Navajo Code Talker Thomas Begay, Iwo Jima Hero (Full Interview)

you rush iran you don't stand there looking you move it told us so stop moving i check out with a recruiter in gallup new mexico and join the marine my mom has to use her thumbprint to authorize me i was 17. so she went got my uh authorization join the marine and i didn't they i signed up to be area gunner and you know it's that's what i want to do they gave me all kinds of tests and then they also test me for see how much how far i went and great and they they told me that my all my test score shows that i finished eighth grade so i was very happy i finished 8th grade they put on my application then i came to uh albuquerque and sanofi for physical it took about three days came up to santa fe drove up and then the one day we started up in the big building from the east side all they gave us what they call a ditty bag a little bag with our wallet stripped to nothing he walked through the system all the way around by the end of the day a lot of physical they look everywhere [Laughter] i took with them nation i passed then one day in the last part of august he told me i'm going to boot camp that's the first time i ever been on a train so the recruiter took me to gallup and gave me ticket and i'd be sure don't miss you says uh there's a grand station in los angeles and don't miss this check with the ticket office gave me a ticket i didn't know i had a birth you know a place to sleep on the train i didn't know about it he didn't tell me the next day there's a black guy says how come you didn't sleep in your birthday say well i don't know what you told me yesterday and i was in line to eat and they came down checking tickets i guess each one of us i had my ticket i was way down almost another line when they check my tickets say you go first they took me to the front they say order anything you want so i there was a first class he says all those volunteers from military they were all person lying anyway the change train in los angeles got on uh i met a guy there that he was going to marine too only problem was the train didn't come until evening then he showed me like we got on the train got to san diego there's a marine corps bus all marines are white love uniform and those that marine recruits a whole bunch of us i don't know how many platoons but uh we just lined us up got on the marine corps bus and went over to the base they showed us how to make a bed it wasn't an evening then he the one marine dropped a quarter he said when you make your bed i want i caught my car to bounce like the way i showed you so just when i went to sleep the rebelly song i felt like it was so i got up and then we stripped my bed everything fold nice and put not launder you then we want to eat and they told me a platoon 789 i was the last one the first years tall guys and the most uh marines were from back east east coast they have a long name hard to renounce a lot of them they see that all kinds of different nationality i guess and then when i went to breakfast got the tray metal tray saw the yeah rush iran you don't stand there looking you move it told us or stop moving and i don't eat some of the stuff i have on my tray the marine they were standing at uh in the uniform like this and i had some stuff you know dump it in the garbage can he stopped me did you know there's a war yes sir he eat everything off your tray he go not to say to me like this with a white cloth before i had everything that i didn't eat like butter i'll never used to like because boarding school butter was one it didn't taste good but we have to eat yeah i don't know i guess it's okay because nobody got sick so that's when we stopped marine then we went back and then we got like uniform they're kind of baggy they gave us a c bag put everything they saw so many white we don't keep anything private everything was marine core issue they gave us a box and said watch your clothes i had a black hat i had a boots which i wear when i uh at home you know work a lot of work with you no running the water we had to haul the water hollow wood everything and we have cornfield we walk and we hurt sheep it's busy at home but marine corps or everything's marine white shore uh white underclothes uniform they gave us those helmet they call it jungle handle and you didn't go no store no nothing there's no machine pot machine or anything all during the uh boot camp and i went rifle range i shot expert the first day no problem the second day it got windy and i kind of had rapid fires the one that kind of let it be low i'll make marksman first day i made expert and then during the book kept at kat matthew a different location from the boot camp in san diego it's on north side of camp pendleton and one day they sent me a photographer came by and took a lot of picture of me fox hall thrown grenade and things like that i don't know what that was never told me they never gave me a copy of the uh the photograph they did give us a pratum picture 7 8 9 september october completed boot camp i passed everything i got promotion private first class i got the one stripe they told me to show it on how to sew it on there's only certain way one strike one side because of the war shortage of things like that they said so i was all ready for gunnery school got on my truck they dropped me off at the camp pendleton they call it 1300 area they told report to and then there's restricted area when i got the camp penalty dropped me off on on the three uh douche and hair puzzle i was really puzzled i said oh well i'm supposed to go to gunnery school everybody else went to some school you know and there i walk in i showed up yeah i was communication school i'll walk in the parents report to sergeant there and then i had to stand as attention they report important sir so after he set me down he says you're going to be go to court tucker school sir i said i signed up to be ariel gunner school and they approved it and they told me i'm going to go to gunnery school area gunners school that's what i signed up for too bad he said you're at code chocolate school every novel reports here and you're going to go to court chocolate school i say i don't know that many navajo i sell i don't know to cope with teach you if you refuse you're going to be caught marshall boom i learned a book that's something that you don't get into it's discipline you're gonna take pfc straight boy wow i couldn't believe it i said i don't know that many now or sir but i still don't want to go to counter school too bad light i told her he said if you run off we're going to shoot you too you better stay and you better do what we tell you i don't know i was lost then he says i won't give you list 20 words give it to you and when you report eight o'clock tomorrow i'll look at it see how much you know i look at it and it was abc and then left i i went down on the letter j he says letter j is jackass in navajo oh my god and all the abcs the animal like the letter a was red at so a while away clicked my mind oh letter b was bear and the letter c was musseh that means cat and down the line that dee was a dog that's letter d in navajo so it just kind of clicked my mind right away that uh when i came to letter j that guy jackass you know it's a funny thing so i kind of laughed like none without anybody around it kind of look funny you know so i had no choice i was forced to be caught talking those that can't take fail i guess they just transfer them out and put them in something else like stretcher barrier or supply carrier or something they had a lot of non-voice they couldn't pass out a hundred i guess 15 15 uh you know they couldn't make it but i went through no problem everything came in place in my mind i learned that in less than 30 days it was easy it was only about 200 i guess plus i i knew morse code took a test i already know one skill morse code they said they made me a radio operator you know that was easy we always learned in poor scout at what the fights it was real fast uh i made a low speed operator so i was already classified qualified in a white man radio operator they put it on my mos in my file the other thing that was cryptographic which is secret messages decoding machine international cryptographic i was supposed to have five people testify before me i get the authorization to operate but they made me operate cryptographic every day had code and the machine works he decodes stuff with the machine international that's everyday code so i learned that too i learned singapore uh blinker panel on the ground all kind of single equipment i even trying to pull the first day you're really scary you put the spike you have on your on your shoes and you climb up uh polled and he put the telephone line up it's the first day they they taught me it was it wasn't that hard the radio there is only two kind they call it tpx what you use most code and also voice the other one is tpx it's a voice uh navy radio so we learn let's operate and during the training we go out in the hill and transmit dummy messages they gave us messages to send over the other side of the hill over here and then we went on the field on the woods they're kind of small trees out there they have tree frogs when they uh when it rains or they come out and jump off these little trees you know a lot of rocks out there in the wilderness of our camp pendleton where they train you it was classroom and then december or february they already finished and assigned a combat unit they signed me to another location ready for the overseas and then the fifth marine division formed on february 11th 1942 and uh i was assigned to signal company radio platoon and also the captain calmer was our commanding officer he says when we reported to him he says i'm going to be about the best double hope tucker in the united states marine corps he says and he mattered too and we drill we drill we drill after we join our signal company radio platoon there were five of us a son johnny melito sergeant buck sargent and wilson price uh johnny arm and little toms hpk son of all really nice they all of us assigned to sync my company i have a picture we all went to ewo together all the way through so and then after doing the uh joining the company with the vision we had training on the field all the time dummy messages they write message center people made wrote write messages they give it to us and we sent over the radio in navajo quote tucker or court talking or cw usually cw they give it to the white guys they pawn on the cast it was easy for me too so i a lot of our other radio but they don't know i know morse code but my mrs was rare our regular radio operator and then co-talker so and the one day we sailed august 12 now august africa anyway 194 44 overseas is in tulsa going until out in the sea say we're going to hawaii we're going to be at camp torreira i thought it was a nice speech you know and all that stuff they put us way up there on the mountain they call it kamawala penny uh ranch i guess it's a desert tumbleweeds and things like that we all live in tent on the platform one day we had uh earthquake and she see bouncing around on the board uh you sleep in the oak on your cotton the boxer um so we trained continued to train one only one day we had uh alua they called that they cook a little pig and uh in a rock the native people do all that stuff and uh it's the same way we deal with the porcupine see we i used to cook porcupine you know just the taste of it and the same way they cook in the stone heated storm put it in there really good we had recreation little sports and things like that before we went overseas one day in december and our commanding general general keller iraqi to star here's a last gentleman general but some officer boy just to get you going there yell at you you know captain um connor was okay too lieutenant castle the opportune leader we mixed with radio section ready to repair people radar and all the radio operators except message senator has a separate the wire people telling home people a separate section we all do different things but we so we're assigned a radio between all the radio operators some are high speed you know mostly manned by the angular people the cooks where a couple hispanic they cook they make the marine called them s.o.s you know what that is gravy and biscuits that's what we had it's the same thing we have that navajo too in fact i heard it this morning i laughed this morning my daughter and son grandson said i wanna that's our ass so i had therefore brothers it was kind of funny but we have that too at the sheep camp i call a sheep very special so it's pretty good it mix it with uh ground meat there's like ham or hamburger meat or something like that so we have those marine corps it's kind of a flex in a regular outfit but on bookkeeping totally different board they can move you around you call out general order and things like that in english language in navajo a different language so so any time like a word pass we you make it into a coat we thought that that means pick a-s-s you know what others he said in navajo we saw temperatures cheek [Laughter] pigs ass real funny some of them are cold so so one day all packed going to come back we got on usc ussc seoul what major general kelly iraqi our commanding general assistant commanding general or the officer on uss cecil we have a quote tucker recon company at a levels and the reward platoon radio patrol mrs center group stopped at honolulu i guess the general lab conference there then we head out somewhere in the south side and then we stop it and uh uh i don't know when he what was [Music] an and whitca island a little recreation and she went by um guam then arrived at the saipan and they were still fighting we went by there then we sail out in meantime we all you know practice dummy messages people are shortened and knives and band that and all that stuff machete we had a nice machete with us i guess you can take it out and chop off whatever anyway we head out and then out at sea they told us that we're going to iwo jima island and we're assigned to the beach green beach red one and the red two were fifth marine division tonight marine assigned to green beach to climb the circle straight up then we're assigned to uh sinking our company i'm not signed but we have a landing party right on red beach one and red beach two it was scheduled farewell not february 19 1945 the landing d-day is it uh it's 9 00 a.m february 19th prior to that he called the hr we got ready in the ussc song they got us about two sometime in the morning they told us to get your last practice you make it feel funny the last rapper said oh my gosh i said they don't need to say that but the navy and marines are and sergeant-men little and i got the radio ready to make sure they work while we were up on top deck with testing radio when we got there ready to get on the boat higgins spoke touched some radio before the shell came over bounced after that and exploded on the other side so we got saved before he didn't explode on the deck oh my gosh she's already yeah i said you know scary don't even talk about it and pretend you don't know what's going on you know you don't know what's going to happen it was february 19th each hour over 900 we supposed to land the first group but usually the infantry there was the engineer looking for mine they're looking for mine on the beach the beach is pretty well messed up not like you see marine landing on the sand in the way like that the japanese didn't leave nice white they had mine and they had sniper ready they have everything ready on the other side when you start landing you come down like a weapon like rain come down so they start landing and i'll tell you that's the more scary place she ever spent in your life while they are dropping airplanes some stuff the japs uh shot down one airplane was flying right by the serpenti you went down the garden come on and i saw i guess you were scary on the fourth division was on uh i know right uh on the east side so we all have a beach sign fourth division i think they were on blue or yellow i don't know we concentrate on your your position only you don't worry about nobody they don't worry about you about you you know and you stay low when you have a radio you try to carry it down here if you carry on your bed the jets got you sniper that's what they did to one navajo code taco called start landing on red beach two podcani and then also another person from saint marco no ta orinota he got hit by the uh by the motor because i talked to the corpsman tented to willie wait in no time he got mortar came down got him the sniper part of kennedy kurt tucker so that left by uh melton kishore quote talkative and then [Music] the guy from toholina so the second day they want a court talker out there so they they told me it's awesome manly to see you are you going out what do you say well see you so a guy came down marine got me second day and they took me out there and then they got another guy jimmy leeson he jumped in the bomb crater but the jabs put the motor right into the where they were they saw the navajo tucker he just lost his foot the other guys uh the other guy killed and the one guy survived pretty surprisingly it was a bad place i'll tell you so they sent me out there to help out melton kishore until we got back i got back with them on uss storm king 38 days i was there the 23rd of flight racing we can see uh airfield number one is kind of sloped like this okay we had command posters like colonel colonel um i forgot the name he made a lieutenant channel these days we have a big foxhole radio tpx and also a small scr 300 we had that in the for us code talker and then we sent 800 messages without a mistake our commanding officer major connor reported that and there were many reports so and there were 33 of us and uh bob craig tucker wounded and then [Music] three others in a different outfit see we either two or three sometimes the one in the unit if they use navajo you know you every unit has a a neighborhood like recon company 26 marine 28th marine 27 more rain so ours second day i was resigned frontline red beach 27th marine so i was out there all this time and then on 23rd at 10 30 i think a marine by marine raised a flag on sarbachi flag 12 30 between 12 and 12 30 there's a big flag that famous photographer took the picture and that's the one that they show and ara hayes and we had a court talker up there george james james coho they got five of them up there answer budgie so they were up there where they they saw all the action up there flag racing so that's how it happened so but we stayed the year i was the sun during the combat i stayed with the mentor by over 30 days and they were the last one to to leave on the north side i got on a book 23rd march 1945 and i kill over pass out i guess something happened to me on the ship just when i got on they said they took me this uh hospital ship hospital i spent five days up there they said i had a malaria or something a touch of that made me sick why i pass out in my lifetime the only time that happens is that there i guess i i had no i couldn't grab i couldn't i don't remember what happened but i found myself in the ship hospital oh you look around i said the world happened to me i don't remember what happened so we had some picture taken by the marine coming back uh i have them and my son has them in the picture it was bad they had body pile up all they do is cover with the poncho and they put a rifle in the back put the helmet on all around the beach then they had a farm lawn they built um sanitary all they did is they applaud big things like that and they covered them with sheep [Music] in their the blade comes over with their blood then they didn't have any special known ceremony you

Channel: American Veterans Center

Views: 13,616

Rating: 4.9465775 out of 5

Keywords: AVC, American Veterans Center, veteran, veterans, history, army, navy, air force, marines, coast guard, military, navy seal, navajo code talkers, world war ii, wwii

Id: 8fo0m_Y7vqc

Length: 42min 24sec (2544 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 23 2021