Hadley Twp.- With the exception of a few sea birds and caribou the Aleuntian Islands of the north Pacific are deserted.
Yet about 60 years ago the small, jagged volcanic chain of islands were a pivotal WWII battleground. Ortonville native Orra Sutton was part of the defense of these islands’key in staving off a Japanese invasion from the west.
Born in 1919, Sutton attended Ortonville High School earning his diploma in 1936. A sheet metal worker by trade, Sutton was employed by Holland Furnace Company in Pontiac after high school. Following the outbreak of WWII Sutton enlisted in the United States Air Force in the spring of 1942. He married Kathryn in April and left for basic training at Jefferson Barracks, Mo. two weeks later.
‘The bus picked up a few of us boys in downtown Ortonville,? said Sutton. We left in the afternoon and went to Pontiac before leaving for Missouri. Some of my friends were going into the infantry ‘that’s not for me, so I choose the Air Force.?
Sutton went from Missouri to Seattle then by ship to the northern Pacific and the Aleuntian Islands as part of the 11th Air Force.
Sutton was stationed on the Aleuntian Island of Umnak. When he arrived in 1942 they lived in tents and later built Quonset huts for sleeping, and later still a mess hall. The natives of the small island were relocated and an airstrip was built by engineers.
At the time Sutton was stationed on Umnak, the nearby island of Attu, about 1,100 miles southwest of the Alaskan mainland and 750 miles northeast of the Japanese Kurile Islands was invaded by the Japanese 301st Independent Infantry Battalion. Attu is about 20-by-35 miles in size and is today the home of a small number of U. S. Coastguard personnel operating a Loran station.
Due to his training with sheet metal Sutton’s military responsibility included repairing airplanes that may have been shot or damaged during combat.
‘What many people never realized is that the ‘Japs? were eyeing invasion of United States through Alaska and the Aleutian Islands,? said Sutton. ‘Our job up there was to keep them out.?
‘Our winters are worse here in Michigan,? laughs Sutton. Never much snow but lots of wind. The island had few trees and was very mountainous. But there were lots of fish in the rivers so in our spare time we caught salmon and trout.?
Later in the war Attu was the site of some of the most fierce fighting during WWII. On May 11, 1943 the Japanese were driven off the island by American forces.
Sutton would spend about two years on Umnak and return to Sioux Falls, S.D. in 1944. That same year still part of the Air Force accepted a job with National Aeronautics in Cleveland. He would later move to Hadley Township and work for Fisher Body in Grand Blanc.
‘I’ve returned to Alaska twice since the war for reunions with fellow soldiers,? said Sutton. ‘Our number are few now.?