[USMCRET6391]

Marine Parachute Pioneers

In October 1940, the Commandant sent a circular letter to all units and posts to solicit volunteers for the paratroopers. All applicants, with the exception of officers above the rank of captain, had to meet a number of requirements regarding age (21 to 32 years), height (66 to 74 inches), and health (normal eyesight and blood pressure). In addition, they had to be unmarried, an indication of the expected hazards of the duty. Applications were to include information on the Marine's educational record and athletic experience, so Headquarters was obviously interested in placing above-average individuals in these new units.

The letter further stated that personnel qualified as parachutists would receive an unspecified amount of extra pay. The money served as both a recognition of the danger and an incentive to volunteer. Congress would eventually set the additional monthly for parachutists at $100 for officers and $50 for enlisted men. Since a private first class at that time earned about $36 per month and a second lieutenant $125, the increase amounted to a hefty bonus. It would prove to be a significant factor in attracting volunteers, though parachuting would have generated a lot of interest without the money. As one early applicant later put it, based on common knowledge of the German success in the Low Countries, many Marines thought "that this was going to be a grand and glorious business." Parachute duty promised "plenty of action" and the chance to get in on the ground floor of a revolutionary type of warfare.

To get the program underway, the Commandant transferred Marine Captain Marion L. Dawson from duty with the Navy's Bureau of Aeronautics to Lakehurst, New Jersey, to oversee the new school. Two enlisted Marine parachute riggers would serve as his initial assistants. Marine parachuting got off to an inauspicious start when Captain Dawson and two lieutenants made a visit to Hightstown, New Jersey, to check out the jumping towers. The other officers, Second Lieutenants Walter S. Osipoff and Robert C. McDonough, were slated to head the Corps' first group of parachute trainees. After watching a brief demonstration, the owner suggested that the Marines give it a test. As Dawson later recalled, he "reluctantly" agreed, only to break his leg when he landed at the end of his free fall.

On 26 October 1940, Osipoff, McDonough, and 38 enlisted men reported to Lakehurst. The Corps was still developing its training program, so the initial class spent 10 days at Highstown starting on 28 October. Immediately after that they joined a new class at the Parachute Material School land followed that 16-week coursed of instruction until its completion on 27 February 1941. A Douglas R3D-2 transport plane arrived from Quantico on 6 December and remained there through the 21st, so the pioneer Marine paratroopers made their first jumps during this period. For the remainder of the course, they leapt from Navy blimps stationed at Lakehurst. Lieutenant Osipoff, the senior officer, had the honor of making the first jump by a Marine paratrooper. By graduation, each man had completed the requisite 10 jumps to qualify as a parachutist and parachute rigger. Not all made it through — several dropped from the program due to ineptitude or injury. The majority of these first graduates were destined to remain at Lakehurst as instructors or to serve the units in the Fleet Marine Force as riggers.

By the time the second training class reported, Dawson and his growing staff had created a syllabus for the program. The first two weeks were ground school, which emphasized conditioning, wearing of the harness, landing techniques, dealing with wind drag of the parachute once on the ground, jumping from platforms and a plane mockup, and packing chutes. Students spent the third week riding a bus each day to Highstown where they applied their skills on the towers. The final two weeks consisted of work from aircraft and tactical training as time permitted. Students had to complete six jumps to qualify as a parachutist. The trainers had accumulated their knowledge from the Navy staff, from observing Army training at Fort Benning, and from a film depicting German parachutists. The latter resulted in one significant Marine departure from U.S. Army methods. Whereas the Army made a vertical exit from the aircraft, basically just stepping out the door, Marines copied the technique depicted in the German film and tried to make a near-perpendicular dive, somewhat like a simmer coming off the starting block.

Marine paratroopers used two parachutes in training and in tactical jumps. They wore the main chute in a backpack configuration and a reverse chute on their chest. When jumping from transport planes, the main opened by means of a static line attached to a cable running lengthwise in the cargo compartment. Once the jumpmaster gave the signal, a man crouched in the doorway, made his exit dive, and then drew his knees toward his chest. The parachutist, arms wrapped tightly about his chest chute, felt the opening shock of his main canopy almost immediately upon leaving the plane. If not, he had to pull the ripcord to deploy the reserve chute. (When jumping from blimps, the parachutists had to use a ripcord for the main chute too.) A parachutist's speed of descent depended upon his weight, so Marines carried as little as possible to keep the rate down near 16 feet per second, the equivalent of jumping from a height of about 10 feet. At that speed a jumper had to fall and roll when hitting the ground so as to spread the shock beyond his leg joints. Training jumps began at 1,000 feet, while the standard height for tactical jumps in the Corps was 750 feet. The Germans jumped from as low as 300 feet, but that made it impossible to open the emergency chute in time for it to be effective.