Full-grown jungle crowds down upon the open fields, but at the critical line of inhospitable soil the trees stop like a battalion commanded to halt. These vacant areas exist on the northern plain in considerable number. One mile east of where Americans landed there is a huge pasture reaching miles inland with rarely a tree. Our agricultural experts bulldozed away the kunai and built a farm that became rather spectacular. Black soil like the chernozem of Russia went at least sixteen feet deep and yielded three or four crops a year, enough to provide fresh vegetables to many troops. If over-farmed, the soil quickly lost fertility. But it recovered equally quickly, if planted with nitrogenous crops that were allowed to rot. The only drawback: not enough rain.
A trusted observer of exactly what Guadalcanal is like, is rangy, good-looking, talkative A. D. Bugbee from Honolulu. A thirty-eight-year-old Army civilian expert, he has served on the island for the last three years and says, “I like it here. Asked to be reassigned after my first tour. Good water, good fishing, cool nights, regular mail, and a first-class English doctor.” He also has a skiff with a murderous airplane propellor that pushes it up the Lunga River at twenty-six miles an hour. He adds, “I’ve walked through almost every part of the island. Sometimes it’s tough going, but usually enjoyable. That’s why I do it.” He shoots crocodiles for sport, wild pigs for food, and keeps plenty of soft drinks on ice. “My friends in the States write and say, ‘Three years on Guadalcanal? You must be a hero!’ Don’t you dare tell ’em I ain’t. But why should I worry? They wouldn’t believe you.” Of course, Bugbee is not pursued by Jap snipers.
But I wanted to recall exactly how Guadalcanal seemed in the old days when you crept through the bush with C-Rations. I went out one brutally hot day and walked some six miles up and around the Matanikau River. This was where the Marines were knocked back at one time, where the Army did much heavy fighting.
The trees and vines were not bad, for there had been no rain for many days. One could easily walk if he took his time, and the bugs—for this was daytime—were not unbearable.
The heat was. Within ten steps I started to perspire and in fifteen minutes I was a soggy mass. At the end of three miles not a stitch was dry. Even the insides of my shoes were wet. It’s hard to describe the last three miles. I thought my stomach would collapse from lack of water. Never have I been so maddeningly thirsty.
Where the last hour’s worth of perspiration came from I shall never know. The heat was so intense that even under a toque I was beginning to feel faint, and at last I had to scoop a drink from the Matanikau. It was as good as icewater and announced itself to my muscles each inch of the way down my gullet.
Now Guadalcanal was oppressive. I tried to imagine what it must have been like to the men who hated it, and I was sorry that anyone, American or Jap, had ever been forced to live under such conditions. I understood why even rugged Japanese troops had collapsed and died in that stifling mid-day heat, how they starved in this impersonal sea of greenness. Add constant malaria for quaking fevers, and this was forbidding terrain. Twigs crackled, and I needed no flight of fancy to know how increased the terror would have been with Jap snipers lashed in the crotches of the silent trees.
It took me three hours to walk six miles. When I was finished I had the jock itch, the beginnings of prickly heat, and near sun stroke. I was limp from excessive perspiration and my arm tasted acid, not salty. Had I stayed there beside the Matanikau until dark—as our men did—the mosquitoes would have been at me and the stinging bugs. And two weeks later I was to learn how really tough the Matanikau had been.
When I reached the road I looked back at the peaceful river. I should not want to fight there alone, with no medicine and no food, no tent, no communication with my friends. I acknowledged once more what a rotten, sweaty, frightening battlefield Guadalcanal had been. There was unending honor to the men who conquered it.
The worst of my Matanikau venture was the virulent attack of Spring Fever that followed. This tropical disease ran rampant among American officers during the war, and, when mixed with alcoholism, was irremediable. The patient gets up bright and chipper at seven, but at ten he feels drowsy and lies down for a nap. He wakes at twelve in time for lunch, following which everyone in his right senses takes a siesta. The officer passes out cold, like a dead mackerel, and wakens at four. After a swim and a good dinner he is wide awake and a brilliant conversationalist, but about nine he hits the hay. It’s called Spring Fever when you pound your mattress more than twelve hours a day. I was never a champion sack hound because I found that if I slept more than sixteen hours a day, I had a little trouble dropping off at night.
The sharpest comment ever made about Guadalcanal was that of the sergeant who hated the place. On V-J day he rushed in and cried, “Nnnyahhh! Everybody sayin’ how smart the English are in foreign affairs. We just offered to give them back this hole. And they took it!”
Why they took it in the first place is a mystery, for it has been a deficit protectorate ever since. They do not own the islands and must one day turn them over to the natives for self-government. This might take place within a hundred years.
When they resumed control, the British were faced with a dilemma: “Where shall the capital be?” They had to choose between the destroyed capital at Tulagi (good harbor, rotten climate) and some new location on Guadalcanal (no harbor, superior climate). After inflamed debate they chose the latter and drew up plans for an ideal tropical town at Honiara. Americans familiar with Guadalcanal will insist, “There’s no such place.” Up to 1945 there wasn’t, but there is now.
Leave Henderson Field and go west along Highway 50 past Fighter One, past Kukum Docks, across the Matanikau, and on to Point Cruz, where the ammunition dump was. At the base of Point Cruz, which forms the meager semblance of a harbor, Honiara has been built. The word means “where the wind blows,” which, as the planter observed “is so perfect a name for a capital that any comment from me would be superfluous.”
Honiara will be a better town than Tulagi ever was. King-size quonsets have been moved in for barracks, and grass shacks have been tucked away under broad trees to serve temporarily as government offices. Behind the town is a high ridge where lovely homes are being built in breezes that keep them permanently cool and mosquito-proof.
At Honiara there are no signs of war. A good saloon is operated by one of Guadal’s old identities, Kenneth Houston Dalrymple Hay. An hilarious Chinaman, Ho Man, keeps the restaurant, which almost folded because “more than seven hundred dollars’ worth of china and silverware was stolen the first ten months.” Ho Man’s menu is gruesome. He is reputed to be an excellent cook, but Guadalcanal has a most precarious food supply—ships don’t call any more—and when I was his guest Ho Man hadn’t seen meat, potatoes, fresh vegetables or onions for three months. As each hopeless day passed he became more despondent and instead of exercising his skill on what was at hand, raged at fate and banged whatever he could find into a skillet of hot lard. It seems theatrical, but when I got back to Guadal my first dinner with Ho Man consisted of Spam! Also my second through tenth.
There were other more notable dinners in the fine homes on the ridge. Captain Frank Moore, of Australia, is Inspector of Police. He’s about forty, wears a close-clipped moustache, and has a beautiful wife. His house at the top of a cliff commands a startling view of The Slot, and in the large circular living room life can be very pleasant.
Drinks are at six, anything you can name. Formal dress is required: handsome gowns for women, whites with black silk cummerbunds for men. The Peter Hindles are there. He’s from South Africa and is in charge of lands and mines, some of which are suspected of hiding pretty good gold. The guest of honor is Edward John Hugo Colchester-Wemyss (rhymes with seems), the new Chief of Police lately arrived from service in Jamaica. He’s the imposing-colonel type who has known the Empire in its days of glory. “History repeats!” he cries. “England was at her greatest in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. I make bold to predict that she will be eve
n greater in the reign of the new Elizabeth!”
Handsome young MacKenzie-Pollock, glittering in kilts and sporran, is the newer type of colonial servant. His wife is also a doctor and assists at the hospital. Talk turns to life in the tropics and MacKenzie-Pollock says in terrific brogue: “Mind you! White men are not intended to live within ten degrees of the equator.” His energetic wife agrees. “I’m ashamed of myself,” she admits. “I used to bounce out of bed at dawn after six hours’ sleep. Now I rise at seven and take an afternoon nap.”
The meal is impeccably served by a wide-eyed nine-year-old native boy. Four courses, wine, good bread, and liqueurs. Not until later do you remember that Guadalcanal has been without food for three months. Everything you’ve eaten has been improvised. The British would rather eat bully beef than lose dignity in native eyes by going out to hunt wild pigs!
Captain Moore and his colleagues are having a tough time living down certain bad breaks they suffered during the war. Natives watched them flee before the Japs. They saw them desert the Chinese at Tulagi—“No Oriental women or children to board evacuation boats”—and by the fortunes of war it was the Americans who came with fabulous equipment to recapture the islands. More important, they saw that our Negro troops lived the same as white men. It has been aptly said: “For forty years the English used social aloofness to impress the native. In one afternoon the Americans did a better job with a Texas Negro driving a bulldozer.” The impact of Americans was profound, affecting even the story of the Crucifixion as narrated by a native pastor: “Master he look down he see Picaninny belong Him in pain too much. He sign out, ‘Son, how’s things?’ Picaninny belong Him sing out, ‘O.K., Boss!’ ”
On the island of Malaita, one of the untamed centers of the Pacific, a new problem has arisen. During the war certain Americans informed the Malaita savages that when peace came there would be a new order in which black men would govern and every native would receive the better part of a shipload of things like trucks and refrigerators. Upon these promises was formed the Marching Rule (Marxian Rule). Adherents refuse to be numbered in the census, to work, to pay taxes or to listen to the British, whom they threaten to club in the head if they came to Malaita.
The Marching Rule men are confused on one point. They think it’s America that’s leading the Communists. Accordingly, they’ve approached American soldiers with sums up to $4,000 if they will become field generals in the war against the British!
Actually, there are few islands in the Pacific better governed than the Solomons. True, there is much stuffiness about English on any island, including their own. They derive so much pleasure from doing things the hard, time-honored way that they often overlook essentials. For example, in Honiara’s main street a very large Jap shell is periodically uncovered by the road grader, whereupon a big sign is erected: UNEXPLOSIVE BOMB. TAKE CARE, which is one of the best signs in the Pacific. The next trip of the grader covers the bomb again, and the sign is packed away. When I asked what would happen if the grader detonated the bomb, an official thought for a moment and replied, “There’d be a tremendous bang, I should think.”
But Americans who scoff at the British system have one stubborn fact to explain. Bougainville, New Britain, New Ireland and New Guinea are better islands in every respect than the Solomons. Their natives are more susceptible to development. But those islands have been governed first by the brutal Germans and next by the confused Australians. When war broke, these German-Australian-trained natives killed missionaries, betrayed coastwatchers and sold American pilots to Jap soldiers who beheaded them.
On British islands not one white man was betrayed. Not one. The fidelity of the Solomon Islanders was unbelievable. Hundreds of Americans live today because these brave savages fished them from the sea, led them through Jap lines and carried them in their canoes to safety. Sergeant Vouza was the type. The Japs tortured him for hours to make him betray white positions. He refused. They lashed him to a tree and used him for bayonet practice. He received some twenty stabs and fainted. By a miracle he lived and was cut down by friends. “What did you think?” they asked. “I thought it was my duty,” he said.
I knew many fine men in the Solomons. Dr. Fox was a 98-pound missionary who served at a remote spot. A brilliant linguist, he wished to write the definitive treatise on native grammar. To do so, he tried to project himself into the native mind, hiring himself out as a plantation house boy and living with the other servants. He didn’t get the feeling of being a native. Finally he said to his master, “Will you please call me a bloody fool and kick me in the pants?” The white man was astounded, so the fragile little missionary explained, “I want to know exactly how the native feels.” This planter had long hated missionaries, so with relish he backed off and let fire. Dr. Fox rubbed his bottom, thought for a moment, and said sorrowfully, “Too bad. I still don’t get the feeling.”
The American who left the greatest imprint on Guadalcanal was John Burke, of New York. He was six-feet two, weighed about 260, and told a leading naval captain in my presence, “You get in my way, Captain, and I’ll break you!” At five o’clock each afternoon he used to consume three huge malted milks, six candy bars and four steins of beer. Then he would have a gargantuan meal. He was crazy about the jungle and on one trip with me took along only a toothbrush and a copy of the New York Social Register. He sat for hours inside his mosquito net unraveling the intertwinings of leading families. He dreamed of leading an insurrection of the Malaita men, who idolized him. But three weeks after I left, he and my staff flew our old C-47 into the side of a mountain. They were all killed.
The story of Paul Mason seems unbelievable, but only a tithe of it has been told. Says a friend, “Paul was so little and insignificant no one would give him a job in peacetime. We thought he wasn’t quite bright, a five-foot runt of a man with a squint.” He became a coastwatcher behind Jap lines on Bougainville. His exploits were heroic. He swam two and a half miles through sharks’ waters to warn a submarine. He organized a native army which killed hundreds of Japs. At one time General Kanda reported to Tokyo: “Mason is our greatest enemy in this area.” A crate of bloodhounds was shipped in to get him, but he radioed for American planes to bomb them on the pier. The planes came and Mason reported: “Dogs destroyed. Proceeding.” When Admiral Halsey met him for the first time, Halsey said, “You stay seated. In your presence I’ll stand.” He was decorated by three governments, was perhaps the bravest man in the Pacific. It was partially through his efforts that Admiral Yamamoto was shot down at Kieta. The Yanks had broken the Jap code and knew he was landing for an inspection, but not when. Mason sent his cook into Kieta to work for the Japs. Soon the cook returned with electrifying news: “Numbawan Japoni bilong soda water (sea), he come!” And as Yamamoto left, our P-38’s nailed him. Now Mason is running a small plantation on Bougainville. Reports his friend: “They figured that if he could do all that, he could be trusted to cut copra, even if he is a little squirt.”
The American who completely captured Guadalcanal was Carole Landis! She arrived one blistering day with Jack Benny, and when she appeared in a glorious form-fitting gown, there was a breathless hush and then a cacophony of whistles. In her acts she kissed a sergeant, who fainted. My chief whispered, “I’d enlist all over again for one chance like that.” She was a tonic, a bright, bubbling girl whose very appearance made you feel good. After the show she disappeared with a Navy ensign she had known in the States, and the Army went crazy. When the culprits were finally found Army brass thundered that the ensign must be court-martialed, but the Navy commander said, “You’re excused, son. You’ve gone through enough already.”
Today the island contains many surprises. The used portion of Highway 50 is better now than it was in 1945. Many of the bridges have collapsed. Quonset huts left in the bush have sometimes been completely covered with vines. Those that have been painted look better than they did originally.
The chapel has fallen in, the cemetery is gone, only the white steeple
remains. The docks at Kukum are crumbling, and the infamous Hotel De Gink, after five years of complete abandonment, looks about as clean as it did in its heyday, which isn’t saying much.
Wild life has come back to its former haunts. Magnificent birds—parakeets, hawks, heron, quail, frigate birds—are abundant. Wild pigs invade the airfields. Crocodiles infest the rivers. And the flying foxes, with no one to shoot them, have grown bold and plump. But there is one tragedy. Each island unit used to have a couple of bouncing little puppies. They are dogs, now, and have gone wild. They have crossbred into repugnant creatures and have become a major pest. They will all be shot.
Henderson Field is a continuing miracle. In recent years it has received little attention, yet it remains an almost perfect coral strip. I traveled the length of it—6200 unequaled feet of coral—in a battered jeep at 55 miles an hour. It was like a table top. Even the original Jap strip is serviceable. Explains Captain Martin, commanding the closing-down unit of seventeen men, “The Japs probably selected the very best site in the entire Solomons. The drainage is remarkable.”
The only military installation still occupied is ComAir-SoPac on the hill above Henderson Field. Here Captain Martin occupies Admiral Fitch’s old quarters and eats off Navy dishes with four impressive stars. “You’ll observe,” he says with Army satisfaction, “that they’re all chipped.”
Visiting Guadalcanal is like standing on the shores of Spain and looking toward Trafalgar, like walking the fields of Gettysburg. The entire island is a monument to the courage of free men who threw back the rampaging enemy. Although I knew it well during the war, I was moved to deep spiritual excitement when I saw it again, and I feel certain that any American visitor will have the same reaction. For beyond its people, beyond its governmental problems—even beyond the battle records—Guadalcanal must always have a unique place in American history.
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