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Aboard the USS Tryon at Peleliu
In 1944, Richard Price, now of Stratton, boarded the USS Tryon as an 18-year-old medical corpsman. This was Pierce's first voyage and he eagerly looked forward to real adventure.
The Tryon was a new type of vessel, one of only four of this type in the United States Navy. She was designed to do double duty; first, as a combat ship, supporting an invasion by bringing fresh troops to the invasion site.
But the Tryon was also a hospital evacuation ship, with a full complement of doctors, dentists and corpsmen. She was equipped to handle all medical problems, everything from dispensing aspirin to battlefield emergencies.
It was determined right away that the Tryon would not be painted white, with the red cross on its side as true hospital ships were adorned. They too often became targets for enemy attack. Instead, she was painted battle gray and became an integral part of the invasion fleet.
In July of 1944, the Tryon was used for the first time as a front-line, transport vessel, during the assault and occupation of Tinian Island in the Marianas, entering the combat areas loaded with cargo and personnel, then later receiving the wounded directly from the beaches and other vessels, and finally, evacuating them -- as a hospital ship. In September 1944, the Tryon was headed for the invasion of Peleliu, Palau Group, as part of Combat Third Fleet. The Tryon was loaded with Marines who were prepared for a difficult siege. From previous invasions of Pacific Islands the Marines had learned that Japanese positions would probably be well fortified, immune from bombing attacks, and there was a good chance that they would have to be routed, pill box by pill box.
Toward this end the Marines had brought a number of Doberman Pincers, a part of the K-9 Corps. Richard Price remembers that these dogs were particularly vicious. Each day an order came to clear the top deck. It was time to exercise the dogs. It was a very formal event.
Each dog was on the tight leash of one man, with plenty of space between dogs. Even so, there was a good bit of growling and snarling from the dogs. This was understandable. After all, these dogs were bred to hunt out an enemy and kill. They were strictly one-master dogs. This fact became apparent when one of the handlers was stricken with an attack of appendicitis while aboard the Tryon on the way to the invasion.
The operation was routine. The man was soon up and around. Yet, while the man was in sick-bay no one else was able to handle his dog. The dog had to be put to sleep.
Richard Price's fellow corpsman, Lawrence (Ole) Moad, remembers that the Peleliu invasion was the worst in which the Tryon was involved. They took aboard more casualties there than at any other island invasion. The Japanese were very well dug in, and most of the wounded were from a point the Marines called "Bloody-nose Ridge." Because of the close quarter combat, the Tryon surgeons were hard pressed for many hours straight at the operating table.
He remembers that there were five or six men with their lower jaws shot away, and the surgeons did the emergency surgery to keep the men alive till they could be returned to a real hospital for reconstructive surgery.
In a battle like Peleliu, with constant bombardment for days, followed by fierce hand-to-hand combat, it is not surprising that there were a number of shell-shock cases. Anticipating this, one of the hospital wards aboard the Tryon was devoted to trauma cases. The bunks were enclosed in a wire mesh netting, to keep the patients from hurting themselves or others. Richard Price was assigned to this ward.
The Marines took extremely heavy casualties at Peleliu, but they were not the only casualties. One of Richard Price's good friends, another Corpsman, was working with the wounded on the island during the battle when he was struck in the back of the head with a bullet.
He was evacuated to the Tryon for emergency treatment, but his wounds were too grave, and he died in Richard's arms. After four days of intense fighting at Peleliu, the 18 year-old youth, Richard Pierce, left Peleliu aboard the USS Tryon, headed for Pearl Harbor. The Tryon's hospital wards were filled with wounded Marines, men broken in body and in spirit -- the same brave men that had swarmed ashore only a short time before. In Hawaii, her cargo of wounded Marines was discharged to military hospitals and the Tryon returned to the Pacific war zone--just in time to take part in the invasion of Leyte, in the Philippine Islands, on MacArthur's relentless march toward Japan.
Again Richard Pierce was a corpsman aboard that ship. He was still 18, but he was no longer a "youth in search of adventure." His youth had been left on Peleliu.