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Sgt. Thomas Lucius Bolt |
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| Service: U.S.
Army - WWII
Divison: 41st/162 Inf. Co. C. Burial:
San Joaquin Valley National Cemetery, Santa Nella, California |
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| Sunrise at
Zamboanga by Sgt. Thomas L. Bolt It was very quiet as we waited for the dawn. We were on a mountainside, thick with palm trees, high above the sea. The dawn light first hit the tops of the palms, and as it lowered, I could see the notches cut in the trunks, which were used as footholds for the Filipinos, who had gathered coconuts for copra used in making soap in the peacetime. The night had been intensely dark, starless, as there had been a storm with lightning and thunder probably not anticipated by the Japanese soldiers who attacked our perimeter. The banzai attack had begun at 0300 in the morning of 16 March 1945 and it was pitch-black. Shortly afterwards, nature began its pyrotechnics, and the moving figures of the Japanese appeared frozen in a natural stroboscopic light as the rain pelted down with fury. Our company perimeter consisted usually of three men to a foxhole, and we took guard shifts of two hours on duty, and four hours off. After the explosions and flashes of gunfire had subsided, six men from foxholes that had been overrun crawled to our position. I sat on the parapet in order to give the wounded men space at the bottom of the hole. I gave our last grenade to the platoon guide, who had left his weapon behind. Japanese soldiers had been indoctrinated that the night attack was "the spirit of the infantry," and they probably were the most formidable adversary that the U.S. Army ever had to face. Although some of our men claimed they had heard Japanese soldiers yelling "Banzai!", the only intelligible voice command I heard was a brusque "Iko! Iko!" As the morning light penetrated the area with palm fronds still dripping moisture, we began to discern movement. Had the Japanese merely waited for the dawn in order to roll up our perimeter? No, these were our G.I.'s. We had won! Later, I asked a Nisei interpreter what "Iko! Iko!" meant, and he said it meant "Let's go!" |
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Tom Bolt is a Robert Bolt Jr. descendant |
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