member Joe Levato was on hand this first Friday
in February to give an account on his WWII
Marine Corps experiences. Joe also brought
along some of his mementos and souvenirs from
his time spent fighting the Japanese in the
pacific. Always eager to tell a story, Joe spent the
better part of the evening grabbing the attention
of the crowd with his personal history. I took a few
notes and will try to convey them to you here.
Joe was born on the south side of Chicago in
1926. His name was actually Anthony Joseph
Levato but this was soon changed to Joseph
Anthony after some persuasion from his
grandparents. Joe remembers walking out of a
south side movie theater hearing the Japanese
had attacked Pearl harbor. He immediately
attempted enlisting in the Marine Corps but was
promptly turned away due to his age (15) at the
time. Joe eagerly waited a year until he was
sixteen and again on December 7th made
another attempt in enlisting. Joe lied about his
actual age hoping to fool the recruiters. Still no
luck. Joe would have to wait another full year
when he was seventeen and instead of going to
the recruitment office on December 7th he waited
until the 8th. This was Joe's lucky day for he was
accepted in the United States Marine Corps.
California where he would also volunteer for the
newly developed branch of the Marine
paratroopers. Joe would also volunteer for the
highly trained Marine Raider battalion. After
completing his training Joe shipped out for Pearl
Harbor in May, 1944 where he underwent more
training. An interesting bit of trivia is that Joes
uncle was also in the Marine Corps and was
stationed in Hawaii. Joe would later meet up with
his uncle and they took the photo at right.
Joe shipped out from Pearl and headed west for
the fight with the Japanese. He landed on the
island of Saipan on June 15th with the 4th Marine
division. During the fierce fight Joe was wounded
in the head by a Japanese bullet that penetrated
his helmet, cut his head and rendered him
unconscious and temporarily blind. Covered with
blood Joe was thought dead. His good friend
Teddy was saddened by the news of his death
but would later faint when he found out Joe was
while fighting on Tinian. This time it
appeared to be bad. A Japanese
soldier attacked their position and
was himself blown up while doing
so. Joe and his buddies were
wounded from the blast and once
again Joe was blinded. His buddies
looked at him and couldn't believe
their eyes. Joes face was badly
disfigured but yet he felt no pain. He
reached to touch his face and found
to the amazement of he and the
others his "wound" was actually a
piece of flesh from the Japanese
soldier who attacked them.
Joe and his fellow marines fended off a fanatical charge by the desperate Japanese. Joe took a
bayonet in the leg and quickly disposed his opponent. The bayonet that wounded him is in the photo
above.
After arriving back on Saipan the marines were basically protecting the air crews from the Japanese
that were still causing trouble on the island. Joe came across a knocked out American tank and found
a Thompson sub-machine gun so he kept it for himself. This was a good weapon for close quarters
jungle fighting and was ideally suited for the point man on patrol. Well, I think you can guess where
poor ol' Joe found himself on the next few patrols? On point with his new Tommy gun.
take an airplane ride or two. While wandering into the
air corps sector Joe and his buddy were invited to take
a ride in a B-29 where they each manned a .50 machine
gun and proceeded to do a little strafing. Joe manned
the top turret. He and his buddy were rather good at this
aerial marksmanship and were "invited" on 6-7 more
raids. However these were actual raids over Japan.
They would take a piece of chalk and proceed to write
messages on the bombs that were going to be
dropped. After their last raid they were met by some
MP's and quickly brought under arrest. After being
questioned by some army brass they were brought in to
see a General officer who told them their flying days
were over. That General turned out to be General Curtis
LeMay.
Joe just seemed to find trouble wherever he could.
Someone had the idea of cooling off some soda pop
and beer with aviation fuel which was naturally cold.
They proceeded with digging a hole, filling it with AV
gas, placing the beer and pop into it and covering it with
dirt. From a distance you could see the fumes rising
from the ground where the cooling was taking place.
K-bar fighting knife
a friend.
