Retail price: $23.50
The following are excerpts from three of
the sixty-five interviews presented in the book:
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Shifty Powers, E Co., 506th
PIR, 101st Airborne Division, the “Band of Brothers” - As
a rifleman, they expected you to carry an M1, but they weren’t very strict
about it. If you could pick up a
Thompson submachine gun you could carry it or a carbine, whatever. Most
everybody stayed with the weapon they were familiar with. I swapped one time;
we were getting ready to make a jump before Holland.
We were out at the airfield, but Patton overran the drop zone. While we were at
the airfield, they came out and told us the area we were going to drop in; the
Germans had a lot of guard dogs. Well, I’m kind of a little bit scared of dogs,
so I talked to another guy about swapping, I gave him my M1 and he gave me his
Thompson. I figured I could spray the dogs. They called that jump off, so I
went back and swapped back with him. The Thompson was a good weapon, the only
fault I heard about the Thompson was that you had to keep them clean or they
would jam.
The most amazing thing
about that M1 is you could throw that thing down in a mud hole, drag it through
it, pick it up and it would fire. It wouldn’t jam; it would fire. What we did
mostly was keep the outside of it as clean as we could with a rag or something.
And we’d clean the bore out as often as we could. Any time we were off the line
we’d clean the rifles well. In combat, when you were right on the line you
don’t take time out to clean the rifle. You just kept the mud and dirt wiped
off the outside of it the best you can. They were outstanding weapons, that
rifle worked all the time.
Robert Mort, 1st
Marine Division – When I landed on Iwo,
I was carrying my BAR and wore a BAR belt. The belt had six pockets, with two
magazines in each pocket. That gave me 12 magazines in the belt and one in the
weapon. It was a lot of weight! I wasn’t
issued a bayonet, but I carried a Ka-Bar. The assistant BAR man, who happened
to be the biggest man in the platoon, carried six more magazines for the BAR. He
carried a carbine for himself and he had a belt with three pouches for BAR
magazines that could be slung over his shoulder.
I was wounded on the night
of the 7th of March; I almost got through it. We were on an OP about
100 yards in front of our lines. A Jap came in from behind us and dropped three
grenades in our hole. They were looking for water mostly; they had run out of
water and all they had was the sulfur water from the island. All three of us on
the OP were wounded. I came out the luckiest; the other guys were wounded much
worse than I was. When they came out and took us from the hole back to our
lines, I was the last one out and the Jap came in to get my canteens. All he
had was a bayonet and all I had was my Ka-Bar. I made it and he didn’t.
>
Jack Walentine, 188th Inf.
Regmt, 11th Airborne Division. -
It was around the end of November 1950, we were about 40
miles south of the Yalu
River
at the time. The battalion was in reserve, so we weren’t on the front
line. It was cold and we had a few
bonfires going. We had some roving guards pulling security for us. During the night, one of our sergeants got up
to piss. He spotted a group of short horses and men passing through our area. He
knew that wasn’t right and he jumped up on our mess truck which had a ring
mounted .50 on it. He opened up on the group of Chinese and the horses. After
he started shooting it was utter chaos.
I was asleep in my sleeping bag, but when I heard the first shot I
opened my eyes. Standing directly over the top of me was a Chinese soldier with
a Russian submachine gun. He was kicking my rifle away from my side. I cocked
the pistol and fired at him through the sleeping bag three or four times. After
the first shot I couldn’t see because feathers were flying everywhere. I only
hit him one time, in the head, I’m not sure if it was the first shot or the
second, third or fourth. The round knocked him over. My sleeping bag was ruined;
it had a big 15-inch gash in it. The
next day I discovered that the slide of the pistol had left marks on my chest. It’s
amazing that the pistol functioned in the bag like that.
Read
what others are saying about US Infantry
Weapons in Combat:
Most of us U.S.
military weapons collectors have all, at one time or another, wished that
“these old guns could talk.” While that’s not possible, the next best thing is
to hear from their “spokesmen”; the guys who used them in combat. Author Mark
G. Goodwin has assembled an interesting compilation of interviews from U.S.
military combat veterans who used these weapons in combat. We collectors
sometimes get so caught up in the hardware that we overlook the fact that these
arms were looked upon by their users as simply tools to perform a dangerous and
dirty, but vitally necessary, job. Every collector of World War II and Korean
War U.S.
military weapons should have this book on their shelves. The book puts a human
face on what may otherwise be sterile and non-descript hardware. The book
brings the small arms of WWII and Korea to
life by re-telling the stories of the brave GIs and Marines who used the
weapons on far-flung battlefields around the globe to protect our freedom at a
crucial time in our nation’s history. - Bruce N. Canfield, author of “U.S.
Infantry Weapons of World War II”
Riveting book,
not only of the weapons themselves, but more interestingly the
individual servicemans' opinion of how they performed in the field. Highly recommended! - Frank
Iannamico, author of “American Thunder II, The Military Thompson Submachine
Gun”.
Regardless of your interest in
U.S.
military weapons you will find “U.S. Infantry Weapons in Combat – Personal
Experience from World War II and Korean” to be an informative and welcome
addition to your library. Mark Goodwin has assembled first-hand accounts on the
effectiveness, reliability, and dependability of a wide array of weapons. This
is not movie “hype”, it is a true accounting by the men who used these weapons in
combat. Presented here is information on who carried what, when and under what
circumstances. Also included are numerous pros and cons on various weapons: ‘03
Springfield,
versus M1 rifle; M1 rifle versus M1 carbine; M1911A1 pistol versus M1 carbine;
Thompson versus Reising submachine guns; water-cooled versus air-cooled machine
guns and much more. Other weapons reviewed are the M1C and M1903A4 sniper
rifles, BARs, ’97 trench guns, bayonets, knives, hand grenades and rifle
grenades, bazookas, rocket launchers, mortars, and flame throwers. This book
will be an interesting addition to you small arms library. – Larry
L. Ruth, author of “War Baby! The U.S.
Caliber .30 Carbine”
This is a treasure trove of
living history for the M1 Garand collector. The personal stories of its use in
combat make you look at yours resting quietly on the wall and realize it might
have been there with its brothers. This work is highly recommended for collectors, students, and historians!
- Robert
W. Seijas, founding member and Chairman emeritus of the Garand Collector’s
Association.
Perfect bound, soft
cover with laminated cover
6 inches by 9 inches
