Verlin Clark Stephens - WW II
Pearl Harbor
World War II began in the fall of 1939. I was then 16 years old and felt that it would be over soon enough for me to avoid it because of my age. By the time the US entered the conflict, I was 18 years old and of prime age for military duty. The day of the attack on Pearl Harbor, I was washing dishes in the Utah State Agricultural College (USAC) cafeteria and kept hearing bits and pieces of news all day.
The next summer jobs were plentiful and I got a job at the Quartermaster depot in Ogden. After a month there I got a chance to get a better job as a lookout for the Forest Service. However, the only way I could quit the QM job was with a doctor’s certificate which I got easily because I had lost my voice due to an allergy or infection.
The year 1942-43 was a very important one for me. When I returned to school it appeared evident that being drafted very soon was a very real possibility. However, we were told that we could join the reserves and remain in school until we were really needed or graduated, so I signed up for the Naval Reserve in November. In December, doctors from the various services came to give physical exams. Shortly thereafter I was informed that I had failed the Navy exam due to a heart murmur.
In April they decided the time had come to need the reserves, so they were all called to active duty—except me. I got notice to go to Bushnell Army Hospital (in Brigham City) for another physical. I guess I passed because I soon received a notice to prepare for a call by the Army. I rushed around finishing school early so I would be ready When school finished I still expected to be called up anytime and was very reluctant to take a job, so I stayed at school doing odds and ends.
Reporting for duty
Finally I was ordered to active duty on July 16, 1943, at Fort Douglas. I was there for a few days. I didn’t know where I was going, but I thought it would be Fort Old, California, since that is where the other reserves had gone. Three days later we arrived at North Camp Hood, Texas. It was 116ºF and the camp consisted of black tar paper covered buildings. The buildings were all new. Our training field had corn stalks in it from the previous years’ crop. The water supply had just been condemned, so what water we used came from lister bags hanging in the sun and containing a generous portion of iodide. When we were finally assigned to a company for training, our new commander made a bit hit by providing our lister bag with a chunk of ice.
Training
I won’t go into details of basic training since it didn’t markedly effect subsequent events. Everyone in the unit was scheduled to go back to school under the Army Specialized Training Program (ASTP). Somewhere along the line we were again given more tests and then an interview. I was told that I had qualified for the Junior year of engineering and could take my choice of electrical, civil or mechanical. Also we were asked three states where we would want to go to school. I asked for Utah, Idaho or Colorado, and since I had no previous engineering, it was agreed (I thought) that I would be assigned to a one term review course. When the time came to leave, we were all going to be separated and sent to the schools we had requested. We went almost straight north out of Texas, through Arkansas and the eastern edge of Kansas, and continued north finally into Canada, then southeast to our destination—New York City, which was far from the states I selected. We were all assigned to Pratt Institute and lived in a public housing project near the Brooklyn Navy Yard. My roommate was a young fellow named Burt Schultz and he was from New York City. At the first opportunity we went to see his mother. She lived in a large apartment on Central Park West. I soon learned how the other half lived. Burt’s father was vice president and general manager of Raytheon Corp., and in my eyes, they were rich. During World War II, Raytheon employees contributed to the war effort. They supplied 80 percent of the magnetron tubes used in U.S. and British radars and developed parts for the crucial proximity fuse in antiaircraft shells, among other equipment. Raytheon met urgent production needs for magnetron tubes used by Allied forces for radar defense, and produced the Sea Going (SG) microwave surface search radar that went on U.S. Navy ships. The SG provided vital situational awareness in the major battles in the Pacific and helped eliminate the submarine menace in the Battle of the Atlantic.
The other good friend I made there was Harold Rasmussen. Harold was from Westfield, New Jersey. After he took me to his home for a weekend, I almost became a member of his family. For the next two years I spent my weekends there whenever possible. They, too, were fairly wealthy by my standards, since Mrs. Rasmussen’s father had invented the disposable paper cup, and a holder for them. He had then established a company to make them. It had gradually expanded to make napkins, place mats, wall plaques, etc.
As I mentioned, being assigned to advanced engineering turned out to be important for me. After one term, the ASTP program was closed and all those in the first two years and the review course were sent to the 86th Infantry Division on maneuvers in Louisiana. The 86th was sent to Europe and into combat on December 24th, 1944 during the Battle of the Bulge. A very large portion were killed in the first few hours. My friend, Harold Rasmussen, was wounded. He recovered and returned to combat for a few hours, only to be shot again—through the forearm. He lost most of the use of his wrist and was discharged but eventually recovered completely.
Signal Corps
Those of us in electrical engineering were assigned to the Signal Corps. We went off to Camp Wood, New Jersey, and were eventually assigned to school at Fort Monmouth which was only a few miles from Camp Wood. I requested to be in teletype repair school. This was about a three month course, but one could proceed faster. I think I finished school in about half the prescribed time and then became an instructor until the time came to return to Camp Wood. Soon I was transferred to a signal company which was preparing to go overseas. As more or less a final fling, we were given a two week furlough and so I went home to Utah for the first time in 16 months.
I had received a seven day furlough in New York, but it wasn’t long enough to go home, since the only practical means of travel was by train, and that took three days each way at best. I spent that time sightseeing and Christmas shopping. It was a very lonesome period, knowing that theoretically at least, I could have gone home.
When I returned from furlough, I learned that plans had changed, and of five signal companies, only two were to remain. Surprisingly, all of the teletype repairmen were left, so there were about 21 in our company when there was only need for seven. All excess people were transferred to the infantry. To fill time, I was serving as the company clerk. We were stationed at Camp Edison, which was another small station a few miles south of Fort Monmouth.
Meanwhile I continued to go to Westfield, New Jersey, for every available weekend, and the Rasmussen’s always insisted that I bring a friend. There were several of us who enjoyed their love and friendship.
As mail clerk it was my official duty to pick up orders for our unit each day. One day the orders were to send about 180 men to such and such infantry unit, (there were about 220 in our company at the time), so I felt certain that I would go, but surprisingly they sent nearly everyone but the teletype repairmen.
Sometime later we all received orders to go to Philadelphia, to a place called Hog Island, and then to a course in radio teletype repair at the Brookline Country Club just west of Philadelphia. We were returned to Hog Island. Again we were promised an overseas assignment and sent home on furlough. When we returned, we were told that the plans had changed and most of the group was sent to an unknown destination. There were four remaining, and we were sent back to Camp Wood “to keep their teletypes in repair”. Mostly we played pool. We were housed with a company of Japanese interpreters. One of the fellows decided he knew a way to find out our eventual destination by going to camp headquarters and asking to change his will. He came back with the information that we were all going to Camp Beale, California, which was a replacement depot for the Pacific area. Two days later, he left for Camp Beale..alone. A few days later we were sent to Vint Hill Farms, Virginia, and rejoined most of the people who had left earlier. We found that the past year had been spent in getting top secret clearances and we were to be trained as code machine repairmen.
After the school. we received furlough home in preparation to go overseas. By then the war in Europe was over, and while we were waiting for assignment, Japan surrendered. Small groups were sent out to various areas to work, and as each group left, they bragged that they would be released long before those who remained. One group was sent to the Far East. About two or three weeks later, we went to the airport at Agana, Guam, and welcomed them to the Pacific area. They were sent to Seattle and put on a boat. We left about a week later and had gone to San Francisco by train, then to Hawaii for four days, then to Guam by plane.
Guam
We left Hamilton Field about 10 PM on the night of September 2, 1945, which was the day the Japanese war was officially ended. It was my first plane ride in a ‘big’ plane called a C47. It was a new plane going to pick up wounded, so it had no seats. When it became light the next morning, one of the fellows became concerned that one of the wings seemed to be flapping. We assured him that it was normal (of course we really didn’t know any more than he did). We landed at Hickam Field without difficulty. The next day we rode by the airfield and saw that they had removed that particular wing from the plane. We decided that we had been very fortunate. From Hawaii we flew to Johnson Island, then to Kwajalein and finally to Guam.
Since the war was over, we never did do any code machine work. We did transfer a large amount of equipment, which had been dropped in a field during the battles to retake Guam, to a warehouse. I would guess most of it is still there.
Going Home
Early in 1946 we left Guam on a transport ship, the Olmstead, and transferred to Saipan to begin the process of returning to civilian life. The camp on Saipan was on the opposite side of the island from the port. It took about four hours to go through the required processing. Then we waited and waited. There were frequent rumors of ships arriving to get us. Finally after about four days we loaded back into trucks and recrossed the island to find the Olmstead waiting for us. It was a Kaiser built ship and not really luxury. There were 2500 men on board. We slept in the cargo holds on canvas stretched on metal frames. As I remember, each bunk was about 24 inches wide and perhaps six feet long with about 15-18 inches to the bunk above. There were big garbage cans for those who became seasick. Not surprisingly, we spent as much time as possible on deck.
Before I left for the Army, I had only tasted olives a few times and didn’t like them, but I acquired a real liking for them in the service. When we were getting ready to leave Guam, two of us ate a whole can to keep from throwing them away. A few hours later we were bouncing up and down with very heavy seas. The propellers were coming clear out of the water when we pitched forward. Then they announced that dinner was ready. Most of the fellows I was with had long since lost their appetite, but I was hungry. By the time I got there, the line into the galley was long. As we moved up slowly, we passed a fellow who was so sick that he had vomited all over the deck and was sitting in it. I lost some of my hunger but went on and finally reached the galley. Food was served in trays and one stood at a table about waist high to eat. As the ship rolled, some food spilled, and a few people added to it so that the deck was slippery and we slid back and forth as we tried to eat. I soon found what it was like to be seasick. I lost my acquired taste for olives and have never regained it.
After two weeks at sea, we landed at Oakland, California, and in less than a day we were on our way to Utah on a troop train. Thank goodness that was my only experience on a troop train, a box car with bunks similar to the ship. There was no air conditioning in those days and we had sailed across the Pacific in tropical weather. The train wasn’t really heated and we finally arrived in Salt Lake City in a snowstorm with the temperature near zero. After a day or so of processing, during which they tried to get us to reenlist, we were released from the Army.
When I went into the Army, the first month or so I got $21 per month plus board and room and clothing. After that, congress raised the pay for a private to $50 per month, and when I was promoted to Private First Class, I got a raise to $55 a month. Eventually I became a T/5 and got $66 per month for the rest of my time in the Army.
In those days there were no credit cards and very few checks. We were always paid in cash and there were no deductions for Social Security or income taxes. In the Army there was an officer assigned as pay officer. We had to step in front of him, salute, and he would count out our pay. We could have an allotment sent home.
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