Word: augustas
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...bald communiqué from Bougainville said: "Our ground forces enlarged their perimeter. ..." From that bleached and pickled bit of news, one Marine, back in Washington from the beachhead on Empress Augusta Bay, reconstructed a nightmare narrative. The story of stocky, red-haired Technical Sergeant Harold Azine, in civilian life a radio-program director, on Bougainville a combat correspondent...
Into the Jungle. One night, early in the Empress Augusta Bay operation, Sergeant Azine's company slipped into the jungle to hold a "road-block," an outpost guarding the approach to the Marines' beachhead. Miasmal swamp and forest hemmed the area. Most of the company bivouacked smack on the trail. Flank units took position in the jungle; they alone might use firearms, because they alone could shoot without danger of hitting their comrades. Marines on the trail were limited to knives, entrenching tools, fists, or any weapon that would do a job silently...
This kind of fighting wrenched the jungle from the Jap, slowly enlarged the Empress Augusta Bay beachhead. Now, after six weeks of fighting, it runs roughly 10,000 yards along the shore, 8,000 yards inland. Last week came the announcement that U.S. engineers had completed a runway within the beachhead. The Allied command could now count on better fighter cover for air and sea attacks on Rabaul, the Jap Southwest Pacific strongpoint...
...fringes of Empress Augusta Bay U.S. marines and soldiers killed more Japs, expanded their positions. But the week's most spectacular killing of Japs in the Solomons theater took place many miles from Bougainville's steaming, hotbox jungle...
...from Jap-held Rabaul, less than 200 miles distant, steamed boldly off the northern tip of Bougainville, and for 45 minutes poured shells into Jap air bases on Buka Island. Reinforced U.S. troops fought grimly in the jungles of Bougainville, wrenching advances of several hundred yards in the Empress Augusta Bay area while engineers rushed construction of airstrips. Australian troops, using Matilda tanks smuggled in secretly at night, increased pressure against the Japanese in the Finschhaven sector of New Guinea...