- 7/6/2025
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00:00:00Music
00:00:00Throughout the bloody battle for the Pacific,
00:00:23one class of fighting ship was always in the thick of the action.
00:00:26Its creed was to go in harm's way, and its motto, kill or be killed.
00:00:34From protecting the capital ships and bombarding enemy troops,
00:00:38to sinking submarines and bringing down the dreaded kamikaze,
00:00:41it took on the full ferocity of the Japanese and won.
00:00:46Always fighting at close range,
00:00:48they were the eyes, ears and teeth of the American Navy, the destroyer.
00:00:53Best damn ship in the Navy.
00:00:55Thank God for the Fletchers,
00:00:57because I think the Fletchers were vital in winning the war.
00:01:02Using extraordinary archive film and color reenactments,
00:01:06Battle Stations takes you into battle
00:01:08with a machine whose name says it all,
00:01:11the destroyer.
00:01:12April 9th, 1942, Japanese troops capture the Philippine peninsula of Bataan.
00:01:24More than 70,000 Filipino and American troops are taken into captivity.
00:01:29It is the largest U.S. Army in history to surrender,
00:01:31and one of the blackest days of the war.
00:01:37Army commander General MacArthur vowed that one day he would return to retake the islands.
00:01:43But that day seemed a long way away.
00:01:45With the loss of Bataan, Japan appeared unbeatable.
00:01:51Poised to sweep across the whole of the Pacific,
00:01:53a shudder of fear reverberates throughout the free world.
00:01:58But on that very day,
00:02:00a ship with a radical new design was undergoing trials for the U.S. Navy.
00:02:04It was the first of what would become
00:02:06one of the most successful fighting ships of World War II.
00:02:09The new Fletcher-class destroyers.
00:02:16The destroyer had its genesis as far back as the 1870s,
00:02:20when motor torpedo boats were used as a means of attacking battleships.
00:02:25Relatively small but extremely fast,
00:02:28they were usually armed with a single torpedo tube
00:02:30and some form of rapid-fire machine gun.
00:02:35By the outbreak of World War I,
00:02:37the torpedo boat had evolved into the destroyer
00:02:40and had become the backbone of navies throughout the world.
00:02:45But in the 1920s,
00:02:47cautious eyes were beginning to be turned east
00:02:49when the first of Japan's new class of destroyers was launched.
00:02:53These fast, heavily armed ships with five-inch guns
00:02:56were more than a match for anything that the West had.
00:03:01As Japan's expansionist policies increased,
00:03:04so did her fleet.
00:03:05Soon, mighty battleships, carriers and cruisers
00:03:08were all coming off the slipways.
00:03:12Germany and Italy were also hell-bent on building up their fleets
00:03:16as ship after ship took to the seas.
00:03:21But in America,
00:03:22very little was done to counter these threats.
00:03:25The design of the American destroyer
00:03:28really was static into the 20s and early 30s.
00:03:34No new ships were built.
00:03:36Many were decommissioned.
00:03:38So basically, the type of destroyer that the Navy,
00:03:40U.S. Navy, had into the 20s and 30s
00:03:42was the World War I emergency program, Flesh Deckers.
00:03:44As the world entered a crazy race to rearm,
00:03:49American naval designers finally took a hard look at these new battle fleets.
00:03:54What they saw was alarming.
00:03:56The message was clear.
00:03:58As a counter to these new ships,
00:04:00they had to come up with a fast and heavily armed destroyer of their own.
00:04:04The designers also faced an added problem.
00:04:08Aircraft.
00:04:09As planes became faster and more powerful,
00:04:12a new breed of destroyer would have to be able to carry enough firepower
00:04:15to protect themselves and to destroy the aircraft.
00:04:21Slowly, a new design evolved.
00:04:23And in 1939, plans were laid down to build a new class of American destroyer.
00:04:29The Fletcher class.
00:04:30These would be the largest class of destroyer ever built by any nation.
00:04:36Its design was an engineering achievement of balancing ruggedness and seaworthiness,
00:04:40armament and speed on a classically proportioned steel hull.
00:04:46At 376 feet long and nearly 2,900 tons when fully loaded,
00:04:52the Fletchers were significantly larger than any previous American destroyer.
00:04:57They had five 5-inch guns.
00:05:00Ten 21-inch torpedo tubes.
00:05:05Seven 40-millimeter and seven 20-millimeter guns.
00:05:12They were also armed with 56 depth chargers.
00:05:15The destroyer would also be the first to be fitted with surface and air-warning radar.
00:05:25With their 60,000 shaft horsepower engines delivering a speed of over 36 knots,
00:05:31the destroyer was destined to be an awesome fighting machine.
00:05:34And world events would soon prove it.
00:05:39In September 1939, Germany invaded Poland, and World War II began.
00:05:45By 1940, the war at sea had intensified, and German U-boats began decimating British convoys in the Atlantic.
00:05:54While still neutral, one incident would bring America one step closer to war.
00:06:00On September 4, 1941, during a routine convoy patrol, an American World War I destroyer, the Greer, had two torpedoes fired at her by a U-boat.
00:06:15The U-boat fired torpedoes at the Greer, which in turn responded with depth charges.
00:06:24Greer, of course, had been shadowing the submarine, and so the German U-boat skipper, in defending his ship, fired torpedoes.
00:06:32Although the Greer was not hit, in a fireside chat, President Roosevelt sent a chilling message to Germany.
00:06:42With millions of Americans listening in on the message, he issued a shoot-on-sight order to the U.S. Navy on any German vessel found in American waters.
00:06:52But let this warning be clear. From now on, if German or Italian vessels of war enter the waters, the protection of which is necessary for American defense, they do so at their own peril.
00:07:12Shortly afterwards, another U.S. destroyer, the USS Kearney, was badly damaged by torpedo with the loss of 11 American sailors.
00:07:20These were the first U.S. deaths by Germans.
00:07:25America had been blooded in a war that it was not part of, and the U.S. Navy's destroyers had fired America's first shots of the war.
00:07:35Little did anyone know that this was just the beginning, and full-scale world war was soon to erupt, with the destroyer at the tip of the spear.
00:07:50On Sunday, the 7th of December, 1941, Japan held its aircraft at the American Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor.
00:08:04Within 55 minutes, the fleet lay in ruins. America was at war.
00:08:10Immediately, the might of U.S. industry mobilized behind the war effort.
00:08:24Its Pacific fleet had been severely damaged, and it needed ships to take the fight back to Japan.
00:08:29Along the length and breadth of America, shipyards sprang into action to build the hardware that would avenge Pearl Harbor.
00:08:40Eleven shipyards were given the task to build these new destroyers.
00:08:44As ship after ship started to roll off the production line, the call went out for seamen to man them.
00:08:57I was 17 years old, and I enlisted eight days after turning 17, and about three days later, I was sworn in and on my way to San Diego.
00:09:07I had been to boy scout camp, but it was a far cry from that, because it was, everything went by the book, it went by the bell, it went by the whistle, and the chief made us march up and down, and we had to go to bed at a certain time, and get up at a certain time, take a shower every day, and shave.
00:09:27I was 17 years old, shaving. I didn't have anything to shave.
00:09:30Straight from boot camp, these men, some as young as 16 years old, were sent to the U.S. Navy's most advanced destroyers.
00:09:39For many, it would be love at first sight.
00:09:42I felt that I was going to be assigned to a small carrier, which I didn't want.
00:09:49And then when I saw a destroyer, I thought, well, now this is what I want, and as luck turned out, that's what I got.
00:09:56Well, I loved it immediately. That's called the Dungaree Navy. All one crew, really, officers and men were one group together.
00:10:08Destroyer is a special thing unto itself. It has the speed, and it throbs, and you know you're at sea on those things. So it was something I found exhilarating.
00:10:20Meanwhile, the bloody fight for the Pacific intensified. Japan had conquered all before it.
00:10:30American forces had to take control of the sea before they could start to retake the islands, and the destroyer would be in the thick of the fighting.
00:10:38In June 1942, came Midway. In an unforgiving battle, the U.S. Navy's aircraft sank four of Japan's front-line aircraft carriers.
00:10:54But it came at a price.
00:10:58The carrier USS Yorktown was also sunk.
00:11:02At the same hour, seven time zones to the east, the first of the new breed of destroyers was ready to enter the fight for the Pacific.
00:11:13But its crewmen would soon find out the conditions aboard a U.S. destroyer were a far call from the comfort enjoyed by those sailors aboard the bigger capital ships.
00:11:22The complement of the ship was slightly over 300 officers and crew. And the officers, they lived two to a stateroom. And the enlisted people lived 50, 60 in a compartment.
00:11:37And the bunks were just big enough for one person. You didn't turn over too much because you'd fall out. They were stacked either three high or four high.
00:11:49I was on the bottom bunk, so I was maybe this high off the deck. Which meant I could get up easy, just roll out, and start going.
00:12:03When everything you own goes in a little footlocker that big, you know, it doesn't seem like you're needing space. You know, you've got plenty of room.
00:12:12And as long as you've got your bunk and mattress, well, you're in pretty good shape.
00:12:17The heat was tremendous. Of course, you were constantly soaking wet in the tropics.
00:12:23And on deck, it was always well in the hundreds. And you had to try and keep in the shade.
00:12:30If you were away from the landmass and moving at a fairly good clip, it wasn't too bad because you had the air hitting you.
00:12:37But once you got into the channel there around Guadalcanal, the heat was just terrible there.
00:12:42Hotter than blue blazes, and most of us went up on deck to sleep.
00:12:50And I can remember clearly being on the deck.
00:12:53And when the five-inch gun would go off,
00:12:56I'd come up off the deck and bounce down and then go right back to sleep.
00:13:05The food, you know, of course, we had good food.
00:13:08You got a little bit tired of it.
00:13:10The old saying used to be that they had the best food in the world until the cooks got it.
00:13:15And then they changed it all, but they did a good job.
00:13:18And we ate real good most of the time.
00:13:23The food was horrible.
00:13:26You know, I think we had a bad cook, you know.
00:13:29And nobody ever gave three cheers for the cook on our ship, I'll tell you.
00:13:34They called out which watch was ready for lunch or dinner or whatever.
00:13:40And, of course, they just called a chow.
00:13:42And you got in line, went through with a metal tray,
00:13:45and they threw the food on the tray, and then you sat down and ate.
00:13:50I can't remember having but one or two good meals all the time I was on that ship.
00:14:00For the officers, life on board a destroyer was much more comfortable.
00:14:05The officers lived pretty darn well.
00:14:07By tradition, they had Filipino mess boys in white jackets,
00:14:13a ward room, with a ward room table and a couple of places to sit down.
00:14:20We were served on china and silver.
00:14:26But it was the washroom facilities which were the harshest.
00:14:29Aft, where I lived, we had two showers and, oh, maybe two dozen lavatories and six toilets.
00:14:44And the toilets were a trough with planks across the trough to sit on
00:14:50and seawater running in one end and out the other.
00:14:55And, of course, the ship rolled all the time and pitched.
00:14:58And it was always water on the deck, so your feet always got wet.
00:15:03When you went into a shower booth, there'd be four other guys already in there.
00:15:07So what you did there was kind of lather up and get splashed from these other fellows
00:15:14and then hopefully get enough water on you to get rid of the soap.
00:15:21So there's always maybe eight or ten naked men standing around
00:15:25either getting wet or soaping or getting rinsed or whatever.
00:15:30It was an experience.
00:15:33But within the washroom, there was one place that no one wanted to be, on the red seat.
00:15:42Back then, during World War II and before, sailors who had a venereal disease,
00:15:49they were considered to have stolen time from the Navy
00:15:54because they couldn't have certain duty and they were set aside.
00:15:57And whatever time that they lost, they had to tack it on at the end of the enlistment.
00:16:03So that the government didn't lose anything.
00:16:06And so rather than have them use the same facilities that everybody else had
00:16:10because they might catch something, which, of course, you couldn't, but we didn't know that,
00:16:14they had a separate toilet for that sort of thing.
00:16:18By the autumn of 1942, Fletcher-class destroyers had arrived in Guadalcanal
00:16:23and were formed into an elite fighting unit known as the Cactus Strike Force.
00:16:28For the U.S. Navy, it wasn't a moment too soon.
00:16:32Japanese forces were continuing to advance.
00:16:35The technology, engineering and armament of the destroyer had to pay off.
00:16:41Lives depended on it.
00:16:44By early 1943, the first five Fletcher-class destroyers had arrived in the Pacific ready for action.
00:16:50Known as the Cactus Strike Force, their first role was to target and smash the Japanese supply convoys
00:16:57that were ferrying troops needed to continue their invasion of the Pacific Islands.
00:17:01It's something that's hard to describe.
00:17:04You have no lights.
00:17:06Not any ship has a light showing.
00:17:08And there were all sorts of navigational hazards, which you thought of.
00:17:16As a matter of fact, we were using some charts that dated back to the 1700s.
00:17:22We got very close, within 60 miles of the Japanese airfield, so that's why we had to do it at night.
00:17:28And they were coming down mainly to resupply their troops.
00:17:34And they had a sophisticated marge system that would go hug the shoreline and go at night.
00:17:40So our job was to intercept them and try to cut them off.
00:17:48And their job was to get by us.
00:17:51Already the role of the destroyer was changing.
00:17:54Once looked on as a defence for the capital ships, the new Fletchers were now being thrown into the furnace of battle.
00:18:05If there was a strong point you wanted reduced, you called for fire from the ships offshore,
00:18:10and many times it was a destroyer that provided that.
00:18:16They would screen the larger ships, battleships, carriers, cruisers,
00:18:20performing such duties as lifeguard, say if a pilot went down or a plane crashed the stern of the ship,
00:18:26the destroyer would be there to pick the pilot up,
00:18:29usually rewarded by the carrier with a gallon of ice cream or two for their efforts.
00:18:34They performed convoy escort, in short, any duty that needed a fast ship to go in harm's way,
00:18:41that's usually where the Fletchers ended up.
00:18:42The destroyer was a floating gun platform,
00:18:46and the five five-inch guns with their devastating firepower were its main armament.
00:18:51The five-inch .38 could fire a 54-pound projectile 18,000 yards,
00:18:59which is about nine nautical miles, about ten and a half statue miles,
00:19:03had a ceiling of over 35,000 feet for anti-aircraft.
00:19:12Then, of course, it could be used rapid fire for beach invasions and that sort of thing.
00:19:20Ammunition from the magazines below decks was fed to the guns as fast as they could use them.
00:19:26We fired three every three seconds, but they had to qualify that,
00:19:30because if everything goes proper, these men laying these big projectiles in the tray,
00:19:36they can't hold up too long, loading them that fast.
00:19:44Now, three to four seconds was pretty good for five or ten rounds.
00:19:50After that, your fire slows down.
00:19:52It's dirty. You'd be surprised that every time the gun fires,
00:19:59you have grease flying around and gunpowder.
00:20:03You come out, you're just peppered with grease all over your face and clothes,
00:20:08and very smoky, very noisy.
00:20:13The Fletcher's 40- and 20-millimeter anti-aircraft guns
00:20:17could put up a shield of steel against enemy bombers and fighters.
00:20:20The 40-millimeter rate of fire was 160 rounds per minute,
00:20:25and the 20-millimeter, a staggering 450 per minute,
00:20:30enough to shred an aircraft in seconds.
00:20:34I was a loader on a 40-millimeter gun,
00:20:37which was a good position to be in.
00:20:41The problem was you were so busy loading
00:20:43that you couldn't really look at the plane that was coming in,
00:20:47and if you did, there was always a chance of you losing your concentration
00:20:50on getting that gun loaded.
00:20:52So I tried not to look at the planes coming in.
00:20:57Controlling all this firepower
00:20:58was a command center deep within the ship.
00:21:03Packed with the latest electronic radar,
00:21:06it could locate the enemy up to 40 miles away.
00:21:09It was known as the CIC.
00:21:13CIC is the Combat Information Center,
00:21:17and all communications and all the radar returns,
00:21:21all the radar equipment,
00:21:23and most of the radio equipment, too,
00:21:25was centered in the Combat Information Center.
00:21:29And all during any action of any sort,
00:21:33that's where everything was kept track of.
00:21:35With its radar tracking anything that moved above the surface,
00:21:42the Fletchers also had the most sophisticated sonar
00:21:44that enabled them to hunt down anything that was below the sea.
00:21:48As a sonarman, my assignment was to go up on the bridge
00:21:53where the sonar equipment was,
00:21:55and we sent out a signal underwater, a sound signal,
00:21:59and it went out until it hit something,
00:22:02and we could tell by the time that the signal went out
00:22:06and the echo came back, we would get the distance.
00:22:10And so we knew where it was.
00:22:12Then the officer says to the telephone talker,
00:22:15Fire one.
00:22:16Fire one.
00:22:17Fire one.
00:22:19Boom, boom, it goes out.
00:22:20Then fire two, fire three, fire four.
00:22:22And so they're going out on both sides of the ship,
00:22:26three side racks of depth chargers,
00:22:29and you have two stern racks,
00:22:31and two of them are going off at a time.
00:22:33The side racks are 300 pounds of TNT,
00:22:35and the stern is 600 pounds each.
00:22:37So you're putting a lot of explosives down there,
00:22:41and it doesn't have to land on deck.
00:22:43It just has to get close, because it'll open seams.
00:22:47And once you open a seam in a submarine,
00:22:49there's not much else you can do.
00:22:50Sink.
00:22:50And sink they did.
00:22:54The Fletcher-class destroyers sank 29 Japanese submarines.
00:22:59But just sinking a sub was not enough.
00:23:01You had to have proof of a kill.
00:23:03To determine the kill,
00:23:07we put a whale boat over the side
00:23:08and sent a crew around to see what they could pick up,
00:23:10and pick up a lot of flots,
00:23:11and sometimes they pick up body parts.
00:23:16The second submarine we sank,
00:23:19we found a piece of lung,
00:23:21and the doctor aboard examined it
00:23:23and said the man had tuberculosis.
00:23:25Almost an advanced stage.
00:23:27But because the destroyers were always in the thick of the action,
00:23:32fighting at close range,
00:23:34their losses were beginning to mount.
00:23:37On the night of February the 1st, 1943,
00:23:40the USS Dehaven was spotted by enemy aircraft
00:23:43off the coast of Guadalcanal.
00:23:46Fearing that they were an interception force
00:23:48sent to block their evacuation,
00:23:50the Japanese held a full squadron of dive bombers at the Dehaven.
00:23:53I remember hearing,
00:23:57knowing that there was conversation over the TBS,
00:24:00the talk between ships,
00:24:01that there were bogeys in the area,
00:24:04and they were suspected of being Japanese planes.
00:24:09But our captain, for some reason,
00:24:11decided to wait, to wait, to wait,
00:24:14to see if further identification of these planes could be made.
00:24:19And he waited, I guess, too long.
00:24:22And I stepped out on the starboard wing of the bridge
00:24:24and looked back aft across the top of the stacks,
00:24:28and I saw the first bomber come in.
00:24:31And I watched the bomb being released from beneath the plane.
00:24:35It was that close, and I could see it.
00:24:38It's still a burnt orange color in my mind.
00:24:41It looked like the size of a large ball.
00:24:43And at that instant, I said,
00:24:46I shouldn't be out here in the open.
00:24:48So I jumped inside very quickly into the sonar room.
00:24:52And a moment later, the explosion went off.
00:24:54I think the second bomb that hit knocked out the engine room.
00:25:05And, of course, the third one,
00:25:07what had to be the one that hit the number two gun mount,
00:25:10went down and set off the powder magazine
00:25:12down in the bottom of the ship to blow the bow off
00:25:15and just blasted the pilot house and the superstructure,
00:25:19pushed it back.
00:25:19I managed to pull myself loose.
00:25:23I just lowered myself about three feet into the water,
00:25:27swam away.
00:25:28I saw no other person until I was farther away from the ship.
00:25:33Then I realized there were other heads bobbing around in the water.
00:25:37And I looked back, perhaps a few minutes later,
00:25:41and watched the ship slide under the water.
00:25:44There were 167 men killed and 38 or 39 wounded.
00:25:49The Dehaven was the first destroyer to be lost
00:25:55and the 15th American ship to be sunk
00:25:57in the bloody Guadalcanal campaign.
00:26:00But unknown to the men of the destroyers,
00:26:03it was just the beginning.
00:26:06Darker days were coming for the ships of the Pacific
00:26:08and their crews.
00:26:10By the spring of 1943,
00:26:15the Fletcher-class destroyer had established itself
00:26:17as a relentless multi-role attack machine
00:26:19against the Japanese.
00:26:21Constantly ready to go into action,
00:26:23each man's nerves were on edge
00:26:25for the dreaded call to General Quarters.
00:26:27General Quarters, General Quarters,
00:26:29man your battle station.
00:26:30It was a little bit scary.
00:26:32You know, you'd grab...
00:26:33Usually you left your helmet up at your battle station.
00:26:37You know, it was hooked onto the gun up there.
00:26:39So you'd just grab...
00:26:40If you were dressed, you'd...
00:26:41went like you were.
00:26:43If you weren't dressed,
00:26:44you'd try to throw a pair of pants on
00:26:47and get up there as quick as you could.
00:26:49And you'd go up and man your station
00:26:51and then just wait from there
00:26:52to see what was going to happen next.
00:26:53With the call to General Quarters
00:26:59and never knowing if they might be sunk,
00:27:01the men of the destroyers
00:27:02had a special way of protecting their valuables.
00:27:05The few little valuables we had,
00:27:07you know, we were always thinking what to do.
00:27:10We would put them in a rubber,
00:27:13we called them in those days,
00:27:14and today they call them condoms.
00:27:17But anyway, we would put all our little valuables in there
00:27:20and then tie a knot in this thing
00:27:22and keep it in their pocket.
00:27:26On every front,
00:27:27they were involved in close contact battle,
00:27:30using every one of their weapons
00:27:31to destroy the enemy.
00:27:36But perhaps one of the strangest weapons they used
00:27:39was on the night of April the 5th, 1943.
00:27:44The USS O'Bannon
00:27:45and the other destroyers of the Cactus Strike Force
00:27:48were returning from a mission
00:27:49bombarding Japanese shore positions
00:27:51when the O'Bannon picked up
00:27:53a large Japanese submarine on her sonar.
00:27:57Everybody looked,
00:27:58and sure enough,
00:27:59there was a submarine sitting on the surface.
00:28:02We had a Commodore aboard,
00:28:04and he wanted to ram that submarine,
00:28:06and the captain didn't want to.
00:28:09Fearing that a collision could cause an explosion,
00:28:11the O'Bannon's captain ordered a hard change of course.
00:28:15As the two ships came within feet of each other,
00:28:18the Japanese suddenly woke up to the situation.
00:28:21We got right up to them,
00:28:22and they paid no attention to us,
00:28:24and we were running right alongside of them
00:28:26when they woke up and jumped up
00:28:29and started running around.
00:28:30And nobody could fire anything.
00:28:32Our smallest guns could not come down to that
00:28:36to fire on the submarine either.
00:28:40So some of the fellows picked potatoes out of the bins,
00:28:43which were right-handed,
00:28:44and started throwing them,
00:28:45because there they were, you know.
00:28:50And the Japanese evidently thought they were hand grenades,
00:28:54and so they ran and started throwing them back
00:28:57and throwing them off the submarine
00:29:00before they would blow up.
00:29:02And then in that period of time,
00:29:04they did not get to their gun,
00:29:05and we were able to pull away from them
00:29:07and start firing.
00:29:09And then we came back and made a run on them,
00:29:12and evidently we learned later
00:29:14that we actually did sink the submarine.
00:29:17A fitting tribute to the men of the O'Bannon
00:29:19was delivered in the form of a plaque.
00:29:21It was sent by the potato growers of Maine.
00:29:27The relentless fight for the Pacific
00:29:29continued through 1943,
00:29:32and by 1944,
00:29:33the destroyers had been involved
00:29:34in some of the bloodiest battles of World War II.
00:29:38But it was during the Battle of Leyte Gulf
00:29:40that the fighting men of the tin cans became legends.
00:29:47On October the 25th,
00:29:49four Fletcher-class destroyers
00:29:50were on escort duty,
00:29:52protecting a task force
00:29:53that was involved in landing operations
00:29:55at Leyte Gulf.
00:29:57Two of these destroyers
00:29:58were the USS Johnston
00:29:59and the USS Hull.
00:30:02When the Johnston had been commissioned,
00:30:04her captain,
00:30:05Commander Ernest Evans,
00:30:07made a speech to his crew
00:30:08that typified the destroyer man's creed.
00:30:10This is going to be a fighting ship.
00:30:13I intend to go in harm's way,
00:30:16and anyone who doesn't want to go along
00:30:18had better get off right now.
00:30:21I said he had more courage
00:30:23than was good for the rest of us.
00:30:27Believing that they were screened
00:30:28from any surface attack
00:30:29by the ships of Admiral Halsey's 7th Fleet,
00:30:32the Johnston and Hull
00:30:34were completely surprised
00:30:35when heavy shells started to land around them.
00:30:37The two destroyers,
00:30:41the Johnston and the Hull,
00:30:42were in the gun sites
00:30:43of the Japanese Navy's center fleet.
00:30:46There were four battleships
00:30:48in that Japanese fleet,
00:30:50eight cruisers
00:30:51and 11 or more destroyers.
00:30:54And the Yamato
00:30:56was the largest battleship in the world.
00:31:00They had 18.1-inch guns,
00:31:02and they had nine of them.
00:31:03And one projectile weighed
00:31:06about 3,400 pounds
00:31:08compared to our 54 pounds
00:31:10for a five-inch projectile.
00:31:14Captain Evans,
00:31:15who had promised his men
00:31:16that they were going into harm's way,
00:31:18led his ship
00:31:19in a David and Goliath heroic attack.
00:31:22The first order I heard him give
00:31:24was all-ahead flank,
00:31:26which meant as fast as you could go.
00:31:29We began making smoke,
00:31:31zigzagging.
00:31:33So he told our gunnery officer
00:31:35to pick out
00:31:36one of those lead cruisers.
00:31:39And we did.
00:31:41And we made the torpedo run on it.
00:31:43And I know I stood over
00:31:45on the starboard side
00:31:46and watched all 10 torpedoes
00:31:48as they were fired.
00:31:49We completed our run
00:32:01and then we turned
00:32:03and we was trying to retire
00:32:05into our own smoke.
00:32:07And then we was hit
00:32:08for the first time
00:32:09with the three 14-inch projectiles,
00:32:12mostly a midship.
00:32:16The ship just completely
00:32:18rose up out of the water
00:32:20and came down with a thud.
00:32:24That projectile,
00:32:25it's got a whow, whow like that
00:32:28and it's a terrible noise.
00:32:32For some reason,
00:32:33I just turned
00:32:34and started walking forward
00:32:36and I only got just a few feet.
00:32:39And this round came in
00:32:40and killed most of those guys
00:32:41that I was standing with.
00:32:43And I look back
00:32:44and I recall,
00:32:45I can still see it today.
00:32:47One of my friends
00:32:48from about half up
00:32:49and his arms are still moving.
00:32:53Helpless in the water
00:32:54and pounded
00:32:55by the Japanese heavy guns,
00:32:57the Johnston turned
00:32:58to help its fellow destroyer.
00:33:00Its young crew members
00:33:01began to think the unthinkable.
00:33:03And I truly believed
00:33:05that that was the last day
00:33:07of my life.
00:33:08With a Johnston dead in the water,
00:33:10Captain Evans had no option
00:33:11but to abandon ship.
00:33:13It was a bad feeling.
00:33:18First of all,
00:33:19you know,
00:33:19you've never seen anything
00:33:20like you saw it that day
00:33:22and you was one of those
00:33:24that thought,
00:33:24well, this can't happen to me,
00:33:26you know.
00:33:28Yeah, it wasn't a good feeling at all.
00:33:32As the survivors
00:33:33huddled together on life rafts,
00:33:35they thought that rescue
00:33:36would come swiftly.
00:33:37As the day wore on
00:33:40and the evening came on
00:33:42and it began to get dark,
00:33:43well, then you begin to wonder,
00:33:45now, where in the hell are they?
00:33:48And why aren't they up here,
00:33:49you know, to retrieve us?
00:33:51Within two hours,
00:33:53the Johnston, the Hurl
00:33:54and the escort ship Roberts
00:33:56had been sunk
00:33:56and the survivors
00:33:58were scattered over miles of ocean.
00:34:00But the U.S. Naval Command
00:34:02was fearful
00:34:02that if one ship
00:34:03should find them and stop,
00:34:05it would be a sitting target
00:34:06for enemy submarines.
00:34:08They issued a terrible order,
00:34:10permission denied
00:34:11to save survivors.
00:34:14Our task force commander
00:34:15knew exactly where we were.
00:34:17He knew we were in the water.
00:34:20Other ships was asking permission
00:34:22to come back and get us
00:34:23and it was denied.
00:34:25The men had sacrificed themselves
00:34:27to save the carriers
00:34:28and protect the landings
00:34:30at Leyte Gulf.
00:34:32But for the crew
00:34:32of the destroyers,
00:34:34abandoned in the sea,
00:34:35the horror was far from over.
00:34:37We saw our first shark
00:34:39about three o'clock
00:34:41that afternoon.
00:34:46Somebody would scream out
00:34:48when one of them
00:34:48had a hold of them.
00:34:50And we had a chief petty officer
00:34:52that one of them
00:34:53got him in
00:34:53one of his thighs
00:34:55and then just a few minutes
00:34:58afterward got him
00:34:59in the other thigh.
00:35:01And so when they'd scream out,
00:35:03you knew that a shark
00:35:05was hitting somebody.
00:35:08For the next two days,
00:35:09the men fought the sharks
00:35:11and the elements.
00:35:13The water was cool at night,
00:35:15but the sun was hot in daytime.
00:35:17And of course,
00:35:18we were from here up,
00:35:20you know,
00:35:20we're getting burnt real bad.
00:35:22This little float
00:35:24wasn't very big
00:35:25that we had
00:35:26and we put
00:35:27the wounded,
00:35:29most wounded
00:35:29inside that,
00:35:32which was
00:35:32a couple of guys
00:35:33that was burnt real bad
00:35:35and couldn't see.
00:35:36Then
00:35:36dark
00:35:38or just a little bit
00:35:39after dark,
00:35:39both of them died.
00:35:41So we
00:35:42let them
00:35:43slip beneath the surface.
00:35:45When finally rescued,
00:35:49out of the combined
00:35:50crews of over 600,
00:35:52only 147 survived
00:35:54from the Johnston
00:35:55and 86 from the hull.
00:35:58The heroism
00:35:59of the destroyer crews
00:36:00who had helped
00:36:00to win the Battle
00:36:01of Leyte Gulf
00:36:02was summed up
00:36:03by the official
00:36:04naval historian.
00:36:06In no engagement
00:36:07of its entire history
00:36:08has the United States Navy
00:36:10shown more gallantry,
00:36:11guts
00:36:12and gumption.
00:36:15Following this victory,
00:36:17the Philippines
00:36:18were successfully recaptured.
00:36:20General MacArthur
00:36:20had fulfilled
00:36:21his promise to return
00:36:22and a destroyer
00:36:24was there
00:36:24to help fulfill
00:36:25that vow.
00:36:27But for all its armament,
00:36:29the destroyers
00:36:30were small
00:36:30and vulnerable warships
00:36:32and it was not only
00:36:33from the hands
00:36:34of their enemies
00:36:34that the men
00:36:35of the destroyers
00:36:36faced death.
00:36:38Sometimes,
00:36:39nature would unleash itself
00:36:40with devastating consequences.
00:36:43By late 1944,
00:36:46the Fletcher-class destroyers
00:36:48were now coming
00:36:48off the slipways
00:36:49at an incredible rate
00:36:50of four each month.
00:36:52As soon as they had
00:36:53their shakedown crews,
00:36:55they were hurled
00:36:55into the bloody battle
00:36:57for the Pacific.
00:36:59As American forces
00:37:00slowly recaptured
00:37:01each island,
00:37:02the price in lives
00:37:03kept going up.
00:37:05With the Japanese
00:37:06refusing to surrender,
00:37:08it was a case
00:37:08of kill
00:37:09or be killed.
00:37:10But for the men
00:37:13of the destroyers,
00:37:14death sometimes
00:37:15came from forces
00:37:16which even they
00:37:17could not fight.
00:37:21During the autumn storms
00:37:23of 1944,
00:37:24the USS Spence
00:37:25was part of the escort
00:37:27for Task Force 38.
00:37:29If you was watching
00:37:30the ship,
00:37:31it put a clear
00:37:31out of sight
00:37:32where it would go
00:37:32below the waves,
00:37:33you know,
00:37:34and you think,
00:37:34well, it's gone,
00:37:35then next time
00:37:36it'd be up above you.
00:37:3750, 60 feet or more.
00:37:39Sometimes wind
00:37:42was so strong
00:37:43if you're into the wind
00:37:44you couldn't breathe.
00:37:47The next day
00:37:48the weather
00:37:48became even worse
00:37:49and then the storm
00:37:51became a typhoon.
00:37:53In winds
00:37:53of over 100 miles
00:37:54per hour,
00:37:55huge quantities
00:37:56of water
00:37:57swamped the Spence.
00:37:58I was on the watch
00:38:00on that
00:38:00and I had all the,
00:38:03all kinds of rain gear
00:38:04on and everything
00:38:05and the earphones
00:38:07and, you know,
00:38:09it seemed awful funny
00:38:10like when the ship
00:38:11laid over on its side
00:38:13and you're walking
00:38:13on the side of it
00:38:14and then all of a sudden
00:38:15it turns all the way over
00:38:16and, uh,
00:38:18throwed me out
00:38:19in the water.
00:38:20I didn't dream
00:38:23that it'd be a storm
00:38:24enough to sink
00:38:25any ship,
00:38:26any man-of-war ship
00:38:28anywhere.
00:38:28At about 11 o'clock
00:38:31in the morning
00:38:32with winds
00:38:33now reaching
00:38:33over 120 knots
00:38:35the Spence capsized.
00:38:42Of the 330 men aboard
00:38:44only 24 survived.
00:38:48Everybody
00:38:48that was below deck
00:38:49in the engine room
00:38:50and the fire rooms
00:38:51and that
00:38:51they,
00:38:52they never had a chance.
00:38:54The ship upside down
00:38:55there's no way
00:38:56in the world
00:38:56they could ever
00:38:57get out.
00:38:59Two other destroyers
00:39:00also sank
00:39:01in the typhoon
00:39:02and the mighty carrier
00:39:03the Hornet
00:39:04had its flight deck
00:39:05ripped apart.
00:39:07In total
00:39:07approximately 790
00:39:10officers and men
00:39:11lost their lives
00:39:12during the storm.
00:39:14But for the men
00:39:15of the destroyers
00:39:16another far more
00:39:17deadly onslaught
00:39:18was about to face them.
00:39:21By late 1944
00:39:22during the Battle
00:39:23of Leyte Gulf
00:39:24the Japanese
00:39:25desperate to defend
00:39:27their positions
00:39:27turned their fury
00:39:28into a new form
00:39:30of attack
00:39:30the kamikaze.
00:39:32Again it was
00:39:33the destroyers
00:39:34that were in
00:39:34the front line
00:39:35of battle.
00:39:36Their mission
00:39:36was clear
00:39:37target and kill
00:39:38any kamikaze aircraft
00:39:40that came within
00:39:40the vicinity
00:39:41of an aircraft carrier.
00:39:43It was a total
00:39:43suicide effort.
00:39:45First time I saw it
00:39:46I couldn't believe it.
00:39:48They came in
00:39:49and we were
00:39:50in a big formation
00:39:51and we had destroyers
00:39:52in a circle
00:39:53in the middle
00:39:54with the big ships
00:39:55and they had to fly
00:39:59over us
00:40:00to get to the big ships
00:40:01and I would see
00:40:02these planes coming in
00:40:04and see the shells
00:40:07going out
00:40:07and we fired
00:40:10the five inch guns
00:40:11because they had
00:40:12the proximity fuse
00:40:13which meant
00:40:13they would explode
00:40:14and shot them
00:40:15would go all over
00:40:15the place
00:40:16and the 40 millimeters
00:40:17going out
00:40:18the 20 millimeters
00:40:19are going out
00:40:19when they get close enough
00:40:20and you just sit there
00:40:23and say
00:40:23well how can you
00:40:25get through it
00:40:25because there's so much
00:40:26metal up there
00:40:27that they bound
00:40:28to run into something
00:40:29but if it didn't
00:40:30hit the right place
00:40:31then the thing
00:40:34still flew.
00:40:36So we just
00:40:37grit your teeth
00:40:39and you keep shooting
00:40:39bang bang bang
00:40:40until finally you'd hit it
00:40:42or it would fly over
00:40:43you and go look
00:40:44for something else.
00:40:46But sometimes
00:40:47the kamikaze pilots
00:40:49targeted the
00:40:49destroyers.
00:40:51On April the 6th
00:40:521945
00:40:52the USS Bush
00:40:54was on picket duty
00:40:55off the coast
00:40:56of Okinawa
00:40:56when CIC's radar
00:40:58picked up a large
00:40:59formation of enemy
00:41:00aircraft.
00:41:01We first spotted them
00:41:03about 50 miles away
00:41:04we saw a pretty large
00:41:06group
00:41:06probably 10 to 20
00:41:09planes
00:41:09and here's another
00:41:12group behind that
00:41:13and then almost
00:41:15immediately a third
00:41:16group
00:41:17and then a fourth
00:41:18group
00:41:18and so we knew
00:41:20this was going
00:41:20to be a big one.
00:41:22Within a few minutes
00:41:23the Bush knew
00:41:24that they were
00:41:25the target.
00:41:26We had a plane
00:41:28coming in at
00:41:29low on the water
00:41:30on our bow
00:41:32right
00:41:33for us
00:41:34we fired
00:41:35everything
00:41:36and the 5-inch
00:41:38the 5-inch
00:41:38the 40s
00:41:39the 20s
00:41:39all were firing
00:41:40and didn't stop him
00:41:42a very skilled pilot
00:41:44and he knew
00:41:45what he was doing
00:41:46and he hit us
00:41:47exactly
00:41:48right in the spot
00:41:50the most
00:41:50perfect spot
00:41:52possible
00:41:52and that is
00:41:53right between
00:41:54the two stacks
00:41:55right at the water
00:41:56line.
00:41:57then about a half
00:42:01hour later
00:42:01another one
00:42:02came in
00:42:04a little higher
00:42:05and peeled off
00:42:07and came in
00:42:08and hit us
00:42:08on the other side
00:42:09exactly the same way
00:42:11and then about
00:42:14a half hour later
00:42:15a third one
00:42:16came in
00:42:17and
00:42:18crashed into the
00:42:20forward
00:42:20right at the
00:42:21focus hole
00:42:21and that was
00:42:22the most damaging
00:42:23hit in terms
00:42:24of people killed
00:42:25because we had
00:42:26people out on deck
00:42:27there
00:42:27and he sprayed
00:42:28gasoline
00:42:29flaming gas
00:42:31all over that
00:42:32forward deck
00:42:33with its hull
00:42:35almost torn in two
00:42:37the bush sank
00:42:38taking 87
00:42:39of its crew
00:42:40with it
00:42:41in the weeks
00:42:45that followed
00:42:46the destroyers
00:42:47faced more than
00:42:481500 kamikaze
00:42:49attacks
00:42:50and by the war's
00:42:51end
00:42:51had fought in
00:42:52nearly every
00:42:53naval battle
00:42:54in total
00:42:55over 1300
00:42:57battle stars
00:42:58were awarded
00:42:58to the fletcher
00:42:59class
00:43:00but a bigger
00:43:02accolade
00:43:03awaited them
00:43:04in august
00:43:061945
00:43:06admiral bull
00:43:08halsey
00:43:08ordered the
00:43:09three destroyers
00:43:10the uss
00:43:11nicholas
00:43:11o'bannon
00:43:12and taylor
00:43:13should accompany
00:43:15the mighty
00:43:15battleship
00:43:16missouri
00:43:16to accept
00:43:17japan's
00:43:17surrender
00:43:18because of
00:43:19their valorous
00:43:20fight
00:43:20up the long
00:43:21road
00:43:21from the
00:43:22south pacific
00:43:22to the very
00:43:23end
00:43:24we met the
00:43:25japanese destroyer
00:43:26that came out of
00:43:27tokyo bay
00:43:28with the harbor
00:43:29pilots and peace
00:43:30emissaries
00:43:31and we sent our
00:43:33whale boat over there
00:43:33and picked them up
00:43:34and then transferred
00:43:35to them
00:43:35to the missouri
00:43:36and to other ships
00:43:39and the fleet
00:43:40it was quite an honor
00:43:41by the end of world war ii
00:43:45175 of these tough destroyers
00:43:48had been built
00:43:49and sent into battle
00:43:50but at a price
00:43:5125 had been lost
00:43:54the hulls of steel
00:43:59are long gone
00:43:59but for the men
00:44:01of the destroyers
00:44:01the fighting spirit
00:44:03lives on
00:44:04thank god for the
00:44:05fletchers
00:44:06it was the finest
00:44:08destroyer that was
00:44:09ever built
00:44:09be a captain
00:44:11of a destroyer
00:44:12you're king
00:44:13in your own world
00:44:14my friend
00:44:17my friend
00:44:21she named
00:44:21so
00:44:28ôt
00:44:29we're going to
00:44:30get ready
00:44:31to get ready
00:44:32for the
00:44:33housing
00:44:34and
00:44:35we're going
00:44:36right
00:44:37to be
00:44:38my family
00:44:38we
00:44:39we're going
00:44:40to
00:44:41come
00:44:42to be
00:44:42come
00:44:42to be
00:44:44okay
00:45:14Oh, I'd probably seen a John Wayne movie or something, and I was 17 years old, and I enlisted eight days after turning 17, and about three days later, I was sworn in and on my way to San Diego.
00:45:31When I went aboard, first went aboard, as I mentioned, I was assigned to the deck force in the forward part of the ship, which is the first division.
00:45:43And then later, I was assigned to work in the laundry, which was good duty.
00:45:49You made a little extra money working in the laundry, and you had pretty regular hours.
00:45:57So for at least the last two months, maybe a little bit longer, I was assigned to the laundry that the ship was afloat.
00:46:06I had worked in the laundry on the night of the 24th, and I secured about 4 a.m. on the 25th, and went to my bunk in the mess hall.
00:46:19And about 6 o'clock, General Quarters sounded, which wasn't unusual because it did that if we were underway.
00:46:27And I went to my battle station, and we were there only a short time, and we secured.
00:46:36And I went back below and got in my bunk again, and then about 5 minutes to 7, the General Quarters alarm sounded again.
00:46:46And someone passed the word that the Japanese fleet was 15 miles astern of us.
00:46:52Well, that does something to quicken your pace when you hear something like that.
00:46:57And so we again went to our battle stations, and I know when I got topside, I imagine the captain got on the bridge just about the same time I got to my battle station
00:47:12because the first order I heard him give was all ahead flank, which meant as fast as you could go.
00:47:19And then he said left full rudder, and we began making smoke, zigzagging, and headed back.
00:47:28I didn't know at that time that we were headed on a torpedo run, but we were.
00:47:34And so he told our gunnery officer to pick out one of those lead cruisers, and we did.
00:47:45And we made the torpedo run on it, and I know I stood over on the starboard side and watched all 10 torpedoes as they were fired.
00:47:53And then I don't know why, but I felt better by going back to the port side.
00:48:00Of course, they could just shot all the way through the ship anyway, but at least I felt better being on that port side.
00:48:06And we completed our run, and then we turned, and we'd never been hit yet.
00:48:15And we was trying to retire into our own smoke, and then coming out of the smoke and a rain squall,
00:48:24and then we was hit for the first time with the three 14-inch projectiles, mostly a midship,
00:48:29and then followed by three six-inch, one of at least, hit the bridge, killed and wounded several.
00:48:39And then from then on, it was a constant hammering of one right after the other.
00:48:47When you were being hit with those, it was terrible.
00:48:51It was a terrible sound.
00:48:53And I know after it finally got, the ship was shot up so bad in my area that it was burning,
00:49:02and you could no longer stay up there.
00:49:04So I went to the main deck, and I was amid ships, and was standing kind of under a gun tub,
00:49:14which was affording some protection, I thought, from shrapnel.
00:49:19And then for some reason, I just turned and started walking forward, and I only got just a few feet.
00:49:27And as a round came in and killed most of those guys that I was standing with.
00:49:31And I look back, and I recall, I can still see it today, one of my friends from about half up,
00:49:38and his arms are still moving.
00:49:40And I thought, well, you know, it's you now, but it'll be me in a minute.
00:49:46So that's the way I handled that, I guess, knowing that I was about to die too, you know.
00:49:55And I don't guess, I thought too much about it except my main feeling was,
00:50:02now how was my mother going to handle this?
00:50:05You know, I knew I was about to lose my life, but I just, I wondered how she'd handle it.
00:50:10Uh, no, not really, uh-uh.
00:50:13You didn't see any panic going on.
00:50:17People were just conducting themselves normally, or normally as you can get in a case like that, I suppose.
00:50:24And, uh, I know when, uh, when I abandoned ship, uh, one other man and I swam off of the port quarter,
00:50:36and, uh, uh, probably 75 or 100 yards.
00:50:42And, uh, we were about probably 20 or 25 feet apart.
00:50:47And there was a round that came in and hit between us.
00:50:51And we didn't know where it came from right at the time.
00:50:54But we thought they were shooting at us, but they weren't.
00:50:58It was a ship out there that was still shooting at the, our ship, which was still afloat.
00:51:03And one of the rounds just fell short and fell between.
00:51:06So, needless to say, we relocated after that.
00:51:10And we went more to the stern of our ship where most of the people were.
00:51:17And, uh, that's, then after they, uh, the Johnston rolled over and finally sank,
00:51:25I had a feeling of mixed emotions.
00:51:27You know, I thought, well, if it will go down, maybe they'll get out here and leave us alone.
00:51:32But on the other hand, once it goes down, they won't have anything to do except direct their attention to us in the water.
00:51:40And, uh, but when it did go down, they, one of their destroyers came up through the, the, those of us that was in the water.
00:51:50And I was probably 25 yards to port of the, the Japanese destroyer.
00:51:57And some were much closer than I was.
00:52:01And, uh, no, nobody was on the gun.
00:52:04They were, uh, I distinctly remember people being in, in khakis.
00:52:09I don't know if they were Marines or what, but they were lining the ship and, of course, shouting at you, you know, and, and saying something.
00:52:18I didn't know what they're saying.
00:52:19They didn't really care, you know, as long as they got on out there and left us alone.
00:52:23And they did.
00:52:25They, once they cleared the, they slowed down real slow, they probably wasn't running five knots.
00:52:31And when they got through their, uh, people, well, then they kicked you to the head, you know, and, and, and went on over.
00:52:39Well, of course, they was needed at the time, too.
00:52:41They had, uh, cruisers that was sinking and they was trying to, uh, get, rescue, you know, the people that was going on that ship.
00:52:49So, uh, they was needed somewhere else.
00:52:52So, maybe that's one of the reasons they didn't direct their attention to us.
00:52:56That first night, uh, it was a long night.
00:52:59Uh, we had, we saw our first shark about three o'clock that afternoon.
00:53:07I, I hadn't even considered sharks up until then.
00:53:12And, uh, we saw one and he was pretty good size when he was working his way in on our group.
00:53:18And came on in, but he never hit anybody at that time.
00:53:21But we never had anybody hit until after dark and I don't know whether he was one of them or not.
00:53:26But we had people, we lost a few lives to sharks and, uh, some wounded very seriously from their shark bite.
00:53:37But, uh, then morning came, you know, uh, you're wondering, well, what the hell happened to them, you know?
00:53:46Where are they?
00:53:46And then about six o'clock the second morning, there was two guys that said they was going to try to swim to Samar.
00:53:56And we was, you could see the island very clearly, but it was a long ways distant.
00:54:03And so six more of us said, well, about six hours from now, we will also depart and try to make it.
00:54:13And maybe some of us will make it there and to get some help.
00:54:16And, um, and we did.
00:54:18And then about four o'clock that afternoon, well, I thought that we saw a couple of guys and I thought they were in a boat.
00:54:29And I, we got a little closer, one of them said, we have some water.
00:54:33And I said, well, hell, they speak English.
00:54:35Maybe, maybe they're Filipino.
00:54:37And then as we got closer, I realized it was the two guys that started swimming earlier that morning.
00:54:44And they didn't have a boat, but they did have one of our life rafts that had been blown off the ship during the battle, I suppose.
00:54:52But it was pretty well intact.
00:54:55And so we joined up on that and we hung on to it then the rest of the way.
00:54:59Well, I guess some people probably did, but, uh, I thought, well, as long as I'm breathing, you know, I've got a chance.
00:55:09And, uh, the only way you'd know after it got real dark, you know, when there was a shark around when somebody would scream out when one of them had a hold of them.
00:55:18And, uh, we had a chief petty officer that one of them got him in one of his thighs and then just a few minutes afterward got him in the other thigh.
00:55:30And, uh, so when they'd scream out, you knew that a shark was hitting somebody.
00:55:36And, uh, I know I had, uh, a guy that was, I was right next to him and he got hit in the back and, uh, took several stitches in his back to close up the wounds.
00:55:48But if it hadn't been for that K-Pok life jacket he had on, it would probably have killed him.
00:55:52But the shark got a good mouthful of that life jacket and, which helped him.
00:55:59But, uh, and he just recently died last year, so he, he survived all these years.
00:56:04Well, I've often said, I guess, people who have never hallucinated can't really feel how real it is.
00:56:14But, uh, I think we all did, fortunately, we didn't all hallucinate at the same time.
00:56:21I know, uh, uh, after we were in the water and I had the feeling that I was drifted alongside a destroyer escort.
00:56:33And it, it seemed very real to me that I climbed aboard that destroyer escort.
00:56:41There was nobody on board.
00:56:43I went to the various drinking fountains trying to find water.
00:56:47Not being successful, I got back on the raft.
00:56:52And then a little bit later, I, it's so real to me, I, I said, have we seen any ships?
00:57:00And one guy said, yeah, we did see some DEs.
00:57:03Well, I go, well, I thought, well, damn, I knew that.
00:57:06And then I got to think, well, now, if I was ever up off of this raft and on that deck, why did I get back in this water?
00:57:14And so I ruled it out.
00:57:15I knew that, that, that hadn't happened at that time.
00:57:18But it was so real to me that, uh, and it was to those other people, too, I'm sure.
00:57:23And as one of our survivors, he's dead now, he said, some of those people that hallucinated, he said, I don't think they ever came all the way back.
00:57:32And I think he's right.
00:57:33Some of them didn't.
00:57:35And they, even today, if they're still alive, have problems with separating fact from the fiction or what they think happened.
00:57:46And they, even though they're still alive, they're still alive, they're still alive.
00:58:16The USS Softley was a general-purpose 2,100-ton destroyer of the Fletcher class, equipped to provide anti-aircraft, surface and shore bombardment fire, deliver torpedo attacks, and furnish anti-submarine protection.
00:58:39Converted to a prototype anti-submarine warfare vessel, she has undergone extensive changes in equipment.
00:58:46Improved and enlarged ASW facilities have been installed with marked reduction in anti-aircraft and torpedo equipment.
00:58:54Her war complement of 309 crew members has been reduced to 264, with consequent reduction in living accommodations.
00:59:03But operating experience has demonstrated the need for additional personnel without additional living space being available, a common occurrence on present-day ships.
00:59:13The Softley's engineering plant, controlled from this throttle board, requires one-third of the ship's total crew to operate the machinery that provides the power to carry the ship's offensive weapons to the scene of action, and to operate them while there.
00:59:28Propulsion equipment, such as this fire room, is particularly costly in space and weight in combatant types.
00:59:34This is the price of speed.
00:59:38Communications with other units are coordinated by Radio Central.
00:59:41Messages, both manual and teletype, are transmitted and received.
00:59:45And voice and visual traffic is serviced and filed.
00:59:49This is considered a commodious space in a destroyer.
00:59:51The combat information center receives and displays all types of information necessary to support command decisions.
00:59:59This compartment illustrates the increasing cost of this service in space, men, and equipment.
01:00:04The five-inch plotting room, shown here in operation, is typical of the complex gunnery installations, which make heavy demands on manpower and space within the ship's hull.
01:00:15This elaborate underwater battery plotting room exemplifies the Softley's primary mission of anti-submarine warfare.
01:00:24The installation of this complex equipment improves the ship's ability to deliver killing attacks, but the necessary space has been obtained at the expense of the crew's living quarters.
01:00:34Moreover, the number of personnel required to operate and maintain this equipment has greatly increased over that of earlier gear.
01:00:43Also, additional space and weight is utilized by the air conditioning installation, considered essential for the efficient performance of personnel working here.
01:00:51To handle ever-increasing paperwork and records, this ship's office accommodates files and working space for four yeomen.
01:01:00However, space limitations here and in other offices require much of the ship's paperwork to be performed and retained in the officers' rooms.
01:01:09The ship's laundry contains a washer, extractor, dryer, and presser, which must be operated on a 24-hour basis to provide weekly laundry services.
01:01:18The ship's sick bay has facilities for routine medical treatment, while the engineering log room adjacent provides office space for the largest department aboard.
01:01:29This, then, is how the crew works.
01:01:32Now let's look at their living spaces.
01:01:35This is the E-Division berthing compartment before Reveille.
01:01:38Seventy men with all their personal effects and miscellaneous ship's equipment are accommodated in 800 square feet of area, 11.5 square feet per man.
01:01:49But increases in personnel necessitate the use of cots.
01:01:53Shops and passageways are pressed into use for deck space, and sea bags substitute for lockers, with dubious effects on sanitation and morale.
01:02:03Traffic problems approach a maximum at Reveille.
01:02:06Even the bosun's mate occasionally gets trapped in the narrow passageways.
01:02:09As mentioned earlier, this compartment has 11.5 square feet per man, a reduction of 2 square feet below the standard of 13.5 prescribed by the Bureau of Ships.
01:02:21Notice what this means in the way of individual privacy and dressing convenience.
01:02:25To this must be added the confusion occasioned by ship's motion, the possible presence of additional foul weather gear whenever adverse weather conditions exist,
01:02:35the ever-present high-level noise from machinery and blowers, and the odors resulting from such confined living.
01:02:41Each transom locker shown accommodates one man, 6 cubic feet of stowage space for all his personal gear.
01:02:48Every bunk and locker in this space is occupied, despite 10% or more of the crew being continually away at school or on leave.
01:02:56Restricted passageways and ladders add to the difficulties experienced by the crew en route to the washrooms and topside, especially in rough weather.
01:03:06Notice the large locker in the background containing electronic spare parts.
01:03:10This utilizes space which would otherwise be available for personnel lockers or peacoat lockers.
01:03:17This is the passageway at the top of the same ladder shown in the previous scene.
01:03:21All the after-living compartments funnel traffic up through this space, into the heads and washroom board, or out onto the main deck, through the door shown in the background.
01:03:32This crew's head has one urinal per 41 men and one seat per 21 men, when all equipment is working.
01:03:40The after-crew's washroom has installed one washbasin per 16 men and one shower per 49 men.
01:03:47These figures are very close to Bueship's standards.
01:03:49And these two spaces are considered better than average for destroyer types.
01:03:56Even when occupied, the after-crew's head is considered large for a destroyer and far superior to the forward-crew's head.
01:04:05Normally, the after-crew's washroom can accommodate the number of personnel assigned, tattoos and all.
01:04:11However, during periods of maximum utilization, the presence of excessive water vapor indicates the need for improved exhaust ventilation.
01:04:17This space serves two-thirds of the crew and is considerably superior to the forward-crew's washroom, which was too small to be photographed.
01:04:26Notice that no provision exists for hanging gear or for drying towels.
01:04:30To increase the available berths, the mess hall also serves as a berthing space for 31 men.
01:04:38Folded mess tables and benches are visible in the foreground, and the storage of clothing and shoes thereon is a common occurrence.
01:04:45Considerable difficulty is experienced in access to the lower bunks.
01:04:49The passageway shown comprises one of the two available routes from all forward-berthing spaces to the forward-crew's head, which is abaft and one deck above this space.
01:04:59The dual use of this space prevents late hammocks for the mid-watch, since all bunks must be secured for meals.
01:05:05Also, access to lockers is impossible during mealtimes.
01:05:09In addition to the inaccessibility of the lockers shown, some are unusable due to steam fittings located inside.
01:05:18The ship has a total of 264 lockers for the crew, with the majority being the standard transom locker, shown here.
01:05:25Personnel in excess of this number must use sea bags or share lockers, as 19 are doing at present.
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