. >> from tulsa, oklahoma, gordon gayle was a 27-year-old marine in 1st marine division. >> nimitz thenold the 1st marine division to get ready to go to peleliu. >> when they started forming the marine corporation for world war ii, nobody had ever commanded a division of marines in the field before. the 1st marine division had fought in what we called the banana wars. they became known as the old breed. >> when i joined the marine corps, it was the size of the new york city police force. >> another member of the old breed was 25-year-old everett pope, born in the tiny town of milton, massachusetts. >> when did you first decide you wanted to be a marine? >> that's easy. i was a senior at bodien college in maine and it was 1941, and it was obvious something was going to happen. and this guy came around the campus, wearing this blue jacket, light blue pants with a stripe down the side and i said, have i to have one of those. >> had anybody said anything at school about the likelihood of -- >> not to my knowledge, ollie. not to my knowledge. >> after graduating with honors, ray davis joined

ray davis and gordon gayle were awarded the red cross for their sacrifice on peleliu and nearly 600 menthe 81st infantry division received heroic awards. >> i was entitled to a purple heart, but i had lost so many men that had had arms blown off and legs blown off and just really serious wounds that -- i just felt like it would be an insult to them. for me to wear the same medal. >> in a bizarre twist, more than 2 1/2 years after the last shots were fired, some of the few remaining japanese soldiers still refused to believe that the war was over. >> there were 72 japanese who held out, hid in the caves. in that time, their numbers dwindled from 72 down to 34. and 34 actually surrendered in april of 1947. >> in this "war stories" exclusive, one of the japanese holdouts told us how he literally lived under the boots of american troops. >> translator: i was hiding in a small, narrow cave that i discovered. we were trying to stop laughing because the americans were right on top of us and then goofing around, we would say we could kill them if we wanted to, but we just stayed hidden. >> toda