No Ordinary Joes

by Larry Colton

  By now the war has lasted for nearly four years. Despite the best that has been done by everyone—the gallant fighting of our military and naval forces, the diligence and assiduity of our servants of the State and the devoted service of our 10,000,000 people—the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan’s advantage, while the general trends of the world have all turned against her interest.

  Moreover, the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the power of which to do damage is, indeed, incalculable, taking the toll of many innocent lives. Should we continue to fight, it would not only result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but also it would lead to the total extinction of human civilization.

  After several more minutes, the emperor’s voice stopped and the guards closed their circle around the camp commander. Soon, they backed away and started walking toward their barracks, each leaving behind his rifle stacked upright with all the others.

  It would take several more minutes for the camp commander to confirm to the barracks leaders that the war was indeed over. As word spread through the camp, members of the Grenadier crew came to the Death Hut to share an embrace with Bob.

  Bob smiled, the first time he’d done so in months.

  Ten days after the emperor had announced the Japanese surrender, Bob hobbled across the camp, steadying himself with a tree limb Len Clark had crafted into a crutch. He was heading toward a large box. It had just been dropped in the center of camp by a low-flying F4U, which had come swooping down out of the sky with its pilot canopy open and wheels down.

  This wasn’t the drop of supplies. Immediately after the surrender, the prisoners had painted a large POW sign on top of one of the barracks and had spelled out POW in white rocks in the middle of the compound. One of the drops had included Army-issued clothes, with more than enough to go around.

  Bob was one of the first to reach the new box. He had been feasting on packages of Canadian Red Cross food that the prisoners had found in a storage room after most of the Japanese guards had fled the camp. For the last three days Bob had been splurging on bacon–Hershey bar sandwiches. He’d also been getting heavy doses of vitamin B1, likewise found with the Red Cross food. Although he’d gained 5 pounds and his physical condition had improved enough that he’d moved out of the Death Hut back to the barracks, he was still easily confused. He’d been told that he could try to contact Barbara when he reached Guam in a few more weeks. “What’s Guam?” he asked.

  Bob and the other prisoners quickly opened the box; it was full of Viceroys. Wrapped around the cartons was a handwritten note. “Frank Sinatra #1.”

  Bob furrowed his brow. “Sinatra is president?” he asked.

  The next day several POWs met and made a list of Japanese mineworkers who had treated them nicely. They rounded up as many of these men as they could find and brought them to the center of the camp, where they presented them with supplies that had been dropped from planes. Every one of the mineworkers cried when given their gift of American food and clothing. So did the ex-prisoners.

  On the morning of September 5, 1945, thirty days after the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Bob limped out of the Ashio prison camp, using a newly carved tree limb as a cane. Along with the other prisoners, he walked two miles to the train station and boarded a train for the Yokohama-Tokyo area. The tracks had been repaired. At the station, he saw no civilians, only members of the kempeitai posted menacingly around the station.

  Climbing aboard the train, Bob felt an overwhelming sense of joy and relief. Over the twenty-eight tortured months as a POW, he’d survived on less than a cup of rice a day, received more beatings than he could remember, spent nine months in solitary confinement, performed slave labor in a smelter, watched other prisoners die, lost half his body weight, had no contact with the outside world, and battled beriberi, amoebic dysentery, and dengue fever. And now he was heading home.

  Despite his sense of liberation, he knew one hard truth still remained. “I’m not capable of a logical decision,” he admitted.

  That did not, however, stop him from asking when he’d be allowed to try to contact Barbara. In Guam, he was told. He could barely wait.

  Part Eight

  GOING HOME

  42

  Tim “Skeeter” McCoy

  Texas

  In the days immediately following the end of the war, Tim was practically coming unglued waiting to leave Fukuoka #3. There were promises of B-29s dropping in supplies, but so far, nothing had arrived. There were also daily threats of a court-martial to anyone leaving camp.

  “I’m not sticking around much longer,” he vowed.

  Some men had bribed the posted guards to let them out of camp so they could walk around the town or go down to the ocean for a swim. A few even talked about going out and killing some random Japs. As much as he hated the Japanese, Tim didn’t want any part of that. He was, however, interested in making a raid on the nearby sake plant. For his first unguarded venture outside the camp, he and Chuck walked a mile to the sake plant and traded a Red Cross parcel for a couple of bottles, and then came back to the camp and got drunk.

  Top military officials in all branches had determined that POWs would return to America and be assigned to a hospital, and then be reassigned to a base. Tim had it all figured out; as soon as he got home he would bring Valma to America with the help of the War Brides Act and then get married. He’d buy her a one-way ticket with the back pay that all the POWs were rumored to be getting.

  As for a career after the Navy, he wasn’t sure. Maybe he’d talk to his uncle about going into the insurance business. Or maybe he’d stay in the Navy. Either way, he figured he’d have plenty of time to make a decision. There was a rumor that all the POWs would be getting a ninety-day leave once they were stateside and had been checked out at a hospital.

  He was looking forward to seeing his mom again, too. As for his father, he wasn’t sure if he’d even bother to see him. Being a POW hadn’t healed that wound.

  With each day that passed without a food drop or word about when they would be able to start their journey back home, Tim’s frustration and impatience grew. He talked to Chuck about joining him in escaping. He said he’d wait one more week and then he was leaving.

  Approaching the main opening of the prison camp, Tim whispered to his two accomplices, Elwood O’Brion, a Grenadier crew member from Fort Dodge, Iowa, and Chuck. “Don’t look suspicious.”

  They were sneaking out of camp dressed in Army uniforms and hats that had been dropped into camp. On their sleeves they wore black armbands on which was printed MP in large white letters. Their plan was to catch a train to Tokyo and, crazy as it seemed, find General MacArthur and get him to expedite their return home.

  Despite the leaflets that had been dropped into camp advising POWs not to leave and that they would soon be repatriated by the Army, Tim’s impatience had gotten the best of him. It didn’t matter that B-29s had finally dropped multiple cases of food, candy, Pall Malls, gum, and medicine.

  Passing one of the posted sentries, they all saluted and kept walking down the dusty street that led to the train station. Tim was surprised at how calm he felt.

  The three men were feeling fit for their journey. Food had indeed arrived at last, packed inside 55-pound drums that floated gently to earth under multicolored parachutes. It had been a beautiful sight and the men had gorged themselves. A few of the prisoners had cut out pieces of a lavender parachute and crafted them into elegant coverings with fringed edges to be draped over the boxes containing the ashes of the men who had died. The covered boxes would be shipped home to the families of the deceased prisoners.

  At the station, they were surprised not to see any Japanese soldiers, and even more surprised to see a large pile of rifles stacked on a platform. “Maybe we should each grab one,” suggested Tim.

  “There are three of us and millions of them,” countered Chuck, and he reminded Tim that Emperor Hirohito had instructed the
military to put down their arms and treat the Americans with dignity and respect.

  None of the three men had any money, so without tickets they boarded a train bound for Tokyo, located about 400 miles to the north. The train was standing room only; all the other passengers were Japanese. The relentless bombing by the Americans had displaced millions of civilians, and now many of them were on the move, hoping to relocate with family or friends elsewhere in the country.

  Three Japanese men got up from their seats, bowed, and offered the seats to the men of the Grenadier, who returned the bow and took the seats. A few minutes later, another person offered bowls of rice. Tim and his companions accepted this goodwill gesture graciously, although Tim saw the irony of being given a bowl of rice as a peace offering when they had existed on nothing but rice for more than two years.

  The train continued rolling northbound, stopping in Hiroshima. Tim looked out the window at the devastated city. It looked pretty much like all the other cities and towns they’d passed.

  It was after midnight when the train arrived in Tokyo. The men walked to the temporary Army headquarters, arriving at 4:00 a.m.

  “We’re here to see General MacArthur,” Tim announced.

  MacArthur wasn’t there, but the next day, General William Curtis Chase paid them a visit, assuring them they would get anything they wanted.

  For the next twenty-four hours they were treated to beds with clean white sheets, beers, and huge amounts of mashed potatoes and pork chops. Then they were driven to Yokohama and taken to a hospital ship, where Army nurses greeted them.

  “Y’all are just about the prettiest sight I’ve ever seen,” offered Tim.

  After being deloused and given Navy dungarees to wear, the men waited to be taken to the airport to catch a transport plane bound for Guam. During their wait, Tim and Chuck spotted Commander Barney Siegal, under whom they’d briefly served aboard the submarine tender USS Pelius. Siegal pulled out his wallet and handed each of them $10.

  “I’ll repay you, I promise,” Tim told him. The $10 was more than he’d made during his eighteen months of labor in the steel mill at Yawata.

  Getting off the C-147 transport plane in Guam, Tim was greeted by warm tropical air and a large sign that proclaimed: “GUAM—WHERE AMERICA’S DAY BEGINS.”

  The largest and southernmost of the Mariana Islands, Guam was the only American-held island in the region before the war. Occupied by Japan from December 1941 until July 1944, it was also the only U.S. soil ever to be occupied by a foreign military power. Its recapture had been crucial in establishing the Marianas as a launching site for the B-29 raids on Japan.

  For the next two weeks, Tim and the many POWs who had been sent to the American hospital in Guam were examined by doctors and questioned about their experience in captivity. They were also given large amounts of food.

  “I’ve never seen so much ice cream,” observed Chuck.

  For Tim it seemed like every time he turned around, he was filling out another form. One asked him to detail his treatment at each of the places where he’d been imprisoned: Penang, Singapore, and Fukuoka. Another was to authorize a request of the Japanese government for compensation for labor performed as a prisoner, a request Tim figured would never be honored. He also filled out a form agreeing not to talk to any representatives of the media or to allow his photo to be taken for publication without first receiving authorization from the military. Somebody told him that it was because General MacArthur didn’t want to get the American public any more riled up about Japan than they already were; he and President Truman had figured out that it would be the Russians and Chinese who would be America’s most formidable challenge in the years ahead, and America would eventually need Japan as an ally to help stop Communist expansion.

  “I’ll sign whatever they want if it’ll help me get home,” said Tim.

  He spent a lot of time in the recreation center with the other men, sharing stories and talking about what they were going to do when they got home, as well as drinking copious amounts of beer. The more beer he drank, the less he dwelled on the hell he had just survived.

  Tim sent two telegrams—one to Valma in Perth and another to his mother in Dallas. Because his name had shown up on a POW list after he’d been transferred to Fukuoka #3, they both knew he was alive. He wrote Valma that he would check into the War Brides Act to bring her to America as soon as he got back home.

  His mother sent him a return cable in response: she and his father were back together, and they had been corresponding with Valma. Tim wasn’t sure what to make of this, but his first reaction was that it was good.

  The next day, he was on a ship, heading home to America.

  43

  Gordy Cox

  Yakima, Washington

  His tray heaped with food, including a large T-bone steak, Gordy sat alone at a table in the empty mess hall at the Navy hospital in Pearl Harbor. It was September 5, 1945, and tomorrow he was leaving for America and the homecoming he’d been dreaming about.

  He glanced up and spotted an attractive young woman carrying a tray into the mess hall. Her presence startled him. By her uniform, he knew she was a Wave (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service). When he’d first joined up, there were almost no women in the Navy, but now at war’s end, there were almost 90,000, 2.5 percent of the Navy’s total strength.

  “Mind if I join you?” she asked.

  Gordy nodded okay, suddenly feeling awkward and uncomfortable. He hadn’t talked to an American woman since 1941, and he wasn’t exactly the smoothest of operators back then.

  As she sat down, he stared at his steak. The past three weeks had been a whirlwind. For Gordy, the first realization that the war was truly over was when he walked out of the barracks in Fukuoka #3 and surprised a Japanese guard, who quickly turned and ran away. A week earlier that same guard probably would’ve hit him for failing to bow or salute. A few days after that he’d sat in the barracks listening to several POWs talking about going in search of guards to hang. He said no thanks, believing the greater punishment would be to let the guards continue living in “this godforsaken hell.”

  In the last month his health had dramatically improved. The swelling from the beriberi had gone down, and after the food drops began, he’d gained almost ten pounds and regained some of his energy. In fact, when one of the drums had landed fifty yards out in the ocean, he swam out and pushed it back to shore.

  “Where are you from?” asked the woman.

  Gordy contemplated his answer. Should he tell her he was a POW just returning from a living hell in Japan?

  “Yakima,” he muttered.

  Two other Waves entered the mess hall and sat down at his table; he didn’t greet them. Taking a small bite of his steak, he was suddenly not hungry.

  Like everyone else in Fukuoka #3, Gordy had become impatient to leave the prison camp and start his journey home. A few days after Tim and Chuck took off on their own, he and two other crewmates did the same, catching a train to Yokohama. He wore the tattered dungarees in which he’d been captured, wanting to leave the country the same way he’d arrived. On the train ride, he was surprised by the large number of Koreans on board, including women who’d been forced to work as “comfort women,” providing sexual services for the Japanese troops.

  At Yokohama, Gordy had been one of the lucky ones to be flown to Guam. There he finally learned that the twenty-nine men who’d been separated from the rest of the crew when they’d first landed in Japan, including Captain Fitzgerald, had survived. Along with all the other POWs, he was asked to fill out a war-crimes report against the guards who had tortured him. He declined, saying that as much as he hated them, he didn’t want to have to return to Japan to testify at a trial.

  After ten days of physical exams, clean clothes, and heaping mounds of food in Guam, he’d gotten lucky again and been put aboard a transport plane to Pearl Harbor. Most of the men, including Tim, Chuck, and Bob, would have to make the journey home aboard a ship. />
  “You stationed here at Pearl?” asked one of the Waves.

  Gordy shook his head. He took another bite of his steak, but now it was hard to chew.

  “Did you serve in the war?” asked another.

  Without answering, Gordy picked up his tray and left the table, dumping the half-eaten steak and the rest of the food into a trash can as he left the mess hall.

  Sitting at the bar in Bimbo’s 365 Club on Market Street in San Francisco, Gordy stared into his beer, feeling out of place. It was two days after his return to America, and so far, it wasn’t quite the joyous return he’d envisioned. There’d been no bands or parades to greet him, although two men from a submarine relief organization had met him when he got off the plane and took him into San Francisco, offering to treat him to anything he wanted. He turned down the offer, explaining he hadn’t done anything that thousands of other POWs hadn’t done. They drove him to Oak Knoll Hospital in Oakland, where POWs were taken for more physicals and reassignment.

  Gordy’s biggest disappointment upon returning home was that his mom and dad weren’t there to greet him. He’d sent them a telegram from Pearl, letting them know he was coming to the naval hospital in Oakland but so far he hadn’t seen them. He’d concluded that his mother wasn’t well enough to travel. Unbeknownst to him, his parents had driven the 900 miles from Yakima to Oakland but had gone to the wrong hospital, and were now frantically trying to find him.

  Gordy had taken a bus into San Francisco on a twelve-hour liberty pass from Oak Knoll, and come to Bimbo’s because he’d heard it was a hangout for Navy men. Indeed it was, but when he got there everyone was sitting in groups, laughing and having a good time. He tried making conversation with a sailor at the bar, but it went nowhere and the sailor got up and left, leaving Gordy to stare into the last sip of his beer.