What Lies @ the Heart: September 2007

Pfc. CLYDE B. SMITH – WW II EXPERIENCES

Clyde was 17 years old when he and a friend named Raymond went to Portsmouth, VA to sign up. When they took their physicals they couldn’t see well enough without glasses and were turned down by the Army. The Marines has just passed a new directive that if you could see 20/20 with glasses they would take you. They had passed their other physicals, so this new directive allowed them to enlist in the USMC. Clyde had to send papers home to his parents for permission to enlist as he was underage at 17.   He told them to sign them because one way or the other, he was joining. He did.

Clyde and Raymond were supposed to be in Norfolk, VA to be inducted on a certain day and Raymond had a Dodge (his dad’s) so they took two girls to Danville just “goofing around” then got enough rationed gas and drove the girls from Leaksville, NC to Danville, VA to do some shopping. On the way the car slide and turned over on a damp road. The car was resting on its top in a ditch and Raymond’s girlfriend was pinned under the car. They tried to raise the car enough for her to get out but couldn’t do it. Clyde ran down the highway to a house for help. While he was getting help Raymond got under the car enough for her to get out and some people took them to the hospital in Danville. The girlfriend had cracked ribs. Because it was an accident, the ambulance took them back to Leaksville. This was the same night Clyde and Raymond were supposed to leave for training in Norfolk. Raymond went to see his father at the railroad where he worked. He asked for the car keys and Raymond had to tell him he had wrecked the car. With no car, Clyde and Raymond left on a bus for Norfolk to be inducted.   

Later they were sworn in at Norfolk Navy Yard and given a steak dinner. The next day they rode a train to Yamoss, SC to Parris Island. They were in something like a cattle car. As they drove into the main gate and towards the barracks building, there were trainees all around them yelling telling them they were going to be sorry. Dad’s group asked if they were sorry to which they replied, YES.    They were greeted by a bulldog-looking Sergeant who had something insulting to say to each of them. Clyde had his trousers rolled up. The Sergeant asked him, “Where you come from?” “NC.” “Is it raining up there.” “No.” “Then turn those damn cuffs down!” They then lined up at the barber shop and in less than a minute, with a razor to their head, the barber spun the chair around and their hair disappeared.   

They started out with basic training. DI Carpenter took about 3 months to turn them into Marines. They lined up in Quonset huts near a rifle range. Marched. Drilled with a rifle and other weapons. Marched. Trained on the firing range. Marched. They also had to run in the sand at the beach and the sand flies nearly ate them alive. On the firing range they had to shoot at bulls eye targets from difficult positions, like laying down, sitting on one foot, from a prone position, kneeling. The first day when they fired a rifle, they had 4 shots at 200-500 yards. The bulls eye was no bigger than a tv screen. Every day they had to disassemble their rifle. Clyde did really well on the shooting range because his daddy had taught him to shoot at targets on the branch near their home in Leaksville.   On the first day of firing they fired a full course (68 rounds) at the bulls eye. If they got a red flag (called “Maggie’s drawers”) that meant they had missed the whole thing. That was a practice day. The next day they shot for real for the record and Clyde’s score was 316 (340 was perfect). He got a bulls eye almost every single time! Once, out of 16 shots, he had all bulls eyes. The Marines kept him as a shooting coach on the range. Clyde coached about 6-8 months. Every time they put up a notice for other assignments, he kept putting his name on the list. He thought he was missing something, but it was really a cinch. No guard duty. No work assignments. Off every afternoon. The barracks that housed the coaches was quite large. Every Saturday at noon he was off until Monday 7:00a.m. He had a lot of freedom and went all over the place on his off time. But, the Marines finally took him up on his request for another assignment. He’d live to regret his eagerness for action.

Clyde was sent back to Norfolk to the Navy Yard and the hard stuff began. Here he had sea school for training to be aboard a ship. His platoon was going to the Pacific Theater. Every Marine is a “rifleman”, but to be stationed on a ship, each had to know about the ships. Fifty Marines were stationed on each ship. Marines felt the Navy sailors were lax and undisciplined. The Marines served as the Captain’s orderly, did burial duty, and were stationed mid-ship to one of 7 gun positions. There wasn’t much fraternity between the Sailors and the Marines. There wasn’t any friction, they just didn’t hang around with each other. Clyde said, “I always felt that our 50 Marines (40 sailors and 10 Marines) did more formal work. Marines were the ones assigned to gang planks, guarding the ship, etc.” The 2nd division wore a braid from a French WWI design. Dress blues were never issued during war time. You had to borrow one if you wanted to wear it to something.    

The USS Bataan was the name of the aircraft carrier and the Captain, Captain V. H. Schaeffer, wouldn’t allow any problems. He ran a tight ship. The Bataan, a 600’ foot ship, was built and commissioned in Philadelphia. They had a shakedown cruise from Philly to Trinidad, running exercises and flying planes on and off the ship. They carried 24 F6-F "Hellcat" fighter planes and nine torpedo bombers, known as BMTs. When ready, they left Philly through the Panama Canal. The ship was supposed to have gone to San Francisco, but the ship which was supposed to carry the troops had been banged up on the locks, so the Bataan picked up Marines from San Diego and carried them to Honolulu. They were there for only a short time to get supplies and pick up some planes and then they were off to the Marshall Islands on April 4, 1944 to join Task Force 58. 

The USS Bataan cruised southwest with battleships, and other ships from the fleet. An aircraft carrier is dependent on battleships and cruisers. They are placed inside the rest of the fleet for protection. En route, crossing the-l8Oth Meridian at the Equator, they stopped for the traditional, colorful ceremonies in which the old salts initiated men like Clyde who had never before crossed the International Date Line into the "Domain of the Golden Dragon,” then on to assist in the air operations in the invasion of against Hollandia, New Guinea – Weatac. While there they supported the Army for a 7 day invasion. They bombed to harass, then they went to the Marianas, Siapan, Guam, then chased the Japanese fleet. They arrived at the Marshall Islands on May 4, 1944. The task force was ordered to strike Iwo Jima on June 15 in the afternoon, but after receiving reports of a large Japanese force closing in on the Marianas they canceled it and headed south to rejoin Task Force 58. It proved to be a fortuitous change of plans.

The 1st Battle of Eastern Philippines was Clyde’s first time to man the big guns on the Bataan. During the first day of the Battle of the Philippine Sea, Bataan's aircraft claimed 10 Japanese planes out of the approximately 300 enemy aircraft lost in the battle dubbed the "Great Marianas Turkey Shoot."  Clyde was on a 40 millimeter gun crew as a loader, passing shells to the gunner. He didn’t care for the sights on the gun which was a gyroscope. An image was imposed and each ring was a certain distance. Every 4th shell was a tracer to help know where you were hitting in relationship to the target.   In this Philippine battle the Japanese launched planes from a distance that was too far for them to get back from. So the Bataan launched planes to meet the Japanese and some to wait for them at the islands where they hoped to land. 

Clyde hardly ever got off the ship. On Saipan it was mountainous and there were lots of caves. They couldn’t wander too far because the Japs were hiding in the caves.   They were in a big storm at sea and the pounding waves threw things out of adjustment. It changed the elevation for the planes as well as other damage extensive enough to cause them to return to Pearl Harbor for repairs. The USS North Carolina escorted them to Pearl. The repairs could not be done at Pearl Harbor so they had to go to San Francisco - Hunter’s Point, in San Francisco Bay, arriving July 30, 1944. While on R&R in the Bay, Clyde’s cousin Gene’s ship was there too. He got permission to go visit Gene and they had dinner and went to a boxing match. Another R&R cruiser came in and it had Raymond on it so Clyde got to reunite with the friend from Leaksville he had signed up with.   

Once back in Pearl, Clyde was transferred to 2nd Division and shipped out of Pearl on a troop ship. It wasn’t very comfortable as the bunks were so close together you could only get in by sliding in. And it was very HOT!   The 2nd Division was stationed in Saipan, commanded by Major General LeRoy P. Hunt. They went out on patrols of 39 men just looking for Japanese. While on these patrols, Clyde carried a Browning Automatic Rifle. They ran into Japanese at different times who seemed anxious to stay unknown. It was thought that they probably were getting their supplies from what the Marines were throwing away. Just off the roads there were cane fields that were 6 feet high but they never ran into any troops face to face. The Lieutenant kept them patrolling and Clyde never shot his gun the whole time they were there. Any of the Marines who rambled into caves were killed. Otherwise, they didn’t run into any trouble.    

On the southern end of Saipan was a landing strip for B29’s. They also had one in Tinian and Guam. The Navy maintained a training area on Tinian, the island 80 miles north of Guam, used to launch the two atom bombs that ended World War II. Tinian became an important operational base for the rest of the Pacific war. It had four airfields for the B-29 bombers.   From  19 February – 26 March 1945  there was huge battle at Iwo Jima called Operational Detachment in which 26,000 troops were killed. It was some of the fiercest and bloodiest fighting to date in the ar in the War  in the Pacific. The change in plans for the USS Bataan, sending it towards the Marianas probably saved Clyde’s life - an event that would happen again towards the end of the war.

On March 19, 1945, Clyde recalled the Bataan had a narrow escape when a Japanese plane dropped two bombs on the U.S.S. Franklin, which was 3,100 yards from the Bataan at the time. "After the bombs hit, the Franklin was out of control and was heading directly toward us. We maneuvered our ship and the Franklin just missed hitting us." The next day, the Bataan suffered its first losses when one sailor was killed and 11 were wounded during an attack on the ship by Japanese bombers and fighter planes.   On April 1945 Roosevelt died, which shocked the nation. Clyde’s Division was on their way to Okinawa for the invasion on April 1 when they got the news.  From the information that was being given to the Marines “it sounded like Hell with all enemies then – dangerous conditions.” Self-protection was more in Clyde’s mind. Any “gung-ho-ism” had gone out the window by this time.   On May 15, 1945, the Bataan was hit by shell fire and nine men were killed and 26 others wounded. It was the most casualties of any single day's in the Bataan’s history. 

On July 10, 1945, the Bataan was part of the Task Force's 1,000-plane attack on Tokyo.   In the Fall of 1945 the 2nd Division then went to Okinawa for the invasion of Japan from landing crafts. They were to be support for the 10th Army who made the invasion. They had island “hopscotched’ taking islands as they went and they were now close enough to invade Japan in what was to be called “Operation Downfall”. They went from the southwest side of Okinawa and the Marines were on the southeast side. There were ships around them. Clyde’s division were attacking from the bluff side. The main attack was by Army on the southwest side.  The attack never happened. The operation was cancelled when Japan surrendered after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Soviet Union declared war against Japan. We heard about Hiroshima, Clyde said, on August 6, 1945 at 10:30pm because one of the guys had a short wave radio that made the announcement about the atomic bomb. By this time they had gone to Saipan after there was no landing in Okinawa for the invasion on Japan. This was a near miss for Clyde and the other troops that would have been involved. Truman had been advised by Gen. Marshall that casualties could be around 41,000 in the first 30 days. Nearly 500,000 Purple Heart medals were manufactured in advance in anticipation of the casualties resulting from the invasion of Japan. To the present date, all the American military casualties of the sixty years following the end of World War II—including the Korean and Vietnam Wars—have not exceeded that number.   

When we heard about the bomb, it was already understood there would be in an invasion of the southernmost main Japanese island, Kyūshū. The task force launched planes on August 15 because we didn’t have any word about Japan surrendering, but the attack was called off after news of the surrender and the pilots were singing “Oh, What A Beautiful Morning” over their plane’s radios as they flew back. When relaying this story many years later, Clyde said it scared him in retrospect about how close they came to this invasion in which he stood a good chance of being killed. 

The Marine division  had no sense of danger from the A-bomb residue when they became the first occupation troops to land in Nagasaki after the bomb after Japan surrendered on August 14, 1945, taking up occupation duties that lasted for nine months. Clyde was there for over 4 months, leaving in December.   The wise decision to send the ships from the Okinawa area back to their original location paid off in a different way than planned. Instead of using the ships and troops for Operation Downfall to invade Japan’s mainland, many were used in the occupational duties of Japan after it had been ravaged by the Atomic bombs. The main body of occupation troops, Clyde’s included, entered Nagasaki about 45 days after the bombing. The 2nd Marine Division consisted of 20,000 Marines. In both Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a group of American scientists from the Manhattan Engineer District arrived three days before the troops and performed a radiological survey.  

There was some concern when they went into the harbor in landing craft in Nagasaki Mitsubishi Ship Yards. Part of Nagasaki in the south remained intact. The bomb went off in the northern part of the city close to ground. This actually saved the southern part of the city. Without thought of danger, they went right into the area where the bomb had gone off. Clyde described the surreal site of total destruction. He reported that a typical day in Nagasaki was spent patrolling.  He was there until the first of December 1945, living in a shipyard worker’s building until being sent home.  

Clyde and the rest of the troops went by train from Nagasaki to Sasebo which took several hours. From there they left aboard a ship on December 5, 1945, sailing the Japanese Current and landing in San Diego on December 20.  They arrived back at Camp Pendleton at 9-10:00pm. The camp was almost apologetic about not having china for them to eat on. They left Camp Pendleton after the 1st of the year and were taken to Los Angeles to a train station. Clyde had all his possessions in a sea bag. At the train station all the sea bags were loaded stacked on top of each other. He never saw it again. He got home with a rifle, a Japanese sword which he had exchanged for his rifle with a Japanese soldier, and a ruptured duck (a pin signifying discharge). He was brought by train to Camp Lejeune in NC and discharged there. He took a bus back home to Leaksville to no great fanfare. He had been gone a little over 3 years - - Clyde said, “Long enough!”    

Clyde never liked to talk about the war much, or watch war movies. Too many memories. He did talk about how the war changed his entire life. Born and raised in a mill town in North Carolina to poor parents, he would not have been able to attend college and would probably have ended up like his father, working in the mill. Because of the war, he escaped the small town and was able to use the GI Bill to pay for school and attended the University of North Carolina in pre-law before being called into ministry, marrying Martha Grant, and leaving for Fort Worth, TX to attend seminary.   Pfc Clyde Smith attended the weekend of events and ceremony in the Washington DC mall when the WWII Memorial was dedicated. It proved to be an extremely meaningful and emotional experience.  When Clyde Smith passed away in September 2006, in Wilmington, NC, he was honored with a full dress Marine honor guard funeral, complete with Marine pallbearers, a three-volley salute from a rifle party, and a bugler standing alone on a hill playing taps. It was an extremely moving ceremony honoring an extremely wonderful man. Oooorah! Semper Fidelis!  

What Lies @ the Heart

Thursday, September 27, 2007

Parting (for Chad)

Friday, September 21, 2007

Clyde Smith - A WWII Veteran’s Story

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