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Today Margaret and I went to see the first pictures of Iwo Jima, it was shown in the Capitol [theater]. The first picture was the one of the Marines putting up the flag on Mt. Suribachi, the others were of the convoy and then of the landing boats, some which were being hit from the island by the Japs as they (Marines) approached the beach. Sure is high and rocky, it didn’t look so high or rocky in the pictures shown in the papers, but the movies sure did. Darling I kept looking for you but it wasn’t clear enough. It showed one ship hit and the photographer lying there wounded. Other pictures were of the Marines moving up the slopes. It showed one (our) airplane crash in the sea and the pilot swimming towards a life preserver.

We’re all praying for you to be alright, and as you said, no news is good news. So we’ll try to pray harder and worry less till we hear from you. God bless you, Milly.

President Harry Truman announced the unconditional surrender of Japan on August 14, 1945, and the 4th Division became the first Marine division to return home. On a brisk November Sunday in 1945, Milly and the children traveled to the Wilkes-Barre railroad station to meet Tom. Their faces wreathed in smiles, they ran towards him as he jumped off the train.

Mary Beth Kennedy Voda is the daughter of the late Tom and Milly Kennedy. She has assembled the hundreds of letters exchanged by her parents during her father’s service in the Marine Corps. A teacher and writer from Wyalusing, Pennsylvania, Ms. Voda is working on a book based on her parents’ letters as well as the correspondence between General Kuribayashi and his family.

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