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Robert "Lucky" Hugh Leckie Research Part 18:
Alrighty- maybe the last of the articles lol. We'll see. As always, a great thank you to @bleedingcoffee42 who found these for me!
These are all to do with the show- except for the last one from the early sixties.

the quality ain't great- sorry. This one is better though! Also apparently the original copy of Leckie's memoir, had his inscription saying "I wrote this book to rescue my buddies from the insults of 'war novelists' " . Probably another jab at the South Pacific musical that so infuriated him the in the first place, too- the sanitization of the war? He also apparently hated television lol (the irony)



Some interesting references to Leckie's articles- haven't seen these. Hopefully they'll pop up one day. Also Vera going on his interviews.

wish they would give title on WHICH short story. and also they got the plot of his Lord, What a Family wrong- it's about the family he grew up with, not his current wife and kids lol.
#hbo war#the pacific#robert leckie#love how the old articles are talking about leckie's book being super popular#vera: “moderatly successful”#she does not hold back- love that woman#imagine getting the plot wrong of your guest speaker's book#that's embarrassing#must've been an interesting talk though
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Sketches of Basilone, Sledge, and Leckie for an idea I had. Also still shaking off the rust off my drawing skills. Feedback is welcome!

#hbo war#the pacific#robert leckie#eugene sledge#john basilone#my art#I remember someone saying that Dale's face was hard to draw#with all due respect Mr. Dale#they were not wrong#Basilone was also a little more difficult than I expected but I'm starting to get him down I think
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Some sketches of OCs, plus Deidara (Naruto) from a fanfic I did . Any feedback is welcome!

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Behind the Scenes!!
A great shout out to the lovely @bleedingcoffee42 who found these articles from when the Pacific came out featuring behind the scenes trivia!
Dale Dye's report (basically) on what the bootcamp looked like for the Marines- difficult to say the least, and the actors for the Japanese soldiers were terrifying lol. We may not have a bootcamp diary but there's this! Well worth a read.
Also interviews with Dale, Mazzello, and Seda about their experiences on the show, the boot camp, and getting into character! Super interesting.
And lastly, a short little article by historian Richard B. Frank about Sidney Phillips. If you're looking for a good historian on the Pacific Theater (ie, not Steven Ambrose with all due respect, you didn't do your citations) he's a big name in the field and well-noted. His books are pretty good- albeit a little dry but what can you do.
#hbo war#the pacific#robert leckie#eugene sledge#john basilone#pacific bts#behind the scenes#bovine trauma#dye really did torture his actors lol#interesting about leckie having a different view of himself#versus how others saw him
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Reading Islands of the Damned Thoughts Part 10:
so very last bit on this book... Burgin's thoughts and memories of the war.
He basically never talked about it and tried to forget it for 27 years give or take...which now reading and learning about his experience, yeah, I can see why. I would not want to talk about it either.
However, in 1981, Bill Leyden and Johnny Marmit (I believe that's how it is spelled) (Burgin's old sergeant) get together and decide to do a reunion for their company. They reach out to Burgin and say, hey, how about you contact everyone you know, we do the same, tell others to do the same etc. That's how Burgin goes to his first reunion, and keeps going to them after.
It's an interesting experience. Burgin has a lot of memories that really start popping up from talking and seeing his old comrades. One guy he had completely forgotten about. This fellow had been wounded at the same time as another friend of Burgin's (the latter had actually stayed lifelong friends with Burgin, and they had even been roommates in Dallas before Burgin got married). But Burgin had completly forgotten this guy! Well, everyone asks about him, but Burgin can't remember- until he sees the guy at one of the reunions and everything just comes back.
It's really interesting the way he describes it- like a flashback, just rushing over him. I don't know how Burgin forgot, whether just through the natural passage of time, or if he really did repress so much through his own actions. But this happens a lot. I wonder if he's the only one to have that experience....or well, probably not to be honest.
And yeah, that's Burgin's book. I'd very much recommend it- it's well written with his co-writer, the audiobook narrator does a great job, and it serves as a nice complement to Sledge's book in providing another perspective to the same events or people. Burgin is certainly an interesting person, seems like a good leader (man really did step up) and also a way more intense guy than I would have thought.
#hbo war#the pacific#rv burgin#romus burgin#eugene sledge#burgin is also really passionate about peleliu being remembered#whcih I get#very interesting to see his experience of remembering the war#also neat to see different povs on the same event and people#helps broaden the narrative i think#bill leyden#Yeah wasn't expecting him to pop up in there
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Reading Islands of the Damned Thoughts Part 9:
Burgin gets wounded in his neck- he also just before had been buried by a mortar shell blast and got a concussion on top of this.
Now once the war ends, no one really just celebrates? It's not anything crazy, just huh, shock I guess. Not what you'd expect. Everyone was in a pretty poor mindset tho after Okinawa- to use an example, Burgin talks about an encounter with him and one of the guys under him where the guy gets lippy I guess and Burgin grabs him by the shirt and gets pissed at him.
He also is in a specific NCO camp after they get done with Okinawa- still on the island mind you, just not fighting persay- with the rest of his mortar section in another enlisted camp and the officers in their own camp. This is when he gets malaria- alternating cold chills and hot sweats so no fun as you might imagine. Once you get malaria, it can relapse so to speak and he gets it again and again for a few times in the next couple of years. The last time is in 1947. He was also able to qualify for disability comp for it- man was literally getting fever rashes on the last attack at the VA office. He also experiences the same typhoon Sledge did- only on land and after seeing a ship get beached, Burgin is very quick to move his camp further inland. He is not fucking around with the sea which, fair.
Now unlike Sledge, Burgin gets to go home! woooh. He gets to California- LA I believe?- and promptly is very cold that night, realizing that he has become acclimated to the hotter temps of the Pacific theater- I've heard a similar thing from a Iraq vet. He gets discharged, and heads home, yahh!
He does get an award- I don't recall the exact type, sorry Burgin- and actually does buy a set of dress blues- the only set he will ever have and wear- to wear for the ceremony. His next bit of business? Get a job- the postal service which he always admired. Second step? Get Florence over the US. It's a process- wives with kids, then wives get first priority... then fiances which she is. He started the process on Okinawa for reference. The gov also makes provisions in case these GI wives and fiances get divorced or stood up so they can go back home all expenses paid which is pretty nice actually. She finally comes over in '47, and they get married, and move to Dallas! They have three daughters, who Burgin is very proud of, and build a custom built dream home in '65.
Burgin credits the Marines with learning good leadership skills- in his time as a post master, he never has to yell at anyone or raise his voice, he's able to work with people and figure out who's best for what- a thing he's very proud of.
#hbo war#the pacific#rv burgin#romus burgin#malaria sucks big time#burgin really is a leader#and a proud postman#the war ending reaction is interesting though#you'd think there would be more of a celebration#but I guess shock#coming off a grueling and brutal campaign#everyone's tired and done#acclimatization is wild btw#eugene sledge#florence riseley
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https://archiveofourown.org/works/63521320/chapters/177375896
New chapter up! As always, comments feed my soul and are helpful for writing feedback.
#the pacific#hbo war#band of brothers#sidney phillips#bull randleman#ronald speirs#Mary Houston#richard winters#lewis nixon#harry welsh#shifty powers#frank perconte#johnny martin#bill guarnere#babe heffron#renee lemaire#carwood lipton#zombie au meets horse girl agenda
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Reading Islands of the Damned Thoughts Part 8:
So officers... Burgin has pretty much the same opinion on Hillbilly and Haldane that Sledge did- I think they were pretty well-loved by everyone in the company. However, there are two other notable officers in Sledge's memoir that Burgin talks about: Robert 'Mac" Mackenzie who was shown in the show, and 'Shadow or Lt. Loveday as his actual name was according to Burgin.
Now, Burgin does think Sledge was a little too hard on these two. Mackenzie who also went by 'Scotty'- and that's what Burgin calls him throughout- certainly had a "gung-ho" attitude, Burgin admits, as well as "college boy foolishness". He's in essensce, immature but not bad. The first incident is the shooting a jawbone when he was only supposed to shoot at enemies if they appeared- Burgin, very frustrated, pulls Mac and chews him out. Mac, according to him, was very embarressed, and just stared down at his shoes- kinda like a kid getting chewed out by their parents tbh. The second incident with the grenade prank, Burgin does not even bother to pull Mac aside and just chews him out in front of the whole group- he's just that done I guess lol.
They also have a bit of friction on orders- Mac frequently places the mortars in not super great locations (does things very by the book but not always the best action in actual life). Burgin, annoyed, gets everyone to move to a better place several times- causing great annoyance for the guys who have to dig yet another mortar emplacement/foxhole because the officer couldn't get it right. The mortar section is also perfectly happy to ignore Mac and follow Burgin- even though Mac is higher ranking than Burgin, an NCO. I can imagine this didn't really help their relationship lol. Burgin does say though that once they really get into it on Okinawa, Mac does mature (I don't think Sledge mentioned that aspect lol).
Shadow, or Lt. Loveday, who after the war goes through tours in the Korean War, and Vietnam, does have a temper. Burgin acknowledges this freely, and he would yell at people, sometimes unfairly. There's the whole part with the supply and tank problem, and one of their guys, Weatherford (?) who stands to throw a grenade but leaves himself open to fire- Shadow just absolutly rages at him for being stupid, not thinking, do you want to die etc. It's not fair, because he had to, but Burgin said he didn't think Shadow had actually seen the full picture, plus of course Burgin notes that Weatherford had a tendency to act first, think later, and may have really thought he was being stupid and could have gotten himself killed. Weatherford just stays silent, and then walks off once Shadow is done, probably about five shades of furious/indignation/embarrassment.
also well to mention here- Burgin is very good at aiming mortars, probably because he hunted for so long as a kid, so he can just get coordinates and has a real feel for where to aim his gun crew at.
#hbo war#the pacific#rv burgin#romus burgin#eugene sledge#robert 'mac' mackenzie#interesting to hear different perspectives#i guess because burgin had to work with these guys#versus sledge on the outside#burgin really does feel like the mom who stepped up#having to babysit your new officer#and chewing them out because burgin doesn't get paid enough for this#and sledge is just there judging the absolute fuck out of mac#I could also understand shadow- not seeing the whole situation of course- being so furious#short temper already#plus probably more irritable with stress of combat zone#and being responsible for other people's lives#yeah of course he'd be furious when one of his men put themselves in danger for seemingly no reason#he's responsible for that guy#wonder how he turned out#mac too#so little information on them
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Robert "Lucky" Hugh Leckie Research Part 17:
Now this is a very special part of my research into Leckie- we're going away from the articles (but not forever lol) and getting into two videos. The second was a WONDERFUL find by the lovely @bleedingcoffee42 who I cannot thank enough for it- the full recorded interview of Leckie, perhaps the only one I know of.
Firstly, here's his profile from the Pacific show! Lots of pictures and people (including his wife, Dr. Phillips and Corrigan) talking about him. And he dedicated a park to his friends!
youtube
Here it is- the interview. He's mainly talking about his new book on Okinawa, but also about his own experiences in the war too!
#hbo war#the pacific#robert leckie#such a neat interview#you can really see that he's such a storyteller#he keeps getting described like that in articles#and now I see why#that man does keep making jokes tho#like whoops forgot a name haha that's just old age not Alzheimer's#he does this several times#and i'm just sitting there like#leckie no#leckie stop#he's pretty proud of his kids though- sounds like they've all been very successful- good for them!#got busted down to private four times haha#and the horseballs mention my god#“very unique” sense of humor#yeah Vera I see it#sidney phillips#vera keller#hugh corrigan#he dedicated a park to his friends!#did i mention#it's very sweet
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Robert "Lucky" Hugh Leckie Research Part 16:
Moving out of the 2010s- into 2020! Here's an article, and thanks to @bleedingcoffee42 as always (go check out their research on Band of Brothers, it's amazing!)

Here's a letter to the editor about the banner

and also in 2024, Vera sadly passes away. this is her obituary. RIP ma'am. You sound like a pretty neat lady.
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Reading Islands of the Damned Thoughts Part 7:
So we're on Peleliu, and oh, boy, does it suck! I won't go super into depth here, just cause there's a lot, but you should definently go check out Burgin's book! It's very interesting and it is a nice complement to Sledge's POV of the whole thing. A few things of note:
everyone was getting lost in the first few days- which is funny but also really not funny because that's baadd that that's happening
the Japanese are constantly doing night attacks- basically hiding behind the line and then at night, going to cut your throat/choke you etc. so no one is getting sleep, and what you do is take an hour to sleep, buddy takes an hour to watch and then switch off till daytime.
Burgin has a guy he's with- guy had dropped the bazooka earlier in the campaign- who falls asleep when he's supposed to be awake. Burgin wakes up, sees him awake, and is PISSED. so pissed that he gets on top of the guy, and starts choking him out till the guy wakes up- freaks him out- and Burgin chews the guy out, and then goes to Haldane to ask him to remove this "S.O.B."
Burgin also discusses what he does exactly on Peleliu- he's a corporal here, so he goes ahead with the rifleman and spots coordinates and radios that back to the mortarmen for their targets.
He also mentions Sledge being a guy who would always do what's he's asked to do, and who was an ammunition carrier. Snafu was also give his nickname by Burgin when he got the names for Aussie currency mixed up- he also had a thick Cajun accent that got thicker when he was excited so you could barely understand him. He's got a few other guys, Jim Burke of course, and Vincent Santos (short, Texan) and another guy- Ruckerford I think? who was quiet, thought things thru, and dependable. That's his mortarmen, and all good marines- Burgin really thinks very well of them all. There's also Womack, big broad shouldered guy with bright red beard, who carried the flamethrower- around 70 pounds so he's got to be a giant for that.
Burgin- I may not have mentioned this earlier- has a lieutenant he really hates (Legs is the alias Burgin uses). This Lt. finally ran through Burgin's patience on the first day or days of Peleliu, by running away when he should have stayed with his men. Burgin- and he's not proud of this, let this be clear- actually lines up the guy in his M1 sights and nearly shoots him, but the guy disappears and so Burgin doesn't go through with it, which was probably the right move in all honesty.
Burgin also gets so exhausted at one point, he can't even focus seeing things, and ends up falling asleep and a foxhole right in front of the mortar which is pretty loud - I fired off mortars, not World War II ones but they are pretty loud - but manages to go into a deep sleep for 12 hours, that's how exhausted this man was. He says that's how you had to do it - you just eventually got into a mindset where you were so tired you didn't care you know how dirty you were, or if you lived or died, it's just going through the motions.
He also talks about haldane and hillbilly's deaths. Hillbilly in particular was actually different from how the show showed it. He had gone up onto an army tank to spot I think, got a shot right in his abdomen, that fell him onto the ground, people started yelling for a corpsmen of course, but he gets right up, bloody, gets back on the tank and then finally gets another shot right in the chest that knocks him off and I believe kills him right there. Haldane was pretty much as the show put it, it was a one shot in the head, because he needed to poke his head over ridge to get a good target sighting for the machine gunners - they were having to sighte underneath their barrels, which haldane didn't like the results of being a former machine gunner himself. Johnny Marmot, our boys sergeant, came down very shaken, and basically said that his head exploded... Which is...fuck... Yeah I'd be in shock too. The deaths of both of these guys really hit the whole company very very hard as these two officers were sort of the backbone and soul of the officer team end of the leaders of this company. They were very well loved, and everyone grieved even more than as if they'd lost a family or a loved one as Burgin put it.
After they're finally taken off the line, they get set up at an encampment by the beach, which is luxurious and comparison where they have tents that have planking underneath, they can sit at tables and eat their food, they can watch a movie, they get showers and they can even brush their teeth which they do a couple times just because they can. They end up taking a big company photo - of course there's only very few of them left out of the whole company - and no one is smiling. I believe that's the photo where our boy is standing with his signature on the image. He doesn't even remember taking the picture, and him being 6'1, he had gone from 165 lb when he joined the Marines to being a hundred and 30 or so. That's pretty low for a guy that tall.
#hbo war#the pacific#romus burgin#rv burgin#morale of the story#don't fuck with Burgin#you wouldn't think it but this guy doesn't fuck around#also as someone who has seen a ww2 flamethrower in action#albeit refitted with diesel instead of napalm as fuel#that shit is terrifying and also very very hot#you'll feel it#even yards and yards away#eugene sledge#merriel snafu shelton#snafu shelton#andy haldane#ack ack haldane#eddie hillbilly jones#hillbilly jones#pelelui is very rough and very sad#It is hell
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Robert "Lucky" Hugh Leckie Research Part 15:
Okay, continuing into the 21st century, after our brief dip back to the '50s: More Vera!!! telling us about Leckie because the show's just come out. Thanks to @bleedingcoffee42 as always


He loved football- big Notre Dame fan, and stopped going to church when they changed over the Mass from Latin- Leckie liked the "beauty and mystery" of it all. He did quite smoking.
He never stopped using his typewriter, and wrote a loooooot. Through it all, terrible handwriting as Vera likes to remind us in nearly every article she's talking about him- honestly fair, being able to read that writing is a rare gift so good for her that she could. also Leckie being sweet to his niece
Anyway, pretty interesting. Comments, discussions, and thoughts welcome!!
#hbo war#the pacific#robert leckie#quitting your job after your wife comes home just birthed your third kid?#“that didn't go over well”#Yeah I bet NOT#vera you are strong#he really got lucky he was successful as a writer damn#leckie loved defying authority#also leckie: points to no smoking sign#demands bus driver to stop until everyone obeys sign#Leckie's terrible handwriting#also damn#going through your husband's war memoir and reading all that#finding out your loved one went through all of that...#I can't imagine the emotions on that#yeah I wouldn't be prepared for that either#and the alzheimers- I still feel so bad for Leckie and his family going through that#vera keller
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Robert "Lucky" Hugh Leckie Research Part 14:
So remember when I figured we were out of the 20th century with Leckie's newspaper articles? Yeah, so I was wrong. Please take some more thanks to the wonderful research of @bleedingcoffee42 (go check their stuff out! they're amazing)
Most of these are from the 1950s- our first is a piece about Leckie's daily schedule as a writer in 1957- involving late morning exercise, staring at crabgrass, and several intense hours at the typewriter.


He also gets an award for it. Now about his autobiography of his early life, "Lord, What a Family"- apparently he's known to be quite the storyteller.


Somebody didn't like super well, compared to his war memoir....apparently it has illustrations too...
here's another book review- a history of the Korean War! Labeled as the "unpopular war this country ever fought"- in 1962. don't worry reporter, the Korean War will soooon be overshadowed by another, far more, controversial war.....

got good reviews though- dunking on MacArthur, ahead of his time, good for you Leckie.
#hbo war#the pacific#robert leckie#did not realize the Korean War was so controversial#it really did get overshadowed by Vietnam#man that article coming out in 1962...oof#i need to get that freaking book of Leckie's childhood#its somewhere#also#crabgrass#in case you wanted to know what leckie was doing daily in 1957#and his address#because what is privacy in old newspapers#nothing
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Robert "Lucky" Hugh Leckie Research Part 13:
Now for the next articles, we have moved finally into the 21st century...and unfortunately, Leckie has passed away due to Alzheimers (rip my guy and my condolences to his family because that's a difficult way to go for both the patient and their loved ones).
This is his obituary and a following tribute article to him because, hey, he did (wrote) a lot.
The tribute article
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Robert "Lucky" Hugh Leckie Research Part 12:
jumping ahead to 1992- and it's VERA TIME LETS GO. a wonderful article about the partnership of one Bob and one Vera, or old married couple energy
#hbo war#the pacific#robert leckie#vera keller#leckie's terrible spelling and handwriting#good writing but not a speller I guess HA#“I really didn't know too many boys who had come back from the Pacific”#girl i think they died#man really did show up in his dress blues#casually for sure no motive i'm sure#“freshest kid in the west end” PFTTT#dad trying to talk her out of marrying at THE WEDDING#leckie was just the neighborhood menace and that doesn't surprise me one bit#horseballs#i love Vera- never met this lady but i like her already
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had a thought that you might not have heard these! studs terkel 'the good war' recordings... eugene sledge interview available for download!!! web.archive (dot) org/web/20120120055511/http://www.studsterkel (dot) org/gwar.php
I have not! Thank you!!! But I think something is wrong with the link. I was able to find another link to the recordings- you gotta scroll down and it has all the recordings, plus other interviews for the book- including a Tuskegee airman by the looks of it, and an infantryman who fought in the battle of the bulge so I'll add band of Brothers and masters of the air tags to this.
Let me know if the link doesn't work! Thank you so much! I'm excited to listen to this. You have made my day.
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