Delilah Endicott

George Endicott was a U.S. Marine killed at Iwo Jima.  He wasn’t the only Endicott at Iwo Jima, although he probably didn’t know that.  William O. Endicott (see below) was also there, as a sailor who helped bring the Marines to Iwo. 

  

          George’s descent from Governor John Endecott is as follows:

 

1.    Gov John

2.    Zerubbable

3.    Joseph

4.    Joseph

5.    Joseph

6.    Joseph

7.    William H.

8.    William A.

9.    George Washington

10.George M. 

11.George William

 

          George’s military records obtained from the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis Missouri, show that his parents were Verna and George M. Endicott and that George was born at Richland Center, Wisconsin.   But the family lived for a time in Winona Lake, Indiana, before moving to Evanston, Illinois, which George listed as his home address when he enlisted.  He enlisted in Chicago, Illinois.   Prior to enlistment, he was a carpenter and worked for his father for 8 years.   

 

          George was not only a high school graduate, he had had two years of college and his area of specialization was “math.” 

 

          His enlistment physical exam was on September 21, 1942 and records from it show him to have been 5’ 9 1/2 inches tall, weighed 160 pounds and have blue eyes (which were 20:20), light brown hair and a “ruddy” complexion.  The enlistment document says that “I, George William Endicott … enlist in the United State Marine Corps Reserve for the DURATION OF THE NATIONAL EMERGENCY…”  The records also show a photo of George taken September 28, 1942.

 

          He was assigned service number 466154. 

 

          Shortly after enlistment, George was sent to the Communication School of the Signal Battalion on the Marine Corps base in San Diego, California, where he took a course to become a radio operator from November 28, 1942 to February 19, 1943.  His certificate upon passing the course lists his “final average marking at 76.8.  It says that “Average sending and receiving mark counts 50% in computation of final average,” and since his marks in “Radio Operating Procedure, “Field Work,” “Material,” and “General Communications” were all 85 or above, his average sending and receiving marks must have been 65.5 – considerably lower. 

 

          George may have had some distraction while he was out in California, though, because records show that the day after he entered radio operator’s school, he got married to Isabelle Iona Nordberg, age 19.  Their County of San Diego marriage license, dated November 28, 1942, the same day he entered the school, shows her to be a native of Minnesota, but at that time a resident of Bellingham, Washington.  The marriage itself occurred one day later, on November 29. 

 

          How they met or how she came to be in California when George was there is not known.  Her address after the marriage was listed as Hotel Colin, San Diego. 

 

          The marriage set off a flurry of correspondence between Isabelle and the Marine Corps in order to get her listed as George’s dependent and receive dependents’ benefits.  During this correspondence, Isabelle’s address was listed as 911 Gaffield Place, Evanston, Illinois – the home of George’s parents. 

 

          On June 9, 1943 she finally got a letter stating that she would start getting checks retroactive to January of that year.   

 

          Although Isabelle probably didn’t realize its significance, the signature on the notification letter to her is “Joephus Daniels, Jr. Captain, U.S. Marine Corps.” This is interesting because he was the son of Josephus Daniels, Sr, the Secretary of the Navy from 1913- 1921, when Franklin Roosevelt was Assistant Secretary of the Navy under him.  And when he was President, FDR appointed Josephus Daniels, Sr. Ambassador to Mexico, in which post he served from 1933-1944 – in other words, during the time this letter was written.  

 

          Furthermore, one of his other sons, Jonathan Worth Daniels, became a special assistant to FDR and served from 1942-45.  In 1954 and 1968, Jonathan published two tell-all accounts of Washington life, for the first time revealing publicly the FDR-Lucy Mercer affair. 

 

          The next thing we see in George’s file is that he was promoted to PFC on March 24, 1943.  And then on September 16, 1943, there is a certificate of birth for a baby daughter, Mary Margaret Endicott.  

 

          Curiously, in box 22 of the birth certificate it asks “What treatment was given child’s eyes at birth:” And “20% Argyrol” is typed in.  What is Argyrol?  Well, it turns out that Argyrol was developed as a preventative of gonorrheal blindness in newborn infants.  It is infrequently prescribed today, but it was widely used in the first half of the 20th century.

 

          Anyway, the addition of the baby and the fact that Isabelle moved back to Bellingham, Washington, made sure that it would take a while and more correspondence before the Marine Corps was able to add benefits for the baby, as well.

 

          George got promoted to Corporal on September 29, 1943 and by March 8, 1944 was assigned to the 1st Corps Medium Tank Battalion, Company “A.”  

 

          Then, ominously on December 19, 1944, George’s name appears on a list of 38 names that has the following on it: “ In accordance with the authority of reference (a), the special communication warrants of the below listed men are revoked and warrants for “Line Duty” are hereby issued…”  In other words, George was going into the thick of the war. 

 

          To find out what happened next  you have to know something about the battles of Guam and Iwo Jima,  read the “3rd Tank Battalion Action Report” for Iwo Jima, and read a few other documents in George’s personnel file.  

 

George Endicott on Guam

 

          George participated in what is known as the second battle of Guam, the first battle being when the Japanese captured it on December 11, 1941 in the opening phase of WWII. 

 

          The second battle occurred from July 21- August 8, 1944 when 36, 000 U.S. Marines and U.S. Army soldiers defeated 22,000 Japanese Army and Special Naval Landing force troops, killing 18,040 of them while suffering 1,747 dead of their own.

 

          As with so many other amphibious landings in the Pacific, the U.S. objective was to secure the island’s airfield as a base for U.S. air attacks on the rest of the Japanese empire.  

 

          George’s service records show that on July 21,1944, as part of the Southern Troops and Landing Force, he landed on the western beaches of Guam in the vicinity of Asan Point. 

 

          During the initial landing, despite strong Japanese artillery, by 0900 many U.S. tanks were ashore.  The Japanese made counter-attacks throughout the first few days of the battle, mostly at night in suicidal charges, but were repulsed with great loss. 

 

          On one mission, George’s A company participated in a strong motorized reconnaissance column that was ordered to advance as far as possible toward the north cape of the island.  The patrol was ambushed by a battalion of enemy infantry, supported by 75 mm guns and light tanks and had to retreat.  Later that night two Japanese type 97 tanks came down the road, sprayed machine gun fire around to no effect, and promptly left the scene unharmed.

 

          After twenty days of savage fighting, U.S.  divisional units reached the northern coast of the island and on August 10, 1944, Guam was declared secure.  After that, George participated in “patrols against stragglers on Guam during the period 16 August to 4 November 44.”  In fact, the last Japanese soldier to surrender on Guam didn’t do it until January 24, 1972, 27 years later!

          

          After the Guam was declared secure, it was turned into an allied base.  Five large airfields were built by the Seabees, and B-29 bombers flew from Guam to attack targets in the Western Pacific and on mainland Japan, one of those targets being the island of Iwo Jima.

 

          Of George’s company, a Marine Corps Tankers’ Association publication said:

 

          Their crew was a perfectly coordinated crew of very efficient, well trained         and disciplined Marines, the best ever to man a battle tank.  Among their          achievements were a rising sun painted on their turret, plus some other     insignia for their effort. The rising sun indicated an enemy tank they    knocked out while on reconnaissance patrol.

 

About Iwo Jima

 

          Iwo Jima means “sulphur island” in Japanese.  It is small island out in the middle of nowhere in the Pacific Ocean, 750 miles from Tokyo.  It is about 5 miles long and 2 miles wide at the widest point.   It looks like a pork chop with the narrow end pointing south and right.  At the tip of the thin end of the pork chop is 528-foot high Mount Suribachi, scene of the famous Marine Corps flag raising event photographed by Joe Rosenthal.  The island is noted for its loose, course, black volcanic sand which is hard to run in -- and hard for tanks to maneuver in.

 

          The U.S. wanted the island for several reasons.  First, the Japanese were using it as an early warning station to warn the Japanese mainland about incoming U.S. bombing raids and the U. S. wanted to stop that.  Secondly, the U.S. wanted it as a way station for airplanes to be able to refuel on the way to and from raids on Japan.  There were two completed airfields on Iwo Jima and a third one was under construction.   And thirdly, the U.S. wanted Iwo Jima as a possible base for invading the main islands of Japan. 

 

          Iwo Jima was the first land mass that the U.S. invaded that was actually a part of Japan proper, so both the U.S. and the Japanese knew it would be defended fiercely. 

 

          By this time in the war, the Japanese military knew they were losing and hoped only that if they fought hard enough and killed enough Americans before they, too, died, then maybe the American public would grow so sick of the war that they would demand some kind of negotiated truce and Japan could save face.  

          

          The Japanese idea at Iwo Jima was simply to drag out the battle as long as possible, make the Marines pay as dearly for it as possible, and play for time to help bring about the negotiated truce.

 

          Japanese tactics had always called for a no surrender policy; troops were expected to fight to the death and if they could not manage to be killed at their posts, they were supposed to commit suicide.  That is why there were so few Japanese prisoners taken in World War II.   

          

          In the early part of the war, when it looked as though the jig was up for a Japanese unit, the tactic was to launch a furious, last-ditch  “banzai” charge.  But by 1945 it was evident that these never worked and simply ended in slaughter for the Japanese troops.

 

          So, Lieutenant General Tadamishi Kuribayshi, the Japanese general in charge of the defense of Iwo Jima, decided on a different idea.  He knew that his garrison was doomed but he reasoned that by placing his men in well camouflaged caves and concrete bunkers all around the island, they would be harder to root out, could  jump out to ambush the Marines (especially at night), and generally drag out the defense of the island.  As someone once said, “The Japanese were not on Iwo Jima, they were in Iwo Jima.” 

          

          And General Kuribayashi knew one other important thing,: he had about a year to get ready for any invasion.  So by February 19, 1945, when the Marine attack finally came, he and his men were extremely well prepared for it.

 

          The result was the costliest battle in Marine Corps history.  It was like the opening scene of the movie  “Saving Private Ryan” except that it went on for 5 weeks straight.  Someone said it was like “throwing human flesh at concrete.”  For the first time, the Marines suffered more casualties than the Japanese (although not more deaths; most of the 21,000 Japanese casualties were deaths, while most of the Marine casualties were woundings).  Close to 40% of all the Marines engaged in the battle were killed or wounded.   Of all the Medals of Honor awarded to Marines in WW II, one quarter of them were awarded at Iwo Jima.  Iwo Jima is thus the iconic Marine Corps battle of all time, replacing Belleau Wood from WWI (see Frank James Endicott, above).  

 

George Goes to Iwo Jima

 

          Into this death trap came George Endicott along with more than 70,000 other Marines from the 3rd, 4th and 5th Marine Divisions – one half of the entire Marine Corps (there were 6 Marine Divisions in WWII).

 

          George left for Iwo Jima with the 3rd Tank Battalion, 3rd Marine Division from Guam aboard LST 477, which was hit by a Japanese kamikaze plane and damaged enough so it could not unload its tanks on February 23 as it was scheduled to do with the rest of the battalion.  But it was able to unload them on the 24th.  

 

          By this time, the famous flag raising had taken place on Mount Suribachi (it had happened on the 23rd) on the southern end of the island and the airfield closest to it, “Motoyama Airfield No 1,” had been taken.  Now the objective was to launch an attack from Airfield No 1 to capture Airfield No 2.

 

          That attack was scheduled for February 25 and it was to be led by George’s tanks ahead of the infantry.

 

Marine Tanks Attack

 

          According to Patrick Mooney, a researcher at the US Marine Corps Museum, George crewed an M4A2 Sherman tank.  This was a little unusual since “most of the tanks (two out of three battalions) had M4A3s which they received in Hawaii, where they trained.  The M4A3 was fueled by gas, while the M4A2s were fueled by diesel (much preferred by tankers, since they don't ignite and have fuel fires.)”

 

The Action Report of the 3rd Tank Battalion says that 13 out of its 45 tanks had E4-5 mechanized flamethrowers on them in place of the bow machine gun.  But the Action Report also says that on February 25 only “11 tanks were sent in support of 2nd Bn, 9th Marines in attack across SW end of Airfield No. 2,” and we don’t know whether George’s tank had a flamethrower or not, although Mooney thinks not, for reasons explained in a minute.

 

          Mooney continues:  

 

George was trained as a Radio Operator, which means he sat on the right side of the bow, behind the hull machine gun and was responsible for the
 radio as well as using the hull machine gun.  This is also the position from
 which the E4-5 Flame Gun would have been operated.” 

 

          The Action Report goes on to say that the attack started at 0800 and:

 

                    Targets of opportunity were engaged.  Four inoperative tanks were             repaired and sent to join the others.  The heavy fires encountered           resulted in: two tanks being burned up; 1 bogged down in lose sand,           broke a track, and was  temporarily abandoned; 5 others had to                           withdraw, all of which had received hits on the suspension system.  

                    

1 had a punctured radiator also.  Flamethrowers mounted in tanks proved invaluable against pillboxes which are in defilade from our flat trajectory fire.

 

          Unfortunately, as you can see, the Japanese were ready for the tanks with 1,250 men from the Japanese 8th- 12th Independent Antitank Battalions scattered about the island and they blasted the Marines badly.  Around 3 pm, George’s tank was hit by an anti-tank gun.  Mooney believes the gun was fired about 200 yards north of the middle of Motoyama Airfield number 2 as George’s tank was approaching from the southwest.  

 

          It wasn’t until 3 days later, though, that the Marines were able to get to George’s tank and determine what happened.  The notation on the Certificate of Death for George W. Endicott states it pretty graphically:

          

                    Tank in which patient was a member of the crew received many

                    hits from a 47 mm AT gun on 2-25-45 at 1500.

 

2-28-45.  Body was removed from the area surrounding the tank.

                    Evidently, man somehow removed himself from the inside of

                    the tank.  Examination of the body revealed partial traumatic                               amputation of right leg.  Body bloated.

 

          In other words, George had probably suffered terribly.  He had been hit inside the tank and his leg was almost torn off.  Then, somehow he had gotten himself out of the tank, presumably in excruciating pain, and died on the ground beside the tank. 

 

          Mooney believes this description means that George was not in a flamethrower tank:

 

I do not think he was in a flame tank, as a hit that took off his leg would've ignited the fuel stored around him.  
 

Amazingly, Mooney believes he also has an actual photo of George’s tank after the battle. 


Here’s why Mooney thinks this is the right tank:

 

Each company named their tanks after the company
 letter - A, B, C. In looking at the action of 25 Feb, A/3rd Tanks
 supported 9th Marines, who took over from 21st Marines.  A Co lost 9 Tanks destroyed by a variety of means, i.e. mortars, field artillery and 3 of those were by 47mm AT Tank guns.  
 
 I have found photos of two of the three tanks.  The one I am leaning toward was "A for Agony" {George was in A company – ed] with two photos and one video of the tank after the battle.  With more research, I can confirm it...I am at 80% certainty now. One of the most compelling things is the location of hits taken by the tank that would seriously wound the radio operator/bow gunner in the legs.

 

Next of kin

          

From his personnel file it looks as though George’s death was not recorded on a USMC Casualty Card until March 16, more than two weeks after he was killed.  The next day the following telegram was sent to Isabelle: 

 

TELEGRAM

 

FROM: COMMANDANT OF THE MARINE CORPS

TO: MRS. GEORGE W. ENDICOTT (WIFE)

       BOX 302

       WINONA LAKE INDIANA

 

DEEPLY REGRET TO INFORM YOU THAT YOUR 

 

Relationship

Rank-Name

Classification   HUSBAND CORPORAL GEORGE W ENDICOTT USMCR

 

WAS KILLED IN ACTION 

 

(Date-Location)

25 FEBRUARY 1945 AT IWO JIMA VOLCANO ISLANDS

 

IN THE PERFORMANCE OF HIS DUTY AND SERVICE OF HIS COUNTRY.  WHEN INFORMATION IS RECEIVED REGARDING BURIAL YOU WILL BE NOTIFIED.  TO PREVENT POSSIBLE AID TO OUR ENEMIES DO NOT DIVULGE THE NAME OF HIS SHIP IR STATION.  PLEASE ACCEPT MY HEARFELT SYMPATHY.  LETTER FOLLOWS.

 

RELASED BY: M.G. CRAIG

 

             DATE:  17 MARCH 1945                  A.A..VANDEGRIFT

                                                                      LIEUT GENERAL USMC

                                                  COMMANDANT OF THE MARINE CORPS

 

          From then on much of the file concerns the correspondence between Isabelle and the Marine Corps about what to do with George’s body, returning his personal items, and paying her the $10,000 government life insurance policy ($10,000 is worth about $110,000 today).  Some of the Marine Corps correspondence to Isabelle was signed by the same Captain Josephus Daniels who had first written her two years earlier.  

 

          But one interesting document is the partly illegible handwritten letter of condolence from George’s commanding officer to Isabelle on April 5, 1945 giving his personal account of what happened to George and trying to console her:

 

                                                            5 April, 1945

                    Dear Mrs. Endicott,

          

                    By the time you receive this letter you will already have

                    received official notification from the Navy Department,

                    that your husband was killed in action, as this letter will

                    be held by Headquarters, Marine Corps until such time.

 

                    Corporal Endicott was killed in action, during the battle 

                    for Iwo Jima, by enemy rifle fire.  It will no doubt be

                    of some comfort to you to know that his death was

                    instantaneous and that no suffering was involved.

 

                    Allow me, as your husband’s commanding officer, to

                    attempt to convey to you a few words of condolence

                    during your time of sorrow.

          

                    Memories of ------will always ------ in the minds of his

                    many friends, and may I assure you that we, his

                    comrades will never forget the great sacrifice made by

                    Corporal Endicott.  His spirit will go with us in our

                    future battles and be in our hearts and the hearts of

                    his countrymen throughout our lives.  

 

                    May I extend to you on behalf of the officers and men

                    of the company, our deepest sympathy for your loss.

                    which  is -----and which we share with you.

 

                                                  Very Sincerely Yours,

 

                                                  Captain William --   ------

                                                  U.S.M.C.R.

 

          You can see that this letter’s description of what happened to George does not exactly comport with the account in the Certificate of Death.  That account describes a very painful death with a lot of suffering, while this one claims the opposite.  One tends to think, therefore, that this letter was a falsification of the facts in order to spare the grieving widow the awful truth.  But the letter does add the detail that George was killed by rifle fire.   In other words, as he got out of the tank with his leg wound, Japanese soldiers shot him. 

 

          The rest is quickly told.  George was buried in a temporary Marine Corps graveyard on Iwo Jima.  He would be one of 23  3rd Tank Battalion enlisted men killed on Iwo Jima.  Two others died of wounds after the battle and 8 officers and 85 enlisted men were wounded.   But the 3rd Tank Battalion went on to complete its mission of securing the center sector of the island in the gap that developed between the 4th and 5th Marine Divisions.  (After capturing Mount Suribachi, the 5th Marine Division clawed its way up the left, or west, side of the island; the 4th Marine Division slugged its way up the right side and a gap developed between the two.)

 

           The Japanese had concentrated their strongest forces in this area and the 3rd Marine Division encountered a most heavily fortified portion of the island in their move to take Airfield No. 2 and the rest of the island in their operational area.  Frontal assault was used to gain each inch of ground.  By nightfall on March 9, the 3rd division reached the island's northeastern beach.

 

          Finally on March 26, following a banzai attack against troops and air corps personnel near the beaches, the island was declared secure. The U.S. Army's 147th Infantry regiment assumed ground control of the island on April 4, relieving the largest body of Marines committed in combat in one operation during World War II.

 

          Records show that later Isabelle requested that George be moved to the “Punch Bowl,” the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii but this was not done until January 25, 1949. 

 

          One of the last documents in the file is a letter from Isabelle to the Marine Corps on December 11, 1947, in which she says:
 
 

          “…If it is possible I would like to have the flag that was used for the     military funeral service sent to his parents, Mr. and Mrs. George M.           Endicott, Winona Lake, Indiana; however I would like to be informed as to        the location of the grave, plot, row and grave number so my little girl and I       may visit it in the future.

 

          George’s cemetery ID number is 00466154, and his grave is Plot C, and Grave number is 883.

 

          Today, on the cemetery records, available on line, George’s name has an asterisk next to it, meaning that the record “has not been verified as accurate by the Veterans’ Administration.”  This apparently has to do with the controversy involving a number of graves at Arlington National Cemetery that were found to not contain who they were supposed to contain, thus triggering an investigation into many graves at Arlington, and apparently at other places, as well.  

 

Father…George Muller Endicott Dec 10 1892- Jan 26 1976

Mother  Verna May Jacoby  Dec 26 1894 – Feb 4 1957

Sources:

1.     Casualty Card, US Marine Corps History Division, Quantico, Virginia

2.     Service records from National Personnel Records Center, St. Louis, Missouri. 

3.     3rd Tank Battalion Action Report

4.     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M4_Sherman

5.     http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-M-IwoJima/USMC-M-IwoJima-VI.html

6.     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Guam_(1944)

7.     Marine tank battles in the Pacific By Oscar E. Gilbert

8.     Email correspondence with Patrick Mooney on April 10, 2019

9.     https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/116462174/george-william-endicott

10. https://www.fold3.com/record/643066336/george-william-endiccott-us-marine-corps-casualty-indexes

11. https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/M7LQ-GJG