This might work, after all. Japanese troops swept up Engineer Hill toward the howitzers but then encountered heavy hand-to-hand fighting on the ridgeline. Incredibly, as Yamasaki’s forces fell back down the slopes and dispersed, about 500 Japanese soldiers committed mass suicide by pulling the pins on their grenades and holding them to their chests. Yamasaki himself took a bullet while leading one last charge. The Americans were stunned.
