History Pgs. 32-65
10/9/06
5:22 PM
Page 37
THE MARINES
Main mission or not, Marines conducted fully a half hundred armed landings “under conditions short of war” during the Henderson Era. These small landing excursions occurred all around the globe, from the Falkland Islands to Liberia, and from Sumatra to Uruguay. In fact, Marines splashed ashore at far distant places called Tarawa and Okinawa in this era, islands to which they would bloodily return nearly a century later. Archibald Henderson may have lacked a vision for amphibious warfare, but in his steadfast way he did worlds to establish formal legitimacy and informal legacy for his small Corps. He accorded special status to Marine noncommissioned officers, many of whom would command Marine detachments on the smaller ships of war without benefit of an officer’s rank or privilege. He made Marine NCOs the heart of the Corps, a hallmark of its success.
Admiral Nimitz Museum National Museum of the Pacific War
Manifest Destiny (1859-1914) While the combat role for fighting Marines on warships declined, the Marines still proved useful in battle. In declared wars, the nation always found a need for an instantly available, rigorously trained force of relentless fighters. But in the “extra-curricular” fighting of the imperial age they were especially handy, presenting a powerful national military presence in something of a seagoing constabulary role, always politically easier to commit than the Army. The Marines had a pivotal role in a crucial moment in the countdown to the Civil War. When abolitionist John Brown seized the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry with an insurrectionist force, took hostages, and barricaded himself in an engine house as he sought a general uprising of slaves, the situation represented a national tinderbox. The Marines got there first. It was November 1859. Lieutenant Israel Greene mustered a full company of regulars from Marine Barracks Washington in short order – armed, equipped, and aboard the first train to Harper’s Ferry in three hours. Greene led two columns of his Marines in a storming attack against the barricaded engine house at daybreak. Two Marines fell. Greene flattened John Brown with a back-handed slash of his sword. His troops killed or captured the other kidnappers with deadly efficiency. All hostages survived. Nice work. But the Corps faced deep problems. While all armed services suffered the loss of Southern officers resigning their commissions, the Marine Corps arguably lost its best and brightest. The U.S. Marines also missed a ripe opportunity to provide the spearhead in forcible amphibious assaults along the entire Southern coast, as well as in thousands of miles of inland rivers. Instead, [Commandant Colonel John] Harris clung mutely to the old ways, providing “penny packets” of Marine detachments for outdated 1812-era functions on the major warships. His few attempts to organize larger fighting forces were disastrous. The fighting heart of the Corps continued to beat, quietly and effectively, in a thousand close-range naval engagements. At Drewry’s Bluff on the James River below Richmond, Confederate Marines and Union Marines dueled each other with muskets while the forts and the federal ironclads swapped thundering broadsides. Hardest hit was USS Galena, whose gun decks quickly ran red with blood. Through all the death and destruction strode U.S. Marine Corporal John Mackie, who pulled the wounded to shelter and matched his Rebel counterparts round for point-blank round until Galena could extricate herself from the firestorm. Abraham Lincoln personally awarded John Mackie the Medal of Honor, the first such award ever earned by a Marine.
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THE ADMIRAL NIMITZ FOUNDATION AND THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE PACIFIC WAR FREDERICKSBURG, TEXAS CONGRATULATE THE NATIONAL MUSEUM THE MARINE CORPS
OF
FOR ITS TRIBUTE TO ALL
MARINES PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE. WE WISH YOU THE BEST OF LUCK WITH ALL YOUR PLANS.
George Bush Gallery National Museum of the Pacific War
