| Original Caption: “Photograph of Marines Charging a Hill on Tarawa – Marines Take a Hill on Tarawa. Marines charge a hill on Tarawa in the early stages of the battle on the Jap[anese]-held island. They took it.” A machine gun squad charges towards what would be known as “Bonnyman’s Hill,” the highest point on Betio. Massively banked with sand and coral, it rose 20 feet (6 meters) above sea level. Marines had maintained basically the same positions for 48 hours, since landing on November 20. 2nd and 3rd Battalions, 8th Marines, went into the attack at around 0930 Hours on November 22, 1943, with a sustained mortar barrage, and their luck began to change almost at once: a mortar round landed among a heap of ammunition alongside a log emplacement, and the whole position erupted in flame, dirt, and cartwheeling timbers. K Company rushed forward and overran the position; at the same time, F Company, accompanied by the M4 Sherman tank “Colorado,” launched an attack on a steel pillbox. The tank clattered up to within feet of its firing aperture and blasted it with 75 millimeter shells; the Marines of F Company then moved in with grenades and Trinitrotoluene (TNT) charges, and this 2nd obstacle was eliminated. Crowe now regrouped his men in readiness for the assault on the Japanese main concrete shelter. He called in assault engineers from the 18th Marines armed with demolition charges and flame throwers, and, under the cover of rifle fire, the attack began. For nearly an hour, the Marines, under Lieutenant ndy” Bonnyman Junior (May 2, 1910 – November 23, 1943), fought the Japanese troops to gain control of the top of the bunker, before Bonnyman finally reached the summit. The Japanese immediately launched a counterattack from the other side, but Bonnyman’s Marines held their ground, thwarting all attempts by the Japanese to regain the top of the shelter. Inevitably, Bonnyman was hit; dropping to his knees to reload his carbine, he fired a final flurry of shots into the enemy struggling up the sandy ramp from the eastern side before he fell dead among the many bodies that littered the slopes. For his courageous stand, Bonnyman became the 4th Tarawa recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor, the 3rd to be awarded posthumously. His surviving engineers now dropped grenades down the vertical ventilator pipes which protruded from the top of the shelter, and this was enough to send swarms of Japanese pouring out of the 2 exits – straight into withering machine gun and rifle fire. As they fled eastwards, a round of canister shot – a useful speciality unique to the M3 Stuart light tank’s 37 millimeter (1.45-inch) gun – killed at least 20. Bulldozers were now moved forward to seal up the exits with walls of sand and coral, while Marines poured jerry cans of petrol down the vents and dropped lighted paper inside. In this ghastly inferno, more than a 150 Japanese perished. Of Bonnyman’s original assault party of 21 Marines, 13 had survived. Bonnyman was killed as he called for more demolition charges. Bonnyman’s remains were recovered in 2015 and buried with full military honors in Knoxville, Tennessee’s Berry Highland Memorial Cemetery. Photographed by Warrant Officer Obadiah “Obie” E. Newcomb V, (June 22, 1909 – February 25, 2004) United States Marine Corps Reserve. He followed Bonnyman and photographed the assault. In some of Newcomb’s photos, United States Marine Sergeant Norman T. Hatch (March 2, 1921 – April 22, 2017) can be seen filming the attack with his Bell and Howell Eyemo. Much of the footage of the assault was incorporated into the 1944 Best Short Documentary Oscar winner, With the Marines at Tarawa. | |
| Image Filename | wwii1597.jpg |
| Image Size | 436.76 KB |
| Image Dimensions | 2086 x 1701 |
| Photographer | Obadiah “Obie” E. Newcomb V |
| Photographer Title | United States Marine Corps |
| Caption Author | Written or Adapted by Jason McDonald |
| Date Photographed | November 22, 1943 |
| Location | |
| City | Betio |
| State or Province | Tarawa |
| Country | Gilberts |
| Archive | National Museum of the Pacific War |
| Record Number | NMPW_Tarawa-038 |
| Status | Caption ©2026 MFA Productions LLC Please Do Not Duplicate or Distribute Without Permission; Image in the Public Domain |
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