Flame-throwing tank in action, Okinawa Island, Japan, 1945

Description: 

Photograph. U.S. Marine watching flame-throwing tank in action. Official Caption: "Rome, 6/5/45--Flame-throwing tank in action--A U.S. Marine watches a flame-throwing tank attack Japanese positions on Okinawa, main island in the Ryukyu (Loochoo) chain, where American forces landed on March 31, 1945. By June 4, after weeks of bitter fighting, U.S. troops were driving south from captured Yonabaru, one of the last Japanese strongholds on the island, and had effectively cut off and isolated Chinen peninsula. This move cleared the shores of Nakagusuku, a former anchorage for the Japanese fleet. American shipping, coming into the bay, can now rush supplies for the gigantic air bases being thrown up on Okinawa.--FMC photo--Serviced by Rome OWI (A List out). Approved by appropriate military authority. 6582." Okinawa Island, Japan. 5 June 1945

Image Information

Donor: 
Dylan Utley
Accession Number: 
2012.019.662
Date: 
06/05/1945
Location: 
Hometown: 
Branch: 
Theater of Service: 
Unit: 
Campaign / Event: 
Okinawa (April - June 1945)
POW / KIA: 
Topical Subjects: 
Tanks (Military science)--American--Okinawa
Flamethrowers--Okinawa
Collection Level: 
Items from the service of Isaac "Ike" Bethel Utley, who was born in Smith Mills, Kentucky on 3 March 1920. Ike enlisted in the Army Air Corps on 19 January 1942. He was shipped overseas to the European Theatre and worked with a supply division based out of the city of Naples with an office set up in a residential villa. Utley worked with the Office of War Information and used their photographs in news articles to inform soldiers of the progress of the war. At war's end, Utley returned stateside. A trunk full of over 800 photographs from the O.W.I. arrived on his doorstep from his office in Italy, sender unknown. This collection consists of those photographs.
Geography: 
Okinawa-jima
Thesaurus for Graphic Materials: 
Tanks (Military science)--American--Okinawa
Flamethrowers--Okinawa