Norman T. Hatch, a Marine Corps cinematographer who produced some of the most intimate and harrowing glimpses of war seen on film and whose dramatic footage of the Battle of Tarawa during World War II won an Academy Award, died April 22 at a nursing home in Alexandria, Va. He was 96.
The cause could not immediately be determined, said his son, N. Thomas Hatch Jr.
Using a hand-cranked 16mm camera, Mr. Hatch and his crews in the Marine Corps’ newly formed Photographic Services Branch captured several fierce battles in the Pacific Theater as they happened. The resulting film revealed the heroism and horror of battle in sometimes raw and unsettling ways.
In November 1943, Mr. Hatch single-handedly filmed much of the 76-hour battle for the island of Tarawa, one of the first major Allied victories in the Pacific Theater of World War II. He took shelter in bomb craters, then joined his fellow Marines as they advanced toward Japanese enemy lines.
When other Marines asked why he was so close to the action, “I would say, sure I’ve got to be here,” Mr. Hatch told United Press International in 2005. “I’ve got to be here just as much as you’re here. I’ve got to document what you’re doing.”
Japanese forces were heavily entrenched on Tarawa, a strategic island about one-third the size of New York’s Central Park. Mr. Hatch filmed the fighting in black-and-white and in color, often standing exposed to rifle fire, grenades and bursting artillery shells.
“Why I didn’t get hit, I don’t know,” he told UPI. “I was probably within about 30, 40 feet of the enemy in one shot.”
In the foreground of one scene, he showed Marines firing at fleeing Japanese soldiers — perhaps the only time in the Pacific Theater when troops from both sides could be seen in the same frame of film.
More than 1,000 Marines were killed on Tarawa, but images of the dead were considered shocking and even unpatriotic at the time. President Franklin D. Roosevelt did not want to release the footage of dead Marines floating in the waters off Tarawa, but he became convinced that people would give more support to the country’s war effort if they could see its grisly toll.
Mr. Hatch's film was edited at a Hollywood studio and made into a 20-minute documentary, "With the Marines at Tarawa," complete with narration of the sound effects. It was widely shown at theaters throughout the country and received the 1945 Academy Award for best short documentary.
Instead of going to Hollywood to accept the Oscar, Mr. Hatch went onshore with the first wave of Marines reaching the island of Iwo Jima in February 1945.
The Battle of Iwo Jima was not just a turning point in the war, but it provided one of the country's most indelible battlefield images, as Marines raised the U.S. flag on the island's Mount Suribachi. Mr. Hatch did not film the flag-raising himself, but he sent two members of his crew, who were joined by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal.
A small flag had been raised earlier, but a Marine officer wanted to plant a larger flag that could be seen over a wider distance. It was this second flag-raising that was captured by Rosenthal and by a Marine cameraman under Mr. Hatch’s command.
When a dispute arose over whether the second flag-raising had been staged, Mr. Hatch was summoned to the Pentagon to help resolve the matter. He confirmed the authenticity of Rosenthal's memorable photograph with footage shot by Bill Genaust, who was killed days later on Iwo Jima.
Mr. Hatch later helped edit film that was released as the documentary "To the Shores of Iwo Jima," which was nominated for an Academy Award.
“Once you put the camera up to your eye, you are in another world,” Mr. Hatch said in 2005, when asked about working under fire. “You are not part of the battlefield when you do that because you are concentrating on what you are doing.”
Norman Thomas Hatch was born March 2, 1921, in Boston and grew up in Gloucester, Mass. He joined the Marine Corps in 1939 “because I needed a job,” he later said.
Long interested in photography, he eventually joined the Marines’ photographic unit and was sent for training with the documentary filmmakers of the March of Time newsreels. After his discharge in 1946, he sold photographic equipment for a few years before joining the Defense Department as a civilian employee in the early 1950s.
He worked in the Pentagon’s audiovisual department and became an adviser to the secretary of defense and a consultant to the White House press office and Congress. He retired in 1980 and later ran a photo agency, Photo Press International, for more than 20 years. He served in the Marine Reserve for many years, reaching the rank of major.
A book about Mr. Hatch and his film unit, “War Shots,” by military historian Charles Jones, was published in 2011.
Survivors include his wife of 74 years, the former Lois Rousseau of Alexandria; and two children, N. Thomas Hatch Jr. and Colby Hatch, both of Alexandria.
In later years, Mr. Hatch often spoke about the Marine Corps, the battles he witnessed and the importance of having the media document the nation at war, even if it was uncomfortable for the military.
“They should be there no matter what,” he said in 2005. “If you don’t let the public know what you’re doing then they won’t support you later on.”
The Academy Award for "With the Marines at Tarawa"resides at the National Museum of the Marine Corps in Triangle, Va.
When asked about the Oscar, Mr. Hatch said, “I didn’t win it. The Marine Corps won it.”
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