Guest Blog: John Butler on the loss of his father in WWII, echoed in one of my characters
Note: My book, “Wild Hands Toward the Sky” (Tales Press), is a fictional account of a boy whose father died on Guadalcanal during World War II and grows up in the rural Midwest, drawn to other returning veterans of the war as he searches for something to fill an inexplicable void and learn about life, responsibility, duty and honor. I’ve known several people who were very young when they lost their fathers in combat. Such a sudden and stark loss makes an indelible impact on their lives forever after. My friend, John Butler (and his brothers, Morey and Clint, and sister Mary Jo), experienced such loss and had to find a way to get on with life. I’d already written my book before I met John and his brothers, but I wanted to share this essay John wrote as another look at how such a loss impacts those left behind.
Losing My Dad Before I Really Knew Him
I was 5 years old when my father, Lt. Col. John Augustus Butler, commanding the First Battalion, 27th Marine Regiment, was killed in action on Iwo Jima while leading his men from the moment they landed on Red Beach Two on Feb. 19, 1945.
Years later on a trip to Iwo Jima for the annual “Reunion of Honor” in 2005, I met and roomed with Ray Elliott. Ray asked me what it was like growing up after having lost my dad in war. Ten years later, I attempted to answer that question, having thought about it often. I also learned on that trip that Ray had written a novel, “Wild Hands Toward the Sky,” based on a young boy growing up in rural Illinois who had lost his father on Guadalcanal.
Seven-year-old John Butler has his father's posthumous Navy Cross medal pinned to his white T-shirt by a Navy admiral in the family's Florida home. A framed photo of John's father, Lt. Col. John A. Butler, is on the mantle behind them. (Photo courtesy of John Butler)
One thing I had in common with Ray’s fictional boy was a longing to search for knowledge about my dad and what he had done in the war. This longing was largely met by my mother, who always kept the image of my father alive in the stories she told about him from their short, loving life together. My father’s mother, on summer visits to our home in Florida, also told us stories of his youth, and the two I always treasured were of my dad beating up a school bully and writing a letter that was published in the New Orleans Times-Picayune after a man had poisoned the family dog. Much later in life, I learned more about my dad and his early family life in New Orleans from an aged uncle, my dad’s youngest brother, Clinton.
On my seventh birthday, an admiral, two Marines who had served on Iwo Jima, and Alexander Vandergrift Jr.—himself a battalion commander on Iwo with the Fourth Marine Division—came to our home on the Caloosahatchee River in western Florida to present my dad’s posthumous Navy Cross, which was pinned to my clean white T-shirt. After the ceremony, my 3-year-old brother, Morey, and I took the admiral to our chicken house to show off our many chickens. This event loomed large and resulted in a lifetime of wanting to learn more about my dad and his life as a Marine and as a leader of his battalion on Iwo Jima.
While I did learn some things from my mother about my dad’s life as a Marine from 1934 to ’45 and as a midshipman at the Naval Academy from 1930 to ’34, there was more I wanted to know, and many of these questions were answered, in part, as my life progressed to where it is now, but the quest still goes on.
I attempted to follow in my dad’s footsteps by attending and graduating from the Naval Academy and becoming a Marine officer. The academy was no easy challenge for a free-spirited youth from the wilds of Southwest Florida, but I somehow prevailed and strived to meet the high standard of manhood and values of my dad as had been passed on to me by my mother.
From Mom, and my dad’s class yearbook, I learned that he had struggled with some of the technical courses, but excelled elsewhere and had stories he’d written published in the midshipman magazine, Trident.
He was attracted to the Marine Corps by the writings of John W. Thomason, the Frederick Remington of the Marine Corps early in the last century, and was on the crew and basketball teams. He was also a good boxer, but had his nose broken when matched with the brigade champ in his weight class.
The admiral presenting the Navy Cross to the Butlers shakes the hand of John Sr.’s widow (Photo courtesy of John Butler)
I could not play basketball, and crew was for the much rangier and taller midshipmen in our class. My sports were football in plebe year—which kept me on the training table and away from the upper class at meal times for at least three months, and track and field—where I competed as one of many pole vaulters at the academy.
I did well in boxing class, but knowing about my dad’s broken nose, I declined our boxing coach’s invitation to train and fight the then-prevailing brigade champ in my weight class, a classy fighter who never lost a fight in his four years at the academy.
In academics, I barely scraped by in electrical engineering but did better in other courses. My very best grades were in language and foreign policy. I was no academic stalwart by a long shot and had my struggles in the demerit department, particularly first-class year. When it was over in June of 1961, I wondered if my dad would have been proud of my sub-par performance as a midshipman. But I was never prouder to graduate and be commissioned a second lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps, and my mother—God bless her—was indeed proud of her newly minted Marine officer son.