The Ghost Mountain Boys: Their Epic March and the Terrifying Battle for New Guinea--The Forgotten War of the South Pacific (46 page)

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D
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Spencer, M., “2 Allied Generals Swim Half Mile,”
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Variety of articles in the
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.

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Acknowledgments

This book is a work of nonfiction based on information contained in written accounts, war diaries, reminiscences, letters, scrapbooks, memoirs, or stories related to me by the veterans or their surviving family members and friends. Every attempt has been made to reconstruct the epic journey undertaken by the men of the 32nd Division—especially the march of the Ghost Mountain boys—and the brutal battles at Buna and Sanananda as accurately as possible.

I do not pretend to have written the complete history of the Red Arrow Division at Buna and Sanananda. Consequently, countless men and their acts of bravery and selflessness are missing from these pages. It is my hope, however, that through research, I have come as close as possible to describing an experience that all veterans of this savage campaign will recognize as true.

This book has taken me three and a half years to research and write. The project has been a memorable one. I have met many veterans whom I have come to regard as friends. I have attended their reunions, eaten with them, played cards, drank beer, traded stories, visited with them in their homes, and talked with them for hours on the phone. To all of these men who opened old wounds and exhumed long-buried memories, and to their family members who stood by them with equanimity, love, and support, I am extraordinarily grateful.

The saying goes that in order to understand someone, you have to walk a mile in his shoes. In an attempt to appreciate what the 32nd Division’s soldiers went through, I walked across New Guinea in the footsteps of the Ghost Mountain boys. The trek was a grueling one. I injured my knee, and one expedition member had to be flown out because of serious leg infections. Eventually half the team came down with malaria. I saw the battlefields, the clouds of mosquitoes, and the leeches. I felt the blazing sun of the coast, the chill of the mountains, and the suffocating stillness of the swamps. Thankfully, I never had to go to war.

In New Guinea, the Red Arrow men saw hell in spades, but you would be hard-pressed to get one to talk freely about how terrible it was. Most are stoics who long ago chose silence over relating the horrific details of fighting in a place that most people had never even heard of.

At some point, as they near the end of their lives, some of the veterans of the Buna and Sanananda campaign made the brave choice not to die with their memories, but to break the silence with which they have lived for so long. I am thankful for their stories. I hope this book is a tribute to them.

I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to a variety of people and sources from Wisconsin and Michigan to Washington, D.C., to Australia and Papua New Guinea. First and foremost, I would like to thank the men of Muskegon, Michigan’s Company G: Carl Stenberg, Stanley Jastrzembski, Russell Buys, Samuel DiMaggio, Don Stout, Ferrell “Bing” Bower, and Don Ritter, who has since passed away. I would also like to thank a group of veterans from the Grand Rapids, Michigan, area whose input helped me immeasurably: Bob Hartman, Carl Smestad, Martin Bolt, Erwin Veneklase, Jack Hill, Wellington Homminga, Frank Jakubowski, Steve Janicki, Ed Szudzik, Russ Prince, and Delbert Rector. Thanks also to Bill Sikkel of Holland, Michigan, and Ray Bailey of Green Bay, Wisconsin, who proved to be veritable fountains of information, and to Frank Stobbe of Berlin, Wisconsin, who even at ninety-five has a knack for telling a good story, and to Phil Ishio for his insights into what it was like to be a Japanese-American translator at Buna.

There are many other veterans of the New Guinea campaign whom I had the good fortune to interview. Although their names may not appear in this book, I relied on them to tell this story: Irving Hall, Alan Strege, Roy Gormanson, John Laska, Glen Rice, John Serio, Gordon Zuverink, Edward Doyle, Hilding Peterson, W. Lewis Evans, Harold Leitz, Dewey Hill, Robert Mallon, Don North, Don Ryan, Lyle Hougan, Roy “Soup” Campbell, Robert Johnson, Ed Cox, Ernest Gerber, and Walter Gerber, and to Bill Barnes, Charles “Red” Lawler, and Lawrence Chester Dennis, who have also passed away since I began the book.

The Ghost Mountain Boys,
in a sense, is a collaboration. Without the help of so many people, many of them family members of New Guinea veterans or of men who perished there, this book would have been impossible to write. Thanks so much to Bill and Joyce Boice who, in 2001, made their own brave journey to Buna to see where Bill’s father, Captain Jim Boice, died in battle; to Jerry and Alice Smith, Al and Dave Medendorp, Harry Keast, who lost his father at Sanananda, and Alice Brahm; to Angeline and J. P. DiMaggio, Paulette and Rick Lutjens, Wendell Trogdon, George Pravda, Art Edson Jr., Joanne Steenstra, Cornelius Warmenhoven, Walter Hunt and Amy Hunt, Katherine Schmidt-McConnell, Lloyd Fish, Terry Shima at the Japanese American Veterans Association (JAVA), Sandy Cochran, Susie and Tamar Walllace, Evelyn French, Walt and Pam McVeigh, Al Wiesner, Doc Sartell, Don White and the 32nd Division Old-timers gang, Lieutenant Colonel Tim Donovan, Robert Frankenstein, Bert Ramirez, Scott Renkema, Frank Boring, and lastly Katherine (Bailey) Mathews for her strength and grace, and Ann Holman and Muriel Joldersma for their courage.

A world of thanks to Abbie Norderhaug and the superb staff at the Wisconsin Veterans Museum, whom I have relied on for the last three and a half years. And to Kenneth Schlessinger of the National Archives and Bill McKellin at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. Thanks also to writer-historian Tom Doherty, who very generously offered his notes, research, and expertise, and his insights into the campaign and some of its participants.

I am indebted to author-historian Mary Ellen Condon-Rall for her help in portraying the situation faced by the 32nd Division’s medical staff. Thanks also to Major Lewis Barger in the office of the Army Surgeon General.

Thanks to Sarah Beyer-Kelly, National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition Saturday producer, and host Scott Simon, for their interest in this story and their patience in dealing with the myriad obstacles of trying to get a satellite connection from the jungle.

I was fortunate also to have the support of Mary Turner of
Outside
magazine. Without her enthusiasm for the story, sound editorial judgment, and general good nature, and the conscientious fact-checking of Justin Nyberg, the account of my trek (
Outside
magazine, May 2007, “Chasing Ghosts”) following the route of the Ghost Mountain boys would never have turned out as well as it did.

I wish to thank my good PNG friends Malum and Hula Nalu and their family for welcoming me into their home. Many thanks also to the PNG Tourism Promotion Authority and to Titi Gabi, Bill Nama, and the villagers of Gabagaba for their hospitality. For submitting to my interviews: Frank Gabi, Sir Philip Bouraga, Hare Bore, Toea Uru, Vavine Gamoga, Aria Parina, Boga Tali Boga, Raga Naime, Gevena Naime, Bala Parina, Taugau Parina, Len Sabadi, and Nanai Aria. On the other side of the Papuan Peninsula, I would like to thank the people of Buna, and in particular Wellington and Willie Jojoba. Also McCester Opusa, Peter John Bonga, Timothy Ungaia Doroda, John Marry Bundari, Henry Bedura, and David Sinama. I am grateful, too, to the fine people along the route of the Kapa Kapa trail, especially the inimitable Berua and the villagers of Laruni, Suwari, Jaure, and Natunga. And to Barnabas Orere for the loan of the book and his thoughts on how the war changed New Guinea, and to Maclaren Hiari for sharing with me the history of his father.

A hearty thanks to Erik Andersen and the POM Productions gang, Lee Ticehurst, Cal, Jack, Samu, Maryanne, and Jethro for their hospitality, the superb film and sound work, and for their companionship on the trail.

I wish to extend my thanks to the sponsors of my New Guinea expedition: BugBand, Mountain House, Helly Hansen, Gardline Communications, Air Niugini, Coral Sea Hotels, and Fontana Sports of Madison, Wisconsin.

A very special thanks to my brother Jeffrey, who has nursed a fascination with the island of New Guinea as strong as my own, and who twice has joined me on adventures there. I hope one day we can show our children the place that captured our youthful imaginations.

To my mother for her worry and prayers. And to my father and sisters for their love and support.

To my friends and fellow adventurers: Dr. Dale Fanney for his sound advice and the wilderness medical kit that we put to good use on the trail; Jon Clark for the good wishes, the pre-promotion, and the river shoes; and Tim Malzhan, who spends more nights under the stars than anyone I know, for the trusty waterproof journal.

A big, hearty thanks to my buddy and all-round wilderness man Dave Musgrave for his toughness and good humor on the trail. To old friend George Houde, who inspired by a few beers in a Chicago bar agreed to join me on the New Guinea adventure and then immediately upped the ante by proposing that we do our own documentary film on our attempt to repeat the march of the Ghost Mountain boys. And to Philipp Engelhorn, photographer extraordinaire, world wanderer, and newfound friend.

Thanks to my brother-in-law, Sean O’Conor, and father-in-law, Daggett Harvey, for the early reads of the manuscript and their suggestions. To Greg Putnam for the maps and his enthusiasm. To Ellie Harvey for her loyal support. To Chris Warrilow and Warren Dutton and to Paul Chatterton of the World Wildlife Fund. And to the staff at the Lodi Library for their assistance and forbearance.

Thanks to Dean King for his sharp-eyed assessment of the book’s final rough draft and his generosity of spirit. Thanks to my agent and advocate David McCormick for fielding my manic phone call from Hartford, Connecticut, and for recognizing instantly the book’s possibilities. To Luke Dempsey, who eagerly bought
The Ghost Mountain Boys
for Crown. And to Sean Desmond, who inherited it from Luke and rode herd on it to the end, suggesting changes that made for a better book.

A New Guinea–sized thanks to Burns Ellison, my friend and de facto editor and assistant who was with me on this book from the outset, who took time away from his own novel to transcribe taped interviews, to mine WWII books for ideas and narrative techniques, and to challenge me always to pare down my language, to make it spare and clean. It would have been impossible for me to write this story without his encouragement, help, and estimable editorial skills.

Finally, a word about the country of Papua New Guinea. War is an ugly thing, and in the context of this book, the country that I love is not portrayed very favorably. But I remain as impressed by its landscape, its diversity of culture, language, and flora and fauna, and the kindness of its people as when I first set foot in PNG nearly twenty years ago.