Gunnery Sgt. Elmo M. Haney served with Company K, 3d Battalion, 5th Marines in France during World War I. Between the two wars, he taught school in Arkansas for about four years, then rejoined the Marines Corps where he was assigned to his old unit. He fought on Guadalcanal and at Cape Gloucester with Company K. In the later action, he won a Silver Star for heroism when he "took care of some Japs by himself with a few hand grenades," as one Marine described the scene.

Haney was more than fifty years old when the 1st Marine Division assaulted Peleliu. Although a gunnery sergeant by rank, he held no official position in Company K's chain of command. In the field he seemed to be everywhere at once, correcting mistakes and helping out.

I had seen Haney around the company area but first noticed him in the shower one day because of the way he bathed. About a dozen naked, soapy replacements, myself included, stared in wide-eyed amazement and shuddered as Haney held his genitals in his left hand while scrubbing them with a GI brush the way one buffs a shoe. When you consider that the GI brush had stiff, tough, split fiber bristles embedded in a stout wooden handle and was designed to scrub heavy canvas 782 web gear, dungarees and even floors, Haney's method of bathing becomes truly impressive.

I first saw him exert his authority one day on a pistol range where he was in charge of safety. A new second lieutenant, a replacement like myself, was firing from the position I was to assume. As he fired his last round, another new officer behind me called to him. The lieutenant turned to answer with his pistol in his hand. Haney was sitting next to me on a coconut-log bench and hadn't uttered a word except for the usual firing range commands. When the lieutenant turned the pistol's muzzle away from the target, Haney reacted like a cat leaping on its prey. He scooped up a large handful of coral gravel and flung it squarely into the lieutenant's face. He shook his fist at the bewildered officer and gave him the worst bawling out I ever heard. Everyone along the firing line froze, officers as well as enlisted men. The offending officer, with his gold bars shining brightly on his collar, cleared the weapon, holstered it, and took off rubbing his eyes and blushing visibly. Haney returned to his seat as though nothing had happened. Along the firing line, we thawed. Thereafter we were much more conscious of safety regulations.

Haney was about my size, at 135 pounds, with sandy crew-cut hair and a deep tan. He was lean, hard and muscular. Although not broad-shouldered or well-proportioned, his torso reminded me of some anatomy sketch by Michaelangelo: every muscle stood out in stark definition. He was slightly barrel chested with muscles heaped up on the back of his shoulders so that he almost had a hump. Neither his arms nor his legs were large, but the muscles in them reminded me of steel bands. His face was small-featured with squinting eyes and looked as though it was covered with deeply tanned, wrinkled leather.

Haney was the only man I ever saw in the outfit who didn't seem to have a buddy. He wasn't a loner in the sense that he was sullen or unfriendly. He simply lived in a world all his own. I often felt that he didn't even see his surroundings; all he seemed to be aware of was his rifle, his bayonet and his leggings. He was absolutely obsessed with wanting to bayonet the enemy.

We all cleaned our weapons daily, but Haney cleaned his M1 before muster, at noon chow, and after dismissal in the afternoon. It was a ritual. He would sit by himself, light a cigarette, field strip his rifle, and meticulously clean every inch of it. The he cleaned his bayonet. All the while he talked to himself quietly, grinned frequently, and puffed his cigarette down to a stump. When his rifle was cleaned, he reassembled it, fixed his bayonet, and went through a few minutes of thrust, parry, and butt-stroke movements at thin air. Then Haney would light another cigarette and sit quietly, talking to himself and grinning while awaiting orders. He carried out these proceedings as though totally unaware of the presence of the other 235 men in the company. He was like Robinson Crusoe on an island by himself.

To say that he was "Asiatic" would be to miss the point entirely. Haney transcended that condition. The company had many rugged individuals, characters, old salts and men who were "Asiatic", but Haney was in a category by himself. I felt that he was not a man born of woman, but that God had issued him to the Marine Corps.

Despite his personal idiosyncracies, Haney inspired us youngsters in Company K. He provided us with a direct link to the "Old Corps". To us, he was the old breed. We admired him - and we loved him.

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I find it telling that there's NO mention of his family whatsoever. No wife, no kids, nada. How sad for the man, IMO.

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So he threw rocks and scrubbed his dick really hard.......

Ok.

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You disrespectful liberal shit.  I'd bet anything you're not worth cleaning his boots.

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You disrespectful liberal shit.  I'd bet anything you're not worth cleaning his boots.

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Lol at the "liberal" comment, if they removed the part about him being a gunny in the marines and just said that he sat off by himself, with no friends, and talked to himself, threw rocks, and attacked his dick in the shower, he'd be ridiculed.





I've met plenty of senior military members who would be (and are) mocked mercilessly because they aren't really very good at anything except staying around long enough to get promoted.





There's nothing impressive in that article except the quick anecdote about killing japs with grenades, which may or may not be true.





I might be a Marine, but I don't drink the kool aid or buy into our own mystique.





ETA: Ok, he was in those campaigns, so were a lot of other guys, many of whom didn't do anything noteworthy except be there, I'll have to hear something specific before I give it up for him. The silver star isn't good enough by itself, I've seen enough awards given out as favors among senior enlisted and officers to be wary of anyone getting them.

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Un-fucking-believable.

Do you think they just hand out the Silver Star?

Show some respect and stop trolling.

Just realized you added your little jewel of an "ETA".  The part in red, seriously?  Again, please show some respect.  

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I might be a Marine, but I don't drink the kool aid or buy into our own mystique.

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Based on my own experience, yes, they do just give out awards in many cases. I'm jaded by the whole award business because I've seen enough heavy collars get awards for doing shit that the junior guys were doing all the time, somehow it deserves an award when an E-8 does it, but not an E-3, that's a bullshit double standard.

I've served with guys who are total shit bags, shouldn't even be Marines, let alone 03's, they have the distinction of saying they were "there for Fallujah", or they were there for "the push to Baghdad".

Just being there isn't good enough to get my respect. I reserve it for when it's demonstrably deserved, I'll happily reverse my opinion if someone can give a credible account of what he actually DID to get that silver star.

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If I remember, doesn't he flip out later in the book? Or am I thinking of someone else? It's been a year since I read it.

Anyways, tough old bastard! That book really illustrates the hell of WWII in the pacific.