My Grandfather

[Drunk Monk]

I can't remember if any of you ever met my grandfather. Tara is in an azn-american studies class and asked about our family history and we got to talking about him.  I found this on the web.

My grandfather was Capt. Taro Suzuki. This excerpt captures some of his tale. 

On the September 2nd 50th Anniversary Celebration of the opening of the National Me~orial Cemetery of the Pacific, our own Taro Suzuki was the distinguished guest. Ron Komine of the Punchbowl staff spoke on Taro's behalf. One of the outstanding accomplishments of Taro's service as the first director of the cemetery was getting the grass green. With the help of the University of Hawaii's Agriculture Department Dairy Project, Taro got all the manure he needed at no cost. We found out later that Taro's contact was none other than Kengo Otagaki of Headquarters Chapter.
The following is from the book "The Boys. of Company B," by Dick Oguro, Editor. "The 100th left Shelby on 11 August and reached Camp Kilmer, New Jersey. But a few days or so before departure, Capt. Taro Suzuki, Bn. S. O. (Supply Officer) had assumed command of Co. B. Capt. Clarence Johnson was declared overage or something or perhaps because he had been assigned as an instructor in Motor Maintenance at Fort Benning, Georgia. Capt. Suzuki, exercising the options given him by Col. Turner, took Herbert Ishii out of Hqtrs. Co. Mess to be B Co. 's mess Sgt., replacing Robert Ishihara. He also placed Takashi Kitaoka as 1 st Sgt., replacing John Hattori. Kit had won over Sgt. "Heavy" Tokuichi Koizumi in the "straw" balloting by the men. Capt. Taro Suzuki, son of a shipwright, received his commission after completion of the R.O.T.C. program at UH Manoa (1921). That same year he graduated with a Bachelor of Economics. In July 1929 he was called up for a short tour of active duty, the first reserve officer of Japanese ancestry to receive this distinction as a sort of "Guinea Pig" model for calling up more AJA officers at a later date if he turned out okay. Having made an excellent record, or rather he was sort of forced in another hitch, promoted to 151 Lt. (32) was one of the AJA officers called up for active duty in 1940 and assigned to the QM Corps Hawaiian Depot at Fort Armstrong. Then he was transferred to McKinley High School as assistant Military Instructor with the rank of Capt. After December 7, he closed out McKinley R.O.T.C. and was transferred back to the QM Depot to become the Capt. of the guard detachment there. His transfer to the 298th had been rescinded. He was a "tough hombre" with immaculate military dress and bearing. The inmates really got the business. He later took over command of the depot's newly created reclamation division of the entire island of Oahu. Then Col. Turner asked for him and made him Bn. S. O. three days or so before departure on June 5, 1942. Turner called Capt. Suzuki in sometime after the 100th returned form the Louisiana Maneuvers and gave him a choice of 2 companies without company commanders-Co. A and Co. B. He took Co. B because he was promised his choice of a First Sgt. and a cook. Co. A was lacking only a company commander. Arnold took over Co. A.
6
When Capt. Suzuki assumed command, Executive Officer Mizuta was no longer there, having been transferred out. Lt. Rocco Marzano was the ex officer. Lt. Andrew Krivi, 1st platoon, Lt. Young O. Kim, 2nd platoon, Lt. Paul Froning, 3rd platoon, Lt. Ernest Tanaka was still 4th platoon. Krivi, Kim and Froning were recent graduates of Officer Candidate Schools and had been assigned earlier to the company. This was the same line-up that was to take Co. B into its initial baptism of fire from the beach of Salerno to Pozzili.
On Nov. 3, the lOOth jumped off from the junction of Sa va River-Volturno River. Companies E and B led off. On a reconnaisance near Junction 85, Capt. Suzuki and Lt. Kim, looking for a likely approach road and enemy troop, went up to scout the area. Kim went up over the high ground, Suzuki was feeling the ground with his hands for mines. Kim came back and was within hand-shaking distance from Suzuki when, even before Kim's words, "all clear," sounded, tracer bullets whizzed by between the two from the hedge to their front. Suzuki had seen Kim tumble forward, he himself dove for cover, and began firing away with his pistol, attempting to draw fire away from Kim, whom he thought had surely had it. Meanwhile, he came closer to Sgt. Ozaki's position and appraised him of the situation. Immediately Ozaki yelled, "Fix Bayonets! Charge!" The whole company, having heard this command, leaped up and charged forward! That was the first and only "Banzai charge with bayonets" executed in WWII, we believe. The charge netted two Jerries, the· rest had fled after the initial exchange of fire. Kim was found below, nonchalantly lobbing grenades over the hedges.
Next morning Suzuki observed an enemy rolling barrage laid down to perfection. Most beautiful one he had ever seen. Shortly, orders from the Bn Comdr came down - to move his troops through the barrage with a direct assault. Suzuki called Ex 0 (Executive Officer) Marzano and told him to be ready to take over the command of the company because he was going to refuse to execute this command order and that he expected to be court martialed. Capt. Mizuha yelled, "You scared?!" and Capt. Suzuki replied, "You're damn right, I am!" Maj. Gillispie came over for a personal inspectionand agreed with Taro. The Bn started an end-run on its objectives, by way of Pozzi Ii.
Company B was in reserve in this operation and company runner Bunichi J. Kimura and Masao "Stu" Yoshioka were at Bn Hqtrs in a grape vineyard. The forward units could not be observed, nor detected, being under cover of an olive orchard. But Company B was easily spotted among the grape vines, and was mistaken for the main body by the Germans who rained mortar shells upon the company. 3 officers got hit by one shell, including Suzuki and Capt. Johnson who died of shrapnel wounds. Suzuki decided to be a walking wounded and started walking toward the rear. The last to exchange cheers with Suzuki before he collapsed almost at the feet of Doc Kometani was Jimmy Shintaku. Suzuki had blacked out from loss of blood. Forward observers whose equipment had been blown up by the barrage and who had offered assistance earlier, carried him to the aid station." https://evols.library.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/10524/18668/1/PPP-1999Oct-n10.pdf

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

"Tough hombre" indeed.

[Drunk Monk]

Title Captain Taro Suzuki of the 100th Infantry was formerly employed in the grocery department of T.H. Davies & Co., Ltd
Date Created and/or Issued 1944-03-27
Publication Information The Bancroft Library;;University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720-6000, Phone: (510) 642-6481, Fax: (510) 642-7589, Email: bancref@library.berkeley.edu;;, URL: http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

Isn’t this the Grandfather that had a bum arm, so had a switch-blade? Or is fancy weaponry just a general familial trait?

[Drunk Monk]

You remember right well about the switchblade. Shrapnel severed a nerve in his right hand so he wore a custom wrist brace. He switched to being left-handed fairly easily which made many believe that he was originally left-handed and forced to be right-handed, as was the custom in those days. He was an avid hunter and could still shoot, hooking his claw-like hand over the trigger and pulling with his whole forearm. He did his own taxidermy and his house was littered with stuffed birds, deer pelts and antlers. He shot a bear. There was a huge bear skin rug, the skull mounted on a stand with the cartridge shell, and the legendary gold-capped swizzle stick made from that bear bone.  You know which one. 

He could wield his wounded hand like a mace. It was just skin, tendon and bone, so it hit hard and had minimal feeling for him. He used to wrap me on the skull with it, which sounds horribly gross now but it was what I was raised with and as a kid, you just don't know. You just accept crap like that. He never hit me in anger - it was more teasing - but I didn't spend more than a week or two with him ever and I was his treasured grandson. I imagine if we spent more time together, that would be different. He had a temper, probably PTSD driven in retrospect. 

I have so many odd memories and mementos of him. I have his Purple Heart.