Photo By Joseph Siemandel | Soldier on the Galloping Horse, 1943, Howard Brodie, Library of Congress Prints and...... read more read more
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More than eighty years ago, soldiers of the Washington National Guard’s 161st Infantry Regimental Combat Team laid eyes on the small, embattled island of Guadalcanal. The feeling must have been surreal, just weeks removed from the paradise of Oahu, they regarded the island looming on the horizon with apprehension. The beaches, palm trees, and green jungle marred by that deep sense of foreboding that precedes combat. Unaware of their destination until just two days earlier, soldiers from the regiment exchanged idle speculation for frenzied preparation. Soldiers checked and cleaned equipment one last time and packed up their belongings.
Disorientation ensued as the ship’s loudspeakers barked out directions as platoons gathered their gear and moved to the deck before climbing down the cargo nets into landing craft. The gentle swell of the ocean felt more keenly on the smaller vessels as they ferried them to the beaches.
Unbeknownst to the men, who recently arrived on shore, they would see combat far earlier than anticipated due to the operational impact of disease. By January 1943, the Army estimated that a division committed to the front in the Pacific for three months would suffer a staggering eighty percent casualties due to malaria. Those who returned to duty did so in a considerably diminished capacity. Planners on Guadalcanal believed that the 161st’s higher headquarters, the 25th Infantry Division, should be committed aggressively before disease began to impact the formation. “We wanted at least one division,” Maj. Gen. Robert Spragins explained, “which could maneuver and go through the jungle, capable of tremendous physical effort, capable of the movement necessary to put over a hard attack.”
The bulk of the regiment landed unopposed on December 30, 1942, the remainder followed a few days later. After organizing supplies and stores on the beach, the 161st took over responsibility for the perimeter defense of Henderson Field, a critical American airfield on the island. Tension permeated the atmosphere as soldiers began to grapple with the realities of imminent combat. They endured their first air raids and suffered their first casualties resulting from enemy action. Perimeter patrols found Japanese bodies and equipment surrounding the airfield, a testament to the hard fighting that had occurred earlier in the campaign. They grew to fear the night. The impenetrable darkness brought with it taunts from Japanese soldiers and, of greater concern, the ever-present threat of enemy infiltration.
The anticipation of combat, however, quickly yielded to its reality. Ordered to augment the 27th Infantry to their south on January 11, 1943, the 161st Infantry Regiment would face its first ordeal of fire in a narrow strip of dense jungle known as the Matanikau River Pocket. This unforgiving terrain sloped down from a relatively bare hill complex known as the Galloping Horse to the Matanikau River below. A slight ridge following the course of the river marked the end of traversable terrain in favor of a shear drop to the river’s bank. Within this narrow stretch of jungle, not more than 500 yards wide and 2,000 yards long, elements of the Japanese 228th and 230th Infantry Regiments defended from a series of heavily camouflaged positions, orienting their automatic weapons along two trails that constituted the principal avenues of approach. Clearing out these pockets of resistance constituted difficult, deadly work. “The reduction of the pocket in the Matanikau,” the Division Commander MG J. Lawton Collins later observed, “was one of the toughest assignments that any unit had in the division.” The jungle proved exceedingly thick, with dense vegetation masking Japanese positions well-constructed to blend into the terrain.
Assuming responsibility for the 27th Infantry Regiment’s left flank, 1st Battalion, 161st Infantry Regiment, occupied the high ground overlooking the Matanikau River valley and also established a blocking position along the river on the eastern edge of the hill complex. With a companion block established on the western edge, Japanese forces lost access to the river that constituted their principal supply line. Beginning on January 15, 1943, 1st Battalion launched a series of patrols from the eastern block to clear out these remaining pockets of resistance. The going was slow and advances ground to a halt in the face of Japanese machine gun fire and ardent resistance. The battalion’s efforts to employ 60mm mortars achieved little advantage—the rounds exploded upon impact with the tree cover. Finally securing permission to use the heavier 81mm mortars, and with the regiment assuming full responsibility for the pocket, the 161st squeezed the enemy, inducing futile counterattacks in a desperate Japanese attempt to escape. Defeating these desperate pushes, 1st Battalion finally cleared the pocket on January 21, 1943. Combat operations on Guadalcanal would continue for several weeks, but the 161st Infantry Regiment faced no tougher test on the island than its ten days spent clearing the Matanikau River Pocket. The regiment from Washington had proved its mettle.
Story by Dr. James Perrin, Command Historian
| Date Taken: | 03.14.2023 |
| Date Posted: | 03.14.2023 18:08 |
| Story ID: | 440400 |
| Location: | CAMP MURRAY, WASHINGTON, US |
| Web Views: | 497 |
| Downloads: | 2 |
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