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10 November 2025 is the 250th anniversary of the United States Marine Corps. I served in the Corps, and today I work for the Corps s a historian. I am proud to be a Marine, proud of my Corps. We celebrate our birthday every year with balls and ceremonies, and for the past few years I've celebrated by sharing quotes about Marines on line. Not all positive - loving the Corps means taking the bad with the good - but they all illustrate, in my opinion, some aspect of the Corps and the Marines who make it what it is. So, through 10 November, I'll share several quotes a day, a long with a iconic painting or photograph about Marines.
Today's Marine Corps Quotes:
If the Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eaton, the Japanese bases in the Pacific were captured on the beaches of the Caribbean.
—LtGen H. M. “Howlin’ Mad” Smith: “Coral and Brass,” 1949
A man with a flag in his pack and the desire to put it on an enemy strong point isn’t likely to bug out.
—Col Lewis B. “Chesty“ Puller to an Army staff officer who, watching Marines raise the flag over Seoul, complained “Marines would rather carry a flag into battle than a weapon.”
I’m going to fight my way out, I’m going to take all my equipment and all my wounded and as many dead as I can. If we can’t get out this way, this Division will never fight as a unit again.
—MajGen Oliver P. Smith, CG, lstMarDiv, Korea, 1950, to LtGen Ned Almond, USA, X Corps, who suggested Smith’s division escape the Chosin Reservoir by letting “every man go out on foot by himself.”
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| Marines make their way down Funchilin Pass on their way from Chosin Reservoir to the port of Hungnam. Painting by Charles H. Waterhouse "Band of Brothers." |
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