[Annotator's Note: The tape begins with the interviewee describing an attack on Mount Suribachi, Iwo Jima, Japan, by Vought F4U Corsairs and North American P-51 Mustang fighter aircraft.] William Wayne was born in September 1925 in Bridger, Montana. He later moved to Spokane, Washington. After his father died, he and his mother moved to Vandalia, Missouri where he finished high school and joined the Marine Corps. The Great Depression affected his family very much. His father had problems finding work as an interior decorator. Wayne liked living in Spokane and he knew Bing Crosby [Annotator's Note: Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby, American singer, comedian, actor] there. When he lived in Missouri, a family member told him of the attack on Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. He figured we would be going to war. He was 15 and knew he would eventually go. One of his friends went into the US Army Air Corps right away and was shot down in a B-17 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber] over Europe. He continued in high school and was drafted when he turned 18.

William Wayne was drafted and went to Fort Leonard Wood in Saint Louis [Annotator's Note: Saint Louis, Missouri] for his exams. Out of 10,000 men, he was one of six given a choice of the Army, Navy, or Marine Corps. He joined the Marine Corps. His cousin was a colonel who went through flight training with Joe Foss [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Major Joseph Jacob Foss; fighter ace; 20th Governor of South Dakota] and was asked to be a trainer. He was sworn in and had three weeks leave then he went to boot camp. He thought he could get away with not shaving one day and was forced to dry shave under the drill instructor's cot. After recovering from being wounded, he ran into his former drill instructor in Hawaii. Wayne was a platoon guide. He had never shot a rifle before. Most of his platoon went to the 5th Marine Division at Camp Pendleton [Annotator's Note: Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, San Diego County, California] where they stayed in tents. His first hike at Pendleton was in the hills and a lieutenant killed a big rattlesnake that had eaten a rat. Ralph "Pee Wee" Griffith was in Wayne's platoon in boot camp. They were wrestling one Sunday, and they knocked their tent down. They were just kids. One of the men in his platoon, Don Ruhl [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Private First Class Donald Jack Ruhl], eventually got the Congressional Medal of Honor [Annotator's Note: the highest award for valor in the US military]. Ruhl had a car and wanted to go see his father. One day, they got gas delivered instead of oil and Ruhl took the gas and went to Montana. He missed the boat to Hawaii. He later arrived and had to spend 30 days in the brig [Annotator's Note: naval military jail].

William Wayne left the United States for the first time and it was not scary, but it was different. They made their way to Hawaii. He saw snow on the mountains as they approached the big island. It was raining as they made their way to the camps by train. By the time they got there, they were dirty from the smoke and rain. They started training to take hills almost right away. They did not understand why until they got to Iwo Jima [Annotator's Note: Iwo Jima, Japan]. In Hawaii, they were walking along a big ditch once, looking for dud ammunition [Annotator's Note: munitions which failed to properly detonate]. A wild boar family came running out of a hole, scaring him. He was there for New Year's 1945 [Annotator's Note: 1 January 1945]. Lieutenant J.K. Wells [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps First Lieutenant John Keith Wells] took ten of the men up to a rest camp on Mauna Kea [Annotator's Note: Mauna Kea, Hawaii]. After training, they loaded ships. Wayne was driving a tractor on the docks taking a ride and got chewed out by a major. He was playing Pinochle [Annotator's Note: playing card game] one night, and Ruhl [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Private First Class Donald Jack Ruhl] was sleeping. The guard came by and told them to turn the lights out. Ruhl told him to come in and turn them out himself. The guard did. They got in trouble for that the next morning. They went by ship to Honolulu for a week and had some parties thrown for them. Once they were out in the middle of the ocean, they learned what was going to happen.

William Wayne went from Honolulu [Annotator's Note: Honolulu, Hawaii] to Saipan [Annotator's Note: Saipan, Mariana Islands] where they transferred to LSTs [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank]. They had one LST just for their company [Annotator's Note: Company E, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marine Regiment, 5th Marine Division]. The LST was not designed for that many. There was an LCM [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft, Mechanized] on top of the LST above the deck. Wayne's quarters were between the two ships and it was uncomfortable. It took six days to get to Iwo [Annotator's Note: Iwo Jima, Japan]. They saw the island and the LCI’s [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft, Infantry] rocketing the beach and they got into amphibious tractors [Annotator's Note: Landing Vehicle, Tracked or LVT; also known as alligators or amtracks] in the hold. They had only practiced on Higgins boats [Annotator's Note: landing craft vehicle, personnel or LCVP]. It was scary how the boats slammed in the water. They circled around for a couple of hours. Wayne was in the 11th wave in. They were nervous. Wayne and a friend started singing duets to relax the men. His amphibious tractor was the furthest on the left, next to Suribachi [Annotator's Note: Mount Suribachi]. He was worried but he did not think that he could get killed in the next few minutes. The amphibious tractor had a .30 [Annotator's Note: Browning M1919 .30 caliber machine gun] and a .60 caliber gun [Annotator's Note: Browning M2 .50 caliber machine gun]. Just as it hit the beach, bullets started ricocheting off the gun turrets. The driver of the tractor stopped them short in waist-deep water. They started up the beach and mortars were going up and down the beach. One mortar landed just four feet from Wayne's head.

William Wayne had joined the Marine Corps with John Shepperly who got shot through the arm landing on Iwo Jima, Japan. Shepperly was taken off but returned and later got shot through the ribs. They are still friends. They were told to go take over the lines from a battalion that had been shot up in the first waves and could hear bullets whistling past them. Wayne was maybe a third of the way across and he came across a pair of men's legs with no body. His platoon sergeant was in a bomb hole and Wayne jumped in right as he called out "landmine!". Wayne missed the mine. Two-thirds of the way across, he was sitting in a vegetable garden next to a bunker. They [Annotator's Note: the Japanese] started shooting out of the bunker. Ruhl [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Private First Class Donald Jack Ruhl] ran up on top and dropped a hand grenade in a hole. A grenade came out but Ruhl got out of the way. They took the lines for the night. It was scary. Three of them were in a shallow hole. Some battalions were given brandy in medicine bottles. Wayne had a BAR [Annotator's Note: Browning Automatic Rifle] and an extra ammunition pocket in his belt where he had his brandy. The three of them would sip it to calm their nerves. An ammunition dump got hit in front of them and it was like fireworks for most of the night. One guy would stay awake and the other two would sleep. One guy was wounded that night.

On his second day on Iwo Jima, Japan, William Wayne and his unit [Annotator's Note: Company E, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marine Regiment, 5th Marine Division] were going through deep ditches, tank traps. There was a guy sitting there with a big box handing out cigarettes. He was from the Salvation Army and he gave cards with the cigarettes that said who donated them. Ruhl [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Private First Class Donald Jack Ruhl] got a box of K-rations [Annotator's Note: individual daily combat food ration consisting of three boxed meals]. They crossed the island and took over the front lines facing Suribachi [Annotator's Note: Mount Suribachi], about three or four hundred yards away. There was a tank there. Wayne saw a mortar shell land four feet or so, from him. They ran barbed wire on their lines. There was a gun emplacement. Wells [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps First Lieutenant John Keith Wells], asked for volunteers to sleep there to guard against the Japanese coming back. Ruhl volunteered and went into one of the tunnels. He found blankets for the men and a kitten as well. The next morning, they pulled the barbed wire back and started forward. Wayne was behind a little knoll next to a guy from another battalion. There were four men on a machine gun and another friend from boot camp. Wayne got shot through the top of the helmet there. The man next to him had his face shot off and died as did the men on the gun. Wayne and his friend jumped into a hole. Wayne's BAR [Annotator's Note: Browning Automatic Rifle] was jamming so he took an M1 rifle [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1 semi-automatic rifle, also known as the M1 Garand] from another man. He was cleaning it when a mortar shell landed in the hole. All of them were hit. Wayne jumped out and laid on a bunker. He was lying beside Ruhl, who had jumped on a hand grenade that killed him. His head was under his back. The platoon corpsman, John Bradley, came to patch up Wayne. The mortar had blown the seat of his pants off. Wayne could hardly walk. He still has seven pieces of shrapnel in his hip.

William Wayne ran into a corpsman who was sitting with a guy who was wounded in the stomach. Wayne told them they could not just sit there and got some stretcher bearers to take him back. Wayne made it to the aid station next to a man who was holding a Samurai sword. The man had been attacked with it and had grabbed it with his hands, took it from the Japanese and killed him with it. An amphibious tractor [Annotator's Note: Landing Vehicle, Tracked or LVT; also known as alligator or amtrack] was brought up and the wounded men were put on it and taken out into the water to a barge where doctors were operating. Wayne was taken to a ship and had to climb a landing net up the side. The other man would not let go of the sword there. Wayne held the sword while his hands were sewn up. Wayne stayed on board the ship for two weeks. Every day the doctor would pull more shrapnel out of him. He was to be sent to a hospital on the island. They gave him new clothes and an old rifle. He was then put on another ship to Saipan [Annotator's Note: Saipan, Mariana Islands] that had some Japanese prisoners on it. He went to a Navy hospital. A man from his unit [Annotator's Note: Company E, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marine Regiment, 5th Marine Division] was in the bed next to his. He got to take a shower after three days. There were two Japanese women watching him shower. Wayne was sent to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii]. His friend Lavelle [Annotator's Note: unable to verify identity] had been flown there. They were in the hospital there for three or four weeks. John Bradley [Annotator's Note: US Navy Pharmacist's Mate 2nd Class John Henry Bradley, known as "Jack" or "Doc"] was there, and he went out on the seventh Bond Selling Tour [Annotator's Note: Bond Tours; elaborate shows put on to raise money for the war effort in the United States].

William Wayne got out of the hospital and was in the Marine Transit Center in Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii] waiting to get back to his company [Annotator's Note: Company E, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marine Regiment, 5th Marine Division] when President Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] died. He was put on garbage detail. He got on a ship and won 200 dollars playing poker. He got back to the company and there were a lot of replacements. This was at Camp Tarawa [Annotator's Note: Hawaii, Hawaii]. Dave Severance [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Colonel Dave E. Severance], the company commander, gave him a five day leave. He stayed at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel for the leave. He was in downtown Honolulu going to have a drink. Three sailors from a submarine tender were there and an older guy bought all of them drinks. They went all around town and the man bought all of their drinks that day. He then went back to training. He was a fire team leader. They were on maneuvers in Hawaii when it was announced that the Japanese had surrendered [Annotator's Note: 14 August 1945]. Wayne was still training. When they came back to camp, the press was there.

William Wayne and his unit [Annotator's Note: Company E, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marine Regiment, 5th Marine Division] packed up and loaded ships to Japan. They went into Sasebo [Annotator's Note: Sasebo, Japan] as the first Americans there. The town was empty except for very old people. They were nervous about being there. They had to sleep in a warehouse on the docks the first few nights. Rats would run across them in the night. They then went to Fukuoka [Annotator's Note: Fukuoka, Japan] which was bombed out. There was a Catholic Church that had not been hit. He and 11 others went to an aircraft factory for guard duty. The Japanese firemen were on duty there and they became good friends. The head fireman gave Wayne a package that contained a large Japanese flag. He went to Kumamoto [Annotator's Note: Kumamoto, Japan] where the camp caught fire and burned. He stayed there for about seven months. He made several Japanese friends. He was riding in a rickshaw one day and saw a woman with a fur coat and pressed pants. He made a date with her but could not get liberty to go. He went to look for her the next day and found her and her family. He brought sake and she heated it and made food. Her son played the piano for them. He had a good time. Her husband was in the Japanese Army in China. He also met a chef who was being harassed by a Japanese-American guy. Wayne ran the guy off and he and the chef became friends. They had dinners together. When Wayne said he was leaving for the Unted States, the chef cried. Wayne returned to San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California]. A seagull left Sasebo with them and followed them all the way to San Diego. A whale followed them for one whole day. Wayne was discharged out of San Diego. The 5th Marine Division disbanded [Annotator's Note: 23 January 1946] and Wayne went into the 2nd Marine Division. His platoon sergeant had been a friend of another soldier Wayne was friends with. They became good friends. Wayne was still a PFC [Annotator's Note: Private First Class] and was second up for corporal in his battalion. He made corporal easy.

William Wayne has two bad memories of Iwo [Annotator's Note: Iwo Jima, Japan]. The first was going across open land and having bullets whiz around and guys getting killed. The very worst was the third morning when the guy next to him was killed, the four guys on the machine were killed, and seeing Ruhl's [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Private First Class Donald Jack Ruhl] head under his back due to his broken neck. That was the goriest thing he had ever seen. There were some guys who were resentful of the Japanese. There were some Japanese who were resentful of the Americans. In Kumamoto [Annotator's Note: Kumamoto, Japan], there were around 90 people pulled out of the river during his time there. They had been beaten, some Marines, but mostly Japanese. Wayne never had any trouble with them. There was a dance place there. Wayne became friends with one girl there. The morning he was leaving there, he caught a train at six o'clock in the morning and that girl came to wave goodbye. Wayne had no real bad feelings about them and found it easy to make friends.

William Wayne says that Iwo Jima, Japan is shaped like a shoe. The part he was on was deep, thick, volcanic ash that was hard to run in. When they landed on the beach, he would just wiggle down into the ash when being mortared. He never got into the brush of the north end of the island because he was wounded and taken off. There were never any banzai charges while he was there. Lieutenant Wells [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps First Lieutenant John Keith Wells] was a fighter. He was wounded worse than Wayne was, but he volunteered to go to Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan]. He was a good leader and was right in the front. He did not push from the back. Wayne got promoted to PFC [Annotator's Note: Private First Class] but was never told about it. He did not get along with his platoon sergeant, Thomas, who had been a drill instructor at Parris Island [Annotator's Note: Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, Port Royal, South Carolina]. He treated Wayne like he was in boot camp, and Wayne did not like it. They never became close. There was a lot of rubble on the beach. The night before Wayne landed on Iwo Jima, Tokyo Rose [Annotator's Note: nickname for all female, English-speaking radio broadcasters of Japanese propaganda during World War 2] had told them all to go home. Severance [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Colonel Dave E. Severance] was very formal, and Wayne had little to do with him. He got chewed out by him one time. Wayne respected him. Wayne was on guard duty in Hawaii when Colonel Liversedge [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Brigadier General Harry Bluett Liversedge] came by and patted him on the shoulder. He thought he was a neat guy. Wayne was also a good friend of Lindberg [Annotator's Note: Charles W. Lindberg], a tough guy and strong as a bull.

William Wayne says Bradley [Annotator's Note: US Navy Pharmacist's Mate 2nd Class John Henry Bradley, known as “Jack” or “Doc”] was a really cool guy. A lot of corpsmen would flip out because they could not stand the pressure of seeing your friends shot up and killed. Bradley was calm and collected about it and was kind of a father figure to younger guys. They were good friends. Ira Hays [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Corporal Ira Hamilton Hayes] was not what you would expect. The night before they left Pendleton [Annotator's Note: Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, San Diego County, California] for Hawaii, they had a few beers. Sometimes, American Indians had a hard time with getting mean when they got drunk. Hayes did not like a lot of publicity. Wayne did not know Mike Strank [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Sergeant Michael Strank] well. He was a tough guy and stronger than a horse. Wayne did not know Franklin Sousely [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Private First Class Franklin Runyon Sousley] well. He was nice and quiet and from a good family. Gagnon [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Corporal René Arthur Gagnon] was in their company [Annotator's Note: Company E, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marine Regiment, 5th Marine Division] and not doing well so he was put into Headquarters Company. He just happened to up there, luckiest break in his life. Harlon Block [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Corporal Harlon Henry Block] was a friend of Strank's. Wayne was a kid compared to them and they did not spend a lot of time together. Henry Hansen [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Sergeant Henry Oliver "Hank" Hansen; raised the first flag on Iwo Jima] was a very nice guy and never wore a helmet. Neither did their battalion commander. Colonel Johnson [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Chandler W. Johnson] got hit with a mortar right on top of the head and it blew him apart. He was a fighter. Wayne had gone to sick bay one day and went to the recreation room to play cards. Johnson came in to give a guy a court-martial and Wayne hid behind a couch cushion.