Whipped Cream Difficulties

Col. Dave Severance (USMC – ret.) has passed away. He was 102.

The flag-raising atop Mount Suribachi on Feb. 23, 1945, captured by an Associated Press photographer, Joe Rosenthal, was taken when the battle for Iwo Jima was far from over. In the days that followed, Colonel Severance earned the Silver Star, the Marines’ third-highest decoration for valor after the Medal of Honor and the Navy Cross. The citation stated that in a firefight for a heavily defended ridge, he “skillfully directed the assault on this strong enemy position despite stubborn resistance.”
Colonel Severance, a captain at the time, commanded Easy Company of the 28th Marine Regiment, Fifth Marine Division — part of the 70,000-man Marine force that sought to seize Iwo Jima, 7.5 square miles of black volcanic sand about 660 miles south of Tokyo. The island, defended by 21,000 Japanese troops, held airstrips that were needed as bases for American fighter planes and as havens for crippled bombers returning to the Mariana Islands from missions over Japan.
Amid heavy casualties, the Marines by the fifth day of combat on Iwo Jima had silenced most opposition from Japanese soldiers dug into caves on Mount Suribachi, an extinct volcano 546 feet high at Iwo Jima’s southern tip.
In midmorning, a group of Marines from Easy Company raised a flag at the summit, a ceremony photographed by Sgt. Louis Lowery of the Marine magazine Leatherneck. When James Forrestal, the secretary of the Navy, who was on the beach below, saw the flag, he requested that it be kept as a memento. After it was returned to the beach, Colonel Severance sent another group of his Marines to bring a larger flag to the mountaintop.
It was the raising of the second flag that was portrayed in Mr. Rosenthal’s dramatic photograph.

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He was commissioned as a lieutenant and first saw combat as a platoon commander in the 1943 battle for the Pacific island of Bougainville. His platoon was ambushed and cut off by Japanese troops about a mile behind enemy lines, but fought its way out of an encirclement and wiped out the enemy with the loss of only one Marine, according to the National WWII Museum in New Orleans.

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After World War II, Colonel Severance completed flight training and flew fighter aircraft during the Korean War. He completed 69 missions and earned the Distinguished Flying Cross. He was promoted to colonel in 1962. At his retirement, in May 1968, he was assistant director of personnel at Marine headquarters.

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Colonel Severance was portrayed by Neil McDonough as a Marine captain and by Harve Presnell as an older man in “Flags of Our Fathers” (2006), Clint Eastwood’s film about the six men who raised the flag at Iwo Jima. Colonel Severance was a consultant for the movie.

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Asked how he would like to be remembered, he said, “I never thought about it,” then added, “Just that I was a Marine for 30 years and I never ended up in jail.”

Alvin Ing, actor. He was in the original Broadway production of Sondheim’s “Pacific Overtures” and the revival in 2004. He also appeared in the 2002 revival of “Flower Drum Song”.

He also did some movie and TV work, including “The Final Countdown” and the bad “Hawaii Five-0”.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 5th, 2021 at 9:11 am and is filed under Heroism, History, Movies, Obits, Theatre, TV. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.