GyBill
10-20-2006, 03:45 PM
Veteran remembers moments from Iwo Jima
Joe Colley lay in a foxhole in a quarry on the island of Iwo Jima when six men - nearly two miles away - raised the American flag on Mount Suribachi.
"Someone in the quarry said the flag was up," Colley said. "I went to my backpack, pulled out a camera that I didn't know I was going to use, and I got a picture of the flag."
To Colley and the 60,000 other Americans fighting on the eight-mile-long island, seeing the flag raised on February 23, 1945, meant the U.S. was on the way to victory over the Japanese - a defining moment in history.
Immediately, everyone was cheering, he said. The Marines went wild.
Colley, a former private first class with the Marines' 4th ASCO Division, said he later found out his photograph was probably one of the few pictures taken of the flag that day.
"That was our flag," he said. "What you saw, that was symbolic of the whole Pacific war. But for us on the island, that flag, that was the inspiration."
Colley, who now resides in Westminster and Ocean Pines, said he is looking forward to seeing Clint Eastwood's movie "Flags of Our Fathers," which opens in theaters nationwide today.
Colley said he remembers everything about the day he joined the Marines.
He went to the draft board with a friend on his 18th birthday, registered and then went across the hall and joined the Marines, he said. He said he joined the Marines because of the movie "Wake Island."
"Three days after I graduated from high school, I was in the Marines," Colley said.
First deployed to Maui, Colley was assigned to become a radioman, he said.
"In the 1940s, radar was the secret weapon," he said. "Everything was very hush, hush."
One or two days after arriving at Maui, Colley was marched with others to an outdoor movie theater surrounded by a big circle of radios, he said.
"The man in charge said, 'Gentlemen, these are radios and you are now radiomen,'" Colley said. "I never fired a rifle after that."
Colley said the radio weighed approximately 40 pounds and he weighed about 150 pounds at the time. He said that shortly after, he was trained he was on his way to Iwo Jima.
Colley was in the sixth wave of Marines to arrive at Iwo Jima, he said.
"It was difficult to get over the volcanic ash on the island," Colley said. "We would take three steps forward and two steps back."
On his first day on Iwo Jima, Colley said, he saw a Marine lying on the ground about 20 to 30 feet away from him, and he couldn't understand why he wasn't getting up. It didn't dawn on him that the Marine was dead.
"I should have recognized it because he was face up," he said. "I am 19 years old at this point and I have never been in combat before, never been in this kind of situation before and it was one of those 'I can't believe it' kind of things."
After he saw the dead Marine and heard the shells hitting all over, he started to dig because he was standing out in the open.
"I am digging as fast as I can and it is not easy at this point," Colley said.
He made his foxhole shallow because it was so difficult to dig. Once inside he couldn't do anything besides pray.
"You can't imagine the fear of the sounds of the shells," he said. "You can hear them, the one you don't hear is gonna get you."
Colley will get a chance to hear the falling shells again when he goes to the movie, which he said he hopes to see this weekend. He said he expects it will be as good as the book.
"I have read the book three times," he said. "It is accurate."
His copy also now includes some of his own additions.
"I went through and made notes about what I was doing at certain points throughout the book," he said.
Reach staff writer Sara Bott at 410-857-7876 or botts@lcniofmd.com.
Joe Colley lay in a foxhole in a quarry on the island of Iwo Jima when six men - nearly two miles away - raised the American flag on Mount Suribachi.
"Someone in the quarry said the flag was up," Colley said. "I went to my backpack, pulled out a camera that I didn't know I was going to use, and I got a picture of the flag."
To Colley and the 60,000 other Americans fighting on the eight-mile-long island, seeing the flag raised on February 23, 1945, meant the U.S. was on the way to victory over the Japanese - a defining moment in history.
Immediately, everyone was cheering, he said. The Marines went wild.
Colley, a former private first class with the Marines' 4th ASCO Division, said he later found out his photograph was probably one of the few pictures taken of the flag that day.
"That was our flag," he said. "What you saw, that was symbolic of the whole Pacific war. But for us on the island, that flag, that was the inspiration."
Colley, who now resides in Westminster and Ocean Pines, said he is looking forward to seeing Clint Eastwood's movie "Flags of Our Fathers," which opens in theaters nationwide today.
Colley said he remembers everything about the day he joined the Marines.
He went to the draft board with a friend on his 18th birthday, registered and then went across the hall and joined the Marines, he said. He said he joined the Marines because of the movie "Wake Island."
"Three days after I graduated from high school, I was in the Marines," Colley said.
First deployed to Maui, Colley was assigned to become a radioman, he said.
"In the 1940s, radar was the secret weapon," he said. "Everything was very hush, hush."
One or two days after arriving at Maui, Colley was marched with others to an outdoor movie theater surrounded by a big circle of radios, he said.
"The man in charge said, 'Gentlemen, these are radios and you are now radiomen,'" Colley said. "I never fired a rifle after that."
Colley said the radio weighed approximately 40 pounds and he weighed about 150 pounds at the time. He said that shortly after, he was trained he was on his way to Iwo Jima.
Colley was in the sixth wave of Marines to arrive at Iwo Jima, he said.
"It was difficult to get over the volcanic ash on the island," Colley said. "We would take three steps forward and two steps back."
On his first day on Iwo Jima, Colley said, he saw a Marine lying on the ground about 20 to 30 feet away from him, and he couldn't understand why he wasn't getting up. It didn't dawn on him that the Marine was dead.
"I should have recognized it because he was face up," he said. "I am 19 years old at this point and I have never been in combat before, never been in this kind of situation before and it was one of those 'I can't believe it' kind of things."
After he saw the dead Marine and heard the shells hitting all over, he started to dig because he was standing out in the open.
"I am digging as fast as I can and it is not easy at this point," Colley said.
He made his foxhole shallow because it was so difficult to dig. Once inside he couldn't do anything besides pray.
"You can't imagine the fear of the sounds of the shells," he said. "You can hear them, the one you don't hear is gonna get you."
Colley will get a chance to hear the falling shells again when he goes to the movie, which he said he hopes to see this weekend. He said he expects it will be as good as the book.
"I have read the book three times," he said. "It is accurate."
His copy also now includes some of his own additions.
"I went through and made notes about what I was doing at certain points throughout the book," he said.
Reach staff writer Sara Bott at 410-857-7876 or botts@lcniofmd.com.