PELELIU CLEAN-UP A DIFFICULT TASK
http://surviving-history.blogspot.com/2012/06/lone-wolf-us-marine-who-captured-1000.html
The next day, Gabaldon returned to the cliffs and captured two Japanese guards. He persuaded them to venture into the caves and talk their fellow soldiers into surrendering.
It was a high-risk strategy. Gabaldon was alone and completely defenceless against such a huge number of men.
‘It was either convincing them that I was a good guy or I would be a dead Marine within a few minutes,’ he later said. ‘If they rushed me I would probably kill two or three before they ate me alive. This was the final showdown.’
There were a tense few moments as Gabaldon awaited the return of the guards. Then, from further down the cliffs, he heard the sound of voices. Hundreds and hundreds of Japanese soldiers could be seen walking towards him.
Gabaldon was both nervous and excited. ‘If I pull this off,’ he said to himself, ‘it will be the first time in World War II that a lone Marine Private captures half a Japanese regiment by himself.’
The men were extremely jittery but they decided to surrender when Gabaldon assured them they’d receive medical treatment. Gabaldon found himself with 800 prisoners.
It earned him the nickname the Pied Piper of Saipan...........
Wow, fascinating!
A little better info here. I don’t think he made the news for a long time.
http://www.wtj.com/articles/gabaldon/
..................Before leaving Saipan, I went to the Stockade to bid adios to the many people I knew there. There were actually hundreds who I had personally saved from sure death. One guy, Shimabukuro, was a special friend, and he had become my personal barber. “Guy-san, before you leave us, I want you to see someone here who you saved from jumping over the cliff. Do you remember that woman you grabbed right after she had thrown her baby to the rocks down below. The people who were there say that she screamed and fought you, but you held her down. Well, she lost her mind a few days after she was brought here to the stockade. It seems that when she realized that she had killed her child unnecessarily - that the Americans were not going to roast and eat the children - she became “hidari-maki” (lost her mind). Come I will take you to her.” There she sat, motionless, just staring straight ahead. My God, what a pathetic sight. I should have let her join her baby that day at the cliffs.
This was truly the horror of war.