Closed Captions

Two Navajo Nation code talkers explain their critical role in WWII Pacific operations (1942–1946). They detail how they created an unbreakable military code using the Navajo language, demonstrate encoding methods with alphabet-based animal names, and recount specific combat missions including the flag-raising at Iwo Jima. A coordinator adds historical context on the four waves of Navajo and Native American code talkers recruited across the nation.

Transcript

0:04 Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Tent of Many Voices. My name is Aaron. I'm one of the Rangers traveling with this exhibit. We're a traveling exhibit with National Park Service as well as many other multiple agencies that have sponsored us traveling along the Lewis and Clark trail 200 years in the future. Um Everywhere we stop, we stop in various cities or towns or big towns like this one.
0:29 And we invite presenters to our Tent of Many Voices to share their voice, their perspective of Lewis and Clark or something related. And with us at this hour are uh Samuel Tso, and Merril Sandoval who are code talkers with the Navajo Nation and they did a lot, well, they did, they're gonna tell you a lot of what they did
0:50 for World War Two in 1942 to 45. So let's all. Welcome these two gentlemen.
1:09 Good afternoon.
1:13 My name is Merril Sandoval just like she said. And uh I'm from uh right at the present time. I live in Arizona. A place named Tuba City. It's between uh Flagstaff Arizona and uh Lake Powell Page, Arizona just east of Grand Canyon. And, uh, we're here to present a little bit about what we did.
1:38 I know it will take a long time to tell quite a bit of the code talkers, but it's our duty. We're, if we're requested from all over the country, even across the ocean, we try to do our best to explain why, what for the whys and who is and where and all that people are still,
2:02 they read about us and they heard about us. So we try to Sam and I is gonna explain a little bit about what we did as best as we can. And uh today, uh Sam is here with his wife and I'm here with my wife. Uh Could you stand, dear? Her name of Lorraine Sandoval,
2:28 July 27th. We'll be married for 54 years. And yeah,
2:39 also, uh was responsible from Phoenix, Arizona. Scottsdale, Arizona is our coordinator is Mrs Town, Miss Town. He's the one that has the [inaudible]
2:55 Thank you. [inaudible] administration. U h, how we use our code. We are Navajo Indians and uh we went to school in several, uh most of uh one that participated in this program for the United States Marine Corps. We, they were selected from at least seven or eight
3:18 boarding schools on the reservation and that we do have a uh a big reservation as a lot of, you probably know a reservation covers uh part of Arizona, part of Utah and part of New Mexico and the state, I mean, the reservation alone, they figure it about the size of West Virginia
3:43 and our population is 250,000 and more. And, uh, we were picked from 1942 and, uh, all the way up to 1946 to use our language and we didn't know that we would use our language until we got through with our boot camp in, uh, San Diego, California,
4:07 just like any other marine. We volunteered. I volunteered when I was 17 years old. That was 1943. And we went through our regular training as a marine and that's the way we figured we were, we're just gonna be fighting and we're gonna help. We're gonna go against the Japanese and help out.
4:30 Uh, we, we got to further training after boot camp rifles school. We went to another camp Camp Pendleton. That's where we found out when we got there. There was a whole bunch of Navajos there that were ahead of us in a classroom. What they were doing. They were, they were decoding our common language,
4:54 the Navajo language they use every day where they were decoding it and we, they made their own alphabet.
5:06 It's all right.
5:12 Secret.
5:15 You're right there. You're right. There you go. Maybe it writes on the other side. I don't know. Anyway, uh, there was 29 older one there, older ones that, uh, were recruited or volunteered. There was 29 around 30 they used them to start the program and they decoded uh
5:40 the language, you know, in our alphabet and all the other general terms. And uh the reason was that we never had a Navajo code uh dictionary on the reservation. So on top of that, we didn't have to know anything in any word about military because we have to learn all that. And I'll show you
6:04 how we did. We changed our alphabet from A to Z and, uh, comprised of mainly animals or whatever. And mostly animals from A to Z, like for a B, like an ant, A and T and B would be bear, C would be cat, D, would it be dog. On down the line. And
6:29 so the other code that they were using in the other military service, they, uh, have what they call American Morse code and that was commonly used in all the other military service and the Japanese were decoding them so much. They were pretty expert on decoding messages.
7:14 And that this, the one that we had made was like this A-N-T, B-E-A-R, C-A-T compared to the other ones like Abel Baker, Charlie and all that. Some of you probably veterans remember that in the communications in the army or in the air force or all the other, the Navy.
7:39 And this was a Navajo code
7:43 this is American Morse code. So there was a difference whether we, we started off with that and any messages that we had and say in combat you. So we got an order. I happened to be with um a major general, just two star general and one star general, bigger general. And I got a bunch of colonels
8:08 and headquarters signal company. And that's how we were separated. And each division, each division was about 20,000 marines in combat. And it goes on down the line like regiments, companies, battalions down to, down to the front line and they placed us all the way down because
8:32 messages that had to go down or orders had to go down. Directives had to go down requests coming back or messages and all that. So say any message like in combat, say we were s we have an order from the front line or request
8:56 that is getting rough up there. We need some help. They will be asking for maybe naval gunfire, aerial gunfire, artillery gunfire, mortar gunfire. And that was our job. We had, we had Navajos on the command ships also out there in the sea. So they got the message
9:21 and then they respond whatever we they're asking for from the ground. If they say we're asking for it for it, they want a bomb, a certain place like a hill in combat, your coordinates, just like a blueprint. There was always a hill wherever you go and
9:44 there might be a hill is a location like that and they usually number them or letter them like hill one, hill two or hill three. Give you an example. Bomb
9:59 hill
10:02 two. That's the kind of message that we get. And uh
10:10 what they do, the commander of that say in the company down there, they'll give a message, just an ordinary piece of paper. Maybe the colonel or somebody give it to the Navajo code talker. He writes out in English just that message because the order is got going back. So he goes to the radio
10:35 and then he trans uh transmitted back to us in headquarters in uh Navajo code. And then I receive it and I get it in Navajo code and I translate it into English and we print it. That's the fastest way of doing it. We don't use longhand typewriter or anything like that
11:01 or short hand. And then we just gave it to our officer. We translate it in English. Then they got the message right away. So then it goes out to the ship. No, to the air. And uh we need some help on that hill two probably the, the Japanese are there fired on the
11:24 machine gun nest or whatever and they wanted that out of the way. So we transmit this. This is already coded through this alphabet. A bomb. We didn't have to spell that because it will take a little longer to spell it. We could go, we could say bear
11:48 O. O is an owl down here. Owl and I forget what mom was uh I think it was mouse. We can't say bear, owl mouse, bear, there's two B's and there's still two bears. And instead of that,
12:08 they, they gave us, the decoder gave us the Navajo that went ahead of us. They call it an egg.
12:17 It's like a chicken egg. So, and then they come to Hill, Hill instead of spelling that, which take a little time, we go back to the alphabet. H was a horse. So we got this horse now,
12:36 but there's another word there. Ill. You all know what a is a, a per a sick person or a sick horse or whatever. So we've made, we name it sick horse backwards. And this was a common, more common with just say [speaks Navajo] which means two. So the message is
13:02 in Navajo egg [speaks Navajo] and
13:08 horse in Navajo is [speaks Navajo] and this is this common not [speaks Navajo] which means two. So [speaks Navajo] that was how fast it was. And our Navajo people are on the reservation. They could hear us talking in Navajo if they could hear us,
13:30 but they wouldn't know what make a head or tail of it. It was all mixed up like that. That's how the code. There's a lot of other words that, that we, we, we use against the Japanese and uh of course, the Japanese were there, they get on of our frequency and uh they were all smart
13:53 probably you know, they were trained and over there or the United States and they're real smart expert on decoding messages like this code, naval code or army code or Morse code that was commonly used. It was. But they know, we know they're listening to us because they tried to jam us,
14:17 they play an old, uh, record or something, make a lot of noise or they do scratching noise to interrupt us, but they never did. We knew each other so much. We trained together, we train, we knew each others voices real good and we knew the code real good and that was all memorized.
14:41 We did the messages that went through and there's a lot of other ways they try to do it. Like I, I explained here about Hill two, say our troops are on hill one and the Japanese on hill two in that area. Maybe they fired on our, our troops on hill one. That's why we asked for support
15:06 and they'll come on the air while we're doing that. Uh They figured that they, they were, they, uh somehow they know if there's a plane going over or something like that and they try to throw us off somehow in English. And uh we knew better.
15:31 They were not our commanding officer that gave us the message. So everything was done in, in the Navajo coded language. And uh they try to throw us off on some, on some reports that we had and
15:48 we knew that was them. But unless we got another message from our commanding officer, even if it happened, another message behind it, it had to be done by a navajo code talker, not in English again from there. So what they try to do is divert us from one hill to the other and create a friendly fire and they couldn't succeed on that. And
16:14 there's a lot of things that happened that we could talk about it all day. But uh that's how we start using. There was other words and we never had any um navajo words for military planes like uh torpedo bomber or observation plane or uh fighter planes. The same way with ships
16:39 and the ships, we never had a Navajo word or ships, all kinds like submarine, battleships, cruisers, destroyers and all that. Then we had no, no language for rank like a general or colonel or sergeants all the way down the line. and we had no, no words for outfits like uh brigi- uh
17:05 regiment or battalion or company. Those we had to for planes. We use birds, we use birds for planes and we use the ships, we use fish for ships. But in our language, we had a rough time on it
17:28 because we don't have all kinds of birds like these birdwatchers. No.
17:34 And the only thing we knew is like crows and owls and that's it. They're pretty prominent all over same way with ships. With the, we don't have lakes out there. We don't have rivers or we didn't know all the, we didn't know any name for fish. We have to learn that, like, for a submarine because there was no Navajo language. We called it iron fish. So
17:57 that's made of iron and goes underwater. And battleship. We don't have no word Navajo. They call it bird carrier [speaks Navajo] See birds are up there so they carry the birds, you know, at that. And the same way with, uh, planes, like an owl,
18:20 like observation plane, we had a lot of observation planes that fly over all the time. They spot things. We call that an owl because you know how an owl is there always observing all that. So that's how we get that language was decoded and it worked real good. Our own people wouldn't even know.
18:43 Nobody went to that Navajo code school wouldn't know. And hardly any mistakes. If we did make mistakes, nobody would know just us. Ok, not even the general would know it
19:02 but they were, they were corrected real fast, you know, that's so that's how we operate. Uh, there was supposed to be Navajo sergeant with us. He was supposed to monitor us but he didn't give it. I, you know, combat, he doesn't go ahead. Oh, yeah. Language here anyway. Uh, that's part of the, uh, the, the language that we, we're gonna go more and more on that.
19:27 Demonstration on that. And uh how it started was uh through a Anglo fellow at the time, he was working in Los Angeles as an engineer, civil engineer. And years back, he was raised on a Navajo reservation. He was a son of a Navajo, I mean a, a missionary and he learned that language
19:51 when he was a little boy. I'm playing with the Navajo kids and he thought about it because they found out that he heard that there was too much code being, being deciphered, decoded, which was true. They knew the Japanese knew where we were, where we were going, when we were going, how many of us are going all of that ahead of time
20:16 on top of that Tokyo always coming to
20:20 trying to follow us up. And uh otherwise, you know, anyway, she wanted to, that's how uh this code was used. And he suggested that to the Marine Corps in San Diego. And uh so it took quite a while for them to decide they had a demonstration. Some Navajo was over here and the regular Morse code users
20:44 and they sent, gave, gave them messages, identical messages, sent, sent it and the receiver over there. And there's two Navajos over here and then the other two that uh not Navajos but they operated the other form. So they sent a message, the Navajo message went through about two minutes and over here they, it took about 15-20 minutes it's how fast it was too.
21:08 So, a lot of lives were saved on that because decoding, they had the little machine with buttons, like numbers and letters. They had to decode it, send it over air and then the other side, they have another machine, then they decode it took time, took time. So, and that's where our language came in real fast. So I think a lot of times that,
21:32 that they really help, I think being a speed and hardly any, any mistake I, my last operation was Iwo Jima You probably heard of Iwo Jima. That island had to be taken and it cost us a lot of casualties. Well, that's another thing that my job was from headquarters
21:55 every day. I had to transmit uh casualty killed in action, wounded in action, missing in action all day fighting. There's a lot of casualties and we transmitted to a board ship where there were some more commanders, high ranking generals and admirals and there's some Navajos up there,
22:20 they got the message and related to them. And then in the morning, the same way, all night fighting. Of course, we got a lot of casualties. Again, they transmit that. They transmit to Pearl Harbor, which was our general headquarters. And from Pearl Harbor, they transmitted to the president at that time was Franklin D Roosevelt. So the president knew
22:44 what was going on that day. And uh that's about what I want to tell you. I have more to tell, but I'm going to let Sam take over at this time. Oh, my God.
23:05 Yeah.
23:11 Have a rest,
23:14 you dont write on that side I think.
23:19 Can this be erased?
23:23 Sure. Yeah. Somehow All you need is a rag Good afternoon.
23:31 I see we made full house again
23:37 and that's good.
23:39 This shows me that there are a lot of people that are very patriotic to us here.
23:58 Let me tell you
24:02 when I went in
24:05 1943 March 13th,
24:11 when I went in, I didn't even know what was I was getting into. I didn't know whether I was coming or going
24:27 just completely off the reservation.
24:34 And, uh,
24:37 but I learn,
24:41 I learned otherwise, I wouldn't be a code talker.
24:48 I had to know how to speak Navajo language fluently and understand it.
24:59 On top of that, I have to know how to speak English, read, write with good grammar.
25:13 Otherwise, if you don't have the two, you can't become a code talker. Yeah, they won't let you.
25:26 But, uh, I'll tell you something, what Major Connors of the, uh, communication officers said
25:44 he was the one that
25:47 was with Fifth Marine Division and he said,
25:54 if it were not for the Navajo code talkers, the Maries would have never taken Iwo Jima
26:06 if you doubt me, ask Major Connors.
26:15 Now,
26:17 I'll tell you about the, um,
26:21 flag raising on Mount Suribachi
27:06 on February 23rd. Just before noon.
27:13 We were all dug in
27:17 a foxhole.
27:20 All of a sudden
27:23 this message came in on the radio.
27:30 I just only caught from this part on,
27:37 but I heard this one but I wrote this one down on a, on a pad.
27:48 And every time I received a message
27:55 on a pad, the marines are right around me. They always, now and then they look at us
28:04 and then when we receive the message and write it down, they always say what's up chief?
28:14 You know, I used to resent being called chief.
28:21 I don't know it just guys but think about it, put you down there.
28:29 But later on, I found out that they were giving me a promotion,
28:41 then I accept it.
28:45 And now
28:48 when I wrote this down
28:51 and the message in my ears, it came in and the English interpretation, this one Mount Suribachi is secured by the marines. But uh it said
29:15 [speaks Navajo] means space. If you uh watch the uh movie on
29:30 um
29:32 Wind Talker, those guys are talking to each other. They keep saying [speaks Navajo] that means space, space, space.
29:43 Otherwise, if there is no space, everything will be all together. [inaudbile]
29:52 And uh when I received it, uh this one, the M is for mouse
30:08 and then it says mouse, a capital letter is big.
30:14 So this one will be big,
30:22 big mouse
30:25 that's for M capital M and the T is for Turkey.
30:43 And then space
30:48 and then this one,
30:51 we don't have any of these uh verbs like this. It comes afterwards, not before what it describes. So uh this is the only one I heard
31:08 this letter here stands for sheep,
31:20 E
31:42 like that. It says a big mouth, turkey, space. Sheep's eye is cured and see this one, here's the word cured.
31:59 This one is for I and this one is for sheep
32:04 and that sort of became the famous one. Even our own people always ask us about that. He says though, what was that phrase that you uh said about the flag being raised on top of mount. Mount Suribachi So we say this one to them.
32:31 That's the one I received. And as soon as I wrote it up and then uh they asked the marines uh asked me what's up. So all I did was point up to the top of the mountain and they look over there and they just jump out and start yelling and dancing there. Those guys are kind of nutty.
32:57 He forgot Japanese bullets were still flying around there.
33:02 And then the sergeant is there, just bark at us and said, get back into your foxhole there. So they just all jump back in there there. I don't know if anybody got hit or not there. But I also jumped out in there too.
33:19 Anyway, this is one of them. Oh, we receive it, decode it in our head and write it down in English. Uh like this and then write it down and either give it to our runner or our sergeant or the other there.
33:42 And another one that I was a number of them, I was involved in it like ordering tanks, flamethrower or dive bombers to strafe or bomb. By the way, dive bombers is called [speaks Navajo]
34:11 Chicken Hawk.
34:16 And then also the, uh, I'll give you the code word for America.
34:25 [speaks Navajo]
34:28 it means our mother, that's the code wood for America or USA.
34:37 And then uh
34:41 another incident that uh
34:45 we also were directly involved was that yesterday, I explained that running, across the death valley
34:56 and that death valley
35:00 when we came back to hill number 368.
35:08 And he told us to report. So, uh my buddy that I ran across with, he went in to report and the sergeant pulled us over to the side and boy, he really chewed us up and down there.
35:26 Haven't you learned how to take orders yet?
35:33 And says that when we were trying to help, that was not your order. Your order was to locate the machine gun nest and report back.
35:48 Oh, he kept chewing us up on that. And then I thought he was going to give us 100 push ups there,
35:57 but he never did.
36:01 Anyway,
36:04 one of the code talkers there
36:08 sent a message for artillery,
36:15 rocket fire and mortar
36:21 all at the same time
36:26 on those machine gun nests.
36:31 And then it only took less than five minutes before all those artillery fires, rockets and mortar shells start coming in on the machine gun nest. They just completely pulverised that area.
36:52 So when I say less than five minutes, that mean to send a coded message and then start firing in less than five minutes. That's how quick it was.
37:05 Anyway,
37:08 when that thing start exploding oh
37:13 it's deafening your ears,
37:18 And then when they stopped firing,
37:23 they ordered the marines
37:27 across and they just walk across no fires at all.
37:37 And uh
37:39 afterwards,
37:42 some of the marines said,
37:46 I didn't think about it. I never thought that I was just taking orders.
37:54 Hey, you guys
37:57 don't you understand what we, what they did to us?
38:02 I said what they send you guys out there for them, the Japanese machine gun target
38:12 and we were out there being used as a target to locate the machine gun nest.
38:19 Why they put, pick us to do that is beyond me. They could have done it to the same marines that were trying to cross there. But as they pull us out of the front line and they march us over there.
38:38 And boy, I tell you, I now I really resent it.
38:45 If they're going to punish me. Why do they punish the other guys? Not me. Anyway, that one, that was used again there.
38:57 And also my own outfit, the recon company,
39:06 they sent them out to Iwo Jima Island three days before the invasion. Just before dawn, they were out there on the beach looking for obstacle.
39:22 I never knew why demolition experts were included in the recon company. And that's what they were. Mostly the demolition expert were, went into the submarine and they went ahead and then it's a good thing. They didn't blow up anything because there was no obstacle. They came back and they told us
39:47 we found out we were going to hit Iwo Jima. And then here's the map. He showed us the map and I took a look at it and I found out it was only about 8, 7 miles long. The lengthwise, the widest part was uh about three miles. And then I said,
40:11 I went on top of the deck of the ship we're moving forward with, I looked to the right and I looked to the left. Oh my gosh, there are all kinds of ships, battleships going forward
40:28 and right there. I said, with all that help. If we get on top of the island, we'll all sink it
40:43 in less than a day. But I found out that,
40:49 that Iwo Jima Island was really fortified. They have block houses, they have underground tunnels.
41:00 Oh man, it was really a fortress
41:06 when we move forward
41:10 and we get pinned down by the machine guns, we can't move forward. So they have to call in flamethrower for help.
41:23 We lay behind some of the boulders and stuff like that. And the flamethrower finally crawls in and he started putting the flames on them. You can hear the Japanese screaming at some of them running
41:42 and you know what?
41:45 I was very happy that they were on our side. If it's on the other side, we would have really gotten the hot foot too.
41:59 Even when they ask for support with the tank. When the tank comes in, they start blasting away direct right at them and you go behind it
42:12 while they put their heads down, we move forward. And that's another help that you have your own team with you.
42:23 When the dive bomber comes in, they start diving it and then uh dropping bombs and uh strafing it, you almost get up and start clapping. Thank you air boys for helping.
42:40 Boy, that, that, that was some experience I've lived through there and up to this day,
42:49 what did I do?
42:54 And I realized that
43:00 it is worth fighting for America and the freedom that it has for us.
43:10 And I'll be glad to do it again if they need me.
43:29 And I'll also like to thank all the American people
43:39 finally, they are beginning to know
43:44 what we did in the Second World War and boy.
43:51 I saw the bask in glory now.
43:57 Thank you, ladies and gentlemen for Private First Class Samuel Tso and Corporal Merril Sandoval.
44:19 Thank you very much. My name is Ronnie Town and as Merril mentioned earlier, I'm a special events coordinator for the Navajo code talkers. My involvement began with my father who was an instructor based in Camp Elliott, which is now Camp Pendleton. Um This is the place where most of the code talkers were sent. Um because there was a special school
44:42 there called the Navajo Communications School. This is where they learned the code and it was strictly done by memorization. There were about three waves of code talkers sent over. The first began with a group of 29 which created the code. Um They use the Navajo language and the American alphabet
45:04 and military method of code, combining the three. And that's how they came up with the Navajo code. There are about 13 Native American tribes across the nation that were used as code talkers during World War II. And um from the research that I've done, it looks like the military went straight down the United States
45:26 and everybody west of a certain line went to the Pacific, everybody east of a certain line went to Europe. Um American Native um um American Natives have been fighting for the United States as far back as long before Lewis and Clark. Um Our basic um you will notice among most tribes,
45:49 our basic understanding of human nature is to assist rather than to attack. Um We were not always met with gratitude and friendship, but um our first effort was always to befriend because it was another human life. Um We have always defended Mother Earth and when it is um threatened
46:14 at any point in time, you will see most Native Americans come up to defend firsthand. Um Out of the three groups that were sent over the 29 were sent first. The second wave was probably the largest. They were sent from 1942 to 1944 recruited and they were the ones who saw battle. Um These gentlemen were part of that group.
46:39 Um The last group was recruited in nine, from 1945 to 46. Most of which did not see battle. Um They were trained in the code. They were given basic military training, but they never actually went overseas because by then the war had ended. Um It has been my
47:00 great fortune um to receive a history lesson, a very fast history lesson because my father, as most of these gentlemen um were told, never said anything about what they were involved in. We all knew they were military men, military veterans in World War II, but they had never said that they were involved in. So, um such a secret military mission.
47:25 Um I did not learn about my father's involvement until three years before he received his silver medal. Um The 4, 5 gentlemen that you saw on National TV, receiving the gold medal from the president were the last five remaining of the original 29. Since then, we have lost one of those gentlemen.
47:48 So there are only four of that original 29 group still alive. There were overall in the past, in the four years that they were recruited about 450 men. Um The Navajo Code Talker Memorial Foundation took a census just recently this past October and they were able to locate um
48:09 about 325 of those 450 men. And they are still as far as we know, still residing within the States of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah. And I believe we even found one in California and also one in Oklahoma. It has been our deep honor and pleasure to be here in Montana.
48:33 It is my first trip here and I'm ready to move to Montana now.
48:38 Um We thank you so much for the invitation and for attending. I will take these gentlemen in the back. We do have some of our um books available for their, your purchase and they will be happy to autograph that we also have a photo of the largest group that I've ever worked with. There are 15 code talkers who attended the Santa Fe Indian market in 2001.
49:01 These two gentlemen were in um involved in that um event and they are also in that photo. And so they will be happy to talk to you and uh shake your hand and, and take whatever greeting you have and, and oh, and Sam, of course, is not done. 13 code talkers KIA
49:23 there were 13 code talkers missing in action or killed in action that never returned back.
49:30 So, um again, thank you so much and God bless America and God bless you. Thank you
49:50 in the back And thank you so much for sharing your story with us.

Tent of Many Voices

Merril Sandoval and Samuel Tso: Navajo Code Talkers in World War II

Merril Sandoval

Navajo

50:00

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Merril Sandoval and Samuel Tso: Navajo Code Talkers in World War II

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