The Camp Opens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

The First Graduates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Expansion Looms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

CHAPTER 2. THE 51st DEFENSE BATTALION . . . . . . . . . . 15

The First Combat Unit. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Overseas Duty. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

On to the Marshalls. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Home Again . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

CHAPTER 3. THE 52d DEFENSE BATTALION. . . . . . . . . . . 23

First to the Marshalls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Forward to Guam. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Postwar Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

CHAPTER 4. DEPOT AND AMMUNITION COMPANIES . . . . . . . . 29

Into Service Overseas. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Combat in the Marianas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Combat on Peleliu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Combat on Iwo Jima . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Combat on Okinawa. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Occupation Duty. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Windup in the Pacific. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

CHAPTER 5. BETWEEN THE WARS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Finding a Place. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Truman and Integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

The End in Sight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

CHAPTER 6. A DECADE OF INTEGRATION. . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Combat in Korea. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Black Leaders. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Changing Times . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

CHAPTER 7. THE VIETNAM ERA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Action Against Discrimination. . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

Racial Turmoil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Black Officer Procurement and Human Relations. . . . . 74

Vietnam. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

APPENDIX A. NOTES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

APPENDIX B. BLACK MARINE UNITS OF THE FLEET MARINE FORCE,

WORLD WAR II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

APPENDIX C. BLACK MARINE MEDAL OF HONOR RECIPIENTS. 97

INDEX. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

 viii

INTRODUCTION

A Depot Special Bulletin #1-44 dated 28 July 1943 references an article printed in Time Magazine on 24 July, 1944. "...Last week, as a footnote to the invasion of Saipan, Time correspondent Robert Sherrod wrote about the first to see action: Negro Marines, under fire for the first time, have rated a universal 4.0 (Annapolis mark of perfection) on Saipan. Some landed with the assault waves. All in the four service companies have been under fire at one time or another during the battle. Some have have been wounded, several of them have been killed in action. 'COOL IN COMBAT' When Japs counterattacked the 4th Marine Division near Charan Kanoa, twelve Negroes were thrown into the line. Their white officers said they accounted for about 15 Japs....They were under intense mortar fire and artillery fire as well as rifle and machine gun fire. They kept advancing until the counter attack was stopped. Negro Marines were at their best while performing their normal duties. Credited with being the workingest men on Saipan, they performed prodigious feats of labor both while under fire and after beachheads were well secured. Some unloaded boats for three days with little or no sleep, working in water waist deep....On an open transport, where a detachment of Negroes was left to load small boats, they volunteered to unload and tend the wounded who were brought to the transport...." 2. To the 18th, 19th, and 20th Depot Companies and the 3rd Ammunition Company, congratulations from their Commanding Officer. Well Done." Signed Earl H Phillips Col. USMC Commanding.

Prior to President Harry Truman's 1948 declaration of intent to end

segregation in the U.S. Armed Forces, blacks who served most often did so in

segregated units or under a quota system designed to limit their number. In

time of war, the need for men usually required the recruitment or drafting of

blacks; in peacetime the number of black servicemen dwindled. In large part,

the situation of blacks in uniform was a reflection of their status in

society, particularly that part of American society which practiced racial

segregation and discrimination.

During the American Revolution blacks served in small numbers in both the

Continental and state navies and armies. According to surviving muster and pay

rolls, there were at least three blacks in the ranks of the Continental

Marines and ten others who served as Marines on ships of the Connecticut,

Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania navies.<1> It is probable that more blacks

served as Marines in the Revolution who were not identified as such in the

rolls. The first recorded black Marine in the Continental service was John

Martin or "Keto," a slave of William Marshall of Wilmington, Delaware, who was

recruited without Marshall's knowledge or permission by Marine Captain Miles

Pennington in April 1776. Martin served on board the Continental brig REPRISAL

until October 1777 when the ship foundered off the Newfoundland Banks. All of

her crew except the cook were lost.<2>

On 27 August 1776, Isaac Walker, identified on the rolls as a Negro, was

enlisted in Captain Robert Mullan's company of Continental Marines in

Philadelphia, and on 1 October, a recruit listed simply as "Orange. . . Negro"

was enrolled. Both of these men were still on the company payroll as of 1

April 1777.<3> It is quite possible that they served with Mullan's unit in the

Second Battle of Trenton (Assunpink Creek) on 2 January 1777 and in the Battle

of Princeton the following day.

Those few black men who have been identified as Marines from surviving

Revolutionary War rosters were pioneers who were not followed by others of

their race until 1 June 1942. The Continental Marines went out of existence

within a year after the Treaty of Paris was signed on 11 April 1783. When

Congress conditionally authorized the construction of six frigates for a new

Navy in 1794, Marine guards were part of the planned ships' complements. In

1797, after the completion of three of the frigates, Constitution,

Constellation, and United States, was authorized, Marines were actually

enlisted. The Secretary of War, who also supervised the Navy, on 16 March 1798

prescribed a set of rules governing the enrollment of Marines for the

Constellation which provided that "No Negro, Mulatto or Indian to be enlisted.

. . ."<4>

These regulations prohibiting the enlistment of Negroes were continued

when Congress, on 11 July 1798, reestablished a separate Marine Corps with a

major in command. The new Commandant, Major William Ward Burrows, was explicit

on the subject in his instructions to his recruiting officers. To Lieutenant

John Hall at Charleston, South Carolina, he wrote:

You may enlist as many Drummers and Fifers as possible, I do not

care what Country the D & Fifers are of but you must be careful not

to enlist more Foreigners than as one to three natives. You can make

use of Blacks and Mulattoes while you recruit, but you cannot enlist

them.<5>

The regulations for recruiting Marines were much more selective than

those for seamen because of the reliance on the small guards on board ship to

maintain discipline, prevent mutinies, and give a military tone to men-of-war.

This situation was, in part, a carry over from the experience of British

Marines, about whom the observation had been made a hundred years earlier:

It may be added to what has been said of the usefulness of the said

[Marine] Regimts that the whole body of seamen on board the Fleet, being

a loose collection of undisciplined people, and (as experience shows)

sufficiently inclined to mutiny, the Marine Regimts will be a powerful

check to their disorders, and will be able to prevent the disasterous

consequences that may thence result to their Mats [Majesties] service.<6>

ix

Certainly those instrumental in recreating the American Navy had before

them the spectacle and lesson of the British Navy's Spithead and Nore mutinies

of April and May 1797 and the part played by Marines in their suppression.

There is no known record of black Marines serving in the various wars of

the 19th Century. The Navy did frequently enlist blacks as seamen, so much so

that at one time in 1839 the Secretary of the Navy issued a directive that no

more than five percent of enlistees could be blacks.<7> Thousands of blacks

served in the Federal Army and Navy during the Civil War and some continued to

serve thereafter--in the Army's case in two black infantry and two black

cavalry regiments which fought the Indians on the western frontier.

Mixed crews with blacks in all ratings remained a feature of the Navy up

until World War I, when the majority of black volunteers were assigned to the

Messman Branch. Following the war, black recruitment in the Navy ceased for

more than a decade and when it resumed in 1932, blacks were again only

enlisted in the Messman Branch.<8> The Army used blacks in segregated units in

World War I and continued the practice following the war. At the onset of

American involvement in World War II, the segregation of blacks in the Armed

Forces continued. Black Army volunteers and draftees were assigned to

all-black units. The Navy restricted its black volunteers to steward duty and

the Marine Corps accepted no blacks at all.

x

CHAPTER 1

A CHOSEN FEW

The door was opened for blacks to serve in all branches of the Armed

Forces on 25 June 1941 when President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive

Order No. 8802 establishing the Fair Employment Practices Commission with this

statement:

In affirming the policy of full participation in the defense

program by all persons regardless of color, race, creed, or

national origin, and directing certain action in furtherance of

said policy . . . all departments of the government, including

the Armed Forces, shall lead the way in erasing discrimination

over color or race.<1>

Major General Commandant Thomas Holcomb appointed Brigadier General

Thomas E. Watson to represent the Marine Corps on the newly established

commission, and the Corps took preliminary steps to comply with the

President's Executive Order. There is no question but that the order was

unpopular at Headquarters Marine Corps. Faced with the necessity of expanding

the Corps to meet the threatening war situation, few, if any, of the Marine

leaders were interested in injecting a new element into the training picture.

There was serious doubt that blacks would meet the high standards of the

Marine Corps. Once war had broken out, this opposition stiffened. The

Commandant, in testimony before the General Board of the Navy on 23 January

1942, indicated that it had long been his considered opinion that "there would

be a definite loss of efficiency in the Marine Corps if we have to take

Negroes. . . ."<2>

General Holcomb also indicated that the Marine Corps did not have the

facilities or trained personnel to handle all the whites who wanted to join

after Pearl Harbor. If there were to be black Marine units, he noted that he

could use only "the best type of officer on this project, because it will take

a great deal of character and technique to make the thing a success, and if it

is forced upon us we must make it a success."<3> The need for experienced

noncommissioned officers (NCOs) in training blacks was equally acute and the

Commandant felt that "they simply can not be spared if we are going to be

ready for immediate service with the fleet."<4> Concluding his remarks, he

said, "the Negro race has every opportunity now to satisfy its aspirations for

combat, in the Army--a very much larger organization than the Navy or Marine

Corps--and their desire to enter the naval service is largely, I think, to

break into a club that doesn't want them."<5> Regardless of the Commandant's

private protests, the pressure was on from the White House and from other

public sources to get on with the enlistment of blacks for general duty in the

Navy and Marine Corps. Wendell L. Wilkie, the titular head of the Republican

Party, in a speech delivered at the Freedom House inaugural dinner on 19 March

1942, described the Navy's "racial bias" in excluding blacks from enlisting

except as mess attendants as a "mockery." He challenged, "Are we always as

alert to practice [democracy] here at home as we are to proclaim it

abroad?"<6> The Administration's answer, delivered by Secretary of the Navy

Frank Knox on 7 April, was that the Navy, Coast Guard, and Marine Corps would

soon accept blacks for enlistment for general service in active duty reserve

components. Actual recruitment would begin when suitable training sites were

established.<7> Secretary Knox's statement was followed on 20 May by an

announcement from the Navy Department that on 1 June the Navy would begin

recruiting 1,000 blacks a month for shore and high seas service and that

during June and July a complete battalion of 900 blacks would be formed by the

Marine Corps.<8>

This was to be a new experience for the Marine Corps. One officer

recalled:

. . .when the colored came in, we had the appropriations and the

authority, and we could have gotten 40,000 white people. It just

scared us to death when the colored were put on it. I went over

to Selective Service and saw General Hershey, and he turned me

1

BLACKS IN THE MARINE CORPS

over to a lieutenant colonel [Campbell C. Johnson?]--that was

in April--and he was one grand person. I told him, "Eleanor

[Mrs. Roosevelt] says we gotta take in Negroes, and we are just

scared to death; we've never had any in; we don't know how to

handle them; we are afraid of them." He said, "I'll do my best

to help you get good ones. I'll get the word around that if

you want to die young, join the Marines. So anybody that joins

[has] got to be pretty good!" And it was the truth. We got

some awfully good Negroes.<9>

The Beginnings

In the course of a study prepared on the possible uses of blacks in the

Marine Corps by Brigadier General Keller E. Rockey, Director of the Division

of Plans and Policies, the possibility that they might be employed in a

messmen's branch, similar to the Navy's, was considered, but the Corps at that

time did not have such a branch. Strong doubts were expressed that blacks

could serve successfully in combat units, citing the Army's experience that

the General Classification Test scores of the majority of black recruits

showed low levels of learning aptitude.<10> The Marine Corps actually had

little choice in the matter. The die had been cast. There would be blacks in

the Marine Corps and some at least would serve in combat units. The initial

vehicle for that service would be a composite defense battalion, a unit

containing seacoast artillery, antiaircraft artillery, infantry, and tanks,

whose task was overseas base defense.

Units of this type, their organization always tailored to their mission,

were already deployed overseas and had seen combat. Outnumbered elements of

the 1st Defense Battalion had gallantly defended Wake Island from invading

Japanese. Other units of the 1st on Johnson and Palmyra and of the 3d and 6th

Battalions on Midway had engaged enemy ships and planes with seacoast defense

and antiaircraft guns.<11>

As General Holcomb had pointed out to the General Board, the selection of

an officer to head the black unit, in fact to oversee all black Marine

training, was crucial. The choice was a wise and fortunate one. Colonel Samuel

A. Woods, Jr., a native of South Carolina and a graduate of The Citadel, had

some 25 years experience as an officer, including service in France in World

War I, duty in Cuba, China, the Dominican Republic, and the Philippines, and

service with the fleet.<12> In addition to a varied and well rounded career,

he had personal qualities that made him a memorable

<ILLUSTRATION>

<FIGURE NOT AVAILABLE>

Colonel Samuel A. Woods, Jr., first Commanding Officer, 51st

Composite Defense Battalion and Montford Point Camp. (USMC

Photo 9511).

man to the first black Marines. Almost universally they speak of him with

respect and affection. In the words of one black NCO who served closely with

him, his most outstanding quality was "his absolute fairness. He would throw

the book at you if you had it coming, but he would certainly give you an

opportunity to prove yourself."<13>

Colonel Woods, basing his findings upon a General Board report to

Secretary Knox of 20 March, presented his plans for the program to be

established for black Marines to General Rockey on 21 April. He based his

concept on a minimum of 1,000 black reserve recruits to be equipped as a

defense battalion after six months. Training was to be conducted at Mumford

Point (later renamed Montford Point) at the Marine Barracks, New River, North

Carolina. The barracks, soon to be named Camp Lejeune, was already the major

east coast combat training site for Fleet Marine Force (FMF) units and it

would soon be the only training site for black Marines. The sum of $750,000

was alloted to construct and enlarge temporary barracks and supporting

facilities for the new camp at Montford Point.

Some of the colonel's plan came to fruition,

2

A CHOSEN FEW

other parts were changed to meet the circumstances at Montford Point.

Basically, however, a headquarters and service battery and one or more recruit

training batteries would be formed as the initial camp complement. The first

recruits to report would have cooking experience. It was expected that boot

camp and basic training would take 180 days. At the end of this time, the

black Marines would receive combat equipment and organize for training as a

composite defense battalion. The first appointments of black NCOs would be

made at about the same time.

Colonel Woods recognized the battalion's table of organization contained

"some ranks which normally require considerable experience and more than 12

years' service to attain."<14> Since the unit was eventually to be composed

entirely of black enlisted men and white officers, blacks would have to learn

on the job to fill all NCO billets. Promotion was to be governed by length of

service, experience, and demonstrated ability, and controlled by changes in

the training allowance for the battalion.<15>

Recruiting was to begin on 1 June 1942. Although the public announcement

was not made until 20 May, the basic instructions for Marine Corps Recruiting

Divisions were sent out in a letter from the Commandant on 15 May. This letter

set a quota of 200 recruits each from the Eastern and Central Divisions while

the Southern was to furnish 500 of the initial 900 recruits. These men were to

be citizens between 17 and 29 years of age, and they were to meet the existing

standards for enlistment in the Corps. They were to be enlisted in Class

III(c), Marine Corps Reserve, and assigned to inactive duty in a General

Service Unit of their Reserve District. Both the service record book and the

enlistment contract were to be stamped "Colored."<16>

When recruiting opened on 1 June, the first men to enlist were Alfred

Masters and George O. Thompson (1 June), George W. James and John E. L.

Tillman (2 June), Leonard L. Burns (3 June), and Edward A. Culp (5 June), all

in the 8th Reserve District, headquartered at Pensacola, Florida. On 8 June,

James W. Brown in the 3d District (New York) and George L. Glover and David W.

Sheppard in the 6th and 7th Districts (Charleston) enlisted. From then on the

number on the rolls gradually rose, with the instructions to recruiters that

the first men to be sent to Montford Point would be those who had skills that

would help ready the camp for those to follow.

The majority of the recruits were well motivated to join the Marine

Corps. One recruit, Edgar R. Huff, from Gadsden, Alabama, who later became the

senior sergeant major in the Marine Corps, expressed the feelings of a lot of

those first men when he said: "I wanted to be a Marine because I had always

heard that the Marine Corps was the toughest outfit going and I felt that I

was the toughest going, and so I wanted to be a member of the best

organization."<17>

Other recruits, faced with a long delay in reporting to boot camp unless

they had qualifications that were needed in the initial camp setup, stretched

the truth a little. In Boston, a young black, Obie Hall, who eventually became

the first man in the first squad in the first regular recruit platoon

organized at Montford Point, told the recruiting sergeant that he could drive

a truck. He recalled later, "I could no more drive a truck than a man in the

moon, [but] I said, 'I'm a truck driver.'"<18> And as a result he arrived at

Montford Point on 2 September 1942.

The original schedule called for about 25 cooks, bakers, and barbers to

report to camp on 26 August. The next 100 men were to report on 2-3 September

and another 125 or so with miscellaneous qualifications were to arrive on

16-17 September. The middle of each month thereafter was to bring about 200

recruits until the target total of 1,200 men was reached.<19>

The Camp Opens

On 18 August 1942, Headquarters and Service Battery of the 51st Composite

Defense Battalion was activated at Montford Point with Colonel Woods as

battalion commander. His executive officer and officer in charge of recruit

training was Lieutenant Colonel Theodore A. Holdahl, a World War I enlisted

man commissioned as a regular officer in 1924, who had served in the

Philippines, China, Nicaragua, and British Guiana.<20> Battery strength, all

white Marines, was 23 officers and 90 enlisted men, these last soon to be

known to black recruits as SES men (Special Enlisted Staff). While there was a

sprinkling of experienced officers and warrant officers, the majority of the

commissioned strength was second lieutenants not long out of officers'

training at

3

<ILLUSTRATION>

<FIGURE NOT AVAILABLE>

Map of MONTFORD POINT 1943-1945

4

A CHOSEN FEW

the Marine Corps Schools, Quantico, Virginia. The staff NCOs, sergeants, and

some of the corporals were men with years of experience in the Marine Corps.

The few privates first class (PFCs) and privates filled clerical, motor

transport, and other camp support billets.

The men chosen to be drill instructors (DIs) were "old line" Marines, men

who were to impress the black recruits with their bearing and firmness of

manner. In the memory of one of the few recruits who had had prior experience

in the Armed Forces, Gilbert H. Johnson, these DIs "set about from the very

beginning to get us thoroughly indoctrinated into the habits and the thinking

and the actions of the Marine Corps. Discipline seemed to be their lone stock

in trade, and they applied it with a vengeance, very much to our later

benefit."<21>

On schedule, 13 of the 24 black recruits expected in August arrived at

Montford Point on the 26th. The first black private to set foot in the camp

was Howard P. Perry of Charlotte, North Carolina. He was joined on that

eventful first day by Jerome D. Alcorn, Willie B. Cameron, Otto Cherry,

Lawrence S. Cooper, Harold O. Ector, Eddie Lee, Ulysses J. Lucas, Robert S.

Parks, Jr., Edward Polin, Jr., Emerson E. Roberts, Gilbert C. Rousan, and

James O. Stallworth. The rest of the 23 men who eventually arrived in August

came in over the next five days. Battery A of the 51st Composite Defense

Battalion was organized on 26 August "as an administrative and tactical unit

for the training of recruit platoons," with Second Lieutenant Anthony Caputo

as commanding officer.<22>

In September recruit training began in earnest. What Montford Point

Marines later called the "Mighty" 1st, 2d, and 3d Recruit Platoons were

organized with 40 men in each platoon. Several SES NCOs were assigned to each

platoon to give the men experience in handling black recruits; as more men

came in in mid-September many of the original DIs were transferred to help

form new platoons. This was to be the experience of the first few months, in

fact it was not long before exceptional recruits were being singled out and

made "Acting Jacks," assistant DIs in their own platoons. This came about

partially because of the shortage of white NCOs and equally as well because

one purpose of all training at Montford Point was to discover and develop

potential black NCOs.

The number of voluntary enlistments of black Marines was not up to the

anticipated rate. The requirement for these first recruits to have ability in

needed skills was undoubtedly a factor in the slow intake. It became necessary

on 9 October to modify the plans for assembling the black personnel of the

51st, and the assignment of experienced SES personnel had to be curtailed in

the face of pressure for men for FMF units already deployed in the Pacific.

Although it had been anticipated that 1,200 black recruits would be enlisted

by the end of October less than 600 were in camp.<23> The Commandant was

writing as late as 19 December that "colored personnel will continue to be

procured and ordered to the 51st Composite Defense Battalion at the rate of

200 recruits per month until 1,200 is reached."<24>

The camp at this time made an indelible impression on the incoming

recruits. Coming off Highway 24 near the small and sleepy town of

Jacksonville, a narrow road about a mile long led through a corridor of tall

pine trees into a large clearing where there was:

. . .a headquarters building (#100), a chapel, two warehouses,

a theatre building with two wings, which later housed a library,

barber shop, [and] classification room on one side and a

recreation slop chute [beer hall] on the other, a dispensary

building, a mess hall, designated by the recruits as "The Greasy

Spoon," quarters and facilities for the SES personnel, a small

steam generating plant, a small motor transport compound, a small

officers' club, and 120 green prefabricated huts, each designed

for billeting 16 men.<25>

Surrounding the open spaces of the main camp area were thick pine

forests. Beyond the north forest area was Highway 24, to the south the point

of land that gave the area its name thrust into the New River, to the west was

the river, Wilson Bay, and the town of Jacksonville, and to the east was

Scales Creek, which had notorious areas of quicksand. Across the creek was an

old Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp area now partially occupied by a

war dog training center. In all there was about 5-1/2 square miles of rugged

ground in the original camp site. Mosquitoes abounded, the woods were full of

snakes, and bears padded about through the camp, much to the consternation of

recruits who saw their tracks when they fell out for morning roll call. There

was a lot of bush in the camp area to start off with, but the boots soon

cleared it away or wore it away with their incessant drilling.

Part and parcel of this somewhat drab and uninviting encampment was the

traditional DI reception the incoming recruits received. The idea at all boot

camps, whether white at Parris

5

<ILLUSTRATION>

<FIGURE NOT AVAILABLE>

Montford Point Camp as it appeared in 1943. In the left center

is the mess hall; in the right center are the "little green huts"

of boot camps. (Photo from Montford Point Pictorial).

Island and San Diego or black at Montford Point, was to knock the new recruit

off balance, keep him on the run, hammer at him physically and psychologically

day and night, and eventually meld him as an individual into a member of a

team, his platoon. There was ample room for the men to believe one DI's

statement, "I'm going to make you wish you never had joined this damn Marine

Corps."<26>

In point of fact, however, Gilbert Johnson, who had served six years in

the Army's black 25th Infantry on the Mexican Border in the 1920s and most of

the 1930s as a Navy mess attendant and officers' steward, sagely observed in

regard to the white DIs that "the policy was to select the type of individuals

who were not against the Negro being a Marine, and had it been otherwise, why

I'm afraid that we would have all left the first week. Some of us, probably,

the first night."<27>

Johnson, who had been an Officers' Steward 2d Class, had asked to be

discharged from the Navy in order to enlist in the Marine Corps as a private.

The Commandant and the Secretary of the Navy concurred in his request; he

received his discharge, enlisted in the Marines, and soon became known, once

out of boot camp, as "Hashmark" Johnson, because of the prior service stripes

that he wore on his sleeves. Due in part to his age, 37, when he reached

Montford Point, his considerable service experience, and a serious dedication

to making a success of being a Marine, he was destined to become a legend in

his own lifetime to the first black Marines, an elder statesman and historian

of the Montford Point experience.

But "Hashmark" Johnson was far from the only memorable man who joined in

those first few months when volunteers filled the ranks at Montford Point. The

recruiters had been selective; there were other men with Army service, John T.

Pridgen, who had been a member of the black 10th Cavalry in the late 1930s,

and George A. Jackson, who had been an Army lieutenant. Both eventually became

drill instructors. There was a host of college graduates and men who had had

college training including Charles F. Anderson, a graduate

6

A CHOSEN FEW

of Morehouse College, who arrived in September and eventually became the first

black sergeant major of Montford Point Camp and Charles W. Simmons, a graduate

of Alcorn A and M with a masters degree from the University of Illinois, who

wound up as sergeant major of the 51st Defense Battalion.<28> The man who was

to become the senior bayonet and unarmed combat instructor of black recruits,

Arvin L. "Tony" Ghazlo, a former bodyguard and jujitsu instructor from

Philadelphia,<29> arrived in October, and the next month saw the man who was

to be his principal assistant, Ernest "Judo" Jones, reach Montford Point.

Besides teaching the recruits, these two and their assistants were responsible

for many memorable exhibitions of unarmed combat techniques.

There were many of those early recruits who became men of note amongst

black Marines and, in fact, men of substance in their communities in later

life. They were, in general, a select body of young men; the recruiters had

tried hard to find and send to Montford Point men with technical, educational,

and work backgrounds who had the potential to fill out the various billets of

a defense battalion. The call for such specialists could not be completely

met, however, and the Commandant was informed in late October that it was

"doubtful if even white recruits could be procured with the

<ILLUSTRATION>

<FIGURE NOT AVAILABLE>

Corporal Alvin "Tony" Ghazlo, senior bayonet and unarmed combat

instructor at Montford Point, disarms his assistant, Private

Ernest "Judo" Jones. (USMC Photo 5334).

7

BLACKS IN THE MARINE CORPS

qualifications listed ..."<30> This racial comparison of relative skills was

not as odious as it might seem today, but rather a statement of the prevailing

situation in most of the country, there the general education level of blacks

was lower than that of whites and the chances for skilled job experience were

severely limited for blacks.

The First Graduates

By the end of November 1942, the initial recruit platoons were near the

finish of their eight weeks of boot camp. Two weeks preliminary marksmanship

training was conducted at Montford Point, culminated by a week of live firing

at the Camp Lejeune rifle range near Stone Bay. Since there were as yet no

living facilities for blacks at the range, the recruits found themselves

trucked to the range before dawn and returned to camp after nightfall. Still,

they did well, and the majority of the first 198 men to graduate from boot

camp qualified as rifle marksmen or sharp shooters, enabling them to wear

their qualification badges proudly on their uniforms. Even more important to

the men, the first blacks were qualified to sew rank stripes on their uniforms

in November. On the 1st, 16 privates were promoted to private first class and

on the 19th, four privates were promoted to assistant cook. Many of the new

PFCs had been acting as assistant DIs to the SES NCOs, some had even finished

up the training of their platoons as the white DIs were spread thin among

newly formed units. Others of the new "one stripers" were slated to take over

office duties in existing or planned headquarters, while the newly designated

cooks would man the kitchens of the 51st's messhall.

In early December, the new graduates had their first opportunity to go on

liberty and poured out the front gate walking down the long road to

Jacksonville. Their reception was a rude awakening to the men. The sight of a

couple of hundred blacks in Marine green coming into the little town was

unnerving to the merchants, and they closed down their stores. Far more

disturbing, the bus station and the ticket office were also closed, and the

young blacks had seemingly lost their opportunity to leave "J-ville." They had

no intention of staying in town, they wanted to get out, to take a bus to

Wilmington, Kinston, or New Bern, larger towns with substantial black

populations. In this instance, as in many, Colonel Woods was the champion of

the black Marines. He ordered out the 51st's trucks, which took the men to

their chosen liberty towns, stayed with them, and brought them back to

Montford Point. And he took steps to ensure that the buses were available

thereafter to the black Marines. Yet, the actualities of segregation in the

South made the use of these buses a sore point with the men at Montford Point.

Not only did they have to ride in the back of the bus, they were often

arbitrarily denied entrance by the white bus drivers while the buses were

filled with white Marines returning from liberty. On a few occasions during

the course of the war years, white bus drivers who attempted such arbitrary

action found themselves abandoned beside the road while a delighted crew of

black Marines returned themselves to Montford Point in the commandeered buses.

With the advent of promotions and liberty came new assignments for the

first recruit graduates. The 51st Composite Defense Battalion began to take

shape. On 1 December, Rifle Company (Reinforced) of the 51st was organized.

But its immediate function belied its name, for it was primarily a schools and

training organization for the many specialists needed. Student bandsmen,

cooks, clerks, communicators, and truck drivers were among the men who filled

its ranks. Some of these individuals were already experienced in their

specialties, others had been selected to learn by formal schooling or

on-the-job training. Also formed on the 1st was a 155mm gun battery and a 90mm

antiaircraft group. On 21 December, a 75mm pack howitzer battery was

organized. Remaining behind in Battery A were nine privates and 12 PFCs, six

of the latter to serve as DIs and six as battery clerks.

December offered many of the newly minted Marines a chance for a week's

furlough; many were home for Christmas or New Year's Day. Their misadventures

were many, for their number was still small, and the existence of black

Marines was apparently not widely known. In several instances, men were

questioned or arrested for impersonating a Marine, but the misunderstandings

were usually cleared up in short order.

Expansion Looms

While the 51st Composite Defense Battalion, still the vehicle for

handling all black Marines,

8

A CHOSEN FEW

<ILLUSTRATION>

<FIGURE NOT AVAILABLE>

Map of CAMP LEJEUNE AND VICINITY

9

BLACKS IN THE MARINE CORPS

was in the process of reorganization, there was the prospect of a whole new

ball game insofar as blacks in the Marine Corps was concerned. Instead of

1,200 men, one defense battalion and its training base, there were going to be

thousands more men arriving at Montford Point.

On 5 December 1942, voluntary enlistments in the Armed Forces were

discontinued for all men 18 to 37 years of age, although 17 year olds and, in

some instances, those 38 or older could still volunteer for the Navy and

Marine Corps. Beginning in January 1943, all men in the 18-37 age group would

be inducted into the services through the Selective Service System. To make

the call-up equitable, at least 10 percent of those selected would be blacks,

a proportion approximating the number of blacks in the U.S. population as a

whole.

The Army, which was the principal beneficiary of the stopping of the flow

of the volunteers into the other services, was interested in having the Marine

Corps concentrate on taking black draftees until it had reached the same

percentage of blacks in its ranks that the Army already had. This concept was

unacceptable to the Corps, since it would have severely disrupted existing

training plans for replacements and new combat units, but there was no arguing

with the imposition of an induction quota. Its advent was recognized early in

the year's planning and was confirmed in a memorandum of 8 March 1943 from

Headquarters Marine Corps to the Chief of Naval Personnel. Since the approved

increase between 1 February and 31 December 1943 was 99,000 men, this placed a

requirement on the Corps for the acquisition and accommodation of 9,900

blacks. In order to meet this goal, calls were placed with Selective Service

for 400 men in February and March, 800 in April, 1,300 in May, and 1,000 men

per month thereafter. Any increase in the authorized strength of the Marine

Corps would lead to a corresponding increase in the monthly draft calls for

black Marines.<31>

Obviously, Montford Point was due for drastic expansion, and the 51st

Composite Defense Battalion could not be the vehicle to absorb such numbers.

Some of the new men would have the opportunity of becoming officers' stewards,

cooks, and messmen, for the Secretary of the Navy on 1 January had authorized

the formation of a Messman Branch (eventually Stewards' Branch) in the Marine

Corps, composed entirely of black Marines. Still others of the incoming

thousands would serve in a second defense battalion that was contemplated as a

follow on to the 51st. But most of the new recruits, in fact the majority of

World War II black Marines, would end up serving in pioneer or labor units,

for the need for logistic support troops in the Pacific fighting was acute.

Colonel Woods visted Headquarters Marine Corps in January and presented a

plan for the future development of Montford Point. He indicated the 51st could

carry on the handling of all black Marines through February and into March

when a new 1,000-man camp area would be ready. Simultaneously, organization

work would be underway on the Mess Attendants School (an 8-week course) and an

Officers' Cooks and Stewards School (a 16-week course). The contemplated

increase in black Marines would dictate the organization of a separate

Montford Point Camp headquarters by late spring.<32>

In January, the first 42 selective service men arrived at Montford Point

to be treated no differently as boots than the men who had gone before them.

Many of the draftees, both then and later, were selective service volunteers.

Marine liaison officers with the Selective Service System and Marine

recruiters worked mightily to ensure that most of the draftees were men who

wanted to serve in the Corps. The experiences of a number of men who entered

during this period bear out the continued effort at enlisting the best men

available.<33> In May, Colonel Woods wrote the Commandant that "the standard

of inductees continues to be about the same as in the case of volunteers. This

indicates excellent work by the recruiting service."<34>

Change continued at Montford Point during the first half of 1943. In

January, the first black NCOs were appointed as three assistant cooks, Jerome

D. Alcorn, Otto Cherry, and Robert T. Davis, were named field cooks

(corporals) on the 18th. Men who had been assigned to tactical units of the

51st, but who had demonstrated that they were of DI caliber while in boot

camp, rejoined Battery A in February. Ten of them made corporal on the 19th,

the nucleus for a vastly increased recruit training effort. Nineteen other new

corporals were made in other units of the 51st in February and thereafter new

NCOs were appointed every month.

10

A CHOSEN FEW

On 11 March, Headquarters and Service Company, Headquarters Battalion,

Montford Point Camp was activated, as was Headquarters Company, Recruit Depot

Battalion. Battery A of the 51st became Company A of the Recruit Depot

Battalion. Colonel Woods, as camp commander, relinquished his command of the

51st to Lieutenant Colonel W. Bayard Onley, a Naval Academy graduate (1919)

who had recently served as Execuitve Officer, 23d Marines,<35> and Lieutenant

Colonel Holdahl took over the new recruit battalion. On 1 April 1943,

Headquarters Company, Messman Branch Battalion was organized with the new

battalion commander Captain Albert O. Madden, a World War I veteran who had

been recommissioned as a food service officer after extensive restaurant

experience in the Albany, New York, area.<36> The new unit with its attendant

schools was redesignated Stewards' Branch Battalion on 13 April. The new camp

area which would house the stewards was dubbed "Slotnick's Grove" by the black

Marines after a young lieutenant who had been involved in its

construction.<37>

Reorganization and augmentation continued at a frantic pace as hundreds

of recruits poured into Montford Point. New recruit companies were organized,

a Schools Company and a Motor Transport Company were added to the camp

headquarters battalion, the 51st's Rifle Company became the vehicle for

organizing and dispatching depot companies (labor troops) to the field, and an

Assistant Stewards' School (Company A) and a Stewards' Cook School (Company B)

were added to Captain Madden's battalion.

The change on the recruit drill field was the most drastic. Almost all of

the SES DIs had left by the end of April; black sergeants and corporals took

over as the senior DIs of the eight platoons then in training: the 16th

Platoon (Edgar R. Huff); 17th (Thomas Brokaw); 18th (Charles E. Allen); 19th

(Gilbert H. Johnson); 20th (Arnold R. Bostic); 21st (Mortimer A. Cox); 22d

(Edgar R. Davis, Jr.); and 23d (George A. Jackson).<38> In late May, the last

white drill instructor, First Sergent Robert W. Colwell, was transferred, and

Sergeant "Hashmark" Johnson took his place as the re-

<ILLUSTRATION>

<FIGURE NOT AVAILABLE>

Corporal Edgar R. Huff one of the first black drill instructors,

confronts a recruit platoon at Montford Point. (USMC Photo 5377).

11

BLACKS IN THE MARINE CORPS

cruit battalion's field sergeant major, in charge of all drill instructors;

Sergeant Thomas Pridgen was his assistant. From then on, all recruit training

at Montford Point was conducted by black NCOs-a milestone had been passed.

Boot camp did not get any easier, in fact, in the testimony of those who

served there in the transition period it became rougher and stayed

rougher.<39> The boots started on the run and stayed on the run. As one black

DI commented: "Glenn Cunningham [a famous miler] had nothing on the recruits

at Montford Point."<40> "Hashmark" Johnson, first as field sergeant major and

later as sergeant major of the Recruit Depot Battalion, was determined that

the black boots would measure up in every way to Marine Corps standards. His

philosophy prevaded boot training. In later years, addressing a group of

veterans of that era, he reminded them of their ordeal and the reason for it,

remarking:

I was an ogre to some of you that met me on the drill field

and in the huts of Montford more than a quarter century ago. I

was a stern instructor, but I was fair. I was an exacting

instructor, but with some understanding of the many problems

involved. I kept before me, always, that nearly impossible

goal to qualify in a few weeks, and at the most a few months,

a type of Marine fully qualified in every respect to wear

that much cherished Globe and Anchor. You were untried. The

objectives were to qualify you with loyalty, with a devotion

to duty, and with a determination equal to all, transcended

by none . . . As I look into your faces tonight, I remember

the youthful, and sometimes pained expressions at something

I may have said . . . But I remember something you did. You

measured up, by a slim margin perhaps, but measure up you

did. You achieved your goal. That realization creates within

me a warm appreciation of you and a deep sense of personal

gratitude.<41>

With Johnson's type of drive permeating the boot camp at the man-to-man

level of DI and recruit, life proved to be very trying for the new Marines.

But it was not all drill and training. There were USO shows and movies at the

camp theatre and a full schedule of intramural sports between various units at

the camp. And there was always music, for many talented singers and musicians

had enlisted. Men from the bands of Count Basie, Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington,

and Erskine Hawkins were in the ranks of the 51st's band, which later became

the camp band. The band was capable of producing jazz combos, dance

orchestras, and concert groups of professional caliber.

Fortunately, one of the young officers who arrived early at Montford

Point was Lieutenant Robert W. Troup, Jr., an accomplished composer and

musician from New York, who established immediate rapport with the black

musicians which carried over to the rest of the men. He eventually became camp

recreation officer, and many of his activities were directly connected with

the improvement of morale through the arrangement of talent shows, sporting

events, and concerts using the multitude of entertainment and athletic talent

in the ranks at Montford Point. He elicited almost universal praise for

understanding, ranging from "Hashmark" Johnson's typically restrained, "a top-

notch musician, a very decent sort of officer," to Obie Hall's, "he was the

sharpest cat I ever seen in my life."<42> But most of the men of Montford

Point remember Bobby Troup's song "Jacksonville," which hardly rivaled his

World War II hit "Route 66" in nationwide popular music charts, but certainly

was a hit at Camp Lejeune where it echoed the sentiments of black and white

Marines alike with words like:

Take me away from Jacksonville, `cause I've had my fill and

that's no lie,

Take me away from Jacksonville, keep me away from Jacksonville

until I die,