Photographs from the Battle of Iwo Jima

26-G-4468 Under the menacing walls of Mount Suribachi, landing craft unload supplies on the beaches of embattled Iwo Jima among the wreckage left by the furious fighting that marked the landings on that tiny fire-spouting island fortress. Marines and Coast Guard beach parties work like Trojans to back up advance fighting units which have driven the Japanese inland. It is D-Day plus 5.

26-G-4470 The black slopes of Mount Suribachi loom in the distance as the American task force edges close to the beaches of Iwo Jima in the earlier stages of the attack on that volcanic island fortress. This picture made from a Coast Guard-manned LST shows a transport, at left, and landing craft of all sizes, many of them with Coast Guard crews.

26-G-4472 AMTRACs bogged down in Iwo’s sands.

26-G-4474 Smashed by Japanese mortar and shell fire, trapped by Iwo’s treacherous black-ash sands, AMTRACs and other vehicles of war lay knocked out on the black sands of the volcanic fortress. In the distance, Coast Guard-manned and Navy LSTs unload under the frowning walls of Mount Suribachi, volcanic knob on Iwo’s southern tip.

26-G-4477 Hit by Japanese at the height of Iwo Jima’s D-Day an American ammunition dump blows skyward, as Coast Guard-manned and Navy LSTs move in and out from the embattled beach to disgorge men and supplies.

26-G-4669 A further indication that not all Japanese fight to the death is this bag of 221 Japanese prisoners of war. Sprawled on the deck of an LCT (landing craft, tank), they are being brought to a Coast Guard-manned troop transport at Guam for transfer to Pearl Harbor. Thirty of the prisoners were taken at Guam, while the balance were captured at Iwo Jima. Some wounded lie on stretchers. For the most part the prisoners were thin, indicating that even their usual diet of rice and dried fish had been severely cut before their capture.