Three Marines

This is the story three Marines who gave their lives on Saipan.

Their backgrounds were varied. Robert G. Thompson was born in Queens, New York on April 8, 1922, the youngest son of bookie Edward Thompson and his wife, Margaret.
William Ronal Ragsdale, a native of Tennessee born in 1920, was a lanky young man with big ears who won the heart of pretty Mina Eloise Friedli. Arthur Ervin, who lost his father to a mine explosion six months after his birth, was raised in small towns in Oklahoma and Texas, before seeking his educational future in Los Angeles – a future interrupted by the death of his stepfather, which led Arthur to seek employment as a paper delivery supervisor before enlisting in the peacetime Marine Corps.

The three young men came together in California in the late summer of 1943. Thompson had successfully qualified as a rifleman at Parris Island and arrived at his new unit – Charlie Company, 24th Marines – as a newly-made Private First Class. Ragsdale left behind his new bride Eloise to enlist, and was judged to be more effective behind a desk – he became the chief clerk of Able Company, 24th Marines, before a transfer to his battalion’s HQ company. Ervin, who had been stationed at Ford Island during the attack on Pearl Harbor, volunteered for the Third Raider Battalion and made a combat landing at Pavuvu before a bout of filariasis sent him back to the States, where he petitioned consistently to be allowed back into a combat unit. He was assigned to the weapons platoon of Able Company as a machine gun squad leader.

They would be joined together in combat, too. Thompson and “Mumu” Ervin participated in the battle of Namur in early 1944. Thompson survived unwounded, while Ervin was hit twice during the assault, leading a charge against a pillbox which would earn him the admiration of his comrades, a promotion to sergeant, and a Navy Cross from Admiral Nimitz. “Rags” had been detailed to stay with the battalion’s administrative section and help move the division’s base from Camp Pendleton to Camp Maui, but performed well enough to merit a promotion to corporal.

The three men from different backgrounds, different companies, and different experiences would all land together on Saipan. During the battle that followed, the three would be bound together in the most tragic way.

Bill Ragsdale was the first. On the morning of June 23, as the battalion licked its wounds from an ambush the day before, the HQ company clerk was marked as “absent” on the muster roll. Noone could say what had happened to him; perhaps he had been wounded in action and attempted to find his own way back to help. A search of the rear areas turned up nothing – he was not in an aid station, nor on a hospital ship. By July 31, he had been officially classified as “missing in action.”

Robert Thompson went next. June 24 was a quiet day for his company – some patrolling in Saipan’s lightly defended Kagman Peninsula before a welcome stretch in regimental reserve. June 25 found all accounted for – except PFC Thompson. Like Ragsdale, he had disappeared seemingly without a trace, and would be listed among the missing.

Arthur Ervin – who had been promoted to second-in-command of his company’s mortar section - survived twenty days on Saipan. Early in the battle, he led a volunteer patrol against a heavily defended position which had been bypassed in the day’s advance. He destroyed the position completely without the loss of a single man, prompting his officers to recommend him for the Silver Star. On July 5, Ervin’s platoon leader (Lieutenant Philip E. Wood Jr) noticed a group of civilians in the path of the company’s planned advance. As he led a group of volunteers forward to bring them in, a Japanese machine gun ambushed the Marines, mortally wounding the lieutenant. Witnesses would later tell of how Ervin leapt up, screaming “Don’t worry, Phil! I’m coming for you!” before running “like a lost calf after its mother” into the crossfire. He had just reached his friend when another burst from the same gun caught him in the head. The two men died side by side. However, when the graves were marked in the division’s cemetery, Arthur Ervin’s name was not among them. His mother and widow received notice of his death, as well as his personal effects, but nothing more was known about where he lay.

Years went by. The Army sent out graves registration teams to every island where Americans fought and died, intending to repatriate the remains of all the fallen. The bodies marked “unknown” were subjected to a series of tests to match their physical characteristics with records, but many were returned to the earth with the sad title “known but to God.” Arthur Ervin’s mother had her son’s name inscribed on a memorial shared with his late father; Eloise Ragsdale remarried but never gave up searching for what had become of Bill; she was making Internet inquiries searching for information until her death in 2007. In New York, the Thompson family resigned themselves to the fact that their boy would never come home. The three Marines seemed destined to be forgotten.

However, there are some who are not content to let them fade away. Government organizations like JPAC process hundreds of cases per year, while others like Project PRIAM and PacificWrecks scour remote islands for clues – a dog tag here, a piece of smashed aircraft there. Despite the best efforts of these groups, more than three thousand Marines remain officially missing in action. In the past year, though, the number of unidentified decreased – by three.

A search party found the body of Robert Thompson several days after he was killed. Instead of transporting the remains to a Marine division cemetery, the searchers elected to take him to the Army cemetery, which was closer. At 1330 on July 6, Thompson was buried as “Unknown X-5” in Plot 2, Row 2, Grave 439.

Ten minutes later, “Unknown X-6” was buried in Grave 440. The man had been tall and thin, and wore a wedding ring inscribed “Bill, from Eloise.” Bill Ragsdale and Robert Thompson would lie side by side until 1948, when their remains were removed to Fort McKinley National Cemetery, Manila. They are buried there beneath markers reading “Unknown.”

Arthur Ervin had no business remaining “Unknown.” His comrades had seen him fall; he was buried in line with four other Marines from his company, and directly beside his friend and leader Phil Wood. For reasons that are not fully known, Ervin was not wearing dog tags at the time of his burial, and his personal belongings had been removed by the battalion’s adjutant to be returned to his next of kin. With no one to claim the remains, “Unknown X-64” was also interred at Fort McKinley Cemetery after the war.

The three Marines have been left unknown for nearly seventy years. Thanks to the hard work of Ted Darcy of the WFI Research Group, with some assistance from Geoffrey Roecker (Phil Wood’s cousin), tentative identifications have been made, and the results submitted to JPAC for consideration. All materials used have been available in government archives since the war ended, and the only thing needed to bring closure to these cases was a little time, effort, and care for their memories.

Three have been found, but three thousand more remain. Three thousand more Arthurs, Williams, and Roberts. They loved and were loved, stood tall and fought, bled and died far from home. They were proud to fight for their country, and their country has failed them by not moving heaven and earth to bring them home.