Basil Joseph Gillis
PFC Basil J. Gillis served with the scout/sniper platoon of Headquarters Company, 2nd Marines.
He was killed in action at Betio, Tarawa atoll, on 21 November 1943.
Branch
Marine Corps Reserve
Service Number 487635
Current Status
Remains Not Recovered
Pursuit Category
This case is under Active Pursuit by the DPAA.
Capsule History
Pre-War Life
Birth
June 26, 1925
at Ipswich, MA
Parents
John J. Gillis
Agnes H. Gillis
Education
Ipswich High School (ex-44)
Occupation & Employer
High school student
Service Life
Entered Service
October 21, 1942
at Boston, MA
Home Of Record
18 East Street
Ipswich, MA
Next Of Kin
Mother, Mrs. Agnes Gillis
Military Specialty
Scout/Sniper
Primary Unit
Scout/Sniper Platoon
H&S Co./2nd Marines
Campaigns Served
Tarawa
Individual Decorations
Purple Heart
Additional Service Details
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Loss And Burial
Circumstances Of Loss
PFC Gillis was a member of the Greater Boston platoon of "Wake Island Avengers," which was recruited in Boston a year ago October. He had just been graduated from Ipswich High School where he had played on the football and hockey teams. He was 17 at the time and had never been away from home before.
He told me of his mother. "Not until I left home," he said one night while we were stretched out on deck under a sky full of stars, "did I really appreciate what she meant to me. When this war is over, I'll never leave her again."Hy Hurwitz, The Boston Globe, 13 February 1944.
PFC Basil Gillis served as a member of Lieutenant William Deane Hawkins’ Scout/Sniper platoon, part of Headquarters Company, 2nd Marines. He was specially recruited out of G/2/2nd Marines for this duty; Tarawa was his first operation.
On the morning of 20 November 1943, Gillis and half of the scout/snipers were loaded into a Higgins boat and sent towards the burning beaches of Betio.The other half of the platoon, led by Lt. Hawkins, were the first to land on a long pier jutting out from the island. After securing a foothold, Hawkins came to fetch his reinforcements. Combat correspondent Hy Hurwitz described the scene:
Our boat had been held up at the starting line and while we were waiting for further orders another landing craft pulled up alongside. It had just returned from the pier and in it was 1Lt. W. D. Hawkins who was in the first boat to reach the pier and who, with the aid of flame throwers and demolition men, had cleared the edge of the pier of Japs.
Lt. Hawkins had lost some of his men. Others were wounded, and after transferring the wounded he took the 17-man scout and sniper unit into his boat. That was the last I saw of PFC Gillis.Hy Hurwitz, The Boston Globe, 13 February 1944.
Gillis managed to reach the shore and survived the first day of fighting. He would not make it through another. “I learned of how heroically he died,” continued Hurwitz. “You may have heard the airfield on Betio has been named after Lt. Hawkins, Well, PFC Gillis accompanied Hawkins in a daring charge on a Jap machine-gun nest and he received his mortal wounds at the same time as Lt. Hawkins.”
Historian Eric Hammel offered a different version of the story. “The platoon was ordered south at 0830 to spot for Marine mortars,” he wrote in Bloody Tarawa. “Shortly after the group moved into the open, several scouts dropped for cover, but PFC Basil Gillis kept moving and was shot well to the front of the others. Instinctively, PFC William Matteson ran into the open and dragged Gillis to safety. The effort drew considerable fire, but Matteson finished the job without being hit. Gillis, however, had been mortally wounded in the attempt.”
Eighteen-year-old Basil Gillis died of multiple gunshot wounds on 21 November 1943. The exact location, and the disposition of his remains, is not known.
Burial Information or Disposition
No information recorded; no identifiable remains recovered.
A memorial marker was erected in Cemetery 11, Grave 5, Row 1, Plot 1.
Next Of Kin Address
Address of mother, Mrs. Agnes Gillis.
Location Of Loss
PFC Gillis was killed in action at an unspecified location on Betio.