Marine island-hopped through South Pacific

U.S. Marine Corps Private First Class Richard Roman stormed the beaches of the Solomon Islands, seizing enemy airfields in the South Pacific during World War II.

“We're leapfrogging different little islands,” he said. “Ninety percent of the men didn't know where we were — we'd never heard of those islands.”

The Marines' mission was to find, capture and secure Japanese airfields, getting closer and closer to Japan, he said.

Roman's journey to the Solomons began in 1942, when he and five high school buddies signed up for the Marines.

“I was the only one accepted,” he said.

He was sent to Parris Island, S.C., for boot camp, where he encountered racial and regional tension within the ranks of recruits.

Roman, born and raised in Newark, N.J., wasn't prepared for the not-so-hospitable Southern welcome awaiting the boys from the north.

“We were fighting the Civil War all over again,” he said. “We were Yankees. The Rebels resented the Yankees. In those days, there were Jim Crow laws.”

Roman said he had never seen separate drinking fountains, restaurants and restrooms before.

“It was kind of like a culture shock,” he said. “There was so-called ‘resentment.'”

After training, the men headed to the California coast.

“I shipped out from San Diego in early 1943 on a liberty ship,” he said. “It took us 28 days to get to New Caledonia (a small group of islands south of the Solomons) with the escorts, zigzagging across the Pacific.”

Bathing on board was an “all hands on deck” affair.

The men, in uniform, gathered on deck, lathered-up their bodies and clothes with military-issue brown soap and waited to be rinsed off.

“Then they turned the big hoses on everybody,” he said.

The Marines eventually landed in Guadalcanal, where they trained in preparation for the invasion of Bougainville — “the biggest island in the Solomons,” said Roman.

He described typical invasion operations: “We climbed down the cables from the liberty ship into the landing craft. The front came down and you attacked the beach. Once you hit the beach, they tell you to get off the beach and hit the jungle.”

“We spent seven days in a foxhole (filled) with water and land crabs,” he said.

“I never thought I'd appreciate asphalt and sidewalk streets” at home, Roman said. “You're in mud all the time.”

The dense cover of the jungle kept the enemy well-hidden from U.S. troops.

“The snipers would stay up in the palm trees,” he said. “You could hear the Japanese bombers flying over but you couldn't see them. You hear 'em, you dive in a foxhole.”

Roman recalled a time when two Japanese soldiers were captured and the orders were to bring them back to U.S. headquarters on the beach.

“‘I want you back here in five minutes,'” he said, repeating the message from his superiors.

“We were a mile from headquarters,” Roman said. “You get the idea of what they want you to do.”

The Japanese soldiers didn't make it back to headquarters.

“That's war,” Roman said.