3,000 Japanese Attacked 840 U.S. Marines on a Ridge – And Lost

In September 1942, the entire American hold on Guadalcanal came down to one bare coral spine a mile south of Henderson Field, the only airstrip on the island. Lieutenant Colonel Merritt Edson got his Raiders and Parachutists onto that ridge by telling his own division commander it was a quiet place to rest. It was not. Captured Japanese documents from a raid at Tasimboko had already put thousands of enemy troops ashore, and Major General Kiyotake Kawaguchi’s brigade was marching through the interior to take the airfield back. Edson’s two battalions were under-strength, worn down by Tulagi and Gavutu, dug into coral they could barely break, and carrying one or two grenades per man. Over two nights, Kawaguchi threw everything he had at them. By the early hours of 14 September the Marine line had been pushed back onto a single hill, and one shouted word nearly turned the whole position into a rout. This is the full story of the Battle of Edson’s Ridge, what it cost both sides, and why the Japanese never came closer to winning Guadalcanal.