We boarded the USS Ancon about 1:30 AM on Jan.
31, 1942 and pulled out of the harbor about 2;30 that afternoon. The
ship had been built in 1939, so was a pretty nice ship. It was built
as a combination freighter-passenger ship that ran between U.S. and
S. American ports.
Had facilities for 250 passengers and lots of freight.
Had been converted to a troop ship to carry approx. 3000 troops. This
was accomplished by stacking bunks 3 high in the hold areas and 4 high
in the ballroom. Of course, the officers had the staterooms. The bunks
consisted of canvas stretched between a steel frame - just barely large
enough to accomadate my 6'1' - 180 Lb. frame. Along with the 3rd Bomb
Gp. was the 35th Air Base Gp., which had been with us in Savannah. They
fed two meals a day, early morning and late afternoon. The first 3 or
4 days out a good many of us could have cared less about food. We were
so damned sick we just wanted to be left alone to die. Fortunately none
of us did. So we settled in for very boring 25 day South Sea pleasure
(?) cruise.
On the way over we had 6 sub alerts, on about three
of them the destroyers did drop ashcans. On the last one about 2 days
out of Brisbane the Navy claimed to have sunk a ship. We had to take
their word for it, as there was nothing to see except eruptions of water.
But after seeing the Navy gunners knock 25 Kamakazis out of the sky
three years later in the Phillipines on a convoy where they sank 8 ships
out of our convoy - I will believe anything the Navy says -- they are
good.
When we started it was pretty generally believed that
we were headed for the Phillipines. Due to the rapid detieriation of
the situation when we arrived in Aust. we figured we were diverted.
But I never did hear any confirmation of whether or not this was true.
Since they had failed to made any arrangements for aircraft for us,
I doubt that they would have sent us into the Phillipines.
Having figured we were due to get involved in this
war for sometime, I think it was the geneal consensus that there was
a job to be done, lets get it over with. I was not surprised that we
were in it, but a lot of us were surprised by the Jap attack on Pearl
Harbor. Altho it was not that much of a surprise to the powers that
be in Washington. Having broke the Jap code, they knew it was coming,
just didn't know when or where. But the military in both Hawaii and
the Phillipines should have been on high alert, and the sneak attacks
should not have been so devastating. But that is something that we didn't
find out until after the war, and the attack did pull the country together
for a concentrated effort for a common cause to pull for -- the like
of which we haven't seen since -- witness the present election debachle.
This country is so polarized and split right down the middle, it is
pathetic. But I'm sure you don't want a discourse on the present sad
state of affairs. A lot of us had a long stretch over there, but by
and large we pretty much hung in there and moral was excellent except
for one short stretch. There was always rumors that we would be relieved
and get to go back to the states. When we had been over there about
a year and a half, MacArthur put out a Memorandum that except for combat
crew who completed their 50 missions and medical reasons, nobody would
be going home until the war was ovr - in other words, we were there
for the duration. That did put us down in the dumps for a short time,
but it didn't last long.
