US Marine Corps General. He served as the 20th Commandant of the US Marine Corps and is remembered for securing a permanent place on the Joint Chiefs of Staff while serving in this position, gaining parity for the Marine Corps with the other military services. A highly decorated US Marine officer, he was a veteran of World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. He graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1917, graduating a year early so he could enter the Marine Corps. He was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Marine Corps in April 1917 and reported for active duty at the Marine Barracks, Port Royal, South Carolina the following month. In 1918, during World War I, he served in France as a member of the 5th Marine Regiment with the first elements of the American Expeditionary Forces. He sat duty in defensive sectors in the vicinity of Verdun and participated in the Aisne-Marne offensive (Château-Thierry) where he was twice wounded in action at Belleau Wood during the fighting there in June 1918. He returned to the front in August, rejoining the 5th Marines and saw action in the St. Mihiel and Meuse-Argonne offensives (Champagne) where he was wounded for the third time. After duty with the Army of Occupation in Germany, he returned to the US as a captain in July 1919. Two months later, he returned to France to prepare relief maps showing the battlefields over which the US 4th Marine Brigade had fought. In December 1920 he returned to the US, and was assigned as White House aide and Aide-de-Camp to the Commandant of the Marine Corps, Major General John A. Lejeune. In July 1922, he took command of a selected company of Marines at the Brazil's Centennial Exposition in Rio de Janeiro. The following year, he was assigned to sea duty as Commanding Officer of the Marine Detachment on the USS Idaho, which was followed by duty at the Marine Barracks, Norfolk, where he commanded the Sea School. In April 1927, he was sent to China for expeditionary duty, where he served in the 3rd Marine Brigade in Tientsin and Shanghai. Returning to the US in 1929, he held various assignments before entering the Naval War College at Newport, Rhode Island in 1936. Following graduation in May 1937, he commanded the 2nd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, part of the newly formed Fleet Marine Force, Atlantic, which was being extensively employed in the development of amphibious tactics and techniques. In June 1939 he was assigned to the Staff of Marine Corps Schools, Quantico, Virginia, where he served during the next three years as Director, Correspondence School; Chief of the Tactical Section; Officer in Charge of the Candidates Class; and Assistant Commandant. In March 1942, four months after the United States entry into World War II, he took command of the 9th Marine Regiment at the rank of colonel and organized, trained, and took the unit overseas as part of the 3rd Marine Division. In July 1943 he was promoted to the rank of brigadier general and was sent to Guadalcanal in the pacific Theater, and was assigned as Assistant Division Commander of the 1st Marine Division. In this capacity, he participated in the Cape Gloucester operation on New Britain from December 1943 through March 1944. In May 1944 he became commander of the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade and led them in the invasion and subsequent recapture of Guam during July and August 1944. For distinguished leadership in this operation, he was promoted to the rank of major general. After organizing the 6th Marine Division from the Brigade, he commanded it throughout the Battle of Okinawa and subsequently took the Division to Tsingtao, China where he received the surrender of the Japanese forces in this area on October 25, 1945. He returned to the US and in March 1946, he organized the Troop Training Command, Amphibious Forces, Atlantic Fleet, at Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek, Virginia. In November of the same year, he was ordered to duty as Assistant to the Commandant Marine Corps Headquarters, Washington DC. He remained at this post until April 1948, when he was assigned to Quantico where he served as Commandant of the Marine Corps Schools until June 1950. With the outbreak of the Korean War, he was in command of the Fleet Marine Force, Pacific, with Headquarters at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, where he played a major role in the amphibious assault at Inchon and the evacuation of U.S. forces from Hungnam following their withdrawal from the Chosin Reservoir in North Korea in December 1950. On January 1, 1952 he was promoted to the rank of general and President Harry S. Truman appointed him Commandant of the Marine Corps. During his four-year tour in this capacity, he initiated a number of important policies that resulted in increased military proficiency for the Marine Corps. He was the first Commandant to become a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and he retired from the Marine Corps on January 1, 1956, with 39 years of active military service. He received numerous US military and foreign decorations and awards, including the Navy Cross, the Distinguished Service Cross, the Navy Distinguished Service Medal with two stars, the Silver Star with two oak leaf clusters, the Legion of Merit with one oak leaf cluster and valor device, the Bronze Star with valor device, the Purple Heart with two oak leaf clusters and one star, the Navy Presidential Unit Citation with three stars, the Navy Unit Commendation Medal with one star, and many, many more. Two months after his retirement, he was appointed Chairman of the Inter-American Defense Board, serving in that capacity until September 1959. He died at his home from bone cancer at the age of 94.