This is one of those stories where truth is stranger than fiction.
Marcus Island during the spring and summer of 1945 was the scene of much violence and hardships. In Japanese hands since the turn of the century, Marcu Island had become a bastion protecting the approaches to Tokyo from the Central pacific. The Japanese built two runways on the small island and stationed a force of 4500 Army and Navy personnel on the island. In March of 1942, it was one of the first Japanese bases attacked by the US after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. But the United States had decided to bypass the small island and not try to take it by force. Instead, the US would monitor the Japanese on the island and attempt to destroy its effectiveness through air attacks,one naval ship bombardment, and submarine surveillance. With the B29s assigned to attack Japan proper, the US decided to use the B24 LIberator in the Pacific to attack targers closer to the US forces. By the summer of 1944, a total of three B24 groups had been assigned to the 7th Air Force, which was responsible for the central Pacific. The 494th Bombardment Group, stationed on Anguar Island, was in fact the last B24 group established by the United States. It had been decided earlier in the war to just use B24s in the Pacific, vs the B17, due their greater range and bomb load. These B24s were used to attack targets closer to the US forces bases and let the long range B29 take care of the strategic bombing of Japan. During 1944, the B24s began to attack Iwo Jima and the Philippines. And they would make periodic raids on the bypassed Japanese bases on Marcush Island and Truk. And, the US Navy, running out of surface ships for their submarines to attack, begain stationing a US submarine in the island’s vicinity to monitor Japanese activities and to act as a Lifeguard for B24 aircraft that were damaged over the island. The US Navy also ran B24 reconnaissance flights out of Guam with thier B24 reconnaissance aircraft.
After the invasion of Iwo Jima in February 1945, the US turned their attention to Marcus Island and Truk Atoll. They thought the Japanese might try to stage aircraft through Marcus Island or Truk to attack the new US air bases in the Marianas (Guam, Tinian, and Saipan) and the great Naval anchorage at the Ulithi Atoll.
The three B24 groups began to attack Marcus Island almost daily beginning in May of 1945. Planes from the 494th Bombardment Group were moved temporarily from Anguar Island to Harmon Field, Guam, to augment the other two bomb groups in attacking Marcus Island. Even US Navy PBY4s (Liberators and Privateers) got into the act by being put on 1 hour alert status in May to attack Marcus Island.
The island was kept under pressure until late July 1945 when the island was no longer a threat to US forces in the Marianas. and the United States diverted the B24s to mainland Japan.
One of Marcus Island’s antagonist was the 11th Bomb Group, with B-24s, stationed at Harmon Field, Guam. (Harmon Field was just north of Agana, Guam and is an industrial area now) The 11th BG was initially used to bomb Iwo Jima and the other Bonin Islands in preparation for the invasion of Iwo Jima.
After the Iwo Jima invasion, they began almost daily bombing missions to Marcus Island, the Japanese naval base on Chichi Chima, or Truk Atoll during April – June of 1945. In June 1945, most of the 11th BG moved to Okinawa in preparation for the invasion of Japan.
A list of the 40 missions flown by Lt Stone of the 11th Bomb Group during WW2. This is typical of the missions flown. Note the change in targets at the end of March, from Iwo Jima and Chichi Jim to Truk and Marcus Island (Lt Stone, 11th Bomb Group.org)
The crews still on Guam fell into two groups: the new crews that needed training on the relative “milk run” missions to Truk or Marcus Island, and the high-time crews close to completing their 40 missions needed to return to the United States. It was the 11th Bomb Group policy to not allow crews with less than 30 missions to fly combat missions from Guam. Instead, crews with over 30 missions were scheduled so that they could complete their 40 required missions and not have to make the move to Okinawa.
Sixteen daylight strikes were made by the 11th Bomb Group in June 1945, with 20 x 100 lb General Purpose bombs or 20 x 125 pound fragmentation bombs being the normal bomb load. Between nine to 24 aircraft from several squadrons participated in each strike.
The strange plight of B24 44-41576 on the Tuesday – 19 June 1945 Marcus Island attack
The following article from the History of the 11th Bombardment Group Heavy in the Pacific, 1940-1945 is about one of those missions and the heroic actions of a 42nd Bombardment Squadron B-24 Flight Engineer, TSgt Guillermo Abrego.
Three squadrons of the 11th Bomb Group participated in the 19 June strike on Marcus Island, the 431st BS, the 98th BS, and the 42nd BS. A total of ten aircraft of the 431st BS and 98th BS were the first bombers over the target. They received only a few burst of flak, none of which was close enough to cause any damage. The twelve planes of the 42nd BS were next to make their run over Marcus Island and the Japanese threw everything they had at them. Burst of flak appeared much more accurate and could be heard throughout the formation aircraft. One burst, or possible a three gun salvo was right “on the button” within the formation, scoring hits on eight aircraft – 521, 576, 615, 522, 466, 467, 280, and 987. Aircraft 44-41576, with eleven aircrew members onboard, piloted by Lt Floyd W. Beanblossom, received the most damaging hits. This was their fourth combat mission.
The bombardier of 44-41576, Lt Joseph Arena of Boston, described the run in as follows: “We were on the bomb run when they nailed us,” he said, “The Japs threw up about 20 burst and scored hits on nine of the 11 planes in our formation, so you can see what kind of shooting the little men are putting out. We had four direct hits: the first one on our number 3 engine, knocking it out and puncturing our right wheel. Another one burst right under our nose. A third shell smacked our open bomb bays and the flak made a hell of a clang as it glanced off the bombs. The fourth burst got us beneath the tail. Almost simultaneously, we got our bombs away and headed home, but all of us knew in our hearts were were through.”
The stricken B-24 dropped out of the formation and was unable to maintain altitude. Another B-24, # 615, “Wild Ass Ride”, dropped out of the formation to escort the stricken plane.
Top Row L-R: Cpl. John W. Scanlan, Lt. Marion (Phil) T. Gaines, Lt. Henry S. Janeski, Lt. Jack I. Moore, Lt. Ellis L. Walker,
Bottom Row L-R: Cpl. William J. Rice, Cpl. Donald L. Olson, Cpl. Robert E. Powers, Sgt Odmund T. Olsen, Cpl. Chris S. Muller.
The rest of the formation returned to Guam and their aircraft were readied for an early takeoff the next day to come back and search for the crew of 1576. However, the crew of one aircraft, #44-40521, RITA, noticed a bad gas leak but were unable to locate the source. Unknown to them a piece of flak had destroyed one of their tires also, which resulted in the total loss of the 44-40521 aircraft on landing. All crew members escaped but two had been wounded over Marcus Island. Final report for the June 19, 1945 raid was two planes lost, four in the depot with major damage, and two with minor damage.
Meanwhile, the stricken 44-41576 began a controlled descent of about 500 feet per minute. The number three engine was smoking and the propeller windmilling furiously. Pilot Beanblossom and Flight Engineer Abrego worked to feather the propeller but the mechanism had been shot off. Eventually the propeller froze when the oil gave out, but its blades were flat against the wind, causing a heavy drag. The crew tried to lighten the ship. Out went the empty bomb bay gas tank, the ball turret, guns and ammunition, part of the upper turret, waist windows, everything that could be unscrewed or ripped loose. After about 20 minutes, the plane was stripped down to a rattling shell and the pilots were able to hold altitude at 3800 feet.
Even before this mission, the crew had considered their aircraft a “jinxed” ship from the start. On their first mission, they took a direct flak hit over Marcus Island and their co-pilot, Lt Roy Grice of Oakdale, Tennessee, lost a leg.Their second mission was uneventful but on their third mission they were hit again over Marcus Island, but fortunately not too bad. Then, this mission, their fourth. Lt Robert Davis, the squadron operations officer, was filling in for the injured copilot on this flight.
Lt Beanblossom continued ” We had been hit about 4:00 pm (0040Z) and we managed to plug along for an hour and a half. We kept going only by using full flaps and throttling down to 125 mph, just above stall speed. Number one engine was overheating and getting ready to cut out. Flight Engineer Abrego was working like crazy to hold her aloft. Somehow he managed to transfer gas from the dead engine and salvaged a lot of it, but the number 4 was still leaking badly. We had a big consultation to figure our chances. As close as we could estimate, we had just enough gas to keep us going three hours and 10 minutes. And it would take a minimum of four hours to make the nearest field at Saipan. So, by simple arithmetic, we knew we couldn’t make it and that we’d have to hit the silk somewhere. We had only half an hour of light left and we were still 600 miles from the Marianas. If we waited until the last minute to bail out we would be a lot closer to Saipan, but it would be pitch dark and no one in the world would ever be able to spot us. On the other hand, if we jumped right now, there would still be light enough for a navy rescue aircraft, or Dumbo, to set down in the water and pick us up. We were in contact through our patched up radio with a Dumbo that was coming up fast, and we talked it over with them. They agreed to land for us if we jumped, since the sea was like a pan of milk. Under the circumstances, there was only one thing to do – jump.
B24 crews did not want to ditch in their airplane. The high wing configuration meant that the impact of hitting the water was absorbed by the fuselage. And, since their bomb bay doors were light-duty aluminum, they would collapse when it hit the sea. Usually, the B24 would have its wings ripped off, the tail separated, and the fuselage broken in two. Ditching ssurvival rates in a B24 in the ocean were low.
I ordered the crew to get ready to bail out, and began to fly in a circle to allow the Navy Dumbo to catch up to us. Finally, we saw him coming and the crew began to jump. I waited until I thought all of them had gone, then set her on automatic pilot and went back to the bomb bay to jump myself. And there I saw TSgt Abrego standing on the catwalk, adjusting his parachute.”
“TSgt Abrego was one of my best friends and he was the best flight engineer in the Marianas. He knew everything there was to know about a B-24 Liberator; he was the kind of guy who spent all his spare time reading tech orders when everybody else was playing cards or horsing around. He was a big, dark, handsome kid, of Spanish extraction, with a wife and baby back home in Enid, Oklahoma. A very pleasant guy to have around. He went straight in the the US Army at age 19, and had been in for four years, during which time he had been an old line chief back at Liberal, Kansas. He had piled up more than 1200 hours in B-24s – he worshipped the damn plane, and talked, ate, and slept airplanes and engineering. He was interested in everything on a B-24 and couldn’t rest until he had mastered it. I’m an old B-24 Liberator instructor pilot and he was always pestering me to show him the ropes. Like most flight engineers, Abrego had piled up a lot of stick time over the years, knew how to use the autopilot, fly on a heading, work a radio compass, and somewhere along the line he had even talked somebody into letting him shoot landings, which he could make fairly decently. He was as good a flight engineer as it is possible to be. When the crew got to Guam in April 1945, he organized classes for the crew chiefs and even the best of them admitted he could teach them plenty. But not even Abrego could teach them to combat a jinx.”
We stood on the catwalk over the open bomb bay doors looking down at the ocean below us. I told him to jump, but he just looked at me, half-smiling. I gave him a little shove and he pulled away. “You don’t have to push me, “ he said. “I’ll jump okay – lets jump together”. Well, something about his manner made me suspicious, so I looked him in the eye and said “Are you sure now?” He stared right back without flinching, and nodded. So I said, “Okay then, here we go pal” and I dropped out. After my pack opened, I counted the chutes drifting down over two miles of sea, and one was missing. Then I knew he hadn’t jumped after all. I could only cuss at myself, and then wish him luck and hope he’s make it, but I was dead sure he’d never coax her back.”
Months later, in a crew debrief, the surviving crew members, sitting remembering the moments of the jump, stared at the floor. The navigator, Flight Officer Anthony DeBenedetto of Washingtonville, NY, spoke slowly. “Kind of hard to tell just what another man’s motives are, ” he said. “But I’ve heard Abrego say a dozen times that he would never bail out over water. He couldn’t swim a stroke and he used to say that you might as well go down with the ship and get it over with fast, as to strangle slowly in the water. And he was such a bug on airplanes that he had tremendous confidence in the plane.” he remembered. “As long as she was still aloft, he’d stick with her. It was just another B-24 – we ‘d never got around to naming her- and she had had bad luck from the start, but he loved that ship. She was his baby. As I look back now, I know he never did intend to jump, because while we were getting ready to bail out, he slipped in to me and asked what was our compass heading back to the Marianas. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, and told him what it was. Even then, he was figuring on taking his chances with the ship.”
With Abrego at the controls, the B-24 headed into the setting sun and dusk to the south west toward Saipan, over 500 miles away.
Their escort B-24, # 615, “Wild Ass Ride”, circled the crew and reported seeing ten parachutes leaving the plane at 3000 feet. The fate of the 11th crew member was unknown at that time. The other ten crew members splashed into the sea one by one, while their B-24 escort swung in and dropped two life rafts. But the rafts fell out of reach of them. As darkness settled over the area and their fuel load reaching bingo levels, # 615 had to leave the area and returned to base. Contact was made with the Air Sea Rescue Service and the Navy dispatched a submarine, the USS Seafox, a destroyer, and a search plane to the position last given. The US Navy Dumbo swept over the men to land but missed them in the growing twilight.
It veered around again and came back, only to circle the water more than a mile away from the men. It had lost sight of them. The men were mere dots in the vast sea. After several futile sweeps, the Dumbo gave up and also had to return to base. The men in the water later reported that they heard its engines die away in the distance and then the night was on them. They were alone, without life rafts, bobbing in Mae Wests in the open ocean, 600 miles from land friendly them, 200 miles from their target, Marcus Island.
“That ended it,” said Beanblossom. “Every man in the crew gave up hope right then. We had flown search missions for three weeks at a stretch, looking for Lt General Harmon. We knew it was simply impossible to spot single men from planes, unless they were in rafts or had sea dye or a mirror.”
On February 25, 1945, a C-87 Liberator carrying Lieutenant General Millard F.Harmon Jr, and Brigadier General James Andersen, his chief of staff, departed Guam for Washington, DC., via Kwajalein Island and Hawaii to resolve a dispute with Gen LeMay over operational control of the B-29s. Their aircraft reached Kwajalein safely but disappeared the next day after taking off for Hawaii. The aircraft was never found and there were no survivors. Two airfields on Guam, Harmon Field and Andersen Field, were named after them.
“With no dramatics at all, we just made up our minds quietly that we were finished. Our sole chance had been the Dumbo and that had failed. We had used up our luck. All that remained to be seen was how long it would take us to die.”
As the night wore on , the men hailed one another and three pairs finally got together. Lt Beanblossom teamed up with the tail gunner, Sgt Donald Butler of Akron, Ohio. Lt Di Benedetto found Cpl James McDonald of Oak Park, Ill, a photographer who had unluckily picked their plane to fly the mission on. Lts Arena and Davis also were able to get together. But four men were alone all night; Sgt Tom Powers of of Richmond, Va, a nose gunner; Sgt Joe Freiman of Chicago, the radar instruments man; Sgt WIlliam Kluth of Philadephia, the ball gunner; and Sgt John Barrett of Somerville, Mass, the radio operator. They were all in bad shape.
“Several times during the night, Davis and I hollered to Barrett and he answered, “ said Lt Arena. “I asked him if he had a raft and he said no. Then he asked me the same thing and I told him no. We were all cussing our luck at not having one-man rafts attached to our chutes like the B-29 crews and fighter pilots have. They were on order, and in fact, arrived at the squadron the day after we hit, and there’s some bad luck for you. But Barrett’s voice was a long way off in the night and we couldn’t get together. After 2 a.m. we tried several times to get some more response from him, but he never said anything more. He had drowned. When we found his body the next day he had been dead about 14 hours. I’ll never forget the sound of his voice across all that dark water when he asked me if we had a raft – not really believing we had, but just asking as a matter of form – so lonely and coming from so far away.”
Sgt Powers, a skinny GI who seemed the frailest in the crew, put up an almost superhuman demonstration of endurance. His Mae West would not work and finally he threw it away. For 16 hours, without relief, he treaded water to keep afloat and was still swimming when he was rescued the following afternoon. No one in the Marianas can remember a previous case when a crew has survived more than 20 hours without life rafts – as this crew did – even when its Mae West were working. The rescued crewmen said flatly that survival for more than 48 hours is impossible under such circumstances. And no one out here can remember anyone who survived – as Powers did – for as long as 16 hours with no Mae West at all.
Powers kept afloat by paddling easily, conseving his strength, and using an emergency survival technique in whch he had been briefed. He knotted the ends of his pant legs and swung the pants over his head to fill them with air. The improvised water wings leaked air continually and it was a struggle to keep them filled, but they gave him a sufficient margin of buoyance to stay afloat. Sgt Freiman also had trouble with a leaky Mae West which was only partly inflated, but he managed to keep going somehow.
“Those hours dragged on,” said DiBenedetto, the navigator. “Every star seemed a plane, every wave splash sounded like a ship. I’ve never put in such a long night in my life. I was bothered by a small fish about a foot long that kept nibbling at the seat of my pants, but luckily no sharks bothered us, although we saw some the next day. It was cold and we had no hope at all and we shivered and shook and out teeth chattered and we tried not to think about the next morning when the sun would get at us.”
The men don’t go into details, but some of them admit that they thought long and seriously of getting it over with, to save themselves suffering. Some looked for a quick end by tring not to struggle, hoping they would drown. But always at the last minute, when they went under water, the urge to live was overpowering. They found themselves struggling to survive whether they wanted to or not. And finally they settle down grimly to hang on to the last bitter moment, to sweat it out however long it took.
“What we did not know, “ said Lt Beanblossom, “was that a Navy submarine, the USS Seafox, over 200 miles away had overhead our conversation with Dumbo and had marked our position.” They were enroute to Saipan to top off with fuel.
![Photo] USS Spot, USS Sea Fox, and USS Queenfish at Saipan, Mariana Islands, Mar 1945 | World War II Database](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/OB1aBev550nEuhXz76xyeduXwIaEIWvdh2zsb1MuUhDKxA2qy5c9Ck5D3r_l-JkYcCho_U64-O4LLGWrBfLK)
Lt Beanblossom continued “And, although they had no obligation to help us – and even assumed the Dumbo already had us aboard and on our way home – they decided to come all that way just to play safe and make sure the Dumbo hadn’t missed some of us. That skipper, Commander R. C. Klinker, is a very great guy and for our money there isn’t a better man in the Navy. Mind you, he didn’t have to come. But with no hesitation he turned that sub around and headed full speed for our position. To get to us, he had to come through a restricted zone, putting his ship in great danger. Our planes had instructions to sink any submarine in that area, because none of ours were supposed to be there. But he brought her hundreds of miles, running full speed on the surface. An at noon the next day he sighted us, just as a whole flock of Dumbos finally appeared. “
“The sub cruised around until she had found us all, scattered over three miles of sea. We were a bad sight, burned raw by the sun, half whacky from thirst, our bodies dehydrated and covered with immersion sores where our clothes had chafed. The last one found was poor Barrett – his body was floating face down. They were getting ready to bring the body aboard for a formal burial at sea, when the currents settled the question. A couple of small waves nudged him gently to the rear of the sub and he was pulled under the water by the suction of the submarine’s propellers and not seen again. It was just as well, I guess. The sea already had him and a formal burial service would have been a bad ordeal for all of us who were his friends. The men said some prayers as he disappeared under the surface of the Pacific ocean. He was a wonderful crewmate and the best radioman I have ever known” remarked Lt Beanblossom.
The remaining nine survivors remained aboard the sub for 12 days.. The Seafox arrived at Midway Island on 29 June 1945 to let the crewmembers off the submarine.
But what happened to TSgt Abrego?
Early Wednesday morning of 20 June 1945, preparations were being made on Harmon Field, Guam for the early takeoff of search planes for the missing crew of B-24 44-41576. Ten parachutes had been seen behind the stricken aircraft. The US Navy said they would have a submarine in the area around 6:00 am that morning to look for the fallen flyers. There was no report on the 11th crewmember. However, at 02:00 AM local time, the base received a teletype message from Saipan, reporting the crash landing of a B-24 on neighboring Tinian Island. On search of the aircraft, one crewmember had been found but he was severely injured and unconscious. They were requesting information on the identity of the man.
Of course it was determined quickly that the unknown B-24 was no other than 44-41576 and the unidentified crew member was 23 year old TSgt Guillerno Abrego, ASN 18024421, the flight engineer of Lt Beanblossom’s crew.
“It was the weight, “ said Beanblossom. “The ship was already stripped to her bare bones and we were using 195 gallons an hour, at a speed barely above stalling. I know that when Abrego and I figured the fuel status, we decided that if we had had an extra 150 gallons of gas, we could have made it back with the full crew. Well, when the 10 men jumped, the plane lost about 2000 pounds. Abrego probably cut back the power setting to conform to the lighter weight of the aircraft, and probably saved nearly 50 gallons and hour. He flew for more than five hours after we jumped, arriving at Tinian about 11:00 o’clock local time that night. That meant he had saved about 250 gallons of gas over our original schedule, or just enough to make it. And, even then, his tanks were bone dry when he landed. The plane did not catch fire although it was demolished – so you know how little gas he must have had. “
Standing on the catwalk of a crippled B-24, 200 miles out of Marcus Island and 600 miles from Saipan, the closest friendly land, 23 year old Guillermo Abrego for his own private reasons made a decision. As he stood there watching his crewmates plummet out the hatches, their white parachutes drifting down and away, he decided to disobey the pilot’s command to jump. He tricked the pilot into jumping without him. Then Abrego made his way back to the flight deck and sat down behind the controls of the aircraft. The plane was a flying sieve, with four direct hits in her wings and belly. Her Number 3 engine was out and her Number 4 was nearly useless., with precious gasoline leaking out in streams. Her hydraulic system was gone. Her landing gear was shot up, she had lost hundreds of gallon of fuel and her Number 1 engine was overheating and ready to go.
But somehow – no one will ever really know how – Abrego kept her going. He headed the broken bomber into the setting sun and thickening darkness. Looking at the compass, he kept the aircraft on the southwest heading the navigator had told him just before he had abandoned the aircraft. Abrego did his own piloting and his own navigating. He nursed and prayed in the plane hour after hour, for 600 long miles over an empty ocean. Plugging along through the night alone with the noisy slipstream howling through the holes in the aircraft. Nearly six hours later the island of Tinian came into view.
The island of Tinian, a few miles south of Saipan, and 80 miles north of Guam, was the worlds largest airfield at the time. Six long bomber runways and three smaller fighter runways had been constructed since the US invaded it in July 1944. At its height in the war, over 50,000 US military personnel were stationed there.
As Abrego piloted the stricken B-24 over the Tinian coast, he headed for Tinian West field, with its two long landing strips. In April and May 1945, West Field, Tinian had received B-29s of the 58th Bombardment Wing, (40th, 444th, 462nd, and 468th Bomb Groups) which had been redeployed from the now-defunct XX Bomb Command in the China-Burma-India (CBI) theatre. Two of the runways were 8500 foot long, with no obstructions for hundreds of yards around. Even if he missed those strips, the terrain was flat as a table and he would have probably survived a crash landing. He picked the area between the two runways. It can only be a guess, but it is believed that he was confused by the runway lights and thought he was landing on the proper runway. Or he could have been avoiding the parked B-29s to minimize the damage he would cause by his crippled aircraft. No one will ever know.
He managed to lower the landing gear and as he touched down, the aircraft lurched on the flat right tire observers said. Abrego still could have survived if he had let her stay on the ground and let it ground loop. Instead, he reapplied power and tried to take her off again. She climbed her last 30 feet, stalled, and went in. It skidded off the runway. There was one pile of coral left from construction, a small heap alone in a big field, with no other obstructions for 200 yards. As if magnetized, the crumpling ship slewed around in a half circle and ran square into the coral heap. The jinx had again raised its ugly head.
Navy men at the Tinian field ran out in an attempt to save the crew. They broke into the hulk and swarmed inside. There was nothing but emptiness and silence except for the wind through the flak holes in her broken belly and the popping and crackling as her engines cooled. There was no fire. They stared at each other and felt shivers down their backs. “It’s a goddamn ghost ship,” one whispered. “She came in by herself; she was trying to come home.” Minutes later, and outside the cockpit, they found Abrego at last, but nothing could be done. He never gained consciousness. He never muttered so much as a word that the hospital attendants could make out, and six hours later he died.
In August, 1945, just two months later, two B-29s would take off from Tinian and turn north to Japan. On board were the secret atomic bombs. The rest is history and the war officially ended officially on September 2, 1945.
The approximately 2400 Japanese on Marcus Island surrendered peacefully on August and would be repatriated to Japan in October 1945. On October 17, 1945, the Japanese cargo ship Daiku Maru arrived in Japan and no more Japanese occupied the island.
Marcus Island became a hub for the US Navy and Army Air Force transport aircraft plying the Pacific from Hawaii to Japan. The US abandoned it in 1947 after typhoons destroyed much of the base. In 1951, the Japanese Weather Service was allowed to station a small contingent of weather men on the island to make weather observations. The US returned in 1963 with the establishment of a Coast Guard LORAN C navigation station there.
The island was returned to Japanese control in 1968. In 1993, the USCG turned the LORAN station over to the Japanese. The LORAN C station closed permanently in 2009 with the advent of GPS. Now, a small Japanese Self Defense force and Weather Service personnel occupy the island. And an unknown number of ghosts of US and Japanese soldiers and airmen from the US Navy and Army Air Forces.
For more information on Marcus Island, go to: A little history on Marcus Island . . . – Pacific Airlifter