William Jensen

(41^stU.S. Army Division, New Guinea, Philippine Islands, and Japan, in post-war occupation, 1944-1946

The decade of the 1930’s had been a difficult time for Bill Jensen, a wiry, good-looking, single man, who always wore a warm smile. He possessed an inner strength, as hard as granite that was born of the Depression years. Three years after he graduated from high school in 1937, his family lost their farm. Times became desperate as he worked from one tedious job to another, first as an oil-drilling roughneck on the sagebrush prairie of northern Colorado and then as a long-distance truck hauler. The low wages, dangerous work, and months of separation from family were unending discouragements. It was difficult for him to hold on to a sense of optimism; his future did not appear promising. In 1942 his older sister, Ruth Jensen, finally found a liquor salesman’s job for him in Denver. It was his first permanent work since his high school graduation. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the youngest brother was again uprooted, his mettle tested in ways that the Depression never did.

This jungle grows on you. The cuts and abrasions you get here wouldn’t kill a man at home. I sure am getting fed-up with this continually hot and overly-damp weather. Will be getting web feet the first thing I know.

We made a landing at Biak Island in the Shouten Islands of the

Netherlands

East Indies on 29 May. I believe that was about the roughest place we ever fought. The terrain and elements were very much against us. Cliffs rising straight up for approximately three-hundred feet were right off the beach. It was all coral— porous, sharp, and hard as Hell. It was really tough to walk on. A man could never dig a fox hole in a million years. Just pile up the loose stuff around you and let it go at that. Once you ran into the Nips, you couldn’t move an inch. I wish you had the opportunity to see what kind of men they are. The only thing that compares is an animal. They blew themselves up with grenades when there was still an opportunity to escape or even give themselves up which they rarely did. They seemed to be accustomed to only one type of fighting.

Biak is the most worthless piece of ----. You could hardly call it ground because there was but one inch of soil over the coral. It always puzzled me how the hell the trees grew. It must have been the rain. There were a series of about five ridges that ran almost around the island. From the top of one ridge to the next one was about a hundred feet. It was about a hundred feet to the bottom between them. The center of the island was relatively flat giving the whole thing a saucer appearance. I never did figure out how the natives cut it.

We poured over a million dollars worth of artillery into one place [Ibdi Pocket] that wasn’t over three acres square. The final result was that the Army Air Force had to use concussion bombs. The Air Force dropped one-thousand-pound blockbusters on the enemy using B-24 Liberators. We finally got a good foothold and the rest was just a matter of hunting them down in the jungle and caves. It was a Hell of a job. We were still killing Japs seven months after the campaign was closed. Enough of that place.

Biak Island landings (May 30-31, 1944)
William Jensen, 41st Division

Allied Occupation of Hiro, Kure, and Hiroshima, Japan (October—December 1945)

The Army Air Force gave the old heat treatment to these places. Reminds me of a nice crisp piece of bacon. Hiro was burned out by the B-29s. Kure was a big naval base. The Japanese put everything they had into war production. Only the machinery of the factories is still standing. Our B-29 planes did a neat job when they went to work on these places.

I don’t believe the Japanese could have lasted six more months, no matter how things would have gone. The atomic bomb was not the deciding factor in their surrender. It may have been in time, but they don’t get around much in this country. They would not have believed the damage unless they had seen it.

The Japanese are really destitute. They have very little clothing and practically nothing to eat. The rice crop this year is very poor. It looks like they are really going to have a time of it this winter. I don’t feel a bit sorry for the rascals though. They asked for it. Now let them suffer awhile.

The camp sits right on a flat area that was originally a rice paddy. It is only built about three feet above the water. It gets pretty wet at times. The temperature stays around fifty degrees and sometimes drops as low as forty. We don’t have as yet any stoves. Our winter clothing has not been issued so you can imagine just how cold we have been with nothing but tropical uniforms to wear.

We are living in several former two-story naval barracks at Hiro, the old naval Japanese air base. They are of the flimsiest construction I have seen in a long time. The wind blew over about half of them. The others are about ready to fall down. It rained almost continually the first three or four days we were here.