Letter From Bob, October 1943

Dearest Rosie:
You're no doubt pretty mad at me for not having written in so long, but for once I've got an excuse. Seems I came down with a small case of malaria. Nothing to worry about, and the doc says I'll be good as new, but it was rough for a while I have to say.

I've got no one to blame but myself. We're all supposed to take malaria pills regularly as New Guinea is so thick with mosquitoes that no amount of netting and ditch-draining will ever get rid of them. We're advised to keep our sleeves rolled down and our long pants on, but the sap who came up with that rule never spent months where the temperature and humidity never move off the 100 mark, to say nothing of chasing Japs around for hours every day in an unventilated P-38.




You've probably read about our recent successes at Salamaua and Lae. After heroic effort the Aussies have driven the Japs out of their big bases there. Lae, of course is where Amelia Earhart departed on the last leg of her round-the-world flight five years ago. My buddies and I flew air support for these operations, thought the boys from Down Under had the toughest job.

Well, I got so caught up in the action that I forgot a dose of malaria pills, despite the warning signs the doc put up:




Sure enough, a few days later I woke up feeling like I'd been simultaneously hit by a jeep, tossed into Puget Sound in February and roasted like an ant under a magnifying glass. I don't remember much after that except dreams about as bizarre as the image I just described. I was laid up for a couple of weeks, but thankfully the docs pulled me through. They gave me a talking-to about the pills that I won't soon forget, but after what I've been through I'm about as likely to forget a dose as the Japs are to surrender tomorrow.




So here I am, back in fighting trim, but with one remaining problem: Your birthday. You've patiently accepted my feeble efforts for the last two years, but alas there's even less to buy in a hospital tent than there is in a New Guinea village. But fate's a mysterious thing. While I was lying on my cot the CO came by and told me I'm eligible for a furlough! Won't be until early next year, but if you don't mind my banged-up carcass for a belated birthday present I'll be all yours!

They tell me I was calling out your name while I was delirious with malaria. I don't remember it, but I have no doubt it's true. When everything sane seems to be slipping away I know that you are the one thing I have left to hold on to. Now I'll just be counting the days until I can hold on to you in person!

Your loving husband

Bob.

Letter to Bob, August 1943

Dearest Bob.

The letter-writing guides they give us are full of helpful hints: Keep it light!" "Talk about family!" "Tell them about doings around town."

But I'm sure none of these things are what you really want to hear, and if I wrote them you'd be reading the pamphlet, not a real letter from me.

I thought and thought about what to write. Finally, I decided to imagine it's a usual Sunday, since that's my day off from the factory and the only one to which a few tattered shreds of life before the war still cling. I'm sure that if you could be magically plucked away from New Guinea and parachuted back to Tillicum Drive for 24 hours, it would be on that day.

I picture us having coffee together, snitching sections of the newspaper from each other as we always do. In my dream there's no war, no "communiques" or dispatches." No maps with snarled arrows circling each other around unpronounceable place names. No black wreaths enfolding lists of dead Seattle boys.

Since it's a warm August day, we'd walk to the beach to watch the white sails blossom on the sea. The destroyers belching black oily smoke have vanished, and the ferries hurrying across the water are filled with picnickers instead of tired, grubby factory girls.

We'd walk along the waterfront and stop at the soda fountain. You'd point out how the shadows are stretching further across the streets now that summer's ending, then laugh and tell me I had a spot of ice cream on my nose.

We'd stroll back to the house. Instead of cartoon Japs on every telephone pole reminding us to buy war bonds and save scrap and not talk, there'd be announcements for garage sales and babysitters.

I'd fix you dinner. A big juicy steak, with buttered potatoes. Stormy would meow and wind her way around the table legs. You'd feed her bits when you thought I wasn't looking.

Then night would come and there'd be no more talk.


It doesn't take much to shatter this reverie: A glance at the paper, a turn of the radio dial, a walk down the street past all the bungalows with star flags in their windows. But my heart is strong, and the dreams are safe inside it until you come home and make them real again.

All my love,


Rosie

Letter from Bob, July 1943

Dearest Rosie:

They've moved us away from the "big city" of Port Moresby to a small spot on the other side of New Guinea. I'm not supposed to tell you where it is, but even if I did it wouldn't matter. No one but the natives has ever heard of any of the places in this part of the world.

We're spending most of our time chasing Zeros up and down the coast, scrambling to intercept the Japs when they come buzzing over the horizon from their big base in Rabaul. Old Man MacArthur's undoubtedly got some grand plan up his sleeve, but whatever it is it's not obvious to us jungle pilots.

As usual it's a test of our speed and firepower versus their maneuverability, like hawks plunging down on sparrows. Except these "sparrows" are buck-toothed bastards who'll machine-gun a parachuting pilot without batting an eye.

I used to think I was above saying things like that. I told myself I'm not one of those-blood-and-guts fellows. But watching your friends die changes a man forever. I worry sometimes, Rosie, that you won't recognize me when I come home. When I was studying architecture all I dreamed of and cared about was the earth: Houses and streets and trees and the little bungalow I'd build for us when we were married. I never thought about the sky except to admire a sunset. Now I spend all my time there and it's a beautiful but hateful place. It's full of stars and steel, raindrops and drops of blood. I just want to be done with it.


I'm sorry if I seem down. Haven't been feeling like my old self recently, and a little unwell the last couple of days. Nothing to worry about, just the usual sort of thing that happens when the cook decides to get "creative" with Spam and coconuts.

Going to lie down for a bit after I mail this, then back at the Japs. "Rosie" has at least one 50-caliber shell with a Nip's name on it.

As always I miss you more than I have words to tell. I picture you and Stormy (forever as a kitten though of course she's grown into a big cat now!) and our house, even when I'm skimming above the tops of the palm trees and over the icy Owen Stanley Mountains. I promise that when I return I'll never leave you again for anything.



Your loving husband,


Bob

Letter From Bob, June 1943

Dearest Rosie:

I wish I had some sort of dramatic battle or heroic accomplishment to describe to you, but lately it's just been one long, dreary slog between us and the Japs here on New Guinea. I'm beginning to wonder if we'll ever retake this misbegotten island.

So I decided that for once I write about something light, since there's little enough of that to go around.

You've likely seen pictures of the nudie cartoons they're painting on planes these days. Some are pretty amusing, and the fellows in our squadron have been pestering me to get one and give my trusty P-38 a name. Our ace pilot Richard Bong has named his Lightning "Marge" after his sweetheart back home. He hasn't let anyone paint any cartoons of her, not that there's room on his plane's nose anyway what with all the kills he's racking up:






Well, I'm no slouch, but I'm no Richard Bong either, so there's a little room left on my Lightning's nose. When that copy of the Saturday Evening Post with Rosie the Riveter on the cover finally made its way to New Guinea, after all the teasing died down our resident Rembrant (who drew comic books before the war) offered to paint it on my plane. "Hell, no," I said, "My Rosie's beautiful!"







I showed him your picture. Three days later the sap had the gall to come back with a risqué drawing! The only thing that kept me from popping him one was reminding myself that he's a bachelor. I told him in no uncertain terms that even though you're the world's most beautiful Rosie the Riveter you're a respectable woman.

Finally, he showed me the rough sketch I've enclosed. I like it, and I've agreed to let him paint it on "Rosie"'s nose. Now the other fellas, as well as the Japs, can get a good look at what I'm fighting for.

I hope you're not offended. It makes me happy to think that the last thing any Jap I shoot down will see is your smiling face!

All my love,

Bob

Dear Mrs. Wilcox

"Dear Mrs. Wilcox. It's hard to write a letter to someone you'll never meet, especially when it's about how her husband died. But you deserve to know, so I'll give it my best.

Joe was in my squad, and you could never ask for a better buddy. No matter how tough things got he never complained. We were cold, hungry, and sometimes more scared than we'd admit, but Joe took it in stride. We all liked him. He was generous. He even gave one of the sweaters you knit for him to a fellow who didn't have one. I think he might have saved that man's life, as we didn't have enough supplies when we first arrived on this miserable frozen rock, and some fellows died of exposure.

Of course Joe talked about you all the time, how he missed your cooking and your picnics near Mount Rainier. I've never been to Seattle, but Joe made it sound like a wonderful place, even with all the rain! He was incredibly proud of your work building the Flying Fortresses we see every day here in Alaska.

But I can tell I'm stalling, and I'd better get to why I have to write this letter.

On May 29 we thought we finally had the Japs on this island licked. Most of them were dead, and their last remaining troops were bottled up in a tiny area around Chicagoff Harbor.

But I'm from Texas, and I know what happens when a rattlesnake's cornered. He strikes. And being the snakes they are, that's exactly what the Japs did.

The night before, one of our scouting patrols made it behind the Jap lines. They almost didn't make it back, either, because the saps forgot the password when they returned to camp; the sentries didn't let them in until the patrol started yelling "Brooklyn Dodgers, New York Yankees, Joe DiMaggio!" Anyway, the patrol had a fantastic story: They saw Japs in their camp swilling sake, shouting and jumping up and down like madmen. One fellow saw them shooting their wounded. Something bizarre was happening. The patrol leader told the lieutenant, but he ignored him. Japs are always doing crazy things, who can understand them? But the patrolmen figured something was up, and they went from foxhole to foxhole telling our men what they saw.

At about 3:00 the next morning Joe and I were in the chow line when we heard a horrible screaming racket. A thousand crazed Japs came running down the hill straight at us, hurling grenades, firing rifles and waving bayonets tied to sticks. We ran for our weapons, but a Jap caught Joe. They fell down on the tundra, kicking and punching each other savagely. Joe was unarmed, but the bastard Jap had a knife. Somehow he twisted around and shoved it into Joe's chest. All I can say, Mrs. Wilcox, is that the knife went to Joe's heart so it was over quick. I was able to grab my revolver by this time, and I shot that murderous sonofabitch right in the face and sent him straight to the hell he came from.


Mrs. Wilcox, your husband was not alone. The rampaging Japs went on down the valley, screaming "We'll drink your blood!" They found one of our medical stations and cut the ropes holding up the tents, so the wounded GIs were tangled in the canvas and couldn't escape before the Japs hacked them to death. They also bayoneted men who were in their sleeping bags.

Finally, the Japs reached an engineering unit on the far side of the valley. The cooks and the bulldozer drivers were able to mount a defense and machine-gunned a bunch of the attackers. The rest of the Japs blew themselves up with their own grenades.

When it was over the valley was littered with corpses. I even heard the chaplain say of the Japs, "I'm glad they're dead, really glad. How can I go back to my church when I've got it in me to be glad men are dead?"

Well, I'm not a man of God, so I have no problem with dead Japs. My goal in life is to produce a lot more of them.


I can't tell you how sorry I am that Joe's gone, and doubly sorry that you have to hear about it from as poor a writer as me. Your husband and all the other brave men who died on this stinking rock will surely be avenged, and I pledge to you, Mrs. Wilcox, that I will do everything in my power to make that happen.


Yours,


Pfc Phillip Bolden

Letter From Joe, Late May 1943

Dearest Betty. I'm sorry to say I don't know what day it is here any more. One freezing, foggy, blowing hour just seems to run into another, and it feels like we've been here a hundred years instead of just a couple of weeks.

It's an awful slog fighting the Japs. They're clinging to this miserable speck of rock as though their lives depend on it, which I suppose they do since the Japs don't believe in retreat or surrender. The Army Air Force keeps dropping leaflets on them (I've enclosed one for you). They tell me they read as follows:

"The kiri leaf falls. Its fall is the omen of the inevitable downfall of militarism. With the fall of one kiri leaf comes sadness and bad luck. Before spring comes again the raining bombs of America, just like the kiri leaves fluttering to the ground, will bring sad fate and misfortune."

A lot of silly words wasted on a lot of paper if you ask me, but I'm only a private and not a general, so what do I know?

Actually I do know one thing the Japs understand, which is a grenade. Since I last wrote to you we fought our way out of the aptly-named Massacre Valley and up onto the high ground. The Japs were dug in on the valley walls, but we got a lucky break. The artillery gunners behind us fire smoke-screen rounds. The Japs thought it was poison gas, and scrambled for their gas masks. That gave us time to lob grenades into their positions and do a little bayonet work.


A photographer got the enclosed picture of some of my buddies in action:






This is pretty much what it's like all over the island. We've been in shallow trenches like this one at times:





But we've also got tents, and hot food and fuel. Heck, the Army's even trying to boost our morale by taking us to the movies, if you can believe that! Here's our "limousine" from the front to the movie tent:





Betty, I've got to admit that Hedy Lamarr is almost as beautiful as you!

Well, that's it for now. We've got just a few remnants of the Japs bottled up around Chickagoff Harbor. Our sergeant says we'll likely be going at them to finish them off in a day or two, so with any luck this will be my last letter from this frozen lump of dirt.

Give my best to Rosie, tell her I see lots of P-38s like her lounging, coconut-juice drinking husband Bob flies in that tropical paradise of New Guinea (she knows I'm joking).


See you soon. All my love,


Joe

Letter from Joe, Mid-May 1943

This is a horrible place.

Betty, I don't know how to sugarcoat things since I don't have a lot of fancy words like the college boys, so I'm not going to try. You'll just have to hear it like it is, but I know you can take it.

We were pinned down in the Massacre Valley for days after we landed. We only got a little way inland before the Japs started shooting us from the hills. We had beach artillery that fired back, but the ships in the bay couldn't do anything for us because it was too foggy. I spent the most miserable night of my life lying in a freezing, muddy streambank trying to stay out of the machine-gunners' sights. Some fellas a few hundred yards away tried to keep warm by setting fire to the stocks of their rifles, the only thing they had that would burn. They were dead by morning. I heard one of the officers say the Japs have fur-lined boots and uniforms and plenty of kerosene. All I can say is, I hope they'll all stay nice and warm in the hell we'll send them to.

We slowly made our way up the valley, a few yards at a time, holding on to each other's cartridge belts. We're supposed to be linking up with another unit that landed in the northern part of the island, but it's been unbelievably slow. A buddy told me he heard that when that Northern Force got to a camp the Japs had abandoned, our fighter pilots didn't realize they were our boys, and killed a bunch of them by bombing and strafing. He said he also heard the Japs killed their own wounded by injecting them with morphine and throwing grenades into their medical tent.

Thankfully we've got what you might call a camp set up now. We've got a little stove, but the mud floor's pretty nasty. It's been tough getting supplies in because the vehicles keep getting bogged down in the mud and the muskeg, but it seems like we're secure for the time being.

Don't you worry about me. I got those socks and sweaters you knit me and they sure feel good. I'm putting all my mind to staying safe and winning this thing. I've got to go now, but I promise I'll write again as soon as I can.

Love, Joe