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| Author | Eugene B. Sledge |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | WarMemoir |
| Publisher | Presidio Press |
Publication date | 1981 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | |
| Pages | 326 p. |
| ISBN | 0-19-506714-2 |
| OCLC | 22653690 |
| 940.54/26 20 | |
| LC Class | D767.99.P4 S55 1991 |
| Followed by | China Marine: An Infantryman's Life after World War II |
With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa is aWorld War II memoir byUnited States MarineEugene Sledge, first published in 1981. The memoir is based on notes Sledge kept tucked away in a pocket-sized Bible he carried with him during battles he fought at Peleliu and Okinawa. The book formed part of the basis of the material covered byKen Burns'PBS documentaryThe War (2007), as well as theHBO miniseriesThe Pacific (2010), in which Sledge was portrayed byJoseph Mazzello. Author and oral historian Studs Terkel, interviewed the author for his definitive oral history,The Good War(1984).
By his own account, Sledge began writing the memoir in 1944, "immediately afterPeleliu while we were in rest camp onPavuvu Island" and continued working on it "as soon as I returned to civilian life" in 1946.[1] Nicknamed "Sledgehammer" by his comrades, Sledge experienced combat during the battles ofPeleliu andOkinawa as a60 mm mortarman while part of K Company,3rd Battalion, 5th Marines,1st Marine Division (K/3/5).
The book's working title wasA Marine Mortarman in World War II, which Sledge later changed toInto The Abyss. The book was first published under its final title by the Presidio Press in 1981.
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Sledge's memoir gives a firsthand perspective on thePacific Theatre. His memoir is a front-line account of infantry combat in thePacific War. It brings the reader into theisland hopping, the jungle heat and rain, the filth and malaise, the fear of potentialbanzai attacks, and the hopelessness and loss of humanity that characterized the campaign in the Pacific. Sledge wrote starkly of the brutality displayed by Japanese soldiers during the battles and of the hatred that both sides harbored for each other. In Sledge's words, "This was a brutish, primitive hatred, as characteristic of the horror of war in the Pacific as the palm trees and the islands."
Sledge describes one instance in which he and a comrade came across the mutilated bodies of three Marines, butchered and with their severed genitals inserted into their mouths. He also describes the behavior of some Marines towards dead Japanese, including theremoval of gold teeth from Japanese corpses (including, in one case, from a severely wounded but still living Japanese soldier), as well as other macabre trophy-taking. He details the process and mechanisms that slowly strip away a combat infantryman's humanity and compassion, in a manner that is accessible to a general audience.
Sledge describes in detail the physical struggle of living in a combat zone and the debilitating effects of constant fear, fatigue, and filth. "Fear and filth went hand-in-hand," he wrote. "It has always puzzled me that this important factor in our daily lives has received so little attention from historians and is often omitted from otherwise excellent personal memoirs by infantrymen." Marines had trouble staying dry, finding time to eat theirrations, practicing basicfield sanitation (it was impossible to diglatrines orcatholes in the coral rock onPeleliu), and simply moving around on the pulverized coral of Peleliu and in the mud ofOkinawa.
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Describing it as an example of "the American procedure at its best, unashamed of simplicity,"Paul Fussell said thatWith the Old Breed "is one of the finest memoirs to emerge from any war."[2]
New York Times writer and editorDwight Garner describes the book's depiction of war as "surpassingly vivid," adding, "What putsWith the Old Breed across is, oddly enough, Sledge's sensitivity. He offers many small, artful portraits of men he admires (and a few he despises.) He chronicles small kindnesses and profound acts of friendship."[3]