Jack Lummus was in the first wave of troops to land at Iwo Jima on February 19, 1945. He and his platoon spent the next two weeks fighting the Japanese.
Jack Lummus
“After twice being knocked over by grenade blasts, the second of which resulted in shoulder wounds, Lummus continued to attack entrenched positions when suddenly he was at the center of a powerful explosion, obscured by flying rock and dirt. As it cleared, his men saw him rising as if in a hole. A land mine had blown off both his legs that had carried him to football honors at Baylor.
They watched in horror as he stood on the bloody stumps … But he was still shouting for them to move out, move out, and the platoon scrambled forward.”
A selection from Richard Newcomb’s book Iwo Jima.
After being hit by the land mine, the legless Lummus was carried to a battlefield hospital and lived for several more hours. At the aid station, he famously told the doctor, “Well, doc, the New York Giants lost a mighty good end today.”
Andrew Jackson Lummus Jr. was a baseball and football star at Baylor University. He signed with the New York Giants in 1941 where he wore No. 29 and earned $100 a month salary. He played in nine games that season and a month after it ended, in January 1942, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps.
“For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty … Resuming his assault tactics with bold decision after fighting without respite for two days and nights, First Lieutenant Lummus slowly advanced his platoon against an enemy deeply entrenched in a network of mutually supporting positions.
Although knocked to the ground when an enemy grenade exploded close by, he immediately recovered himself and, again moving forward despite the intensified barrage, quickly located, attacked and destroyed the occupied emplacement.
Instantly taken under fire by the garrison of a supporting pillbox and further assailed by the slashing fury of hostile rifle fire, he fell under the impact of a second enemy grenade but, courageously disregarding painful shoulder wounds, staunchly continued his heroic one-man assault and charged the second pillbox, annihilating all the occupants.
Subsequently returning to his platoon position, he fearlessly traversed his lines under fire, encouraging his men to advance and directing the fire of supporting tanks against other stubbornly holding Japanese emplacements. Held up again by a devastating barrage, he again moved into the open, rushed a third heavily fortified installation and killed the defending troops.
Determined to crush all resistance, he led his men indomitably, personally attacking foxholes and spider traps with his carbine and systematically reducing the fanatic opposition, until, stepping on a land mine, he sustained fatal wounds.”
In a letter to his mother, Lummus’ commanding officer wrote:
Jack suffered very little for he didn’t live long. I saw Jack soon after he was hit. With calmness, serenity and complacency, Jack said, ‘The New York Giants lost a good man.’ We all lost a good man.
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