--- description: A veteran of Tarawa, Saipan and Tinian was on his way home last week, on leave. His name: Siwash. His species: duck (the mascot of a Marine Corps artillery outfit). His combat record:¶ At Tarawa,... title: Marines: Good Old Siwash image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [U.S.](/section/us/) # Marines: Good Old Siwash by [TIME](/author/time/) Sep 25, 1944 4:00 AM CUT by [TIME](/author/time/) Sep 25, 1944 4:00 AM CUT A veteran of Tarawa, Saipan and Tinian was on his way home last week, on leave. His name: Siwash. His species: duck (the mascot of a Marine Corps artillery outfit). His combat record: ¶ At Tarawa, where he landed with the early waves, Siwash routed, single-winged, a Jap rooster. ¶ At Saipan, he did not hit the beach until several days after the fight began, but his managers blame this on a working party aboard ship. ¶At Tinian, Siwash got back into his waddle: he hit the beach on D-day and personally captured a tiny Jap duck. But he had to leave his war bride behind him. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6782570/marines-good-old-siwash/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6782570/marines-good-old-siwash/"},"headline":"Marines: Good Old Siwash","datePublished":"1944-09-25T04:00:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-03T16:09:51.623Z","description":"A veteran of Tarawa, Saipan and Tinian was on his way home last week, on leave. His name: Siwash. His species: duck (the mascot of a Marine Corps artillery outfit). His combat record:¶ At Tarawa,...","url":"https://time.com/archive/6782570/marines-good-old-siwash/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME","url":"https://time.com/author/time/"}],"articleSection":"U.S.","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/us/","name":"U.S."}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/archive/6782570/marines-good-old-siwash/","name":"Marines: Good Old Siwash"}}]}] ```