The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an oral interview with John Keith Wells. Wells was in the cavalry at Texas A&M when the war broke out. He joined the Marine Corps and attended officer’s school. There he learned parachuting, completing his final jumps with a broken leg, which he never sought medical care for. He received further training at Camp Pendleton and became the executive officer of his company. Landing on Iwo Jima in the third wave, he remained there for the duration of the campaign. While crossing the island, he received multiple shell fragment wounds to his leg and head. As a member of the 3rd Platoon, E Company, 28th Marine Regiment, he witnessed both the first and second flags atop Mount Suribachi. By the end of the war, he was on a first-name basis with a general, who was impressed by his grace under fire. Wells retired from the service as a major, earned a degree in geology and entered the oil industry.

The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an oral interview with Edward McCreary. McCreary was born in Spain in 1928 and attended school in the Philippines beginning in 1935. He was a high school sophomore in Baguio when the Japanese invaded, and he managed to escape to the mountains, where he hid for three months. After he was caught, he was imprisoned for one year in a small camp. As guerillas began to recapture parts of the island, prisoners were transferred to Santo Tomas University. There American prisoners organized committees to serve as a form of self-government. Thanks to them, McCreary completed his high school education while there. By the spring of 1944, starvation was setting in, causing death and illness. In September 1944 a Navy air raid brought hope to the prisoners, but it was several weeks before American troops landed. Soldiers broke into the prison and spent three days barricaded there beside the prisoners; together they shared military rations and food that had been smuggled to them by Dominican priests. Upon being liberated, McCreary was evacuated to the States and enrolled in Harvard University.

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