American Valor Quarterly Issue 10 - Summer 2013 | Page 25

was not in the plans.
Anyway, things in those days
happened really quick. From boot
camp to the West Coast, I wound up
in the Navy yard in Pearl Harbor. And
there were a lot of us. What did they
do with us? Put us on work detail. My
first work detail was helping to take
the dead bodies off of the Oklahoma
after the Japanese attack. As you
might imagine, it was not a very
pleasant task.
Well, I happened to be on a work
detail on the carrier Saratoga. We were
waiting to be assigned in a fresh water
tank, wire brushing rust. They just
decided to take her out on a shake
down for whatever there was to do.
Well, I was still in the fresh water
tank, wire brushing rust when an
explosion occurred. An explosion. It
happened only 20 feet from where I
was on a work detail.
“What was that?” I thought to myself.
“Get out of that tank!” somebody
yelled. So I got out of the tank.
“What happened?” I asked as soon as
I got out.

The USS Nautilus off Mare Island, April 15, 1942.

And that’s exactly what happened. I
wound up waiting to be assigned to
the submarine service. Along came the
submarine Nautilus about the middle
of May 1942 and I became crew
member. That was exactly what I had
wanted. I really wanted combat;
wanted to get in there and really sock
it to ‘em. They had modernized the
Nautilus because of the war and added
torpedo tubes, bringing her up to ten
– six forward and four aft. We carried
28 torpedoes with ten in the tubes so
you’ve got 18 more between the
forward room and after room. The
Nautilus was a submarine that was
built between 1927 and 1930. This
was the first submarine built at Mare
Island Navy Yard in California. There
were three submarines that were built
in those days: the Argonaut, the
Narwhal, and the Nautilus. The
Nautilus was twelve years old already
when the war started.

then boarded again the next day to fly
on to the Orient. I got to know the
place well, having spent a few nights
there.

After Pearl Harbor the Japanese, with
six large aircraft carriers, established
themselves as a seemingly
unstoppable force in the Pacific. The
Americans were able to turn back the
Japanese expansion at the Battle of
the Coral Sea in May 1942, damaging
two of the Japanese carriers. But
Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto
felt insulted and threatened by the
“Doolittle Raid,” an air attack
initiated by the USS Hor net,
motivating him to plan a massive
showdown with U.S. forces before
resting his men. He was very
confident in the strength of his fleet,
and planned to eliminate the U.S.
carriers through a surprise attack at
Midway Island, about halfway across
the Pacific from Japan. None of us
We left Pearl Harbor to go on patrol knew this at the time, but it is how
around Midway. We wondered what the Nautilus – and our fleet – ended
the excitement about Midway was. up at Midway.
What was Midway but a little sand bar?
Back before the war, in 1938 and 39, We had gained an advantage, though,
Pan Am flew a big sea plane called by deciphering the Japanese code,
the China Clipper from LA to the which allowed us to anticipate the
Orient, stopping at Midway. attack. Still, the Japanese forces
Passengers got off, stayed in a little greatly outnumbered ours. They had
place called the Gooneyville Lodge, four large carriers, two medium

AMERICAN VALOR QUARTERLY - Spring 2013 - 25

U.S. Navy Photo

“Oh, I don’t know,” was the reply
from the chief in charge of the work
detail. “Something put a hole in the
water line.” It may have been a
torpedo, we weren’t sure, but it was
definitely a hole. Even though we
made our way back safely to port,
when I got out of that fresh water
tank I didn’t want any part of aircraft
carriers. I looked over and saw the
submarine base, and I thought to
myself that maybe I would rather be
on the shooting end of the torpedoes
rather than the receiving end. I had
to go to the chaplain because the chief
in charge wouldn’t let me go. But the

chaplain was very
sympathetic. He
said, “Son, you
know what you’re
getting into?” He
said, “I’ll let you go
over there and if
you talk to them
and you bring me
back confirmation
that they’ll accept
you, and I’ll free you
from this work
detail.”