For some reason, my mind has been telling me that I have forgotten something for the 1st of October. I kept looking at my calendar thinking I had forgotten an appointment. And then I began planning my next blog and looked at dates. Someone upstairs is nagging me....
John & Della Shaffner's son, Walter Fanoit Shaffner was born the 29th of December 1917 in Dillon, Montana. He went to college at University of Montana in forestry and joined the ROTC graduating from college on 9 June 1941.
Walter enlisted in Marines in 1942 as a private, received his commission to 2nd Lieutenant and was promoted to 1st Lieutenant in field.
In the Dillon Tribune issue of 5 February 1943 there is a picture of Walter F. Shaffner with a Resing submachine gun. The article beneath the picture states that ...A Dillon Marine Corps officer, Second Lieutenant Walter F. Shaffner is eligible today for assignment to a combat unit or specialist's school for final training after completion of reserve officer's school at Quantico, Virginia, according a release from Marine headquarters in San Francisco. Lieutenant Shaffner, while training in Quantico qualified as an expert with both the rifle and pistol.
Dillon Tribune October 27, 1944. First Lieutenant Walter Shaffner, son of Mr. and Mrs. John Shaffner, was killed in action in the South Pacific on October 1, according to word received from the War Department by his parents yesterday. Information as to the place of his death has been withheld for security reasons but the message stated that he was buried on an island in grave No. 150.
Walter F. Shaffner
As you research ancestors, you learn about genealogy serendipity and this story is one of my unbelievable ones! My sister, Gail mentioned that a person in Dillon had been at a meeting where the speaker upon learning he was from Dillon, Montana; inquired if he knew Walter Shaffner's family. This person then asked Gail about Walter. I was excited to learn that someone knew him because of course; he was a forgotten soldier except to his family.
Upon learning the name, I searched the internet and located the man, wrote him a snail mail letter and below is what I received in return. I will not name the individual because I don't have him permission. When Dad read the letter, tears came to eye and he said...this man knew Walter and described him perfectly. Dad also went onto to say that while they knew he had been killed in battle; they never knew the story.
Your letter of inquiry as to your Uncle Walter's military experience in the South Pacific brought back for me many memories of those far away and long forgotten bloody struggles on islands rarely mentioned in comment today. Putting your uncle's experience in perspective, the First Marine Division badly mauled and ridden with malaria left Guadalcanal December 22nd, 1942 and sailed in transports first to Brisbane, Australia and then subsequently to Melbourne, since the former was too tropical a location to give optimal chances for recovery from malaria, whereas the latter did. It was there that your uncle Walter came in early 1943. Your uncle was assigned as a replacement infantry officer and joined "C" Company of the First Battalion, First Regiment, the unit which I had commanded for most of the year preceding the initial assault on Guadalcanal August 7th, 1942. I gave 2nd Lieutenant Shaffner command of the second platoon of the "C" Company, and was immediately impressed with his quiet but very effective leadership of that platoon. When the first division was deemed again ready for combat, we were shipped north to a staging area on New Guinea and then turned loose in an assault against Cape Gloucester on the island of New Britain, December 26th, 1943. Although initial Japanese resistance was light, the beachhead itself was extremely narrow, only a few yards wide and then immediately we plunged into a formidable jungle swamp (which had then been noted on aerial photographs as "rainforest"). As the rest of the division came ashore, we received our orders to move out of the swamp and be prepared to attack the airstrip which the Japanese had constructed on Cape Gloucester to support the major airbase they had maintained at Rabaul. From the moment of our landing it never stopped raining for eleven days. Approaching the airstrip and emerging from the swamp, "C" received intense machine gun fire, but were assisted in the final assault which seized the airstrip by adequate support from both mortars and artillery. Having seized the airstrip in late afternoon, we hastily prepared the perimeter defense of fox holes lightly "protected" by bar wire hastily assembled. During the hours between midnight and dawn, "C" company sustained and repelled a determined Japanese counter attack, during which your uncle distinguished himself as he led his platoon in frustrating the Japanese attempt to re -conquer the airstrip. The Cape Gloucester campaign lasted many months, with nearly every day marked by at least a partial tropical downpour, as the Japanese retreated toward Rabaul, the first regiment was engaged in active combat in pursuit, mainly with long foot patrols through the jungle, where again your uncle demonstrated his competent leadership as a platoon leader. When the caands near Guadalcanal, which then, had become a major staging area for American force. Reaching Pavuvu, I was promoted to Major and became second in command of the battalion, saying good- bye to beloved "C" Company after commanding it for nearly three years. Captain Everett Pope succeeded as "C" Company commander. In late summer we were informed that our next objective would be the capture of Peliliu, an island in the Palau group, five hundred miles east of the Philippines, in order to neutralize its airstrip in preparation for the larger assault planned by the army in returning to the Philippines. It was forecast as a "quickie" operation, to be preceded by five days of bombing and shelling by the Air Force and Navy. Landing on the beach soon proved it was the exact opposite. The Japanese had been fortifying the steep limestone ravines inland from the beach for many years, so the shelling and bombing were largely ineffective and the casualties on the beach mounted with each passing hour. Fighting day and night against bitter Japanese resistance, casualties continued to mount. On the fourth day orders were received from Regiment that "C" Company would be transferred from the First Battalion to temporary duty with the Second. It was with a sense of foreboding, remembered to this day; that I watched Captain Pope lead what was left of the Company away toward their new assignment, which was to assault a heavily defended spur of Bloody Nose Ridge, the principal line of the Japanese defense in depth. The ferocity of the struggle on that hill during the following night cannot be adequately described. Only a dozen men stumbled back down at dawn's first light. Sadly, your uncle Walter was not one of them. He died there that night as bravely as he had led his troops from the day he joined "C" Company. You and your family have every reason to take pull pride in your uncle's unflinching valor as I, myself, take in having served as his commanding officer.
Walter's body was returned to Dillon for burial where a ceremony was held 12 October 1948.
His father applied for a Headstone or Marker
Mountain view Cemetery, Dillon, Montana
And then in my files is this receipt for a headstone purchased by Donnee Shaffner Stibal on July 24, 1989
Recognition for Walter Shaffner at the Veteran's Park in Dillon, Montana
Don Shaffner included his brothers on this wall of memory for those that had served.
Donnee never forgot Walter, always keeping his memory alive for the family to remember.
And then she died on 1 October 1993, 49 years later.
The Angels are still tapping on my shoulder........
