WWII hero honored by former unit members at ceremony on Okinawa
By Carlos Bongioanni,
Okinawa bureau
Carlos Bongioanni /
Stars and Stripes
Joe McConville, 77, plays "Amazing Grace" on the bagpipes during a ceremony
Sunday at Camp Kinser, Okinawa, to honor the late Maj. Gen. James L. Day. |
CAMP KINSER, Okinawa — The last time Ray Kendell visited
Okinawa, he was embroiled in a bloody conflict with Japanese forces. Ditto for Joe
McConville.
The two World War II veterans didn’t return to Okinawa to relive
war memories. They came back, 56 years later, to honor the late James L. Day.
Day retired from the Marine Corps as a major general in 1987. He
received the Medal of Honor Jan. 20, 1998 from then President Clinton for his battle
heroics in Okinawa. And although he died nine months later at age 73, his legacy lives on.
“We came back to honor a great buddy of ours,” said
McConville. “His Medal of Honor was well deserved, even though it took them 53 years
to give it to him.”
Day earned his nation’s highest combat award for holding off
Japanese forces from retaking a heavily contested position on Sugar Loaf Hill in Naha. For
three days and nights, then-Cpl. Day fought virtually alone, repulsing wave after wave of
enemy assaults. When reinforcements arrived, some 158 enemy bodies littered the battle
area surrounding Day’s foxhole.
Both McConville and Kendell said they learned of the famed
corporal’s heroics only after the battle.
“When you’re in the battle, you see only this much,”
Kendell said spreading his hands out about two feet in front of him. “You only see
what’s directly in front of you. You didn’t know, until later, that there were
so many heroes around you.”
“I got to know him very personally after he retired ... when he
started attending our annual reunions in the early 1990s,” McConville said referring
to the 6th Marine Division Association’s yearly veterans functions.
Ten members of the association returned to Okinawa to dedicate a
plaque in Day’s honor Sunday at Camp Kinser’s Garden of Remembrance.
The Garden is the site of a three-sided monument that pays tribute to
238,000 who died in the Battle of Okinawa — one side for the Americans, another for
the Okinawans and a third for the Japanese.
“Despite his battle toughness, he was caring, gentle, kind and
compassionate,” said Edward Fox, the former president of the 6th Marine Div. Assoc.
“Like all true warriors Jim Day was a peacemaker... He taught us how to
forgive.”
Brig. Gen. Willie J. Williams said that Day’s virtue and
character strengths must be remembered and passed on to future generations.
Day’s grandson, Lance Cpl. Josh Eustice, 24, attended
Sunday’s ceremony and said he joined the Marine Corps to continue the family
tradition.
“The legacy that I have to live up to is really simple: Be nice
to everybody; be kind to all people,” Eustice said.
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