battle of saipan casualty list

The subsequent invasion occasioned a refugee crisis on the island and, soon, some of the most harrowing experiences any civilian would face in the course of the war. The list also shows next of kin address. U.S. commanders reasoned that taking the main Mariana IslandsSaipan, Tinian and Guamwould cut off Japan from its resource-rich southern empire and clear the way for further advances to Tokyo. cit. The element of surprise was the main factor in casualties being so low. Battle of Saipan | Military Wiki | Fandom One of the casualties of the . However, American intelligence services had greatly underestimated Japanese troop strength on Saipan. 1 - BY NAME 1941-45, CABOT Tinian - Marine Corps University > Research The 27th Division of the New York National Guard suffered heavy losses during the World War II battle for the Pacific island of Saipan in the Northern Marianas where the Japanese were determined . Battle Of Saipan - HistoryNet cit. The Japanese attempted to repel or . [26], The U.S. erected a civilian prisoner encampment on 23 June 1944 that soon had more than 1,000inmates. Hands Fall 2005, Vol. Battle of Saipan | Description & Facts | Britannica The plan had the support of U.S. Army Air Force planners because the airfields on Saipan were large enough to support B-29 operations, within range of the Japanese home islands, and unlike a China-based alternative, was not open to Japanese counter-attacks once the islands were secure. Battle of the Philippine Sea . Operation Downfall, the planned Allied amphibious invasion of Japan? Fighting became especially brutal and prolonged around Mount Tapotchau, Saipans highest peak, and Marines gave battle sites in the area names such as Death Valley and Purple Heart Ridge. When the U.S. finally trapped the Japanese in the northern part of the island, Japanese soldiers launched a massive but futile banzai charge. Click Conditions improved the following day when the next group of battleships arrived to bombard the coast anew.24 And yet, in the cool light of morning, it became clear that the Marines had not succeeded in reaching their assigned line in the sand. World War II photographs show American soldiers' fight for survival in Initially, as the battle started, Japanese accounts concentrated on the fighting spirit of the IJA and the heavy casualties it was inflicting on American forces. 21 Heinrichs and Gallicchio, Implacable Foes, 9394. Over the next several weeks, ferocious Japanese resistance inflicted heavy casualties on U.S. troops before the Americans were finally able read more, In late January 1944, a combined force of U.S. Marine and Army troops launched an amphibious assault on three islets in the Kwajalein Atoll, a ring-shaped coral formation in the Marshall Islands where the Japanese had established their outermost defensive perimeter in World War read more, In the Battle of Tarawa (November 20-23, 1943) during World War II (1939-45), the U.S. began its Central Pacific Campaign against Japan by seizing the heavily fortified, Japanese-held island of Betio in the Tarawa Atoll in the Gilbert Islands. 1 Woodburn S. Kirby, The War Against Japan, vol. Of the four commanders of the 2nd Marine Divisions initial assault battalion, none escaped this phase of the battle unharmed.17. To safeguard this veritable armada, he ordered that transports and supply ships clear the area by nightfall and head east out of harms way.27, Spruance had good reason to worry, not necessarily about the beachheads, which appeared to be secure before D-day-plus-1 had ended, but about the First Mobile Fleet of the Imperial Japanese Navy. See Kirby, War Against Japan, 431. Focus on History: Many casualties in the battle for Saipan 5 See the oral testimony of Professor Harris Martin, in Saipan: Oral Histories of the Pacific War, compiled and edited by Bruce M. Petty (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2002), 157. STATES, MARINE The Americans decided that the best course of action was to invade Saipan first, then Tinian and Guam. By February 1944, it was obvious even to the islands children that something terrible was about to happen: Just before the invasion took place, remembers one civilian whose girlhood was spent on the island, several trucks with Japanese soldiers [drove] up to our school, and the next day we had to take our classes under a mango tree. Battle of Saipan Battle of Saipan. BREACHING THE MARIANAS: The Battle for Saipan - ibiblio From the Marianas, Japan would be well within the range of an air offensive relying on the new B-29 with its operational radius of 3,250mi (5,230km). The Marine Corps' Navajo Code Talker Program was established in September 1942, when the US Military instituted a specific policy of recruitment and training of speakers of Native American language speaker. This contribution has not yet been formally edited by Britannica. However, General Douglas MacArthur strenuously objected to any plan that would delay his return to the Philippines. sites. 35 Oral testimony of Cristino S. Dela Cruz, in Saipan: Oral Histories (op. Vice-admiral Chuichi Nagumo, the naval commander who led the Japanese carriers at Pearl Harbor, also committed suicide in the closing stages of the battle. We felt that the Americans were God-sent.46, The invasion of Saipan was horrific. The Marines dubbed the ridge Purple Heart Ridge for the many American casualties sustained there. Careful artillery preparation placing flags in the lagoon to indicate the range allowed the Japanese to destroy about 20 amphibious tanks, and they had placed barbed wire, artillery, machine gun emplacements, and trenches to maximize the American casualties. WWII Army and Army Air Force Casualties | National Archives The Americans gradually developed tactics for clearing the caves by using flamethrower teams supported by artillery and machine guns. A Marine fires on a Japanese pillbox. Naval History U.S. Marines on Saipan, Mariana Islands, 1944, atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, https://www.britannica.com/event/Battle-of-Saipan. RM HN59XJ - PACIFIC WAR During the Battle of Saipan a US Marine finds a family hiding in a hillside cave on 21 June 1944. We have 681 casualty profiles listed in our archive. It was the largest banzai charge of the Pacific war, and, as was the nature of such an attack, most Japanese troops fought to their death. The WW2 Casualties Database is a work in progress and a huge undertaking. Fighting their way through rugged jungle terrain, Marines finally won control of Mount Tapotchau by the end of June. For the Americans, the victory was the most costly to date in the Pacific War: out of 71,000 who landed, 2,949were killed and 10,464wounded. Naval bombardment of the island had started two days earlier on the 13th, and had some effect in terms of weakening the Japanese defenses, but no amount of shelling could shake the Japanese soldiers' resolve. Cristino S. Dela Cruz, an islander who later joined the U.S. Marines, remembers the day, on the eve of invasion, when Japanese troops confiscated his familys house in Garapan. General Yoshitsugo Saito had hoped to win the battle on the beaches but was forced to switch tactics and withdraw with his troops into the rugged interior of Saipan. If you would like to make a contribution to help to complete the database, please contact bill.beigel@ww2research.com, with thanks! The facility exploded with a tremendous cloud of smoke and flame.18, Japanese resistance proved far greater than anticipated, not least of all because the latest intelligence reports had underestimated troop levels.19 In reality, troop levels, in excess of 31,000 men, were as much as double the estimates.20 For at least a month, Japanese forces had been fortifying the island and bolstering its forces. 8: New Guinea and the Marianas, March 1944 to August 1944 (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1953), 18384. Out of solidarity with fellow-Jewish citizens and resentment of the Nazis' actions in the capitol, a general strike, was announced for 25 February 1941. The Americans flamethrowers, too, shone brightly amid the carnage: We could see some of our landing craft being hit by Japanese artillery and we watched Japanese tanks as they counterattacked from the low hills.30, The center of Saipan, no more than six or so miles from the farthest coast, is mountainous, but the rest of the island consisted mostly in open farmland, almost all of it planted with sugarcane and therefore inhabited.31 Uncultivated landsabout 30 percent of the islands surfacefeatured dense thickets and even denser grasslands. In the spring of 1944, U.S. forces involved in the Pacific Campaign invaded Japanese-held islands in the central Pacific Ocean along a path toward Japan. The Battle of Saipan was fought June 15 to July 9, 1944, during World War II (1939-1945) and saw Allied forces open a campaign in the Marianas. %PDF-1.6 % Early on the morning of July 6, an estimated 4,000 Japanese soldiers shouting Banzai! charged with grenades, bayonets, swords and knives against an encampment of soldiers and Marines near Tanapag Harbor. In mid-1944, the next stage in the U.S. plan for the Pacific was to breach Japan's defensive perimeter in the Mariana Islands and build bases there for the new . If you have any questions about these collections, please contact the Archives at (703) 784-4685 or history.division . Documents include operation plans, operation orders, field orders, intelligence reports, action reports, periodic reports, administrative orders, official correspondence, studies, comments and recommendations, and memoranda concerning Operation Forager in the Mariana Islands, specifically the battle of Saipan (15 June - 9 . The National Archives also has a State Summary of War Casualties for World War II for Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard Personnel available through the National Archives Catalog . Then it was back to Saipan, where U.S. military personnel still needed reinforcements and materiel.29 Indeed, just hours after the Philippine Sea engagement had ended, the Saipan landings resumed. But after Tj failed to shuffle his Cabinet due to excessive internal hostility, he conceded defeat. open at the sides.43 Drainage, especially from the privies, was of serious concern.44, An inmates experience of Camp Susupe, as it was called, depended largely on his or her ethnicity, gender, and combat status. American personnel in Hawaii ran their final rehearsals in May.3 Unfortunately, the Marines and Army had conducted most of their training separately. On 16 July US forces began the bombardment of the nearby island of Tinian as a prelude to the successful Battle of Tinian (24 July-1 August). Pacific War, major theatre of World War II that covered a large portion of the Pacific Ocean, East Asia, and Southeast Asia, with significant engagements occurring as far south as northern Australia and as far north as the Aleutian Islands. Many were killed in the fighting, but thousands more committed suicide, along with many soldiers, rather than come under the control of the Americans. There the family and several others subsisted for a week on rice, coconuts, and a small supply of salted fish as the battle raged around them. It was fought during the Pacific War of World War II, in the seas surrounding the Philippine island of Leyte from 23 October to 26 October 1944 between the Allies and the Empire of Japan. Two U.S. Marine divisions began landings in the southwest of the island on June 15; they were joined two days later by an Army division. 13 Heinrichs and Gallicchio, Implacable Foes, 94; Rottman, World War II, 376. In 1998, efforts were re-initiated to secure the Medal of Honor for Gabaldon. for source abbreviations. Gabaldon, who was raised by Japanese-Americans, used a combination of street Japanese and guile to convince soldiers and civilians alike that U.S. troops were not barbarians, and that they would be well treated upon surrender. . The weapons used and the tactics of close quarter fighting resulted in high civilian casualties. Battle of saipan hi-res stock photography and images - Alamy The deadliest battle in WWII, Dnieper, had 1.58 million casualties. In addition to William O'Brien, Ben L. Salomon and Thomas A. Baker, Gunnery Sergeant Robert H. McCard and PFC Harold G. Epperson, were each posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor. The Landing and First Phase of the Battle . ), 18. A total of 4,311 Japanese troops were killed on the July 7 banzai attack. cit. Saipan, Tinian, and Guam (Mariana Islands) - Archives Branch: Campaign When it was all over, Saipan could be declared secure. c1943 USS SOLACE WWII NAVY SOLDIER LETTER +SIGNED 2 LINE CENSOR ! USS to US Navy Casualties, WW2. Victory at Okinawa cost more than 49,000 American casualties, including about 12,000 deaths. "Battle of Saipan - American Memorial Park (U.S. National Park Service)", "Operation Forager: The Battle of Saipan", "U.S. Army in World War II: Campaign in the Marianas, Ch. With the capture of Saipan, the American military was now only 1,300mi (1,100nmi; 2,100km) away from the home islands of Japan. The U.S. was then able to use Saipan as a strategic bomber base from which to attack Japan directly. This list of Marine Corps casualties - those who died or were killed - is compiled from: USMC Casualty Cards (mc), American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC or bm), POW/MIA Accounting Agency (pm), and ; States Lists (na, from National Archives) sites. It had a projected casualty count of 6.7 to 14 million (and that's just the American and Japanese numbers, not including other parties like the British Empire and Soviet Union). [10] The U.S. 2nd Marine Division, 4th Marine Division, and the Army's 27th Infantry Division, commanded by Lieutenant General Holland Smith, defeated the 43rd Infantry Division of the Imperial Japanese Army, commanded by Lieutenant General Yoshitsugu Sait. In May, American forces also bombed Marcus and Wake islands, also in the Marianas, to secure the approach to Saipan in June. 26 Heinrichs and Gallicchio, Implacable Foes, 98; Rottman, World War II, 378. For the United States, around 2,949 people were killed, and 10,364 were wounded. The standard method of clearing suspected bunkers was the use of high-explosive and/or high-explosives augmented with petroleum (e.g., gelignite, napalm, diesel fuel). [29] During the war, his commanders had requested that he receive the Medal of Honor for his actions; however, his initial award was the Silver Star. 6: The Twentieth Century, edited by Peter Duus (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 362; Alan J. Levine, The Pacific War: Japan versus the Allies (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1995), 121; Kirby, War Against Japan, 43032. The U.S. was then able to use Saipan as a strategic bomber base from which to attack Japan directly. In Breaching the Marianas: the Battle for Saipan, author John C. Chapin, a Marine on Saipan, described the chaos around him that morning, with its bodies lying in mangled and grotesque positions; blasted and burned out pillboxes; the burning wrecks of LVTs [landing vehicles] ; the acrid smell of high explosives; the shattered trees; and the churned up sand littered with discarded equipment.. US Marine Corps killed and died by name including Iwo Jima and Guadalcanal War 2 - United States Navy at War, UNITED 46 Castro, in Saipan: Oral Histories (op. Accounting Agency (pm), Part Fortunately for the Americans, the Japanese had not succeeded, either, in their efforts to repulse the invaders. Skip to main content (Press Enter). The logistical demands of the invasion of Saipan were dizzying. More than 300LVTs landed 8,000 Marines on the west coast of Saipan by about 09:00. Roosevelt. 8 Kirby, War Against Japan, 431; Rottman, World War II, 378. Fact Sheets > Article View - Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency Thomas A. Baker, all posthumously. When it happened, in June and July 1944, the conquest of Saipan became the most daringand disturbingoperation in the U.S. war against Japan to date. Today in Naval History - Naval / Maritime Events in History 9th of June some of the events you will find here, please use the following link where you will find more details and all other events of this day . from the official USMC Chronology, are being added at: UNITED 120 0 obj <>/Filter/FlateDecode/ID[<132B5D2159DFC14F800E7FA24CBE4310>]/Index[92 64]/Info 91 0 R/Length 123/Prev 126934/Root 93 0 R/Size 156/Type/XRef/W[1 3 1]>>stream They became trapped under their own house until Japanese soldiers, in search of a defensible position, pushed them out into the open. The Durrani Empire also suffered heavy losses . 1944 Uss Solace Soldier Christmas Card +Small Letter ! Navy World War Martin, who had landed on D-Day-plus-5, helped set up and administer the islands internment and displaced persons camp. Eventually, Martin and the others had the idea of separating these groups, not least of all because conflict persisted after years of exploitation by the Japanese. This mass of U.S. personnel became an easy target for mortars and other projectiles.14 Nevertheless, the Marine divisions managed to get to dry ground before H-hour had passed.15, Then came another nasty surprise. The bloodiest single day in the history of the United States military was June 6, 1944, with 2,500 soldiers killed during the Invasion of Normandy on D-Day. The Navys involvement bookended the operation: naval vessels and personnel ferried Marines and Soldiers to the beaches and then, after ground combat was over, took leading positions in the administration of the occupation. This left the Japanese holding the Philippines, the Caroline Islands, the Palau Islands, and the Mariana Islands. On the morning of June 15, 1944, a large fleet of U.S. transport ships gathered near the southwest shores of Saipan, and Marines began riding toward the beaches in hundreds of amphibious landing vehicles. Battle of Little Bighorn. 2 Waldo Heinrichs and Marc Gallicchio, Implacable Foes: War in the Pacific, 19441945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 94. Iwo Jima and Okinawa: Death at Japan's Doorstep [25] Although Tj agreed to resign, Emporer Hirohito blocked his resignation because he considered Tj to be Japan's strongest war leader. The Costs of War. "use strict";(function(){var insertion=document.getElementById("citation-access-date");var date=new Date().toLocaleDateString(undefined,{month:"long",day:"numeric",year:"numeric"});insertion.parentElement.replaceChild(document.createTextNode(date),insertion)})(); FACT CHECK: We strive for accuracy and fairness. While the battle officially ended on 9 July, Japanese resistance still persisted with Captain Sakae ba and 46 other soldiers who survived with him during the last banzai charge. Each state list is alphabetical divided by the casualty type, including wounded and recovered. Among the dead was the Tenth Army's . ASL Map Spotlight: The Battle of the Hrtgen Forest Research Guides: Archives Branch: Campaign Collections: Iwo Jima 38 Oral testimony of Escolastica Tudela Cabrera, in Saipan: Oral Histories (op. 45 Ada, in Saipan: Oral Histories (op. By 16:15 on 9 July, Admiral Turner announced that Saipan was officially secured. Corrections? That area was all in flames because the Japanese had a lot of storage tanks there, remembers Marie Soledad Castro, then a young girl resident on Saipan and whose father was a dockworker.6 The raids continued. [30] The effort was ongoing in 2006.[31]. Month after month, on islands like Tarawa, the Marshalls, the Marianas, Leyte, Iwo Jima, and . 15 Kirby, War Against Japan, 432; Rottman, World War II, 378. ), 162. The List of Names at the Marianas Memorial and the Court of Honor The Japanese Civilian Tragedy of the Pacific War Their armor was not heavy enough to withstand the barrage from Japanese artillery, and their agility on rough ground proved lacking.16 Troops scattered in several directions as hilltop snipers tried to pick them off one by one. https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/battle-of-saipan. Research, development, and procurement made that a long-term prospect. For days, Sailors had been watching the action on the shore from Sheridans decks. [17], By 6 July, the Japanese had nowhere to retreat. However, any reader familiar with Saipan's geography would have known from the chronology of engagements that the U.S. forces were relentlessly advancing northwards. It took place at the Tarawa Atoll in the Gilbert Islands. Since the fall of the Marshall Islands to the Americans a few months earlier, both sides began to prepare for an American onslaught against the Marianas and Saipan in particular. Nearly 6,400 Japanese, Koreans, and Americans died in the fighting . The Japanese used many caves in the volcanic landscape to delay the attackers, by hiding during the day and making sorties at night. His objections were routed through formal channels as well as bypassing the Joint Chiefs of Staff, appealing directly to Secretary of War Henry Stimson and President Franklin D. Just under 3, 000 Americans were killed and more than 10, 000 were wounded. ), 2223. (80-JO-63354) Enlarge Title page of the ATIS-translated copy of the Z Plan. It cost the Marines 384 dead with 1,961 wounded. endstream endobj 93 0 obj <. The following day, two naval bombardment groups led by Rear Admiral Jesse B. Oldendorf arrived on the shore of Saipan.