With the Old Breed by E.B. Sledge: A Review Essay

Introduction

E.B. Sledge begins his memoir by recounting his marine training in Company K, 3rd Battalion, 5th Regiment, 1st Marine Division. The memoir is structured around two horrific battles that ultimately devastated the Division. The first of these was fought at Peleliu, where over 8,769 Americans were killed, wounded, or reported missing in action over ten weeks of combat. Nearly the entire enemy garrison on the island was eliminated — approximately 11,000 Japanese soldiers perished in the battle. Sledge's central concern, however, is with the 235 colleagues who survived in Company K. His company lost 150 men declared dead, missing, or wounded. Notably, Sledge expresses no bitterness about the strategic decision to attack Peleliu.

The next operation, dubbed Operation Iceberg, was conducted the following year with the objective of capturing Okinawa, and it brought even worse outcomes. This mission proved to be the most disastrous of any undertaken in the Pacific War. It claimed over 50,000 American casualties, with 12,500 soldiers among those killed — the greatest toll of American losses ever recorded in a single campaign (Hanson). Sledge opens his memoir by recalling a deep longing to serve overseas in combat before the war ended (Sledge 5). He joined the Marines to fulfill that ambition and realize his sense of purpose. Yet what he found most compelling was simply the identity of being a marine — what he calls esprit de corps. Sledge and his friends in Company K strove to live up to the ideals and expectations of marine life (Hiatt).

The Author's Experiences in Combat

The style Sledge adopts in With the Old Breed is graphic and often deeply disturbing. Company K fought through the same jungles for many days at a stretch. Sledge narrates how the men witnessed corpses decaying across a variety of terrain and weather conditions. Peleliu was oppressively hot while Okinawa was perpetually rain-soaked. He describes watching corpses being consumed by large blowflies. The accounts are gory and genuinely difficult to read. He admits having been ordered to dig a foxhole in a spot where a Japanese soldier had been buried. He discovered this fact only when his entrenching tool began slicing through the corpse. He was commanded to continue even after making the discovery. Many such incidents recur throughout the memoir. Sledge succeeds in rendering these details with unflinching honesty. Combat is never glorified (Hiatt).

Sledge recounts several incidents in which his fellow marines extracted gold teeth from the mouths of Japanese corpses. He also describes witnessing one incident in which a Japanese soldier had his gold teeth taken while he was still alive. A marine Sledge did not know pushed forward to claim his share of the spoils. As the marine drove his knife into the mouth of the still-living Japanese soldier, Sledge and others in Company K shouted him down. At that moment, another marine stepped over and shot the Japanese soldier. The marine who had been after the gold teeth completed his grim task and left angrily, cursing the rest of the company for showing what he considered weak sentimentality (Sledge 120).

Sledge himself briefly attempted to extract gold teeth from a Japanese corpse, reasoning that his father, who practiced medicine, might find them of interest. He pulled out his KA-BAR knife and bent down to begin the extraction. A hand grasped him from behind and pulled him back. Doctor Caswell made a firm appeal to his humanity. Though visibly shaken, Caswell tried to remain composed. He warned Sledge that handling the teeth could expose him to dangerous germs. Sledge understood, however, that his friend's real concern was not infection but the preservation of whatever humane instinct the war had not yet extinguished — and that Caswell was trying to help him hold onto that as well (Sledge 124).

Sledge documented the details of the war's savagery using notes he had carefully kept in his copy of the New Testament. His language remains restrained throughout. The analysis of battle produces eerie, almost dreamlike imagery. The plainness of his descriptions actually heightens the impact of the savagery on the reader. Sledge recounts discovering a dead medical corpsman torn apart by American shelling — his abdomen ripped open. Sledge recalls thinking, for a moment, that it could not be a human being. He compares the body to the carcass of a rabbit he had skinned during boyhood hunting trips. He narrates how the entire encounter left him feeling deeply sick (Hanson).

Works Cited

Hanson, Victor. Introduction to E.B. Sledge's "With the Old Breed." 25 July 2007. Web. 22 Nov. 2016.

Hiatt, Bryan. With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa. 2005. Web. 22 Nov. 2016.

Sledge, Eugene Bondurant. With the Old Breed, at Peleliu and Okinawa. Oxford University Press, 1981.