Cpl May.

In the same attack, C and B had but light opposition – swept around the Jap right flank, made perimeter 200 yards behind them. Now from mopping up R Perimeter, K joined us, and we dug in with 1/Bn. Although K had come from the ships only on 11 Jan, it had drastic losses. A plus K now made up only 1 company in strength. At dark, we huddled into mud-holes with bully beef and hard tack for supper. At dawn, Nips grenaded and fusilladed our holes, wounded 1, killed Wojtech, Livermore. Our bullets tore those Nips apart.

After our bitter fight of 16 Jan, A was now on the Japs’ right flank. Orders came to attack with K on a given azimuth to determine extent of the perimeter we fought yesterday. Until we turned back, we had no resistance – then hit a strong point 250 yards behind Jap lines, and halted. On 18 Jan, A and K struck the perimeter we probed the day before – which some called Perimeter T. We hit it in the middle, advanced to the very edge before Japs halted us. We remained before these Japs overnight, fought again next day. On 19 Jan, we pushed with A’s own LMGs well forward and a HMG Pln guarding our right flank – until our advance masked our own automatic fire. Japs rallied to stop us – close to main Nippo Hq.

This fight climaxed 20 Jan. We pulled back 150 yards with K, and FA barraged 15 minutes to 1030. Then massed 81s and MGs impacted for 5 minutes; and we charged, caught most Japs in holes or trying to come out. We slew them in droves, and K Co had excellent shooting against Nips trying to eacape. Then A Co fanned out on the right, and lent fire power to B and C at work on S Perimeter. As Jap shooting lessened, B and C got in to storm the Japs. As the fight closed, 1/Bn counted 525 dead Japs. A had no casualties, found souveniers galore.

Thinking the battle finished, we still had to clear K’s area at dawn. K Co had with stood an attack of 70 Japs, and now needed relief. We killed a few.

Then on 25 Jan, Nips played a last sick joke on us. Relieved from those corpse-filthy perimeters and expecting so more combat, we entrucked under Lt Nugent to guard Ambogo Crossing. We chose bivouac at random in the heavy thickets, began unloading our 3 trucks. Then Arisaka rifle fire rattled at us from the base of an immense stump. We shot back. A Jap grenade thudded against a limb, bounced back, and exploded among Japs. We buried 5 deep under ground right where they died. From 15 Jan to 15 Mar, we picketed at Ambogo, then boarded trucks for small river boats that motored us to Oro Bay.

At Oro Bay, we had a New Guinea paradise – on mosquito-free heights 1800 feet up – a 270 degree view of blue mountains and green ocean. For safety from planes our tents were pitched on the side of a gorge. We framed and platformed our tents in bamboo. Lt Nugent left us for B Co; and after hospital rest, 2/Lt McKinney became CO – a position he had well earned. And we rested from battle and remembered our dead – 13 at Sanananda, and 4 Weapons men drowned in Australia at Torbul Point. There Cpl Leavitt had saved 2, but Kinsel. Tressman, Hernandez, and Cpl Arpell White had drowned. And we proudly remembered the great days when we struck Jap perimeters point-blank – and above all, those fights of 13 and 16 Jan 1943.

TWO ATTACK ROSTERS – A-163 Inf.

2/Pln, 13 Jan 1943

Lt McKinney; Pln Sgt Wolcott; Sgts Carpenter. Davenport, Brody, Beesley; Cpls Dorris, May, Daly, Murray; Pvts Jicha, Hart, Cheney, Miller, Jones, Behuncik, Reynolds, Olson, Hritz, Hudson, Huxhold, Casciato, J. Smith, McMannus. Stroud, Carlson McGrath, Mattice, Turek, Del Sasso, Wilson, Wanninger, Alirea, Urnaza, Fleming, Bunker, Medic Baker.

1/Pln, 15 Jan 1943

Lt. Houston; S/Sgt Henry; Sgts Ziegele, Burrison, Weyer; Cpls Walter, Wittlieb, Rutledge; Pvts Chambers, Curry, Pisapia. Veselka, Johnson, Heintz. Madej, Luedke, Aiking, Macy, Marquart, Haarala, Hasselbring, Lanigan. Hughes, Apida, Beckwith, Cordova, M. Gonzales, Archuleta, Martinez, Max, Tatarski, Bashor, Icenhower, Medic Smith. WEAPONS ATT’D: S/Sgt Harris; Cpl Roberts; Pvts Hoppe, Mack, Collier, Fellows, Taylor.

Prime source is unsigned MS merely called Headquarters Company ‘A’ 163d Infnatry/Office of the CO. Capt. Howard McKinney added more data during meetings some 5 years ago with other A Co vets at Poplar. Montana. Also useful were Dr. Samuel Milner’s VICTORY IN PAPUA, and Federal Archives reports, The Battlo of Sanananda, New Guinea Chapter/The Battle of Sanananda," 163’s Journal untitled, and George Welter’s Chicago Daily News stories. (I have lost the name of a man suggested as the author of this first, unsigned MS, so welcome the chance to make up for this omission.)

by Dr. Hargis Westerfield, Division Historian

with Sgt. James J. Eder

In the dark before dawn, at 0320 on 30 Dec 1943, B Co., 163 Inf. awoke at Port Moresby to enplane for the Sanananda battle. But deathly mists hid the Owen Stanley mountains that our Aussie planes had to dodge through. Zeroes would hover above us if we came out of the mists. It was three days before DC-3s landed B Co. in the jungle swamps to lose 23 KIA, 34 WIA before the battle ended.

By 3 Jan. B garrisoned Musket Perimeter on that lethal north side before Jap perimeters Q and R. After we dug in, Jap fire began. When we fired back, they wounded mortarman Knoepfle. They chattered just yards from our forward holes. Then they tried to hit our rear, but found we had no rear. After heavy casualties, they withdrew, then struck a final blow. During these attacks, B lost wounded (besides Knoepfle): Robjdek, Al Miller, Guider, Castillo. Capt. Hamilton was narrowly missed. All day Jap fire whizzed by B while Aussie Hanson Troop’s 25-pounders fired security, and we blasted with grenades and called down 81 fire.

Next day began the heroic phrase of B Co’s Battle of Sanananda. With only light supporting fire, heroes of memorable names led grim combat patrols or all-out attacks against almost impregnable Jap bunkers. With other 1/Bn men, B endured an experimental phase of fighting like that which decimated 32 Div. at Buna-Gona. Losses were heavy.

On 3 Jan. B tried an attack from Musket against Jap Perimeter R. One patrol hit a MG nest 40-50 yards north, but the attack failed. Even while supported by 81 mortar shells, a second patrol also failed before that same MG nest.

Sgt. Reddoor led one of these patrols. When the Jap MG fired, his patrol hit the ground, but Sioux Reddoor leaped behind a tree. Although wounded in hip and right foot, he threw two grenades into the nest to kill eight Japs. Then Chippewa Sgt. Belgarde charged across the open with his Tommy firing .45 slugs as fast as he fed in clips. He scooped up Reddoor and bore him to safety. Belgarde was wounded also. All day 4 Jan. rifle fire was continuous against B Co. in Musket Perimeter.

Next day, Hamilton planned to storm that pillbox which had wounded Sgts. Reddoor and Belgarde. After another 25-pounder barrage, 2/Pln. attacked in front while 1/Pln. came in to the left and behind the Japs.

Roy Ramsey thought that B’s timing was off—that 2/Pln. attacked too soon from in front. S/Sgt. Sullender was stricken, to die later.

The enveloping 1/Pln. patrol of two officers and 28 men encountered the crossfire of four cleverly hidden MGs. We destroyed one MG, but at a high price. In this attack of 1/Pln., Limbocker was the first man to die. Both McMeel and Potter tried to save Limbocker, but they saw Jap tracers pass too close to his body. Benske would have tried, but we talked him out of risking another death to save our man. Lt. Ellers and Cpl. Pinkenstein were also wounded. Connor’s grenade rebounded to kill both him and Koustrop. Mendoza was wounded and had to be left to die under the Jap guns that night.

Both Potter and McMeel were missing in action and already believed dead. Nobody ever found McMeel’s body. Later Chaplain Siqueland found a mess kit in the Jap Hq bunker—a mess kit that S/Sgt. Eder had given to him—with Eder’s name on it.

Specially tragic was the death of Sgt. Gaskell. Reportedly hit by a sniper, he threw himself on his own grenade to save the men in his squad. From this attack of 5 Jan., eight B men were dead or missing and three wounded.

It was probably shortly after this holocaust of 5 Jan. that S/Sgt. Eder led a four-man patrol including Cpl. Dolan, the company clerk, to reconnoiter the Jap perimeter. We first moved left to our front on Suicide Trail—the name B Co. gave to the crosstrail which 2/Bn. would use on 9 Jan. to cut off the Jap escape route on Killerton Trail.

At this outpost, Eder had a guide lead us through a booby-trapped area. Quietly, the guide took us through and quickly got away from us. Sliding through the swamp, we crept towards the center of the Jap perimeter. We easily passed between two MG posts to reach that Nippo center.

But the Japs evidently became suspicious and dispatched a patrol to kill anyone they could find. We froze to the ground, Eder and Dolan face to face. Eder was down behind a fallen tree parallel to the trail up which the Jap rifles were coming.

The Jap patrol leader halted on the other side of the log Eder was hiding behind. The Jap stood on the other side near Eder’s head and hurriedly scanned the jungle. From concealment, Eder feared to look long at the Jap; he dared not take the risk of drawing the enemy gaze. Eder smiled weakly at the scared Dolan and waited.

Perhaps the Jap was just as scared as Eder and Dolan, for he spoke to the patrol and took it out of there. After observing and memorizing awhile, we also got out of that sinister place.

In escaping past those MGs, one member of the patrol panicked and dashed through our own booby traps towards our outposts. After the shooting stopped, Eder found him repentant and had the kindness never to report the man’s headlong flight to Hamilton.

On 7 Jan. attrition of B continued. Hamilton lost the soldier whom he considered his best enlisted man, S/Sgt. Lockman. Hamilton thought that the same sniper who had shot Gaskell had also killed Lockman. Ramsey saw the bullet strike laterally across Lockman’s back. Gorischek also was killed 7 Jan. For 8 Jan. Col. Doe had decided on 163’s largest operation of the war—up to this point. Aussie Gen. Vasey gave him permission to strike Jap perimeters Q and R which were dug between B at Musket and C north of us at Kano Perimeter. (Vasey gave permission, but he wisely sent his Col. Pollard to hold Doe back from committing 2/Bn., which was to block Killerton Trail next morning.)

While C struck Q Perimeter, B was assigned to storm R,—the larger perimeter on the west side of Sanananda Road. Each B man took two grenades and two days’ rations for the push. Although Doe certainly expected success, B’s CO. Hamilton doubted whether he would get through 8 Jan. 1943 alive.

About 1145, Aussie Hanson’s FA Troop opened up with 25-pounders. All available mortars and MGs fired preparation. But Hanson Troop was out of impact fuzes to explode on contact with the earth. These Aussie guns fired only delayed action fuzes which exploded harmlessly in muck, if they exploded at all. A waist-deep swamp and heavy fire stopped C Co. dead, and C lost Lt. Fisk, among the 10 wounded and 10 missing that Hamilton recorded in his diary.

And, like C, we B men had an impossible mission. Best direction of attack was from west to east against perimeter R, but Hanson Troop was on the east—out of position to cover B’s push.

We had to make a suicidal frontal attack from the south. We ran into fire from the perimeter we fought, and on the flank from Q which C was attacking. To Weapons Pln’s S/Sgt. Eder, it seemed that the waiting Japs let his men get just 5-10 feet out of their holes before the drum-fires cracked down.

From long bunkers and coconut-tree pillboxes, the Japs shot —with automatic weapons firing on line 10 feet apart. We recoiled shooting back blindly, with what dead and wounded we could get out. Waist-deep in water, we had our new positions. We were happy that raw E Co. garrisoned those lines for the night. Hot food and some sleep helped our morale, but our losses were again severe.

We never could recover Berg’s body. Dead also were Russell, Foltz, Irmen, Carroll, Horan, Sgt. Genther. Wounded were McFarland, Rubens, Cawiezell, Haller, Del Costello, Nore, Kjemhus, Laabs, Tyree Martin, Cpl. Petrovitch.

On 9 Jan. E Co. left our lines to join 2/Bn. in the push to Killerton Trail, and we had to return to our swamp before R Perimeter. Soaked in rain and mud, we learned to sleep with FA firing overhead and grenades blasting nearby. Busha was wounded 9 Jan. On 10 Jan. Hamilton hoped for no casualties, but Hanrahan and Thornton were wounded in the same hole. (An unnamed medic was also killed.) On 11 Jan. Fiseus was killed about 1900 hrs.

Indispensable was Capt. (now Col.) Robert M. Hamilton’s rain-blurred diary with casualties’ names and dates. Also indispensable was Sgt. James J. Eder’s 7-page, single-spaced typescript, B Co. and J, with his ltr. 13 Feb 1973. Roy Ramsey gave me data at Gearhart Reunion of 1971; so did George Weller’s 1943 Chicago Tribune articles and Dr. Samuel Milner’s Victory in Papua.

Then came two days’ relief from the lines—back in Musket Perimeter. And no rain fell. B Co. lay barefoot on the ground and began to dry out. Diarrhea and malaria were now prevalent.

And about 16 Jan. Eder got orders for a difficult one-man contact patrol. He had to move north through Jap country and find 18 Aussie Brigade, now moving south from the sea in 163’s direction. With his youthful bringing up as an Umpqua Sioux, dark-skinned Eder was in many ways the best possible choice for this difficult mission. During field training exercises, he had made other B men shiver when he would come up out of nowhere among them. In this jungle fighting, he was already notable for his silent, deadly stalking of Jap patrols.

He now alerted B men facing that seaward side of our field-of-fire to be careful not to shoot until sure their target was a Jap and not Eder. He faded into the opaque jungle greenery. Then he crawled patiently northward through muck and water—how long, he never could remember.

But suddenly, he heard Jap voices behind him; he knew that he was past the Nippo lines without having known when he passed them. Eder now felt panic; somewhere in the opaque jungle before him were Aussie outguards—bitter blond veterans of deadly Jap battles—men who might shoot instinctively at a black face. For tropic-tanned Eder was shades darker than any Jap; other Yanks had shot at him for a Jap more than once. (He was in fact, a hundred per cent American combination of American Negro, Sioux, and German.)

He knew that he could not long remain in one place. He began crawling again; he prayed.

Suddenly he was staring into the muzzle of an Aussie Owen gun. Why that Aussie never squeezed the trigger is a mystery to this day. After Eder had identified himself, the Aussie Owen gunner could give no reason why he had not shot Eder to pieces.

The Aussies fought their way south to 163, but their CO kept Eder close beside him all the time. Eder shook too much to be of use in combat now.

And so went B Co., 163 Inf’s first, or heroic, phase of the Battle of Sanananda. In this heroic phase, too many were killed or wounded in our own perimeters, or in poorly supported attacks—especially those attacks of 4 and 8 Jan. Our sacrifices were heroic yet wasteful, but perhaps 163 needed them to acquaint a raw regiment with its need to adapt to battlefield reality. And perhaps 163 needed these sacrifices to undermine Jap morale, which was still high when we took over Musket and Kano (Fisk) Perimeters.

By about 16 Jan. B entered into our second phase of the Battle of Sanananda. Operating with other companies, we seasoned and bloodied veterans would wipe out Jap perimeters S,T,U—those surviving perimeters astride the great road-bend north of Kano (Fisk) Perimeter. In the previous heroic phase, our losses had been 17 killed out of a total of 23 in the entire battle, and our wounded 23 out of 30 in the entire battle. In the second and last phase, B’s losses would be comparatively few, our fighting superb.

Standing Patrol at Sanananda

By Dr. HARGIS WESTERFIELD, Division Historian, with S/Sgt. MORTON E. RUBENS

On 3 Jan. 1943, S/Sgt. Mort Rubens was point man when B Co. 163 Inf. tensely hunted through mud and brush to relieve the shattered Australian garrison of Huggins (Musket) Perimeter. B slipped up the Sanananda supply trail in battle formation. We had heard that 300 Japs had cracked Aussie lines. News of this strike by 300 Japs was more than rumor, to judge by the slow trek of B up that trail. We were rightly alerted for trouble.

But B had no Jap trouble—only the disheartening sight of pale, drawn-faced, slouch-hatted Diggers shambling down the left side of the trail almost close enough to touch. These Aussies of 2/7 Cavalry Regt. had fought to hold Huggins since 16 Dec. 1942. (The CO for whom the perimeter was named, Capt. Meredith M. Huggins was seriously wounded earlier, 5 Dec. 1943.) The departing Aussies were sick, wounded, despairing. Their uniforms were rotten. Rubens thought that they could not hold out another day. Right then, Rubens decided that B 163 did not have much of a chance to return alive from that swamp.

So we soaked down into Huggins (renamed Musket) Perimeter. We dug L-shaped holes with two men to a hole. The hole was shaped like an L so that if a Jap grenade dropped in, a man could heave himself to safety around the bend in the L.

Once in perimeter, B was always under fire—snipers and MG’s daily, grenades at night. In full daylight, we kept heads down. Their snipers were good; they smashed a helmet any time you lifted one on a stick to test their aim. We left our holes only when light was bad—early morn and dusk—and then in fear.

In an L-shaped hole, we stayed down all day and watched all night, seemingly without sleep, in two-man shifts. Nights in that jungle opening were indeed black. There was danger that a grenade thrown from a hole would hit a tree and rebound into the hole of the thrower. Rubens cannily placed pieces of wood on the rim of the hole so that he could touch them in the dark and guide his grenades into a forest opening where they would menace the Jap raider and not himself.

Sgt. Rubens and his 1/Pln. men spent far too many grenades as far as custodians of supplies were concerned. Early one morning after a bad night of Jap alarms, 1/Pln. was low on grenades. Back at the ammo dump centering on Musket Perimeter, Maj. Hawks said, You guys out there use up too many grenades at night. Rubens naturally replied, Major, come out with me tonight. You’ll see how many you use.

Hawks had no answer. Boiling with anger, Rubens slung his Tommy gun on his shoulder, gripped two boxes by their handles and strode back toward 1/Pln. (Rubens was 6 feet, 3 inches tall, and then weighed some 215 pounds.)

As he walked, Rubens grew angrier. Suddenly it dawned on him that Musket Perimeter was far too quiet. Something was wrong.

He had trudged out past B’s holes which he hadn’t seen in his blind anger and was close to where Japs would be lurking. Rubens turned tail, and still carrying grenades and gun, he dashed back in panic and threw himself into a hole.

Then the Nips opened fire. Maybe they were as surprised as Rubens himself at his casual stroll towards them. Or maybe they were going to let him walk into them and then kill him.

That same day, he decided to enlarge his cramped L hole. He would also dig a new seep for drinking water, one different from the hole that they had used for some days.

In that soft earth, Rubens dug about 12 inches; then he hit a shoe—a Jap shoe with a foot in it! He covered the foot hurriedly, then dug in another direction. After that, when he filled his canteen, he began sterilizing his water with two drops of iodine instead of one. Using a second drop made him feel a little better.

And now he got his first important mission for 163 at Sanananda. He was to set up a hazardous standing patrol on what Sgt. Jimmie Eder of Weapons Pln. called Suicide Trail. (Suicide Trail was that strategic route which 32 Div. Infantry and Aussies had used to seize and hold Huggins Perimeter from the Japs. It ran west from Musket-Huggins to Killerton Trail. Maj. Rankin’s 2/Bn. would need that trail in their great advance of 9 Jan., when they closed the Japs’ escape route.)

A standing patrol was a flexible trail block, a defense in depth to retain the use of a trail or road. Taking 13 men, including two BAR teams, Rubens dug in on both sides of Suicide Trail. He placed the BAR’S to cover it all the way to the bend in the trail. Besides guards out front, he also kept an alert man at his rear to prevent being surprised and cut off. And he mined the trail ahead and personally attached trip wires to grenades, preferably the Nippo thin green wire that was hard to see.

On this standing patrol, it was a grim touch-and-go—maybe four-five days, hard for a man to remember just how many days when the time passed in danger. We were on our own with our own supplies and only the phone to connect us with 1/Bn. And daily and nightly, Jap patrols tried to find our position to kill us.

Daily we set up forward defenses on the trail, and sometimes exchanged grenades and gunfire. At dusk, we pulled back some 50 feet and let booby traps deal with Jap night-fighters.

CREDIT: When Mort Rubens read S/Sgt. James J. Eder’s mention of being guided by Rubens on Suicide Trail, he wrote to me to identify himself and begin his story. Core of this story are these Rubens’ undated ltr. about May 1974, dated ltrs. 14 May and 29 May 1974, undated note about June 1974. Some aid came also from Dudley McCarthy’s South-West Pacific Area First Year, and 163’s Extract from History (1 Jan-8 Jan. 1943). Mort Rubens has a small restaurant in the Farmers Market at 3rd and Fairfax Sts. in Los Angeles.

It was through our hidden booby traps that S/Sgt. Rubens guided S/Sgt. Eder about 5 Jan. when Eder made a daring four-man patrol with company clerk Bill Dolan into Nippo territory. On 7 Jan., another B patrol through Rubens’ position came upon Nips cutting poles 70 yards northwards. The Nips fired on the patrol, and the patrol withdrew.

Early one morning, Japs pushed on Rubens’ patrol from two directions: from our right flank and from our front over the Suicide Trail we guarded. On the right, our trip wires blew up grenades and halted them. But they came on in front. They were trying to flush us out, for they could not find our exact location. We held fire to draw them on. They lost two on the trip wires; still they came on.

The strain was too great for one of Rubens’ men; he started to get up and run. If the Japs saw him, all of our lives would have been in danger. Rubens jammed his Tommy against the man’s back and gritted, Try to run, and I’ll shoot both your legs off. Rubens pushed the frightened man down, but kept him in sight thereafter.

Now our BAR’s opened up on the Japs and dropped some of them. They pulled back and tried again, and we felled a few more. This was the last time the Japs probed our standing patrol in force.

Thus for four-five days, Rubens with 13 men held Suicide Trail and carried out orders not to let the Japs use that trail. In all that time, we were never aware that our keeping that trail clear was of paramount importance for 2/Bn’s great march to cut the Japs’ escape route to the sea.

Only contact with 1/Bn. was still by phone. With that phone to his ear on 7 Jan., Rubens got a shock. While hearing B’s 1/Sgt. Edeline report B Co’s losses to Hq., he heard an echo repeat the top kick’s name five times.

At once, he told Edeline that a wire was being tapped, somewhere between Rubens’ patrol and the main perimeter. Edeline instantly ordered Rubens to pull back to B with all hands, and to keep ready to shoot. Japs might be hurrying down the wire to blast us.

Thus Rubens pulled out his standing patrol but he was lucky to return. At the last minute, new trouble developed.

No Japs followed him, but he came from the jungle unexpectedly upon newly arrived E Co.—men who had not yet fought. E was casually sitting out in the open with their arms disassembled. They were cleaning equipment at the front.

Rubens found an officer and warned him that Japs could be within 25 yeards. E Co. got out of sight fast.

E was lucky then; so was Rubens. For if E’s men had been more experienced, they would have opened fire on Rubens’ patrol the instant Rubens came out of the jungle.

Rubens had begun that standing patrol with 13 men and he returned to B Co. with all 13 men.

And now Rubens got his second and last important mission for 163 at Sanananda. When B with C made the great assault of 8 Jan. on the two Jap perimeters north of Fisk, we heard that some 80 Japs were before us. We were going to clear them out completely. In this action, Rubens was suddenly called from 1/Pln. to lead 2/Pln’s push.

With 35-37 men, Rubens’ 2/Pln. headed north to fight the Japs. Soon a Jap MG opened up, and B ran low. When the MG lowered its fire, 2/Pln. crawled. It became rough going; in thick jungle under fire, a man couldn’t raise his head to see where he was.

Suddenly Rubens’ line of men stopped moving, although we had hardly advanced 200-250 yeards from Musket Perimeter. Rubens crawled up to try to spring a few individuals’ advances. Every man he contacted was dead or wounded. The Japs had shot them all from above.

Moving over to the right, Rubens tried to find out where that deadly fire came from. He spotted snipers above and before the pillbox that was firing the MG on us.

He raised up his Tommy gun with a 50-shot drum which he had taken from a Jap corpse. His heavy slugs killed a sniper in a tree to his left.

But in firing, Rubens took a shot in the right temple. He rolled over, squeezed trigger, and killed the man who had wounded him.

Then all the rifle fire on earth seemed to strike Rubens at once. Bullets tore the Tommy from his grip, wounded him twice in the right hand. With his unwounded left hand, he threw a grenade at that pillbox; its defenders hurled a lot back.

Rubens then kept passing out. He tied the gun sling around his arm to stop the bleeding and dragged his half-dead body back to perimeter. How long it took him to return alive, he never knew.

Thus went Rubens’ war against Jap Perimeter R, with inadequate FA preparation, and without the techniques of carefully timed preparatory fire that 163 would use later at Sanananda. Since he had been reassigned to 2/Pln. just before the attack, he hardly got to know the names of the B men killed or wounded. Perhaps the killed were Irmen and Carroll. Perhaps the wounded were McFarland, Cawiezell, Haller, Del Costello, Nore, Kjemhus, and Laabs.

Despite the wound in his temple and two more in the right hand, S/Sgt. Rubens at first seemed to have recovered. He continued soldiering. After some five months in the hospital, he became an intelligence NCO at Base Section 7. From Base Section 7, he was selected for OCS and appointed in Jan. 1944. In recommending him, the CO of Base Section 7, Brig. Gen. Thomas E. Rilea, wrote, I would be glad to have him serve under my command in the grade of Second Lieutenant.

But Rubens’ old wounds and privations of Sanananda came back on him. He had to return to Base 7 for limited service, then enter hospital and return to the States. Finally came his medical discharge. He had two disc operations. He now has 30 per cent disability pension from the VA: 10 per cent for the bullet wounds, 10 per cent for malaria and 10 per cent for his back. And he can get no indemnity for his liver after its injury from medication against the tropical hookworm disease, no doubt complicated by drinking from a polluted seep in Musket Perimeter.

Such was the saga of S/Sgt. Rubens in his Sanananda Campaign—a dexterously led standing patrol on Suicide Trail and a brave day of battle against Perimeter R.

B Co. 163 Infantry:

Sanananda: The Victory Phase

by DR. HARGIS WESTERFIELD, Division Historian

WITH COL. ROBERT M. HAMILTON

AND SGT. JAMES J. EDER

Indispensable was Sgt. James J. Eder’s 7-page, single-spaced typescript, B Co. and I, with his Ltr, 13 Feb. 1973. Also indispensable was Capt. (Now Col.) Robert W. Hamilton’s rain-blurred diary with casualties’ names and dates. Basic narrative is also probably by Hamilton–An Unsupported Attack from 41 Div. Training Notes, No. 2, Part IV." I also used Dr. Samuel Milner’s Victory in Papua, George Weller’s 1943 Chicago Tribune articles, 163 Inf’s The Battle of Sanananda, and extracts from 163’s History.

On 16 Jan. 1943, B Co. 163 Inf. began the victory phase of Sanananda–as opposed to our earlier, heroic phase, of 3-12 Jan. In our heroic phase, B Co. had almost single-handedly bucked the Japs’ R Perimeter north of Musket. We had lost heavily–17 dead, 23 wounded. Weapons and FA support had been ineffective. But in our final, victory phase B would coordinate action with other 163 outfits and heavy support fire for ultimate victory.