On 24 November, Colonel Nakagawa sent his final message to his superior on Koror. He advised that he had burned the colors of the 2d Infantry Regiment. He said that the final 56 men had been split into 17 infiltration parties, to slip through the American positions and to “attack the enemy everywhere.” During the night of 24–25 November, 25 Japanese, including two officers, were killed. Another soldier was captured the following morning. His interrogation, together with postwar records and interviews, led to his conclusion that Colonel Nakagawa and Major General Murai died in the CP, in ritual suicide.
FINAL MARINE ACTION
The final two-day advance of the 81st Division’s soldiers was truly and literally a mopping-up operation. It was carefully conducted to search out any holed-up opposition. By midday on 27 November, the north-moving units, guarded on the east by other Army units, met face-to-face with the battalion moving south, near the Japanese CP later located. The 323d’s commander, Colonel Arthur P. Watson, reported to General Mueller that the operation was over.
Not quite. Marine air on Peleliu continued to attack the Japanese positions in Koror and Babelthuap, joining the patrolling Navy units in destroying or bottling up any remaining Japanese forces in the northern Palaus. A late casualty in that action was the indomitable Major Robert F. “Cowboy” Stout, whose VMF-114 had delivered so much effective air support to the ground combat on Peleliu.
On 27 September 1944, the U.S. flag was raised over Peleliu, symbolizing that the island was secured. The honor guard was comprised of 1st Marine Division Band members. The general editor of this pamphlet, Benis M. Frank, is eighth from the left.
The stubborn determination of the Japanese to carry out their emperor’s war aims was starkly symbolized by the last 33 prisoners captured on Peleliu. In March 1947, a small Marine guard attached to a small naval garrison on the island encountered unmistakable signs of a Japanese military presence in a cave in the Umurbrogol. Patrolling and ambushes produced a straggler, a Japanese seaman who told of 33 remaining Japanese under the military command of Lieutenant Tadamichi Yamaguchi. Although the straggler reported some dissension within the ranks of that varied group, it seemed that a final banzai attack was under consideration.
The Navy garrison commander moved all Navy personnel, and some 35 dependents, to a secure area and sent to Guam for reinforcements and a Japanese war crimes witness, Rear Admiral Michio Sumikawa. The admiral flew in and travelled by jeep along the roads near the suspected cave positions. Through a loudspeaker he recited the then-existing situation. No response. Finally, the Japanese seaman who had originally surrendered went back to the cave armed with letters from Japanese families and former officers from the Palaus, advising the hold-outs of the end of the war. On 21 April 1947, the holdouts formally surrendered. Lieutenant Yamaguchi led 26 soldiers to a position in front of 80 battle-dressed Marines. He bowed and handed his sword to the American naval commander on the scene.