Leatherneck legends : conversations with the Marine Corps' Old Breed

Summary: Lem Shepherd 1917-1956, Roy Geiger 1907-1947, Eddie Craig 1917-1951, Ray Davis 1938-1972, Bob Barrow 1942-1983. These five men are truly legendary in the Marine Corps; they are Leatherneck legends. They are also members of the "old breed," those who have gone before. Through personal interviews, oral history archives, and other sources, author Dick Camp - a retired Marine Corps colonel himself - has crafted a multi-person "memoir" of combat experience that spans five wars: World War I, the Banana Wars, World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. Whether facing direct combat while commanding a platoon of Marines on the deadly fields of the Western Front in World War I or leading thousands of Northern I Corps Marines engaged in mortal combat in Vietnam as a division commanding general, the stories of the Leatherneck legends are full of physical and moral valor. As a group, they earned a Medal of Honor, six Navy Crosses, and two Distinguished Service Crosses (the U.S. Army decoration equivalent to the Navy Cross); they wore eighteen silver stars of the USMC general officer; they commanded combat forces at every level from infantry platoons to field army; and they include the twentieth and twenty-seventh Commandants of the Marine Corps. From World War I to Vietnam, these legendary Marine Corps officers have fought their country's battles: Belleau Wood, Haiti, Santo Domingo, Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, the Pusan Perimeter, Chosin Reservoir, A Shau Valley, and many, many more. With almost two hundred years of Marine Corps service among them, their experiences in America's twentieth-century wars are replete with invaluable lessons for Marines of today and tomorrow, and all other Americans as well. Their stories, told largely in the legends' own words, make for exciting, inspirational reading. --

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