War Stories II (79 page)

CAPTAIN JOHN SWEENEY
returned to Ohio following World War II but would never forget his experiences on Edson's Ridge, or Bloody Ridge, as it was later called. For his actions on Guadalcanal, Sweeney was awarded the Navy Cross.

PLATOON SERGEANT MITCH PAIGE
received a battlefield commission following his heroism at Guadalcanal and made the Marine Corps his career. He has spent more than two decades working to expose frauds who claim to have been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor but who were never cited for the award. He has exposed a large number of frauds, including one highly publicized on
60 Minutes
.

CAPTAIN JOE FOSS
, a highly decorated Marine fighter pilot, moved up the ranks to general. He held the records as the top World War II ace, with twenty-six confirmed enemy kills. Foss stayed in the Marine Corps until his retirement and then began several other productive careers: president of the National Rifle Association, Major League Baseball commissioner, and governor of South Dakota. He died in January 2003.

MAJOR GREGORY “PAPPY” BOYINGTON
was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his exploits in the South Pacific. After the war, he penned his autobiography,
Baa Baa Black Sheep
, and in 1976, Hollywood producer Steven J. Cannell launched a dramatic television series loosely based on Boyington's book and the exploits of the Black Sheep Squadron in the South Pacific. “Pappy” was hired as a technical consultant for the show. He died of cancer in January 1988, at the age of seventy-five, in Fresno, California.

LIEUTENANT HENRY “HANK” MCCARTNEY
stayed in the Marine Corps for twenty-six years and retired to Florida to begin another entirely new career. Hank founded a citrus company, managed it for a number of years, and recently sold it.

LIEUTENANT HENRY “BOO” BOURGEOIS
was an ace in many of the South Pacific battles and was another career Marine, spending twenty-one years in the Corps. He left when his eyes were no longer what they'd been when he was a twenty-two-year-old pilot in the Solomon Islands. He then took a sales engineering position with a division of the Singer Company and moved up the corporate ladder until he recently retired.

FIRST LIEUTENANT JOHN F. (JACK) BOLT
was promoted to captain and returned to the U.S. in 1944, right after his first tour of duty, to marry his high school sweetheart. Then he returned to combat. After World War II he stayed in the Marines and served in the Korean War, where he became an ace all over again—shooting down six MIGs piloted by Russian aces. He retired from the Corps as a lieutenant colonel after twenty years and went back to school, studying law and earning his degree from the University of Florida.

LIEUTENANT W. THOMAS (TOM) EMRICH
finished his stint in the South Pacific and returned to the United States. He stayed in the Marines until he was offered the opportunity to become an airline pilot with TWA. That began a wonderful, although less exciting, career in aviation.

LIEUTENANT ED HARPER
was wounded and shot down during his stint with the Black Sheep Squadron but returned to duty. He remained in the Marines and served in both Korea and Vietnam. When he retired from the Corps, he went to work for McDonnell Douglas in California, where he worked on the Marine Harrier aircraft. He retired after eighteen years there.

LIEUTENANT DEAN LADD
recovered from wounds received at Tarawa and returned to duty with the Marine Corps. He achieved the rank of lieutenant colonel before he retired. Thirty-nine years after being wounded at Tarawa, Ladd returned to that tiny atoll, ferried to the remote site in a landing craft very similar to the LCR that had carried him away. Following that visit in 1982, Ladd helped convince the Marine Corps to put a memorial on the atoll honoring the young men killed in the three-day battle there.

MAJOR MIKE RYAN
was nominated by his regimental commander, General David M. Shoup, to receive the Navy Cross, the nation's second highest award, for his heroism in the Battle of Tarawa. Ryan finished out the war and then served in the Korean War. He spent time at the USMC headquarters, completing an illustrious career as a Marine Corps major general.