The High Ground

The scene in the White House rose garden seemed more like a christening than an epilogue to bloody Two Jima (casualties: dead, 5,563; wounded, 17,343). Colonel Justice Marion ("Jumping Joe") Chambers, 42, retired Marine hero of the Iwo invasion, had brought along his family of five to watch the President loop the shiny, star-shaped Medal of Honor around Chambers' neck. Harry Truman had hardly begun the commendation when one of the seven-month-old Chambers twins grabbed at the script, rattled it vigorously until restrained by a firm presidential hand. Then the other twin reached up for the President's pocket handkerchief. But despite the interruptions, ex-Artilleryman Truman held his smile until after the ceremony was over and the picture-taking began. He read his lines seriously; the U.S. gives no Medals of Honor lightly.

"Exposed to relentless hostile fire," he read, "[Chambers] coolly reorganized his battle-weary men, inspiring them to heroic efforts by his own valor and leading them in an attack on the critical, impregnable high ground from which the enemy was pouring an increasing volume of fire . . ." For eight hours on that Feb. 19, 1945, Jumping Joe had concentrated a lifetime's cunning, shrewdness and bravery on silencing the murderous Japanese guns, had finally been carried away under fire, blasted by an enemy machine gun. His was the 431st Medal of Honor of World War II, the Both to a marine.

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