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left: "Up Mezado Ridge"
center: "Smooth, grassy place, no? All coral!"
right: "Southernmost tip of Mezado"

left: "That ridge in back was Mezado - My BTN had 57% casualties there."
center: "Prisoner and US Marines"
right: "Japanese prisoners"



left: "Jappas"
center: "An arrogant young man"
right: "Thousands of Prisoners!"
Object: Southern tip of the island
Mezado, Kuwanga and Kiyamu

"The final phase started on June 17. There were three barriers, three coral ridges, filled with caves and holes ideal for Jap last ditch stands.

The 1st Battalion of the Twenty-second Marines was peppered with shot at the base of the Mezado. But they took it by morning.

On June 18, the Regiment's 2nd Battalion got Kuwanga Ridge. There the new regimental commander, Harold C. Roberts was killed while trying to get aid for a trapped company. In another day, the Fourth Marines had Kiyamu.

More and more prisoners thronged the Division stockades. Some 250 of them. A few minutes later, 350 stepped out of adjoining caves."
Uncommon Valor





left: "Raise the flag"
center: "They tried hard, as you can see, to make it another Suribachi thing"
right: "The inevitable flag raising - The boys pose"
Okinawa declared secured

June 21 - "And the Sixth Marine Division as it planted the flag on Kiyamu Ridge, could look back to eighty-two days of stellar accomplishment." Uncommon Valor





left: "Always - for 82 days - long lines of tattered civilians"
center: "Study those faces - the Marines too!"
right: "Okinawans"
left: "Corpsman bandaging the wounded"
center: "The ever present Okies"
right: "Carrying the wounded"
left: "The inevitable photograph"
center: "An old woman - she didn't want to come out of the cave"
right: "Another Corpsman tending to the injured"





In 82 days in Okinawa,
...the Sixth Marine Division had:

(1) Captured part of Naha, once a city of 60,000, the largest city occupied by the Marines in the war


(2) Captured Naha Airfield on Oroku, a prize of the Ryukus, and an important ferrying stop for the Japs for Japs flying south


(3) Captured Yontan Airfield, the second major airbase on Okinawa; the midget submarine base and vast stores of equipment and supplies


(4) Seized more than two-thirds the physical land area of Okinawa


("In 82 days on Okinawa, the 6th Marine Division suffered 8226 casualities. Over 1700 of these lie in a hillside cemetery facing the East China Sea.") Uncommon Valor
"On the day the war ended, the Sixth Marine Division was at Guam, in the midst of a new training program, designed to equip it psychologically and physically for the planned assault on Japan itself." Uncommon Valor
"Marianas, Guam ~ Conference of Public Information personnel at CPAC July 27, 1945"
Back row: De Chant, Biggerstaff, Tuckman, James, Knowles, Thurston, Engel, Terrell, Dedker, O'Donnell, Parsons, Stowe, Deutsch, Purcell, Edwards, Fink, McVarish, Chaptel, V. Johnson, Price and E. Johnson. Fourth row: Littin, Moriarity, Myers-Summers, Myers, Dashiell, Foreman and Fanning Third Row: D. Johnson, Theeringer, Dube, Hamilton, Holton, Roberts, Petit, Chapman, Meagher, Breard and Childress. Second row: Prendergast; Liapes, McCready, Hoolihan, Evans, Clark, Weir, Doyle, Callahan, and Sandberg. First Row: Zschau, Lund, Stanley, Young, Ross, Kogan, Boian, Land and Hagenah.






left: Tsingtao, China - October 25

center: "With the American troops in formation at the Tsingtao race course, Major General Nagano surrendered"
right: "In the stands were the Chinese, Russians, Germans - many of them refugees from the Nazis"


left: "Unconditional surrender to Generalissimo Chang Kai-Shek General Lee Shepherd of the 6th Marines was named the duly-authorized representative of Chang."
Final Assignment:
Oct. 25 - Tsingtao, China

Formal surrender of Japan's 5th Brigade

"The rest of the Sixth Marine Division sailed on October 1 for duty in Tsingtao in North China's Shantung Province

The task of the Division was signalized by the formal surrender of the Japanese Fifth Mixed Brigades. With the troops of the Twenty-second Marines, the Twenty-ninth Marines, the Sixth Tank Battalion, the Sixth Marines (Engineers), the Division Headquarters Battalion and other troops in formation at the Tsingtao race course, Major General Eiji Negano, the brigade commander, surrendered.

Silent and wordless, the would-be conquerers of the world left the surrender platform and entered automobiles awaiting them. The Americans in the stands watched them grimly. The Chinese couldn't restrain themselves and broke into cheers. There were hoots of derision when one car wouldn't start. Finally, with the aid of a push, it rumbled down the track trailing a cloud of exhaust. And such was the exodus of the Japanese Army at Tsingtao." Uncommon Valor


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"By April 1, 1946, one year after the Striking Six had come to Okinawa, it ceased to exist. In spirit it would live forever in the memories of the thousands who had fought in the tangled brush of Mobotu, on bleak, deadly Sugar Loaf, in the rubble of Naha, on the coral of Oroku, and places called Mezado, Tomigusaku, Kiyamu, Kuwanga..." Uncommon Valor

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Writing for the 1946 Marine Corps Infantry Journal, Uncommon Valor, Herman Kogan referred by name to the following Marines of the 6th Division who served in Okinawa:
PFC Dan (Amph-trac) Albin, Albany, LA
PFC Ernest D. Andrews, San Jose, CA
Lt. Dale Bair, Pocatello, ID
Cpl. Maynard Baird, Knoxville, TN
Col. Victor F. Bleasdale
PFC Mark H. Bigler, Los Angeles, CA
Pvt. George Campbell, Philadelphia, PA
Capt. Philip Carleton
Lt. Willam Carlson Cohoes, NY
Gen'l William T. Clement
Capt. Clifton B. Casement, Glen Cove, NY
PFC Guido Confi, Freeport, PA
Maj. Earl Cook, Parker, KS
Maj. Henry A. Courtney, Jr.
Lt. Col. Robert L. Denig Jr.
PFC Joseph Dubiel, West Orange, NJ
Pvt. Donald Duncan, Flat Rock, NC
Lt. Rodney E. Gaumnitz
Cpl. Donald "Rusty" Golar
Cpl. Vic Goslin, Ashland, ME
Lt. Leo J. Gottsponer, Morrilton, AR
PFC Ray Huestis, Chicago,IL
2nd Lt. Roy (Alley Oop) Hunt, Greenville, SC
2nd Lt. Bob Johnson, Batavia, NY
2nd Lt. Ben Hinson Jones, Milwaukie, OR
Pvt. Don Kelly, Chicago,IL
Platoon Sgt. John Kimlin, Pougheepsie, NY
Pvt. Harry (The Beast) Kizirian, Providence, RI
 		Col. Victor H. Krulak
Combat Correspondant Elvis Lane
Navy HC Fred Lester, Downers Grove, IL
Capt. Warren F. Lloyd, C Company
Lt. Garr Loftis, Durham, NC
Col. Robert B. Lucky
Capt. Howard L. Mabie
Pvt. Bob McGraw, Birmingham, AL
Col. John C. McQueen
Combat Correspondant Ed Meagher
Pvt. Alford Mitchell, Nashua, NH
Maj. Tom Myers, Buies Creek, NC
PFC Rufus E. Randall, Augusta, GA
Father Paul Redmond, III Amphibious Corps Chaplain
Col. Harold C. Roberts
Col. Merlin F. Schneider
Cpl. Frank Schumann, Easton, PA
Cpl. Fred Schwantes
Col. Alan Shapely, South Detroit, MI
Gen'l Lemuel C. Shepherd Jr.
Lt. Alan Shilin
PFC Cleo Slider, Vienna, VA
Lt. George Thompson, Dorchester, MA
Lt. Jack Vaughan, East Albion, MI
Staff Sgt. George Voigt, Combat Correspondent
Col. Thomas E. Williams
Lt. Jim Winters, Oklahoma City, OK
Col. Horatio C. Woodhouse, Jr.