My Story of Beach Attack... Dr. Thomas M. Deas Homer, Louisiana 10 January 2002 Our Regiment [124th Infantry Regiment of the 31st Infantry Division] started out from Aitape to the Driniumor river with Battalions more or less abreast-3rd Bn on the mountain side, then 1st Bn, then on the beach was Regt HQ with some Antitank, Cannon Company and other attached units. HQ medics were always with HQ. The battalion medics were with their particular battalion and company of the battalion. I think we left Aitape on the 12th of July (maybe the 13th). The battalions went through the jungle. Regt HQ and its units were on the left. HQ and its units had some vehicles; I had my jeep and trailer. The first night we bivouacked on the beach. I had my first casualties from a booby trap being set. One died, was badly wounded. He was sent back to the hospital. The next day we reached the village of Anopapi and set up a Regt HQ perimeter for supply and evacuation. But when we reached that little village, we had to fight the Japs for it. We fought enemy troops and they had some mountain guns set up on the Driniumor River about 1/2 mile down the beach. I had several casualties before we cleaned out the Japs, and evacuated them. The mountain guns were destroyed by our artillery (I think). We had a couple of "Tank Destroyers" (a 75 mm gun on a half tank-no top) on the beach side and they stayed with us for several days. We cleaned out that village on 14 July [1944] and set up a perimeter about 150 yards deep and maybe 200 yards long right up against the thickest jungle I had ever seen. The first day after the fighting was spent in digging and making foxholes. The Antitank boys and Cannon Co. manned the perimeter, and most of us were on the jungle side of the sand dune on the beach. I was under a grass hut, had a casualty come in at 9 pm, so my 1st Sgt. and I spent the night in a dugout near where they brought the casualties in. Gun fire and grenades went off all night from itchy trigger fingers. I nearly froze to death in that darn hole, my poncho was over the wounded boy. Next day we evacuated those brought in and took care of those being brought in, evacuating them by LCM (Landing Craft Medium) or by truck. That nite was miserable from trigger happy boys and grenade shrapnel and a Dental Officer that ate all night, rattling his canteen. I told my 1st Sgt. that I was moving down to the beach the next day and we did. We had a foxhole about 6 x 6 x 4 ft and well armed! Well, we took turns in 2-3 hour shifts at night, and I had just gotten to sleep from my "awake" time when all hell broke loose. It was just before daylight, and soon was daylight, but there were people running around and hollering, shooting, grenades exploding and, in general, a mess. I heard Japs trying to holler, "Joe!!!, Medic, Rolland" (They couldn't get the letters right in pronouncing. Seems they had trouble with "l"s and "r"s). As I looked down, my watch looked like a flashlight-luminous dial. I put it in my pocket. I took the safety off my carbine and peered out, but never shot at anything. It was getting light and one of the Tank Destroyer boys was hollering "Medic," so I told my 1st Sgt., "Let's go," and we crawled out and over to that fellow who was shot in the leg. Fixed him up, saw a Jap drawing a bead on me and he never quite finished-a burp gun got him. I thought it was my supply Sgt., Buck Moore. Then a darn machine gun down at the end of the perimeter started cutting up sand near us and we pulled the wounded over behind the tank destroyer and hit the dirt. Someone silenced that machine gun and my Sgt. and I took care of some other casualties. It is a kind of blur now, but there were dead Japs all over the place. I remember one was stabbed to death with his own bayonet down about 25 yards from where we were working. One of my Medics from 3rd Bn, who had brought in some wounded and was helping man a mortar that night, was killed. We had several wounded and about 4-5 KIA. Those Japs had walked down the beach from the river and went out in the ocean at low tide, walking up to our perimeter and came in from the ocean side, something that wasn't expected, but taught us a lesson. I don't believe any of them escaped, though. About 200 Japs were KIA. Things got right hairy there for a while for someone who hadn't had much contact with the enemy. After it was over, I dreamed about it for a while-even now a day, sometimes. I am sending this map to show what: [Here Dr. Deas drew a map of where the beach attack occurred, on the north coast of New Guinea near Aitape, slightly west of where the Driniumor River empties into the Pacific Ocean]. The Colonel (Colonel Edward M. Starr, Regimental Commander*) evidently saw me taking care of WIA and wrote me up for Silver Star. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Thomas M. Deas, M.D. According to Paul Tillery, the beach attack occurred on 17 July 1944. Explanatory comments added by Paul Webber are in square brackets. Transcribed by Paul M. Webber on 15 January 2002 Home Page: http://home.pcisys.net/~pwebber/31_id/rtw.htm