Justin Green Mills
First Lieutenant Justin G. “Tex” Mills served with Charlie Company, First Battalion, 2nd Marines.
He was killed in action at the battle of Tarawa on 20 November 1943.
Branch
Marine Corps Reserve
Service Number O-11121
Current Status
Accounted For
as of 9 August 2019
Recovery Organization
History Flight 2014 Expedition
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History
Justin Mills was born in Houston, Texas on 12 December 1917, the second child of Roger Quarles and Aline (Ruiz) Mills. He saw little, if anything, of his father during his earliest days – Roger enlisted the day after Justin’s birth, and until February 1919 was in the service of Uncle Sam.[1] When Roger returned to Texas – and after the birth of a third Mills child – the family moved to Lockhart, where Roger set up shop as an automobile mechanic. The Mills kids (Rita, Justin, and Lydia) spent their early childhood on their grandparents’ farm on Nueces Street.[2]
While work and sports dominated Justin’s weekdays, his weekends were taken up with military drills. On 29 June 1937, he enlisted in the Fleet Marine Corps Reserve and served with the Fifteenth Battalion – conveniently based in Galveston. He proved to be a quick study in military matters, and by the fall of 1939 held the rank of sergeant. His marksmanship drew the attention of his officers, and in 1940 Sergeant Mills spent some time competing with the Marine Corps Rifle and Pistol Team in Wakefield, Massachusetts.
In November of 1940, the Fifteenth Battalion was placed on active duty status. Mills resigned from the Galveston Wharf Company and traveled to San Diego for assignment with the Second Marine Brigade. The following January, he was posted to Company L, Third Battalion, 2nd Marines. Life in a rifle unit was just what he wanted. “[Mills] served his required training period in San Diego, and liked it so much he signed up for a second ‘stretch'” reported the Galveston Daily News.[4] Mills was at Camp Elliott, California when Pearl Harbor was attacked, and was likely anxious to get overseas. However, he had one more training task to complete. In the late spring of 1942, Sergeant Mills attended an officer candidate’s class in San Diego, and emerged with a second lieutenant’s commission effective 9 June 1942. He would deploy overseas as a platoon leader in Charlie Company, First Battalion, 2nd Marines.[5]
Lieutenant Mills very quickly demonstrated an intense, hard-charging leadership style. Just two months after earning his commission, Mills was aboard a Higgins boat in the Solomon Islands leading his platoon in an assault landing against the village of Halavo on Florida Island. Mills was ready to get ashore, but found that not all aboard his boat shared this enthusiasm. “During the landing, [Mills] was having difficulty with his coxswain, who was afraid to get close to the beach,” related historian Stanley Coleman Jersey. “The sailor wanted to pilot the Higgins boat to within a short distance of the island and discharge his passengers in the foaming surf. Mills looked at the young coast guardsman sternly, slowly unlatched the flap on his pistol holster, and calmly said ‘Son, take us to the shore or you will be sorry.’ A few seconds later the craft was beached on the shore at Halavo.” This episode helped earn Mills a reputation for “No Guts, No Glory” leadership.[6]
Although the Florida Island operation was almost entirely unopposed, Mills and his platoon participated in the mopping up of Tulagi Island on 8 August 1942. Then, they settled into garrison duty as the battle for Guadalcanal took place a few miles away. For the next two months, Mills’ battalion mostly remained on Tulagi with occasional raids, shelling, or bombing providing a dangerous distraction from the monotony. On 9 October 1942, the battalion staged a large raid against a Japanese staging area at Gorabusu on Guadalcanal. The operation began badly – one of the boats carrying a platoon from B/1/2nd Marines foundered, drowning Mills’ comrade 2Lt. Floyd B. Parks and fourteen of his men – but the rest of the battalion made it to shore and met up with coastwatcher Martin Clemens and his scouts. The scouts deftly led Company C to Gorabusu in the dark, and Mills helped to orchestrate a dawn ambush that wiped out thirty Japanese soldiers.
Clemens also bore witness to Mills’ composure under fire.
About that time [when the firing stopped] Mills informed his troopers that there were some wounded Japs. And that they should be shot. There were three Japanese at the base of a large Banyan tree, one enemy moved to sit-up, Mills shot him; 'Rubber Nose' Murray put his bayonet on his '03 and struck the other two; but he shut his eyes beforehand.[7]
At the very end of the month, Mills’ battalion arrived on Guadalcanal for keeps – just in time to participate in the November offensive west of the Matanikau River. In a series of bloody attacks over the first few days of November, the 2nd and 5th Marines managed to shove the Japanese defenders back past Point Cruz – a significant gain. Mills particularly distinguished himself in action on 3 November 1942. “When his platoon encountered vigorous opposition, [Mills] courageously pushed forward in the face of machine gun, mortar, and point-blank 37mm gunfire,” noted the citation for his Silver Star Medal. “Although his platoon suffered heavy casualties, he succeeded in capturing and holding his objective.” One can only imagine the chagrin felt by Mills and his men when they were ordered to abandon those hard-won positions just a few days later.
On 18 January 1943, Justin Mills accepted a promotion to First Lieutenant, based in part upon his performance in combat during the Matanikau offensive. He remained on Guadalcanal with his company through the end of the month, mostly participating in small combat patrols and manning defensive positions. Finally, in early February, they boarded transports and sailed for New Zealand.
The next nine months were a mostly peaceful lacuna for Justin Mills and his fellow Guadalcanal veterans. After a welcome period of resting and replenishing their personal strength, they had little to do besides routine training, integrating new replacements into the unit. There was also plenty of time to spend on liberty in Wellington – bars, dance halls, dates, and anything else a young Marine cared to enjoy. Like many of his fellows, Mills was impressed by “Kiwi” friendliness and fortitude. “Lt. Mills says he has been associated with men and women of our allied nations,” reported The Galveston Daily News, “and declares that they ‘give as freely and die as gallantly as any American’…. our future welfare and peace of the world means we must ‘continue to think of these people as friends and allies.'”[8]
As fall approached, a shuffling of officers and a raft of promotions led to a new assignment for Mills. He gave up command of his platoon and took on the role of executive officer, becoming second in command to a fellow Texan, Captain James R. Clanahan of Amarillo.
On 17 October 1943, Clanahan and Mills formed up Charlie Company and marched them to the docks to board the USS Harry Lee. They would spend just over a month aboard the transport rehearsing amphibious landings, anticipating action, missing Wellington, and enduring long stretches at sea. Mills, naturally, was a conspicuous character aboard the Harry Lee – “a loud-talking Texan, bellicose [but] with a saving quick grin,” remembered Allan Callow. “He was big in the shoulders. He considered himself a tough, fighting Marine. After the war he wanted to stay in the service and become a professional soldier.” However, Callow noted that “Tex” was more than just a big talker.
Tex was a veteran of the 'Canal [and] knew what he was going into. He said he might be killed, that many of his buddies would not be coming back. Of that he was certain. He and Dan Fennelly, a new Navy ensign, had loud, long arguments about the planned pre-landing naval barrage…. We [navy officers] thought the island might well be blasted out of the water. Tex disagreed. He laughed when Fennelly, a boat officer, said Tex would walk ashore, claiming the Japs would be dead or shell shocked. Tex offered Fennelly his place in the lineup if Fennelly really believed this.[9]
On the morning of 20 November 1943, the Harry Lee arrived in the transport area off Betio Island in the Tarawa atoll. As the much-discussed navy bombardment roared overhead, Clanahan and Mills organized their men on the deck, reminded officers and NCOs of their assignments, and then wished each other luck as they headed for their landing stations. Common sense dictated that the two senior officers land in separate boats in case of a lucky hit from a Japanese shore battery.
The First Battalion, 2nd Marines was assigned to land in a reserve wave – remaining afloat while the Second and Third Battalions led the assault, and landing wherever needed. They soon saw that Tex Mills’ prediction was all too accurate: the assault battalions disappeared into a maelstrom of enemy fire. At 1030, the reserves were summoned – but only enough LVTs survived to transport Able and Baker Companies. Charlie Company had to wait until noon before transport was available.
“I received verbal orders to land on Beach Red 2, organize, stand by, and await further orders,” recalled Captain Clanahan. He brought most of his company ashore alive, but scattered – out of nearly 200 men on his roster, only 70 managed to join up on the beach; a single BAR and a light machine gun were the heaviest weapons available for night defense. Several men were wounded, and five were killed outright: Corporal Oscar H. Cole, Jr., Field Music 1c Roy E. Keele, PFCs Marion E. Briethaupt and Norman A. Buan, and First Lieutenant Justin Mills.[10] The hard-charging exec was brought down by a gunshot wound to the head.
In the aftermath of the battle, the grim task of collecting and burying the dead took on paramount importance. Temporary cemeteries sprang up around the scenes of the heaviest fighting. Just inland from Beach Red 2, two of the largest such burial grounds – “Beach Red Cemetery” and “Central Division Cemetery” – took shape. Bulldozers scooped out long trenches, and hundreds of Marines and Navy corpsmen were laid down side by side, covered only in ponchos if covered at all. Keele, Breithaupt, Buan, and Mills were all buried in the second row of the Central Division Cemetery. Small sticks with their names formed the only available markers.
Of the C/1/2 personnel buried in this cemetery, Keele and Breithaupt were identified on the spot by the Graves Registration troops. Buan and Mills were not so fortunate. Their families received unwelcome letters from the government: the remains of their loved ones were determined permanently non-recoverable and would not be coming home. The cases were closed in 1949.
In 2014, non-profit group History Flight conducted archaeological digs in the area of Cemetery 26. They discovered many human remains and artifacts left behind by the 604th QMGRC – more than enough to raise the prospect of identifying some of the men. The following year, the remains were handed over to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency for laboratory examination.
After an exhaustive process comparing physical and dental records, chest radiographs, and DNA samples, two of the bodies were segregated and identified. Justin Green Mills was officially accounted for on 19 August 2019; his comrade Norman Buan followed on 27 August. Both Marines were returned to their families.
Justin Mills was buried in Arlington National Cemetery with full military honors on 26 May 2021.
[1] Roger Mills served with 94th Aero Squadron as a master signal electrician. The 94th was the first American squadron to arrive in France and included famous pilots like Douglas Campbell and Eddie Rickenbacker.
[2] According to the 1920 Census, the entire Mills family was living with Roger’s parents, Green and Mary Mills.
[3] The Hurricanes were a local Galveston team in the South Texas Amateur Football League.
[4] “The Service Club,” The Galveston Daily News (Galveston, TX) 26 October 1941.
[5] The Marine Corps had a long-standing policy of reassigning men commissioned from the ranks, with the reasoning that it would reduce undue familiarity (or tension) between the new officer and his former enlisted buddies.
[6] Stanley Coleman Jersey, Hell’s Islands: The Untold Story of Guadalcanal (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2008), 315.
[7] Stanley Coleman Jersey, “Ordinary Marines: Guadalcanal’s Lonely Patrol During World War II,” World War II Magazine (October 2006), available online at Historynet.
[8] The Galveston Daily News, 19 September 1943.
[9] Allan Callow, The Man On The Ground: Who Really Wins Our Wars? (Allan Callow: Lulu Publishing Company, 2013), 17.
[10] According to Captain Clanahan, C/1/2nd Marines suffered 13 KIA and 35 wounded during the battle for Tarawa. Second Marine Division, Report on Gilbert Islands Tarawa Operation.
Decorations
Purple Heart
For wounds resulting in his death, 20 November 1943.
Next Of Kin Address
Address of mother, Mrs. Aline Mills.
Location Of Loss
Lieutenant Mills was killed somewhere in the vicinity of Red Beach 2.
A real life hero !
1ST LT Justin G. Mills, is finally home after a temporary stay on Betio Island, Gilbert Islands since November 20, 1943. LT Mills, will always be FOREVER young. May he RIP.
A selfless Marine leader who gave all so that his men could live. You are honored and your sacrifice not forgotten. Semper Fidelis