Jim McEnery - Hell in the Pacific: A Marine Rifleman’s Journey From Guadalcanal to Peleliu

A MARINE RIFLEMANS VIVID, BRUTALLY CANDID
MEMOIR OF LIFE AND DEATH ON THE
FRONT LINES OF WORLD WAR II IN THE PACIFIC

In a letter to Jim McEnery penned in 1981, the late Eugene Sledge, author of With the Old Breed at Peleliu and Okinawa, wrote: With profound admiration for one of the best Marines and bravest NCOs I ever saw under fire. It was guys like you, Jim, that acted as an example to some of us boots and kept us going when things got rough.

PRAISE FOR BILL SLOAN

Sloan is a master of that narrative genre at least as old as the Iliad, the combat narrative.

BILL MARVEL, THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS

In what may be the last memoir to be published by a living veteran of the pivotal invasion of Guadalcanal, which occurred almost seventy years ago, Marine Jim McEnery has teamed up with author Bill Sloan to create an unforgettable chronicle of heroism and horror.

McENERYS RIFLE COMPANY the legendary K/3/5 of the First Marine Division, made famous by the HBO miniseries The Pacific fought in some of the most ferocious battles of the war. In searing detail, the author takes us back to Guadalcanal, where American forces first turned the tide against the Japanese; Cape Gloucester, where 1,300 Marines were killed or wounded; and bloody Peleliu, where McEnery assumed command of the company and helped hasten the final defeat of the Japanese garrison after weeks of torturous cave-to-cave fighting.

McEnerys story is a no-holds-barred, grunts-eye view of the sacrifices, suffering, and raw courage of the men in the foxholes, locked in mortal combat with an implacable enemy sworn to fight to the death. From bayonet charges and hand-to-hand combat to midnight banzai attacks and the loss of close buddies, the rifle squad leader spares no details, chronicling his odyssey from boot camp through twenty-eight months of hellish combat until his eventual return home. He has given us an unforgettable portrait of men at war.

JIM McENERY, born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, enlisted in the Marines in 1940 and fought in three major campaigns in the Pacific. He lives in Ocala, Florida, with his wife, Gertrude.

BILL SLOAN is the acclaimed author of more than a dozen books, including Undefeated, Brotherhood of Heroes, and The Ultimate Battle. He lives in Dallas, Texas.

MEET THE AUTHORS, WATCH VIDEOS AND MORE AT

SimonandSchuster.com

THE SOURCE FOR READING GROUPS

JACKET DESIGN BY TOM McKEVENY
JACKET PHOTOGRAPH BY AP PHOTO/J. SCOTT APPLEWHITE
COPYRIGHT 2012 SIMON & SCHUSTER

ALSO BY BILL SLOAN

Undefeated: Americas Heroic Fight for Bataan and Corregidor

The Darkest Summer: Pusan and Inchon 1950
The Battles That Saved South Korea
and the Marinesfrom Extinction

The Ultimate Battle: Okinawa 1945
The Last Epic Struggle of World War II

Brotherhood of Heroes: The Marines at Peleliu, 1944
The Bloodiest Battle of the Pacific War

Given Up for Dead: Americas Heroic Stand at Wake Island

JFK: Breaking the Silence

JFK: The Last Dissenting Witness

Elvis, Hank, and Me: Making Musical History
on the Louisiana Hayride (with Horace Logan)

The Other Assassin (fiction)

The Mafia Candidate (fiction)

Thank you for purchasing this Simon & Schuster eBook.

Sign up for our newsletter and receive special offers, access to bonus content, and info on the latest new releases and other great eBooks from Simon & Schuster.

or visit us online to sign up at
eBookNews.SimonandSchuster.com

Simon & Schuster
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
www.SimonandSchuster.com

Copyright 2012 by Jim McEnery and Bill Sloan

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Simon & Schuster Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition June 2012

SIMON & SCHUSTER and colophon are registered trademarks
of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your live event. For more information or to book an event, contact the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau at 1-866-248-3049 or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com .

Designed by Ruth Lee-Mui Maps by Paul Pugliese

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McEnery, Jim.

Hell in the Pacific : a Marine riflemans journey from Guadalcanal to Peleliu / by Jim McEnery with Bill Sloan.First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition.

p. cm.

Includes index.

1. McEnery, Jim. 2. World War, 19391945CampaignsPacific Area. 3. World War, 19391945Personal narratives, American. 4. United States. Marine Corps Biography. 5. MarinesUnited StatesBiography. I. Sloan, Bill. II. Title.

D767.9.M393 2012

940.545973092dc23

[B] 2011052985

ISBN 978-1-4516-5913-9
ISBN 978-1-4516-5915-3 (ebook)

I wish to give heartfelt thanks to my wonderful family
my wife, Gertrude McEnery; our daughter, Karen; and our grandsons, Brendan and Erik Cummins
and also to my coauthor, Bill Sloan, a true and special friend, >without whose knowledgeable help this book might not have been completed.

I T WAS ABOUT 8:30 AM, August 7, 1942, when I got my first good look at the island where we were going. To me, it seemed pretty much like every other island Id seen in the Pacific during the two months Id been there: white sand beaches framed by clusters of dark green palm trees, with dense jungle undergrowth just behind and blue-green hills rising up in the distance.

But this island was different, and every one of us knew it. This one was supposed to be crawling with Japs, all of them itching to blow us to hell.

We were bound for a section of shoreline designated as Beach Red. We didnt care much for that name. It made us think of bloodour blood.

Until our officers and senior NCOs started drumming how dangerous this place was into our heads, the name of the island hadnt meant a damned thing to me or any of the other guys in my platoon. I doubted if anybody back in the States had ever even heard of it.

Just for the record, it was called Guadalcanal.

The brass had warned everybody to expect the worst. They said some of us who were climbing down the cargo nets on the side of the troopship and trying to keep from stepping on each others hands as we boarded our Higgins boats were going to get killed today. The letter wed received from Colonel LeRoy P. Hunt, our regimental commander, had tried to be reassuring, but it didnt quite make it.