“Just before sunrise, about 0400 on 7 July [1944], like some ancient barbaric horde, the Japanese soldiers started down the Tanapag plain from around Makunsha. The attack route followed mainly along the coastal railroad. The men were led by officers, and they were equipped with machine guns, mortars, and tanks. Yet it was like military order gone awry, replaced by individual passion, a fearful charge of flesh and fire. Savage and primitive, the assault reverted to warfare of centuries before. Some of the enemy were armed only with rocks or a knife mounted on a pole. Whatever it was that drove the Japanese, or inspired them, they came on and on, straight into the muzzles of opposing guns. ‘They just kept coming and coming,’ recalled Major Edward McCarthy, commanding 2/105. ‘I didn’t think they’d ever stop. It was like a cattle stampede.’ The exact number of the attackers will probably never be known, but it was believed to approximate 3,000, including remnants of every unit on the island, even walking wounded.” – Henry I. Shaw, Jr., Bernard C. Nalty, and Edwin T. Turnbladh, Central Pacific Drive, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. III, “Northern Saipan: End of the Campaign”