Marines Say Bradley Not in Rosenthal's Famous Photograph

Just been reading that on Facebook .

 

I guess that explains why he never talked about it. Gagnon and Hayes knew and they didn't say anything. My guess is that everyone, who was there, knew. There is a reason why nobody jumped up and said: "Me..Me...it was me, I was there".
Some things need to be left alonee.

#it'samarinething

 

You also need to remember:

-When the photo became famous those involved were still fighting. The photo was taken on 23 February, was published in the Sunday papers 25 February and immediately struck a chord with the public. They didn't know which picture, of the many taken that day was the one that became famous.
-Joe Rosenthal who took the photo didn't know which photo had taken off and thought the one that became famous was the "Gung Ho" photo taken of all the flag raisers after the second flag raising. This led to the rumor that the flag raising had been staged, because Rosenthal when asked by Robert Sherrod, a Time-Life correspondent, if he had posed the photo answered "yes" because he still thought the "Gung Ho" picture was the famous one.




-Secretary of the Navy, James Forrestal had just landed on the beach at Iwo with General Holland "Howlin' Mad" Smith when the first flag went up. Forrestal remarked to Smith "Holland, the raising of that flag on Suribachi means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years".

From Wikipedia, but accurate:

Forrestal was so taken with fervor of the moment that he decided he wanted the Second Battalion's flag flying on Mt. Suribachi as a souvenir. The news of this wish did not sit well with 2nd Battalion Commander Chandler Johnson, whose temperament was every bit as fiery as Howlin Mad's. "To hell with that!" the colonel spat when the message reached him. The flag belonged to the battalion, as far as Johnson was concerned. He decided to secure it as soon as possible, and dispatched his assistant operations officer, Lieutenant Ted Tuttle, to the beach to obtain a replacement flag. As an afterthought, Johnson called after Tuttle: "And make it a bigger one."

-PFC Rene Gagnon a battalion runner/messenger, had been sent by Captain Dave Severance, CO E 2/28 back to battalion to secure replacement SCR-300 batteries.

-Lt. Col. Chandler Johnson, CO 2/28, in the meantime had ordered Lieutenant Albert Theodore Tuttle, assistant S-3 2/28, to secure a larger flag. Tuttle got a 96 x 56 flag from LST-779 and returned it to Johnson. Johnson gave the flag to Gagnon and ordered him to take it up to 1st Lt. Harold Schrier, XO E 2/28 and leader of the third platoon patrol up Suribachi, and to bring back the original flag. PFC Gagnon returned to Captain Severance.

-Sgt. Michael Strank (KIA March 1), and three men of his squad Corporal Harlon H. Block (KIA March 1), PFC Franklin R. Sousley (KIA March 21), and PFC Ira H. Hayes had been ordered to run a landline (comm wire) up Suribachi, take the replacement SCR-300 batteries up, and now take Gagnon and the "new" flag up to Schrier, raise it and bring the "old" flag back.

-President Roosevelt demanded that the flag raisers be identified and returned to the US, PFC Gagnon was brought in to view an enlargement of the photo and to identify the Marines in it. He initially refused to identify Hayes, because Hayes threatened him if he did so. Only on threat of prosecution at HQ Marine Corps did he finally identify Hayes. It was Gagnon that identified the others in the picture, included Bradley, and as is now determined failed to identify Schultz. He also initially misidentified Harlon Block as Sgt. Henry Oliver "Hank" Hansen (KIA March 1). Hansen was one of the flag raisers in the first photo. Upon finally seeing the photograph in question Ira Hayes immediately recognized the Marine identified as Hansen was actually block. He brought up the mistake but was told to keep quiet about it by a PR person. No sense ruining a perfectly good bond drive. Block's mother claimed to have recognized her son by his "bottom" she had powdered so often as a child and publicly questioned the identification. Hayes in 1946 hitchhiked to Texas and told Block's family that they were correct. Block's mother contacted her Congressperson and a six-month Congressional Investigation was undertaken to prove the identity of that Marine. Bradley who knew Hansen well, when asked sided with Hayes, the identification was reversed.
James Bradley in "Flags of Our Fathers" writes; "Ira remembered what Rene Gagnon and John Bradley could not have remembered, because they did not join the little cluster until the last moment: that it was Harlon [Block], Mike [Strank], Franklin [Sousley] and [Hayes] who had ascended Suribachi midmorning to lay telephone wire; it was Rene [Gagnon] who had come along with the replacement flag. Hansen had not been part of this action."



Both Hansen and Bradley were involved in the first flag raising, that's Hansen to the left with a soft cover on, paratrooper boots and his hand on the flag pole.

-SSgt. Lou Lowery, a photographer for "Leatherneck" magazine who took the pictures of the first flag raising was knocked off his feet by a grenade blast and his camera was broken. He was going down the mountain and passed Rosenthal coming up. The two spoke. Rosenthal was in the company of SSgt. William Homer "Bill" Genaust a Marine Combat Cameraman that took motion picture footage of the 2d flag raising. SSgt. Genaust himself was KIA on Iwo Jima on 4 March 1945.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-xGKIn_cnM

This is a video showing the motion picture footage and some of the other photos.

In the end, based upon Gagnon's mis-identification's (Hansen for Block and Bradley for Schultz), and the fact that he wasn't part of the party tasked with raising the second flag he was probably giving his best guess at who was involved. Hayes knew the four Marines in his party, but not who the two that joined at the last minute were. Obiously, Gagnon because he was initially the only known participant. Bradley when first identified probably wasn't sure which picture had become famous and assumed it was from the flag raising he was a part of. When he got to Washington and saw the actual picture in question and being aware that when Hayes raised the incorrect identification of Hansen vs Block and was threatened to keep his mouth shut, wasn't about raise a stink. Plus, I'm sure he had no idea of who the Marine he had been identified as was, and very likely the Marine in question had been killed during the battle, as had so many of those involved. Hayes probably thought the identification of Bradley was correct, he was only sure of the four in his party. Only Schultz knows why he never came forward.
To me, I don't think it matters other than as a bit of trivia. The picture signifies all the Marines and Corpsmen that fought and died, it is appropriate that you can't tell exactly who they are. To the Marines involved it was not an important event, just a moment during a battle where many more important and life or death events occurred. Three of the Marines involved died before ever knowing that raising the flag had made them famous. It is the public and the amateur historians (who ended up being correct) that are making a big deal about who the individual Marines were. The Marines themselves didn't feel they did more, and Hayes for one even as much as the other members of the 40 man patrol or the wire laying detail that later joined them. It just wasn't one of the important moments in their lives other than the notoriety that was forced upon them by Washington and the American public.

Another interesting tidbit is that two ships argue over who supplied the second flag. LST-779 that the Marine Corps credits and Coastguard crewed LST-758 that the Coast Guard recognizes as having provided the flag.

 

The fact that many of those rifles have bayonets attached gives pause for thought...