On July 4, 1944, Charlie returned to the United States. He was sent to the Aviation Battalion at Geiger Air Corps Base in Spokane, Washington, for a short tour of duty until his transfer request came through for Hamilton Army Air Corps Base near San Raphael, California. In 1945, his work involved being an airplane flight dispatcher at Hammer Army Air Corps Base in Fresno, California. In an interesting story, one of the staff sergeants had a hot date. He was the engineer on a flight to San Francisco and talked Charlie into taking over for him. He told Charlie, “There’s nothing to it. You just watch the altimeter and the cylinder head temperature and a few other dials.” The flight arrived without incident, but the colonel wrote in his report, “Next time send me an engineer who knows what he’s doing.”
Sergeant Charles Bates, U.S. Army Air Corps. Charles Bates.
Since the war was coming to an end and many air bases were starting to close down, the army needed to supply logistical personnel to aid in handling the closures. The military assigned Bates, along with ten soldiers who had no prior experience in this capacity and were waiting to be discharged from the service, to close the bases. He was able to train them to accomplish the assignment with precision and accuracy. In addition, his role was to assist in closing the hospital’s eight surgical operating units.
After the war ended in August 1945, Charlie, still haunted by his memories of the Great Depression, decided to make the military his career. He volunteered for the U.S. occupation of Japan. His Japanese tour was from March 1947 to September 1948. During this time, Charlie was promoted to staff sergeant, serving as warehouse supervisor while with the 591st Air Material Squadron, Ashiya Air Base, Japan. He worked in logistics, keeping track of inventory and ordering parts. It was a very pleasant and interesting experience to learn the culture of the Far East. He had a very unusual meeting with some people who were in Japan when Hiroshima was bombed. He says that it was a pleasure to speak with a German priest and several groups of Catholic nuns from Ireland, England, France and Germany who aided the elderly people left to die in the streets of Kokura, Japan. He recalls a happy memory of a time when his unit had some surplus nylon parachutes that were to be destroyed. When the nuns who worked at one of the orphanages became aware of this, they asked if they could use this material for making clothing. So he donated the parachutes. Later, Charlie learned that the nuns had made beautiful First Holy Communion dresses for the Japanese children.
The August 15, 1945 issue of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette announced the end of the war. Cartoonist Cy Hungerford held out the prospect for a world without war. Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh.
Once back in the United States, Bates took advantage of every educational opportunity to which he was entitled that he believed would advance his military career. His military courses included personnel management; redistribution and marketing; equipment cooling specialist; refrigeration and air conditioning specialist; and automotive and diesel repairman. After serving assignments as close to home as the Pittsburgh airport in Coraopolis and as remote as Grand Forks, North Dakota, Master Sergeant Charles Bates retired from the 464 3rd Support Squadron, Semi-Automatic Ground Environment, on May 30, 1962. He was ready to head back home to Pittsburgh. Charlie became a civilian and received his retirement orders from the armed forces after service of twenty years, four months and eleven days.
When Charlie served as a disposal agent at the Greater Pittsburgh Airport Air Reserve Center in Pittsburgh in 1985, a Pittsburgh newspaper interviewed him regarding a mysterious phone call he received while working at the center. This call concerned the B-25 bomber that had crashed into the Monongahela River. This plane had been an inventoried item that was sold. The mysterious caller inquired whether he could purchase parts of a similar plane, making it appear as though the plane had been found. Bates informed the caller that he would have to contact the plane’s owner. When the caller was asked for his name, he ended the call. The mystery of the B-25 bomber, known as the Ghost Bomber of the Monongahela, began on January 31, 1956, and continues to this day.
In civilian life, Charlie remains active in the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW). He helped his community preserve a World War II monument in a park near his home. A very interesting person who has a very positive attitude about his life and career as a soldier, Bates loved the military and has no regrets about participating in a part of history that will never be forgotten. He is proud to have served his country and would do it again. He feels that the United States’ involvement in World War II was a necessity that helped regain peace and balance in the world. His other great love was his wife, Mary, to whom he was married in 1948. They were married for fifty-six years. Charlie described her as a very compassionate and loving person, and it was not until after her death that he found that she had kept every letter he had written to her while he was overseas in the service. Charlie thought the world of Mary and deeply appreciated her loving devotion and her support of his military career.
WHEELING AND DEALING
Sidney Bernstein,
As told to Rocco Ross
Sid Bernstein was born in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A very social and mischievous youngster, Sid spent much of his free time on the streets of the Uptown Pittsburgh neighborhood near Duquesne University. Because he looked older than he actually was, Sid was able to get into bars and clubs when he was only sixteen years old. He met all types of people and new friends in this adult environment and was having too much fun to really pay any serious attention to the great war erupting in Europe.
Bernstein never even considered joining the armed forces. He remembers that before World War II, soldiers had a negative connotation. He thought that they were viewed mostly as bums because many poor and uneducated men who could not find a civilian job would join the army just to be able to eat and earn a little bit of money. Sid also felt no call to arms as a sense of service because he, like most people of his time, did not want to get involved in the conflict across the Atlantic.
His cavalier lifestyle, along with his negative impression of soldiers, changed completely after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in December 1941. In 1942, Sid was drafted into the United States Army. A large meeting was held for the newly drafted men at Taylor Allderdice High School. Reluctant, but required to attend, Bernstein showed up to find that preliminary medical screening and interviewing were already underway. Anyone who was obviously not physically suited for the army had a black X marked on his hand. Bernstein pleaded with the examiners to be given an X, but he was unsuccessful.
After being sworn into the service, Sid was sent by train to St. Petersburg, Florida. From there he made further training stops in Chanute Field, Illinois, and Long Island, New York. Finally, he was sent to a base near the coast of Maine. When Sid arrived in Maine and reported to his outfit, he discovered that they were to be sent overseas immediately. Having talked only with other low-ranking soldiers and no officers, Bernstein inquired about joining another unit that was not leaving so soon. A soldier told Sid that there was another unit stationed not far away, so he took off to find a more suitable group. The fact that he was able to undertake such a change without official orders attests to the lack of organization in those early days of the war. The newly minted word “SNAFU” (Situation Normal, All F---ed Up—or alternately Fouled Up), describing the muddled state of military organization, in this case, worked to Sid’s advantage.
When Bernstein arrived at the other unit, it was nightfall, so he found a covered truck in which he slept that night. The next morning he recalls being pulled out of the truck by his legs and questioned by officers about his identity and where he had come from. Bernstein told the officers that he was instructed to join this unit and that when he arrived, he did not want to wake anyone up, so he slept in the truck. With that flimsy explanation and no transfer papers, Sid Bernstein became the newest member of a combat engineer unit.
The same amiable personality that had allowed Sid to attract friends and women in the bars at home
would soon allow him to gain the friendship and trust of the men and officers in his military unit. Sid was placed in the motor pool, where he was assigned to drive a jeep for a captain. One of his “missions” was to drive the captain to visit his girlfriend. Sid was instructed to drop him off at the town where she worked and to pick him up two days later. In return for his quiet cooperation, Bernstein was given two days’ personal leave. He quickly learned that in the military, keeping one’s mouth shut was usually advantageous.
Another job that made Bernstein popular among his fellow soldiers was his role as alcohol transporter. Alcohol was difficult to come by at the Maine base. The officers would send Sid to nearby towns to purchase beer and liquor for them. As a token of their appreciation, they would often give him some for himself. While he was at these towns, Sid would be sure to buy some alcohol for the other enlisted men in his unit.
Before long, Sid and his group were sent out on a ship bound for the South Pacific. He remembers the time on ship being tough because “you did not know exactly where you were going or what you would have to do when you got there.” When they arrived in the South Pacific, Sid’s group of combat engineers typically followed marines onto the islands and began clearing the beaches so that tanks and other armored vehicles could make their way on land. Once the area was secure, the engineers sometimes began building airstrips to allow planes to take off and land on the beach.
Such missions were not as trouble-free as they might sound. During his time on the islands, Sid recalls a lot of fighting. He remembers seeing fallen marines as they stormed the beaches of the islands. The Japanese were ferocious fighters and would entrench themselves in the tiny islands. On one particular island, Bernstein recalls that taking over the beach for an airstrip was the only objective. The marines drove the Japanese into the jungle, but they were not required to go in after them because taking over the entire island was deemed unnecessary. One day, a force of Australian soldiers came to the island and said they were going in after the Japanese. Bernstein and his friends wished them luck but knew they would probably be slaughtered. To their astonishment, Sid found that “the Australians turned out to be even more merciless fighters than the Japanese.” Before long, they returned to report that the island was free of any Japanese presence. Because of that, Bernstein gained the utmost respect for his Australian allies.
As Bernstein traveled through the South Pacific, he faced death several times. Sailing between islands, he remembers Japanese fighter planes strafing the boats and kamikaze pilots dive-bombing in an attempt to sink the ship he was on. As U.S. forces drove nearer to Japan, the fighting grew more intense. When Bernstein finally made his way to Okinawa, he saw death and destruction everywhere. The memories of that horror would never leave him. Stacks of marines’ bodies, five and six feet tall, lay all around.
The suffering and death of fellow Americans took its psychological toll on Bernstein and his buddies. On several of the islands that the combat engineers worked, they encountered liberated POWs. These men had been beaten and starved by the Japanese. “It was,” Sid says, “beyond belief.” Those images, coupled with the sight of mounds of fallen marines, caused many soldiers to lose all inhibitions in battle. Bernstein remembers that it was commonplace for Americans to shoot surrendering Japanese in retaliation for their treatment of Americans. Such was the face of war.
As chaotic and disastrous as the war was at times, Sid experienced many entertaining and jaunty situations. For example, once on an island in the South Pacific, food, water and other supplies were being delivered in bulk to a designated location before being divided and rerouted to the soldiers around the island. When the goods would get to Sid’s group, he and the other men always felt as if they were being shortchanged. Being a confident smooth-talker, Bernstein took some friends and a company truck on a mission to the depot where the supplies were being shipped. Once they arrived, Sid distracted the soldiers who were working by talking to them about women, the news or anything else he could think of to hold their attention. While he was keeping these men busy, his friends were stealing food and other items and loading up the truck they had brought. The rest of their unit was delighted upon their return to camp.
Sid discovered that another effective way to cut through red tape and get additional luxuries and benefits was to become a military police officer. However, a soldier cannot simply change his assignment designation in the military. So Sid and some friends “acquired” MP helmets and armbands and went around the islands posing as MPs. Soldiers who were afraid of getting in trouble would bribe them with money and other goods.
American soldiers were not the only victims of Sid’s schemes. He once encountered a Swiss paratrooper who had a pocketful of money. Sid and his pals convinced the Swiss soldier that they had connections that could get him all types of food and alcohol. The condition was that he had to pay up front. After handing over $300, the paratrooper never saw Sid and his buddies again.
When Bernstein was not scamming on the islands, he was fraternizing with Hollywood stars. One of the highlights of his time in the South Pacific was meeting actor Lew Ayers. Sid recognized Ayers in the Philippines, where he was working as a medic. Ayers had become famous for his part in the 1930 war movie All Quiet on the Western Front and the Young Doctor Kildare movie series. He had attempted to join the Medical Corps but was refused because of their inability to protect such a famous personage. He then declared himself a conscientious objector, resulting in a change in their decision and his acceptance as a medic. Ayers served with distinction in the Pacific Theater and New Guinea. The two spent time together talking about Ayers’s career and both of their experiences in the war.
Bernstein recalls the end of the war, when the United States dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Although not part of an attacking force, Bernstein’s combat engineers would have more than likely been involved in a land invasion of Japan had that option been exercised. Bernstein views the use of the atomic bombs as “a good decision by President Truman” because it saved so many American lives.
When the war ended, Bernstein was discharged from the army but decided that he wanted to continue working with the armed forces. Sid joined the USO and worked for them for many years. It was not until after the war that Bernstein discovered the fate of European Jews in the Holocaust. As a Jewish man himself, Bernstein had a deep sympathy for the suffering of his fellow Jews.
In 1945, Pittsburghers dedicated the downtown honor roll at Sixth and Forbes Avenues bearing the names of 1,021 residents of the First Ward who served in the nation’s military. Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh.
Although he was reluctant to enter the army, Sid acknowledges that the military gave his life discipline and direction that he otherwise may never have gained. He looks back on his days of service with both fond and earnest memories. The war permitted Sid to make many new friends, travel the world and serve his country in a meaningful way at that crucial time in history.
A SOLDIER’S BRUSH WITH DEATH
Raymond Book,
As told to Stephanie J. Fetsko
A native of Pittsburgh’s Mount Washington neighborhood, Raymond T. Book was only nineteen years of age when he enlisted in the army on April 15, 1943. He was shipped to Ireland for basic training. There he became skilled in weaponry and was taught to put a machine gun together blindfolded. After basic training, he was sent to England and was assigned to the Fourth Army Division. Departing from England, he boarded a ship that took him to one of the most memorable days in history—D-Day. He served in the First Army, commanded by General George Patton.
On that infamous day, June 6, 1944, Book nervously waited on board ship with thousands of other young men to storm the beaches of Normandy, France. He recalls that his battalion was scheduled to land on Omaha Beach a day or two after the initial landing. As he was climbing down the rope ladder from the LST (landing ship tank) to the landing craft, his hand slipped, causing him to lose his grasp of the rope and fall into
the icy waters. With all his gear and a tripod for a 105-caliber machine gun strapped to his back, he sank like a lead weight. He miraculously survived the incident when a fellow soldier quickly pulled him out of the frigid waters. Book narrowly escaped from death—not just from drowning, but also from being crushed between the ship and the LST rocking together in the choppy waters. They bumped against each other while the men climbed from the ship to the landing craft. His soaked clothing did not excuse him; like everyone else, he had to plunge straight ahead. There was no turning back. In fact, there was no change of clothing for another month or two.
LSTs (landing ship tanks) used on the D-Day invasion were manufactured by Dravo Corporation at the Neville Island Works in the Ohio River, just downstream from Pittsburgh. Evident in front is the bay door, which swung downward, forming a ramp to unload amphibious landing craft, tanks and other vehicles. Senator John Heinz History Center.
Upon landing on Omaha Beach just after the first day of the D-Day invasion, Book’s platoon saw bodies of many fallen comrades. There was still fighting to do before the beachhead was secured. Although the worst of the battle had been fought, they still had to face sporadic German fire. The howitzers already set up on the beach from the previous day were manned until they were knocked out by the enemy. As the platoon moved from the beachhead, they would be left to fight their way across France without artillery pieces for a long time before the howitzers could be replaced. Book and his battalion then continued on a northwestern route to Cherbourg, France, where they were assigned to assist in the liberation from German occupation. As they made their way, they encountered little resistance. The American infantry had passed through the previous day, gaining some control over the territory, but they still faced some shelling from the Germans.
Pittsburgh Remembers World War II Page 6
