Charles William “Bill” Markham was born in Alton, Illinois on October 24th, 1924 to Lawrence and Mary Markham, the first of three children. After the attack on Pearl Harbor he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps on June 5th, 1943 and completed bootcamp at camp Elliot in October.
Following his completion of boot camp, Markham was with the MARDET on the USS Montpelier before finding himself transferred to F Company of Major Gordon D. Gayle’s 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines on June 17th, 1944. On September 15th, 1944 PFC Markham landed between 0935 and 1015. The 5th Marines fought across the airfield and eventually hit an impassable scrub jungle on the northeastern side of the airfield. Major Gayle led his marines, using the cover of the jungle, advanced 700 yards from the airfield, thus securing the primary goal on D+2. 2/5 tied in with the fabled K/3/5 and pushed up the narrow causeway toward the village of Ngardololok.
It was during this fighting around the between the 17th and the 19th that PFC Charles W. Markham received shrapnel wounds to the left side of his body and his back while, according to his family, “he was squatted down emptying his bowels”. In a letter from his father to a local congressman he claimed that the wounds were caused by a Japanese grenade. However, there is also equal likeliness that his wounds were the result of friendly fire as air support and artillery heavily inflicted casualties on 2/5, causing 34 casualties in 2/5 on September 18th.
Regardless, PFC Markham’s wounds ended his tenure on Peleliu and he was evacuated to a hospital ship on September 21st. He recovered in time to land with F company on Okinawa and spent 54 days on the famed Shuri line before the battle ended and F company was sent to China.
PFC Markham received his discharge from the Marines Corps on January 26th, 1946, receiving the rank of Corporal. He returned home to Illinois where he married Eleanor Orman in 1947 and had two children with her. Charles lived the rest of his life in Crown Point, Illinois, passing away on March 19th, 2014.
Comments