Col Peter Ortiz

Col Peter Ortiz

A recent issue of Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture contains an article by historian and Marine Corps veteran Roger McGrath titled “The Marine Corps’ Answer to James Bond.” The article looks at the life and career of Col Peter Ortiz, who was born Pierre Julien Ortiz in New York City in 1913. His mother was an American of Swiss-German…

Atomic Marines

Atomic Marines

by LtCol Lynn “Kim” Kimball, USMC (Ret) Operation Crossroads’ atomic bomb tests at Bikini Atoll in July of 1946 erased any lingering doubts that might have remained following their use at Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August of 1945 about the monumental impact of these weapons in future warfare. The Marine Corps’ major contribution to Allied…

A Brief History Of The Origins Of MCAS New River

A Brief History Of The Origins Of MCAS New River

MCAS New River traces its origins to the early 1940s when the U.S. military began an unprecedented expansion to meet the rapidly growing threat of the Axis powers to our national survival. War plans projected a strategic situation that would initially require two Marine divisions to spearhead a simultaneous war against Germany and Japan. Prior to February…

Huerth Street

Huerth Street

LtCol L. J. Kimball, USMC (Ret) 9 Jan 2022 In August of 1942, the citizens of Onslow County were cheered by the news that the 1st Marine Division (MarDiv), which had occupied the adjoining Marine Corps base of Marine Barracks (MarBks) New River (now Camp Lejeune), since beginning with the advance party’s arrival in September 1941,…

The Haitian Hangar: MCAS New River’s Tie To The Banana Wars and One Hundred Years Of Marine Corps History

The Haitian Hangar: MCAS New River’s Tie To The Banana Wars and One Hundred Years Of Marine Corps History

Although the history of Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) New River dates to 1941, hangar AS-840, the “King Air Hangar,” so named because the station Headquarters and Headquarters Squadron maintains the assigned UC-12F and UC-12W “King Airs” there, can trace its history back to the Marine Corps’ early expeditionary years immediately after World War I,…

The Dutch Marines and Camp Lejeune

The Dutch Marines and Camp Lejeune

On 10 May 1940, the Nazi blitzkrieg, achieving complete tactical and strategic surprise, thundered through and over the erst-while neutral Low Countries. Unprepared, ill-equipped and vastly outmanned, the Netherlands struggled heroically but futilely, collapsing completely by 15 May and surrendering, the royal family and the government having fled to England on the 13th. The scattered…