Although Grady Faulkner jokes that his memory is failing, he still remembers every detail of the day he was wounded in Okinawa, Japan.

As a corporal in the 6th Marine Division's 29th Regiment that landed on Okinawa on Easter in 1945, Faulkner was helping to take over the mountainous northern part of the island. Near sundown on May 17, his platoon was looking for a spot to settle down for the night on Sugar Loaf
Hill when Japanese troops opened heavy fire.

He and another Marine were carrying a wounded friend when he was shot in the back of his right leg.

"There were all kinds of things they throwed at us, like shooting mortars and artillery. It was a really heavy bombardment," said Faulkner, 85. "I don't know how I really got out of there."

His friend was killed. Faulkner hid in an abandoned trench until more troops moved in and he was picked up by a Jeep being used as an ambulance.

"Driving without lights is already dark, and it was about 10 p.m. then," he said. "The driver slipped off the road, and the Jeep turned over and lodged between some trees. I could see the river below us."

Faulkner was loaded into another ambulance and taken to the field hospital nearby. He woke up the next morning with a cast on his leg.

Three days later, he was evacuated by plane to Guam and then Aeia Naval Hospital in Honolulu a week later. The Gainesville News printed Faulkner's story on Aug. 16, 1945, written by a Marine war correspondent.

Faulkner was still in the Honolulu hospital when Japan surrendered.

"The announcement came over a PA system in he hospital," he said. "I had surgery a few days before and had a cast on, so I couldn't do much celebration. I just watched the others march up and down the aisles ... Everybody was so happy that the war had ended and we would all get to go home."

Finally in September, Faulkner was able to move around the hospital, and a Marine general awarded several men the Purple Heart Medal.

"It was a good feeling," he said. "We were on the parade field there at the hospital. A bunch of us were getting it."
Faulkner was still recuperating, however, and spent time in naval hospitals in Oakland, Calif., and Charleston, S.C., before returning back home to Lula.

Faulkner traveled between family and jobs in Georgia and Ohio for several years, including a one-year contract in Guam, where he worked for a company trying to help rebuild the island in 1946 after the war.

His friend was a plumber, and Faulkner worked as a plumber's helper.

Faulkner returned to Ohio and attended the National Radio Institute to work as a television repairman. He met his wife, Marjorie, in Georgia and started working at Lockheed Corp. in 1951. They've lived in Smyrna, Jefferson and Clayton before landing in Oakwood. They'll celebrate 60 years of marriage next month.

He still laughs when he remembers how long it took to get from Charleston to Lula in 1945. He took a bus ride from Charleston to Gainesville and waited.

"My dad knew I was coming in and came down to meet me, but the bus was two or three hours late and he figured I wasn't coming in," he said. "You couldn't get in touch with each other back then like you can now."

He took a taxi, but it broke down on the way. The cab driver and Faulkner hitched a ride back to Gainesville and took another taxi. He finally returned home at 4 a.m.

"Oh, it was a happy moment," he said. "I couldn't believe it. I could hardly believe I was back home."