Center for Louisiana Studies Archival Catalog

World War II; draft; military service; Arkansas; Lafayette; jobs / work; differences between Louisiana and Arkansas

Transcription:

Robert J. Adams    Interview: September 18, 2004
107 Hibiscus
Lafayette, LA
Born: March 11, 1922
Seaplane/Spitfire Recon pilot

I was born in Houma, but we moved around a lot because my father was a railroad man. He worked on the railroad in Alexandria, Mamou, Lafayette, New Iberia, and even Cypermont Point and Weeks Island.

I was going to school here at SLI when Pearl Harbor happened. I didn’t know much about what was happening because I was flying all day. I had taken up flying at SLI and I was in one of these small airplanes. That plane cost $999 and it came with instructions on how to fly it. 

I was fascinated with flying ever since I was a young boy. My father didn’t believe in flying. So I took up flying when I got to college. There was an old wood hanger at the airport here in Lafayette and we had this little plane; it was a civilian model Piper Cub. We’d have to pick it up by the tail and turn it around. You’d put it in the direction you wanted, started it up and took off. I found out about Pearl Harbor later that afternoon when I landed.

In January of 1942, me and a buddy of mine hitchhiked to New Orleans to join the Navy Air Corps. We were mad at the Japs for attacking Pearl Harbor and wanted to get back at them. We took our test in New Orleans and they sent us back to Lafayette to finish school; that’s when I met my wife.

I had wanted to fly the P-40, the plane with the Flying Tigers. That was the best plane that we had at the time. But when I got my wings, they put me in a SOC seaplane.

I was sent to LSU in Baton Rouge in the summer of ’42 to go to the ground school for navy warfare training. From there I went to Athens, Georgia. I went to school there and took half a day flight training. Then I was sent to Dallas, Texas to train in the N2S2 Steerman. From there so many were sent to dive bombers, some went to big bombers. I was sent to Corpus Christi where I was assigned to a seaplane.

I didn’t know anything about the seaplane before, nothing at all. I was very disappointed about that because I wanted to be fighter pilot. But that’s the Navy. They put you where they need you. And they just picked me for the seaplane.

I flew the OS2U. It had the interior of a small airplane. It had one wing and two machine guns. I had a radioman in the back. The plane could carry two 350-pound depth charges. We went after the submarines and mainly scouted for the heavy cruisers. We were four seaplanes on that cruiser. They would shoot you off of a catapult and you would land in the water. We trained to do everything that you could do at that time. When we finished, we got our wings.

I was sent to Portland, Maine in January of 1944 and was put on my ship, the USS Augusta. We flew patrol in the North Atlantic for three months hunting the submarines. Every once in a while you’d see something, but we never attacked an enemy sub. We flew ahead of the fleet at about six miles an hour. When you flew in a convoy you had to fly as fast as the slowest ship. 

The Augusta was the flagship of the Atlantic Fleet. The first American killed in World War II was on the Augusta (August 21, 1937, China Sea). His name was Falgout and he was from Raceland, Louisiana. The ship was in the China Sea and a shell came over the ship and exploded. The shrapnel killed him. They built a monument in Raceland to honor him. The Augusta was sort of a famous ship. Roosevelt and Churchill met on the Augusta during one of their conferences at the beginning of the war.

There were about 800 men on that ship. When I wasn’t flying I read books and wrote letters to my wife to pass the time. We sailed to England. They sent me down to the southern part of England to go to school to fly the Spitfire. I was on loan to the British.

The British were very nice people. Some people didn’t like the British, but I got along with them. I just didn’t like the food. But the beer was really good.

[Mrs. Adams: Bob didn’t like the food. He used to fly to American airfields to get some American food. My sister had dated a fellow from Alexandria, Louisiana and he was in the Air Force. He worked in the tower. One day Robert flew to this airport and wanted the land. The tower asked him his name and Bob said, “Bob Adams.” The tower said, “Oh! You wouldn’t be married to a girl named Maude Johnson would you?” He said, “Yes, that’s my wife.” So he told him to come on down and he and my sister’s boyfriend met in England; the only time they ever met.]

The Spitfire was a very nice plane and it kept getting better; more power, more speed. I really enjoyed flying it. See the Germans had some really good planes too—they were really fast—and our little old two-wing seaplanes could only go about 135 mph—and that was in a dive. So that’s why they put us in the Spitfire, because it was much faster.

Foreman, who created the Spitfire during peacetime, wanted a really good plane. The Spitfire was a very good airplane. It had six machine guns, three on each side. We trained in the cockpit that showed all the instruments and various equipment for flying the plane. We were going to be used to (foreward) spot for the gun ships at sea. We were especially trained in spotting the fire—the eyes of the fleet.

Before we left on D-Day we had designated targets that we were supposed to pick up. They had done reconnaissance before to pick out the various targets and briefed us on the locations before we left. We were given the coordinantes to go on and we’d go out to beat them up.

We trained for this before the invasion. They had put out these platforms in an area about as big as my house and covered it with different material that the Germans would use. We had to spot for the fire coming in to the targets.

The instructors at the school were all British and they were all good soldiers. We bunked at a boarding school in Sheffield (?) Park. Each pilot had an enlisted man, called a batboy, who took care of your clothes, food, shoes and all that—protocol!

We knew that something big was coming. It had to be. And we knew that it was going to be dangerous, but you just had to go and do it. We were all ready, all excited to go. Actually, D-Day was supposed to be on the 5th of June. But they called it off until the 6th because of bad weather. I wasn’t supposed to fly on the 5th. I had got grounded from a bad sinus infection. When Eisenhower decided, “let’s go” on the 6th, I was well enough to fly. 

We studied on the German Luftwaffe operations. They had good planes, but we had better planes. The Spitfire was one of the best.

We were stationed in Southern England at Lee-on Solent, right across from the Isle of Wight. The morning of the invasion we got up before daybreak and went to our planes. We started out towards the Isle of Wight early that morning. It only took about 15 minutes to fly across the Channel. It was about 90 miles to the target area behind Omaha beach. Flying over the invasion fleet, I saw thousands of different kinds of ships. I was thinking, I’m glad I’m in the air.

We flew in pairs: one pilot would concentrate on the target and direct the fire; the other pilot would hover over him to protect him against enemy fighters and to let him know if he had an enemy on his tail. If we saw an enemy aircraft approaching our wingman, we were instructed to radio him, “break left,” or “break right.” They had sharpened our wing tips so we could break quickly. If he got involved in a dogfight, then I was supposed to take his place and continue spotting the fire. But thankfully, the Luftwaffe never came.

We had two targets on that first mission on D-Day. At Travieres, they didn’t have any Germans there, so I radioed back asking them not to shot up the town. Hell, it was just a little bitty old town. Traviers had a communications center and there was a spotter in a church steeple. He was way up high and could see the invasion beaches. I took a few shots at the steeple, although we weren’t supposed to do that. After we spotted it, our big guns neutralized it until they couldn’t use it anymore.

The naval guns ships would shoot three shots about 200 yards apart. And you would walk the middle shot up to the target and then report back to ship, “fire for effect.” Every gun on that ship would track the same shot and destroy the target.

My other target was the big guns at L-15 in Insigny. It was pretty well camouflaged. We spotted for that and our guns took it out. We had radio contact between the two pilots and the ship offshore.

The Germans were sending up a lot of anti-aircraft fire. I tried to dodge the incoming fire. One of the guns must have hit my plane because I started loosing fuel. I knew that I couldn’t return to England so I had to land it somewhere. I told my wingman that I was hit and I was going to land. I had a parachute, but I wasn’t gone to ditch the plane and jump out. I didn’t want to risk landing it and getting captured either. So I flew out to the Utah beach area where I knew I could land. The sand there on the beach was very smooth. So when I got there I looked down and saw an opening where the bulldozers had cleared a path for planes to land. I signaled them as best I could and that’s where I landed; I didn’t have a choice. It was a smooth landing and I had no problem getting her down. I was the first pilot to land in France on D-Day.

I think a bullet had torn my fuel line. So these boys fixed me up, gassed me up, and I took off heading back to England. (Distinguished Flying Cross)

I got back to base, checked in and was briefed for my second mission that afternoon. This mission was further inland from the beach. There were a lot of ships and a lot of smoke on that beach that afternoon. We flew missions from June 6 to June 24, everyday. 

The Germans didn’t have very many planes, but we didn’t know that. I was lucky; I never ran into enemy aircraft, although we lost one of our guys that day.

After the 24th of June, I got back on the Augusta and went to Algeriers in North Africa for three days. All we did was sit around a table and drink wine. Then I got on the Tuscaloosa and went to Sicily. From there I got on the USS Philadelphia and went on the invasion of Southern France (Operation ANVIL/DRAGOON).

I got back on the seaplane for the Southern France invasion. My first mission was to fly to this minesweeper out in the Gulf of Fos. I picked up this guy from the minesweeper and flew him ahead of the fleet to spot for mines. We could see the mines from the air and he took the compass reading of the minefield and radioed back to the minesweeper the location. I flew about 13 missions on that invasion. We lost another guy on that invasion.

I stayed on the Philadelphia until the end of August. Then I got back on the Augusta. Eventually we made it back to the States. My son was born on August 18. When I got back to Lafayette, he was just four weeks old.

All together, we were 17 pilots. We lost two during the war.

I went on to practice law here in Lafayette and I still fly with the Coast Guard Auxiliary.

Every other night, over England, the skies would light up, and rumble from the violent screams of the fast approaching German ‘Buzz bombs.’ The V-1 and V-2 self-propelled rocket bombs—vengeance weapons as Hitler referred to them—were launched from sites in France, Holland, and Belgium. The bombs were fired over the English Channel, and were sent crashing down on unsuspecting victims, killing and wounding tens of thousands of helpless civilians in the battered British cities. London, Hitler’s favorite target, was practically leveled from the daily visits of the unmanned Nazi terror bombs.

Ned Arceneaux: Jason Theriot

(Continued) had trucks help pick up the liquor they found and were able to "keep" two of the trucks from then on

-They were stuck in the Falaise Gap and the planes couldn't come in and then they were bombed
-Operation Cobra and the VII Corps had 4 divisions under them (4th, 9th, 30th, and 1st)
-Arceneaux was a part of the quartermaster staff and followed behind the divisions
-They had to inspect cemeteries and railroads as part of their duties

When they got to Paris they had run out of gasoline and so the tanks couldn't move (3:33)
-A Red Ball Express drove by African Americans, they'd be up all 24 hours sometimes, refueling
-As Arceneaux had to keep track of all these going-ons on paper and then ration out the gasoline to the Armored Divisions (3rd Armored Division)
-Arceneaux was with the VII Corps until the Battle of the Bulge when the 54th Field Artillery Battalion supply officer got killed and he was transferred to replace that officer

Speaking French (7:00)
-Arceneaux could go and run errands for the unit as he could speak French while in France
-French treated him right as he could speak their language and was American however things changed after the war they were a bit more cold (resentment) towards the Americans
-But in Germany they were treated even better by the German people than any other country

Back to the Battle of the Bulge (10:40)
-Still with the VII Corps and when the battle broke out, that was when Arceneaux was transferred to the 54th
-he was in charge of running up the supplies and the gasoline for tanks, trucks, halftracks and jeeps for 2 weeks

Bastogne, on the outskirts (16:08)
-Arceneaux was with Patton when he came to rescue the place with his tanks
-Then went back to France and then through Germany to Nordhousen

Nordhousen, Germany (18:03)
-A regiment of the 3rd Armored Division that found a concentration camp
-Went on Leipzig and met up with the Russians on the Elbe River
-There was all these displaced persons with them everywhere and following them; they had to transport them to the Russians sections
-Arceneaux had to drive the trucks that would pack these people on them like cattle to get it done faster
-Russians would inspect the truck in and out of the section and they'd take anything they could from them, displaced people's or American soldiers' possessions

Trip back (23:05)
-Stayed in Europe with the occupation until October
-Arceneaux got out on points and sent to Reimes, France and was put in a n Engineer Battalion as a Personnel Officer
-On a Liberty ship went through the Strait of Gibraltar and in the Atlantic Ocean hit a storm and everyone had to stay below deck as there was no railings except a thin wire
-Anchored in New York and Arceneaux was put on a train to Camp Shelby, Mississippi to be discharged
-Kept him for 3 days as they wanted him to stay in the army but Arceneaux said no and took a train to New Orleans and then a bus to his brother’s house

Got to his brother's house in Lafayette as he lived in town (30:06)
-Surprised his sister-in-law; she was in a packing and seal organization that sent food over to the soldiers and she'd send him a package every week
-Then went over to his parents' house to see his mother and she cooked for him

Talking and names given (33:20)

Continuation of Transcript:

When we got back he told me, “Redline those trucks and tomorrow morning I want you to go to each of the four divisional headquarters and bring them each a truck. Tell them its compliments of J. Lawden Collins.” So I did that, then General Collins said, “Well, Ned. There’s two trucks left. Ones for me and ones for you!” So, we had those trucks with us from Cherbourg on!

We had to go and inspect the cemetery and inspect the supplies coming in from the railroad. Then we’d have to make our reports to our colonel and he would report to Gen. Collins.

We had to get all the gas for the tanks and trucks. The 3rd Armored Division was attached to us. When we got to Paris we had run out of gasoline. So, we had to stay there for a while. The Red Ball Express, all black soldiers, would drive these trucks all night long. One of these guys was from Lafayette. He worked at a lumberyard. One time, he told me about the Red Ball. He said, “We had to put that damn truck to the floor; we’d go and unload then come right back and load up again.” He said, “Sometimes we’d go 24 hours without sleep, just rations.” They caught hell that Red Ball Express. But, they got the job done.

When General Collins would say, “Ned, I need some fresh eggs. Not just for me but for the whole unit.” So, I’d try to find an egg merchant. I found one in Carentan, France just below Ste-Mer-Eglise. This is where I met an egg merchant. I told him how many dozen we needed—I had the numbers all figured out. “Oh yeah,” he said. “We can fix that.” So he invites me into his house. “Come on, let’s have a drink,” he said. So, he pours some Calvados. It was the worst damn thing that I ever drank. It wasn’t the good stuff; it was the rotgut. He served it with coffee and man by the time I left I was so damn drunk. I got out of there in hurry, but anytime that I needed some more eggs I’d go back to him.

I spoke the language and the French people treated me right. But I was American and we were liberating them, so whatever we wanted, we could get.

We were on the outskirts of Bastogne and firing on the Germans. Patton came in with his tanks and rescued Bastogne.

We had made it to Germany and we were staying at a college there when the Battle of the Bulge broke out. When word came in that the Germans were making their move, we had to move and go back through Belgium.

I stayed with VII Corps until the Battle of the Bulge. After that I was transferred to the 54th Field Arillery Battalion.

In the 54th Field Artillery, we had three firing batteries with 105mm’s mounted on tanks. And we had to supply them with gas and oil and parts and whatever they needed. I had 6 trucks and jeeps to use every morning to move supplies. We had a guy who was the gasman. I believe he had 16 halftracks to go to the depot, load up, and transport it back to the vehicles.

When we took Cologne, Germany, our guns, three batteries, fired on the city for 24 hours. That whole day, this gasman and I would drive our trucks and halftracks to the depot, load up on gasoline, then drive back to the line.

We ended up in Nordhousen, Germany. That’s where we found a concentration camp. We didn’t know anything about then. I had never seen anything like it. Were we shocked? Shocked, oh my, my, my. We were attached to a regiment in the 3rd Armored Division, and they were the ones who found this place.

We went to Leipzig on the Elbe River; that’s when we met the Russians. There were thousands of these displaced persons from Poland and all over other parts of Europe. They were scattered all over in camps. After V-E day we were staying as the Army of Occupation and we had to transport these people to the Russians. We would load them up in trucks with all their clothes and belongings; they were pitiful looking—it was real sad. On the first trip that I made with my trucks, we brought maybe ten people per truck. I thought, “This ain’t gonna work.” So, on the second run, we hurried these people on their like cattle. They were pitiful. When we’d get to the Russian section to drop them off, there were these two big buxom women with rifles at the checkpoint. They would stop us and then come to inspect what we had on each truck. If you had a wristwatch on, you’d better make sure that it was in your pocket or they would swipe it from you. We didn’t want anything to do with these people. They were mean people.

When the war ended, the German people treated us better than the French did. We had liberated them, but I guess they had a different attitude.

I stayed in Europe until October and finally got out on points. I left from Reimes, France and rode on a Liberty ship through the Strait of Gibraltar and across the Atlantic. I landed in New York and was sent to Camp Shelby, Mississippi to be discharged. They wanted to promote me and keep me there. I told them, “Man, I just want to go home. I want to go home.” I took a bus to my brother’s house.

My poor sister-in-law was so glad to see me. See, she would go to this place in Lafayette where you could pack and seal foods to send overseas and I would get a package from her every week. This captain told me he wanted some Tabasco Sauce, so I wrote to my sister-in-law and she sent me three or four bottles. The first day that he tried it, I showed him how to use it and this captain said, “Wow man!” We were sitting around and these three officers were eating together. This one officer said, “Hey man, what is that?” I told him it was Tabasco sauce. He said, “Oh man, I understand that’s good stuff.” So he grabbed the bottle and started pouring it on and I said, “Hey podna! Wait! Wait! Go slow; that’s hot stuff!” When he tried it he said, “Oh yeah that’s hot stuff!” We all bust out laughing.

Andrew Roy Armentor; Jason Theriot; Mrs. Roy Armentor

-Spoke French all his life; there was even a few times when Armentor was sent home from school because he spoke only French
-By the time Armentor was a teenager, he was speaking English; taught his parents
-Armentor was out of high school working when WWII broke out; he had worked at the rice mill in the packing department
-On December 7, 1941 he was at home and heard about Pearl Harbor on the radio and his brother, who was in the Marines, was called immediately back from leave

-Armentor was drafted in February 1943
-Left Abbeville by bus and came to New Iberia and then Fort Polk
-He was the sole supporter for his family after the war broke out
-He had tried to volunteer with 3 friends at LSU but Armentor failed the eye test; did not want to go into the infantry but the Air Corps

Training (13:03)
-No one from New Iberia that he knew of made it to Polk with him
-Then went to Camp Butner in Durham, North Carolina took basic training there
-Came home on leave once after basic
-Thought they were well disciplined soldiers that stuck together; last company of the battalion all the time
-Armentor was a part of a group that volunteered for a special unit that spoke French and went to D.C. for more training
-altogether there was five in Armentor's group: Claude Galley, Nolan Frickey, an Allamon by the name of White from Perry, a Veilleux from Maine and Billadoux from Nova Scotia
-They asked them questions on whether they would be able to do certain duties, like jumping out a plane
-hazardous duties; they had no idea what they were getting into
-Lived in tents on the outskirts of Washington D.C., had a small potbelly stove to keep warm as it was snowing
-Ran 5 miles every morning, ate breakfast, exercises and then to classes

Then went into Maryland and then shipped to Norfolk, Virginia to go onto a big Liberty Ship and cross the Atlantic (28:43)
-At the time Armentor had tonsillitis and suffered from motion sickness; sailed for 15 days and 13 days he was sick
-Landed in Casablanca, North Africa and traveled by train through Oran to Algiers
-All the towns they went through they heard "C'est la guerre!" which meant "It's the war!"
-Stopped near the seashore for parachute training for 3 days and made 5 jumps
-Armentor always jumped in the middle or the rear to make sure everyone made it out; known as the static line out of a C-47
-They had a section of 30 men, but they had 15 men in their sub-section; Armentor stayed with the same 5 men he volunteered with
-They were a special reconnaissance battalion, part of the OSS (but they didn't know what that really meant)

Went to maneuvers with the French Foreign Legion in the Atlas Mountains (39:40)
-They had to live off the land in the fields and did not have rations; ate better this way as they knew how to cook
-Either they hunted or stole from the Arabs' gardens
-The French Legion were rugged people and were from North Africa, so all were black, but they had good communication with them
-Was easy to even talk with the people they met in towns, could order anything from places; a lot was donated though, like wine

First mission (50:50)
-First mission Armentor hurt his back and they landed in a field
-Assigned one night and flew over France but they did not find the signal so they had to go back to Algiers
-Reassigned another night with the French Marquis and the landing gear of the Liberty Bomber had trouble so they turned back around
-Third time they went, jumped out of a British Sterling; commanded by Lt. Weeks from Mississippi

-Armentor was a T-3 sergeant trained in demolitions; used pencil types and C-2 explosives
-They were equipped with a .45 pistol, a carbine rifle, trench knife, machete, a canteen, ammunition, grenades and rations
-explosives were dropped in containers with the men at the same time
-French Underground were tell them where to jump and then gathered up everything for them
-They jumped into the Castle Naizere, France in the Pyrenees that first night, supposed to be an 800 foot drop but it was a 500 feet fall
-it was dark and when the shoots went out
-they just fell and that's when Armentor hurt himself and was knocked out for a while; had to stay with a French family to heal

The French family (1:05:26)
-They were very serious and much against the German occupation forces
-They were like everyday people that anyone meets
-Had 2 story house, first floor had the cattle and second floor was the living space; very clean
-The family was very nice, "overly nice"; stayed there for about a week

After rejoining the group in the hills he was still too injured to go out with the group on a few missions (1:08:00)
-Near Carcassonne they were able to capture a few Germans, "a few bosses," one had a lot of money but he gave it to the French people;
-Armentor didn't believe he would ever make it back home so he kept nothing;
-the work they did was dangerous
-Did not know the mission in France was to stop any Germans from going into Spain as it was a haven for agents as it was a neutral country

Invasion of Southern France (1:11:58)
-They could hear the guns from Montpellier and on the radio they heard "le song liege et da vive" otherwise "the invasion has begun."
-Had 2 invasions, of Normandy and Southern France from over the Mediterranean
-Later on the group went to Grenoble while Armentor was sent to Marseilles and then Naples, Italy to a hospital (from his injury from the fall)
-Discharged and sent to below Naples at a repot depot to go with Patton's army as a replacement
-Armentor requested a 2 day leave and walked around the repot depot to see if he could find his group; he did and they took him the headquarters
-Hadn't seen his group for over a month and when he saw the colonel and told him that he was being shipped out with Patton but the colonel said he was going back home
-Out of the five that had signed up with him had all come back with him to the states

Speaking French in Combat (1:20:29)
-While in Toulouse at a hospital, the first night some German agents were shot trying to get in to kill Armentor as he was part of the French Underground
-He was always being moved around as the Germans were always targeting their group

Going Back (1:22:40)
-Stayed in the states for 30-35 days; still in a crouch
-Went back to Washington on the west coast then shipped out to India
-While in the Indian Ocean they got word of Roosevelt's death
-Once in India they went to Burma, flew over the Hump and into Kunming to start training a Chinese group (early 1944)
-While there in Kunming the bombs were dropped
-they were there training these men because there was to be a Chinese invasion on the coast

-Armentor was to go with his group and Lt. Weeks for a jump into China and the night before he was pulled out
-A major took his name off and sent him home; was supposed to be discharged a year ago
-Went back through India and through the Red Sea and Suez Canal back into the Atlantic
-That night of the jump it was cancelled as the bombs were dropped

-The five men that signed up together, Galley got shot through the hand and Armentor hurt his back, but all lived and came back home

Transcription:

Andrew Roy Armentor
804 Prioux St.
New Iberia, LA 70563
337-367-8823
Born: December 25, 1923
2477 Special Recon. Battalion/OSS
Southern France

I was born in Abbeville, Louisiana. My parents were French-speaking people and we spoke French all of our lives. We didn’t speak any English at home at all. Everyone around us spoke French; our friends, our neighbors, everybody spoke French. There was no way for us to learn English. In fact, when I went to school I was sent back home because I was a French-speaking student. They were trying to do away with the French-speaking language. I was sent back home three times for speaking French. I knew a little English, but I was going to continue going until they accepted me.

Once you know French, it stays with you all the time. Of course we speak a different language than the French-speaking people in France and in North Africa. It’s very close, but they speak what we would call a patios, which is a derivative from the French language, but they add words to it, like we add words over here. The French that we spoke in Abbeville when I was a young boy was on just about the same level as the language spoke when I went into the central part of France.

I was speaking English by the time I was a teenager. The schools that I attended growing up were made up of mostly French-speaking people. We were all Cajuns. In fact, there were very few who didn’t know any French. As the years progressed, we learned English because we had to, and then we’d try to teach it to our parents. We were all Cajuns alike in those days.

I was working when World War II broke out. We didn’t have government loans in those days; you either had money to go to school or you worked. We poor people, the Cajuns, we worked. I worked at United Gas for a while, then at the rice mill in the packing department.

On December 7, 1941, we were all home in the backyard because my brother had come home on leave from the Marines. We heard the news on the radio and he was immediately called back. We were not too impressed with what had happened, to be frank, because we didn’t know the actual meaning of it. We did realize that we were at war, however, we didn’t know what war meant. We had never been to war before. But because we had one in our family our view of war from then on was a little different.

Three of us tried to volunteer for the Air Corps. My two buddies made it my I didn’t. So I came back home and worked. I didn’t want to go into the infantry, but they drafted me anyway. I became a grunt instead…and I’m still a grunt! I was drafted in February 1943. I left from Abbeville and came to New Iberia. From there our group left on a bus and went to Fort Polk. From Polk I went to Durham, North Carolina, Camp Butner. It was rainy and cold, with ice-cickels, and we took basic there. We were becoming good soldiers, I would say, because we were very disciplined and we all worked hard. We came home on leave once, after basic (I got married), and when we returned that’s when all of this started to happen.

Wearing a full field pack, we would do about five miles in about 35 minutes. We were taught that if somebody dropped out, you would give your pack to another man, and you would pick up the other guy and carry him. We had a group of us that spoke French that became pretty good friends. This group of us volunteered for this special unit and we wound up in Washington D.C.

We saw some information that was posted on the bulletin board saying that the army was looking for volunteers who spoke French and other languages. So those of us who spoke French went to this meeting in a big auditorium and they spoke to us. They told us about the kind of work we would be doing and about what we would be expected to do. They asked us questions like whether we would jump out of an airplane. All together we were five; five French-speaking soldiers from south Louisiana; they were from Algiers, Merroro, Westwego, all from the New Orleans area, but Cajun nonetheless. One was Claude Galley, the other was Nolan Frickey, one was an Allamon, and a fellow by the name of White from Perry. There was also a Veilleux from the Maine area and Billadoux from up near Nova Scotia. They were from the Northeast but we all spoke French. And we all spoke the same French, the same patios. So we got along real well.

We all decided to volunteer for this special unit. Each one of us was investigated before we were accepted. The FBI investigated my background. The FBI came to Abbeville and contacted different people asking about my background. After the investigation we got our orders to move, and that didn’t take very long. And they didn’t give us too much information about it. All they wanted to know was if we would do hazardous duty, such as jumping into an area. We didn’t think about it too much, because when you are young, you didn’t think too much about things like that; you more or less thought about everyday life. I didn’t think about the hazardous duty we would be doing with this particular group; I had no idea. And I wasn’t the only one. None of us had any idea what we were getting into.

In November 1943, we got to Washington and we were assigned to these tents to live in. We didn’t have any special treatment; we were just regular soldiers. We lived in those tents with a little bitty potbelly stove to keep us warm at night when we would sleep. It was snowing and it was cold and we coonies didn’t know what snow was. In the mornings we would fallout with just a T-shirt, shorts, and jump boots. We’d run five miles every morning. We came in and had breakfast, took exercises, went to classes—demolition classes or knife-fighting classes—all kinds of classes. We even learned Kung Fu. It was really harsh training. But understand, we didn’t know anything about what was going on. I knew there were people experimenting with different types of explosives. They would invent it and we would try it out. We stayed there training for several months.

We went to Maryland to continue training. We were shipped out of Norfolk, Virginia on a great big Liberty Ship. We traveled across the North Atlantic on the thing and I had tonsillitis at the time—I’ll never forget that. We were all in a hole in the bottom of the ship and it was stuffy, it smelled like diesel fuel, and I suffer from motion sickness. This young doctor gave me an intravenous shot that didn’t go into my vain. It went all throughout my body. I had to strap myself in this bunk with my belt to keep myself from falling off. And that ship was rocking back and forth. We rocked and rolled across the Atlantic for 15 days.

We landed in Casablanca in North Africa. I couldn’t walk a straight line when I got off that ship. We traveled on these rail cars through Oran and into Algiers. It was a slow moving thing and it took us a few days to get there. It was moving so slow that we would jump off and walk for a little bit and relieve ourselves, and then jump back on. There was no beds, no bathrooms, and we ate C rations—those beautiful rations. The toilet was outside and you held on if you had to go do a number two and you did the best that you could. We traveled through the towns that way. C’est la guerre! That’s all we heard when we came through those town: “C’est la guerre.”

Our section encamped about 4 or 5 miles off the seashore. We were preparing for parachute training. We began preparing on a Monday thru Wednesday doing mock training: jumping out of planes, how to roll, what to do, how to hold your risers. On the fifth day, they brought us to the airport and we drew our shoots. We had two shoots, a main and a reserve. I was a sergeant so I jumped in the middle of the stick or the end of the stick. We were 15 men training for static line jump out of a C-47. Three days of training. On that first day, we jumped out, landed, rolled our shoots, put our gear in the trucks, went right back to the airport, drew another shoot, went back up again, and jumped out again. We made two jumps a day. I did well until the fourth jump. I was in the middle and the fellow who jumped after me jumped on my shoot and got his feet entangled in my shoot. We were coming down and my shoot wasn’t open. I looked down, then looked up and saw that his feet were caught, so I started whipping my risers until finally he got loose and my shoot blossomed. I came down and rolled right away. He landed and broke his leg.

The five of us stayed together in a section. We went to Algiers as a group, and we trained as a group, and we jumped into France as a group. We were a special reconnaissance battalion, part of the OSS, although that didn’t really mean anything to us.
We were briefed in Algiers and went on maneuvers in the Atlas Mountains with the French Foreign Legion. We lived off the land because we didn’t have enough rations to eat. But a “coonie” is hard to beat when he gets on the outskirts, living on the land. He knows what to steal; he knows what to kill. He knows what he likes and what he doesn’t like and he knows how to prepare it. All of us knew how to cook. We had goat and lamb and we’d hunt javalinas in the moonlight. We skinned them and cooked them. We’d steal vegetables from the Arab’s gardens. We’d raid the fruit trees and bring all that back to camp.

Those French were very rugged soldiers. They were dark-skinned Moroccans and they were very tough. Most of them were from North Africa and they all spoke French, the same kind of French that we Cajuns spoke, almost. So, we got along pretty good with them. We’d go into town every once in awhile and go to the burless shows. The actors would make fun of us because we were paratroopers, but we could understand their French. It was little jokes about us, but we knew. We could go into the communities and drink all the wine that we wanted; we could order anything at the restaurants. We paid for it all, but very little. Sometimes the five of us would go into the little towns and the people would give us wine and bread. The wine was very plentiful in North Africa, very plentiful…too plentiful!

I would rather be in the paratroopers than any other branch of the service. You were on your own and you were with a group. And you operated with this small group. We never worked with a large group. We worked with a group of British Commandos while we were there, too. All of us—the French, British and Americans were all Special Forces training in that area.

Prior to us, there was another OSS unit formed in England. They were jumping into France and working with the French Underground, the Marquis, gathering information and wiring it back. Sam Broussard was apart of that.

We were trained in demolitions, to cut rails for trains, blow up bridges, how to attack a column. It was a hit and run deal—we’d hit, then run, but we stayed in. We’d jump into a section and conduct our mission and then regroup to go to attack another section. We never stayed in the same area very long. And we did all of this in conjunction with the French Underground, because they gathered the information for us and then we prepared the attacks and went to work.

On our first mission into France we flew in a British Halifax over our jump area, but we couldn’t find the signal on the ground. So we had to come back. We had gone from Algiers, across the Mediterranean and into France and we had to come back. We were reassigned for another night to jump in with the French Marquis. Their job was to light up a section for us to jump into at night. On that second time, we made it over the Mediterranean, and then our plane—a British Liberty bomber—had trouble with the landing gear. So, we had to turn back around. The third time was on British Sterling. We got the signal over the area and we jumped out of the bomb bay. You would sit in a line on the floor and scoot up until you got over the hole and then you just fell out of the plane. You see, the C-47 could not make that trip on two engines. We had to fly in the big bombers to get us there.

We were one plane, one stick, commanded by Lt. Weeks from Mississippi. I was a T-3, a sergeant, trained in demolitions. We used pencil types and C-2 explosives. You could apply this explosive like a putty and you could cut a rail with just a little piece of it. All 15 of us had the same training, the same skills, same weapons, same specialty, and we all spoke French. The one thing that I carried that I wish I would not have was this bush knife—a machete. It was a long blade with an arrow point. We should have never had that, because we were so overloaded. You had grenades, you had your gun, you had your parachute, and you had a little pack. It was all a bit too much. But I guess that’s what we needed.

I had a .45 pistol and a carbine rifle with a folding stock. I had a trench knife, that machete, a canteen, ammunition, grenades and rations. Our explosives were dropped with us in these containers. Both the men and the material were dropped at the same time. The Underground was there waiting for us. They would secure the area from the Boch. They gathered everything on the jump, including our chutes and our containers and they threw all that into wood-burning trucks, and that’s how they powered their automobiles. We would gather ourselves and go into the mountains with them. They had a headquarters up in the Pyrenees Mountains. We jumped into Castle Naizere, France that first night.

We jumped into the southern part of Aude and we worked our way up in Toulouse. We did a lot of work in Carcassonne. On our first mission in southern France, we started off out in the open, in a field. I didn’t think too much about our position and I wasn’t the only one. As I’d go around checking each man, they all felt the same way: “We’re too much in the open. We’re too much in the open.” But you are taught and disciplined to the point that you obey your commanding office and he tells you ‘this is it and that’s it.’ But we were fortunate. At dusk it happened… and it didn’t last very long. The column turned and they went another way. We regrouped up in the mountains and prepared for another mission.

We were supposed to make an 800-foot jump into the Pyrenees. But it ended up being about a 500-foot fall. We jumped out and our chutes blossomed. It was dark and we landed in this area. We all converged with the French Underground and moved out.

I injured myself when I landed. The landing knocked me out, but I came to shortly after. Our medic, Guion from Mississippi, fixed me up. I went into the headquarters and then went down into the village with the French people. I stayed with a French family. The man was le guard de forrestia—a forest ranger. He wanted my rifle but I couldn’t give it to him. He had never seen a carbine and I’ll always regret not giving it to him, but I would not have had a rifle to protect myself. So I gave him my machete. Damn right. I’m glad that I gave it to him because it was a pain to carry around.

The French were very serious people and they were very much against the German occupation. They were like everyday people that you would meet, just like our neighbors that we had growing up in Abbeville. They took me into the safety of their home. They had an upstairs where they lived. Downstairs they kept their cattle and made their milk and butter down there. In other words, the dairy part was down below where they lived. But everything was spotless, clean, well taken care of. They were very, very nice to me; overly nice, you could say. The wife tried various kinds of medicinal things to relieve the pain. I’d exercise every day for a week or so. The rest of my unit was up in the hills and eventually I joined them. That was the last time that I saw that French family. I am very sorry that I did not get their names because I would like to have communicated with them after the war. This was in Castle Nazaire.

I rejoined my group up in the hills, but I was still too injured to go out on a mission. From there we went to different sections.

We captured a few Germans, a few bosses, near Carcassonne and brought them into the French. I captured one who must have been a gambler. He had a purse full of money. So I took the money and gave it to the French people. I was so sure that I wasn’t coming back home. I didn’t think that I would ever make it back.

Our job was different from a regular GI. We lived in danger…there was danger around you all the time. Our mission was to stop the Germans from getting into Spain, more or less, but we didn’t know that at the time. We only knew what we had to do on these missions. Spain was a haven for agents; it was a neutral country, a free country. Anybody could go into Spain. We had a hand radio to communicate back and forth with the army. The only ones who really knew what was really going on were the radioman and the commanding officer. He told us what to do and that was it.

When the invasion of Southern France had commenced, we could hear the guns from Montpellier, because we were just north of the city. And we could hear the guns very plainly and we knew something was happening. We also heard on the radio, “le song liege et da vive”—the invasion has begun. And we heard that on the radio all day long.

Later my group went on the Grenoble and I went down to Marseilles. From there I was sent to a hospital in Naples, Italy. I was later discharged from the hospital and shipped to a repot depot. I was destined to go in with Patton’s Army as a replacement. I was waiting to be shipped out and so I requested a two-day leave. I started walking and I told myself, You’ve got to walk around and spot your group’s number on a truck or something. And sure enough, as I walked, I saw this truck coming down the road and on his bumper was the Special Recon number #2477. I got in the middle of the road and I stopped him I told he to take me to the headquarters and I told him why. So I got in the truck and passed right by the repot depot on our way. We drove a few miles and there was my headquarters. I had not seen my unit in over a month. I got in and requested to see the colonel. I went in and he recognized me. I told him that I was being shipped out with Patton’s Army. He said, “No you not. You’re going back home.”

One of our guys, Galley had got shot and one of the lieutenants was killed. The boy from Maine got in a confrontation with some Germans and he got out of it all right. All five of us, the original group, came back to the States.

I was in a hospital in Toulouse. There was a nurse who took care of me. The first night I was there, the French had shot some German agents who were trying to get into the hospital to get me. She told me about it the next morning. These Germans were on our tail all the time because we were with the French Underground. If those Germans would have got into that hospital, that would have been it for me. I would not have come back; they would have done it right there in the room. But I was very fortunate.

I left from Italy and came back to the States. I stayed in the States for 30 days. I was still in a crouch from my injury. I was sent to the west coast. The people up there used to marvel at us because we would run all the time. They said we were the runningist outfit you ever saw. We’d run through the compounds. We went across the Pacific and into the Indian Ocean. We were enroute to India when Roosevelt died. We went to India, then to Burma, flew over the Hump, and went into Kunming. We landed in Kunming and started training Chinese troops. While I was there we dropped the bomb. We were training to make a jump during the invasion of the Chinese coast. We were training these Chinese boys, but they hadn’t the slightest idea what they were doing.

I was destined to go out with Lt. Weeks. We were all there up in the mountains again. The same group. All five of us were together again. The night before we drew our equipment, my name was called out, and that was it for me. This major saw my name on the jump roster and pulled me out. He said, “I going to send you home; you should have been discharged a year ago.”

From India, through the Suez Canal, through the Mediterranean and across the Atlantic, we traveled. On my way back, the bomb was dropped. Lt. Weeks eventually jumped in with another group into to China.

The five men that went all made it back. I hurt my back, Galley got shot in his hand. This lieutenant, who had joined us in the latter part, got killed. The original five all made it back.

A lot of those people thought of us as a “frog, with webbed feet.” A lot of them believed and still believe today that we go around and communicate in pirogues and bateaus down the bayous. We were looked down on because we were from Louisiana; they thought they were better than us. But I was never downhearted about speaking French. I was always proud of speaking

Ned Bradeaux; Jason Theriot; Hewitt Theriot

(The end of another interview)

-Looking at pictures

Question: Did other members of you family hear of this story of you as you told us?

No
My brother (Nelson) was in the battle of North Africa; we never talked about it

-Talking of another interviewee (1:25)
-How glad he was to finally talk about it

-Photos of Nelson (2:15)
-He was in the 82nd Air Division
-Anzio Beach, Belgium, Germany

-Photos of others and a book (3:38)
-Talking about these people

Col. Leonard Barrow, Jr., Jason Theriot, and Hewitt Theriot

-Appointed as a flying cadet in February 1938 at Randolph Field; flying school by March
-Randolph Field was in San Antonio and was the only flying school in the U.S.
-Went over to Kelly Field to specialize; Barrow was in the attack-aviation
-Commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army Air Corps Reserve, February 1, 1939
-Then went to Barksdale Field in Shreveport and was assigned to the 3rd Attack group; flew A-17A attack bomber

-Married in 1940 to a daughter of a WWI veteran
-Moved to Savannah when the war broke out later in October; flew A-20 light bomber, fastest plane at the time
-Went all over the U.S. for maneuvers; they could see the war was coming
-War did break out and Barrow's outfit was spilt 2-3 times
-First time Barrow went to the West coast and flew dive bombers

Remembering Pearl Harbor (6:27)
-Was having lunch with his father-in-law and wife, on a Sunday his father-in-law got a phone call and was excited to tell them that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor
-He went immediately to the air base and Barrow soon left too
-They were shocked that the Japanese were able to pull off such an operation

-Worked for several months on the anti-submarine dive patrol
-Flew about 200 miles over the Atlantic everyday
-Very poorly equipped, no depth chargers, just 500 lbs bombs that if dropped to close to the water would blow them up too
-Christmas Eve, Barrow did see a periscope lined up to a United Fruit Liner, between Georgia and Florida; strafed it as he was too low to bomb it

The 8th Air Force was activated in Savannah and Barrow was taken out and put into them (9:25)
-By March his old outfit went to Australia
-The first outfit was caught in the Philippines he stayed at the Headquarters and in early June flew Gen. Duncan, the Commander, to D.C.

Gen. Duncan found he had been reassigned to the Chief of Staff (10:57)
-Flew to Fort Dix, New Jersey for a week long training and then to New York
-In New York got on the Queen Elizabeth to go to Scotland by late June Went to the airfield of Chelveston
-Transferred to the operations office in the headquarters in London; eventually moved out to Bushy Park
-Operation officer for a B-17 wing and for training but had never been in one; sent back to the 8th Air Force later
-Put out training programs and mission trainings and was sent around to the British airfields

November 1942 (17:11)
-Was sent to Saint Eval, RAF station, to supervise the passage of airplanes that were going to the invasion in North Africa Heart of the British defense was the radar
-Could now spot airplanes before they got into earshot
-Had air-defense-centers along the coast looking for Germans and run the operations
-When they got there to Britain, the Battle of Britain of 1940 had already happened so attacks from the Germans on England were more nuisance attacks at night
-By the end of November (1942) Barrow's operation had ended

North Africa (24:40)
-His father-in-law took over a troop carrier wing and asked Barrow to transfer to him

-Wanted flying time so he asked to be transferred; went back to Bushy Park to be sent out to North Africa (funny story of killing a King's deer 26:36)
-Was transferred to North Africa but had to find his own way there; there were some P-38s in Ireland with no pilots

-Called the Fighter Command and asked he could fill a spot and was given the okay: had to get there himself by his plane (another story 31:40)
-Reaches Northern Ireland and was tasked with looking over the last 6 remaining planes until he could get over to North Africa
-Flew down to Saint Eval after the New Year and then followed a B-26 to Gibraltar and continued on to Oran (8 hours and 5 minute flight)
-Then went up to Tunisia to a P-38 base but didn't want to work there so caught a ride to Algiers
Met up with his father-in-law, who shipped him out Mostagenum to a troop carrier squadron of C-17s to drop paratroopers and gliders

Invasion of Sicily (52:40)
-Towed gliders from Tunisia to Sicily at night; strong winds, bad maps and the navy shot up everything
-Second night dropped paratroopers over Mount Etna; navy shot down 37 C-47s (friendly fire)
-On the first night Barrow led the group and was later awarded the DFC and the Air Medal
-It was an experience on joint amphibious operations; but bad communication
-Then spent the next 2 weeks flying in and out of Sicily
-Moved the outfit to Italy

Invasion of Italy (57:18)
-Landed on the Salerno beachhead with supplies
-Made serval trips for supplies (might have brought back wounded)
-Reassigned as the executive officer and 2 weeks later Barrow gets orders to go back to the U.S. (October 1943)
-Reported to Sedalia, Missouri to get his pilots; but no planes Moved to Alliance, Nebraska and stayed there till March 1944 and then to Pope Field at Fort Bragg, North Carolina
-Worked with the 13th Airborne Division dropping paratroopers
-Missed D-Day

Went overseas in January of 1945 (01:03:59)
-Supported Patton; hauled fuel and supplies
-Then in May went over to England to pick up British men and flew to Copenhagen, Denmark
-Germans were still there at the airfield; wild experience--the Danish executing Quislings, Germans passing by in trucks, parties, etc.
-That night they found out the war had ended and flew back to France the next morning

War Ended (01:11:18)
-Part of the white project for Japan; went back to the U.S. first
-Went out to the west coast to California and had to wait 30 days till the planes could come in and then head out to Okinawa Bay
-While waiting, the war in Japan had ended
-Still had orders to go, but a friend that told Barrow to ignore the orders, as he had the only intact troop carrier group left, and things were too hectic
-Few days later sent to Austin, Texas for a year

-Stayed in the Air Force for 32 years, also serving in the Korean and Vietnam wars

Transcription:

Leonard Barrow, Jr.
Born: February 25, 1917
Retired Air Force Colonel
C-47 Pilot for the Invasion of Sicily
4104 Walnut Dr.
New Iberia, La. 70563
Interview conducted by Jason P. Theriot

I was appointed a flying cadet at Randolph Field in San Antonio on the 25th of February 1938. I started flying school in March. I spend eight months at Randolph learning to fly, then I went to Kelly Field on the other side of San Antonio for the last four months. I specialized in attack-aviation there. My starting class numbered three hundred and fifty, and roughly half finished. I was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Army Air Corps Reserve on the first of February 1939. From there I went to Barksdale Field in Shreveport. I was assigned to the 3rd Attack Group, 90th Attack Squadron. We flew the A-17A attack bomber armed with six machine guns and bomb racks..

I was on active duty, but I was still in the reserves. I flew everyday practically. I got married at Barksdale in 1940. I married the daughter of a WWI major and we are still married today.
We moved to Savannah in October 1940, because the war in Europe had broke out. While we were there we transitioned to the A-20, light bomber—the fastest bomber in the world at that time. It was equipped with a Norden Bombsight. During that period we had maneuvers in Louisiana, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Connecticut; we could see the war coming.
We were shocked, however, when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. We knew that relations with the Japanese weren’t good, but we never dreamed that they would have the audacity to pull off an operation such as they did. In retrospect it was an absolutely magnificently planned and conceived operation, and it caught us with our pants down.

When the war broke out I was a first lieutenant. My group was split up. I spent the next several months on anti-submarine patrol over the Atlantic. We would fly out about 200 miles in the Atlantic. We were poorly equipped. We didn’t even have depth charges. All we had were 500-pound bombs; you drop one of those too low, and you would blow yourself up. I saw a periscope one time; he was lined up with a United Fruit Liner between Georgia and Florida in the Atlantic. I strafed the periscope and he went down.

I was subsequently taken out of my group and was transferred to 8th Air Force headquarters in Savannah. In early June, I flew General Duncan, Commander of the 8th Air Force, up to Washington D.C. When he arrived, he was reassigned as the Chief of Staff. We flew to Fort Dix in New Jersey for subsequent deployment to England.

We went to the port of New York and we boarded the Queen Elizabeth in June 1942. We landed in Scotland a few days later. We went down to an airfield that the British called Chelveston. Later on this was a base for our B-17s. The 8th Air Force headquarters was then in downtown London. I got a phone call to report to the operations section of 8th Air Force headquarters. We stayed in London for a week or two before we moved down to Bushy Park near Hampton Court Palace. I became an operations officer for a B-17 wing in July. I had never been inside a B-17 before in my life, but nevertheless, I was an officer in of the wing that was doing the training program for them. I stayed down there for a month. I made captain in February. Somebody who had more experience with the B-17 took over, and I was sent all around various British airfields to check out training programs for our airmen. It was a wonderful experience. The British were very casual people. I got to fly the Spitfire, the Hurricane, the Beau Fighter as well as several of their bombers. I flew a couple of missions with the British later on.

The Battle of Britain had taken place in 1940; that pretty much broke the back of the German’s attempt to shoot up England at will. By the time I got there in ‘42, the German attacks were limited to nuisance attacks at night. They were sending one or two airplanes at a time to drop bombs on London, primarily at night. The heart of the British homeland defense was radar. The success was that they could spot German planes coming before they got to within earshot. Before radar, the British used these giant “ears” to amplify the sounds made by the enemy. This was the method used during World War I; but it couldn’t tell you how high, or how fast the enemy planes were going. With radar you could tell how high the enemy was, how fast they were going, and how many miles away they were. They waited until the Germans got very close, then they released the Spitfires and Hurricanes, and they came in from above [the enemy planes] to attack. The British had these air-defense-centers near the coast, and they would run the defense operations from there.

About this time, in 1942, the B-17 bombers began arriving in England, and they were flying their “freshman” missions. I was sent back to 8th Air Force headquarters. In November 1942, I was sent to a place called Saint Eval, a RAF station, to supervise the passage of the airplanes that were then going down for the invasion of North Africa. We had C-47s coming through; we had B-17s, P-38s—all American planes. I got to fly a P-38. The airplanes for the invasion flew 1,600 miles from Saint Eval to Oran. Most of the big planes—the bombers and twin-engine fighters—had auxiliary fuel tanks to make the trip. The smaller fighters, like the P-40s, were brought over on a carrier.

My father-n-law took over a troop carrier outfit. He asked me to come over. I had been wanting to get out of headquarters; I wanted to fly—the hell with this paper work! I had been promoted to major in August. Headquarters approved the move, and I was walking up to the gate back at 8th Air Force headquarters at Bushy Park, and low and behold there was an infantryman standing guard with his M-1 rifle. I walked by and he “pooped to.” And he’s grinning like a jackass eating fries. He comes to the rifle salute and I saluted him…I looked at him and it was Harold Courtois from New Iberia. I go over and I said, “Harold, what in the hell are you doing here?” He said he was in the National Guard and they had been federalized and sent to England in October. He said, “Man, you better come eat with us today.” The British food was terrible, and I hadn’t had a good meal in a long time. He said that one of the guys had killed a deer and they were cooking up some venison. You see, there was deer all over the place, and this guy was standing guard one night and he hear a noise, so he challenged…three times…no response, so he shot, and killed a deer. That was not good. Killing the King’s deer was almost as bad as making a pass at one of the princesses. So, his commander went through the channels to report this to the King, who in turn presented the deer to the mess hall. So, they had venison that day and Marion Broussard was the cook. Boy it was good!

I found out that I’m to be transferred to North Africa, but I had to find my own way. Most of the planes had already left for the invasion, but I found out that there was still about six P-38s somewhere in Ireland. So, there was a Colonel Bob Landry from New Orleans who I had known at Barksdale. He was in Fighter Command. I called him up and said, “I had heard that you were short on fighter pilots, and that you still had some planes left to go down.” I told him, “I checked out a P-38 about two weeks ago.” It was only one flight, actually, for about thirty minutes: “I’d sure like to help you out.” He said, “Oh, sure that’s what we’re looking for. We’ll cut some orders assigning you, and we’ll give you all the information you’ll need.” My airplane was in a depot in England still. I got in it and I flew it over to Ireland. I had the hell scared out of me. I’m passing over the Irish Sea, and I got challenged by a ship. They signaled, and I was supposed to respond with a red light or a green light. Well, the P-38 was different. It had a row of switches down low. I thought that I had the right button, but I didn’t. I was doing about 250 miles per hour and all of a sudden the wings start flapping. I slowed to about 180. I got close to the airfield in Ireland, Langford Lodge, and everything was normal on the plane. I come down on this airfield and landed. I check out my plane and low and behold, my landing lights were extended. They’re not supposed to be on at the speed that I was flying; that’s why the wings were flapping. I had hit the wrong button, and I gave that ship the wrong signal. Luckily he didn’t shoot me down.

So, I land in Northern Ireland and I meet up with Lt. Col. Roy Lowe from Alexandria. He was the executive officer of the 82nd Fighter Group. Most of his planes had gone, and there were a few left. He told me that he was taking off in a couple of days, and he would leave me behind to take over the remaining six planes. So, I met with those pilots, and I got to fly up a few times in the P-38, and I shot the guns. I spent the most miserable Christmas up there that year. We fixed up those planes and we flew them back down to Saint Eval. We followed a B-26 to Gibraltar—an eight-hour flight. We went through the Straits of Gibraltar and the damn Spanish open up on us from Spanish Morocco. They were neutral, but very pro-German. We continued on and landed in Oran finally. We refueled and flew out the next day to Tunisia, near Constantine—at a P-38 base. I signed off on my airplane and I went looking for Col. Lowe. I finally found somebody and they told me that he hadn’t come back from his last mission. They said that he had dropped back in formation and that was the last time anybody saw him; a German had shot him down from behind. So, I caught a ride on a French airplane to Algiers. I was a major then, and they had given me latitude with my orders. I was actually looking for a P-38 squadron, but I reported to Algiers, and then in turn, met up with my father-n-law. He assigned me to Mostagenum, near Oran. It was a former French airbase.

I reported to the troop carrier squadron there as a squadron commander, and they were training in the C-47s to drop paratroopers and to pull gliders. We were flying supplies up to Tunisia. We were there during the German breakthrough at Kasserine Pass. We were flying wounded troops back. In between flying evac and supply missions, we would train the paratroopers for the invasion of Sicily.

We eventually moved into an area in Tunisian. (Photograph of tent for the book) It was lousy; the food was canned rations. The invasion of Sicily came. We towed gliders from Tunisia to Sicily at night. We were towing British troopers in those gliders. Sicily was the first mass-attempt to use paratroopers and gliders in combat. The first night of the invasion, I led the whole group of C-47s, and I was awarded the DFC and the Air Medal for that, because I was the lead plane. The second night, I dropped British paratroopers over Mount Etna. They were both night operations; the winds were strong, the maps were not good, and the Navy shot the hell out of everybody in sight. We even got shot in the fuel tank. (Has a picture) Between those two nights, the Navy shot down about thirty C-47s—friendly fire. All of us had a lot to learn about joint-amphibious operations, and we did. I think the invasion of Normandy was a testament to that.
For the next few weeks we spent flying in and out of Sicily; hauling ammunition and taking out the wounded. I was promoted to Lt. Col. In July 1943.

Eventually, I took part in the invasion of Italy. I landed on the Salerno beachhead with supplies. We flew into the ancient city of Paestum; I saw bodies stacked up like card-wood—American bodies. It was the damndest thing that I ever saw. I flew several supply runs and transported wounded for a while. Then I was transferred to be the group executive officer. It was another pencil pushing job. After about two weeks—out of the clear blue sky—I was reassigned back to the United States. I packed up my stuff and caught a plane to Brazil and to Miami. I then reported to Indianapolis. This was October 1943. I had been overseas for a year and a half. I came home for a month on leave and spent time with my wife and family.

We were sent to Sedalia, Missouri. I had about ten or fifteen pilots, and no airplanes. Eventually we got a dozen planes. They ordered us out to Alliance, Nebraska. My god. I never saw the ground the whole time I was there. It was January of 1944, up in the hills of Nebraska, almost in Colorado, and there was nothing, I mean nothing up there. The only good thing about that place was that it was the most fabulous pheasant hunting that I’ve ever seen in my life. They were everywhere. We stayed there till March of 1944, before we were ordered to Pope Field at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. It was a nice place.

We received our contingent of sixty-four airplanes and we were training with the 13th Airborne Division, dropping paratroopers and pulling gliders. In the fall of ’44 they gave us the biggest twin-engine airplane in the world—the C-46, called the Curtis Commando.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<European experience>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

We missed out on the invasion of D-Day, but we ended up flying overseas across the Atlantic in January 1945 to support Patton and his army. We hauled gasoline, ammunition, and evacuated the wounded for Patton. We were flying from France and into Germany. I was promoted to Colonel in March.

Then, we got a very secret mission on the sixth of May. We went over to England, picked up a bunch of British men, and flew to Copenhagen in Denmark. Copenhagen was still under German hands and they were running the airfield. The war hadn’t ended yet. We flew in. German planes were landing at the same time that we were landing; it was quite and experience. I spent the night in Copenhagen that night, and it was one of the wildest experience that I ever had in my life. Hundreds of Germans were coming by in trucks with food and what not, with their rifles. The Danish were executing the Quislings—the turncoats from Norway. We got to the hotel and these civilian-armed guards would not let us leave. Shortly after, this Mercedes drives up and this woman comes dashing out, and right behind her is this important looking man. Within moments, they opened fire on him. He was a high-ranking Quisling and they didn’t want us to get in the middle of it all. This woman had set him up. And they killed. Sometimes when you lose the war, the losers don’t fair so good.

We found out that the war had ended! We ran into some Danes that night, and we couldn’t pay for a thing; they were pumping drinks down us, really celebrating you know.
I flew to the States and ended up in California where my wife was living. I was assigned to pickup new airplanes as we were headed to Okinawa for the invasion of Japan. While I was on leave the war in Japan ended. I finally retired from the Air Force after 32 years having also served in Korea and Vietnam.
[What qualifications did you possess to get promoted to a higher rank during the war?] The number one qualification for getting a promotion is staying alive.

Louis Berges, Jason Theriot, Hewitt Theriot:

-Part of the rig builders in Baton Rouge in 1941
-Drafted in Baton Rouge in December 7, 1942 and then went to Camp Beauregard for training
-Went into the Air Force and was sent St. Louis, Missouri, put in the Jefferson Barracks (the worst one)
-Left in summer uniforms from Louisiana and it was cold in St. Louis; on the Mississippi River
-After training there went to Savannah, Illinois to an ordinance school
-Berges was given a choice to the next place he could go to so he went to Esler Field, the 98th Airbase, in Alexandria, Louisiana; closer to home
-Stayed there till 1944 or 1945 and then transferred to South Carolina; his wife and child came to join him in South Carolina
-Worked in ordinances at both

(7:42) Start of the War:
-Over in Florence, South Carolina and was drafted out of the Air Force to the Armored Infantry around the time of the Battle of the Bulge (1945?)
-Had to get on a troop train in Camp Beauregard to Atlanta with his wife and son with him
-Put them on another train to East Texas where she had family while he went from Atlanta back to Alexandria again
-Put on another train a few weeks later after GI training to New Jersey, Camp Kilmer, a staging place for embarkation in New York
-Was on a ship with volunteers from Monique that spoke French (Cuban Island)
-Shipped out to France, took 11 days, had all their equipment; stayed in barracks that only had hay for bedding
-Put on boxcars and eventually made it into Austria; the war ended while they were in Austria

-Was in the martyr squad and berserker, was supposed to go in as the third attack with the tanks
-When the tanks went, they went in, not always in order though and most times they went in the first attacks
-A part of the 17th Armored Battalion, 12th Armored Division in the 7th Armor
-Most of the time they were under Patton’s 3rd Armor instead

-They travelled fast along the Rhine River and on the Audubon
-Was heading to Nuremburg but missed it and ended up in Munich; drove a halftrack
-Had to wear the same clothes for days as they had nothing else; 11 men in a squad

(21:25)
-Berges’ job was to carry the martyr and set it up; worked with ammunition
-Set up in farms mostly
-Most German people were friendly in Austria, washed their clothes and traded with them
-Moved from town to town; in the mountains in Austria when given word that Germany had surrendered
-Sent back to Munich and then to a smaller town west, where they stayed with the locals in their houses

(24:47) Story of a prayer book Berges brought back home; trying to find the family

(33:04) Confirming dates of Berges’ draft, training, departing for Europe, fighting and being sent home:
-Earned 2 battle stars, helped him get discharged earlier than the others
-Travelling in the halftrack; injured once in Germany while coming out of the halftrack under fire—strained back
-Halftrack was blown up at one point and they lost all their clothes and other possessions inside it; replacement came in quick
-POWs they met after the war; POWs camps made after the war that they had to guard; sorting out displaced people

-Talking of those they knew that were in the war; looking at pictures

(59:00) went home on a Liberty ship in France
-Was in the 17th Armored Battalion
-Mentions about the favoritism in the Air Force and Army, certain outfits were given more credit than others because of those that were in them

(1:13:50) War was over:
-Found out before they got into Munich but knew nothing after that
-No time to celebrate and quickly had to deal with the POWs camp
-Liberty ship was nicer than the ship he went over on before
-Was under the impression that when he did come back to the states he’d rest and then head out to fight in the Pacific
-While on the ship is when the bombs were dropped; found out when they landed in New York
-Was discharged in Fort Sam Houston, Texas, close to his wife in east Texas
-Took his sister’s car with his family back to New Iberia;
-Every 5 miles the car would stop and then start up again (leak in the pipes that trapped air)

Cecilia “Mac” Beyte, Jason Theriot, and Hewitt Theriot

-The day the U.S. declared war Beyte was working at a bank in New York; that week she signed up for the Red Cross
-Had an interview and went to D.C to have training, which was supposed to be 6 months but after one week she was in San Francisco being sent out overseas
-After 3 days on the ship they finally told them where they were going: Auckland, New Zealand
-It was completely over run by American soldiers
-New Zealand had been fighting for the last 3 years so their men were gone, just the elderly, women and children were left
-When those men fighting in the war did come back they found their women had not been faithful and there were more children now that were not theirs, lots of tension later on
-New Zealand had been fighting in Egypt, Italy and Africa
-They landed in June 1943

-Travelling by ship, the “Matzoonie,” she was so fast they did not send her in a convoy
-It was more of a passenger ship but converted into a troop ship
-There were serval nurses, the Red Cross group of 16 and 5,000 troops
-The ship made good time as it zigged zagged a lot
-When they reached the equator they stopped to have an initiation for them (Red Cross)
-Few days later they went through a hurricane

-While on New Zealand Beyte was assigned as a recreation worker at the hospital
-There was 3 ships, known as the Unholy Trinity, which would take men from all over to battle and bring back the injured to New Zealand
-They would go on the ships to take care of the men before dropping them off on New Zealand; Beyte was never on a hospital ship
-They stayed more on the north island of New Zealand and there was thousands of men
-Always building barracks for the men and women; New Zealand did provide some food, lots of mutton

Stayed at Auckland for 5-6 months (16:10)
-Left when Eleanor Roosevelt came to Wellington to speak and Beyte was picked to be her escort; she never actually got to speak with her
-Beyte was put up in a nice hotel with a few other service women and men
-Mrs. Roosevelt was there to be a morale booster for the troops
-When Mrs. Roosevelt left, Beyte stayed on at the hotel as no one told her to go or where to go afterwards
-Did some sightseeing and worked at the hospital
-One night Beyte came back to the hotel after helping out with a dance for the Red Cross, all her things were packed and put outside;
-she was supposed to have left with Mrs. Roosevelt
-They let her sleep on the couch as it was 2 in the morning by then
-Next day her supervisor sent her to the Navy hospital in Silver Stream, Base 4
-That’s where she met her husband, Johnny (“Putsey”) who was a dentist for the Navy (Louisianaian)
-They began dating but he had a fiancée already in California (the last place he had been stationed)

The war was moving closer to Japan (25:36)
-So troops and people were moving and the hospital and Base 4 was closed
-Beyte went back to Auckland and Johnny was shipped to Nuemea in New Caledonia
-Eventually Beyte’s rest area in Auckland was closed and she was transferred to Nuemea
-At that time Johnny asked Beyte to marry him but she hadn’t finished up her year of service in the Red Cross
-As it wasn’t like the the army, the Red Cross did not have a strict policy on them for staying the full year or even staying on longer; many girls never finished a year but Beyte wanted too

"Question: How did these ladies manage to get back home? They were not military or did any battle time so no one had to respect them and send them home right away" (28:26)
-All depended on where they were stationed as to how they were treated
-In New Zealand they were told that they were under the same rules and code of conduct of the nurses;
-Like dating an enlisted man could get you sent home

End of service (32:20)
-Beyte’s year was up around the same time as Johnny’s tour was too
-Red Cross gave them a vacation and then would allow them to sign back up again
-Johnny was going back first so Beyte told him to talk to the girl he was engaged to and they would see how things went from there

-Landed in San Francisco and went to D.C to hand in her resignation
-From there she went to visit her parents in New York and then got on a train to New Orleans to get married
-Beyte had wrote and told her father about Johnny and how she was in love
-he wrote back to her about that she should give serious thought to the marriage and her going to Louisiana to live with him
-Moved to St. Martinsville with her husband Johnny after their honeymoon in New Orleans

Cuts into silence (43:16)

Stories from Working in the Red Cross (44:34)
-When stationed at Silver Stream that was when Beyte saw the truly bad injuries of the war
-They were always trying to find things for the men to do
-Men that couldn’t write thanks to their injuries were left to the girls’ care to write for them

One man that came couldn’t speak at all as all of sudden he was paralyzed, and no one knew why (48:32)
-They would talk to him but he made no sign if he heard anything and one day all his belongings came in and they found out his name and letters that his family had written to him
-he was a young Jewish boy named Pack
-Beyte read the letters to him and he began crying so they knew he hear them
-eventually a ship came that was heading back to San Francisco and he was able to get on it
-She wrote to his mother to let her know that he was coming home
-when Beyte got back to the States the mother had written her to say that Pack had had a brain tumor and died a few days after he got home

At Home (54:53)
-Got home and married all in 2 weeks’ time
-Johnny had 2 weeks leave and everyday they’d go and see if he had gotten his orders; their hope was he would be stationed in California
-Eventually his orders came in he was being sent to Algiers (Louisiana); Beyte at the time thought he meant a place overseas before someone told her
-They were living there when the war ended
-They were playing golf (around 11:00) when the news came and the church bells began ringing; whistles blew and the horns on the boats were going off
-Then they came back to St. Martinsville as they couldn’t find any place to live in New Iberia
-Johnny had had his practice in New Iberia so he wanted to go back there

Life after the war and living in New Iberia (1:05:00)
Stories of:
-Looking for a house
-Where they did live; their neighbors
-Starting a family
-Living in New Iberia

Transcription:
Cecilia MacDerment Beyte
Born: March 11, 1918
Red Cross Volunteer- New Zealand

The day we declared war I was working at a bank in New York. That week I went to see the president of the bank and he was associated with the Red Cross and I asked him if he would recommend me to join the Red Cross. And he did.

I wrote to them (Red Cross) and interviewed with them and the next thing I knew I was in Washington DC at their headquarters. I remember going there and getting my uniform and I was very proud to wear my Red Cross uniform. Ideally we would have three to six-months of training. One week later I was in San Francisco. I was headed overseas. We were at sea for three days before they let us know where we were going. We were headed to New Zealand. We went over on the Matzoonie. We were 16 girls in our group with about 5,000 troops on board. We stopped at the equator for the initiation. It was fun. We ran into a hurricane a few days later. I was lucky because I never got seasick.

I ended up in Auckland New Zealand about June of 1942 (1943?). This was less than a month after I had joined the Red Cross. Auckland was completely over-run with Army, Navy, and Marine Americans. The New Zealander's had been at war for over three years in Egypt and Africa. Their mother country is England, so when war was declared New Zealand and Australia went to war. They were fighting the Germans way before we did. It was sad because there were no (native) men in that country. It was sad too because when the men returned from the war they found out that there were a lot of children not spawn from them. Their wives and girlfriends had not been too faithful.

It is the most beautiful country. The north island is tropical, but the south island is glacier and snow covered mountains. It's the last stop before the South Pole.

I was a recreation worker assigned to the hospital. When the GI's would get wounded they would bring them there it get treated and rest up. I stayed there for about 5 or 6 months.

I left Auckland because Eleanor Roosevelt came to speak at Wellington. And she needed an escort, so I was chosen to go to Wellington with Mrs. Roosevelt, whom I never really got to speak to, but anyhow they sent me there. They put me up in a hotel in Wellington. It was really nice. She was charming and so homely. (She was there to boost moral among the troops.) That was her supporting role. I was in her company for a few weeks. I was really just a tag along. After she left, I stayed at that hotel and really enjoyed myself. Nobody told to leave so I stayed there for a while. I had a wonderful time.

While I was down there I was working at the hospital. I would go and do my hours and then tag along with Mrs. Roosevelt. After she had left I came back to my room late one night after helping out at a dance that the Red Cross had put on, and all of my bags were packed and waiting outside. They told me that I was supposed to have left with Mrs. Roosevelt. Well this was two o'clock in the morning. They let me sleep on a sofa in the lobby, so I did. The next day I got in touch with my supervisor and they sent me to Silver Stream. There was a Navy hospital. It was a beautiful place on this golf course. That's where I met my husband, Putsey.

He was a dentist in the Navy. We met and started dating, but he was engaged to a girl in California. The war was moving along and troops were moving up and people were getting transferred. They closed down this hospital and sent me back to Auckland. Johnny was shipped to an island-Nuemea in New Caledonia. Some time later I was transferred and they sent me to Nuemea. He always said that I chased him all over the South Pacific.

He had asked me to marry him, but I hadn't finished my year in the Red Cross. A lot of girls left before their year was up, but I decided to stay.

From day one we were told that we would be under the rules and code of conduct that a nurse had to follow. Rule number one was that we couldn't date enlisted men. If you did you could get in trouble.

In Nuemia there were dances on Friday and Saturday night with an orchestra. I was dating John then, but I did not know that his nickname was Putsey till after we got from the war. I was 23 and I can't imagine that I would have married a Putsey!

Well my year was up and his tour was ending right at the same time. We were both going home around the same time. He was going home first so I told him, "You better go and tell that girl you are engaged to that you asked me to marry you. And we'll see how it works from there."

I had written a letter to my father, and told him about John, and I told him that I was in love. He wrote me back, and I still have that letter, giving the mean temperature of southern Louisiana, the population as to black and white, and all about the culture down here. He told me that I should really give serious thought to this marriage.

Before I left to go overseas there was a girlfriend of mine who had joined the Red Cross with me. She caught the measles right before we left so she didn't make it with us. Well when I get back to Washington I ran into her. Come to find out she went to India and had got married to an enlisted man. They were less restricted than we were. Come to find out she had married a man from Lake Charles, and so I told that I was glad to hear that because I was moving to a place called St. Martinsville which I knew was near Lake Charles. She said, "Well you can go to St. Martinsville, but I'm never going back to Lake Charles." She said, "If you think India was hot, and you think India was rainy…" She said, "No way am I going to live in Lake Charles Louisiana, thank god he is going to move to Connecticut." So I'm thinking, "Oh Lord, what am I getting into?"

So I got home and landed in San Francisco. That's when I found out that his nickname was Putsey. He had been waiting for me. So I came to DC and gave them my resignation and went and visited my parents in New York, got on a train and came to New Orleans and got married.

At that hospital in Silverstream they had a patient, a marine that everybody was talking about. They were saying he was a hero, he was this, he was that, and come to find out it was Walter McHelhenney.

After we were married Putsey took me out one night in St. Martinsville to the old Hill Top Club and we were sitting at this bar and Sheriff Hebert walked up and Putsey introduced us and he said, "She's a Yankee." This darling little man said, "May sha that's OK, we gonna absorb you." I'll never forget that.

While I was in Auckland I was doing real recreation work; arranging for dances, arranging for trips for the men, arranging sight seeing, making sure they were entertained. I didn't see the real side of the war until I went to the hospital in Silverstream. A lot of the wounded had come from the neighboring islands: Guadalcanal and the Russell Islands.

One of our jobs was to write letters home for the wounded GI's who couldn't. There was this one young man there who couldn't speak at all. He was on an island when all of sudden he had gotten paralyzed. So they sent him to New Zealand. I went to visit him everyday, to see how he was doing, but you really couldn't tell if anything was getting through to him or not. His belongings finally caught up with him at the hospital. We found out that he was a young Jewish boy from New York City. When he arrived at the hospital, of course all these letters arrived from his family, his mom and dad. So I would read the letters to him, and tears would come down his face, so we knew he could hear us. Finally a ship came in and was taking some of the wounded back to the states and when he found out he was going home he let out a great big yell. And that was the first thing he said or done in many weeks. His last name was Pack.

The skipper of the ship told me I could find his mother; and I had been reading her letters to him. So I wrote her and told her what had happened and that he was coming home. So she came all the way from New York to San Francisco to meet him when he got off the ship. After I got back to the states she wrote me and thanked me and told me she was able to see him just before he died. He had a brain tumor and died a few days after he got back.

After I got back and resigned my mother and I went to New Orleans and Putsey and I were married there during his two-week leave. The war was still going on then. Everyday for two-weeks we would go to see if his orders had come in. Finally they came in and when he read his orders he said, "Damn." I got worried, and said, "Where are they sending you?" He said, "They are sending me to Algiers." Well I burst into tears, you don't think I knew that Algiers was across the river in New Orleans. They finally told me where Algiers was. But he was disappointed; he wanted to go back to California. So we lived on St. Charles Ave. until the war ended. I was playing golf that day and all of the church bells in city started ringing, and we said, "Oh my God the war is over." It was really exciting. But I hope we never have another one.

And then we moved here to New Iberia. His practice was on Church Alley and we lived in the brick apartment across the street from Delahouse's Restaurant (Corner of Lewis St. and Main St.) We lived upstairs from the Mestayer's Brothers grocery store.

Jeanette Birchett, Jason Theriot, Hewitt Theriot:

-Birchett was in training at the Charity Hospital in Lafayette when they heard of the news of Pearl Harbor
-Decided to join 3 ½ years later as she wasn’t old enough yet to go into the service
-A friend Irene Comeaux wanted Birchett to go with her into the service when they turned 20
-May of 1944 when she did turn 20, the superintendent of the hospital did not want them to go as they were needed more at home than at service
-Threatened to freeze their jobs (deferment)
-Eventually they were allowed to go and went to Hunter College in New York for basic training
-Went in as pharmacists’ mates; stayed there for 6 weeks
-Then went on to St. Alban’s Hospital in Long Island for indoctrination for 2 months
-Birchett’s orders were to Corpus Christi, Texas as Comeaux’s went to Georgia
-On the main base at Corpus Christi there was a large hospital (main base) where Birchett stayed for a few days
-Sent on to Rod Field, a smaller air base off Corpus
-Worked in the lab and ran the pharmacy; also took care of other WAVES when they got sick in the dispensary

-Uniforms were given out at basic training
-They had a blue smock or a “sears suckers” uniform when working at the hospital
-Then a navy blue dress and a white dress with caps for elsewhere

Basic Training (6:53)
-Basic training for 6 weeks
-It was hard to Birchett as she couldn’t march; had boot camp training more or less
-Had to get up early; woman drill sergeant
-They put her in the back row as she couldn’t march
-She lived on the 9th floor with no elevators
-Went in as an enlisted woman; was a pharmacy’s mate, never an officer
-Paid about $50 a month
-Did everything the navy way

At Corpus Christi (12:50)
-Stayed at Corpus till the end of the war
-Lived in barracks; had a bunkmate
-They had 3 sections; worked on call all day, that night had duty, second day off by 4:30 and the third day was the off day
-Birchett was in charge of all the lab work; blood work, checking diseases, giving medication, etc.
-Anything serious was sent to the main hospital, lab work or injured men
-The main base, Corpus, had smaller bases around them called P fields; Birchett was at Rod Field

-For fun they watched the latest movies that were not even out in regular theaters yet; new one every night
-Had dances some nights; it was like a family

D-Day (23: 30)
-Birchett was in the commissary getting coffee in the morning; everyone was excited about what was happening
-Then they started doing the paper work for discharging; one needed so many points to be able to get out and go home
-Took about a week before people began going home; had to go to the main base in Corpus to get discharged or check to see if you were able to
-Never really thought about whether the U.S. could lose the war; weren’t told much about the war anyway, they were too busy and so young

Talking (28:58)
-What Birchett did after being discharged
-Men she dated (and her husband)
-What WAVES stood for (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service)
-Books of Louisianans in WWII (New Iberians)
-Other WAVES she knew
-Women that worked in the service for the navy and the army; navy women were trained to take the places of men that had went off to war
-How she enjoyed working in the service

Funny stories (40:20)
-Living in the barracks in basic training and in Corpus
-Things they did in Corpus
-How she believes she swallowed a pen once

Coming Back after the War (43:30)
-It was an exciting time when everyone was coming back
-Discharged in June 1945 (after V-E Day)
-Civilians knew more about the war than those in the service; all the news was always late to those in the service
-Letters were all censored

Talking (47:16)
-About Jason Theriot’s work
-People they know

End of Birchett’s interview (53:05)

(Parts of another interview of Ned Badeaux afterwards)

Transcription:

Jeanette Judice Birchett
Born: May 4th 1924
WAVE
Interview conducted on August 6, 2001

I was working at Charity Hospital in Lafayette on Pearl Harbor Day. I remember I was training. I was working in the lab and I heard the news come through. I decide to join three and half years later. You see I wasn't old enough then. I had a good friend, and she wanted me to go with her. Her name was Irene Comeaux. I said I wasn't old enough, "but if you wait till I turn 20 I'll go with ya."
So in May of '44 I turned twenty, so she says, "OK let's go." But the superintendent at the hospital did not want us to go. They were going to freeze us on our jobs (Deferment). They said we were needed more here, at the hospital than in the service. But she really wanted to go, so we talked our super into letting us go. Which is funny because I ended up taking care of her. She was a good friend and she was lonesome when we got to New York.

We signed up and went into the service as pharmacists' mates 3rd class. From Lafayette we boarded a train and went all the way to New York. We took our basic training in New York at Hunter College. We stayed there 6 weeks. From there we were sent to indoctrination at St. Albans's Hospital in Long Island. We stayed there for 2 months, and then I got my orders to go to Corpus Christi. She went to Georgia.

There was a large hospital there on the main base. I stayed there for a few days, and then they sent me to a smaller air base called Rod Field. I worked in the lab, I ran the pharmacy, and also when one of the WAVES was sick I had to stay in the dispensary with her.

The cloths fit pretty well. We had a uniform like a blue smock, for when you worked, in the hospital. Then we had "sears suckers" uniform, and we had dress navy and the dress white uniform, with the cap. I don't know what happened to all my uniforms. I don't have them. I just didn't keep them. When I got out I didn't figure that I would live this long to be interviewed!

Basic was ruff for me because I couldn't march. We had to get up early. They put me on the last row cause I couldn't march. I never forget that, they called me "judice". They always called you by your last name. I lived on the 9th floor and we had no elevators. Up and down those stairs all day, we stayed in good shape. We learned discipline, the navy way. Everything had to be done the navy way.
I got paid about $50 a month.

In Corpus, I had a bunkmate. We had sections, three sections; we worked shifts. I took care of all the lab work. I checked the blood work, and anything serious, and would send it to the main hospital. I took care of the medication for the airman. I did the lab work for diseases. There were a lot of venereal diseases and I would give medication to treat those things. I did blood work for malaria and others and we tried to treat all that.

We mostly took care of the airman, who were training at our particular "P- field." We had marines that worked as guards there and of coarse we had sailors who were stationed at the base there. So we took care of them too.

I fell out of the bunk one night. One time I was running late for work, and I was running with a pen in my mouth and I sneezed; I thought I swallowed that pen. I went and had x-rays, but they never could find that pen. I could have sworn that I swallowed it.

We kept busy; we had dances and watched movies. We got to see all the new movies before they came out. It was like a big family. There was something to do every night. Everybody knew each other.
We didn't think about the war. We were so young and so busy. I didn't think about being invaded from the West Coast or from the Gulf. We really didn't know what was happening over seas, I think they didn't want us to know. They didn't want anybody to panic.

I remember a really bad hurricane that hit Corpus Christi. I was up stairs in my barracks sleeping and they said for all the WAVES to go to one wing. Most of these girls had never been in a hurricane before, but I had, and I wasn't scared. It came right through the naval base.

They told us that Corpus was the farthest overseas that we would get in the Navy. See our jobs were to take over for the men who had to leave the states, that's what the WAVE were trained for. So when I was ordered to Corpus I was replacing a male pharmacist mate who was sent overseas.

Everybody was needed no matter what you did. My family wasn't in favor of me volunteering, but I'm glad I did. I really enjoy my time in the service. I learned a lot.

Some time after V-E Day (June '45), they began to discharge people. We had to have so many points to get discharged. I came home for a month. I had a sister who lived in Houston, and I went to work there as a technician for a pediatrician and that's where I met my husband.

We moved here (New Iberia) about 5 years later. I worked at Dautrive's Hospital for a while. And then I volunteered; I worked for Dr. Flore. I was married for 53 years.

Dr. Nelson ("N.C") Boudreaux, Jason Theriot, Hewitt Theriot:

-Boudreaux was in school at SLI (Southwestern Louisiana Institute-now ULL) and on the weekends would go back home to court his now wife
-Hitchhiking back to Lafayette a Sunday night, they heard on the radio about the attack on Pearl Harbor
-All that night he and his cousin stayed up to listen to the radio and both decided that night they were going to join the war
-The next day they went to the Air Corps to sign up to be pilots
-Boudreaux was 19 at the time so he needed his parents’ permission first (of age was 21)
-Took him 2 weeks to convince his parents while his cousin (who was 21) had already left for Alabama
-By the time Boudreaux did get permission the Air Corps was closed for cadet training so he signed up for the Air Force and was put on the waiting list
-Failed the physical test as he was put down as colorblind but in reality he was not completely colorblind so they failed him

-Talking about a photo of his cousins that were in the war (8:30)

Enlisted into the service after failing his test (10:37)
-Went to Kessler Air Force base and for a few weeks took tests; ended up in radio school
-Sent him to a radio-gunner school in Scott Field, Bellville, Illinois
-Trained as a radio mechanic operator and in Morse code

-Once finished, was sent on to gunnery school in Harlingen, Texas
-Spent a lot of time on the range shooting skeets and training to shoot in AT-6s
-Boudreaux was made an instructor as he could take apart a .30 cal and .50 cal machine guns blindfolded; 7-8 months there just teaching
-Went and studied while there to take the colorblind test again and passed it (late 1942)

Wanted to be a flyer (18:30)
-Everyone wanted to be a flyer, even after a year of the war starting
-After finally passing the physical Boudreaux was still put on a waiting list
-Once in the system he was sent to the Black Hills of South Dakota and stayed there for a month in classes
-Was put into a cadet program and sent to Santa Anna, California; nothing but basic training and classroom work

-Cadet training was split into 4 sections:
1. primary flight training (Visalia, California)
2. basic training for larger airplanes (Bakersfield, California)
3. advanced training for specialized airplanes
4. Boudreaux chose P-38s and lastly went to twin-engine training school (since he picked a P-38)
-Went to Marfa, Texas to fly the twin-engine planes

-Around 1944 was sent to Marlin, Missouri to the C-47s in a troop carrier training outfit
-There was a large number of pilots there
-The Army figured that they would lose a lot of troop carrier pilots in the invasion so they were to be replacements

-Then sent out to Fort Wayne, Indiana for a month doing nothing before being shipped out

Left from New York City from a convoy (36:50)
-Was put in the infantry; assigned to the ship "HMS Brittany" belonging to a British fleet
-Went up to the North Sea to avoid submarines and spent 2 weeks traveling

Reached England in December 1944 (41:30)
-Assigned to an outfit in Redington at an air force outside of London
-Came into the barracks around midnight and an officer asked if any of them wanted to go on a mission with them that morning; they all volunteered
-The mission was dropping supplies to the soldiers at the Battle of the Bulge

-Assigned to as a co-pilot to a major who was a squad leader; thousands of planes were reviving up around them
-In formation headed towards France and Belgium; could see the American tanks moving into battle; the next day they broke though
-They came in low and fast as that was their only protection as they did not come in with a convoy; 500 feet
-Once they dropped the supplies they turned back around

Towards the end of the war (55:04)
-When flying out supplies, on the way back they would bring back wounded soldiers or German prisoners
-When fighting on the Rhine River pushing the Germans back, they would drop paratroopers and gliders into enemy lines
-Involved with the 101st and 82nd Airborne divisions; thinks he dropped some of the 82nd
-After they dropped they went back to England; flew for 2 hours and saw nothing but formations of planes with gliders going in behind them

When the war ended (1:00:28)
-Boudreaux was in Paris on R&R when he saw the headlines in the newspapers of Roosevelt's death
-After the war he flew troops to the Riviera for R&R
-Stayed there for a while, maybe about a month after that they started sending men home (his cousin that he initially signed up with was shot down and killed, was in the 42nd)
-By the end of the war flying planes became more of a chore and lost its excitement

-On the way home from France stopped off at in Paris and by a truck to an airport to Ireland then over to Iceland
-Eventually reached the states and rode cattle cars in troop trains home
-Was home by V-J Day

Letters from home (1:10:10)
-His mother wrote him and his wife
-Mail lagged behind and one point in England after 2 months his mail caught up with him
-Did not open them in order; never got the letter of his brother's death
-His brother (Marlin Boudreaux) in Patton's army was killed at the Maginot Line in France; saw his grave before he left for the states

Talking about why most veterans don't talk and how important it is that they do (1:13:40)

Transcription:

Dr. Nelson C. Boudreaux
Born: April 9, 1923
C-47 Pilot
ETO

I was at SLI (Southwestern Louisiana Institute) before the war. I’d come in on weekends to court my wife. I had come in one weekend, and I had lunch with the family on Sunday. I was hitchhiking back to Lafayette. In those days, people traveled by hitchhiking. So on December 7, 1941, I was in the car hitchhiking back to Lafayette, and on the radio they were saying that we had been attacked at Pearl Harbor.

When I got back to Lafayette, me and my cousin sat up all night listening to the radio. We were upset about what happened and so my cousin and I decided that night that we would join the service. In those days patriotism was there.

The next day we went to see about joining up. The response was overwhelming. Everybody wanted to join. We went to the Air Corps recruit station because we wanted to fly. A few days later, I resigned from school to join the service. It took me two weeks to convince my family that I was going. My momma really didn’t want me to go. I was 19 at the time.

I enlisted at Kessler Air Force base. I spent a few weeks there taking test. They put me in radio school and sent me to radio-gunner school in Scott Field, Bellville, Illinois. I was training as a radio mechanic operator and I learned the Morse code.

When I finished there, I went to gunnery school in Harlingen, Texas. We spent a lot of time on the range with machine guns. We were shooting skeet. We went up in AT-6’s, which was an advanced training aircraft. I could take apart a .30 cal and a .50 cal. machine gun blindfolded. So they made me an instructor.

There wasn’t a whole lot to do down there, but it was a good little service town. I made friends with a fellow named Tex and we’d go into town once a week to get a steak and supper. I stayed there almost a year.

But I wanted to fly. So I took the physical and I had to wait to get into their training system. Finally, they sent me to the black hills of South Dakota. That was the thickest snow that I had ever seen. I stayed there a month when they called me up to go into their cadet program. From there I went to Santa Anna, California for basic cadet training: drills, marching, classroom work.

From there I went primary flight training in Visalia, California. I went to a little civilian flight school and trained in a little two-seater, open cockpit, single prop-job. I flew about seven hours with an instructor before my first solo. From there I went for more training in Bakersfield, California. Then I went to advance training, where they let us choose what type of aircraft we wanted to fly. I chose the twin-engine P-38. So they sent me to twin-engine training school.

So I went to Marfa, Texas. And that is where I learned to fly the twin-engine plane. We did some night flying, some cross country flying, some formation flying, and a little instrument flying.

In early 1944 they sent me to Marlin, Missouri to a troop carrier training outfit. We were flying the C-47’s. That was the best plane ever built. The Army figured that they would loose a lot of troop carrier pilots during the invasion, and they were going to need replacements. That is why I was sent into the troop carrier.

Were weren’t too far from St. Louis, but Bellville, Illinois was one of the best towns; they people were really good to the servicemen. We’d go into town and on the bulletin board in the USO center was full of names of people who invited you to go to their house for the weekend. There was BBQ’s and parties; they would really open the doors for us.

I made friends with these two fellows. We called ourselves the three musketeers. We were sent to Fort Wayne, Indiana for a month before being shipped to the port of embarkation.

I didn’t have a full presence of mind about the hostilities that we would be facing overseas. I had such an easy time during training that I really didn’t appreciate what was going on.

We left from New York City on a ship, the HMS Brittany. It was one of the largest ships in the British fleet. We were tagging along with the infantry. We were all 2nd lieutenants. We went up through the northern Atlantic to avoid the submarines. We spent over two weeks going across.

We landed in England in December 1944. I was assigned to an outfit in Redington. There was an air force base there, about 50 miles outside of London. We were living in these Quonset huts.

The next day we flew our first mission to drop supplies to the soldiers fighting at the Battle of the Bulge near Bastogne. I was assigned to fly co-pilot for this major who was the squad leader. I didn’t know what to expect. There were literally hundreds, maybe thousands of planes reviving up the engines. We had to get up quick. As soon as we left the ground, there was another plane right behind us. We almost took off in formation. (What squadron/air force group did you fly with?)

We headed out towards France and Belgium. On the way there, we could see snow on the ground, and American tanks moving toward the battle. We came in low and fast, about 500 feet. Each container in the plane had a different color parachute: ammunition was blue, k-rations was yellow. The Germans were shooting at us with 20mm and .50 cal AAA. When we got back to England, I noticed bullet holes in the plane. That was my first experience in combat.

The C-47 was the best plane we had in the war. And the pilots who flew them were the best. They could fly that plane just like a piper cub. I didn’t spend a whole lot of time flying. I spent most of our time in trucks, hauling supplies.

When we did fly in supplies, we would come back with wounded Americans or German prisoners. Toward the end of the war, we were flying every other day out of an airfield in Reimes, France. We had finally pushed the Germans back to the Rhine River. This was the final battle line that the Germans were going to defend. There was a railroad bridge over Remagen that the Germans were supposed to blow up, but they didn’t. Our forces were trying to cross that bridge when we came in and dropped paratroopers and gliders. My squadron flew in first—we were three abreast—and we dropped paratroopers right over the area. There were 30 troopers in each plane. I didn’t know any of them. In fact, we didn’t see any of them until right before we took off. After dropping off the troopers, we turned right to head back home. I saw planes coming in, two abreast, for two solid hours. They were all carrying gliders.

When the war ended, our job was to fly troops to the Riviera for R&R. A month later we were shipped back to the States. Before I left from France, I visited my brother’s gravesite. He was killed in the line of duty trying to take the Maginot Line in France.
(Sgt. Marlin Boudreaux, KIA on Nov. 27, 1944 in Germany) My job was easy compared to the men on the ground. I thank the good Lord that I had an easy job to do…but some of them didn’t, like my brother. But we had a job to do and we did it.

I never talk much about it; I never told me my kids much about. It is a shame, because it really is a story that should be told. It was part of our lives. I’m reminded by my dad who was a patriot par excillant—a patriot. He used to make us stand when the National Anthem was played at home on the radio. I guess that is why I decided to go to the service when the Japs attacked Pearl Harbor. And after the war, I guess that I just wanted to put it all behind me.

Claude Broussard, Jason Theriot, Hewitt Theriot, Mrs. Bourrard:

-Broussard volunteered for the service as his brother (Paul) was already in it
-Was first sent to Camp Livingston or Beauregard; shipped to Fort Knox for basic training in 1942
-Went to the Louisiana Maneuvers at Camp Polk and was put in the 3rd Armored division; then cadre into the 7th Armored division

-Before being shipped overseas Broussard was cadre into the 697th Field Artillery
-They had tractors pulling the trailers for the10-in guns; tractors were to slow so they had to use tanks
-Put the tripod on one trailer and the barrel on the other; had to carry a crane to dig a recoil pit; dug a pit 6 feet for the recoil
-Hardly used those tanks in battle

-Left Christmas morning 1943 from Newport News, Virginia at 2 in the morning
-Had a year and half of training; drove a tank at Fort Knox
-Was shipped to California for 5 1/2 months to train for going to Africa
-Would go out every day at 12-3 to train; 120 degrees in the shade
-Was in the 7th Armored at this time; at Fort Benning was cadre into the 697th because they needed tank drivers
-697th had 2 40 hoteitzers with projectiles of 365 lbs.

Overseas (6:20)
-Went to Africa, Sicily and then into Italy
-Landed on top of sunken ship at Naples; Casino was their first real battle
-When leaving the U.S. they went through the Messina Straits to Africa; hit bad weather
-In Sicily made it secured and then up to Naples; had just been taken over when they landed, fired at Casino

-When leaving, the English made cardboard dummies to put up at night so the Germans would still think they were there
-Crossed over the Menturner River in the dark, twice; they had 5 tanks and pulled 2 guns
-Attached to the 3rd Armored Division, the 7th Army; they were known as a bastard outfit
-Their outfit was always being sent all over to push through lines

-From there went to Santa Maria, Italy to fire on Bologna; went on to Leghorn
-At Leghorn boarded LSTs with the tanks and guns; landed in southern France at Marseilles
-Loaded up the tanks and guns onto French flatcars (train) to Bessencorn, France
-Was with Patton 3 times: once in basic at California and twice in Europe

Artillery of the tank (17:30)
-Would go off at 25 yards off the ground, 365 lbs. of shrapnel; this was a radio fuse in the shells
-It was a new weapon and very accurate
-Leaving Rome chasing Germans, they ran for 5 days and 5 nights without sleep; 300 gallons of fuel and fuel trunks right behind them
-The tank was home, Broussard even slept in it
-Had an assistant driver but he rarely ever drove, always Broussard
-Took a four-man tray to carry the projectile; if you didn't have a good balance the concussion would knock you down

Casino (24:20)
-Could hear Anzio Annies going above them; had them at Casino
-Was firing at the Monastery, "the Abby"; ordered to "fire at will"
-Germans had a tunnel that would go to the railroad station under the Abby; so they (U.S) bombed the place
-Everyone went to the north; Broussard was 23 then

(28:38)
-Altogether Broussard thinks his outfit earned 8 battle stars
-Reached the Battle of the Bulge on Christmas Day of 1944
-Broussard's brother was a captain in the infantry at the battle
-Kept pushing north and eventually went over into Austria

-When the war ended they were able to take over Salzburg without a shot (32:47)
-Stayed there until the company was split up and took all the high-pointers (point system); Broussard was one as he had a child at home and had 112 points

-Recapping on when Broussard left the U.S. and his travels in the beginning

Back to the Battle of the Bulge (35:24)
-Germans made a push through Belgium where the Allies' position wasn't being defended
-Huge snowstorm came through, Allied planes couldn't land or help defend; Germans were going to the river Muse to cut the Allied forces into two but they ran out of gasoline

-That day (Christmas Day) they were eating turkey and all the trimmings; at night they left
-Broussard isn't sure where they were as he stayed with his tank to keep it ready
-At night when they left it was really a retreat as the Germans were coming, but they didn’t know that, no one told them

Through Europe (44:05)
-Landed in Naples and then went north to Bologna when they got word to move into France
-At the Bulge, which they didn't know until a reunion a few years ago that they were there
-In Salzburg, Austria when the war ended and the company was broken up

-Was put in CQ (chargers quarters) at an ammunition factory
-When men came through from Germany they'd stop there and then in the morning head out to Paris
-One day as CQ Broussard sees a friend from Jeanerette, Vince DeVeasay

-First person he met from the area while in service was Allen Landry at Casino, Landry was going to Naples
-Saw Elles LaGrange in Rome; ran into the entire National Guard group from New Iberia (156th Reg.) there too
-Never saw his brother while overseas, he went over before Brossard and came home before him

After being split up (52:40)
-On the outskirts of Salzburg; crossing borders into Germany and rivers
-Theriot tells a story from another interviewee (Prince from Loreauville)
-Went through Hitler's Eagle's Nest (Austria); 5-6 stories down in the mountain with hospitals, operating rooms, nurseries etc.

End of the War (56:17)
-May 1945 when the war ended; in Salzburg
-Railroad battalion gave them a bunch of stuff; like tents to sleep in
-Celebrated that night; near Salzburg so they went into town

Wine Story (57:20)
-Was in Italy and the German had vats that they pulled the plugs on in a wine cellar
-Someone found it and they filled as much as they could in their cans; used things from the tank to make a still and finish making bootleg wine
-Officer caught them one day, they bribed him and set up a trade with him; two whiskey bottles for a can of wine

Coming home (1:01:05)
-In the outfit he was in at the ammunition factory; made bullets
-Found a German rifle and took it apart and sent it back home through the mail; still has it
-After Salzburg went through Holland or France to a ship
-Landed in Newport News and got on another ship that sent him to Boston
-From there Broussard went to Camp Shelby and then took a train to New Orleans (Sept. 1945)

Transcription Begins:

July 30, 2001
Claude J. Broussard
New Iberia, La.
Born October 1, 1920.
Tank Driver-697th Field Artillery, Italy & Southern France
Interview conducted by Jason P. Theriot

I volunteered for the service. My brother Paul went in, so I decided to go too. I went to basic at Fort Knox in 1942. I drove a tank. I went to Camp Polk. From there I went into the 3rd Armored and from there I cadre into the 7th Armored. Then I cadre into to the 697th Field Artillery that was shipping out overseas.

They had tractors pulling the trailers for those 10-inch guns, 240mm; well the tractors were too slow so they used tanks. We pulled a trailer. We put the tripod on one trailer and the barrel on the other. We had to carry a crane to dig a recoil pit; you needed a pit dug 6 feet for close range.

We left X-Mass morning from Newport News, 1943. We had a year and a half of training. I was married in April of '43, and then they sent us to the desert in California for 5 and a half months. We were going to Africa you see. So we had to get in the heat every day at noon till three o'clock in just our boots and our shorts to get a tan in that hot desert. It was 120 degrees in the shade. When this was going on I was in the 7th armored. Then when we got to Fort Benning I cadraed into this outfit, because they needed tank drivers. So I had more experience than all the others did, so they put me this outfit (697th). We had two 40 howitzers. That's a big gun. The projectile weighed 365 lbs. We had it on trailers.

We went overseas. We landed in Africa, then Sicily, then Italy. We landed on top of those sunken ships (Liberty Ships) in Naples. Casino was our first real battle. We caught hell there… Ooh man… Mud, rain, and cold at night.

We went through the Messina Straits and hit bad water. When we got there Africa and Sicily had been secured. We had pushed the Germans back up through Italy. We had just taken over Naples when we got there. We were firing on Casino.

Then we pulled back and the English came there and made cardboard dummies of our tanks and armor. And when we left at night, the English put up those dummy tanks, so that the Germans thought we were still there. We crossed the Menturner River twice that night and I didn't even know. We didn't use headlights. We had five tanks in our outfit. We carried two guns on trailers; one trailer for the tube and one for the tripod. Then the spare tank was used to help get the guns in place. We were attached to the 3rd Armored Division, 7th Army. See we were a bastard outfit. We were used all over the place. When they couldn't get through, they would call us. Captain Fletcher was in charge of our battery.

Well we went to Santa Maria Italy, we were firing on Bologna at the time. Then we went to Leghorn. We board those LST's with our tanks and our guns. We landed in southern France at Marseilles. We then loaded our tanks and guns on to French flatcars (railroad cars). From there we went to Bessencorn, close to the Chzeceslovocia border. (Right flank) I was with Patton three times; once in California at basic, and twice in Europe.

We were using a radio fuse in those artillery shells. This was a secret weapon that we had. We had captured a few Germans and the first thing they wanted to know was about this new weapon. It was quite accurate.

When we left from Rome we had the Germans on the run and we ran for 5 days and 5 nights without sleep. We had 300 gallons of fuel in the tank and we had fuel trucks following behind. The tank was my home, which is where I slept.

We had a four-man tray to carry the projectile to the gun. If you were walking by and didn't have good balance the concussion would knock you down. I saw a lot of guys get knocked down.
You could hear Anzio Annie, and the other big rail gun at Casino. We were firing on the Monestary at Casino, the Abby. At Casino we were ordered to 'fire at will'. So as soon as you loaded that charge, you would fire and then load up again, without stopping.

The Germans had a tunnel from the Abby to the railroad station where they had that big rail gun firing on us. We caught fire from them many times. After they bombed it every thing was gone. You could see heat waves, like radiator heat, all in the sky. After we pushed the Germans out we all moved north. I was 23 at the time. All together we had 8 battle stars. My brother was a captain in the infantry at the Battle of the Bulge. We had a good time, if you like that kind of fun.

When the war ended we took Salzburg, Austria without firing a shot. Then they broke up the company and took all the high-pointers, see I was a high-pointer because I had a child back home. I was in charge of CQ for awhile at an ammunition factory. Them boys would come and spend the night there and then ship off the next morning. I ran into Vince DeVeasay, from Jeannerette. I was in charge of the CQ that day and I saw him standing in line and I said, "whatcha doing here you dago. He look at me and said, "hey Bruce whatcha doing here." We talk about that every now and again when I go get a haircut.

I also met up with Allen Landry. It was near Casino, and he was passing on a jeep going to Naples. I met up with Elles LaGrange in Rome. I met up with that whole group, the National Guard group from New Iberia. (156th Reg.) They were MP's. I didn't venture out much like others. I stayed by my tank and wrote letters to my wife. Our great-granddaughter sat down here one night and listened to the stories and was mesmerized. I went through Hitler's Nest in Austria. It was about 5 or 6 stories down from the mountain. There were hospitals, operating rooms, nurseries, etc..SS troopers. This was his haven.

When we were in Italy, the Germans had pulled the plugs out of those vats in the wine cellar. Somebody found out they had wine down there. So we brought up some empty 5-gallon water cans. We went down there and the cellar was covered with wine. So these guys knew how to make a still and I had the cooper tubing from my tank, to clamp on the hose. So we made a worm and these guys, they were from the Carolina's so they knew how to bootleg stuff you know. So they'd put that worm in cold water and put the empty can on the side and let it drip. We would heat the water can and then the vapor would come through and fall in that can. It was red wine, but it would come out white, from the vapors, about 150 proof!

There was an officer who came and caught us. I had furnished the tubing so I was in with them. He asked what we were doing. One of those guys threw him a canteen full with that stuff. The officer wanted to buy some. We said it's not for sale. The only way you can get some is if you give us two of your bottles for one of ours. You see they'd get rations of liquor, the best. We only got beer every six months or so. He followed us until we left for France. He'd find us and come trade two bottles of whiskey for one of ours. One of those guys was a crane operator and he flipped it all drunked up. Those guys drank all the time.

At that German factory in Austria I found a German rifle, and I took it apart and shipped it to myself back home. As soon as I got home I put it back together. I still have it. From there I went through Holland and boarded a ship at Newport News. We went across the Atlantic and landed in Boston. From there I went to Camp Shelby and my wife and my daughter picked me up from the station in New Orleans.

Eugene (Gene) Broussard, Sr., Jason Theriot, Hewitt Theriot:

-Broussard was out ducking hunting at Lake Deautrive when he noticed a lot of airplanes fly overhead
-Got home and listened to Roosevelt’s speech on declaring war on Japan
-Went into active service December 16, 1941 and tried to get a job where he could use his legal profession
-Was turned down as he needed 2 years of practice, he only had 1 ½ years
-Wrote to the FBI and they said the same thing

-Went into the Air Force and trained at Avon Park, Florida; was already flying by himself
-Was pulled out without being told why and put into bombardier training
-Later he was called into a meeting with the FBI, asking him to work for them now
-He was to have a secret job watching over the Norden Bomb Sight; was the main military secret base form WWI
-For 4 years he had to write a report to the FBI; he was not paid as it was “so secret” and the Germans would come for him; never told anybody the whole 4 years
-The best way to get into Norden was to be a bombardier

(4:22) Training
-The bombsight has 2 parts, the horizontal stabilizer and stays in the airplane and then the most important part was the vertical stabilizer
-When checking a bombsight you had to bring a 45-cal pistol; instructed to shoot 2 shots into the bombsight if something went wrong or someone stealing secrets
-In ground training they had to hit these “bugs” that moved on the floor while standing on a bombsight that was also moving; easy for Broussard to do

-First time flying on a bombing run as a cadet, dropped the bomb a mile away at 4,000 feet away from the target
-The next run hit it dead center; average of 5 feet form a mile away, while the typical average is 400 feet
-Was made an instructor to teach the other boys to do the same
-In 4 years they were able to improve the bombardiers by 400%, from teaching 2 classes of 60; the error was now 100 feet by the end of the war

-When each class went through bombardier school the 10% was taken for instructors and then sent to Carsbad Central Instructors School
-There they competed against each other and took 62; Broussard was numbered as the fourth best bombardier in all of the U.S.
-Never went overseas after that; they told him that he was doing more good teaching than fighting

(7:47) Teaching
-First class he taught was sent out to Tampa, Florida; 60 cadets
-In 3 months a 1/3 (20) were killed in training; so the field was closed down and investigated
-For in the beginning of the war more airmen were killed in training than in combat; towards the end the numbers changed
-In Europe 50,000 bombardiers, just them alone, were killed; it’s said that it was the bombardiers that won the war, especially since it was them that dropped the atomic bomb
-Never knew anything about the atomic bomb until it was dropped
-Stayed mostly in Texas and worked at 10 different airfields (he lists them)
-Talking of stories with working with computers, older bombardiers from WWI, other instructors

-Had to fly with every cadet, 60, for about 60 months; trained around 500 in all 4 years
-Lectured to other classes other than his own; tells a story of calling out another instructor
-Once over in Europe all they had to do was fly 25 missions and the come home; Broussard thinks that killed them faster

(18:28) Question: Was there any rhyme or reason for flying in a V formation?
-Flew in the squadron (V) to protect each other; if they flew together it would be a lot easier to shoot them down
-They had 6 guns on each plane to shoot down enemies (B-29)
-Never got training in gunnery, was too specialized (talked about how the guns might have been loaded)

(23:28) Joining Up
-Signed up a week after declaring war; had a low draft number and knew he’d be soon
-Figured he’d go into the army infantry if he didn’t make a move quick; tried the legal profession side first, then the Air Force
-After 6 months of training and trying to get a commission the Army legal department calls him and asked him to work for them
-Said he wanted to work for them 6 months ago and he’d only do it from them if he still got his flying pay and they wouldn’t let him so he said “'well you can shove it up your ass then”
-Broussard thinks now he should have taken it as he’d have gotten promotions and eventually paid better, it’d have been a safer job too
-Was a 1st Lt. for 3 years and never got a promotion even though he was so good

-Had to work 14 hours a day or be shipped out; flew 364 days out the year with 1 day off
-Flew everyday with pilots, men and women, so he wore his parachute; never had jump training though but thankfully never had to use it
-When Broussard was to be married, he needed at least 10 days off and one of his general was able to get him out for it (July 1942)
-Broussard believes he probably would have been killed if he had not became an instructor
-Goes back to the airfield incident in Tampa with the 20 boys killed—reason was that the planes’ wings were 3 feet too short
-Talking about types of planes and those Broussard knew in the service

(44:12) Teaching math

(47:48) Talking
-Thoughts on the atomic bombs
-Airplane training, what could have changed and made it better
-Other stories Theriot has heard for his other interviews
-More on different planes
-Plane maneuvers in training and teaching
-Discharged in November 1945

Transcription Begins:

Eugene D. Broussard, Sr.
Born Dec. 13th 1917.
Interview was conducted by Jason P. Theriot, July 30, 2001.
Bombardier Instructor/FBI

On Pearl Harbor Day I was duck hunting at Lake Deautrive and I noticed a lot of airplanes passing over. So I figured something had happened. When I got home I sat at the dinner table and Roosevelt made his famous speech that Japan had declared war on us. (The US declared war on Japan.)

I got into active service Dec. 16th 1941. And before getting into the service I tried to get a job where I could use my legal profession. So I wrote to the legal dept. in the Army and they said they couldn't use me because you had to have two years of law practice and I only have a year and a half. I was practicing law over here (in New Iberia.) I finished at Tulane Law School. So I wrote the FBI and they said the same thing-that I needed two years.

So I went into the Air Force. I was training in Avon Park, FL and I flew five flights by my self and I was doing well. All of sudden they yanked me out of pilot training and put me into bombardier training…I couldn't figure out why. I found out pretty soon why. About a week or so later the FBI called me into a secret meeting and they said, "We want you to work for us now." Well I said, "I wanted to work for ya'll two months ago." They said, " We have a special job for you. Your job is secret. You can not tell anyone about it. Your job is to watch over the Norden Bomb sight." The Norden Bomb sight was the main military secret we had during the early stages of WWII. They said for me to watch for anything that's not right and report it to them. So for four years I made a report to the FBI.

So when the FBI told me that I had that job, I was pleased because I was only making $75 a month. I asked how much are you going to pay me for working for you. They said that it was so secret that they couldn't pay me. It was so secret that I couldn't tell anybody what I was doing. It’s a secret job. They said the reason why it was so secret because if they (Germans or Japanese) found out what you were doing they would tried to get to you first. They said, "I'll give you an example of the kind of things to look for. There was a German in Germany who found a U.S. Air Force cadet with the looks to match and all, so, he came to the US in a submarine to look for his twin; and he found that cadet and killed him and disposed of his body. He was trying to get the Norden Bombsight. They caught him. The way that I figured that was when you transfer airfields they finger print you and I think they caught him on a fingerprint. So I was supposed to look out for things like that.

I did that for four years. I never told anyone that I worked for the FBI. The best way for me to keep an eye on the Norden Bombsight was to infiltrate the bombardier school as a cadet. So I was working for the FBI and I became a bombardier cadet. Nobody knew that I was working for the FBI. My best friend in the service was a captain named Bennett. He was in charge of all the bombsights at Childress Air Force base in Texas; and he didn't even know that I was checking on him. (He laughs.)

The bombsight is made of two parts: the bottom is called the horizontal stabilizer, it's about 14''-10''; and it stays in the airplane all the time, but the most important part was the vertical stabilizer, it's about the size of one-and-a-half footballs end to end. And you could not check out a bombsight without checking out a 45-cal pistol. We were instructed that if something went wrong and someone was trying to steal the secret, you would shoot two shot into the bombsight to destroy it.

I got into bombardier training. In ground training, to train you, there is a mechanical bug on the floor about as big as a battery; and it moves. And you get on a stand about 8 feet high and there is a bombsight that you operate; so the bug was moving and you had to try to hit the bulls-eye. Well that was a synch to me it was easy to do. I would hit the bulls-eye every time. I was used to shooting a rifle so it came very easily.

The first time that I flew on a bombing run as a cadet, I dropped a bomb from about a mile away at 4,000 feet; and I missed the target, which was a shack, by about 10 feet. I was disappointed. So the next time, on the second run, I hit it dead center. So my average was 5 feet from a mile away. When we landed the commanding officer of the field told me, he said, "boy you don't know what you did. The average bombardier’s error right now is 400 feet and you have an error of 5 feet." He said, "I'm going to make you an instructor; you teach them other boys how to do that." From hunting with a rifle all my life, bombing came easily to me. In four years, in the U.S. Air Force training, I never saw anyone else with as good as a five-foot error on a mission or practice run.

In four years we improved the bombardiers by 400%; the error was 400 foot average at the start of the war, and by the end of the war I instructed two classes where the error for one class of 60 cadets was less than 100 feet. So we made the cadets 400% better than they were four years earlier. They were good at the end of the war. They were accurate. We had taken out all the bugs by then.
See the reason I bombed so accurate was that bombing is all technique and procedure. And at that time, in the beginning, all I knew was procedure. I hadn't developed any bad habits by then. When each class would go through bombardier school, they would take the top ten- percent and make them instructors. Then they took those 10% and sent us all to Carlsbad Central Instructors School; and they made us compete against each other. And they had 62 bombardiers there who were the top ten percent of their class; and I came out fourth in the US. In one way, you could say that I was the fourth best bombardier in the US. So I never did go over seas. They said, "You doing more good here teaching them boys.” So as squadron bombardier, I taught 60 cadets at a time."

We taught one class of 60 cadets and sent them to Tampa, Florida. Within three months they killed 1/3 of them; 20 of them got killed in training. So they closed the field because they thought something was wrong. At the very beginning of the war more airmen were being killed in training than in combat. Towards the end, those numbers completely changed. Over Europe, we lost 50,000 bombardiers, just bombardiers. Most people, when asked what contributed the most to winning the war in the Pacific, they say the bombardier, because a bombardier dropped the atomic bomb, and that won the war (against the Japanese).

I never knew anything about the atomic bomb until after it was dropped.
I was stationed at ten different airfields, mostly in Texas.
One time we had an exercise where the top military brass was invited; and they made a model ship on the ground. And I dropped a bomb right down the smokestack of that ship. Sometimes we would practice dropping bombs at 20,000 feet from 4 miles away with great accuracy.

While instructing a class of 60 bombardier cadets I had to personally fly with each one. So I flew every day. Over the years I instructed almost 500 cadets-60 every 6 months. I would lecture to the classes as well. We would teach them in the air and on the ground.

In Europe during WWII, the airmen just had to fly 25 mission; and then they could go home, but imagine losing 50,000 bombardiers, just bombardiers. Boy that's a lot.
You see they flew in V's (the squadron); that was for protection, to protect each other. You see, if you got them all together it would be a hell of a lot easier to shoot the enemy fighters down. The bombardier, in a B-29, was the aerial officer. He had six machine guns in the front that he fired- six machine guns- one man. -Six 50-cal.

Towards the end of the war, the sight for the machine guns was 98% accurate. The ground crew would load the guns with ammunition to full capacity, before a mission. And boy, they would fire a lot. There were a lot of shells going out.

The B-29 was pressurized. There was a large tube, from the front of the plane to the back. That enabled you to move around without a pressure suit. The second best plane was the B-17. And of coarse we had the B-24 or the ‘flying coffin’ as it was called.

See I had a really low draft number, they were going to get me. So I had to make a move quick. I figured they would draft me into the army infantry, so I joined the air corp. (He joined a week after we declared war)

After it took me six months to earn a commission, the Army waited two weeks and called me to the legal department. And they said “we want you to work for us now.” I said 'I be damn, I wanted to work for you guys seven months ago.' See, they were watching me all the time. I said well that's good; I wanted to do it seven months ago. The only thing is I just got married; and I'm not making a whole lot of money, so if I get into the legal department can I have my flying pay-that's 50% extra. They said 'No we can't do that.' I said, 'well you can shove it up your ass then.' I told them right then and there.
I never got a promotion for about three years in the Air Force. I stayed a 1st Lt.

When the B-29's first came out, they trained us, and on the final examine I scored 100%. That's how much I knew about the plane. Would you believe (he was told) that when a B-29 gets to 20,000 feet, it could fly a mile on a gallon of gas? That's amazing.

The bombsite has two indices, one is stationary and the other one moves, and when the two touch each other the bombs automatically fall. Well, we had a malfunction on the plane; and the indices had a problem so the bombs wouldn't drop, so I told the pilot to fly around and I will drop them all at one time manually. There was a target on the ground. And I dropped 20 bombs from 20,000 feet-guess where they hit; they all hit in the (shack) bull’s eye.

I went to school 18 years to become a lawyer, when I got into the service would you believe I went to school for four more years. All fours years in the service I was in school, all the time. See when I was a bombardier instructor, they'd teach you other things, I studied to become a Navigator. We had to keep track of our time 24 hours a day; and everybody worked at least 14 hours a day. You had to put down when you slept, when you ate, and if you didn't work 14 hours they would ship you out. They were strict on us. And at Childress we flew, out of 365 days, we flew 364-we had one day off in the whole year. It was a grind. We had to be in great shape. We got enough exercise flying at 10,000 feet every day.

And I flew with a different pilot every day, sometimes even women pilots. I wore my parachute all the time, just in case. We never had any jump training though; they could have done better with that. They could have done better with a lot of things, but we got by somehow.

I got a leave to go home for 10 days. I got married in Coteau, Louisiana in July 1942 to Elsie Babineaux. I bought a car and drove home about once a year. I was lucky I was an instructor. If I had been a combat bombardier I would have probably been killed. We lost a lot of young boys. We lost some during training. At that field in Tampa, they lost 20 cadets out of 60. They checked those planes and found out that the wings were 3 feet too short. Can you believe that? I was a similar kind of plane that they flew over Tokyo-Doolittle- a B-25. What do you think encouraged him to make that raid? Man! And he went himself you know. (Doolittle's Raid.)

In the B-24 and the B-17 we had to fly with an oxygen mask when we hit 10,000 feet. It was so much trouble to go to the back of the plane to the toilet that we would just piss out of a hole in the side of the ship. Talk about cold. We'd wear regular coveralls, and fur-line suits. It was 40 below. In the B-29 you were comfortable, because it was pressurized. We were quite comfortable on the B-29.
At 4,000 feet, you drop the bomb about a mile and a half before the target. The Norden Bombsight took care of the distance for you. It came naturally to me, like shooting a rifle with a telescopic sight. The bombsight only went 70 degrees. You set the cross hairs in the telescope and put them on the target. If the cross hairs stay on the target you are all right; if they are not synchronized you're not right. At 20,000 feet you had to start setting up about minutes before target.

My best friend in New Iberia was Donald Duncan; incidentally he became a bombardier instructor too. He and his two brothers were all pilots; they were from Avery Island. My great-grandfather was a general in the Mexican War; my grandfather was a colonel in the Civil War, and my daddy was a Captain in the Spanish American War. I was way down. I was just a First Lieutenant.

In advance, I had no idea about the Atomic Bomb. I read in the newspaper, in Albuquerque, that a deaf child felt a vibration; and no body else felt it. See Los Alamos is about 100 miles from Albuquerque. I was in New Mexico during that time, but I had no idea what it was. We didn't know about it till after.

If we hadn't drop the atomic bomb on Japan, we probably would have lost half-a-million men (in the ensuing invasion.) It killed a lot of people, sure, but look at the Russians. They lost 12 million, with no atomic bomb. Look how hard it was to take all those little islands in the Pacific. If we had invaded the Japanese homeland, every man, women, and child would have had a gun.

I was discharged in November 1945. Now the day that I resigned my commission, the Army came and told me that if I signed up the reserves, they would make me Captain-today. Can you believe that? I told them to shove it again.

I bet you there is no record of me working for the FBI. I had to send them reports periodically. I would say, in the letter, that I was going fishing. If I saw something that didn't look right, I would report that I caught a fish, and they would come see me right away. But I never did see anything. In those reports, I never caught a fish. In early '42 the Norden Bombsight was our biggest secret. The Germans had nothing close to it. It could have changed the war for them.

They lost the air battle over Britain, which was a turning point of the war. With the Norden Bombsight, they could have turned the tide in their favor.

John Broussard, Jason Theriot, Hewitt Theriot:

-Pearl Harbor day Broussard was going to a date with a nurse from Lafayette and he was on the way to pick her up when he heard it on the car radio
-The draft board was going to put him into the Army, so he “jumped the stick” and joined the Marines in January 8, 1942
-Brought him to New Orleans and from there on a troop train to San Diego for boot camp
-After the camp went to Saint Louis Abistol in the mountains; 22 years old

(7:10) After 2 weeks at Saint Louis Abistol in the rifle range went back to San Diego
-That night they got there they were put on a ship for 200 people but had 2,000 soldiers crossing the ocean
-Reached Samoa, unloaded and sent into the hills; no Japanese, came to relieve some “China Marines”
-Were given tents and cots, it rained every day and flooded

-Went through a telephone school there; learned to climb on coconut trees rather than a pole
-First time up fell down 10 feet onto his back
-Stayed there for 6-8 months before going back on the ship to Wallis Island; they were a defense battalion
-They were there to keep the Japanese from taking this island; early 1942
-Made friends with the natives; had a French governor and some French Marines and nuns
-Made a wonderful job in making Catholics out of the natives; would go to their beautiful churches for mass

(14:00)
-Stayed there for 22 months; only way off that island was to get Elephantiasis or as the natives called it “Moo Moo”, got it from a mosquito bite and it’d swell up
-Broussard did get Elephantiasis; they’d take them on a hospital ship back to the states and then once healed back to the island
-Got on leave for 30 days after recouping and got married during that time
-Reported back to Belle Chase, a naval station across the Mississippi
-They were guarding some ammunition dumps where the submarines were stationed
-Transferred to Quantico, Virginia as seasoned veterans
-Never saw any action, closest to it he got was on the islands but still nothing

-Acted as an interpreter on Wallis Island as he could talk to the governor and natives; helped his commander
-Built an air strip on it; nothing ever happened; (27:27) story of a fight
-The natives were lighter skin than Africans; French did a good job in making them decent Catholics; gentle people, dressed well
-Liked to eat dog rather than the wild pigs; coconuts and fish were big part of their diet

-Every 2-3 months a ship would come to give supplies; sometimes brought mail and cigars
-After staying in Quantico he went to Camp Pendleton, in the desert
-Was shipped off to Honolulu, Hawaii; getting close to the end of the war, was there when the bombs were dropped
-Shipped out to Okinawa on an LST; then over to Sasebo with materials to make communications along the coast to Nagasaki

-While in Japan they began sending people home on points and eventually Broussard was sent off
-Took a ship to the Aleutian Islands, very cold and rough waters; seasick for 3 days
-Got back in San Francisco and took a train back home

Transcription Begins:

John Broussard
Born: July 25, 1919
2nd Marine Division/South Pacific
Samoa & Wallis Island

On Pearl Harbor Day I had a date with a nurse from Lafayette. I was born out there on Peebbles Plantation. I practically grew up on the dairy out there, selling milk to the locals. My fat uncle and I bought the dairy and the cows from my grandfather. And there was a young kid that worked with me and he and I joined the Marine Corp shortly after Pearl Harbor.

Between me and my fat uncle, one of us had to go to the service. My uncle told me the farm would be waiting for me when I got back. The draft board had me by the neck to join the army, so I decided to "jump the stick" and joined the Marines. I did on January 8, 1942. They put me on the bus and brought me to New Orleans. From there we went on troop train to San Diego for boot camp. I was a pretty big fellow then; I weighed about 220 lbs.

I made it through boot camp with no problems. Right out of boot camp they put us on a train and hauled our butts to Saint Louis Abistol. I was 22-years old. We got there up in the mountains at a rifle range.

At that rifle range at Saint Louis Apispol we took target practice. I hit maybe a few out of a hundred. I think I had a little crook in my eye. We went back to San Diego that same night. We never got to see the town, never got a liberty pass, and we got onboard a ship- the President Garfield. The ship was built for 200 passengers; we were 2,000 marines aboard that ship crossing the ocean.

It was in the 2nd battalion/2nd Marines. We got to Samoa. We unloaded and they sent us out in the hills. There weren't any Japs, but there had some old "China Marines." We were there to take their place. Boy they were salty. They were tough. They didn't drink beer cold, they drank it hot, cause it had more of a kick.

So we'd go out to the boon-docks and they gave us an old leaky tent and a canvas cot. It rained everyday. I went to a telephone school out there. I learn how to climb coconut trees to run telephone lines. The first time I went up a tree with those spikes, I fell down about 10 feet on my back. It knocked the wind out of me. We stayed there about 6-8 months, then we boarded another ship and took off to Wallis Island, half way between Samoa and Fiji.

This was early 1942. We were a defense battalion. Our job was to occupy an island and sit there so that the Japs wouldn't take it over. We built a little airstrip there and we had some radar stations set up with machine gun nests. We had a ton of dynamite to blow up our installations incase the Japs tried to take over the island.

We got to be friends with the natives there and we were doing good. There was a French governor on that island with his family. I got to be friendly with them. They had a hand-full of French Marines and a dozen nuns that ran a hospital. They had done a wonderful job making Catholics out of the natives. They built some beautiful churches and I'd go to the mass. It was really beautiful out there, but I was far away from home. I stayed there for 22 months.

The natives didn't bother us. They were these big beautiful coconut trees all over the island. There were these wild pigs that would run around in the bush, but the natives wouldn't touch them. But if a big fat dog walked by watch out. Those natives like to eat those big dogs. The natives had dark skin and the women were beautiful. There was an outbreak of leprosy out there. They were very gentle people. The French did a good job making them civilized.

I had made friends with all of them. This one family had kind of adopted me. I had me a nice fat dog that I kept chained up under my bunk, but one time he got out…and he never came back. I guess they ate my dog.

I would act as an interpreter for that French governor and our commander. We'd get together and they'd talk a good bit, and sip on some conyak. I'd have a little tottie myself sometimes. I had a guy who sent me a box of good cigars. They were good.

The only way to get off the rock to come back home during the war was to get Elephantiasis. The natives called it the Moo Moo. A mosquito would bite you and you would swell up. It was close to the equator in the tropics, so we'd sleep naked all the time and we'd get bit by the mosquitoes. If you'd get it, you got to ride in the hospital ship to come back home till you healed up. They'd keep us in a hospital for a few months till you got over it, then back to the rock.

I came home on leave one time while I was recouping from elephantities. I came to New Iberia for 30 days and got married. I reported back to the naval hospital in New Orleans after my 30 days, a married man. I still had the bug in me I guess.

I reported to Belle Chase, the naval station across the Mississippi. It was nice. I had weekend passes and I'd come home. We were guarding some ammunition dumps out there where they had our submarines stationed. The submarines would come and load up right there.

From there they transferred me to Kwanico, Virginia. We were showing these officers how to live out in the boon docks, since we were seasoned veterans. We'd spend a few days out in the snow. I stayed there maybe six months.

I went to the desert at Camp Pendleton for a short while. Then they shipped back to Honolulu, Hawaii. I was there when we dropped the bomb. They weren't happy with me yet, so they put me on an LST and sent me to Okinawa. This was after the Japs had surrendered. We picked up some materials and went to Sasebo, Japan to put up some communications along the coast. We rebuilt telephone lines from the coast up to Nagasaki. There was nothing standing in that city; it looked like it was just squashed. It was awful.

When we finished out job on Japan we went to the Aleutian Islands. Boy it was cold up there, and rough as hell. I was seasick like you wouldn't believe. I didn't eat for three days. I got back to San Francisco and took a train back home.

I got to see a lot of places, but was lucky. I never saw any combat. I had a calm existence in the service

When I got back, my uncle told me that the farm wasn't big enough for the both of us. So he told me to take a hike. I had a wife and daughter to care for so I went into partnership with my other uncle. We bought my grandpa's sugar cane farm and all his mules and tractors. I had saved some money that the government gave me when I got out of the service. It was about $2,000. That was the best thing that ever happened to me.

RJ “Chink” Broussard; Jason Theriot: Hewitt Theriot:

-Was part of the National Guard in New Iberia, in the 156th infantry
-Went to Camp Blanding, Florida before the war (1940?) and when war did break out sent to Charleston, South Carolina
-There to guard the docks; sent to Camp Bowie, Texas and from there eventually overseas (1941)
-Landed in England in 1942

-Was a boxer already and went into boxing in the army too (talking about some fights)
-In London they were on guard duty and training; boxed in middleweight championship there
-Boot camp in Camp Blanding; no infantry training when war broke out
-The 156th infantry was mostly all men from New Iberia
-With the National Guard went to London then to North Africa and then Italy and lastly to France
-Broussard’s term in the guard was over during the war and eventually put into the army

(8:20) In North Africa fought Marcell Serdan twice a week
-Fought on the amateur card at the service club in Oran, North Africa
-Serdan and Broussard would talk French to each other; Serdan was in the Navy
-Looking at newspaper clippings of his fights; boxed till 1948
-In North Africa they fought on Saturday and Sunday nights
-Before being transferred was in G Company and was sent into the Army Special Service
-Fought 90 fights altogether during the war—won 73, drew 7 and lost 10

(16:30) From North Africa went to France then to Italy
-In France had a team of pros and amateurs and then went into Rome
-Had been to Rome before when working with the police
-Guarded some of Rommel’s troops, POWs; worked with the FBI and police looking for fascists
-Would knock on or break down doors of addresses the FBI had given them
-Had taken hand-to-hand combat at University of Oran in North Africa; never had to use it, always behind the front lines
-Was there for entertainment purposes not to really fight in the war

(23:20) Mannheim, Germany
-Was in Germany when the war ended; in with a TDY outfit in the special service
-People drank a lot and then try to drive the military vehicles so Broussard had to arrest them
-One escapee of a POW and had to chase him, Italian GI
-Was in Rome for D-Day

(28:09)
-People he met during the war
-Talking of family, life before and after the war
-Fights and people Broussard knew
-Speaking French as children
-Tour of Europe he did with his wife after the war
-What he did for the troops as entertainment (importance)

Transcription Begins:

RJ "Chink" Broussard
Born: 9-9-19
New Iberia
Company G, 156th Infantry Regiment LA National Guard
Boxer
Interview conducted by Jason P. Theriot

I joined the National Guard in 1940. I went to Camp Blanding, Florida before the war. This was in 1940. When the war broke out we went to Charleston, South Carolina. We were put on guard duty at the docks. From there we went to Camp Bowie in Texas. That was in 1941. In 1942 we left for England. (Besides boxing, what duties did you have in England?: Guard Duty. Did G Company participate in training maneuvers with the rest of the 156th? yes)

I fought in London. I won the middleweight championship there, 168-pound class. I had been boxing since I was ten years old. I started at New Iberia High. Mr. Gunner was my coach. I boxed all over: in a gym, on a headland in Loreauville. From London we went to North Africa.

In Oran, North Africa I used to fight with on Marcell Serdan’s fight card twice a week. We would fight on the amateur card at the service club. He was in the Navy. He was a nice guy. We spoke French to one another all the time. We would box on Friday nights and Sunday nights. There were clubs, nightclubs everywhere we went. And we would take them over and have boxing matches there. Of course those areas were secure from the Germans.

I fought Lou Jenkins; he was the lightweight champion of the world. And he beat me, but he didn't knock me out. During the week I was still a soldier with the 156th—G Company. We were in charge of guarding some of Rommel's troops who were POW's.

We went into Italy after the invasion forces landed. We went on a small ship from North Africa to Anzio. The smell of death was terrible there…lots of dead bodies. We (Who is we, the entire G Company?) Yes. all went to Anzio and then to Rome as MP's. We would go on raids with the FBI and Italian Police looking for Fascist. The FBI had a list with addresses and we'd go to their house looking for them. We'd knock on the door and if they didn't open the door we'd shoot off the lock. I carried a .45 pistol. I had taken hand-to-hand combat at the University of Oran in North Africa.
In Rome, the Americans were on one side of the city and the Germans were on the other side moving out. They had decided not to fight in the ancient city. The Germans were given time to pull out by the Americans.

One time in Rome I was on duty and when those boys would get to come off the front lines for R&R they'd drink a lot. I had stopped this one guy in a jeep driving drunk. He had a bunch of women with him and they were all drinking. We arrested him and through him in the brig.

Another time this Italian prisoner got loose and I had chased him into a yard where he couldn't get out. He had an iron pipe in his hand and he told me he would use it if I got any closer to him. Well I took my pistol out and shot right out in front of him. He said, "I don't care if you shoot me, you not coming close enough to get me." So I got a little closer to him, and he cocked his arm back to swing that pipe at me, and I hit him with an uppercut to the gut and he went down.

At 23-years old I was put in charge of training a group of amateurs and pros from the 156th. I would put on shows for the GI's when they got off of work or when they took liberty. Boxing was very popular during the war.

My tour with the Guard ended in 1945, so I decided to join the regular Army. I was with the 4th Armored Division after the war ended.

I was finally transferred to the Army Special Service. We entertained the troops in Europe at places like Dejean, France and Nancy, France and Menheim, Germany. But all those New Iberia boys were still close by. I would go eat dinner with them all the time. We had all gone overseas together. A few of us are still living. Two guys that I was good friends with were John Mestayer and Ed Broussard. Only one guy was killed out of our group. I think he was a [Oswald] Ransonet boy from Loreauville. I used to work with [Lee] Castille boy before the war. Howard Roy was our commander when the war started. Gerald Wattigney became our company commander overseas.

I spent some time in France, putting on boxing matches. (Was there fighting still going on in France and Germany?) Yes. I had put together some teams of amateurs and pros and we entertained the men when they would get R&R. We would travel by plane. The Army took good care of us. I was 23-years old.

I was in Mannheim Germany with a TDY (What does TDY stand for and what kind of unit was it?) outfit when the war ended. That's another branch of the Special Service. There were French and German wine cellars all over the countryside and we celebrated. But we really just wanted to come back home.

I was in the Stars and Stripes a few times. I had ninety fights while I was in the service. My record was 73 and 10 with 7 draws. My tour ended in 1945, but I reenlisted. I won the heavyweight championship of the 4th Army in 1948. My wife and kids drove our car from New Iberia to New York. They boarded a ship and came overseas to meet me. They landed in Leharve and we drove all over Europe touring.

I had a good time during the war. At the time I was doing something that was really important to the troops. I didn't realize that at the time. When the men would get off on R&R they had swimming pools and basketball courts, but it was the boxing that brought the most. They really enjoyed watching us box.

(Did you use your French in North Africa, Italy, and France to communicate with our French allies, or with the French people? Did it come in handy? Yes

Dot Broussard, Jason Theriot:

-Middle of a story about a map that was used by her paratrooper husband (Sam)
-Foreign exchange students and CODOFIL people from France that they housed through the years

(5:09) Home Demonstration Agent
-Had finished LSU for pre-Med and went back to take Home Ec
-By the time the war started she had been married for 4 months and her husband was killed
-Moved back to St. Martinsville and drove to Breaux Bridge to work
-Broussard’s job was to test pressure cookers to make sure the food they cooked was done correctly

-Taught adults like they were in 4-H, on programs that the state wanted them to use in canning, gardening, freezers, etc.
-Mostly during the war it was all about preserving food with the rations; people liked to gardened
-Taught how to use the pressure cookers, cutting up animals and what to use or can
-Everyone was onboard for the war effort

(14:00) her second husband (Sam Broussard) in the National Guard (sent out activated outfits) and eventually was the Battalion Executive
-He quit early as he was gone every night and he wanted to have the weekends off
-Volunteered for the service as a paratrooper before being put in the National Guard
-Probably would have died if he continued on as a paratrooper
-His knowledge in the French language is what helped him; spoke many different dialects
-Would find out where the Germans were hiding in France, working with other Frenchmen
-Came a few hours later after the invasion on the beach
-He would talk about how sad it was to see all the men dead or dying and couldn’t do anything for them

(18:00) Stories about Sam
-Their trips to France, people they met or he knew from his time over there during the war (stayed in Paris for a year)
-People they know from Louisiana

Ambrose (AJ) Champagne, Jason Theriot, a woman (Mrs. Champagne?), Hewitt Theriot:

-Raised on a farm in the back of Parks (“Grandbois”- big park)
-Drafted March 18 (1942) and sent to Camp Beauregard, Alexandria
-Transferred to Fort Smith, Arkansas and attached to the 6th Armored Division; trained for 6 months before going to maneuvers on the Sabine River in Texas
-Went back to Fort Smith and moved out to the desert in California; trained another 6 months and then sent on to Camp Cook
-Was doing guard work and training; filmed some training films with Paramount Pictures

-Went to Camp Shank, New York to go overseas; water was full of submarines
-Landed in Scotland and moved inland to Long Polk, England; trained there with anti-aircraft guns
-The hospital there was used during D-Day and Champagne watched them bring in the wounded
-Had to wait until an armored division could be safely put on the beach
-Brought to the Channel and waited till July 30th till they could cross; finally saw the aftermath of war

-Camped out in a pasture overnight and the 3rd Army started to retake Brittany
-Pushed back the Germans and then went up to Paris; cleared up more spots and went into Nancy, France and the Moselle River (Mogdiville)
-Ran out of ammunition and gasoline and had to stay there from September to October
-By November they attacked through the back of Metz and pushed the Germans back; Battle of the Bulge soon followed

(7:44) Battle of the Bulge
-On Christmas Eve they moved to Metz and slept; next morning traveled to Luxembourg for a week
-New Year’s Eve (if remembered correctly) they replaced the 5th armored Division
-The snow was horrible and was the height of the fence and so cold (40 degrees below 0)
-Took 9 days at Bastogne to wait out the weather; they’d fight and take 10 feet and that night they’d lose it to the Germans again—a costly war

-One night Champagne got stuck out in some acres of trees with just 2 men; Germans were firing tree-burst shells and all the tops of the trees were gone
-Decided to play coward as the Germans were coming so they dug a foxhole and covered themselves with the fallen tree tops and branches
-There was going to be more Germans than there was of them (3 men)
-Doesn’t really believe he was a coward, just realized there was no way they could fight all the Germans that were coming

-January 9th the sun came out and the planes were able to come in and pushed the Germans back
-They retreated pretty far and they followed them until the 3rd Army was called back; the 1st and 9th Army took care of the rest
-They got to the Rhine River and the Germans were trying to sink the pontoon bridge so they couldn’t cross
-Never got to sink it and they were able to cross it into the country
-Germans were not really on the run but they were running low on equipment
-The Germans were using their flak guns and grenades on them; a fight the whole time they were retreating

(13:32) Went through the town Buchenval and saw a concentration camp
-There was a little room where the people were executed; made with cement with nails on the walls
-The people would be tied by the necks and hung up on the nails until dead
-Never saw any hanging but Champagne knew what it was
-He could see the fingernail marks of where the people would try to claw themselves up
-The beds were big traufs with 3-4 people in each with one blanket
-They were little and starving; had seen American POWs and none went through that kind of punishment

(15:42) Halftrack and Armored Tactics
-Was a sergeant in charge of a halftrack; had 5-6 men with him, a driver and 2 machine gunners in the back
-In the Headquarters Company, 50th armored Battalion, 6th Armored Division

-Tactic: “Let’s say that we were going to fight for Parks. Okay, they would first send some of the line companies in the battalion, foot soldiers. They would be in the two-and-a-half ton trucks. When it was a big deal, they brought in infantry from an entire division, two divisions if necessary. They would walk ahead of the armor.”

-The 2-3 years of training before going into combat helped; learned a lot of the tricks
-English men would say: “He who runs today may live to fight another day”
-Came back with a bronze star and the French “Croute de Ger;” wasn’t there to try and earn medals

(24:43)
-Shot one of his own men one night in the woods
-They had to be careful as Germans were there so they were told to shoot anything that walked unless it knew the password
-These 2 fellows, Wishner and Wagner, Champagne figured they were too old (in early 40s) to be in the army
-Champagne saw movement and yelled for the password and no one replied so he fired and hit one
-Never found out if he killed the man but he (the other man) should have been more alert; had to go on a small trail to see whether or not Champagne shot on purpose
-Needed to be alert as they had replacements coming in all the time (so you didn’t always know everybody that was with you)
-Many times the replacements would go on patrol and never came back; Champagne’s brother Richard was a replacement and after a few days he was killed

-Was under Patton and only ever saw him once in Magdeville
-They were stationed there several weeks waiting for ammunition
-It was the first of November and it was pouring cold rain; Patton was there with Generals Grove and Bradley

-Normandy was hedgerows with Germans in the trees; tanks would get hit in the bellies
-Germans had bulldozers so it was easy for them to knock over the tanks
-One sergeant took a bulldozer and put blades on the tanks; saved a lot of equipment this way
-Found the concentration camp and from then on it was just pockets of Germans they would find

(47:00) Leaving
-Left the equipment at Frankfurt, Germany and 20 men were picked that had been there from the beginning to go back to England with the captain
-They were put on trucks and followed the Rhine River to Coblenz, Cologne and Antwerp and crossed the Channel
-Some places all that was left was little walls of brick, devastated area

(48:20) Speaking French
-Staying at Megdeville for 6 weeks defending the line
-Got to get close to 3-4 families that would cook him food and drink wine with them in the afternoon
-One family (Jobert) kept writing him after the war
-Would go into towns and say “bonjour” to those he met

(57:20) the ship back home
-Took 8 days coming back; landed in New York and sent to Virginia to be discharge
-Got so sick on the way back and stayed on the first deck the whole time

Transcription Begins:

Ambrose Champagne
Born: March 1920
St. Martinville, LA
50th Armored Brigade, 6th Armored Division

I was raised on a farm in back of Parks, what is known as Grandboil (means big park). I was drafted March 18, 1942. I first went to Camp Beauregard, Alexandria. From there I was transferred to Fort Smith, Arkansas, and attached to the 6th Armored Division. I trained there for six months then I went to maneuvers in Louisiana and Texas along the Sabine River. From there we came back to Fort Smith and from there we prepared to move to the desert in California.

We stayed in the desert for six months and then went to Camp Cook, California. We were doing guard work and training. While at Camp Cook, Paramount Pictures took about 15 of us to make some training films, which was very interesting to see how movies were made. They were very nice to us.

From there we went to Camp Shank, New York, and we crossed the ocean. The water was full of submarines, but we made it Scotland. From Scotland, we went more into the interior of England at a place called Long Polk. We trained there about as close as war could be. We went to South Wales and fired our anti-aircraft guns. We went to some fields where they fired overhead and you get the feel of the bullets flying over your head, four or five feet over your head.

There was a hospital near by. After D-Day, we could see that they were bringing in these men who had got hurt. We figured it would be our time soon. We had to wait to get in there because there was no place to put an armored division ashore. We had too many tanks that would have been exposed. They already had a few armored divisions ahead of us.

So they brought us the Channel and we waited there until the 30th of July, then we crossed the Channel. Naturally the war had been cleared up pretty much, but they had a lot of things for you to see. The first thing that I saw when I got into France was a dog carrying the leg of a human being; so that kind of gave me a feeling of what we were about to enter.

So we bivouacked out in a pasture that night. The next morning, the 3rd Army started to retake Brittany. In Normandy, the land was all four or five acres with hedgerows with trees on it. Every time a tank tried to go over the hedge, they hit him in his stomach. They had bulldozers, but they didn’t have any guns, so they were knocked out pretty easy. This one sergeant took a bulldozer and put blades on the front of one of the tanks. He said, “When we get to a hedgerow, we not gonna climb it, we gonna push it.” That American saved a world of equipment.

When we had cleaned up Normandy, we were going to take the Brittany peninsula. We cut off the Germans and pushed them up to the end. We captured a lot of Germans, but we lost some of our men.

I started out as a machine gunner on the half-track. I got promoted when this fellow, Steel, got killed. We were taking a little town and our artillery was firing near us, but they shot too short. They killed Steel. He was right in front of me. Some things, you know, you think are funny. Since he had been in the service, his wife had had a baby. He had a picture of his wife with the little child in his wallet. And the wallet fell out of his pocket when he got hit. The wallet was open…and his little child was there. And he never saw it. From then on I took over the track.

I was a sergeant in charge of a halftrack in the Headquarters Company, 50th Armored Battalion, 6th Armored Division. We had water-cooled .30-caliber machine guns in the back and a .50 in front. We had five or six men on the track: a driver and two machine gunners in the back.

(Halftrack’s role in armored attack) Let’s say that we were going to fight for Parks. Okay, they would first send some of the line companies in the battalion, foot soldiers. They would be in the two-and-a-half ton trucks. When it was a big deal, they brought in infantry from an entire division, two divisions if necessary. They would walk ahead of the armor.

When we were fighting for the Brittany Peninsula, they had a world of infantrymen there.
We would come in from behind the infantry. If the terrain were right, they would send in some tanks to soften them up. We were mostly targeting German airplanes and infantry.

From there we fought a little bit here and there. They we went to Paris. We cleared out a few spots on the way to Nancy, France. The Moselle River separated Nancy and Mogdiville. There, the 3rd Army ran out of ammunition and gasoline, so we stayed there from September to October.

I stayed at Magdeville—that’s close to Nancy, France— for six weeks. When I was there, these three or four families had taken a liking for me. (What were the family names? Martin, Jobert, Ofraw?) When it wasn’t our week to stay on the line, watching to make sure the Germanys wouldn’t come back, they’d cook and we’d drink wine all afternoon. That’s how they are. This one family was Jobert. They kept on writing me after the war.

When I’d come to the little towns, I could speak French, so I’d say to the people, “Bonjour.” I’d go and visit with these families during the day. I got along well with them.

We drank some good wine in France. And in Germany we drank Schnapps; it was green Schnapps—talk about make you sick. Sometimes we’d over-drink.

Our reconnaissance officer, Lt. LaBeadle, always wanted me to go with him because I could speak French. I went with him a lot of times, sticking our nose around behind the German line. We got into some tight places sometimes. He got killed one night.

I saw Patton one time at Magdeville. We had been stationed there for several weeks, waiting for ammunition to catch up to us. It was the first day on November and that morning it was pouring cold rain that was something else. There was General Patton with General Grove and General Bradley—our division commander, our army commander, and our army group commander—present. He was up there with three other generals saying, “Go ahead you son of a bitches! Go ahead!” He was a powerful leader. A lot of times he would go beyond what he had to do, because he didn’t what to stop fighting. He wanted to go into Russia and China. I’d say that Gen. Patton was one of the best.

In November, we attacked again through the back of Metz. We pushed the Germans closed to their line until the Battle of the Bulge came.

During the Battle of the Bulge, the 3rd Army went to the rescue of Bastogne. For Christmas Eve we moved through Metz. The next day we traveled to Luxembourg and stayed there for a week. On New Years Day, if I’m right, the 5th Armored Division got out and we got in. They had taken a pretty good beating. The weather and the snow were just horrible. The snow was up to the height of a fence. It was cold. It was 40-degrees below zero with snow.

At Bastogne, it took us nine days to let the weather clear out so we could do something. It was really just a fight for ten feet tonight—tomorrow night, we would loose it the Germans. And that’s a costly war.

One time, I got stuck with only two of my men. We were in a little pine tree square, maybe six acres of trees. The Germans fired tree-burst shells. When the shells would hit the branches at the head of the tree, the shrapnel would go down. One shell could maybe catch three or four people. There were no more tops left on those trees. There were some engineers between the Germans and us but it got too hot for them and so they backed out. So I was the point; I was going to have to deal with the Germans. All I had was two men. I told them that we gonna dig us a foxhole and we gonna cover it with branches. And we gonna get in there because the Germans are coming and there will be too many for us to fight. So we gonna play coward tonight. So we got in that foxhole and covered it good. About an hour after, the Germans were walking on top of our foxhole. But I still believe that I wasn’t a coward; I just figured that I couldn’t do it. (Where did this happen? In Belgium, in the Ardennes Forest?)

The next morning we had to make two trips to where one of the line companies was to haul back all of our equipment. On the ninth day of January, the sun came out. Our planes were able to come in and really beat up the Germans until they started to back up. So they retreated back through those little towns in Belgium and we followed them until the 3rd Army was called back to where we had been originally been fighting. The First and the Ninth Army finished them off and took care of it.

We got to the Rhine River and the Germans were trying to sink our pontoon bridge we had made there. It was like seeing daylight at night because they had so much tracer fire shooting at the German planes. The Germans were firing shells at us, too.

We finally cross the Rhine and worked our way into the country. The Germans were not necessarily on the run, but their equipment was getting pretty low. They were using their flak guns on us as artillery. It was just fight when you meet them. They were retreating, but they fought all the way. They never did give up all together.

I went through the town of Buchenval, the concentration camp. They had a little room where they would bring the people to be executed. It was made with cement with nails on the walls. They’d bring them in by the truckloads and tie a little rope on their necks and hock them up on those nails until they died. I didn’t see the people hanging there, but I know that the nails were there. The walls were made of clay and those people who were being hanged had eaten up the walls with their fingernails.

There were these big traufs and they put three or four in there to sleep together and they shared one blanket. I saw some of our men who almost starved, but none of our men, that I know of, was ever put through that kind of punishment.

We were in Germany. We came into this little wooded area, patches of pine trees. We went over this hill in my track and this 88 shot us. He shot low and knocked our track off. He could have hit the gas tank and blew us up. I hollered at the boys, “Jump!” Sanders, the driver, said, “You too sergeant.” I said, “Leave it there. Let them amuse themselves.” He said, “Oh, no, I’m gonna get it out.” So he drove it up a little bit and the Germans could shot at us. We didn’t have far to go and the track made it to the shelter behind that hill. So they got one shot, and they busted it up, but they didn’t hit the gasoline tank.
We had to get a new track after that.

I shot one of my own men one night. We went into this wooded area and the battalion commander gave a little talk and told us that we had to be very careful because we were in an area where the Germans were. He said, “Anything that walks, they better use the password.” These two fellows, Wishner and Wagner—I always said they were too old to be in the army; they were about 40 years old—and they were walking towards us. So I hollered the password, and said, “Give me the password! Give me the password! Give me the password!” And when they didn’t I let one of them have it. I don’t know if he died; I never heard anything about it. My lieutenant, who was laying close to where I was standing, came with me to see a bunch of majors and colonels where they put me on a trial. They wanted to see if I purposely shot the fellow.

But nothing ever came of it and I never found out what happened to that fellow. I always said that he didn’t belong in the army. You had to be alert. We had replacements coming in and we had to send them out on patrols at night. Someone of them never came back.

My brother, Richard, was a replacement. He fought just a few days and was killed.

From then on there were pockets of Germans we’d fight. Once in a while we’d have to cross a few rivers and they would put up a good fight.

We left our equipment near Frankfurt, Germany. This captain from our battalion picked about 20 men—who had been in combat from the beginning—to go back to England. So we got on these two-and-a-half-ton trucks and followed the Rhine River to Coblenz, Cologne, and Antwerp—that was all flat to the ground. There were little walls of brick high like my chimney. The beauty of the Rhine Valley is something else. In some places there was nothing to fight for so it wasn’t devastated; that was something beautiful. We passed through that and went to the English Channel and went back to England.

We got on a ship and sailed across the Atlantic. I had got so sick on the way there the first time, so I asked the fellow in charge of the boat, “You gonna need an noncommissioned officer on the deck all the time?” He said yeh, and I said, “Well, don’t look for anybody else, you got the man.” I told him that I was gonna put my bed roll right here along the side and out of the way and I would ride on the top deck all the way back to the States.

I always said that the two or three years that I had in training before going into combat saved my life. I learned a lot of the tricks. Like the Englishmen used to say, He who runs today may live to fight another day. I wasn’t ashamed of running when I had to. I came back with the bronze star and the French Croute de Ger. I got scraped and bruised up and cut up during combat, but I never paid attention to that.

I don’t know how I came out of it, but I still got my lil Rosary.

Homer J. Comeaux, Jason Theriot, Mrs. Comeaux:

-Was 17 years old when signing up for the National Guard against his parents’ wishes
-Left with all his friends from New Iberia in 1940 to Camp Blanding, Florida for 13 months
-They were supposed to train for 12 months (a year) but they were kept an extra month longer so they figured something was wrong
-Within that month the war broke out and they were sent to North and South Carolina to guard the coast
-His friends that he signed up with: Rivis Hebert, Walter Hebert, Shorty Broussard, Eudey Surlock, Wallace Thibodaux, Chink Broussard, Ellis LeGrange, LeTick Courrege, and Oswald Ronsonet

-In South Carolina was put in the combat infantry in the airfield
-Then sent to Brownsville, Texas and trained there until 1942
-September 1942 brought them to New York and put on a ship
-Had turned 18 a few days before they left on the ship

-Met a lot of the Breaux Bridge, St. Martinville, Franklin men
-They all went overseas together
-All could speak French and spoke it to each other a lot
-Some of the orders in the beginning of training were said in French but they were also taught in English
-They were trained in American rules not Frenchmen rules

(9:15) Overseas
-Landed in Scotland and by truck sent into England
-Took them awhile to get to London to help guard the Air Force (8th, Bushy Park)
-They ate many deer off the King’s land (illegal); they had it good for awhile
-When patrolling had to yell “halt” 3 times if they saw movement and if no answer then shoot
-Would do this mostly when they came across deer and say they thought it was the enemy
-Comeaux’s neighbor (in New Iberia) Etian Leblanc was their cook and he was always on the ready for the deer they killed as it had to be done fast so they weren’t caught
-It was an important job though guarding the air field from the Germans

(13:50) Africa
-Took a ship in 1943 to North Africa; no problems really, just a few bombs falling on them
-Their first duty was to guard the Oran prison; then put to guarding the port
-Had problems with the locals as there was a lot of stealing between the Arabs, Africans and Americans
-There were some French speaking people in Oran; his French helped him a lot

(20:57) Italy
-A few months later after landing in Africa put into the 202nd Combat Infantry Battalion and they made them into MPs
-Moved around a lot in Algiers and then shipped to Italy
-Was in the 71st MP Company
-Left for Italy on 5 LSTs; the German news commentator (Axis Sally) was telling them what they were going to do to them when they landed
-That morning of them landing they were bombed at; landed about a quarter of mile from Comeaux’s ship
-Once on the beach they dug their own foxholes; landed on Anzio beachhead
-Followed the infantry into Rome and couldn’t go in as it was an open city
-Had to split up and got in and worked as military police

(24:34) Talking
-Breakdown of movements and dates
-Infantries he was in or might have been in
-Looking through papers and photos
-People from Louisiana with Comeaux, those he knew

(32:47) Story of a jeep accident with a grenade

(33:55) Rome
-Their duty was to find the hiding Germans within the city; go through building and hotels
-Knocking on doors and asking them to come out; if no answer they tied hand-grenades to the door handle and ran around the corner
-Lots of German snipers in Rome; one shot Comeaux’s officer, they unloaded on that German

(Talking of family and wife after the war)

(49:50)
-Didn’t stay in Rome for too long; went to the Rhine River to guard it
-Took no pictures from the war, didn’t believe it was right
-Drove a motorcycle as a MP; all new Harley Davidsons were given to them
-They had to guard a general in Rome with the motorcycle

-Looking at the papers at men that served in Louisiana; trying to find someone from Franklin
-Message Comeaux wants the President and his admin to hear on the war in Iraq

Transcription Begins:

Homer J. Comeaux
218 Bob St.
New Iberia, LA 70560
Company G, 2nd Battalion, 156th Louisiana National Guard
North Africa & Italy

I was seventeen when I joined the National Guard. My parents didn’t want me to sign up, but I signed my name anyway. I left with all my friends. When we left New Iberia in 1940, they organized us and shipped us to Camp Blanding in Florida for 13 months. We were supposed to come back within a year, but they kept us there longer. We figured something was wrong. They wanted to keep us there to train us for one more month. I didn’t have a lot of education, but I had enough sense to know that they were keeping us around for a reason. Within that month the war broke out and they sent us to South Carolina to guard the coast.

I had a lot of friends that were already in the guard and they wanted me to join with them, so I did. I remember them all; Rivis Hebert, Walter Hebert, Shorty Broussard, Eudey Surlock, Wallace Thibodaux, Chink Broussard, Ellis LeGrange, LeTick Courrege who was killed overseas. Oswald Ronsonet was transferred out of our company and was killed somewhere in France.

Everybody was joining the guard at the time, plus we would get a paycheck. My momma and daddy was so poor and they had so many children that I figured they wouldn’t mind one of them off their back. But, they were against me joining. Not because they didn’t want to defend my country, but they were worried about my safety.

I didn’t have the most education, but I believed in my country and I fought for my country. And I would go back and fight for it again.

We were combat infantry guarding the airfield in South Carolina. Everyday we would walk five miles and run five miles back. We were in pretty good shape. Then they rushed us back to Brownsville, Texas for more training. We stayed there until 1942. In September, they brought us to New York and put us on a ship to go overseas. I had just turned 18 years old.

I met a lot of those guys from Breaux Bridge and St. Martinville and Franklin while we were training. They were good people and they helped the war out a whole lot. We all went overseas together. Ninety-nine percent of us spoke French.

Some of our orders in the beginning were in French, but they got away from that because they had to teach us in English. They wanted us to speak French, but not to train as Frenchmen, because we had learned the American rules. At Camp Blanding when we played cards, we would sometimes speak French to each other. We would like to catch two or three of them that didn’t speak French so we would take their money!

We landed in Scotland. They brought us in trucks and they put us guarding the 8th Air Force headquarters near Bushy Park. We ate quite a few deer off of the King’s land. For a while, we had it good. We had a strict order to howler halt three times. If they don’t stop we were told to go ahead and shoot, no matter whom it is. When we knew it was a deer, we would say HALT-HALT-HALT and BANG!

My next-door neighbor, Etian Leblanc, was our cook overseas. We would kill the deer and he would cook it. We wouldn’t let him guard. We’d tell him, “Go get ready with your knife sharpener.” He cooked it in a hurry, because we were always on the move. It was a good brown gravy and we ate quite a few.

What we were doing was very important. Our job, guarding those airfields, was a very important job. There were Germans and spies all over the place.

We took a ship to North Africa in 1943. In Oran, our first duty was to guard prisoners. Then we were put guarding the port. We had problems with the locals, the Arabs. A lot of them wouldn’t listen. There was a lot of stealing going on from the Africans and the Americans. That’s why you had to have tuff guys on guard at the ports and at the entrances. We could take care of ourselves because we had a lot of training.

I had a French girlfriend and I took her to dances. My French helped me out a lot when I was in Africa.

After a few months time, we were put into the 202nd Combat Infantry Battalion and they made MPs out of us. They moved us around a lot. We went to Algiers for a while. And then they shipped us to Italy.

We landed on the Anzio beachhead. The infantry was already on the beach. I was in the 71st MP Company. We left Africa on five LSTs. On the radio, the German news commentator told us what time we left and what time we were going to land. They knew that we were coming. We landed and bombs were falling about a quarter of a mile from us. We got on the beach and tug foxholes.

We followed the infantry into Rome. When we got to the border of Rome, we couldn’t go in for a few days because Rome was declared an open city. I was in the first jeep that went into Rome as military police.

I drove a Harley Davidson motorcycle. Our company got six brand new ones and we road them around Rome. We were guarding a general. We would surround his car with motorcycles on four sides.

There were a lot of German soldiers and officers hiding in Rome. Our job was to go through the city and the hotels and the buildings to get them out. I’d ask the clerk where they were. I’d poke him with my bayonet and tell him to tell me what room the Germans were in—a teleshon [what room]. He knew what I was asking. We’d knock on the door and ask them to come out. If they wouldn’t then we’d tie a hand-grenade to the door and run around the corner.

They had a lot of German snipers in Rome. One sniper shot at our officer. And we all unloaded on him. Those Cajun soldiers were tough. They could handle themselves in a fight. We fought hard for our country. That’s what they need over there in Iraq: a couple of good ole Cajun soldiers.

Irma Darphine, Jason Theriot:

-Graduated high school in 1939 and moved to Port Arthur, Texas for medical training
-She had to be a registered nurse in order to get into the army
-Was at camp Claiborne then John Sealy in Galveston, Texas
-At Sealy when the hospital (127th General Hospital) was activated to go overseas; left August 12 (1943) and took 10 days to get to New York
-Sent to Camp Shanks and missed the ship so they were transferred to Fort Devons in Boston; stayed there till October 13

-Boarded the ship “Martainia” and headed for England; took 15 days, not in a convoy and had to take a detour as the submarines were following them
-Landed in Liverpool in the morning and took a train to south England to Bishop Lydia (near Tauten) to build their first hospital
-It was on an estate’s gardens and they had put in about 45 Quonset huts; the men lived in the manor house but the women stayed in smaller homes nearby
-The hospital opened in November 1943 and kept it going until May (1944); they turned it over to another general hospital

(3:42) D-Day
-Sent near Stonehenge to wait for D-Day; they waited awhile and they lived in tent cities
-They made them march to keep busy as well as conditioning and training; practicing to go down ladders on ships
-They knew about the invasion and that it was coming but they were in a secured location and they weren’t letting them out
-Got on a ship July 31st, an Indian ship, and crossed the Channel; it was a nice ship
-Got on smaller boats (Higgins boats) and landed at Utah beach with the whole staff; 100 nurses, 80 officers (MACS and medical doctors) and 250 enlisted men

-Carried with them their bed roll, Musset bag, Val pack, helmets, canteen belts—everything they owned
-The first night stayed at a bombed out church and then later they built a tent city; maybe stayed there for about 5 weeks (close to Sainte-Mère-Église as holding zone)
-No Germans, the women were well protected and never close up to the Germans
-They kept going until the big trucks came to take them to Rennes, France; opened the second hospital
-It wasn’t too safe at Rennes as they weren’t allowed to go out of their dorms and buildings as there were German snipers; had to clean it all from the mess that the Germans made
-Stayed there for about 9 months and left January 1 (1945)

(11:42) Started for Nancy, France
-Put them on a train, outside was cold
-Nancy wasn’t completely secured so they had to wait in Paris (Battle of Bulge was happening); had some R&R
-Back at Rennes they had worked 12-16 hours a day; were bringing in soldiers from ships as they were near the Brittany Peninsula

-At Rennes, Darphine worked in the orthopedic ward and when in England it was the Hepatitis ward
-If the men could walk they were sent back to the front
-She remembers the first soldier they lost at Sandhill, England and it broke everyone’s heart
-They even had a German pilot there but she doesn’t know what happened to him afterwards

(14:43) Nancy
-Stayed in a chateau and had to walk through a village to the hospital; it was cold and there was snow but the Army kept them well supplied
-It was not a bad experience more of a sad experience; weren’t close to any fighting
-It was rewarding for what they did and they were glad to do it
-Had 2 brothers in the war; the oldest in the infantry and the younger one in the Navy
-The older one was wounded in Metz and transferred to the air force

(17:03) Meeting her older brother in France
-Darphine had had an appendectomy and was recovering so she was working the ward with the POWs
-She was smoking when her older brother came up to her; hadn’t seen him in 2 years
-He took her to Mont-Saint-Michel with friends (island castle off of France)

-She saw him again in Marseilles as he was in the air transport command and at her port of debarkation
-He took her and some friends out on a boat in the Mediterranean
-He was a captain so he was able to get things

(19:15) Back to Nancy
-They had to walk through a village to get to the hospital
-Had a friend that befriended a little girl and gave the girl her first toothbrush
-Looking at some photos of them
-They’d give the children candy, gum or chocolate when they had it and if they didn’t the children would throw things at them; Darphine had something dead thrown at her once

-Towards the end of the war the POWs would farm for them
-They had a dry cleaning establishment, shined the women’s shoes and waited on them in the cafeterias
-They were happy to get out of the army and the war; never made any trouble
-The ladies from other hospitals made baseball teams and they’d play against each other
-Since they were a Texas hospital they had a longhorn for their sign
-The locals started bringing their animals to them thinking they were a veterinarian clinic
-The French people she met were nice

(33:54) Return Trip
-Nancy was their last stopping place
-Got on a train to Marseilles and given immunization and flu shots; half of them got sick
-Also where she met her older brother again; he got to fly home and beat her
-They got on a ship, “Breckenridge;” it was 2 years and couple of days to the day of when she left, October 1945

-Landed in Newport News and were given the opportunity to call home; her parents were so happy to hear her
-They hadn’t heard each other’s voices in 2 years
-Took a train to San Antonio for debriefing before going home
-Her parents didn’t know when she was coming home

Transcription Begins:

Irma Boullier(?) Darphine
Born: August 8, 1922
Crowley, now living in Iota
ETO
Nurse, 127th General Hospital

I was originally from Crowley. I graduated from High School in 1939 and then went to Port Arthur, Texas for my medical training. You had to be a registered nurse in order to get into the Army. On July 7, 1943, I was headed to Claiborne, right here south of Alexandria. That’s where I got into the 127th General Hospital.

The hospital was activated at John Sealy in Galveston, Texas. On August 12 we were headed to New York. It took us about 10 days or so to get to Camp Shanks, New York, but we had missed our ship. From there we were transferred to Camp Devons in Boston. We stayed there until October 13, 1943. On October 13, we boarded a ship, the Martainia, and headed for England. It took us about 15 days. We landed in Liverpool. We were greeted by a band playing American songs and the Red Cross gave out donuts; it was pretty neat. It was dreary and dark when we got off that ship. Then they took us down to South England about seven miles south of Tauten to a little town called Bishop Lydia. This is where we set up our first hospital. It was on a big estate and they had torn down the gardens and they had put in about 45 Quonset huts. We lived in homes close by. We opened that hospital in November of ’43 and we kept it going until May of ’44.

Then we were set up in a tent city near Stonehenge waiting for D-Day. They were trying to keep us busy with constant marching, and conditioning, all the while they were training us. We had to practice going down the sides of ships with ladders and what have you. We were in a secure area but we knew the invasion was coming. We didn’t know about the casualties from the invasion. We had already closed down our hospital by the time it began, so we were just waiting to go.

We got on an Indian ship on July 31 and the Channel was just as smooth as ice. We crossed over on this beautiful ship; it was the calm before the storm. When we got close to the beach we had to climb down the nets to get on smaller boats—Higgins boats—and then we came up on Utah beach with our entire hospital staff. We were 100 nurses and 80 officers—medical doctors and MACs—and about 250 enlisted men. Most of them were from the south Texas area.

We landed on Utah beach on July 31st. We splashed landed and that’s when we got off. I carried a musset bag, a bed roll, a val pack, and of course our helmets with our canteen belts and all of our eating utensils. We carried everything we owned.

The first night we stayed in a bombed out church in St. Mare Eglise because we couldn’t be out in the fields. We had too much of our own anti-aircraft guns shooting in the air and it was dangerous to be out in the open. The next day we set up a tent city where we stayed for about 5 weeks. We were maybe 10 or 12 miles from the beach. We were holding out until it was safe enough to move closer in land.

I remember one time we had these big water jugs hanging from a tripod and these little French kids came over and they were using our water and splashing their faces and all. The kids had got into a minefield and it had peppered their faces, but it wasn’t too bad. So, it wasn’t too cleared out and we had to be careful.

We were well protected and we were working in a safe zone. The Army really took good care of us—the females, the ladies. We kept going until the big trucks came and got us and we went on into Reinnes. It was a sad sight to see because we had to go through all the little burned out cities. When we got to Reinnes, that’s where we opened our second hospital. We were in the Brittany Peninsula and the Germans were bombing ships so we would treat the wounded from that. We were really busy. They were bringing in soldiers from all over and we worked sometimes 12 to 16 hours a day.

I worked in the orthopedic ward. If they could walk around, they were sent back to the front, whether or not they were well enough. I hated to see them go like that. We had some serious injuries and I’ll never forget the first one who died in Sandhill, England. It seemed like it broke everyone’s heart. I guess we just thought that we weren’t going to loose anybody. This doctor jumped on him and tried to resuscitate him. He was a real young boy. We even treated a German pilot who had been shot down. Some of our American soldiers were walking around at night and they came upon this German pilot who was just wandering around, so they brought him to the hospital. They didn’t know what to do with him. That made history for us.

It wasn’t too safe in Reinnes, because they wouldn’t let us get out of our dormitory in our big buildings. There were a lot of German snipers around, so we had to be careful when walking to the hospital. Our first job was to clean the hospital where the Germans had been. It was filthy, filthy, filthy. They had left so many things that were too dirty to use. I helped clean up the pharmacy and we took things down from way up high on the shelves and through them out of the window. And there were trucks and men that would just haul all this stuff off.

We finally opened it up and it was a beautiful place once it was clean. The Germans were really dirty people, or maybe they were in a hurry to get away. Towards the end, they must not have had time to clean up. So we stayed there about nine months until January 1, 1945. That’s when we started for Nancy. They us put on this train and it wasn’t warm. Nancy wasn’t completely secure by that time so they dropped us off in Paris for a while. The Battle of the Bulge was still going on so we had to hold up in Paris. We had a hotel with warm baths and we took tours of the city. We took group pictures. It was a fabulous time. But the fighting was still going on. It is unbelievable to think that you can be in a place like that and maybe a hundred miles away; they are fighting and killing our men. It’s awful.

In Nancy, we were in a chateau, a nice place, and we had to walk about half a mile through a little village to get to the hospital. It was cold and snow, but it was a nice walk. The Army kept us well supplies with warm clothing and boots.

In Nancy, we had to walk through this village from our dorm to get to the hospital. These little children would come and we would give them chocolate and candy. They were very hungry children. My friend, Penney, befriended this one little girl and they stayed friends after the war. The girl told Penney that she didn’t have a toothbrush until she was 9 years old. These kids didn’t have much.

Our unit was from Texas so we always had a big Longhorn sign in front of hospital. I can remember in Nancy, the town’s people were bringing in their cattle and horses; they thought we were a veterinarian hospital.

The people who lived next to us were nice people. The towns were cleaner as you got closer to Germany. This one clerk at a hotel was very nice. There was a lady who lived in Crowley who had married an American after World War I, so she still had family in France. I was getting letters from back home and so I gathered up a big bag of used clothes and this hotel clerk helped me find this lady’s family.

It really wasn’t a bad experience, but it was a sad experience. Dealing with a big, big hospital, we were not close to any fighting. It was very rewarding and we were proud to be there, but people back home were having emotional problems. My mother and dad had three in the Army at the same time. I had a younger brother over there in the navy who I met up with twice and an older brother who was with the infantry. He was wounded in Metz.

I was recovering from an appendectomy and my brother didn’t know that I smoked. He was a big, big ole fellow and he came in (what town was this in?). I hadn’t seen him in about 2 years. He came over and he looked me and said, “Well this is a fine state of affairs.” He swore up and down that I swallowed that cigarette. That was good meeting him. He knew where I was and somebody sent him right up to the ward where I was working. He took me to Machaey Michelle with a group of his friends and some of my friends. It’s an island off the coast of France with a big castle. When the tide comes in it is isolated from France. But if you get there when the tide is out you can drive right on up to it. It was beautiful.

When we got to Marseilles at the end of the war, my brother was in the air transport command and he was at the port of debarkation. He took us out to the Mediterranean in a boat. It was a really nice trip. My brother was a captain and he was able to get things.

Towards the end of the war, we had a farm of POWs who planted vegetables for us. They also had a dry cleaning establishment. These Germans would come and get our shoes and shine them for us. They waited on us in the cafeterias. They were so happy to out of the army.

Towards the end we had a softball team. Girls from other hospitals would come to play. It wasn’t always gloom and doom. We had some good times, too.

I was a first lieutenant nurse in the 127th General Hospital. We went to the war memorial for women in Washington D.C. in October of 1997.

I went back to Reinnes, France in 1997 and went to the same town were we had our hospital. I talked to this man on the street and asked him if he remembered the 127th. He said, “Yes I remember them. I was 12 years old and I used to deliver papers to them, but I remember they were all very generous.

“The 127th hospital did famously and became one of the most dependable units in France.” Elliot Cutler, Brig. Gen. Army of the United States, August 21, 1945. (what book is this quote from, who is the author, and year of copyright?)

Nancy was our final stopping place. From there we got on a train, the 40 and 8’s and we went to Marseilles. There we were given immunization and flu shots. My brother flew back to the States and beat me home. I came home on a ship, the Breckenridge in October of ‘45. It was almost 2 years and maybe 5 or 6 days to the day since I had been home.

When we landed in Newport News, I saw a WAC who was really working. We got into one of these huge trailer-like things and she was driving it. She drove us to someplace where we could get cleaned up and something to eat and make phone calls. We stood in line to make those phone calls and I called my dad and my mother. They were so emotional. They hadn’t talk to us kids for over two years.

I took a train to San Antonio for a debriefing and then they sent me home.

My parents knew we were coming home but they didn’t know when. My mother was canning stuff and she was mailing it to us overseas; she was mailing cans to anybody overseas. She had a friend whose child was in the service and she was mailing cans to him, too. She would stay up half the night canning things to mail to us. It took an effort from everybody, everybody: the rationing of the shoes, the sugar, the coffee, the gasoline, and the tires. It was different times and look at how the world has changed.

Samuel J. Delcambre, Jason Theriot, Hewitt Theriot, Mrs. Delcambre, unknown man (son? grandson?):

-Enlisted in the Air Corps to dodge the draft in 1942; they needed men very badly and Delcambre was assigned as a gunner
-Sent to Kessler Field for basic gunner training and then to Barksdale Field in Shreveport, LA and assigned to the 93rd Bomb Group, 328th Squadron on a flying crew as a waist gunner
-Immediately sent out to Page Field in Fort Myers, Florida for training; trained as flight crews on coastal patrols for submarines
-Picked up 2 depth chargers once from Barksdale and sunk a surfaced German submarine on the way back to Fort Myers
-After training they were told that they’d be shipped off with new planes to either in the dessert (sand colored) of the Far East or to England (green colored); they got green planes

-Flew to Newfoundland and from there flew as a unit to Scotland; lost a plane going to Scotland in the Arctic Circle in cloud cover, it just disappeared
-Arrived at Alchomberry Field outside of London and September 9 started doing bombing trips; made 8-9 missions from there
-Saw Roy Landry from New Iberia there with the National Guard guarding the field (8:17)
-Got a letter from his mother saying she was glad he was in London as there was a war in North Africa now;
-That day the tanniod came on and said: “All crews in your summer clothes leave and go to your planes immediately;” they were headed to North Africa

(11:42) North Africa
-Flew over Spain and Portugal and landed in Oran, North Africa; they were not supposed to fly over these countries but they were needed urgently
-It was raining all the time at Oran and they lost a plane while it was trying to take off and the wheels collapsed
-Flew them to LG139 in Tobruk, Libya over a battle field in a night trip
-From Libya (LG139) went to Bizerte in December 17 (1942)
-They flew from Oran to Sousse and back, Oran-Sousse-Palermo-Tripoli, Tripoli-Sousse, Tripoli again, Messina-Palermo-Naples, and Palermo-Naples
-They were all over water trips (25 trips in all) and that ended Delcambre’s stay in Africa

(15:00) England
-Next trip was a diversion flown over to England
-On the way spent the night in Gibraltar
-Diversions were dangerous missions
-They had a small group of planes, 2-3, that flew along the German coast to bait their fighters to come out and the main group can then sneak around the back
-Flew this diversion April 13, 1943

(16:14) other diversions
-Then went on to Vegesack and Wilhelmshaven, Germany
-From there to France and then Antwerp, Belgium
-By then had 30 trips and it was May 5, 1943
-Delcambre considers himself lucky as most planes were shot down in diversions

(17:25) left Europe
-Leaving the Air Force/ bomber group they were being briefed for a (#31) mission
-Got to the runway and were ready to leave when a jeep pulled up and grounded the whole group except one who didn’t have enough points to go home
-Sent back to the U.S. and went to Florida for rehabilitation, resigning, resting and recreation
-Gave them a complete physical and Delcambre was put in the hospital as he couldn’t hear
-Afterwards assigned to Charleston, South Carolina First Air Force training center and taught; he was the top man running the school
-He stayed there for 17 months

(19:36) Story of meeting a friend at the school (Frank LeBlanc)

(21:50) Combat Tour of Duty
-First trip out “bagged one” but it’s not on his record; Air Force did not confirm “kills” from bomber crews because of all the crossfire
-They’d have a formation of 3 planes with 10 guns each in one small area; there was no way of knowing who shot who
-But the German planes were faster, smaller and shot cannons so their range was longer; Delcambre’s bombers were known as “P-shooters” as they had such a short range
-If you were going to drop the bombs, had to fly straight and level for 5 minutes before the dropping point; the bombardier then set the Norden Bombsight that figured the trajectory
-Used (the Germans) a box with 5 guns to shoot as a scope and their planes were the targets; if you were hit/crippled and that was when the German fighters got you
-That was the problem but it had to be done this way; lost a lot of men
-Daylight bombing was much more successful as they could see and swarm the Germans

-Got frostbit a few times in 60 degrees below zero and no flack vest but just an oxygen mask
-Flew from anywhere from 20-25 thousand feet; flew “tree-top” level trips and night trips
-Delcambre was diverse and some thanks to his training in hunting submarines down; in Africa they were after Rommel’s supply lines
-Earned the Distinguished Flying Cross once and the Airman’s Medal four times

-Discharged in 1944 and re-signed up for another 2 “hitches,” stayed in for 10 years; they tried to get him to rejoin when the Korean War broke out—his term ended the day before

(29:38) Stories
-They were training for the Ploesti Oil Field raid but Delcambre didn’t get to go as his tour had ended
-His airplane did go and came back; 53 bombers were lost on that trip

-The movie “Memphis Belle” and the B-17 footage

-Defining what it means to be “flack happy;” too many close misses in fighting and becoming nervous
-When training the crews at the school, Delcambre kept seeing Germans in the clouds

-Shot many enemy planes down, as far as he knows; describes how he shot down a plane on his last mission

(37:19)
-Gunners were freestanding and with an air hose and had their heads out the window looking; parachutes were on their back and Delcambre never had to use his

-Shot as an expert with 45 at the shooting range and at gunnery school trained with the .20 caliber machine guns
-Also at gunnery school first time to be in an airplane

-Left New Iberia January 19, 1942 and sworn in February 2, 1942 at Camp Livingston in Alexandria, Louisiana
-Left with Gervais Patout, Lee Castille and Roland Durand; talking about Lee in the Pacific war, he never came back

(41:44) North African campaign trip
-The British 8th Army almost got boxed in Egypt and were pushing Rommel back
-That’s when they came in and were in Tripoli to strafe the town and bomb the ships and go back home
-Shot random and Delcambre shot his down a street while flying; a tree-top level trip

-The purpose was to help the British get out the German in Tripoli
-When at the base (U.S) was told there was a mistake made and they came in an hour later than what was asked for
-While at the base in Fort Slocomb, New York met to 2 British soldiers and they were talking and found they were a part of the 8th Army
-They wanted to thank the bombers that flew over and helped them in Tripoli

-In the Libyan Desert they stayed in tents and the beds were 3 feet underground
-At night it’d get lower than 50 degrees and over a 100 in the day and never rained in the last 40 years—rained the day they left
-Sand was everywhere and the sandstorms were terrible
-Had to be flown to Egypt to take a bath once a month; they were in the middle of nowhere

(Looking at pictures in North Africa)
-Had to wear British uniforms as the British were the only Allies at the time in Libya and the locals (Limies) would shoot at anybody else that was seen as an enemy (Germans and Italians)

(55:40) the French
-Never in France; met some French in Africa that would visit with them
-Tells a story of speaking French in Egypt for a haircut and a shave
-Saw Paps Blue Ribbons Beer and Tabasco Pepper Sauce in Egypt’s restaurants
-They spoke St. Martinville French
-Never given problems for being Cajun
-Had his name spelled “Delcambro” so he was given the nickname “Delcambro the daigo”

(1:03:15) Tunisia
-Where a big fight happened
-Tunis was where the Germans left to go to Italy to get away
-The only thing Delcambre ever did there was just bombing; they were hitting the harbors
-Hit up the staging areas for the Germans to the battle front in Africa

-Re-describing the sinking of the submarine near Florida and how they held depth chargers
-Talking about the German U-boats in the Gulf and how long they might have been there; wives tales
-Flying trips and what they did up there; flying formations
-Ground crews and the Rosie the Riveters that built and kept their planes going

(1:19:58) Talking about people he met from the area during the war; people that they know/knew

Transcription Begins:

Samuel J. Delcambre
6606 Daspit Rd. on Hwy. 86
New Iberia, La. 70563-8945
Born: January 21, 1921
Waist Gunner—B-24
North Africa
Interview conducted by Jason P. Theriot

I enlisted in the Air Corp in January 1942 to join the branch of service of my choice. I left New Iberia with Gervais Patout, Lee Castille and Roland Durand for Camp Livingston, Alexandria, Louisiana.
On February 2, 1942, we were sworn into the Air Corp. Lee Castille and I were split up at Kessler Field after basic training. He went into another outfit and he ended up in the Pacific. He never came back.

I went to Barksdale Field in Shreveport where I was assigned to the 93rd Bomb Group, 328th Squadron as a waist gunner in a B-24.The Air Corp was in desperate need for men at the time. I was immediately shipped out to Tindyl Field, Panama City, Florida, for gunnery school. I shot expert with the .45 caliber because I was a hunter on this end. We flew the AT6 Texan to practice shooting at low targets.

From Tindly Field, I went to Page Field in Fort Myers, Florida for our training. There I joined my squadron and my crew. From the minute we arrived, we got in that B-24 training plane flying coastal patrol looking for submarines. It was the typical training of the time. We didn’t have any machine guns or any bombs. We went on a cross county flight and picked up two depth charges from Barksdale—the only two on the base. On the way to Florida (June 1942) we ran into a surfaced German submarine…and we sank it! It was about a hundred and fifty miles south of Pensacola. The kill was confirmed by the Navy, and the pilot (his name was John L. Jerstad) was awarded the Silver Star for that. A submarine was painted on my airplane, right at the top. They had a lot of submarines in the Gulf. In the beginning, the coastal towns would leave all the lights on, and the Germans could pick up the silhouette of our ships passing by. It was nothing for those U-boats to sink a dozen ships before returning home. We had nothing at the beginning to protect against that. We barely had enough planes to train the pilots.

In the beginning all we had to wear were fleece-lined flying suits. We didn’t see the electric flight suites until later on in the war. Flack-jackets; I never saw that. Armor protection; I never saw that. Earplugs; I never saw that. We ate before we left, and we ate when we came back. We had a little hole to pee in when we were airborne. Over the target, you pee’d in your pants! I was scared up there. If you weren’t scared up there, then you were crazy. I believe that I was the only one who prayed in French and in English at the same time. The 93rd Bomb Group lost over a hundred planes in the war…we were lucky.

We were told that we were being shipped off. If we got sand-colored planes we were going to Egypt and North Africa; if we got the green planes we were going to England. We got the green ones. We modified our planes with bulletproof tanks. We flew as a unit to Scotland. We were the first group to go as a unit. We lost a plane on the way—Friday’s Cat. I signal them, and they flashed back to me. That was the last time anyone saw them. They just disappeared. We were up in the Arctic Circle. If you crash land in that; you’re good for about thirty minutes.

I arrived at Alcholmberry Field right outside of London. On the ninth of September we started our bombing trips. We made eight or nine missions from that field. On my first trip out, I got me a “kill,” but the Air Force doesn’t confirm “kills” from bomber crews because of all of the crossfire from the formations that we flew. We’d have planes stacked up and bunched up in a little area, and we got ten guns each, so anybody come in is gonna have a bunch of guns on him at one time. But, those German planes had the advantage on us; they were faster, they were smaller, and they shot cannons—their range was longer. We were shooting “P-shooters,” and our range was not that long.

In order for us to drop our bombs properly, we had to fly straight and level for five minutes. Within those five minutes the bombardier set that Norden Bombsight, which did everything for you to figure the trajectory of those bombs going down. So, we were flying straight, and they (German AAA) knew our altitude. They used a box, just like five men in a blind shooting at one duck, so those five men shot where that duck had to go. They were using at least a thousand guns over the targets we were bombing. And they were told to shoot in that box and keep right on shooting. When they crippled you, that’s when the fighters would get ya.

We lost a lot of planes and a lot of men like that. But that is where the big, big problem was; we had to do it that way. And that’s why daylight bombing was such a success. We just swarmed them, that’s all. But, they knocked down a lot of airplanes. I saw a lot of bombers blow up. And in my case I was lucky; I got away with just losing my hearing.

I got frostbit a few times in sixty degree below weather with no flak vest, just an oxygen mask. When we first started flying we didn’t have the electric suits; that came later on. Our bombing runs were anywhere from twenty to twenty-five thousand feet. But I flew three or four missions “on the ground” —treetop level trips. I flew some night trips, too. I’m diversified.

We were really after those submarines in the beginning. We tried to hold them down, so they wouldn’t get to our shipping. When we got to North Africa, we were after Rommel’s supply lines. We went after his shipping to keep that down.

One morning I was headed to my plane for a mission. I was the first one there, it was dark, and I got challenged: this fella hollered, “Halt, who goes there?” I said “its Sam Delcambre, member of the crew.” This fella hollered back, “Sam, you ole SOB, come here!” I walked up to him, and it was Roy Landry from New Iberia on Orange Street. He was with the National Guard unit and they were pulling guard duty on the airfield.

I got a letter from my mama one day and she said that she was glad that I was not in North Africa, because they had started a war over there. She didn’t know that I had already completed nine missions. Soon after, the tannoid came on and it said, “All crews report to your planes with your summer clothes on immediately.” We were on our way to North Africa.

From England we flew across Spain and Portugal to Oran in North Africa. We were not supposed to fly across those countries. Our colonel, Colonel Timberlake said, “Sometimes you’ve got to bend the rules to save men.”

The British 8th Army got boxed in Egypt, and after the battle at El Alamin, Montgomery started pushing Rommel back. That’s when we came in. We landed in Oran; it was rainy and muddy. We flew to Bizertte, and then on a night trip to LG139, which is in Tobruk, Libya in December 17, 1942. Those British troops were around Tripoli, and we got an order to go to Tripoli at eight in the morning, strafe the town on our way to the harbor, drop our bombs on the German ships in the harbor, and strafe the town on our way back home. This was a tree-top-level run. I remember just shooting my gun down the street. The purpose of that trip was to assist the British 8th Army to get the Germans out of Tripoli, so we did that. But, come to find out, there was a mess up with the time. We really got there an hour late. I didn’t know anything about this mission until I came back to the U.S. at Fort Slocomb in New York waiting to be shipped home. I was in town and I ran into two British soldiers in New York. And they were “PO’ed” until they were fighting mad. So I got to talking to them. They were mad because they had to fly their planes all the way east, through the U.S. just to get back home from Egypt. They called everybody “blokes.” They said what they really wish they could do was to meet the men in those bombers that flew over Tripoli that morning that we flew that mission. I asked him why. He said, “I was a satchel man.” And there was this German pillbox with machine guns in front of him. He was ordered to drop that satchel charge in the pillbox. Just when he was getting ready to do this, here comes our bombers, strafing the whole damn area and the Germans came out with their hands up saying, “Kapult!” We flew over and machine-gunned the area, and the Germans gave up. And here’s these British boys getting ready to throw a satchel of dynamite in a pillbox. We saved their lives: the Germans and the British.

We lived in tents in the Libyan Desert, and our beds were three feet under ground. In the desert it was in the fifties and lower at night, and it was up to a hundred during the daytime. It hadn’t rained there in forty years. Sand…sand everywhere. When a sand storm would come up in the desert, you couldn’t see your face; you had to use a compass to go to the mess tent. We had one canteen of water a day. All we had was Spam and powdered eggs, and you took a bath once a month. They flew us to Egypt so we could have a bath. We didn’t have any camps or airports; it was just a landing strip, the desert, and us. We were wide open, in the middle of nowhere: no fences, no roads, no nothing. This was the battlefield and there was nothing but wreckage everywhere. The nearest big city was Tobruk, twenty miles away. The harbor there was full of ships—from the bottom up. North Africa was really something. (He has a picture of British gas truck and a busted up Stuka dive bomber)

We had three stripes painted on our tail rudder: a red, white, and blue stripe. That was our color code. That was the only international marker that we had in North Africa, and we wore British uniforms. That was for survival. You see, before we got there (Libya) the only people on the desert were British and Germans (and Italians). The Americans were new to this war. The “Limies” would shot at anything that wasn’t British or didn’t have a British marking or uniform on. So we all wore British uniforms. The next war that we are going to fight has started already; and what is the enemy doing today? —he is dressed like an American civilian. The civilians are going to catch it in the next round.

The French were not too far from us. They would come to our area and visit with us now and then. (He has a picture of he and a French Legionnaire) I was bilingual and I could speak with them. One time I went to Egypt to get a shave, a haircut, and a bath. The barber was an albino. I told him: “Raze sa propre” (Meaning: shave it clean). He said, “Mustachio jamain,” (Meaning: the barber never cuts the mustache). He shaved my face, but he didn’t want to shave my mustache. I went to a restaurant in Ismailia, Egypt on Lake Bitter, and on the table was Paps Blue Ribbon bear, Tabasco Pepper Sauce, and they served me pot roast, just like momma used to make it. They spoke St. Martinville French. I was lucky that I was born and raised in this part of the country and taught a little bit of French from my parents. I was never called any names, except a typewriter error misspelled my name; they spelled it DELCAMBRO—some people called me “Delcambro the Daigo.”

Our job in Tunisia was to bomb German and Italian shipping. We lived in the desert and flew missions everyday. We were bombing the harbors in the Mediterranean; Naples, Messina, Palermo, Tunis—all of these were staging areas for the Germans to move supplies to the battle front. We were sinking all of their ships that were re-supplying North Africa. We flew to Sousse, Sousse, Palermo, Tripoli, Tripoli, Sousse, Tripoli again, Messina, Palermo, Naples, Palermo, Naples; all were over-water trips. That all gave me twenty-five trips in; the date was February 15, 1943. That ended my stay in Africa.
My next trip was a diversion, flown out of England. On the way to England, I spent the night in Gibraltar. A diversion is a very dangerous mission. Not many planes make it back from a diversion. They sent a small group of planes—three, two, something like that—to fly around the German coast and suck the fighters out, so the main group can sneak around the back door. I flew this mission on April 13, 1943. I’m lucky I made it.

From there I went to Vegesack, Germany, and Wilhelmshaven, Germany. I went to France then Antwerp, Belgium. By that time I had thirty trips in and it was May 5th, 1943. Immediately after our 30th mission they grounded us. We started training for the Ploesti Oil Field raid, but I didn’t make that trip. I had had my thirty missions, and my tour was over, so they sent me home. I couldn’t even light a cigarette after they ground us, because I was shaking to pieces. My airplane, Jerk’s Natural, went on the mission. It was one of the few that made it back in one piece. They lost fifty-three bombers on that trip; that’s 530 men. The original pilot was killed on one of the Ploesti raids. They were two or three Congressional Medal of Honors awarded on that trip. It was a low-level trip against the oil fields in Romania. It was a two-thousand-mile trip. They had to use auxiliary tanks for that mileage. The B-24 was the only long-range bomber that they had. All the other bombers could not go there. The B-17 could not compare to what the 24 could do. It could carry a much bigger load, much further, but it was a box. They called it the “pregnant cow,” and they had all kinds of names for. It was not a beautiful airplane, but it was a worker. It flew all over the world.

We had the best ground crews in the world. They were dedicated and they took good care of those airplanes. The finest workers built our planes: Rosie the Riveter did more to win the war than anybody else. They are the ladies, the girls, the work force that got into all of those planes and tanks to build that stuff which allowed the men in the factories to go off to war.

I shot at enemy airplanes on many a trip. And I didn’t get another good shooting on an airplane until the last trip that I made, which I think I got another one. That plane was coming in straight from the nose. He came in the front and passed over my plane, and I was on the [left] side. As soon as he cleared those engines I let him have it. He went down through the formation, but I don’t know what happened to him. I saw the pilot though. He was just a little bit further than my garage, so I know that I hit him, I gave him a burst right in his engine.

We flew in ‘V’ formations for protection. First of all you could fly right behind another plane because of the “prop-wash;” you would lose control. We flew in a box. And anytime an enemy plane came in that box, we had several guns pointed at him at the same time.

The waist gunners were freestanding. The only thing we have attached the airplane is an air hose. You gotcha gun in your hand, your parachute on your back, and your head out the window all the time. You keep looking and watching. I had shot expert at gunnery school with the .20 caliber machine guns, but we never trained to use a parachute. I turned my parachute in, after my tour was over, and it was unused. I was just a poor boy from the country and I had never been in an airplane before.

When I left the bomber group, we were being briefed for the next mission; it would have been number thirty-one for me. They briefed us; we got into our planes, got up on the runway, revved up our engines, checked all of our mags, and waited for the signal. Right when we got the signal to take off a jeep pulled up in front of us, flagging us down. We stopped. They pulled the whole crew off, except one man, and grounded us permanently.

I had suffered from “flak-happy,” just like those bicycle courriers in New York—they get traffic happy. They get so many misses that it’s not even funny. “Flak-happy” happens every time you go up there on a mission; you got a thousand guns shooting at you. As long as you see that black smoke, don’t worry, but as soon as you start seeing that red ball, they’re close. And when you start hearing them barking like dogs, or like somebody beating on a drum—Boom—they’re getting close. That’s how I lost my hearing.

I flew in that stuff for thirty trips. Some trips were eight to ten hours. We stayed up there a long time. They were shorter when we would leave from England, but over the desert, we’d leave at noon and we’d bomb at dusk, and we’d get back around mid-night. “Flak-happy” is when you are completely fatigued; you just break down.

I came back to the United States and went to Florida for rehabilitation, resigning, resting and recreation, and they gave us a complete physical. Well they put me in the hospital because I couldn’t hear anymore. I had “bum-ears.” I was reassigned to Charleston, South Carolina, First Air Force training center. I was the top-man for running the school for the Air Force. We checked out the new crews and I stayed there for seventeen months. On those first couple of training flights over the ocean I could see [imaginary] fighters in the clouds; that was from being “flak-happy.” It took me a while to break that. Man, wow, it was bad.

That was my tour of duty during the war. I can’t say that I was a valuable man for the Air Force, but they thought I was because I earned the Distinguished Flying Cross once and the Airman’s Medal four times.

(*You had me read an article about one of your missions over the Brest Peninsula; the article mentioned you as “Waist-gunner, Samuel J. Delcambre, a Cajun from New Iberia, La. saw the crew of the stricken ship…” This was from Captain Author Gordon, 8th AAF. Air Force Journal, October 1943. I would like a copy of that article to accompany your story)