Semper Fi

**Cpl. Wheeler** · #1 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 12:48 AM

I'm Dick Wheeler, a World War II Marine, a corporal in rank, and author of The Bloody Battle For Suribachi, Iwo and A Special Valor, all about Pacific confrontations.
I served in the rifle platoon under the heroic leadership of Major John Keith Wells and was a member of the rifle company that raised both flags on the summit of Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima. Being one of the very few men alive today who fought in the front lines and, though sixty-three years later I still suffer from the effects of the wounds received in the furious battle at the base of the volcano, my memories are yet clear.
I am often disappointed with both the apparent lack of patriotism and interest in history which seem to pervade much of our society today. Consequently, I was quite pleased to learn of this site and the interest of the forum's members. I hope I can add something of value in terms of my memories and knowledge.
Glad to be the newest member.

Hufflepuff · #2 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 01:26 AM

Welcome! I salute you, and hope you enjoy the forum!

bigfun · #3 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 01:27 AM

Welcome!
Great to have you here! I look forward to sharing some posts with you!

Slipdigit · #4 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 02:55 AM

Mr Wheeler, firstly, thank you for spending a portion of your youth in defense of this country. My family and I appreciate your sacrifice.

Welcome to this forum, I am glad you stopped by and dropped us a line. Please feel free to add anything you feel lead to post, we will be more than excited to read what you have to offer.

If you want to continue your posts in this thread, please do so or you can create new threads to talk about whatever you want to.

If you have any questions, please contact one of the Moderators (Me, Mussolini, Stefan, Erich, Kai-Petri, Martin Bull or Skipper) or Otto, the owner of the site. There are also some good members who can be of assistance also.

Here are his books:

Amazon.com: The Bloody Battle for Suribachi (Bluejacket Books): Richard Wheeler: Books

Amazon.com: A Special Valor: Richard S. Wheeler: Books

Amazon.com: Iwo: Richard Wheeler: Books

Which is the best or favorite, Mr Wheeler?

JCFalkenbergIII · #5 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 03:33 AM

Welcome to the Forums Mr Wheeler. Thank you for your service.

krieg · #6 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 03:34 AM

welcome dick
hope you enjoy your stay here there is a lot of great people here
best krieg

Tomcat · #7 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 05:05 AM

You are most absolutely welcome Cpl. Wheeler, we would be privelaged to have you not only join us also for us to listen to any stories you wish to tell. We will be listening with our eyes open and our eyes to the screen.

Skipper · #8 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 06:56 AM

Good to have you on the forum Mr Wheeler and allow me to thank you for your contribution to freedom. You will certainly have a good time on this forum and be surrounded with people who understand you and will have many things in common, such as the notions of Liberty, Patriotism. Even if many of us are too young to have experienced the war, several have parents who fought in it and they mostly know what they are talking about. Mostly they cherish a value which I myself appreciate on ths forum: the respect of those who were there, so welcome!

Kai-Petri · #9 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 07:44 AM

Welcome Mr Wheeler!

It´s an honour to have you here with us!

**Cpl. Wheeler** · #10 (**permalink**) April 30th, 2008, 11:00 PM

Hi, Jeff (Slipdigit) and to all others who welcomed me to the site. One clarification about my books referenced by Jeff. A new, and substantially revised version of The Bloody Battle For Suribachi was released at the end of last year. The book is for sale on amazon but it is not at the link Jeff references. I was very pleased that it was used by the production crew for the Flags of Our Fathers movie and that Rob Lorenz was able to write a nice introduction for the book.
You had asked which was my favorite book. They all are meaningful to me, however, The Bloody Battle For Suribachi was my personal story and that of my platoon-mates, so it is particularly special to me as the men therein depicted were, and those few still alive are my dearest friends.
IWO details the entire battle for the island. In writing that book, I tried to address both combat from American and Japanese perspectives. It was rather well received when first published and I was fortunate to have Major Horie, a Japanese officer who had been on Chi Chi Jima, translate the book into a Japanese version.
Finally, A Special Valor deals with the entire Pacific campaign. Consequently, the three books are different but, as stated, my personal favorite is the one about my platoon. I hope other posters have the opportunity to read and learn about my old comrades.

Otto · #11 (**permalink**) May 4th, 2008, 03:16 PM

Cheers and welcome Cpl. Wheeler! Glad to have you with us. I'm very interested in hearing your stories Sir.

Cpl. Wheeler, being a World War 2 website, we have a special designation here for WW2 veterans, if you don't mind I'll set your profile to indicate this and anyone seeing one of your posts will be immediately aware that you served?

I've pinned this thread so it's a bit more visible to all.

Erich · #12 (**permalink**) May 4th, 2008, 03:34 PM

Good to have you on board Dick, a hearty welcome !

Erich ~

**SouthWestPacificVet** · #13 (**permalink**) May 4th, 2008, 04:08 PM

Hello Dick,

Welcome aboard, this is a wonderful group of people on this forum, very respectful and well read, you would be hard pressed to find better.

The fight for that Island was a rough deal, I went through a number of years of it myself down South. I tell as much as I am able to remember when posting, in order to answer the questions of the members, selling books is not why I'm here.

**Cpl. Wheeler** · #14 (**permalink**) May 4th, 2008, 04:52 PM

Thanks, Otto: I am happy to be so designated. I was a corporal in a rifle platoon under the heroic Keith Wells in a rifle company under Dave Severance. I was fortunate after the war to become acquainted with some Japanese which allowed me the opportunity to obtain the perspective from both sides. I am more than happy to discuss my experiences, those of my platoon and those that I have learned from others during my writing career. I am pleased that people might be interested.
Dick Wheeler

Slipdigit · #15 (**permalink**) May 4th, 2008, 05:30 PM

Mr Wheeler's and Mr Wells' photographs can be found on this page:

"Iwo Jima, the First Flag" by Ron Stark -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Flags of Our Fathers, Iwo Jima, Chuck Lindberg, the battle for Iwo Jima, the last flag raiser, Iwo Jima flag raising

Good show, Mr Wheeler!

Slipdigit · #16 (**permalink**) May 4th, 2008, 06:20 PM

I've ordered this book and should have it in about 10 days.
Iwo by Richard Wheeler : Booksamillion.com (0785823069, Hardcover)

You seem have written a book or two in your life, unless you are not also known as Richard S Wheeler, who writes western novels. There were nine pages of books by Richard Wheeler in BooksAMillion.

**Cpl. Wheeler** · #17 (**permalink**) May 4th, 2008, 07:45 PM

I hope you enjoy IWO. It is one of my favorites, next to the recently revised version of The Bloody Battle For Suribachi published by Skyhorse.
I am not the writer of the western novels that you mention, however. I am just plain Richard Wheeler. As I think I indicated previously, my career has been devoted to nonfiction history, including Revolutionary, Civil and World War II, written from a human perspective.
Happy reading! If you have any questions as you read, fire away. I am always happy to hear from a reader.

dgmitchell · #18 (**permalink**) May 11th, 2008, 10:26 PM

Hello Mr. Wheeler -- I am a bit late to join the Welcome Wagon, but I, too, too welcome you to these forums and I look forward to reading more of your posts. I thank you both for your service to and sacrifice for our country, and for taking the time after the War to educate us with your writings. Being able to hear from men like you and Jack (Southwest Pacific Vet) is both humbling and awesome!

Cheers!

David

**Cpl. Wheeler** · #19 (**permalink**) May 12th, 2008, 03:51 PM

Hello, David: I was happy to receive your welcome as I was to learn of others' interest in World War II.
I introduced myself to this site as an author as we are all to tell a little bit about ourselves to the others.
In this regard, I would also like to clear something up. I just read the post by Jack closely and contrary to the apparent inference therein, I am not here to sell anything. I am very proud, however, of my platoon-mates and, perhaps my zeal in them gave the impression otherwise. I apologize if that was the impression others took from my introduction. In any case, I believe I would be much more comfortable answering questions rather than starting new threads, so I hope anyone with questions will post them here.
Dick Wheeler

Slipdigit · #20 (**permalink**) May 12th, 2008, 04:19 PM

I had not thought that all, Mr Wheeler. I was glad to have you here and hoped you were willing to answer questions.

I've been reading your book over the weekend, between chores and Mother's day visits. It is very good so far-well written. You spent a great deal of time researching. I see where a lot of Letters From Iwo Jima came from.

I see it was initially published in 1980. When did you write the book?

What was your opinion of the above mentioned movie and of Flags of Our Fathers?

Would you answer further questions for me as I read through the book?

**Cpl. Wheeler** · #21 (**permalink**) May 12th, 2008, 04:44 PM

Thanks, Jeff. I will be more than happy to answer your questions and I am glad that you like the book, so far, that is.
In answer to your question about when I started writing, I was injured pretty badly on Iwo and after being on a hospital ship about a month, I went to a hospital in California. When I was there, some of my guys were at the same hospital and that is when I began writing my notes, although my first impressions were gathered on the hospital ship. That is where I met the Marine who took a sword from a Japanese with his bare hands and killed the Japanese with it. His hands were swathed in bandages with blood seeping through but he still had the sword. He came to my bunk and showed it to me. I also started corresponding with other Iwo Marines while at the hospital as we were spread in other hospitals around the nation.
I never saw Letters because at my age I have trouble reading captions. As far as Flags, to be honest, I thought it had too many fictional touches. I had hoped that they would have stuck a little closer to the truth in telling the story as I had anticipated more of a documentary.
Dick Wheeler

Slipdigit · #22 (**permalink**) May 12th, 2008, 04:58 PM

I did not care very much for Flags of Our Fathers, the movie. The book, on the other hand, was well done. Bradley did our country a service by writing it. I did, however like Letters From Iwo Jima.

I understand that you were a reserve unit. How soon after the initial landings did it become apparent that this was going to a difficult event for y'all?