whitehall
Diamond Member
You can't blame A.P photographer Joe Rosenthal. By the time he got to Mt. Suribachi the combat Marine photographer told him it was all over. The Marines already raised the Flag but Joe Rosenthal dragged his small framed body and his heavy Speed Graphic press camera up the still dangerous slope anyway. He quickly snapped a photo of a Marine work party raising another larger Flag attached to an old pipe and some victory photos and sent the undeveloped film to the ship. Nobody thought much of it and Rosenthal didn't take the time to identify the Marines. The alleged Flag raisers were literally plucked off the hill and sent on a war bonds tour despite the fact that they must have shown signs of acute PTSD, Ira Hayes did anyway. It wasn't until recently that it was found that the Corpsman in the photo, John Bradley was misidentified and still more recently it seems that Marine PFC Rene Gagnon was misidentified. You can't blame the characters in the iconic Flag raising. It was just a work party and they probably didn't remember who was who anyway.