WWII hero Tobe Cogswell dead at 93

                                                                     Contributed Photo

Tobe Cogswell, seen here as a young Marine on duty, was awarded a Silver Star and a Purple Heart for his actions in combat. Although Cogswell was proud of his awards, he said he couldn't have done things any differently. "In combat, you don't think about things - you do whatever's necessary."

By Carolyn Wall

(The article below was taken from an interview with Tobe Cogswell in July 2009)


Tobe Cogswell, a Marine Corps League member of Payson, one of the last of the WWII veterans at Guadalcanal between August 1942 and February 1943, died at his home in Payson March 9 at the age of 93.
Cogswell belonged to one other organization, the Guadalcanal Campaign Veterans, an elite group whose numbers are dwindling.

Cogswell went to a reunion of the group in Washington, D. C. in 2008 . He said there were not many members left to tell their stories.

But Cogswell’s memory was sharp and he recalled the details of his time spent on Guadalcanal and how he came to be awarded a Silver Star and a Purple Heart for what he did there.

He explained it simply: “When you’re in combat, you just do what you do.”

Cogswell was 24 years old when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in December 1941. He didn’t have to serve in the military because he was already involved in the war effort, working for a machine shop in Connecticut.

“Like all the guys, after the (Japanese) attacked Pearl Harbor, recruiters were busy as hell that Monday,” he said.

Basic training at Paris Island in South Carolina was cut short.

“Basic training for the Marines was usually three months,” he said. “We did it in five weeks. Then we were sent up to Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.”

Cogswell was in intelligence, studying maps and providing the head of the Second Battalion, First Regiment with combat information. The regiment sailed out of San Francisco for New Zealand on June 21, 1942 and got to Wellington, New Zealand some three weeks later.

“We were supposed to go into training,” he said, “but our orders were changed and we had to reload our ship with combat gear. We left July 22 and after we were at sea, we were told we were going into combat.”

On the morning of Aug. 7, Cogswell’s regiment was offshore of Guadalcanal watching the bombarding of the shore – Navy ships were shelling the coastline. After daylight the men on the troop transport went over the side of the ship into Higgins landing crafts and went ashore without opposition.

“We headed for the airport, two or three miles down the coast,” Cogswell said. “These young Marines had never seen a coconut tree in their lives. They were shooting coconuts out of the trees, drinking the milk and getting sick. The main action was across the sound about 25 miles.

“On Guadalcanal, we were shelled by Japanese naval guns the first few days we were on shore, but the big naval battle was Savo Island on Sunday night, Aug. 10.”

During that battle, the Americans lost three cruisers and the Australians lost one.

“And the Navy pulled off and left us,” Cogswell said.

In the following weeks, Cogswell’s regiment made fortifications and set up a perimeter around the air field. Cogswell was put in charge of three other men on an intelligence crew on the west bank of the Tenaru River.

According to the letter of commendation from Cogswell’s commanding officer, a force of 1,000 Japanese attacked the positions of the Second Battalion, First Marines, in the early morning hours of Aug. 21, 1942.

Cogswell’s intelligence team was at an observation post at the end of the point. They were there to observe and report, but the wire of communications to the command post went out at 3 a.m. Ten minutes later, the Japanese attacked with hand grenades, machine guns and bayonets.

The letter of commendation reads: “These four men, rather than withdraw toward the rear, as was warranted by their line of duty, took positions on the front lines and with those Marines already entrenched there, engaged in a furious hand to hand combat with the enemy and drove them back with great losses, preventing them from establishing a foothold on the western side of the Tenaru River.”

Cogswell and two of the men on his team were wounded in the attack, and the one man who was not wounded made his way back through “the bullet swept zone” to the command post to report what happened. All four were recommended for the Navy Cross, but each received the Silver Star.

Cogswell, who was wounded by snipers, was hit on the instep of his left foot and on the ankle of his right leg.

“There were a lot of bullet splinters in my legs,” he said. “Eventually, the colonel came by and told the boys to evacuate me, but I was helping. When I was standing there, and all these (Japanese) were coming at me, my gun jammed, but I had hand grenades and I was throwing those.”

Cogswell and his observation team, along with the rest of his regiment, had been at the Tenaru River under attack some six hours,  from 3 a.m. till 9 a.m.

Cogswell was treated for his wounds on a hospital ship, taken to a mobile hospital for rehab for a month and returned to Guadalcanal on Nov. 13.

“There was a big naval battle – I was ashore, but you could see the gun flashes,” he said. “We were winding down our part of the campaign. The Army units were starting to come in.”

The Guadalcanal Campaign for the Marines went from Aug. 7, 1942 to Feb. 24, 1943. Cogswell’s regiment went under the command of General Douglas MacArthur, and went for retraining in Melbourne, Australia for seven months and then Good Enough Island, off the coast of New Guinea. He was overseas for 26 months and ended his stint with the Marines on Jan. 9, 1946.

After he got out of the service, Cogswell went into the printing industry and worked doing that for 27 years.

He and his wife, Roberta, retired to Payson from Phoenix in 1980.

“We’ve been here ever since,” he said. “I’ve lived a pretty nice life. I’ve always been the type of guy to not get excited about things,” he said. “I take things as they come.”

Cogswell  saved his letter of commendation from his commanding officer. He was proud of the Silver Star and Purple Heart he earned and wouldn’t have done things any differently. He couldn’t have done things any differently.

 “In combat, you don’t think about things,” he said. “You do whatever’s necessary.”

Tobe Cogswell's obituary is now on our Obituary Page.