"Little Joe" at Barrigada

(Cont'd) I had heard of other battles where the Japanese were in a hopeless situation; drank Saki and then charged the Marines. Quite often this involved hand to hand combat and the Marines were very good at this also. I thought of the private, er sergeant, er private at Camp Pendleton. Anyway, my first day had a surprise for me. The Lt. asked me to "post up" and be the guard, for today. We rotated this assignment. The Lt. returned to camp and I assumed my guard duties. I hadn't done this for very long when I suddenly looked to my left and out of the jungle came a little brown man! I quickly turned to face him and realized he had both hands in the air, with a gun in his hand. I was slowly bringing my carbine around, with the muzzle not pointed exactly at him and I yelled to the guys to watch out when several yelled, "Don't shoot, that's Little Joe! He's not a Jap, he's a Chamorro!" I kept my eyes on him and he was watching me all the way. I was very relieved when he walked up and greeted the other guys, who had met him a day or two before. He looked every one of us in the eye, talked very little, smiled only slightly; looked the area over quietly and after a short while left just the way he had come. He was only about 5'1", but he was a powerful package it turned out. Little Joe! (Cont'd)