by Miner, Ron
Shortly, my hospital mates reappeared, an exhausted and motley looking bunch of wet and dirty outcasts. “Must have been pretty nasty down there,” I said as I gave my pillow an unnecessary pat.
Elliot Schreider, 3rd from left. Del Fager, 2nd from left
We received word that another plane, this one with the crew that had earlier traveled with Reverend Alexander for the R&R in Nouméa, was missing. He was taking it particularly hard and flew with us in “Black Magic” as we spent an entire Sunday searching in vain for them. The pilot, Lt. Merle Schall of our squadron, had endured one of the worst cases of malaria any of us had experienced here and had been sent to a Navy hospital in New Zealand to recuperate. He was there a good month and should have gone stateside, but he refused, wanting desperately to rejoin his crew. By then, the Skipper was sending us all off to Sidney in the same precise order as our initial arrival times in Guadalcanal, and both Merle and his copilot, Elliot Schreider, had been among the first. Elliot later told us that it was decided that Schall, having spent a month already in New Zealand, albeit in the hospital, would need to continue duty while Elliot went ahead and took his designated R&R time in Australia. That night, Schall’s plane went down in Empress Augusta Bay. Merle was a fine pilot and, back in August, he, Elliot, and the crew had been the victim of a friendly fire incident, shot down by a radar firing from one of our own ships in the Blackett Straight. With one engine out from the attack and only 800 feet of altitude, he managed a frantic emergency open sea landing at night without benefit of knowing about wind direction, submerged reefs or other obstacles, or even the very state of the waters below them. They came to rest in between two large swells and watched as the fleet steamed away from them having chalked up another “bogey.” The PBY remained afloat for the remainder of the night, some seven hours, very near the spot where John Kennedy’s PT boat was cut in half by a Japanese destroyer two weeks earlier. One of those PT boats managed to find them and brought the crew back to their base at Rendova where a Black Cat crew later picked them up.
This time things were much different. There was a hopeful report the next morning and finally another PBY was able to locate two survivors who had been thrown out of one of the blisters. They were badly shaken, but recalled a serious downdraft plunging them toward the ocean surface and forcing a wingtip into the water. The plane cartwheeled, throwing them clear before crashing and burning. I was stunned to learn that Bridges and Jicka, two of my roommates in Guadalcanal, were part of the remaining crew that had perished. Richard Jicka had just returned from Sidney and replaced Elliot as First Officer.* We had lost another plane and another part of our family.
I was surprised one day to find a training schedule posted and equally excited to see we were all to be qualified as PPCs (Patrol Plane Commanders). One by one, we were all put in the left seat and practiced takeoffs and landings “in command” of our aircraft. By Dec. 4, it was official, and a pay raise and promotion to lieutenant junior grade (Lt.jg) was in order. The gold bar now became silver.
Almost immediately, there was a stunning announcement that we were to be shipped stateside. The ensuing missions were interminable. We were sure we would be shot down before we could make it back. As the day approached, several in the squadron prevailed upon the local Seabees, the Navy’s answer to the Army engineers, to build us sea chests to ship home our personal gear and souvenirs. Over time, I seemed to have gained status as the squadron artist. I had designed our Black Cat insignia, a snarling cat riding a bomb, and applied it with colored lacquers to a number of leather flight jackets. Now everyone was approaching me to stencil and otherwise adorn their sea chests. I was busying myself on the one belonging to our intelligence officer as he happened in. He seemed to be admiring the work and casually picked up the gin bottle containing the lacquer thinner, and before I could say anything, swigged a mouthful before screaming and running from the tent spewing thinner everywhere. It seemed a perfect end to our last day in this beautiful place, where what you did so often failed to make any sense.
The squadron was replaced by VP-81 and started home Dec. 10, 1943, Henderson to Espiritu Santos. We were aboard a big four engine Coronado PB2Y2 flying boat operated by Pan Am.
By chance, H. V. Kaltenborn the radio commentator was aboard and we explained the details of the Short Snorters club to him. We had him signed up in short order, three of us relieving him of a dollar bill in return for endorsing another one for him.
After a refueling stop at Canton Island, we continued on to Honolulu. By now we were all dying to get our hands on a more advanced aircraft, and I was able to persuade the captain to give me some “stick time” in the PB2Y2. It was wonderful and seemed luxurious compared to our GI equipment.
Bright and early, the squad boarded a troop ship bound for the West Coast and San Francisco, and passed under the Golden Gate on New Year’s Eve, 1943. The Sir Francis Drake Hotel was the place to be that night, and we celebrated the New Year with some ladies at the Starlight Ballroom. We had rolls of worthless Japanese Yen and delighted the girls by using them to light cigarettes. Great food, drink, and company, it was an all out party till they closed the place. It was 1944 and we were loving it!
Our orders directed us to report to Alameda NAS the following day for flight physicals, which would qualify or disqualify us to return to active duty. We reasoned the more indulgent our New Year’s Eve became, the stronger our chances of blowing the physicals and ending up with the coveted stateside duty. So with major hangovers, we boarded the bus to Alameda. We had to carry Pete, who had really set the tempo the night before. Maybe all the alcohol relaxed us too much because we sailed through our dreaded Schneider tests with perfect blood pressure, etc., and quickly found ourselves all reassigned to active duty. It was kind of a shock, so our next angle was to try to improve our lot by putting in for F7Fs (Tigercat fighter) or PV-1s (Venturas), anything more modern than those lumbering PBYs of our first tour.
Coincidently, I found that my younger brother, Mac, was also there, and that he would soon be leaving to become an Army medic somewhere in the Pacific Theater.
Since my closest friend Jack lived in San Francisco, I spent a few days with him taking in the town. We hit Fisherman’s Wharf, the International Settlement, and put away our share of Scotch and sodas. A few more of the Seven joined us for dinner with his parents one night, and I became acquainted with his sister. Soon she and I were dating. The two of us visited Golden Gate Park and the Redwoods, and at one point, even discussed marriage. We would keep in touch with each other for the duration of the war, and even got to see each other on a number of occasions. But somehow, the chemistry wasn’t quite there, maybe it felt a little like a “rebound,” maybe the fact that I knew Jack a little too well played into it, I’m not sure.
I soon found myself climbing aboard the Super Chief, two days and a night heading home to Indianapolis for leave. I wondered how things would seem and what changes our town had been through in my absence.
I knew my being away in a war zone was rough on my parents and hoped they were both holding up well and that the adjustments in their life’s daily routines since the war began hadn’t been too hard on them. They had been through rationing of gas, tires, and anything rubber and had been allowed only four gallons a week while abiding by the national speed limit of 35 MPH. They had endured Indiana winters with modest amounts of heating supplies. They picked up and used prescribed Ration Books that allowed only limited amounts of many foods we had always taken for granted like sugar or meat. Clothing items including shoes were in short supply and nylons weren’t available until after the war. They watched as railroads tracks were stripped of their rails and bumpers removed from cars for the metal they contained. Victory gardens were all over town, and the folks grew fruits and vegetables and everything they could in the yard and canned it. Like many Americans, they even returned grease and fats from cooking to the butcher shop so they could be collected and then later processed into explosives. The family had been
living with less so we could have more.
I wondered how much my little sister had grown up.
Suddenly, I opened the door and we were again a family. I savored the home life with them all and caught up with old friends. Coincidently, I found that my younger brother, Mac, was also there, and that he would soon be leaving to become an Army medic somewhere in the Pacific Theater.
While I was home, I was recruited to speak at my former high school and again confront that always distressing podium. This time, it was made a little easier by the fact that there was so much to share, so many stories to tell. I even spoke to two shifts at the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Plant, letting them know how their dedication to their jobs was sincerely appreciated by our fighting men. Everyone needed to do their part.
Those precious days flew by, and before I knew it, I was back on the Super Chief, two nights and a day to San Francisco.
* * *
*First Officer is another designation for copilot
The Second Tour
It was on to the famous North Island (N.I.) NAS. I had hit a snag coming down from San Francisco and was almost six days late when I arrived at the San Diego base, but the rest of the Big Seven were there waiting for me in our new quarters. In the morning, the group of us was all together looking over our orders when Peckham spoke up.
“Aw, no! Look at this!”
“We’re slap bang back in the ‘Black Cats’ again,” I said in disbelief.
“What happened to the F7Fs? A seagull can outrun those PBYs!”
It was true. Our dream of dashing around the skies in a fighter or dive bomber was history, but at least we were all PPCs now with our own planes and crews and were still together along with about ten other members of the old squadron. Maybe this was the best thing for us, becoming the nucleus of the new version, the new “54.” It seemed an awesome responsibility to be assigned to the left seat, but we felt battle trained and confident, refreshed from our time off, and feeling a mixture of excitement, nerves, and curiosity. We were to be now known as “VPB-54,” the “B” stood for bombing.
Suddenly, there was a different ingredient in the mix. We had a new skipper, a young lieutenant commander, the son of an admiral, a former destroyer man, and fresh out of Navy flight school. It quickly became apparent that, as an old line officer, he was determined to make a name for himself— everything was now by the book but with more or less a “destroyer” flavor. We were to use theoretical practice instead of our battle proven techniques and we could already see the fallacies of it and where it was heading. Training missions now lasted far into the night. I can hear him still, “Stand by to execute! ... Execute!”
During our five months in San Diego, there was considerable emphasis on our physical fitness, especially in the Olympic pool. It was a requirement to pass a triple-A test involving four different strokes: side, back, breast, and crawl; an endurance swim of over a mile; five minutes of treading water; and finally a jump off the high dive with an underwater swim the length of the pool. I had done enough swimming in college to get by the four strokes in good shape, but I struggled with the distance and the high dive. I discovered I could side stroke until tired, recover by doing a back float and kick along almost indefinitely by keeping my lungs partly filled with air, then swim a side stroke into my “second wind” and on for a mile or more. My first effort at a feet first dive off of the high board was a pitiful failure. It was supposed to simulate jumping off the deck of a sinking ship and escaping by swimming below any burning oil. Our coach continued to patiently give us instruction and, before long, I was able to pass the entire test.
On the other hand, Roger, my navigator, was skinny and when those “skin and bones” mixed with water he had a habit of sinking like a stone. He finally came up to me almost in tears and said, “I’ll never make your crew!” Yet he went back in, again and again, swallowing pool water all the while, and somehow, he eventually got through it. And what a fine navigator he was!
Soon, my crew began to take shape. Robert (Bob) White, our copilot, was a good flier and I knew I could trust him to handle things if my attention was required elsewhere. He was eager and absorbed information quickly. Roger was conscientious and a crack navigator. He sported a Texas drawl and was married — I sketched a picture of his baby from a photo for him.
Our plane captain, Norris Townsley, knew what made the plane tick, and my second mechanic, Machinist Mate Keene, was ambitious and also knew his beans. He had a way of anticipating me. First Radioman Lambert kept the complicated radio gear in operation and had been in our first squadron. Very experienced. His Second Radioman, Synan, was a fast learner and very diligent. My two gunners, Combs and Richardson, were wicked behind the .50 calibers and doubled on the camera and bombsight. It was a solid group and I would have stacked them up against any in the squadron.
It was something flying over the United States for a change. We balanced doing takeoffs and landings with time in the link trainer and classes in navigation and recognition. Ray Peckham and I took a short instrument hop up the coast, flying past Santa Anna, Long Beach, and up to L.A., circling over the town and eventually heading over to Catalina Island, the famous resort. It was our aircraft’s namesake.
The terrain from the air was so different from the jungles we had become accustomed to — deep gullies and irregular valleys with sides cut and streaked from erosion. As we swung over the border, the little Mexican towns appeared contrived by a designer gracing them with very wide streets, carefully spaced but unpaved so that grass filled the open spaces, save two winding sets of ruts.
When flying around a big air field like N.I., I was constantly impressed with the miracle of radio, listening to the control tower directing countless planes as they circled, landed, taxied, took off. I found myself surprised every time I spoke and actually got an answer. “North Island Tower from one victor three, on final approach and request permission to land on two ball* runway, over.”
“One victor three, this is North Island Tower. You are cleared to land. Wilco.”
Our PBYs may have had their drawbacks, but their GO9-transmitter radios were not one of them. It was one of the best radios ever made. The thing was big and hot with foot long tubes glowing inside. It seemed you could pick up signals from almost anywhere in the world and sometimes it was fun to try. A long cable with a heavy steel weight at its end, towed behind the plane, provided an antenna and while it was easy enough to extend, retrieving it required a lot of hand cranking effort and some discussion about whose job it would be.
We still did a considerable amount of training after dark and could use that cable as an indicator of our altitude when making night landings on water. In the South Pacific, a moonless night meant almost total darkness below, and while altimeters helped they weren’t accurate down to the surface and you never were sure about high swells and waves. At about fifty feet, the bob on the end would hit the water and sometimes snap off. The pilot slowed as much as he dared and then cut throttles to full stall in, a landing that frequently had consequences, popping rivets and scattering things about the cabin. We always carried golf tees and pencils to plug holes and stop the water leakage.
Returning to the combat zone, a place you felt lucky to survive the first time, was a real motivator, at least as far as R&R was concerned. The point now was to squeeze as much into our remaining time in San Diego as we could. We wanted wine, women, and song, and the song wasn’t all that important. Most of the bars closed at midnight, and our nightly torpedo and bombing run training lasted until 10 p.m. most nights. It was a predicament, requiring a quick shower and shave, and then a boat ride into town, leaving barely an hour to get caught up. We switched to drinks that packed more punch, like Zombies, for a while and Jack introduced me to Nickolovski’s, a brandy laced with absinthe. In fact, there was a game based on this drink that seemed to get the crowd going. It was great sport and the ladies seemed to find it particularly appealing.
Howard at controls
&nbs
p; Del and I and a few of the others decided to chip in and buy a car, a 1940 Studebaker for $950 with good tires and a radio. It was time to widen our range and we drove the sixteen miles to Tijuana to see how it stacked up with what we had observed from the air. It was a crazy little town, mostly souvenir stands and trinkets. The senoritas ... well, none of us spoke Spanish, but apparently we didn’t make much of an impression. They did have the best steaks I’ve ever eaten with a portion measuring over twelve inches and an inch thick. We resolved to head to L.A. for a weekend, a challenging test for our new jalopy, but first had a work session away from North Island for a week.
The training was strenuous, but grew more interesting by the day. Across the Laguna Mountains inland from San Diego is a sizable salt water lake called the Salton Sea. A modest-sized group of us traveled there, a week at a time, and stayed at the smallish base nearby. The lake’s considerable size provided a perfect setting for water work. It was some forty miles long and ten wide, allowing a half dozen or more takeoffs and landings in a single pass, and an adjacent runway allowed us to put the tricycle gear down for land work.
This desert landscape hadn’t a hint of trees — only occasional cactus and sagebrush — and was reminiscent of our visit to little Canton Island in the South Pacific. The sand dunes and desert-scape gave way to stunning vistas of craggy mountains beyond the lake, a few with snow lines mirroring the white clouds above their peaks. Depending on the time of day, the colors would be blues, browns, purples, or all of them. They seemed so very far away from the lake, but as you climbed into the sky they quickly grew in stature. In the valleys below them, the irrigating systems were remarkable, a network of waterways converting desert into green fields for agriculture.
