mt. suribachi. and at that time we were in our landing craft coming up the shore from the mother ship, troop ship that we cruised the pacific on. and when we landed as the regiment strength, we had to work up the island to get to the front line. they assigned us to the middle of the line, and the fourth and fifth divisions were on our flanks. we at that time were in the process of digging everybody out of their holes, caves, embankments, and any imaginable defense that the enemy could put before us. it was cave by cave, pill box by pill box, spider hole by spider hole. and if we did 100 yards in one day, we considered that a very successful day. some days we couldn't move at all. but on "d" plus six or seven, one of our corporals got shot, and i was a fire team leader, that's four men, a bazooka man, demolitions, flame thrower and a couple of men with automatic rifles trying to cover them. and when he was wounded and died, i had a couple of replacements in our squad, and they looked kind of confused