Louis R. Lowery

On June 23, 2016, the Marine Corps announced that former Navy corpsman John Bradley (deceased) who was depicted as the third bronze statue from the bottom of the flagstaff on the monument, was not in the Rosenthal photograph and former Marine Harold Schultz (deceased) was. Franklin Sousley and Schultz are depicted as the third and fifth bronze statues from the bottom of the flagstaff with the 32 foot (9.8 M) bronze statues of Harlon Block, Rene Gagnon, Michael Strank, and Ira Hayes on the monument.

Lowery was the founder and president of the United States Marine Corps Combat Correspondents Association (USMCCCA). He also was a photographic director of Leatherneck Magazine, a publication of the Marine Corps. He died on April 15, 1987, at age 70 from aplastic anemia and is buried in Quantico National Cemetery in Prince William County, Virginia near the Marine Corps War Memorial. In 2006, Lowery was portrayed by actor David Hornsby in film Flags of Our Fathers.

Lowery was buried at the Quantico National Cemetery in 1987, followed by his wife Doris in 2004.

On February 23, 1945, Lowery, then a staff sergeant, accompanied the 40-man combat patrol (which included two Navy corpsmen) that climbed Mount Suribachi to seize and occupy the crest and raise the Second Battalion's U.S. flag if possible to signal that it was captured. The patrol led by First Lieutenant Harold Schrier, captured and secured the mountaintop and raised the flag attached to a Japanese steel water pipe approximately 10:30 A.M. Immediately after the flag was raised, a short firefight took place after Japanese soldiers came out of a cave. An enemy grenade was tossed, and Lowery fell with his camera several feet down the side of the crater from the blast. Lowery was unhurt, and though his camera was damaged, the film was intact.

The actual flag raising (not in Lowery's photographs) was done by Lt. Schrier (a former Marine Raider), Platoon Sgt. Ernest Thomas (a former drill instructor), and Sgt. Henry Hansen (a former Paramarine), according to Sgt. Thomas who did a CBS news interview aboard the flagship USS Eldorado (AGC-11) after meeting with Vice Admiral Richmond K. Turner and Lieutenant General Holland Smith on February 25, 1945. Most of the patrol members were from Third Platoon, Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 28th Marine Regiment, 5th Marine Division; Pfc. Raymond Jacobs was the radioman (photographed by Lowery) reassigned from F Company for the patrol. Hansen was killed in action on Iwo Jima on March 1 and Thomas on March 3, 1945.

The Marine Corps War Memorial (also known as the Iwo Jima Memorial) in Arlington, Virginia which was inspired by Rosenthal's photograph of the second flag-raising by six Marines atop Mount Suribachi on February 23, 1945, was dedicated on November 10, 1954. Lowery, who was present at the first flag-raising on Mount Suribachi and took the first photographs of the American flag, attended the dedication.

Louis R. Lowery (July 24, 1916 – April 15, 1987) was a United States Marine Corps captain. He was the only Marine Corps combat photographer to cover six major campaigns during World War II. He is best known for taking the first photographs of the first American flag that was raised on top of Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima on the morning of February 23, 1945.

Lowery was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on July 24, 1916. He attended Boyd Business College and the National School of Photography in Pennsylvania. He was a newspaper photographer in Pittsburgh before World War II. In 1967, he served as president of the Marine Corps Combat Correspondents Association. He received the Brigadier General Robert L. Denig Memorial Award in 1983 for distinguished service.