Leslie Victor Frink

Private Leslie “Bear” Frink served with Easy Company, First Marine Raider Battalion, during the Solomon Islands campaign. His primary duty was to carry ammunition for one of the company’s .30-caliber Browning machine guns. Frink saw his first combat on Tulagi in August, 1942, and later participated in a raid on Tasimboko and the infamous Battle of Edson’s Ridge.

On 12 September 1942 – the first night of the Ridge battle – Private Frink’s machine gun crew was attached to a C Company platoon posted on the right flank of the Marine line defending the route to Henderson Field. “We crossed the lagoon on a fallen tree, which appeared to be our only exit other than along the river,” recalled PFC John W. Mielke, a member of Frink’s crew. “This was very dense jungle, a heavy growth of banyan trees.” When Japanese troops overran the exposed position later that night, the Marines who survived the onslaught scattered and hid out as best they could. Frink and Mielke stuck together, sharing a foxhole near their original outpost.

As the sun rose the next morning, Marines attempted to seek out fallen buddies. Japanese troops were all around, and small firefights broke out as the groups bumped into each other in the underbrush. When one such scrap erupted close to their outpost, Frink and Mielke hurried to help. “Bear” pulled ahead – and Mielke heard gunshots and screaming. “Frink evidently emerged from the brush directly into [a] Japanese machine gun nest,” wrote historian James H. Alexander. “Startled riflemen bayoneted him in the chest.” Mielke managed to flank the Japanese position, eliminate the gunners, and helped rescue a group of Marines – actions which earned him the Navy Cross.