http://www.IwoJima.com/battle/battlec.htm

Tarawa- Nov 20 1943 Because of bad tides the marines were forced to get off the ships and wade hundreds of yards to the shore and about one half of us died. It was a mistake on the commanders' part. He believed that because they were bombed for nearly a week that all the Japanese would be dead. But nearly all the Japs lived and those Japanese killed about 991 marines and wounded 2311. But we stuck it to them and killed 4,500.

Makin- Nov 23 1943 Makin was easily takin in only four days. It yielded a great loss in the Navy than ground troops with a total of about 642 dead. This was the first real step to carrying the allied offensive towards Japan. I landed on the "Yellow" beach and because of a miscalculation all the boats were dropped aground and our men had to wade more than 250 feet into the shore. Luckily the Japs had chosen to hold their final defense away from the shore so only ten men died while wading up to the shore.

picture from http://www.hourigan.com/~69thny/makin.htm