Bloody Saipan, June 1944

The battle for Saipan and the Marianas Island chain in the Central Pacific was one of the toughest battles of World War II. Assaulted by three American divisions-two Marine and one Army-and supported one of the largest naval armadas ever assembled, Saipan was a strategic victory for the United States. Once it was secured by late-July 1944, massive new B-29 bombers were able to attack Japan from the island chain. This is the historically accurate but fictional story of one of the Marines who hit Red Beach in June 1944: Lance Corporal Henry Hennessey, a high school hockey player from Syracuse, New York. Read how and why Henry joined, what his training was like on Hawaii, who his buddies were in A Team, 2nd Squad, 3rd Platoon, Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, 6th Marines, and what combat was like on Saipan, 1944.