The Story Unfolds

This is where I hope to give you an insight into the process of researching and developing Devil Dogs. Here you'll find interviews with relevant experts, documents and locations that seem particularly important. Owing to the ambition of this story, e.g. the distant and tricky locations, it is a longer term project. Watch it gradually take shape.

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160

Jim McEnery (on right)

"Okay, so how the hell did I end up in this godforsaken place, anyway?"

Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. Close friend to Thurman Miller. Wrote the book Hell in the Pacific, about his experiences.

150

Andy Haldane

"... one helluva great guy and an outstanding officer... He was firm with the troops but always fair, and he never raised his voice.'

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Commanding officer of K Company at Cape Gloucester, where he received the Silver Star for leading hand-to-hand combat on Walt's Ridge. KIA by a sniper during the Battle of Peleliu.

140

Thurman TI Miller

"Will the storm of war swallow me up... Will I ever see my parents again?"

‍A prominent character in the story. A Platoon Sergeant, 2nd Platoon, served in the Marine Corps from 1939-1945. One of eighteen children in a poor family from the Appalachian Mountains in West Virginia. Wrote the book 'Earned in Blood' about his experiences.

130

Eugene B. Sledge

"Until the millennium arrives and countries cease trying to enslave others, it will be necessary to accept one's responsibilities and to be willing to make sacrifices for one's country - as my comrades did. As the troops used to say, 'If the country is good enough to live in, it's good enough to fight for.' With privilege goes responsibility." Eugene B. Sledge, With the Old Breed.

Various images of Eugene Sledge, a prominent character in the Devil Dogs story who published his own memoirs of his time in Peleliu and Okinawa, 'With the Old Breed'. Sledge is featured in several of our short films and you can listen to the chat between his son, Saul David and director Tim Robinson elsewhere in the Story Unfolds section of Devil Dogs.

Eugene B. Sledge Letters Home

Saul David used the letters, journals and text written by soldiers serving in the Devil Dogs to write his book. These are letters from Eugene B. Sledge to his family back home. I'm struck by how much comfort he gets from reading about mundane events from home, and how he relays his experience of war: mostly uneventful, boring even, passing the time in tents, watching movies, chatting with fellow soldiers. Also his realisation that war is hardest on the parents of soldiers. The plan with a documentary about the Devil Dogs is for Saul to trace the steps of these soldiers and read and recount their words as he does so.

Tim, Saul, and Henry Sledge

Conversation between Saul David, director Tim Robinson and Eugene Sledge's youngest son Henry.