11-187 Garand Picture of the Day Saipan June 1944 Rest of the story T.E. Underwood

[Mark in Rochester]

US Marines scrambling down cargo net ladders into an LCP landing craft during the amphibious invasion of Saipan.
Date taken: June 1944
Photographer: Peter Stackpole





Weary American Marine, PFC T. E. Underwood, drinking from canteen while still under fire during the final days of the fierce battle for Saipan.
Location: Saipan, Marianas Islands
Date taken: August 1944
Photographer: W. Eugene Smith

My first stop was the Life magazine website with a search for "WWII Marine." The photos are all arranged within sets of galleries online and with a few minutes I found this one (it won't let me save it):
T. E. Underwood - Amid the Heat of Battle, A Quick Swig - WWII: W. Eugene Smith's Pacific - Photo Gallery - LIFE

It was not the photo I was looking for, but it was immediately obvious to me that this was the same guy. Same chiseled face, same scruffy Beard, same dark eyes. He is drinking from a canteen instead of smoking a cigarette, but I was sure it was him. The caption identifies him as Marine PFC T.E. Underwood on Saipan. The photographer is W. Eugene Smith.

My next stop was to Google "Marine T.E. Underwood." The third link down was this:
Getty Images - Browser non supportato rilevato



That was the photo I was looking for! Bill had taken no artistic liberties because this was the exact same face as the drawing. But the story's not over...

I tried to order a copy of the photo from the website above but the order page was not in English (looks like Italian?). So I went back to Google and the next link down told the whole story. The photo is not of T.E. Underwood after all, nor was he a Marine. The picture Bill gave me and the photo by Smith are of Army Sgt. Angelo Klonis. It was taken on Saipan.

Angelo Klonis was a Greek immigrant living in Santa Fe. He enlisted in the Army shorty after Pearl Harbor. He survived the war and opened a bar in Santa Fe called Evangelo's (still there today, run by his son!). One day in the early 1970's he casually mentioned to his son that a photographer from Life magazine had photographed him during the war. His son, Nick, started to search for the photos but didn't have much luck. Angelo himself said he had never seen them.

Years went by and his son Nick was still looking for the photos. Angelo died in 1989 without ever having seen them. In 1991 Nick found a book with his father's face on the cover. It was a Time-Life published book about WWII. It was the cigarette shot, same one Bill drew and gave to me. Nick displayed the photo behind the family-owned bar his father had started. A few years later they found a second photo of Angelo, the one I first linked with him drinking from a canteen. They displayed it in the bar, next to the other one. Over the years customers would occasionally remark that the cigarette photo was one of their favorites among war photos and the Klonises realized the photo of their father was more famous than they realized.


In 1998 the US Postal Service wanted to use the canteen photo on a stamp. They needed a release from the family and so began a search for the subject or his next of kin. Their search led them to W. Eugene Smith's (the photographer) archives where the curator had conveniently seen the photo on the wall at Evangeleno's Bar. They needed verification that the photo was indeed Angelo Klonis, but they were several problems.

The photo was taken on Saipan. Angelo's family had known about his wartime experiences in Europe, but had never known he served in the Pacific theater as well. It was documented that he was on Omaha Beach during the Normandy D-Day invasion and had fought in other European battles while it was also well documented that Smith was taking photos in the Pacific. Klonis' official military records had burned in a fire. He had never spoken about fighting in the Pacific with any friends or family. Despite this, Nick and the rest of the Klonis family remained convinced that the photos somehow were their father.

Smith's archives also stated that the photos were of a Marine named T.E. Underwood. There were no official military records of a T.E. Underwood in WWII, but there was an Army soldier with that last name. Angelo's son, Nick, contacted soldier Underwood's widow. She said her husband had served in both theaters and was close friends with a Greek from New Mexico (can't be too many of those in WWII). Underwood had done some secret special ops missions on Saipan and had always been instructed to never give out his full name to the journalists. Some of the guys went by last names only, some guys went by nicknames or initials. Upon learning this, Nick recalled that his dad's Army nickname had been Crazy Greek, which in Greek is Trelos Ellinas or T.E. for short. So, there was no such person as T.E. Underwood, but there was a guy nicknamed T.E. who was buddies with an Underwood.

Nick sent the photo to Mrs Underwood and she confirmed it was not her husband. But Nick had found in Smith's archives that the canteen photo was actually cropped from a larger group photo and Mrs Underwood was able to recognize her husband in that group photo, right next to Klonis, and also in several of Angelo's personal photos he had brought home from the war. Upon taking the group photo Smith had probably labeled it with both "T.E." and "Underwood" and accidentally combined the names for the caption when he cropped it to only show Angelo.

source:WWII photo, mistaken identity story






US Marines holding Japanese flag captured during first days of the Saipan offensive.
Location: Saipan, Marianas Islands
Date taken: June 27, 1944
Photographer: Peter Stackpole

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.