Stories of Faith and Courage from World War II

by Larkin Spivey

  In darkness on November 1, 1943, the President Adams entered Empress Augusta Bay on Bougainville with twelve other attack transports and eleven destroyers. Her troops were to go ashore at 7:30 a.m. the next day with the rest of the 3rd Marine Division. Knowing the island was heavily defended there was a lot of apprehension among the Marines. Captain Johnson described the actions of the Navy chaplain during the night:

  I had a wonderful young Baptist chaplain from Texas on board, a junior lieutenant. Before the men landed he had something like twelve hundred men to give communion to, so he was up the whole night before they debarked. I remember that he came up on the bridge about four o’clock saying, “Captain, would you like to have communion? I can give you four minutes’ worth.” That was the most impressive communion I ever had.202

  We know that the purpose of communion is to strengthen our union with Jesus Christ. Bread and wine are taken as symbols of his body and blood, in accordance with the tradition established by Jesus himself at the “Last Supper” with his disciples. Countless young Marines on this night received this reassurance through a Navy chaplain. For some, it would be their own “last supper.” We should all approach this sacrament with the same sense of urgent necessity.

  Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take it; this is my body.” Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, and they all drank from it. “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.”

  —Mark 14:22–24

  Marine jungle fighters on Bougainville. (National Archives)

  May 25

  Up to God

  Louis Zamperini was one of the war’s most interesting characters. After some troubled teenage years he became a well-known distance runner and made the 1936 Olympic team. During the games he so impressed Adolf Hitler that he was summoned for an audience. In 1941 he volunteered for the Army Air Corps and earned his wings as a navigator on B-24 bombers. His squadron deployed to the Pacific and flew long-range missions out of different island bases.

  On May 27, 1943, he was with his crew on a search-and-rescue mission looking for a lost B-25. Flying low due to cloud cover, his B-24 suddenly lost power to one engine. When an inexperienced engineer shut down the other good engine on that wing, the aircraft went out of control. Zamperini described the feeling:

  The most frightening experience in life is going down in a plane. Those moments when you fall through the air, waiting for the inevitable impact, are like riding a roller coaster with one important difference. In a plummeting plane there’s only sheer horror, and the idea of your very imminent death is incomprehensible. You think, this is it. It’s over. I’m going to die. You know with 100 per cent of your being that the end is unavoidable. Yet a part of you still believes you can fight and survive no matter what your mind knows. It’s not so strange. Where there’s still life, there’s still hope. What happens is up to God.203

  After sinking with the aircraft, tangled in severed control cables and seemingly trapped, Zamperini lost consciousness. He woke suddenly to find himself free of the aircraft and swimming more than seventy feet back to the surface. He and two others survived the crash to begin a separate ordeal adrift in a life raft. He was convinced that God was looking out for him throughout this experience.

  There is no god besides me. I put to death and I bring to life, I have wounded and I will heal, and no one can deliver out of my hand.

  —Deuteronomy 32:39

  May 26

  I Looked Up

  Louis Zamperini and two other crewmen amazingly survived the crash of their B-24 in a remote part of the Pacific Ocean. With two small life rafts, six bars of chocolate, and eight half-pints of water, they started one of the longest survival ordeals ever recorded.

  For forty-seven days they faced hunger, thirst, storms, and attack by an enemy aircraft. Sharks were with them constantly, often bumping the raft. A constant lack of water seemed to be the most trying part of their ordeal. They were often tantalized by showers that passed by just too far away, as they exhausted themselves trying to row toward them. Trying to fight dehydration, one would tread water beside the raft while the other two fought off the sharks with paddles. They came to a point of crisis after seven days without water. They were ready to try anything, as Zamperini related:

  In the end, we resorted to prayer.

  When I prayed, I meant it. I didn’t understand it, but I meant it. I knew from church that there was a God and that he’d made the heavens and the earth, but beyond that I wasn’t familiar with the Bible because in those days we Catholics, unlike Protestants, weren’t encouraged to read it carefully at least in my church we weren’t. Yet on the raft, I was like anybody else, from the native who lived thousands of years ago on a remote island to the atheist in a foxhole: when I got to the end of my rope, I looked up.204

  The three men prayed specifically for water. Within an hour a squall was heading for them, and this time did not veer away. They drank until they could drink no more. They didn’t know if they had received a miracle or not, but they decided not to take any chances. Their prayers became a daily and serious matter.

  I lift up my eyes to the hills where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.

  —Psalm 121:12

  May 27

  Another Kind of Race

  Lou Zamperini was “saved” from his liferaft ordeal by a Japanese patrol boat. He spent the rest of the war in prison camps where he endured even worse deprivations, losing the faith that he had found on the life raft. As he put it, “ I believed that my date with death was set. ”205 He lived, but without hope. His day-to-day existence was filled with fear and hatred.

  Zamperini returned home after the war to a welcoming family and a certain amount of fame. He was soon married and seemed on his way back to a normal life, at least on the surface. All the while, however, he had recurring nightmares of his prison experiences. He tried to drown his bitterness in alcohol. Excessive drinking, business failures, and marital problems led to an inevitable downward spiral. He occasionally thought of God in his hopelessness, but he now blamed God for deserting him.

  On a September day in 1949, Zamperini’s wife insisted he go with her to a meeting in a tent on the corner of Washington and Hill Streets in downtown Los Angeles. The speaker was a little-known preacher named Billy Graham. Under great protest, he went, and, with great antipathy, listened. Little by little, he was convicted by Graham’s patient and persistent presentation of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Earlier in his life he had been an Olympic runner. He now realized that he was in another kind of race, a race for his life:

  I dropped to my knees and for the first time in my life truly humbled myself before the Lord. I asked Him to forgive me for not having kept the promises I’d made during the war, and for my sinful life. I made no excuses. I did not rationalize, I did not blame. He had said, “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved,” so I took Him at His word, begged for His pardon, and asked Jesus to come into my life.206

  Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.

  —Hebrews 12:12

  May 28

  Patsy Li

  One night three natives came through the Marine lines on Guadalcanal, asking for the ”priest-man.” They were taken to Father Frederic Gehring’s tent, where they presented the chaplain with a badly wounded child. He was horrified to see a five- or six-year-old girl who had been bayoneted, smashed in the head with a rifle butt, and consumed now with fever. A corpsman applied bandages to stop the bleeding. A doctor arrived later and was even more shocked at the state of the young girl. She had yet to respond in any way and seemed to be very close to death. The doctor told the chaplain to, “ Pray hard for her. She needs the Great Physician. Only a miracle can keep her alive.”207

  Through the next day and night the chaplain and a group of Marines main
tained a vigil, praying for the girl as her life hung in the balance. Finally, on the second day, the girl began to whimper, as her fever seemed to subside ever so slightly. The doctor was called again. After another examination, he proclaimed, “ I’m either a genius doctor, or you’re a genius priest, but in any case, by golly, I think our girl is going to make it.”208

  Since evacuation was impossible at the time, Father Gehring became the girl’s unofficial guardian. Thinking that she was probably of Chinese origin, he made up a suitably Chinese name: Patsy Li. News spread quickly through the ten thousand Marines on Guadalcanal that they had a “miracle girl” in their midst. They began to come in droves to see the girl and to bring gifts. They brought fruit, flowers, chocolate, handmade dolls, and parachute silk sarongs. Patsy Li seemed to become a symbol of love and hope in an otherwise God-forsaken place.209

  He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us.

  —2 Corinthians 1:10

  May 29

  Miracle Child

  By late November 1942, Chaplain Gehring was finally able to arrange for the evacuation of Patsy Li from Guadalcanal. Through a French priest on Espiritu Santo he had her admitted to an orphanage run by French Sisters on the little island of Efate. He delivered her there himself and, while on this mission, met Foster Hailey, a correspondent for the New York Times. Hailey took an immediate interest in the fantastic story of the girl, and sent a series of articles home about Patsy Li and the “Padre of Guadalcanal.”

  Years later, Frederic Gehring began receiving letters from a Chinese woman in Singapore named Ruth Li. The New York Times articles had finally come to her attention, and Mrs. Li felt strongly that this must be her daughter (also named Patsy Li), who had been lost at sea in February 1942. The only problem was, she was lost in waters off the coast of Malaysia, four thousand miles from Guadalcanal, when the Lis’ ship was bombed fleeing the Japanese invasion of Singapore. Gehring also knew that his Patsy’s name was a pure fabrication on his part.

  Even though Chaplain Gehring discouraged her, Mrs. Li felt compelled to make the costly journey to Efate, via Australia, to see for herself. She finally reached the orphanage in July 1946 to find an awkward, ten-year-old child that she did not recognize at first. Due to the psychological trauma of her early life, young Patsy could remember practically nothing before her years on Efate. Her mother found a scar on her eye and peculiarities of her handwriting that convinced her that this was her child. Within days, Gehring received a telegram: “You have been the architect of a miracle, for I have found my Patsy Li.”210 The priest went to the altar and prayed:

  Thank you… for having given Ruth Li the strength to ignore the words of fools like me who would have stopped her from completing her mission of faith. Thank you for teaching me that there is no power greater than mother love that mother love can still flatten mountains, turn the earth upside down, and make the wildest dreams of mortals come true.211

  Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

  —Exodus 20:12

  May 30

  An Act of Love

  Patsy Li’s life with her newfound mother did not go well. Ruth Li had been raised in a strict household where much was expected of the children. She felt it her duty to impose the same kind of discipline on her daughter. Since Patsy had only spoken French for years, there was also a language barrier that made intimate conversations impossible. Back in Singapore, Mrs. Li became estranged and then divorced from her husband, causing more tension and insecurity for Patsy. The young girl became increasingly rebellious.

  In 1949 a desperate Ruth Li turned again for help to Father Frederic Gehring, now living in Pennsylvania. At her and Patsy’s request, Father Gehring arranged for a guardian and admission to a private school in Williamsburg, Virginia. Patsy seemed to flourish in America, making friends and excelling in academics. She successfully graduated from Catholic University and entered training to become a nurse.

  Throughout these years Father Gehring tried unsuccessfully to bridge the gulf between Patsy and her mother. Patsy, however, could not get past her feelings of abandonment. After a lot of prayer and conversation focused on this problem, the story of Moses’ mother finally occurred to the priest. This Hebrew woman had also been forced to abandon her baby to save it. He told Patsy:

  You see, there can be times when a mother deserts a child or seems to desert it for very good reason. Moses’ mother left her youngster in an act of love. Your mother’s ‘desertion’ of you was an act of love, too. Your mother has never lost her love for you, Patsy. She has told me that many times, and even though she finds it hard to get this across to you, I have never doubted her.212

  Father Gehring’s patient and biblically based counseling led to the final miracle in Patsy Li’s story, reconciliation between a long-estranged mother and daughter.

  When the child grew older, she took him to Pharaoh’s daughter and he became her son. She named him Moses, saying, “I drew him out of the water.”

  —Exodus 2:10

  May 31

  Moral Power

  In war moral power is to physical as three parts out of four (Napoleon).213

  Mao Tse-Tung was a founding member and leader of the Chinese Communist Party from 1921 until his death in 1976. During World War II he interrupted a bitter civil war against the ruling Chinese government to fight their common and external enemy, the Japanese. He ultimately resumed the civil war and established the Communist People’s Republic of China in 1949. Mao was not only a politician and soldier, but a philosopher as well. More than 900 million copies of his Little Red Book were printed as required reading for every citizen of China. Concerning what is important in war, he wrote:

  Weapons are an important factor in war, but not the decisive factor; it is people not things, that are decisive. The contest of strength is not only a contest of military and economic power, but also a contest of human power and morale. Military and economic power is necessarily wielded by the people.214

  Mao Tse-Tung focused on simple principles. He was a great revolutionary leader because he devoted himself to educating and motivating his followers. He knew that great achievements spring from great ideas, not things.

  This principle is important in our own lives and, I believe, especially applicable to children. My wife, Lani, made sure our children were never “spoiled” with possessions. She concluded early in our marriage that our kids’ experiences and education were more important than things. As late-coming Christians, we came to realize the even greater importance of experiences contributing to spiritual growth. With children, as in all else, we need to keep our priorities straight. There is no possession that equals the importance of one life or the status of that life in the eternal future.

  Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding.

  —Proverbs 4:7

  A Navy F6F fighter preparing to launch. (National Archives)

  June

  THE FIGHT FOR SICILY AND ITALY

  In January 1943 President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill met in Casablanca to discuss future strategy. By this time, American success on Guadalcanal was assured, and it was agreed that enough resources would be allocated to the Pacific to retain the initiative in that theater. In Europe, the Americans favored an early attack across the English Channel, but Churchill and his staff felt that the Allies were not yet ready. After a lengthy debate, it was decided that Sicily and Italy presented the best opportunity for continuing the offensive in 1943.

  Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily, began soon after midnight on July 10, 1943. The American 82nd and British 1st airborne divisions dropped into landing zones inland to block enemy movements toward the invasion beaches. Meanwhile a naval armada of more than two thousand ships and craft staging out of North African bases converged on Sicily from the south and east. Under cover
of darkness the assault waves of Patton’s 7th Army landed on the southern coast to seize the small ports of Gela, Licata, and Scoglitti. The British 8th Army under Montgomery landed on the Pachino Peninsula and Gulf of Noto to the east to seize the port at Syracuse. In all, more than four hundred seventy thousand troops went ashore across a beachhead extending nearly one hundred miles.

  The overriding Allied objective on Sicily was to converge all forces on Messina in a large pincer movement, to trap the Axis defenders before they could evacuate the island. Characteristically, Patton drove his troops forward with all possible speed, capturing Palermo on July 22. He then turned eastward along the north coast, leapfrogging enemy defenses in a rapid series of amphibious landings. Montgomery decided to bypass the stiff coastal defenses in his sector and moved his forces inland over the rugged terrain around Mount Etna. Falling back along interior lines, the German and Italian forces were able to buy enough time to evacuate more than one hundred thousand troops and their equipment to the mainland, to oppose the next advance.

  The next Allied move came with the September 1943 invasion of Italy. Montgomery’s 8th Army crossed the Straits of Messina on September 3 with no opposition. On September 9 the main attack came at Salerno by the newly formed 5th Army under General Mark Clark. There, the Germans waited in strength behind well-prepared defensive positions. Bitter fighting to gain and hold the beachhead reached a climax on September 1314 when a massive German counterattack with six hundred tanks and mobile guns was beaten back. On October 1 Allied forces entered Naples, as the Germans fell back to a new defensive line along the Volturno River.