Andrew Haldane

Haldane was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts and lived in Methuen, Massachusetts most of his life. He was of Scottish descent and graduated from the Searles High School in 1935, and attended St John’s Prep in Danvers, then Bridgton Academy in Bridgton, Maine.[3]

He graduated from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine,[4] where the memory of Captain Haldane is honored annually by presenting the Haldane Cup to the graduating senior who has displayed outstanding qualities of leadership and character. At Bowdoin he was captain of the football team and president of the student council,[5][6] and he was voted most popular senior in 1940.[7] He became assistant football coach at Bowdoin in October 1941 after graduating that June. He had planned to coach for a season before joining the Marine Corps, but was called up after coaching for a mere two weeks.[8][9][10][11]

He became a second lieutenant in the Marine Corps in 1942 and graduated from the Reserve Officers' Training School in Quantico.[4] He served with the 1st Marine Division on Guadalcanal,[12] and was commanding officer of Company K at Cape Gloucester, where he received the Silver Star for leading hand-to-hand combat in a fight on Walt's Ridge. He led Company K through most of the fight for Peleliu. Haldane was shot by a Japanese sniper on October 12, 1944, while assessing the area of Hill 140 during the Battle of Peleliu in the Palau Islands, three days before the Marines came off the lines.[1][6] A Sea Scouts Ship was named in his honor at his old college.[13]

Eugene Sledge, a mortar-man in Company "K", describes what happened to his company's commander in his book, With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa:

At the time of Captain Haldane's death, the bulk of Company K was operating with its parent battalion (3/5) on Hill 140 within the Umurbrogol Pocket. In an attempt to orient himself to the strange terrain his company was occupying, Haldane was peeking over a ridge and was shot by a Japanese sniper and was killed instantly.[14] First Lieutenant Thomas J. Stanley succeeded him as commander of K/3/5. Stanley led Company K through the remainder of the Peleliu campaign and on to Okinawa the following spring.

In his book, Sledge pays his leader a tribute:[15]

Capt. Andy Haldane wasn't an idol. He was human. But he commanded our individual destinies under the most trying conditions with the utmost compassion. We knew he could never be replaced. He was the finest Marine officer I ever knew. The loss of many close friends grieved me deeply on Peleliu and Okinawa. But to all of us the loss of our company commander at Peleliu was like losing a parent we depended upon for security – not our physical security, because we knew that was a commodity beyond our reach in combat, but our mental security.... So ended the outstanding combat career of a fine officer who had distinguished himself at Guadalcanal, Cape Gloucester, and Peleliu. We had lost our leader and our friend. Our lives would never be the same. But we turned back to the ugly business at hand.

Haldane is portrayed by actor Scott Gibson in the 2010 HBO miniseries, The Pacific, which used Sledge's memoir as source material.[2][6]

Romus Burgin, another mortar-man in Company "K", also speaks highly of Captain Haldane in his book, Islands of the Damned: A Marine at War in the Pacific:[16]

(Captain Haldane) was as well liked as any officer I knew. I never heard him raise his voice at any man. He was firm, but he was a gentleman, and compassionate.

His death is also described in this book. When Third Battalion arrived to relieve the Second Battalion on Hill 140,[17]

Everybody was warning them not to show their heads over the top. Jap snipers on the far side were alert, and deadly. But someone needed to see what was beyond the hill in order to direct the battalion's fire.... Second Battalion's own machine gunners were dug in so low, they could hardly see what they were shooting at. They had to sight their guns by looking under the barrels. This was not satisfactory to Captain Haldane, who was himself an old machine gunner. He slithered forward a few feet and cautiously raised his head. Everybody heard a sharp thwack and knew instantly what it meant. Those who were close enough said his head just exploded. There was no point in even calling for a corpsman.