Simon Bolivar Buckner Jr

Simon Bolivar Buckner, Jr.

As a Colonel, Simon B. Buckner commanded the 22nd Infantry Regiment
at Ft McClellan from approximately 1938/39 until June of 1940.

The following passage from a US Army register of about 1939 deals with Simon B. Buckner

CMTC graduation certificate signed by Simon B. Buckner at Fort McClellan 1939,
as Commanding Officer of the 22nd Infantry

General Simon Bolivar Buckner, Jr. (July 18, 1886 – June 18, 1945) was a American lieutenant general
during World War II. He served in the Pacific Theater of Operations and commanded the defenses of Alaska
early in the war. After that assignment, he was promoted to command Tenth Army, which conducted
the amphibious assault (Operation Iceberg) on the Japanese island of Okinawa. He was killed during
the closing days of the Battle of Okinawa by enemy artillery fire, making him the highest-ranking American
to have been killed by enemy fire during the war, and among the highest-ranking military officers to die,
along with Lt. Gen. Lesley J. McNair, who was killed by friendly fire in France on July 25, 1944,
and Lt. Gen. Frank Maxwell Andrews, killed in an air crash in Iceland on May 3, 1943.
Buckner was posthumously promoted to the rank of a full four-star general on July 19, 1954
by a Special Act of Congress (Public Law 83-508).

His father was Confederate General Simon Bolivar Buckner, Sr., who surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant
at Fort Donelson.

Buckner was raised in the rural hills of western Kentucky near Munfordville, and attended
Virginia Military Institute. He later won an appointment to West Point (class of 1908) from
President Theodore Roosevelt. He served two tours of duty in the Philippines. During World War I
he served as a brevet major, drilling discipline into budding aviators.

Between the wars, Buckner returned to West Point as an instructor (1919–1923) and again as instructor
and Commandant of Cadets (1932–1936). Though recognized as tough and fair, his insistence on
developing cadets past conventional limits caused one parent to quip, "Buckner forgets that cadets are born,
not quarried." He was also an instructor at the General Service Schools at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas,
and was executive officer at the Army War College in Washington, D.C.

Prior to Pearl Harbor, Buckner was promoted to Brigadier General and assigned to fortify and protect Alaska
as commander of the Army's Alaska Defense Command. Though comparatively quiet, there was some action
with the attack on Dutch Harbor on the island of Unalaska, Japanese seizure of the islands Kiska and Attu
(June 1942), Battle of Attu (Operation Landcrab, May 1943), and "invasion" of Kiska (August, 1943).

In July, 1944, Buckner was sent to Hawaii to organize the Tenth Army, which was composed of both
Army and Marine units. The original mission of the Tenth Army was to prepare for the invasion of Taiwan;
however, this operation was canceled, and Buckner's command was instead ordered to prepare for
the Battle of Okinawa. This turned out to be the largest, slowest, and bloodiest sea-land-air battle
in American military history. On June 18, 1945, Buckner was standing between two boulders
watching the first combat operations of the 8th Marine Regiment when he was hit by shrapnel
from a Japanese 47mm artillery shell and killed instantly. He was succeeded in command by
Marine General Roy Geiger. Total American deaths during the battle of Okinawa were 12,500.

Buckner is interred in the family plot at Frankfort Cemetery in Frankfort, Kentucky.

Lt. General Simon B. Buckner (foreground, holding camera),
photographed with Major General Lemuel C. Shepherd, Jr., USMC, on Okinawa

The last picture of Lieutenant General Buckner, Jr., (on the right)
taken just before he was killed by a Japanese artillery shell

General Simon Bolivar Buckner, Jr., graduated from West Point in 1908 and was commissioned in the Infantry.
He served as an instructor at Fort Benning and at the Command and General Staff School-from which he graduated
in 1925 as a distinguished student. Later duties included service as an instructor, Assistant Commandant,
and Commandant of West Point.

In the early days of World War II General Buckner directed operations against Japanese forces on the Aleutian Islands
and subsequently converted those islands into an invasion-proof stronghold.

In 1945 General Buckner was given command of the newly-formed Tenth U.S. Army and with it the task
of invading and neutralizing Okinawa. During the fighting he repeatedly exposed himself to danger
by touring the frontlines to encourage his men. His dogged determination for triumph prompted the men
to nickname him "The Bull."

Four days prior to the victory he sought LTG Buckner was mortally wounded while directing his forces
from an advanced observation post. He was the highest ranking officer to lose his life in the Pacific Theatre.
In 1954 Congress posthumously promoted him to the rank of General.

Service at Fort Leavenworth 1924-28.

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