Center for Louisiana Studies Archival Catalog

***Disclaimer: recounting as a witness to an act of sexual abuse (55:06)***

Francis G. Doerle; Theriot

Pearl Harbor
-Was at Deer’s drive-in on East Main St., near a nightclub; on a date with his wife (girlfriend at the time)
-They were sitting there together that Sunday afternoon when they heard the news of Pearl Harbor
-People were going from car to car talking about it; it was the only thing talked about for days
-Already heard about the war from newsreels and a neighbor (Mr. Bernard) that had a TV with a 100 ft. antenna and could pick up other news stations

-Knew about what Germany was doing, had heard of Dunkirk
-Had heard of what the Japanese were doing to China but never saw them as an enemy like Germany
-Thinks Japan attacked the U.S. to stop us from declaring was on Germany
-Had a class A deferment so he couldn’t be drafted but signed up anyway since most his brothers and brother-in-laws were in the service too
-About 8 men from their family in the service and Doerle felt he should help too

-Worked for the Maritime Commissioner as a ship-building welder inspector at a shipyard in New Orleans
-They gave him the class 1-A deferment; built 6-7 liberty ships; worked as a fruit peddler on the side with his dad
His son David was born in February 1942 and a few months later Doerle told the draft board that he was leaving his job (and deferment) and be ready to send him off
-Was 24 years old at the time

In the Service (14:28)
-Oldest in his outfit, most were 18-19 years old or really 17 years old and had lied to join up
-Had no choice but to join the Army; wanted to join the Navy but the board said no
-Within 3 weeks after leaving his job shipped out to Camp Fanen Texas; stayed there for 10 weeks
-After basic sent to Camp Meade Maryland; outfitted with gear for overseas
-Shipped to Boston and put on a transport ship, “USS General Black” 10,000 on the boat
-Went through a terrible storm while crossing the Atlantic (sick the whole time)
-Were going to be replacements at the Battle of the Bulge; landed at Leharve France in a makeshift harbor and put on railroad cars
-When signing up, Doerle was with OJ Mannual (from Erath was a neighbor)
-They were together until split up in Nancy France; they were given rifles at Nancy

-They had landed in France in December 1944 and it was cold; they had issued clothes made from real wool
-After Nancy he was assigned to the 35th Infantry Division, 137th Regiment B Company, a rifle platoon
-January 1945 they were woken up and loaded into trucks; weren’t allowed to have the headlights on
-Drove till the next morning when they stopped to eat and continued on till evening
-Got off and it was ice and snow everywhere and each person was issued a white sheet to use a camouflage

Battle of the Bulge (33:00)
-They knew what was happening at the Bulge and the Germans were trying to break into Southern France
-They were there at the end of the battle to help push back
-When the Germans did break through, the 28th Division was completely destroyed
-Germans were strong people and very intelligent; the French were the opposite and lazy people
-Germans would change street signs and set traps to confuse or ambush the Americans
-Was at a town near the Ardennes Forest; the artillery and mortar shells would hit the trees and the branches would shatter
-Had to give their foxholes tops to keep from being wounded or killed by the falling debris
-The first night there was sent on patrol to capture Germans for interrogation; didn’t grab anyone for a few nights
-Had seen about 7 days of combat before reaching the Bulge; they didn’t tell them anything that was happening elsewhere

-One of his feet starting turning black but things started happening so he was taken from hospital after 5 days to help load/move ammunition trucks
-Couldn’t walk but he could drive—everyone needed to work
-Once into Germany they went through the Rhine Valley, Cologne and Recklinghausen; where he captured a German colonel
-Was at an outpost watching a bridge and saw some Germans near the CP and there was a colonel
-Another soldier took the colonel from him by threat
-Asked later if the German had been turned in by the other soldier and was told there was no German colonel prisoner (thinks the soldier killed the colonel)

***Mention of sexual assault and abuse***

***American soldiers were going crazy from fatigue and would destroy homes for no reason, loot and rape women; couldn’t stop them as they’d turn on you too; some did kill other Americans—sometimes they’d be fighting and those “crazy” soldiers would just shoot all their mates around them***

Firefighting and End of the War (55:43)
-Most of the time you don’t see who you’re killing; only saw once when he did kill a person
-Never saw the enemy face to face except when on patrol and when cleaning out towns
-Reached the Elbe River and stopped to let the Russians take over Berlin; Germans were surrendering by the truck loads to the Americans so not to be killed by the Russians
-Made a deal that in order to take German prisoners the Germans needed to surrender over American prisoners
-Took 10 days before the Russians took Berlin and Americans transported thousands of Germans by then
-Closer to the end of the war the Germans were easier to handle; only the SS Troops were difficult as life meant nothing to them

-Stopped at a town near the Rhine and found a well-stocked wine cellar; they had a nice time
-While there Doerle ‘s brother-in-law George came to visit; George was a warrant officer and was supplying three divisions
-George took Doerle to his CP that was a governor’s mansion and spent 2 days in luxury before being called back as they were crossing the river into Germany
-Took his first bath in three-four months
-Never saw or was in contact with is brothers; Harold was in the Air force; Paul was in the Navy in the Pacific
-Bobby was a Seabee in Okinawa construction battalion

Combat Life (1:09:00)
-Something not kept on the mind; especially the people you kill
-In situations like war each person has a different outlook and does what they feel was right; did what you had to do
-You don’t shoot someone eating lunch, you shoot someone who’s trying to kill you
-Always thought about what if he never made it back
-The war in Europe and the war in the Pacific were different
-Thinks the Pacific was probably tougher with having to take islands and fighting in jungles
-Europe was in cities and modern weapons to use (on land)
-Germans had more modern weapons than the Japanese; German machine guns fired 3-5 times faster than American’s machine guns

-Once crossing the German border, they advanced so fast into the territory their own artillery thought they were the enemy; sent off three volleys at Dorele’s outfit
-They were walking in the road in the open and the artillery thought they were retreating Germans
-Dorele knew the sound of American guns and knew they were shooting at them—but the 105 mm was slow so they had time to move out of the way (compared to the Germans’ guns)
-One guy was so badly shell-shocked just froze and fainted as everyone went to the ditches
-Another soldier ran in between volleys to grab him (confirms in TH1-043 that no one was killed or badly injured)
-Dorele’s outfit (35th) knew it was the 75th artillery unit ahead that was firing at them
-Was trying to call the CP to cease fire as the artillery were zeroing in on Dorele’s outfit's position
-Everyone was “hauling ass” to buildings and away from the road
-Dorele jumped a barbed wire fence with his gun, that got stuck in the mud and then 10 feet ahead of him a shell went off
-The shock caused bleeding to his ears (still has problems today) and he dove into the mud and made a mound to protect himself
-Finally they got through to the 75th to cease fire

-In the beginning of the war, carried a BAR until given a carbine; had a bazooka once to be used for German pillboxes
-Had to be careful when shooting at German tanks, the Panzer would just bounce the shells off

Transcription Begins:

Francis G. Doerle
Born November 21, 1920
35th Infantry Division
Battle of the Bulge

(December 7, 1941) I was at a place called Deer's drive-in on East Main St. There was a nightclub there. That afternoon, my wife, who I was just starting to court seriously, we were sitting there, it was a Sunday afternoon, and we heard that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. We thought about it a lot. Everybody was going from car to car. So we went about our evening as planned, and I took her home later and we talked about it a little bit with her parents. I came home the next day, and that was all that was on the news, that was all people were talking about.

Right in back of where I lived, Mr. Bernard had a tourist court and he was the only guy in town I knew who had a TV with a hundred-foot antenna. And he could pick up a few stations and we would watch the news (there), and at the movie pictures we would go to. During intermission they would show newsreels about the war.

Germany was walking all throughout Europe like there was no tomorrow. The only thing between Germany and us was Great Britain. That was it. Dunkirk had taken place shortly after that, so it was serious. I was aware of some of the stuff going on in China, although we were at war with Japan and Germany at the time. I wasn't worried about the Japanese. It wasn't a concern of mine. I never did figure them as the real enemy.

I had a class A deferment. I had a good job, but all my brothers were in the service, so I just decided that I had to get involved. I didn't feel comfortable staying here while all the men in my family were fighting in the war. I worked for the Maritime Commissioner as a ship-building welding inspector at the shipyard in New Orleans, so I was offered a deferment. I stayed for a while and helped build ships for the war. While I was there we built six liberty ships.

Before that I was working in the produce business here in town, and when I moved to New Orleans I was welding at the shipyard and conducting business for my dad at the French Market in the morning. I would go to the market at five in the morning to buy fruit and all kinds of fresh stuff. And my father would send a truck over there, and he'd call me and tell me what he needed the night before. After I would load the truck I would go to my other job at the shipyard.

My son David was born in February of 1944, and a few months after that I went to the draft board and told them I was leaving my job and to call me when they were ready for me. The draft board here knew that I was working in New Orleans, I stayed in touch with them every six months or so, but I had a deferment all that time. I was 24 years old when I decided to join.

The draft board was very strict and rightfully so, cause a lot of people would take off. Pete Oliver was on the board.

I signed up with OJ Manual from Erath. OJ and I got split up in a place called Nancy France. He was in a different outfit.

Within three weeks I was shipped to Camp Fanen Texas. (What made you chose the Amy?) I didn't, I asked for the Navy, but they said, "you got the Army." And that was it, when you got in that long line they didn't give you a choice. I took basic training for 10 weeks.

Most guys were from 18 or 19-years old in my outfit. I was the oldest guy in my platoon. Some lied about their age. There were some in there that were 17. This one kid named Ebiline was just 17.

At night, there was complete darkness (in combat). There were no headlights on cars or jeeps; you couldn't even light a match. This guy, Ebiline, started crying saying that he would never see his mother again. I told him he wouldn't if he didn't put out that cigarette. He had lit a cigarette in a foxhole. The next thing you know, you got an 88 in your pocket. And those Germans were so accurate with that gun. That was a hell of a gun.

After basic I came home for a few days then took a train to Camp Meade in Maryland. I got outfitted with all the gear I was going to need to go overseas with. From there I was shipped to Boston. I got on a ship (troop transport) in Boston and went through a hell of storm across the North Atlantic. I was on the USS General Black. There were about 10,000 troops on that ship. We went through the worst storm I had ever been in. It took the bow of the ship and bent it back like this. Fourteen days at sea. I stayed sick the whole time. Everybody was throwing up on everybody else. That was the worse (storm) I had ever been in. When we landed all I could do was suck on oranges; that was the only thing that I could keep down.

We had about 300 ships in that convoy with us. They were sending any and everything to the Battle of the Bulge as quick as they could.

We landed in December 1944. I was a replacement. I was to report to the 35th Infantry Division when I got to France. This was all during the Battle of the Bulge (December 16, 1944). They were taking replacements like crazy. I landed at Leharve France. From Leharve they put us in an ole railroad car, and old cattle car and shipped us off to where the fighting was all in the same day. There were 40 men in a cart.

Leharve was nothing but sunken ships and steel sticking up everywhere. It was a makeshift harbor that was erected in a hurry.

We stopped in Nancy France. This is where they handed me a rifle. It was snowing and ice (was) everywhere. It was cold cold. My gun was full of cosmaline. It's like a thick goo that they put on there to protect the gun while it was transported across the ocean. I had to clean it with gasoline. They said, "Son, I want to see that rifle shine."

They issued us plenty of clothes. It was all wool, real wool. I was assigned to a rifle platoon in the 137th Regiment, B Company. The headquarters was in Metz, France. That city was destroyed. Captain Azbell was the Commander of our company. I was ordered to report to the CP (Command Post). Angelo was my platoon sergeant. I still keep in touch with some of the guys from my outfit. We have reunions every year.

(The 35th was in combat at the Bulge. As men would get wounded or suffer from frostbite or battle fatigue, they would be sent to the back of the line. Replacements where they sent immediately to the front to replace these ranks.)

It was sometime after Christmas (’44); I'll never forget they woke us up in the middle of the night and we loaded on to trucks with all our gear. The truck had no lights and we drove down the road in the dark all night long until part of the next morning. We stopped in a little town where they feed us then we went back on the trucks and drove till late in the evening. When we got off finally, there was ice and snow everywhere. It was the coldest I had ever been in my life. They issued each of us a white sheet (snow camouflage).

We knew what was going on at the Bulge. And we knew they (Germans) were going to try to break out through southern France. But that didn't happen as you know. But we, the Americans weren't nervous about that. I wasn't there at the beginning when the Germans broke through; I was there at the end when we stopped them and pushed them back.

When they broke through, brother, let me tell you. The 28th (holding the line) was almost completely destroyed. The Germans were tuff soldiers. They were head and shoulders above us. There were some Americans, many of us, who thought that we were fighting the wrong people. The Germans were very intelligent people. It was Hitler's Nazi's that we wanted outta there.

The French weren't very smart people. They would shovel cow shit around the pipes that they were pumping water out of to keep the pipes from freezing, so it seeps down in the water-well. The cow shit would seep into the water-well. The French were lazy people.

The Germans were far more advanced than everybody else was. They were 20 years ahead of everybody. They had Autobahn highways, four lane highways. That's what gave Eisenhower the idea to build a highway system in the states years later.

The Germans, when they made their move, would turn the street signs around. It would confuse the Americans. A lot of Americans walked right into an ambush.

We got off in a little wooded town near the Ardennes Forest. The artillery and mortar shells would explode in the trees and the branches would shatter. (The flying pieces of shattered trees wounded and killed many Americans.) You had to build a top in your foxhole. I never dug a hole so fast in all my life. We used branches to cover the tops of our foxholes. We covered the tops with dirt.

That first night, my sergeant and I, Angelo Demem and about 5 others went on a patrol. Our orders were to find German's, capture them, and bring them back to the CP for interrogation. We stayed out pass the outpost for two or three nights looking for prisoners to take back. (The outpost was the farthest American post on the front line-closest to the enemy.) The Germans would walk by and we'd wait till they got close enough and then we'd stand up and shout, "Handy Ho you sons of bitches!" Handy Ho, you know, put your hands up. And we'd say, "Foshnell," which means put your hands up.

But we really didn't know anything. We didn't know where we were or want was happening elsewhere. They didn't tell you anything; you heard rumors, and that was about all. Some Sergeants might tell you a little bit about what was going on, if you got a chance to talk to him. See some of these guys had been on the line for months, some even since D-Day. I had only been there for 7 days, so I didn't know much.

My feet started to suffer. We were told to keep our feet dry, you know keep clean socks on. But I had one foot that turned black. I had to go into the hospital; I was off the line for about 5 days. This was later on. But they didn't keep me in the hospital. I helped move ammunition in trucks. I couldn't walk but I could ride. They needed every man that was fit to work, even those that were hurt. Till today I have to wear soles because my feet are nothing but bones.

I wore a long wool overcoat. Some weeks later I remember cutting it into a short coat because it was getting warmer. We were always on the move. I remember going into Germany after we got out of the cold, cold weather. We went into the Rhine Valley and crossed the Rhine River and went into Cologne. I went through Recklinghausen; that's where I got this colonel; I captured a German colonel.

I was out on an outpost watching the bridge with about 10 others guys and I came back into the CP, and I spotted some Germans near the CP. One of them was a Colonel. I took his pistol off of him; I still got it. Have you ever seen a good-looking German Luger?

This one guy in my outfit was really crazy. He did a lot of things in the war that wasn't right. I saw him kill other Americans. He killed some guys that were raping a woman. I saw him line them up and cut them down with a machine gun.

He took that German Colonel around the building and I followed him and he pulled a gun on me. He said, "Get your ass away or I'm gonna kill you." I checked with the CP later but they had no information on this Colonel. He was a high ranking German officer; he should have had some information. But he never got there. There was a lot of that going on.

I saw people going into other people's homes and destroying them. Beautiful things in these homes. They would knock things over and bust 'em and break 'em just for the hell of it. And you can't control most of it. Some of these guys were so off, so fatigued, that they're crazy, and they will turn on you. They will shoot you.

About a month or two later that same guy had a girl in a room and he made everybody get out. He raped her; he was out of his mind.

I got into a couple of firefights with the enemy. But mostly you don't see who you are killing. I only know of one guy that I actually shot and killed, because I went and checked him. The poor bastard had a picture of his family. You never really come face to face with the enemy, unless you are looking for a prisoner to capture at night. When you go on patrols at night you run face to face with them and when you are cleaning out a town you run into them. But a firefight that you know of, you rarely saw them.

Towards the end of the war up on the Elbe River I shot and wounded a German. I don't know if I killed him, but I know that I shot him. At night you could see the sky light up. You could tell there was a war going on. We were told to stop at the Elbe River to allow the Russians to take Berlin. And we did. The Germans were surrendering by the thousands. We could take all of them. It got to a point where we wouldn't take a German prisoner unless he brought an American prisoner with him. Truckloads of Germans tried to surrender. We agreed to take a truck of German if they brought us a truck load of Americans.

The Germans did not want to get captured by the Russians. The Russians would torture and kill them right there, because the Germans did the same thing to them. At the Yalta Conference Stalin and Roosevelt made a deal- the Russians would take Berlin. We stayed at the Elbe for 10 days waiting for them to take Berlin. We took a lot of prisoners in those 10 days.

Towards the end of the war the Germans were easier to handle because they knew it was kaput. They knew there was no chance for them to win. But we had to be real careful with the SS Troops (Nazi fanatics). They would kill you right there. They were the elite German soldiers who were Hitler's finest troops. Their life meant nothing to them.

I crossed the bridge at Remagen. It was the only bridge across the Rhine that the Germans didn't blow up. And we got there before they could take it out. It was the only bridge into Germany.

We rested in a little town near the Rhine for a few days. We ran into a wine cellar, so we had a good time. It was the finest wine in the world and every soldier had a case of red wine. My brother-in-law, George, found me there. He was a warrant officer. He was in charge of supplying all the men in our Corp. I got a call through the CP. He said, "Francis! God damn it, this is George!" I said, "George who?" He said, "George, your brother-in-law!" I said, "Well you SOB, what are you doing? Where the hell are you?" He said, "Never mind where I am. But don't you move cause I know where you are! And I'll be there in 30 minutes!" He drove up in a jeep with a driver. He was a big shot you know. I said, "George, where we going?" He said, "I talked to Captain Asbell. He said you can come spend a couple of days with me." I took a bath in a beautiful mansion, a castle that belonged to the mayor of the town. George was using that mansion as his CP. And I took a bath and I got in that tub and I soaked my ass in that tub for I don't know how long. It had been three or four months since I last took a bath.

We crossed that bridge a few days later. I went to Dusseldorf and Aachen. You should have seen Aachen. You would not believe it. There was not one roof on any building there. It was completely destroyed. Pitiful.

I was never in contact with any of my brothers during the war. Harold was in the Airforce flying the Hump (Himalayas). Paul was in the Navy, in the Pacific. Bobby was at Okinawa. He was a Seabee, a construction battalion.

(Tell me about combat life) It's something that you don't keep on your mind. The two people that I killed, I hardly think about it. Each person's different. You have to make up your mind. You are there to do a job and it's you are him. You decide what your responsibility is- to yourself, to wife, and family, to your children. You have to think of survival. I didn't relish the idea; it was something that I did automatically. If you saw a German and he didn't surrender right way, you gonna have to shoot him. You don't shoot somebody sitting down in a chair having lunch. You shoot somebody who's trying to kill you.

(Did you ever think that you might not make it back?) You think about that all the time. That's a given. Anybody who tells you that they not thinking about that is not being truthful.

The war in Europe was different from the war in the Pacific and elsewhere. In a lot of ways I think that it was tougher going from island to island. The European war was more of a modernized war. We were fighting in cities not in the jungle. The individual infantryman had a tougher time in the Far East. But the artillery part in Europe was worse. Those Germans could put an 88 in your pocket from 5 miles away.

That same little fella I was telling you about earlier, Ebiline…I saw him cut right in half. We were running from one building to another and the artillery was coming down and we ran into machine gun fire and Ebiline got hit and he folded over just like a piece of meat. The German machine guns (MG-42) fired 3 to 5 times faster than an American machine gun. It would go bbbblllllttttttt. American guns would go bum bum bum. That 17-year old boy got killed right there. I had to keep on running.

When we got into Germany itself I remember our own artillery thought we were the enemy because we had advanced so far. We were walking out in the open. They thought we were Germans retreating down the road. I heard these three volleys go off. I could tell it was an American 105mm. You could hear it coming. You got time to move cause it was slow moving. The Germans used those high velocity shells; you didn't hear them until it exploded. Anyway we were going down this road and I heard those volleys go off and I said, "Holly Shit!" And there was this guy who was kind of nervous; he was shell- shocked. He had taken about all he could take; he was about to blow up. But everybody was high-strung. Everybody up there had seen a lot, done a lot, and been through a lot. But this guy actually fell down right in the middle of the road. Everybody else jumped in the ditch when we heard those volleys. And this guy froze right there in the middle of the road. He was having a breakdown.

We started calling that artillery CP to tell them who we were and to tell them to stop. We knew who they were. They were the 75th. But before we could get them to stop firing we had to move quickly because they were zeroing in on that road, on our position. When those second volleys went off I jumped over a barbed wire fence with my rifle and a pack and all. And I cleared that fence like it wasn't there. I hurdled it. But the fence hit my gun and my barrel stuck in the mud. And man that was a no-no. Man one of those shells exploded about 10-feet in front of me and my ears started bleeding. I had enough awareness to get up and jump behind a mound of dirt for protection. We finally got through to those guys. To this day I am hard of hearing.

I was able to bring this Luger back to the states. I had to register it. It's a fine piece of work.

I carried a carbine after a while. I carried a BAR at the very beginning of the war. I fired it at some tanks. I also carried a bazooka. I fired it at German pillboxes. I saw a lot of German tanks. But you didn't want to be within 10 miles of those Panzers. Our shells would bounce off those Panzer tanks.

Howard Dugas, Theriot:
**technical difficulties in beginning; truly begins at 01:36; will jump and skip around throughout; highway and lawn care noises in background**

Pearl Harbor
-Was shooting pool that Sunday when someone ran in and told them the news
-Figured everything would be settled in a couple of days, they didn’t really know what was going on
-Had turned 18 and just graduated from high school so Dugas joined the Navy
-There was more volunteers than ships so new recruits were put in the Coast Guard
-There was a lot of areas along the coast and Lake Pontchartrain to patrol for submarine sightings

-Boot camp at Harrihan, La which was the New Orleans Army base
-They had to share as the Coast Guard had no place and things were moving fast
-Explained to them that the Coast Guard and Navy was one unit
-Sent to Lake Charles and ran small boats and kept the bridge closed or open for shipyard workers

-Started a new patrol in Cameron, La; couldn’t drive cars as it was a black out area to hide from submarines
-Assigned to a Destroyer Escort “SS Mosley,” for patrolling and standing watch; also patrolled on horse in swampy areas and to keep from having to use lights
-In the early part of the war German U-boats were sinking 1-3 freighters a day in the Atlantic
-This was before the Destroyer Escorts could take over for protection

-Patrolling on horseback Dugas thought it was too easy and asked to be assigned onto the “SS Mosley,” the Destroyer Escort (DE) they had been patrolling for
-Always on alert but most of the crew had no experience with sea duty and neither did Dugas
-The Captain had been an office man and had only 90 days of training in school before taking over their ship
-Once the crew felt comfortable manning the ship they went out to sea to Bermuda for a shakedown cruise; there might have been two ships that went

-A DE was established for escort duty and submarine warfare and maybe some aircrafts
-Had 3 one inch guns, a 40-mm and 20-mm machine guns, K-guns, depth charges and a hedgehog in the back
-Before leaving, a lot of assembling for operations was done along the East coast by Virginia, the Carolinas, and Massachusetts
-Also where the German U-boats, never saw one in the gulf
-Dugas’s group was the first to escort convoys using Des
-Escorted 90-100 freighters at a time bound to the Mediterranean; never lost a ship to engine breakdowns
-They knew submarines would follow them all the way to the Straits of Gibraltar waiting for them to stall or lose a ship in a breakdown to shoot them

-Made serval trips from January 1944 to May 1945 bringing men and materials

Missions (22:40)
-On one mission to North Africa and Italy was asked to break away on the African Coast and look for a fishing boat
-They didn’t know what language the other boat used so the Captain asked Dugas to speak some French but the other boat called back and asked “What’s the matter, you don’t speak English?!”

-Went by Casablanca but didn’t see Humphry Bogart or Ingrid Bergman
-The Germans were further east by then to Tunisia thanks to the British; Hitler had his forces spread out too thin

Only Mission with Severe Causalities (26:35)
-Around dusk in the Mediterranean the lead ship of the convoy had radar (to intercept enemy or friendly planes) and saw a blinking light of unidentified planes that were coming in too low
-They figured because it was getting dark that the planes were going to make one pass and try to hit the freights
-The planes were coming too low anyway for the ships at the front to shoot so they let the planes fly over; Germans were well organized
-A freight at the very back started shooting 20-mm with tracers that could be seen in the night and then everyone was shooting but it was too dark to tell where they were shooting at
-The first ship hit was a troop ship and it had bombs and about 600 soldiers on board and it was hit by a torpedo
-The second wave of attacks hit two merchant ships (materials) and third wave hit the screening ship, hit with a torpedo—all three were beached but not sunk
-Dugas’s ship, the Mosley, laid up smoke screens at dusk to confuse the planes but it was too late
-After that every night they laid up smoke screens in case they got attacked again but they weren’t, just a few submarines

-This trip might have been the third or fourth trip

-Another trip along the African Coast and at night the radar picked up a surface signal for a boat and sent a message out that a convoy was coming and to get out of the way
-15 minutes later a torpedo cut the lead ship in half; couldn’t stop to pick up survivors in the water, they had to keep going

-Lost a lot of people during the war; too inexperienced and many mistakes made, very unprepared compared to the Germans
-By the second to last trip the war was almost over and there wasn’t much need for materials being sent out all over, it was all concentrated in Europe by then
Didn’t have much news on how the war was going, sometimes picked up BCC broadcast yet they never said anything about the war but mostly heard Axis Sally (German propaganda)

-Passed through the Strait of Gibraltar (he thinks) 8 times

-The Mediterranean was beautiful and at night they could see the phosphorus in the clear waters; Dugas’s captain was always excited to it

(38:00) Shore Duty
-After about a year at sea, Dugas was transferred to shore duty in New York
-Really enjoyed it as New York was the place to be for entertainment, could do anything or see anything all year around
-Like music and sports and he could go see stuff anytime
-Was sent to Port Security School to learn to patrol docks and check ships for explosives and fire hazards
-The German submarines they figured had been pulled out of their waters and were closer to home, as submarine warfare started phasing out
-It was a good duty, as they could have fun and take breaks; “always a bunch of girls somewhere”

(42:00) Trip to Greenland
-Towards the end of Dugas’s service he was sent on a trip to Greenland
-Was aboard a Coast Guard Icebreaker—it had a knife at the bottom to break the ice

-They were going to check something out; the ship had already taken a trip to Greenland and captured a German radio station
-On the way an engine went out and a 4 day trip took 2 weeks
-The wind was against them and one engine couldn’t push through it and had to watch for icebergs constantly so someone had to stand outside to look for them
-No clue why he was picked to go on this trip; people were always being sent around, sometimes with no place to go
-Once in Greenland as they came in, had to help a fishing boat break out of the ice, they followed behind them for 2 days
-It was cold but they had good clothes of 3 layers; but the worst was when up in the bridge and the wind blew on their faces and burned them; it was always so windy

-Didn’t stay too long as they had to get the Captain of the North Atlantic patrol was stationed there but he had a nurse with him (his girlfriend) and they had to take her too
-Then they just killed some time as it was Christmas time and by protocol so much of the crew had time off and the radio stations stopped

(51:15) Back in Boston
-People were being sent home on the point system as the war was ending
-Was sent to Baltimore and was waiting around to be discharged back to New Orleans
-Took a train to New Orleans and his parents met him and took him back home to Parks; **tape starts skipping around**
-As things slowed down went to work off shore for a while
-Learned to how to cook and was cooking for the rig then and worked about 15-16 hours a day so he got some good money

(55:15) Talking about what he did after the rig, his leukemia, his family, and answering some questions from Theriot

**hard to hear with tape skipping and background noise**

Transcription Begins:

Howard Dugas (9/9/01)
Parks, La.
Born: 8/13/22
Coast Guard/USS Mosley (DE-321)
Atlantic Ocean going escort

On Pearl Harbor Day I was shooting pool in Parks, La. It was December 7th, a Sunday. Anyway, that's when we heard the news. Somebody came down the road and said that they bombed Pearl Harbor. We said, "Auh, we'll finish that thing in a couple of days." Nobody knew really what was going on.

I had graduated high school and I was 18-years old at the time, so I joined the navy with a friend of mine. We took a bus to New Orleans. There were a lot of volunteers. To begin with there weren't enough ships to assign everybody too, so that's one of the reasons why they put the new recruits in the Coast Guard. There were a lot of areas that needed to be patrolled along the coast. The Coast Guard had a lot of small craft and they were equipped for patrolling the waters. (There were subs all over the gulf.)

We were sent to boot camp in Harrihan, La., which is an Army base in New Orleans. Actually we had to share space with the Army, because the Coast Guard had no other place to train.
After boot camp I was sent to Lake Charles and we mostly ran small patrol boats, mainly to keep the bridge open at peek hours so that the shipyard workers could get to work faster.

Early on, ships were getting sunk off the coast [by submarines] because of the silhouette from the city lights. Later, we were sent to patrol the beach area near Cameron, La. That was a blackout area. (Bayou Boys-Torpedo Book.) We couldn't use cars or trucks to patrol at night, plus it was too swampy, so we used horseback to patrol. They called it the Animal Husbandry detail. We were about 15-20 men patrolling along Holly Beach. People were volunteering for the navy so fast, they didn’t have any place to put them. So they put us with this unit patrolling the coast until the navy could build enough ships. It was easy duty, but I wanted to do something more.

We were getting tired of sitting on the beach and riding horses. So a couple of us asked the chief to see if we could get assignment for sea duty. We had heard that they were building and commissioning destroyer escorts in Orange, Texas. And sure enough, a few days later we were assigned to a Destroyer Escort, the SS Mosley (DE-321).

We were very inexperienced. The Japanese caught us by surprise. The crews of the destroyer escorts were half navy and half coast guard. John Mcloud from Parks, La., was the storekeeper on the Mosley. He and I were friends.

We were always making preparations. We were on full alert, but a lot of that crew had no experience with sea duty. Being from South Louisiana I had been in small boats, but sea duty is really something different. Even the Captain was an office-man who they sent to a 90-day school before he took over the ship. But this was going on everywhere.

During the early part of the war, the German U-boats were sinking anywhere from 1 to 3 freighters in the Atlantic a week. These freighters didn't have any protection; they would sail on their own. This was before the Destroyer Escorts took over.

Once we felt comfortable enough to go to sea we went on a shake down cruise to Bermuda. That was nice, generally speaking. I think there was another DE with us. It was rough going there, but that's how you learn the ship, you go on a shake down cruise. There were only three cars on the island. Everybody traveled by bicycle. It was a beautiful place. The DE was established for escort duty and submarine warfare. We had three inch guns, and 40-mm and 20-mm machine guns for defense. We had K-guns on the stern to roll out depth charges, and we also had what they called a hedgehog. It was right in front of the flying bridge. It would (fire) shoot-up 24-small torpedoes at one time. We trained with all this while in Bermuda. We used as much of the equipment as we could while we were there.

The first mission was to escort a convoy out of Norfolk, Va., to Texas Gulf ports and back, which we did. Then starting in January 1944 we began escorting ships across the Atlantic through the Mediterranean and on to North Africa and Italy. Most of the convoy operations for the shipments of supplies and soldiers across the Atlantic were based along the coast of the Carolina's, Virginia, and Baltimore. That's where the convoys would assemble, and that's where a lot of U-boats would patrol. We were one of the first groups to escort convoys [using DE’s]. We were escorting 90 to 100 freighters at a time, bound for the Mediterranean. We had Navy ships and Coast Guard ships. In a year-and-a-half we made quite a few trips across the Atlantic (Starting January 1944 to May 1945). We made several trips. These convoys were bringing men and materials to the Mediterranean.

We were lucky though. None of freighters ever had engine troubles or breakdowns, so not one ship ever got left behind the convoy on the trip across the Atlantic. If one would have broke down, we couldn't have stopped for it. It would have been a sitting duck for the subs. Enemy submarines would follow us all the way to the Straits of Gibraltar.

Once we were ordered to break off from the convoy and sail along the African coast to look for an important fishing boat. (This fishing boat was friendly, so we pulled up to it and our Captain told me to speak French to them over the radio, and this other guy spoke Italian to them. The guy in the fishing boat came back and said, "What's the matter, you don't speak English!") We located the boat and escorted it to port.

And we went by Casablanca, but I didn't see Humphry Bogart or Ingrid Bergman. We stayed there at port for a couple of days. By this time the British had pushed the Germans further to the east in Tunisia. Hitler had his forces spread out too thin. I think that's one reason why he lost the war, because he was fighting on too many fronts and he ran out of gas.

(April 20, 1944) We were carrying everything in those convoys, even troops. In April we sailed with a convoy to North Africa. It was dusk as we passed through the Straits of Gibraltar along the Algerian coast. The lead ship picked up a surface contact in front of the convoy and sent a blinking light to the ship ahead of us to tell them that a convoy was coming—big mistake! German bombers attacked us in three waves. We used radar to recognize the enemy planes from friendly planes. But these planes were coming at us low to ground level and we couldn't identify them on the radar. They were coming at us from about 20-feet off the water. They were JU-88's. They came right down the line in our convoy and we were in front so we didn't shoot at them at first, but the ships behind us identified them as enemy and started shooting. One of the planes dropped a bomb and it hit a merchant ship carrying demolitions and troops. “The first attack blew the troop-loaded merchantmen Paul Hamilton out of the water, killing 580 men; the next wave hit two more merchant ships; and the final strike sank the screening ship Landsdale (DD-426) with a single torpedo. The Mosley laid covering smoke and opened up with anti-aircraft fire during the strikes. Her guns splashed one JU-88 and damaged another German bomber during the first strike.” (Source:) We got credit for that. We couldn’t stop to pick up survivors that were in the water; we had to keep going. There was lot of confusion and inexperience that caused this. After that incident we would put up barrage balloons and lay smoke screens at night for protection, and we never had another incident with German planes after that. But we ran into a few submarines.

One day we picked up a signal on with our sound gear. It was a German submarine. So we and another DE dropped dept charges. A little while later the debris came floating up; oil and trash from the sub. We were credited with, along with the other DE, for sinking that U-boat. That's what is terrible about war. A lot of people were lost during that war-50 million people died during WWII. On our last two trips we didn't have any problems, because the war was being concentrated in Europe. Hitler had pulled everything out of Africa and the Mediterranean and brought it all in close to Germany.
The Mediterranean was beautiful. At night you could see phosphorus in the clear waters.

(Inexperience and mistakes is what made the war last so long. We were unprepared in a lot of ways and our equipment wasn't as good as the Germans. There was no comparison between our tanks (Sherman) and the German tanks (Tiger/Panzer). The Germans had tanks, real tanks. Those things were monsters compared to the toys we had.) After about a year or so at sea they transfered a few of us to shore duty in New York. New York was a heck of place to be especially back in those days. I like music and sports, and New York was the place to be for all that. They had three ballrooms and all the great bands would come, and Madison Square Garden had great boxing fights. You could do whatever you wanted anytime of the year there.

While I was in New York they sent us to Port Security School. By this time the German submarine warfare had eased off. They sub's were also being pulled closer to Germany. We patrolled the docks and we checked ships for explosives and fire hazards. It was good duty. At the end of my service I went on a trip on a Coast Guard Icebreaker to Greenland. We were going to check something out over there. Before I went on that trip, this same ship and its crew had captured a German radio station in Greenland. We had engine trouble on the way. A four-day trip took us two weeks. It was real cold up there, but we had good clothing.

Back in Boston, the war was ending and they were sending people home on the point system. I got back to New Orleans on a train. And then I came home.

Robert Gerami, Theriot, Hewitt Theriot:

-Volunteered in Jeanerette with the National Guard; long before Pearl Harbor—early 1941?
-After passing the tests sent to Camp Blanding, Florida; trained in Company E, 156th Infantry Regiment, the 31st Division, and was the cook
-The camp was training draftees; Gerami was just a cook though so he was not part of these trainings
-Sent to Bowie, Texas to train some more before going to New York to be shipped out to England
-The whole 2nd battalion and a band came over on the ship “O’rentas Barrows”

-Snubb Derouen, from G Company, was with Gerami’s unit; he commanded Gerami’s company at one time
-Clay Penn, Warren Hebert, Wilson Clark, Norby Dooley, Jack Martin, Gerald Whattigny, were in E Company
-F Company was Breaux Bridge, G company was New Iberia, H company was Franklin; these four companies made up the 2nd battalion
-200 men to a company; but they were split in North Africa

(9:20) Spent 4 months in England, then went to North Africa and made MPs and then split, one half of the companies went to Italy
-In Italy Gerami was working in the police department as an interpreter as Gerami family was Italian and could also speak in French

-In England they were protecting the air bases; he was the cook so he didn’t do much but be a guard
-In North Africa at Oran they guarded German and Italian prisoners; stayed there for about 6 months
-Gerami was discharged in Oran 3 years later on the point system
-While there a large tent mess hall was built for them; had 2 Italian prisoners that helped him, G.G. and Rommell
-The men gave them their families’ addresses to give to their parents when Gerami went to Italy; their families welcomed them and cooked for them one night

(16:23) Gerami’s father died while he was in North Africa but he did not know until much later but he knew the army wouldn’t have let him go back for the funeral anyway
-The Red Cross had sent a telegram about his father’s death but he never got it
-Found out from Wilson Clark who had a letter from his wife telling him of Gerami’s father’s passing; eventually Gerami’s wife wrote to him about it
-His father was from Italy (Palermo?) and moved to Louisiana in Jeanerette for the sugar houses where he met his wife (Gerami’s mother)
-Was actually already married in Italy but left that woman and brought their two sons over to the US; those 2 half-brothers lived in Lafayette

-Spent most of his time at the camp cooking
-After being made MPs his company went to Italy to help secure it; this was where he worked in the police department
-They encircled Rome to run out the Germans; the Vatican was left untouched and they couldn’t go in anyway

(21:45) recounting his trips to England and Oran by ship; looking through different books at the pictures to help jog Gerami’s memory

-After Italy they went to France; doesn’t know why and never really questioned it
-Cooked mostly in England and North Africa and sometimes went around and did guard duty; tells some short stories
-Each company had 6 cooks and 3 cooked one day and the next had the day off as the other 3 cooked
-No one knew when they would go back home
-The Italians were nice, they never wanted to fight against the Americans, that was all Hitler
-More recapping his trips and work again with different retellings

(34:49) His Lt. came and told him that he could go home; the war was over by then (May 1945)
-Sent to Texas where he got his discharge papers and then went back home
-Talking about life before the war and growing up in Jeanerette
-Didn’t really try and get together with those he was with during the war
-Talking about his family

Transcription Begins:

Robert P. Gerami, Sr.
Jeanerette, La.
Company E, 156th Infantry Regiment, LA National Guard
Cook
Interview conducted by Jason P. Theriot

I volunteered for the National Guard here in Jeanerette. I was sent to Camp Blanding, Florida. We were Company E, (156th Infantry Regiment) 31st Division. I was a cook in the kitchen. We were in Florida training with draftees. We went to Camp Bowie, Texas and from there we went to New York and left for England. Our whole battalion (2nd) went over together, even the band. The O’rentas Barrows was the name of the ship.

We had the whole unit with us. Snubb Derouen, from G Company, was with us. He commanded our company at one time. Clay Penn, Warren Hebert, Wilson Clark, Norby Dooley, Jack Martin, Gerald Whattigny, all these guys were with us. We were E Company, F was Breaux Bridge, G was New Iberia, H was Franklin. Those four companies made up our battalion.

We spent four months in England, guarding and protecting the air bases there. I was the cook and the rest of the guys were acting as guards to keep the people safe. We went to Oran, North Africa in March of 1943. There was plenty going on over there. We were guarding the German and Italian prisoners. They built us a big tent, a big mess hall where I cooked. We had two Italian prisoners: G.G. and Rommell; they helped us clean up. They gave us their addresses back home in Italy and a letter to show their mama back home. We went to visit their parents [in Italy] and they welcomed us and cooked spaghetti and meatballs for us and gave us wine. We stayed there in Oran about six months.

My daddy died while I was overseas, but I didn’t find out till much later. Wilson Clark told me; that’s how I found out. I ran into him one time and he asked me about my daddy. I told him that my daddy was fine…and then he told me that his wife had written him a letter saying that my daddy had died. The army wouldn’t let me come home, and I don’t blame them. My daddy left from Italy [or Palermo?] to come here, and lived in Jeanerette.

We were split up and they made us MPs; half of us went to Italy, some went to Sicily. (The other half went to Corsica) We landed at Naples, and there was still fighting going on. In Italy I was sent to the police department to be an interpreter. I’m Italian, so I could speak Italian. I was raised with the French people and my wife was French, so I could speak a little French, too. They took me out of the kitchen to work as an interpreter.

The Italians liked the Americans. They didn’t want to fight…Hitler convinced them to fight.

Our forces encircled Rome and ran the Germans out of there. We bypassed the Vatican City; that was left untouched. We left from Italy and sailed to France, where we stayed till the end of the war. One day they told me it was time to come home, because I had the highest points in the unit; I had two kids, too. I shook hands with my lieutenant and told the boys goodbye. Gerald Whattigny told me to go see his wife when I got home. So I did and I told her that he was okay and that he would be home soon.

Three years overseas…that’s a long time yeah. After the first year you think that you never gonna get home. When they declared surrender and the war was over…boy, we were glad.

Charles "Charlie" Hagan; Theriot

-Hagan owned a barbershop; some family history of his father from Nebraska and mother from New Iberia
-The places where they lived; siblings and children he had

(02:47) Pearl Harbor
-He and his best friend, both married at the time, had gone to Avery Island that morning
-It was around noon as they were driving back that the radio announced the news; they had no idea where Pearl Harbor was
-At the time when he was in high school (learned this in debate club) was that the US had a small army
-The Democrats were trying to build it up as the Republicans were isolationists
-There was a peace time draft after he graduated from high school but Hagan wasn’t 21 yet
-So he went to LSU for engineering but failed in trigonometry and chemistry
-It was a hard time to get jobs now unless you could work in the oil field but one had to be weigh at least 180 lbs., and Hagan was too small

-Hagan’s half-brother was a barber and had a second chair open in shop at the time and needed an extra hand
-So he went to barber school and when finished had to work as an apprentice
-Came back home with his apprenticeship license and his father knew of a barber shop that Hagan could buy
-There was a second barber there that Hagan kept but he was an alcoholic so Hagan wouldn’t allow him to come in to work most times

-The war broke out and Hagan wasn’t 21 until July 1941 so he missed the June draft
-Later in the year there was another draft that caught him, but he was now married
-So he was given a classification of 3-A as they weren’t taking married men yet
-The next year of 1942 the draft broad started taking married men, Hagan’s classification changed to 1-A
-Hagan was already now thinking about voluntarily joining up to the air force
-When he did go to war, he had to shut down his barbershop but he had already paid for the next 3 months rent when he was drafted
-He told his father to either rent out the shop for extra money or continue to pay the rent—his father paid the rent the whole time Hagan was away

(11:29) Basic Training
-Draft in December 22, 1942 and had to report to the courthouse in New Iberia; there were 50 men and they were all sent to Lafayette to be examined
-If they passed the examination they were sworn into the army right then but if they failed, they were given classifications of 4-F and sent back home to wait to be called on later if need be
-Once sworn in they gave them 7 days to go home and get their affairs in order and then report to duty
-But they got some extra days for Christmas and really shipped out on January 3rd

-Took a bus to Camp Beauregard (there for a week) and in Hagan’s unit he had only one other person from New Iberia with him
-Was Harold Vilmore (he became a major’s jeep driver so he never saw him during the war)
-Vilmore was transferred to headquarters as Hagan was sent to A Battery
-Basic training was at Camp Stewart, Georgia; went by train and had to hike with all their baggage to the camp; it was a camp to build them up physically
-Was very insecure of his weight (125 lbs. by then) and height and doubted he could hold his own against about 200 lb. Nazi if it came to it

(17:14) Army Barber
-Was assigned as a barber for his unit at first as his captain knew his background
-Hagan would cut hair at night and not just for his unit but others within the camps
-Still had to do everything else everybody else would do but sometimes was given leave of his duties to go cut hair on army time
-Was paid, charged .50c a hair and everyone was allotted for 2 haircuts so they would pay $1 and Hagan would get 35% of the collections; sent them home to his wife

-Started getting weapons, a 40 mm machine guns; Hagan wound up as a generator operator
-The generator provided the electricity for the gun to be operated remotely and Hagan had to set it up and take it back down
-The halftracks had M-15 with a 37 caliber cannon on the back, plus two .50 caliber machine guns; the M-16 had a quad 50’s on the back
-Hagan was an extra so he was not assigned to any particular gun but had to be able to use either guns when needed
-Goes into detail on how each gun worked and mishaps when in combat as his unit was not really good

(25:47) Desert Maneuvers
-Sent across the country on a troop train and Hagan cut hair the whole way to California; not really sure where they were at
-There was no camp there but it was called “Camp Dump” as they were dumped off to go and build scaffoldings and showers for outfits (not clothes)
-They were part of the 9th Armored Division when they were doing maneuvers
-Sprained his ankle his last week of maneuvers and at the hospital met a famous actor that would talk and play pool with them
-Tells of his adventures of trying to find his outfit in the desert after he was discharged

(40:37) Different Trainings
-Jumping around to different camps for various trainings: amphibious, artillery—did exercises for different battle fronts in Europe and Africa
-They knew what was coming when they would go overseas
-Last camp was Camp Shanks (New York) waiting for a transport ship to England
-They were split up, A Battery (Hagan) and the cooks loaded up on a different ship while the rest of the batteries and headquarters went on a different ship
-Cut hair while they travelled
-Took 13 days to cross the ocean to Liverpool (February 1944) and went south to Bristol Bay to get supplies, weapons and halftracks

(49:45)
-Then went to a beach town and the batteries were separated again; one group went to marsh area while Hagan and others were a part of an invasion
-A and D Batteries were sent over the Channel on an LST with personnel and equipment
-Landed on Omaha Beach 3 weeks after D-Day; they joined up with Hagan’s outfit and CP
-Hagan was now a part of the 2nd platoon of A Battery

-St. Lo they had a bombing but Hagan had been told to stay to cut hair the next day; the CP was a mile from where the bombing was happening
-Ordered to find a foxhole from the retreating Germans to hide in

(audio cuts off at 57:30)

Transcription Begins:

When I was in high school, we had a debate club. I was on the affirmative side: Should the United States build up its Army to equal that of other nations? At that time the Democrats were trying to get our army built up and the Republicans were considered isolationists; they figured we had two oceans to defend us and that an army would just get us into war. I was the only one who really put up a good argument, but the teach called it a draw.

On Pearl Harbor Day, I had a good of mine—we were raised together on Fulton St.—we were inseparable friends coming up. He was married and I was married. We went to Avery Island. We were on our way back around noon and we were listening to the radio when they announced that Pearl Harbor had been bombed. I didn’t know were Pearl Harbor was; I didn’t anything about Pearl Harbor.

Back then, jobs were hard time around here, unless you were in the oil field. And I was a small man, so unless you weighed 180-pounds, you couldn’t get a job out here. So my brother was barber and he had a shop in Beaumont, Texas. He had two chairs, but he only operated one, and he could have used another barber. He kept mentioning that, so that’s why I decided to go be a barber.

I went to barber school and after I had to work as an apprentice. When I came out, I bought a shop from another barber and my daddy backed me up. After a while they had the peacetime draft come up, then the war broke out. I wasn’t 21 until July of ’41. I was married at the time; I had gotten married at barber school. So they gave me the classification of 3-A, as married. They weren’t taking married people then. But then later the next year, 1942, they started taken married people. That’s when they changed my classification to 1-A. I was drafted on December 22, 1942.

I had to shut my barbershop down. Fortunately, I had paid up on my rent for three months and my father kept paying the rent for me until I got back from the war.

I received my draft notice to report to the courthouse in New Iberia. There were about 50 of us. Then we took a bus to Lafayette to take an examination. If you failed the exam, they classified you as 4-F and sent you back home, where they might have called you up again later on. If you passed, you were sworn into the Army right then and there. They read us the articles of war and were then part of the Army. They gave us a seven-day leave to go home and take care of our business. After seven days, we were to report for duty.

We got an extra few days because of Christmas. On January 3, 1943, we took a bus to Camp Beauregard, which was the induction center. This is where they assigned you to your unit. Harold Vilmore and I were assigned to the 467th AAA. He went into headquarters, and I went into A battery. We were sent to Camp Stewart, Georgia.

It was just basic training. They built you up physically: hikes and obstacle course. It was military training. I felt insecure about my size. I was about 125 pounds. We went through bayonet training and all that. And I didn’t feel very secure; if I had to come up against a 200-pound Nazi and I had to battle against him, I didn’t feel too secure about that. Things like that ran through my mind.

So from the very beginning, I wound up as the barber. But the Army doesn’t have a barber; you got your haircut from the PX. But most of the units made barbers like me. Our captain assigned me as the barber, because he knew my background. I started cutting haircuts at night. Later on they had me cutting hair on Army time. It was beneficial because I made money. They gave me a roster of all the names in our battery. When it came time for payday, they’d come to me and if I had you down for two haircuts, then you paid me $1, fifty-cents a haircut. Then I take 35-percent out of that collection and I give that to the battery clerk. I took the rest. I sent all of that to my wife.

Then we started getting our weapons. The first weapons were these 40mm machine guns. I wound up as a generator operator. The generator provides the electricity for the gun to be operated remotely. So we trained with those for a while and then we got these halftracks. The M-15 had a 37 caliber cannon on the back, plus two .50 caliber machine guns. The M-16 had quad 50’s on the back. I was an extra so I wasn’t assigned to one particular gun, but I could be used on either of the guns.

We moved to California for six weeks of desert maneuvers with the 9th Armored Division. From there we moved to the east coast. We headed out of Camp Shanks, New York and board a transport ship for England. We landed in Liverpool in February 1944, and made it down south. We picked up our halftracks and went to a camp on Bristol Bay along the Channel.

We knew what was coming up; we knew we were going into France. Just before the invasion, the captain told me to give everybody a GI haircut. But just before, they separated some of us from the battalion: myself, the cooks, those who were assigned to a halftrack, plus all of D Battery personnel and their equipment. We went to one place and the battalion went to a marshaling area with their halftracks.

We wound up going over the Channel in an LST along with D battery personnel and equipment. We landed three weeks after D-Day. I ran into Al Duetney on Omaha beach. He was a photographer and had a print shop right here in New Iberia. At that time I joined up with the rest of my outfit.

I was part of 2nd platoon of A battery. The night before the bombing of St. Lo, I had reported to the CP and the captain told me to stay there and cut hair the following day. The CP was about a mile from where they were bombing. That morning the bombers started coming in. The ground was shaking. The captain told me to find a foxhole and get in it.