PFC Witek’s Medal of Honor Hailed ‘Inspiring Acts’
Private First Class Frank Peter Witek’s Medal of Honor citation reads as follows: “For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while serving with the 1st Battalion, 9th Marines, 3d Marine Division, during the Battle of Finegayan at Guam, Marianas Islands, on 3 August 1944. When his rifle platoon was halted by heavy surprise fire from well camouflaged enemy positions, Private First Class Witek daringly remained standing to fire a full magazine from his [Browning] automatic [rifle] at point-blank range into a depression housing Japanese troops, killing eight of the enemy and enabling the greater part of his platoon to take cover. During his platoon’s withdrawal for consolidation of lines, he remained to safeguard a severely wounded comrade, courageously returning the enemy’s fire until the arrival of stretcher bearers, and then covering the evacuation by sustained fire as he moved backward toward his own lines. With his platoon again pinned down by a hostile machine gun, Private First Class Witek, on his initiative, moved forward boldly to the reinforcing tanks, and infantry, alternately throwing hand grenades and firing as he advanced to within 5 to 10 yards of the enemy position, and destroying the hostile machine-gun emplacement and an additional eight Japanese before he himself was struck down by an enemy rifleman. His valiant and inspiring action effectively reduced the enemy’s firepower, thereby enabling his platoon to attain its objective, and reflects the highest credit upon Private First Class Witek and the United States naval service. He gallantly gave his life for his country.”
Sources
In addition to the official Marine Corps histories of the Guam campaign, Major O. Robert Lodge’s The Recapture of Guam (Washington, 1954), and Henry I. Shaw, Jr., Bernard C. Nalty, and Edwin H. Turnbladh’s Central Pacific Drive, vol III, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II (Washington 1966), the author consulted the Army’s official history, Philip A. Crowl’s Campaign in the Marianas (Washington, 1960). Of value also were the 3d Division’s history by Robert A. Aurthur and Kenneth Cohlmia, The Third Marine Division (Washington, 1948), the classic U.S. Marines and Amphibious War by Jeter A. Iseley and Philip A. Crowl (Princeton, 1951), RAdm Samuel Eliot Morison’s The Two Ocean War (Boston, 1976), The Fall of Japan by William A. Craig (New York, 1967), and LtGen Victor H. Krulak’s First to Fight (Annapolis, 1984).
Historians at all the Services’ Washington historical offices were universally helpful, but I would particularly like to thank Dr. Terrence J. Gough of the Army’s Center of Military History and Dr. Robert Browning, the Coast Guard historian for their assistance. Conversations and correspondence, and oral history interviews, with the following were helpful: Jack Kerrins; MajGen Charles L. Davis, AUS (Ret); BGen Vincente (Ben) Blaz, USMC (Ret); Col Martin J. “Stormy” Sexton, USMC (Ret); Col Fraser E. West, USMC (Ret); LtCol Wilcie A. O’Bannon, USMC (Ret); Col Henry Aplington II, USMC (Ret); Dr. William H. Putney; Dale M. Quillan; William L. Dunlap; Paul Ulrich; and Alfred G. Don. Even if their words were not used, their thoughts and observations were carefully considered. The author’s own experiences on Guam as a Marine combat correspondent pervaded his whole account.
About the Author
Cyril J. O’Brien served in a line company with the 3d Marines, 3d Marine Division, on Bougainville, and then as a Combat Correspondent in the battles for Guam and Iwo Jima. Following World War II, he covered Capitol Hill as a Washington correspondent, then joined the staff of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory where he was a science writer and supervisor of media relations. He attended St. Joseph’s University, Philadelphia, and the American University, Washington, D.C. He lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.
Erratum
An editing error appears in the 1994 History and Museums Division pamphlet, A Different War: Marines in Europe and North Africa, by Lieutenant Colonel Harry W. Edwards, USMC (Ret), from the “World War II Commemorative Series.” On page 8, the photo caption which begins “Then-Col Julian C. Smith, left ...”, should read “Then-Col Julian C. Smith, below....”
THIS PAMPHLET HISTORY, one in a series devoted to U.S. Marines in the World War II era, is published for the education and training of Marines by the History and Museums Division. Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, Washington, D.C., as a part of the U.S. Department of Defense observance of the 50th anniversary of victory in that war.
Editorial costs of preparing this pamphlet have been defrayed in part by a bequest from the estate of Emilie H. Watts, in memory of her late husband, Thomas M. Watts, who served as a Marine and was the recipient of a Purple Heart.
WORLD WAR II COMMEMORATIVE SERIES
DIRECTOR OF MARINE CORPS HISTORY AND MUSEUMS
Brigadier General Edwin H. Simmons, USMC (Ret)
GENERAL EDITOR,
WORLD WAR II COMMEMORATIVE SERIES
Benis M. Frank
CARTOGRAPHIC CONSULTANT
George C. MacGillivray
EDITING AND DESIGN SECTION HISTORY AND MUSEUMS DIVISION
Robert E. Struder, Senior Editor; W. Stephen Hill, Visual Information
Specialist; Catherine A. Kerns, Composition Services Technician
Marine Corps Historical Center
Building 58, Washington Navy Yard
Washington, D.C. 20374-5040
1994
PCN 190 003126 00
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained.
To make this eBook easier to read, particularly on handheld devices, some images have been made relatively larger than in the original pamphlet, and centered, rather than offset to one side or the other; and some were placed a little earlier or later than in the original. Sidebars in the original have been repositioned between chapters and identified as “[Sidebar (page nn):”, where the page reference is to the original location in the source book. In the Plain Text version, the matching closing right bracket follows the last line of the Sidebar’s text and is on a separate line to make it more noticeable. In the HTML versions, that bracket follows the colon, and each Sidebar is displayed within a box.
Page [26]: “I didn’t breath” was printed that way, as a quotation.
Page [28]: “screaming attacks came at 1230, then again at 0130” was printed that way.
Page [41]: “vigorously patrolling the area they occupied” was misprinted as “vigorously patrolling the area it they occupied”. Changed here.