Horace Lee was 12 when he \u201cgave my heart to the Lord\u201d at a Baptist church in Alabama; 17 when he entered the Marine Corps in 1940; and 21 when he was wounded in Iwo Jima as the U.S. wrested the strategic island from the Japanese.<\/p>\n
\u201cGod taught me a great deal\u201d in the military, Lee, now 91, said. \u201cThe Marine Corps complemented God\u2019s work by their fellowship … because it\u2019s teamwork and fellowship, and if you don\u2019t have that then you cannot depend on that fellow behind you…. It\u2019s similar to the Great Commission, working together to go and tell.\u201d<\/p>\n
The second-oldest of five children, Lee grew up on his family\u2019s cattle farm. His parents were members of Hopewell Baptist Church in Marion, Alabama. After three years of drought in the 1930s, the family could no longer sustain their farm and had to sell and move to Selma, where they purchased new land and harvested cotton and corn.<\/p>\n
On the other side of the world, Japan had conquered most of the coastal area of China in 1937. Germany had invaded Poland and France by the middle of 1940. At the time the U.S. was holding to neutrality.<\/p>\n
But, Lee recalled, \u201cI felt it was my duty to defend my country… We looked on it that the war … was inevitable.\u201d<\/p>\n
While he was stationed at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, killing more than 2,400 people and forcing the U.S. into war by Dec. 11.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s when training heightened for beach landings, Lee said. His regiment was sent to Hawaii for mock operations on the island of Maui in preparation for taking Japan\u2019s chain of key islands, including Iwo Jima.<\/p>\n
On Feb. 19, 1945, Lee\u2019s regiment was called on to be the first wave of invasion for Operation Detachment.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe first thing you did when you hit the beach was to say, \u2018Lord, I\u2019m in Your hands. If it\u2019s Your will, see me through this.\u2019 … You cannot fight in fear.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Marines met intense enemy fire; by evening of the first day, 550 were dead and more than 1,800 wounded.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew many men that were killed. I was part of a team that took a bulldozer to make a 24-foot swatch, 6 or 7 feet deep in the sand for a [mass burial]…. It was hard to see that, especially those you were close to.\u201d<\/p>\n
Under Lee\u2019s direction, a demolition team pressed north, building bridges and setting up pulleys and winches for military vehicles to make it up the island\u2019s unstable sand terraces. \u201cThat\u2019s when the Japanese would lay down that withering fire and we were just an open target,\u201d he recounted.<\/p>\n
The team struggled to gain ground, maybe 200 yards one day, 50 yards the next. At night they would sleep in a foxhole, a small hand-dug pit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was blessed to have a fellow Christian as a foxhole buddy,\u201d Lee said, as he told of each soldier being assigned a foxhole partner.<\/p>\n
After four days of intense battle, another Marine regiment landed with about 300 men. A 40-man patrol reached the summit of the 556-foot Mount Suribachi on Feb. 23 to raise a U.S. flag and signal its capture — a glimmer of hope for those in battle and for their loved ones back home.<\/p>\n
But the battle wasn\u2019t over. For another 32 days the Marines would contend for the island.<\/p>\n
Lee was wounded as his regiment took fire on March 8, struck by machine-gun fire in his right leg and injured again as debris from nearby artillery shells rained on him.<\/p>\n
At the on-island hospital, the tent where Lee was being treated was next to another tent with five injured Marines — one unintentionally placed above a hidden enemy tunnel.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Japanese invaded the tent and [killed] those five men. They were coming to my tent and somehow we had guards around our tent that were able to knock the second wave off of us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Five days later, Lee told his commanding officer he was ready to return to duty. With his injuries still healing he was given the assignment of driving an ammo truck and delivering food and water to the front lines, a job he kept until the capture of Iwo Jima on March 26.<\/p>\n
As his regiment was being transported back to Hawaii, Lee said, \u201cI was praising the Lord all the way through. I was so glad to leave. Even though I was wounded I still had my hands, two feet and two eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lee was presented with two Purple Heart awards in September 1945; his Marine division was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation for heroism in action.<\/p>\n
He had disarmament assignments in Sasebo, Nagasaki, from September to December, destroying \u201canything that was fighting material.\u201d The smell of Nagasaki was horrific, he said, with the heat causing the odor of battle and decaying bodies to intensify.<\/p>\n
Lee\u2019s enlistment ended Nov. 19, 1946; he was home by Dec. 15. He was soon married and working in the steel industry.<\/p>\n
Longtime members of Gethsemane Baptist Church in Hayden, the couple taught Sunday School and served in various ministries. For the last eight years they have been members at Blount Springs Baptist Church in Hayden.<\/p>\n
\u201cHorace is one of the most humble men of integrity you will ever meet,\u201d pastor Jeff Ingle said. \u201cHe is committed to his Lord, his wife and the church.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although Lee endured a season of life where he could easily harbor hate or fear, forgiveness is something he lives out day to day, Ingle said.<\/p>\n
Lee said God has used his wartime experiences to teach him about His guidance and protection. \u201cIf you believe and pray believing, God will take care of you. He has proven that He will. I\u2019ve turned my life over to Him to lead and to guide and direct me, and He has.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Horace Lee was 12 when he \u201cgave my heart to the Lord\u201d at a Baptist church in Alabama; 17 when he entered the Marine Corps in 1940; and 21 when he was wounded in Iwo Jima as the U.S. wrested the strategic island from the Japanese. \u201cGod taught me a great deal\u201d in the military, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[298,453,811,3884,455,3739,1999,3740,1284],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6223"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6223\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}