Aug 24, 2003 4 min read

The story behind the famous photograph of Marines raising the flag at Iwo Jima during World War II is more fascinating than the photo itself. James Bradley, in his book, “Flags of Our Fathers,” says that he did not know his father, John Bradley, one of the six flag raisers, received the Navy Cross for his heroism as a Navy corpsman on the beach at Iwo Jima until after his father’s death in 1994.

An intensely private person, John Bradley, like most veterans of combat, rarely spoke, even to members of his own family, about his experiences in war. His son retraces his father’s footsteps from his high school days to the beaches at Iwo Jima in writing the book, published in May of 2000.

“The flagraising on Iwo Jima became a symbol of the island, the mountain, the battle; of World War II; of the highest ideals of the nation, of valor incarnate. It become everything except the salvation of the boys who formed it,” Bradley says in the opening lines of the book.

Of the six flagraisers on Feb. 23, 1945, three were killed in combat. The three survivors were summoned by FDR’s presidential order to participate in the nation’s seventh, and last, war bond drive. The three men were featured attractions in a nation-wide eight-week tour, with the famous photo as the centerpiece, which raised an unprecedented $26.3 billion in war bonds purchased by average Americans.

“This was the ponderous challenge – and the incomparable excitement – of reaching a mass public in an age before television: a great roving road show that would personify the war’s realities and deliver them to Americans’ home precincts. An effort by the government to communicate almost face-to-face with as many of its citizens as possible, and to make its case for voluntary sacrifices, rather than simply confiscate the needed money through taxes. A gargantuan feat of popular democracy, the likes of which have since vanished from the culture,” Bradley writes.

The battle over Iwo Jima lasted 36 days. It claimed 25,851 casualties, including 7,000 dead. Most of the 22,000 Japanese, entrenched in massive underground caves, fought to their deaths.

In addition to the horror that young men face in combat and the life-changing impact it has on the survivors, the book’s focus is on the life of Bradley’s father. In telling the story of a family man, a father, business owner and community leader, Bradley explains to himself and the reader why his father never truly considered himself a hero.

The only heroes on Iwo Jima, his father once said in one of the few times he ever mentioned the battle during his entire lifetime, are those boys who didn’t make it off the island. This was no act or or a posture of someone who was insincere about not wanting to be given hero status.

John Bradley truly believed what he said. By coincidence, he happened to be at a spot when he was asked by others to help “raise a pole” for the flying of Old Glory. Beyond that 10 seconds of history as the flag was raised, there is no one who would not say that what Bradley and the Marines who fought there did was indeed heroic in the truest definition of that word.

Yet, the veterans of that battle in a place that was “like hell with the fire out,” never sought the status of heroes, nor did they ever seek glory or fame because of what they did there.

With today’s entertainment/self-adulation culture where society seems to worship actors and athletes, the book brings it all into focus. Let no one ever doubt that the true heroes are the men who sacrificed all for their families, their buddies and their country.

If you want a glimpse of true heroism, in a time when the nation came together as one, of personal sacrifice, individual integrity, bravery, tragedy and patriotism, read this book.

You will be humbled by this story of those who served so we could live free.

Mike Ellis is the editor of the Herald-Standard. His e-mail address is: begin mellis@heraldstandard.com mellis@heraldstandard.com end

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