A Day in Hiding Corporal Virgil f. Montgomery 1st Platoon, 14th Field Hospital (28 May 1943) The 1st Platoon of the 14th Field Hospital had been used almost entirely for evacuation, because that was the big problem--moving the wounded men back from the front over the steep mountains and the slippery tundra filled with deep, treacherous holes. The front lines were down Jim Fish Valley quite a ways so we had set up an advance aid station across Sarana Valley from Engineer Hill, and for three days we had used it as a sort of combination aid tent and collecting station. Major Robert J. Kamish was working the station and there were seventeen men from our platoon with him. We had foxholes dug around the tent and pup tents had been pitched over many of them. The night of May 28, Brown, my buddy, and I were sleeping together a short distance from the aid tent in our shelter. The 2d Battalion of the 32d Infantry had established a kitchen and a supply dump in a draw to the left of our draw maybe 400 yards, and the first we heard of anything wrong was a lot of shouting and some shooting, coming from over there. I raised up to listen. It was about 0500 in the morning and still so dark that it was hard to distinguish objects. Firing from down the valley was the usual thing, but there had been comparatively little firing as far back as the supply dumps, so this sudden outburst worried me. I woke Cletus A. Brown up and we watched and listened. Then we saw six men moving out of the draw and coming our way. Although I could barely see them, something in the way they walked made me believe they were Japs. Others around us had heard the commotion and were getting up. We climbed out of our bags, and grabbed our boots and coats; the rest of our clothes were on; we had been sleeping in them right along. Other men had spotted the first group of Japs and had started to move out. We went toward the aid tent first only to meet another column of Japs, who were running and chattering like monkeys, swinging in from the right. Brown was ahead of me and he started to run, shouting, "Up here! We ran along the only route to us, right up the hill between our draw and the draw the 2d Battalion's kitchens were in. As we broke to run, the Japs spotted us and began firing. We ran frantically until we got into a small nook on the hill. Brown stopped, breathless, and I caught up with him. We were panting from the hard run. The shouting and chattering and firing of the melee behind us was terrible. Brown was looking back down the hill, "Hell, here they come!" he said, and he turned and started on up the hill. I took a quick look and six or seven Japs had just come into view over the crest of the little flat we were on. They began firing again. I ran a few feet and hit dirt. Brown kept running ahead. I had made three or four dashes, the bullets whistling around me, and I hit the dirt again; this time my left leg had gone into a hole in the tundra clear up to my hip. Brown was shouting at me. I looked up. He was skylined at the crest C the hill. While I looked he let out a cry and fell. He had been hit. I could see the Japs faintly, behind me, Still coming. As I tried to work my left leg out of the hole, I discovered that the hole was wide at the bottom. My lungs were burning from the run, I dreaded to run again. I was desperate. I pushed myself down into the narrow slit until I was lying flat on my back. My shoulders were wedged tightly against the muddy sides. There was just room for my legs to be almost straight in one end of the hole; and my head was in the opening of a little underground passage in the other end. There was about six inches of icy water flowing through the hole, which issued from the bank in little trickles where my ears were. I lay very still for a long time. I wasn't sure at all that the Japs had not seen me. About three feet over my eyes I watched the slit of light sky showing through the opening, expecting any second to see the face of a Jap leering down at me. I held my breath once when the tundra shook with the footsteps Of someone running by outside. The firing and shouting sounded faint to me. I began to study the leaves of grass that were springing one at a time back to their normal bend from which I had pressed them in squeezing down into the hole. I had almost made up my mind to sneak a look. It was quite light now. I began to squirm in the hole; it was getting cold, and I wanted to see more about where I was. Then I stopped moving and listened. I had felt the ground tremble again. Someone was walking nearby. Then I heard voices, the chatter of Japanese. There seemed to be seven or eight of them, and they were close. One voice was dominating, giving orders. There was a lot of scurrying around right over my head. One Jap stepped over the hole. I remember the blur, the little hobnails and the light-yellow flannel pants. They were working all around the hole, chattering short sentences. I shrank down into the water in the hole. I had given up...I almost wished the earth would close over me and be done with it. I wondered what the Japs were doing just outside the hole. A heel was sticking out over the edge of the opening Had they seen? Suddenly a machine gun fired right over me. Two or three voices chattered excitedly. The machine gun fired again; this time several hot cartridges fell into the hole and splashed beside my neck. The voices chattered again, and then seemed to move away. The heel vanished. There was no sound . . . Then the gun fired again and I felt the tundra tremble as someone moved above. But there was no talking. Apparently the Japs had left one man to fire the machine gun. The gun fired sporadically all through the endless morning. From time to time the heel would stick over the edge of the opening. Christ! If that foot ever slipped . . . My legs were numb from the cold water and my hips and knees ached. Sometimes I would be seized with a fit of shivering . . . and then I was afraid the Jap would feel the shake. Once I heard a funny sharp tuck! tuck! tuck! through the ground. I thought a BAR was firing at the Jap gun. The Jap replied with long rapid bursts, and the "tuck" sounds came no more. It must have been well into the afternoon. The Jap had been firing just off and on in short bursts. Then the ground shook with a heavy explosion. And another. "My God," I thought, "they're firing artillery at this damned Jap gun." The tundra would leap and shake, then I could hear the heavy explosion, muffled, but powerful. At first I was sickened with the thought of an artillery shell dropping into the hole. The Jap's foot dangled into the opening, and I prayed that he would not be hit; even though he was responsible for my predicament. The ground lurched violently, and a huge explosion pushed on my ears. Pieces of shrapnel fell into the hole. The Jap's foot moved away, but he had not moved his body I was sure, neither had he been hit. He had not made a human sound that I could remember, only the firing of-his gun. To hell with him! "We'll go out together you little bastard." Again the ground shook. For a long time nothing happened. My back was aching my whole body was getting numb. "How will this end . . . how will this end?" The thought kept going over in my head. The Jap gun was firing almost constantly now, I realized. From time to time hot cartridges poured into my hole, onto my chest and neck. It was late again I thought. The sky was getting blue and losing the brilliant whiteness it had had a few hours before. I must have passed out, or maybe even dozed. The Jap was firing frantically--I realized I was strangely glad to hear it . . . I must have felt that a crisis was here . . . that it was over. Between bursts of the Jap gun I was sure I felt or heard again the tuck! tuck! tuck! of bullets striking the ground around the hole. The Jap was burning up his gun. His foot stuck over the edge of my hole again for an instant and then disappeared. He had ceased firing. I heard the tuck! tuck! again. Bullets were striking all around now I was sure. Then an explosion roared over my hole. But it was different from the artillery or mortar that had landed before. The tundra did not shake so violently, and the explosion was lighter. Then another explosion went off. Grenades! I thought. Hand grenades. It never occurred to me to worry about a grenade falling into the hole. I was tickled, I was crazy happy. Then I heard the voices. . .I couldn't make out the words, but they were American voices, and coming closer. Then in good clear English words, someone up above me said, "Any more down there?" I raised up and hollered as loud as I could "Here's one. I'm here." I squeezed my head out of the hole. I was looking up to where I had seen my buddy, Brown, go down, it seemed like a week ago. . .A man stood there with a grenade all drawn back Over his head, ready to throw. There were four men with rifles pointed at me too, I saw, in a quick sweep of my eyes. The man with the grenade hollered "Hold it! He's one of our men." They came down and pulled me out of the hole. My legs wouldn't hold me up. They were completely numb. I saw the Jap gun, and the Jap about fifteen feet away, sprawled on his face. I don't remember much of what followed. I think I passed out again. I remember telling about how I had lain in the hole and watched the Jap heel and heard the machine gun firing over my head. I remember getting dry clothes. I remember a cup of coffee and a strange walk across the valley and up onto Engineer Hill . . . and a sleeping bag. An extract from "The Capture of Attu," As Told By The Men Who Fought There. From the Fighting Forces Series of The Infantry Journal, 1115 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington , DC.