No Ordinary Joes

by Larry Colton

  Chuck was glad to be assigned to the Grenadier. When he enlisted he’d said he’d consider staying in the Navy if he made second class chief petty officer by the end of his six-year hitch. He liked the work and the challenge of learning the intricacies of the submarine. He felt a sense of purpose, and a bond of brotherhood with the other men in the crew; he felt part of an elite fraternity that regular citizens couldn’t understand. How could others possibly know the helpless quivering in your gut while lying several hundred feet beneath the ocean’s surface with explosions shaking every rivet of your ship and driving your heart right past your throat into your mouth? They couldn’t.

  Upon first being transferred off the Gudgeon, Chuck missed the buddies who’d been with him on that first patrol when they were the first American warship to sail out of Pearl Harbor. In comparison, his new crewmates on the Grenadier seemed inexperienced, many of them on their first patrol. But he had confidence in its hard-nosed skipper, Captain James Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald wasn’t a leader who demanded respect; he earned it, and he was friendly and accessible to his men. He was only 5 feet 7 inches, but as a collegiate boxing champ he had gained a “hard as nails” reputation; one of the officers on the ship, Lieutenant Al Toulon, called him “a little bantam with a tough face.” On that first patrol up into the Java Sea there was a calm professionalism about Fitzgerald that Chuck appreciated, a leader not likely to buckle under the pressure, yet maybe a little more approachable than the other skippers he’d served under. Once while walking with Gwen in Perth, he’d run into Fitzgerald, and when he introduced Gwen, he was struck by how friendly and polite the captain had been.

  Chuck slowly untied the bow of the little package Gwen had just given him. It was March 19, 1943, and Chuck knew that sometime within the next forty-eight hours he would be shipping out on his second patrol aboard the Grenadier. The crew never knew precisely when they would sail—departure times were kept secret during wartime—but they usually knew within a couple of days. He had traded with a crewmate to get this time off, and Gwen’s commanding officer had generously granted her request for the evening off to be with Chuck. It seemed that Chuck had made a favorable impression on his visit.

  Chuck opened the small gift box and removed a Saint Christopher’s medal, a symbol of devotion to the patron saint of travelers, including sailors.

  He slipped the chain over his neck. “It’s weird,” he said. “For the last few days I’ve had a feeling that something is going to happen on this patrol.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just a feeling that won’t go away.”

  “Why do you think that is?”

  He took her by the hand. “Probably because for the first time in my life I have somebody I really care about.”

  It was the closest he’d come to saying he loved her.

  She put her finger to his lips. “You’re going to be all right,” she said. “And I’ll be waiting for you when you get back.”

  He rubbed the medal. “I’ll never take this off,” he promised.

  10

  Bob Palmer

  USS Grenadier

  Waiting on the pier at Hunter’s Point in San Francisco Bay, Barbara Palmer could barely contain herself. It was April 29, 1942, and the submarine tender USS Pelius, with her husband Bob on board, was due in from Pearl Harbor within minutes. He was scheduled to be home on leave for three weeks, and they planned to cram as much living as possible into their time together. She’d even rented a studio apartment for the two of them in the same building on Pine Street where she’d been living with her Aunt Fern and cousin Margie. A month earlier she’d written and told him that she’d had a miscarriage. Maybe when the war was over she’d confess to the abortion, but not now. The procedure had taken place without any complications, and in fact she walked the two miles from the clinic back to her apartment afterward—in high heels.

  Bob was proud to be part of the war effort, and especially proud to be part of the crew of the USS Tuna, as good a group of men as he ever hoped to serve with, but when he learned that the Pelius was returning from Pearl Harbor to Mare Island for repairs, he saw a chance to get back home to see Barbara. He’d thought about her constantly, especially after getting her letter about the miscarriage. He wasn’t trying to escape combat, but he’d finished the first patrol on the Tuna with an earache that needed medical treatment. That was the excuse he needed.

  On a building behind the pier where Barbara waited, two large signs offered evidence of the nation’s war footing and fear of saboteurs: LOOSE LIPS SINK SHIPS and KEEP YOUR TRAP SHUT. In San Francisco, an almost palpable paranoia had spread regarding enemy saboteurs, with constant warnings to be on the alert and to report any suspicious behavior to the FBI. One sign warned: THERE IS NOTHING TOO VILE FOR AXIS SABOTEURS TO STOOP TO TO ACHIEVE THEIR EVIL PURPOSES.

  Eleven days prior to Bob’s homecoming, sixteen B-25 bombers under the command of Major James Doolittle had taken off from the USS Hornet and conducted a daring raid on Tokyo. After dropping their bombs, the planes flew to China, where they all ran low on fuel and the crews either crash-landed or bailed out. Although the raid inflicted minimal damage, none of the men were killed and the raid helped lift the spirits of the American people. Doolittle received the Congressional Medal of Honor.

  In the weeks leading up to Bob’s return, Barbara had seen signs of the war everywhere on the home front. “Remember Pearl Harbor” had become the great rallying cry and could be seen in almost every facet of propaganda—posters, pennants, napkins, patches, matchbook covers. The “V for Victory” sign had also become ubiquitous; people flashed it from cars, shops, sidewalks, recruiting rallies, and homes. Patriots hung banners in windows declaring that theirs was a Victory Home. Mothers put it on baby carriages. Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse flashed it in promoting war bonds. Little Orphan Annie encouraged kids to distribute V for Victory leaflets. Joe Palooka enlisted.

  Everywhere Barbara went in the first few months of the war, she saw anti-Japanese publications and drawings with depictions of bucktoothed Japanese. The anti-Asian racism that had been fermenting on the West Coast boiled over following Pearl Harbor, especially in California. Seventy-five percent (94,000) of Japanese-Americans lived in California, and despite whatever loyalty they had to America, they were automatically considered guilty of sedition. In the aftermath of December 7, 1941, they were harassed, assaulted, evicted, and denied basic needs such as food, clothing, medical care, and shelter. They suffered property damage to their homes and businesses and faced constant threats of mob violence and lynching.

  Although Barbara didn’t actively participate in any of the overt discrimination, like most Americans she had no sympathy for the Japanese. Why would she? Her husband was in constant peril of being blown to smithereens by one of their torpedoes or depth charges.

  On February 19, 1942, FDR had signed Executive Order #9066 prescribing the confinement of Japanese-American citizens in internment camps erected east of the Sierras. The roundup of these Japanese-Americans began in late March, with thousands hastily rousted from their homes, businesses, and farms and carted off to assembly centers at Santa Anita and Bay Meadows racetracks before being shipped to permanent internment camps.

  A few pacifists objected to this treatment, but Lieutenant General James DeWitt, the commander of the West Coast evacuation, countered: “A Jap is a Jap. It makes no difference whether he’s an American or not.” Many of these Japanese-Americans held to a belief that complying with their government’s orders would confirm their loyalty to America, but it made no difference, even though no Japanese-American was ever brought to trial on charges of espionage or sabotage. They were forced to adapt to primitive conditions in the internment camps, with overcrowding, barbed-wire fences, and dirt and dust a way of life. Armed guards stood watch over them. They lived with rumors and threats—that they would all be sterilized, that they would all be shipped to Japan after the war. They started each dreary day with the Pledge of All
egiance.

  But none of that mattered to Barbara as she watched the USS Pelius ease its way to the dock. Bob had been gone for only three and a half months, but it seemed like an eternity. She was ready to bring him home to the privacy of her new studio apartment.

  Bob’s leave in San Francisco flew by. He and Barbara crammed as much living and loving into three weeks as possible, including a trip home to Oregon. Although Cora didn’t buy Barbara’s story that she had suffered a miscarriage after an adverse reaction to a shot at the dentist, Bob did, or at least he didn’t push for more details. He scored a few points with Barbara’s dad when he helped him fix the carburetor on his car. “At least that boy will always be able to get a job as a mechanic,” said Mr. Koehler. At the end of the leave, Bob and Barbara both agreed that his departure this time was even more gut-wrenching than when he’d left right after they’d been married. On their last night together, she couldn’t stop crying.

  Bob rode the Pelius back to Fremantle, where he worked on relief crews for two months before being assigned as the yeoman for the Grenadier. He was an enlisted man, just like the mechanics, torpedomen, and all the other guys who got their hands a lot dirtier on the job than he did, but he identified with the officers. His little office kept him in close proximity to the officers’ quarters, and he talked to them frequently, taking great pride in the service he provided. His logs were always grammatically perfect, thorough, and precise, with great attention to detail.

  As the recorder of the Grenadier’s log, Bob had meticulously familiarized himself with the ship’s design and history, taking pride in memorizing details and facts, such as that she was commissioned on May 1, 1941, and was 307 feet in overall length and 27 feet abeam and had a surface speed of 21 knots. She had ten torpedo tubes—six forward and four aft—and carried one 3-inch antiaircraft deck gun and two antiaircraft machine guns. After the initial shakedown exercises in the Atlantic, she sailed for the Pacific, and on February 4, 1942, she left Pearl Harbor on her first war patrol, commanded by Captain Allen Joyce, going closer to Japan than any Allied vessel since the beginning of the war, sneaking within one mile of the beach just north of Inubo-saki Lighthouse. On her second patrol she sank a large merchant vessel of 14,900 tons, then underwent a scary twenty-three-hour depth charging, surviving a total of seventy blasts that damaged the propeller shaft, knocked out lights, caused leaks, and twisted the superstructure. After repairs back in Fremantle, the ship’s third patrol was spent primarily on station around Truk and Tol Island, and resulted in the sinking of a 15,000-ton tanker. Again, she survived a depth charging that severely shook the ship, returning to port on September 18, 1942. Bob joined the crew shortly after that.

  The primary object of the Grenadier’s fourth war patrol, captained by Lieutenant Commander Bruce Carr, had been to lay a field of thirty-two mines in the approaches to the harbor in Haiphong, Indochina. The plant, one of the first submarine minefields of the war, was successfully executed at night as the Grenadier dodged junks and islands in water as shallow as twenty-six feet. Returning to base, the ship was forced to dive during another depth charging, the force of the blow as they hit bottom ruining the sound gear and causing chlorine gas to accumulate, which caused considerable suffering and breathing difficulties among the crew, but no permanent casualties. Upon reaching Fremantle, Lieutenant Commander Carr was relieved by Captain James Fitzgerald.

  As the Grenadier prepared to pull away from the pier at Fremantle to start its sixth patrol, Bob frantically looked through the drawers in his office. He couldn’t find his wallet.

  It was March 20, 1943, and the Grenadier was headed for the Andaman Sea, from the Gulf of Martaban down through the Mergui Archipelago to the Strait of Malacca. Her assignment was to investigate and destroy enemy shipping. The Grenadier was the first American submarine assigned to the area.

  Bob checked his pants pocket, then his footlocker. He closed his eyes, trying to remember where he’d last had it. It didn’t take long to figure it out. He’d left it at Leslie Phillips’s house, on the nightstand where he’d emptied his pockets before tumbling into bed.

  He’d met Leslie a couple of nights earlier. He and Len Clark, his new best friend on the Grenadier, had been hitting the pubs in Perth and living it up like sailors about to go back into enemy waters. They ran into Leslie and her friend Hazel at the Prince Edward Hotel. Bob and Leslie hit it off right away, and when Leslie invited him to come for dinner the next night, Bob didn’t see the harm. He told her about Barbara, and she told him about her husband, who was fighting in North Africa. Her offer of a home-cooked meal was just too good to pass up.

  Bob put his hand to his neck and frowned, realizing that not only had he left his wallet at Leslie’s, he’d left his ID and dog tags there, too. Not that he’d need any of that stuff on this patrol, but it was just irritating. He’d told Leslie he’d see her when he returned to port, so he’d pick up the items then.

  11

  Gordy Cox

  USS Grenadier

  It took Gordy over a year from the time his hot and stinky patrol aboard the Sculpin landed in Fremantle until he was assigned to the Grenadier. During that time he mostly worked on sub tenders, helping ready ships to go back into combat. He had time to write a lot of letters home.

  April 3, 1942

  I’m getting along okay I guess. One day I’m cussing the Navy and everything else and the next I feel almost happy. But I know one thing for sure and that is that I’ll never make good in the Navy. I just don’t fit here.… I guess you’ll have to wait until I see you to find out where I’ve been and what I’m doing.… Have you got any of that money that I sent? I’ve taken some pictures but they won’t pass the censors so I can’t send them.… I’ve only received one letter since the war started.

  April 27, 1942

  Everything is still okay on this end so you have nothing to worry about. It’s very quiet here now. It’s hard to believe there’s a war going on.… I made seaman first the other day which I should have done long ago.

  Gordy liked Fremantle. Rear Admiral Charles Lockwood, a popular, can-do type of officer, was put in charge of sub operations there. He had been associated with subs his whole career, and one of his first commands, despite contrary advice from naval brass in Washington, was to lease four hotels—the Prince Edward, Wentworth, Ocean Beach, and Majestic—in the Fremantle/Perth area for the returning crews. He had made improving morale a high priority. The area had excellent recreational facilities, and there was no shortage of women.

  Gordy had been transferred to the tender Holland. He figured he’d been selected because he hadn’t qualified yet. During the previous three months while on patrol, he’d tried to study, but with his duties on the ship, his difficulties with reading, and the constant stress of combat, he doubted whether he’d ever be able to qualify.

  On the Holland he was assigned as a mess cook again, an assignment he wasn’t happy about. He also spent four hours every night on watch. Even though Fremantle was beyond the range of land-based Japanese planes, the fear was that an attack could be launched from aircraft carriers.

  He continued to write home.

  May 5, 1942

  I hope you have stopped worrying about me. There’s really not much reason to. You said yourself that when a person’s time comes it don’t make much difference where they are.… There sure isn’t much to do over here. I’ve been trying to find a good pastime but as yet I haven’t. I’ve met a couple nice girls and their families, but liberty isn’t very good and there isn’t much to do when you do get over.… All of the music over here was out before I left home.

  The Navy decided to move part of its fleet stationed at Fremantle, including the Holland, even farther south to Albany. Should a Japanese attack sink the tender Holland, the fleet would have no way to repair damaged subs.

  Gordy rode the Holland into Albany. From the deck, he could see a small town surrounded by barren hills. The town, population 300, was only a couple of blocks long. The
crew of the Holland numbered close to 600, and with an additional 150 men from two subs that had accompanied it south, plus a destroyer tender and its crew, the resources of Albany were overwhelmed. But its people were eager to be hospitable, believing the survival of their country depended on these American servicemen.

  With the ship moored in Princess Royal Harbour in King George Sound, the crew received liberty every fourth day. Almost daily Gordy listened to crewmates venting about the bad torpedoes. But it wasn’t just the crews who were upset. Admiral Lockwood also listened to his frustrated skippers’ complaints about watching helplessly as faulty torpedoes either ran deep, fired prematurely, or were duds. Lockwood tried to get the Bureau of Ordnance to conduct torpedo performance tests, but they refused, blaming the skippers for not preparing and firing the torpedoes improperly. So Admiral Lockwood ordered his own tests, which showed conclusively that the torpedoes didn’t work. But the Bureau of Ordnance still rejected the results and told Lockwood to halt his testing. He didn’t, and the further testing eventually caught the attention of Admiral Ernest J. King, commander in chief of the U.S. fleet, who intervened. Finally, eight months after the war started, the Bureau of Ordnance admitted that the Mark XIV ran deep. The solution included installing new firing pins machined from a light, high-strength aluminum alloy, using metal that reportedly came from the propellers of Japanese fighters shot down during the Pearl Harbor raid. Immediately, the number of sinkings increased dramatically. But the early course of the war had already been seriously compromised and the lives of thousands of submariners unnecessarily jeopardized, a mistake and scandal later described by naval historian Clay Blair Jr. as “the worst in the history of any kind of warfare.”