Willard Washington Wemple
| NAME: Willard Washington Wemple | NICKNAME: — | SERVICE NUMBER: 960888 | ||||||
| HOME OF RECORD: Polson Township, MT | NEXT OF KIN: Parents, Earl “EJ” & Maude Wemple | |||||||
| DATE OF BIRTH: 2/22/1922 | SERVICE DATES: 6/10/1944 – 3/9/1946 | DATE OF DEATH: 3/26/2007 | ||||||
| CAMPAIGN | UNIT | MOS | RATE | RESULT | ||||
| Iwo Jima | B/1/24 | 745 | Private | |||||
| INDIVIDUAL DECORATIONS: — | LAST KNOWN RANK: Private First Class | |||||||
Willard was born in Polson, Montana, on 22 February 1922. His parents, Earl Jacob (called “EJ”) and Maude (McWethey) Willard, raised four children on a homestead near the southern shore of Flathead Lake. Willard lived at home until 1938; then, at the young age of sixteen, he went out to “see the world.” The Civilian Conservation Corps provided such an opportunity, and Willard spent time at work camps in northwestern Montana. He returned to Polson from time to time; the 1940 Census shows him living with his older brother, Leonard, and working for a “reforestation project.”
Next, Willard set his sights on California. He worked a variety of jobs in avocado orchards and sawmills – and even a dog kennel, where he counted Clark Gable, Carole Lombard, and “Toto” among his clients. Finally, he joined Consolidated Vultee in San Diego and learned to build the massive PBY Catalina flying boats that became one of the company’s most recognizable trademarks.
The attack on Pearl Harbor guaranteed job security for Willard Wemple – he was no longer just an aircraft worker, but a war worker. He stayed on at Consolidated for the next few years, and started building a family of his own: he married Lenoir Davis, a sweetheart from Polson, in 1942 and they welcomed a son, Daniel Willard, the following year.
However, as the war continued the needs for manpower at the front began to outweigh the requirements of wartime industries. On 10 June 1944, Willard was inducted into the Marine Corps. He was given a short time to put his personal affairs in order, and then reported to Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego for boot training.
Private Wemple finished boot camp in the late summer of 1944. With his previous work experience at Consolidated, he might have hoped for additional training and assignment to an aviation unit – San Diego had its own air base, and there were many more in California. Instead, he was sent to infantry school at Camp Pendleton. This meant eventual transfer to the Fleet Marine Force. Wemple learned the basics of most infantry small arms, but showed the most proficiency with the M1 Garand. He committed his rifle’s serial number – 1940712 – to memory, and jotted it down in an address book he carried. He also took down the names of new friends like George Werre and Robert “RV” White. The new Marines had little idea of the experiences they would share in the coming months.
Wemple, Werre, White, and hundreds of other Marines successfully completed their training at Camp Pendleton and were assigned en masse to the 24th Replacement Draft, a temporary unit that shipped out for Camp Maui in November 1944. The draft was attached to the 4th Marine Division, although not fully integrated – it was designed to be broken apart, and the men placed where needed, in the inevitable event of combat casualties. Thus, while the replacements formed tight bonds with each other, they had no guarantee of serving together in battle – nor did they have the chance to train alongside the division’s combat veterans. When they departed for battle in January 1945, most members of the 24th Replacement Draft figured they would not even need to go ashore. The planned invasion – an island called Iwo Jima – was supposed to be quick and easy; they would have ample time to observe the experienced Marines in action and get ready for the next one.
The Marines were violently disabused of this notion on 19 February 1945 as the assault waves were pinned to the beaches and subject to devastating fire. Casualties began to mount at an unbelievable pace. Many replacements were sent in on the first and second days of the battle – not for combat duty, but to help carry supplies, sort discarded gear, or assist the wounded on the beachhead. It was a stark and frightening preview of what lay ahead, and Private Wemple observed his 23rd birthday under these hellish conditions.
Finally, on or around 27 February 1945, a group from the 24th Replacement Draft was ordered to fall in with weapons and equipment. They marched over to an assembly area and were curtly told they now belonged to the First Battalion, 24th Marines. Sixty-six replacements – including Willard Wemple and his buddies George Werre and RV White – joined Baker Company. They received less than a warm welcome: one replacement remembered a veteran squad leader’s greeting as “If you know how to pray, start praying now.” Wemple would have plenty of cause to use the “armored Bible” from his mother.
Private Wemple was assigned to a platoon, a squad, and then a fire team. He would serve as an assistant to a veteran automatic rifleman, carrying spare parts and extra ammunition for the heavy BAR, and backing up his buddy with extra fire from his Garand. It was also implicitly known, if not explicitly stated, that he would take over the BAR if anything should befall the gunner.
This happened sooner than anticipated. On their very first day of combat in the “Meat Grinder,” Wemple’s BARman was shot through the head and instantly killed. Wemple pitched the Garand he’d carried for so many months and picked up the Browning. As he cleaned the Marine’s brains out of the receiver, he started memorizing the new serial number: 522095.
Wemple discovered that he felt much more secure with BAR’s twenty round magazine at his command. On one occasion, a Japanese officer charged out of a cave and made a beeline for Wemple, screaming and waving a sword. A burst from the BAR saved Wemple’s life, and he collected the dead enemy’s sword and pistol. Wemple stashed his trophies in a crevice, intending to collect them later – but never had the chance.
Casualties among the replacements were extremely heavy, and by the end of the battle Baker Company was a shadow of its former strength. Incredibly, Willard Wemple – and his buddies Werre and White – survived unwounded.
Wemple returned to Maui with the 4th Marine Division and settled into a tent at Camp Maui as a permanent and fully accepted member of Baker Company. He was promoted to Private First Class on 23 April 1945, and kept his role as a squad BARman. The division continued training through the summer, anticipating an invasion of the Japanese home islands, but the war came to an end before they saw further combat. As long-serving Marines rotated back to the United States for discharge, newer men like Willard Wemple were reassigned to garrison and service posts. Many Baker Company veterans wound up with the 6th Service Depot at Oahu for a few weeks or months; Wemple enjoyed a period of relatively easy duty with the depot’s ordnance company before receiving orders to return to California. He was honorably discharged on 9 March 1946.
After the war, Willard used his GI Bill to enroll at the newly-founded Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara. Although his marriage to Lenoir ended in divorce, Willard pursued his new career with passion, learning to repair cameras in Connecticut and landing a job at Prestwoods Photo Shop in Scranton, Pennsylvania. He rented a room from Samuel and Edith Harvey; their daughter, Naomi, was quite taken with the “handsome young Montana man” and the two struck up a relationship. Although Willard moved back to Montana, they kept up a correspondence – and he proposed by mail. Willard and Naomi married in September, 1952; the marriage lasted the rest of their lives.
The Wemples settled in Billings and raised three sons. Willard continued to work in photography and engraving until 1977, and then managed rental properties for another fifteen years. An avid outdoorsman, he was fond of fishing, camping, and hiking, and was a fixture at auctions and garage sales around Billings until his death in 2007.
Many thanks to Michael Wemple, Willard’s son, for the photographs and additional information.