Thomas Francis Ryan, Jr.
Marine Corps Reserve | Service Number 553866
Thomas F. Ryan Junior was born in Bethlehem, New York, on 5 July 1926, and grew up in a family haunted by memories of the Great War. Thomas Ryan Senior, an Army artilleryman wounded on the Western Front, survived to marry Bertha Coonradt and raise a family of four in East Greenbush, New York, but never fully recovered from his experiences in uniform. When he died on January 5, 1940, his demise was attributed in part to his old war wounds.
Much to his mother’s relief, Thomas Junior was too young to enlist when Pearl Harbor was attacked on December 7, 1941. Instead, he continued on with his studies at Columbia High School in his hometown, celebrated his older sister Dorothy’s marriage to Army lieutenant Roland Gagnon, and helped to look after his younger sisters Margaret and Arlene. But as time and the war went on, and more and more boys from New York’s Capital Region joined up and went overseas, Thomas Ryan grew less and less satisfied remaining at home. On 26 October 1943, the seventeen-year-old Ryan took the oath to serve in the Marine Corps and was whisked away to Parris Island, where he joined the other boots of the 8th Recruit Battalion.
Private Ryan did well in boot camp; he qualified with the M1, earning the right to wear the Maltese Cross of a sharpshooter. He was packed off to Camp Lejeune for advanced infantry training, then joined the 49th Replacement Draft bound for the West Coast. In the early summer of 1944, Ryan arrived in the Territory of Hawaii and was assigned duty with the Third Provisional Marine Detachment at Camp Maui, home of the Fourth Marine Division. At the time, the Division was off campaigning in the Mariana Islands; Ryan and his fellow Provisional Detachment Marines were in charge of maintaining the camp while the combat troops were away.
Not long after arriving in Hawaii, Ryan received sad news from home. His brother in law, 2Lt. Roland Gagnon, was serving in Italy with Company E, 442nd Regimental Combat Team. On 31 August 1944, as his battalion scouted German positions along the Arno River, Gagnon and a Niesei NCO (TSgt. Isami Murakama of Honolulu) were killed in action.
Ryan, meanwhile, was having a busy few months in Hawaii. He earned a promotion to Private First Class, qualified as an automatic rifleman, and on 20 September 1944 joined a combat outfit: Charlie Company, First Battalion, 24th Marines. For the next five months, he worked hard to fit in with his new comrades – mostly veterans of Namur, Saipan, and Tinian, some of whom had more time in the company than Ryan had in uniform. Conditioning hikes, mock assaults, and combat training defined most days, with the occasional weekend liberty providing a welcome relief. In January 1945, the training came to an end, and PFC Ryan boarded the USS Hendry with the rest of his battalion and sailed off for parts unknown.
Ryan got his first glimpse of Iwo Jima on February 19, 1945. Fortunately, his battalion was in reserve for the 24th Marines and were spared the disaster that befell the first waves of Marines, but by 1600 hours he was aboard a small landing craft headed for the smoking beaches. Charlie Company was ashore by 1700, and picked their way to a designated marshaling area, ducking the occasional shell or rifle bullet and staring wide-eyed at the remnants of 2/25th Marines who had been devastated in the assault. Once again, Ryan’s company was lucky; they drew a defensive assignment 200 yards behind the front lines and spent their first night on Iwo in comparative safety – though still under fire. They moved up on 21 February 1945 and saw the casualty rate skyrocket as they flung themselves headlong into tough Japanese fortifications around the Quarry. After three days of effort, Charlie was pulled back again and assigned to mop-up duties along the coast by East Boat Basin.
Japanese positions on Iwo Jima were often difficult to spot, with multiple entrances and interlocking fields of fire. “Mopping up” was no easy task; in many cases, the Japanese were only discovered when a Marine went down dead or wounded. A furious squad-sized battle would develop, with the Americans trying to get close enough to the enemy position to hit it with a flamethrower or satchel charge. As a BARman, PFC Ryan’s job would be to keep a base of fire on the emplacement, allowing demolition men to get up close. This maneuver, called “corkscrew and blowtorch,” was extremely effective, but also incredibly dangerous.
Curiosity could be as much a killer as enemy action, and a disturbing incident took place in the company during the mop-up on D-plus-5. Some Marines went into caves hunting for souvenirs, and one neglected to tell his buddies where he was going. As he emerged from the cave, a fellow Marine shot him dead. The horrified shooter “just went berserk… and had to be sent back to the hospital ship,” said one Charlie Company eyewitness. “We lost two men on a very foolish deal,” said another.
Later in the day, another group of Charlie Company Marines were dropping homemade explosives into a cave and peering into the hole to see the results. A Japanese machine gun barked; four Marines dove for cover, but the fifth “sort of lost rigidness in his body and fell to the ground.” Seeing their buddy still alive, the other Marines managed to drag him behind some rocks and called for a corpsman. “They found he had received three bullets in a row across his chest and two in his head,” recalled PFC Arthur T. LaPorte. “There was no hope that he would live even to get back to the beachhead, but they loaded him on a stretcher and carried him back in an effort to save his life.”
This second Marine may well have been Thomas Ryan. He survived his trip to the beach and evacuation to a ship offshore – coincidentally, the USS Hendry which had carried him to Iwo. The ship’s surgeons did what they could for him, but to no avail. Ryan succumbed to a gunshot wound in the head on the evening of February 24, 1945. The following morning, he was buried at sea from the USS Hendry.
Thank you so much for the wonderful job you did on my Uncle I cannot put into words the pride I felt in reading this. Semper Fi
David – thank YOU for sending the pictures and motivating me to skip to your uncle’s page. I grew up not far from East Greenbush so his story hit home.
And a happy belated 239th birthday, and a hearty thank you for your service.
Geoffrey
Thank you for this information. This is my Grandmother’s brother. It is very interesting in reading this, as well as finally seeing a picture of Thomas.
Jennifer is your Grandmother Dotty or Francie? My mom was his Sister Marge.
Arlene was my grandmother.
I used to have a lot of fun when my mom would take me over to her house when she lived on Luther road at the bottom of the hill. I remember her having Siamese cats first time I had ever seen one.