Howard Freyou, Theriot, Mrs. Freyou, Hewitt Theriot:
**references the book USS Maryland from Turner Publishing (1997)**

Pearl Harbor Day

-Was at the park in St. Martinsville, sitting in the car listening to the radio; they came across on the radio with the news; was about 16 years old
-After that he left the family farm and went to Baton Rouge for a year; then left to Morgan City to work in the shipyards for another year
-It was around that time that his father called Freyou to tell him that he had a yellow letter—it was a draft notice
-His father was on the draft board and knew that Freyou was getting the letter and asked him if he really wanted to go or he’d take him off; “So I said what the hell, I’ll go.”

-Had already tried once to get into the merchant marines but he wasn’t 18 yet
-Had gone to the docks in January and was ready to board a ship for the marines before the draft board got him; sent him to the Navy July 1943
-Was sent to boot camp in San Diego and then given a 7 day leave so he got married
-Afterwards sent to California to report on the “USS Tennessee” to go overseas to Pearl Harbor
-Once there was told he was not needed on the ship so they put him up in a hotel to wait for when the dock board needed them; there was about 35 guys from New Iberia there

-Then one morning the board had his name and a dock number
-Didn’t know where this dock was and the chief told him to wait at the launch to be picked up eventually
-No one had told him which ship or where to go at the launch
-Once there the chief told a captain that he had Freyou’s orders as an extra man for their ship
-Went upstairs with him and the chief couldn’t understand Freyou’s accent so they sent him out
-Freyou sat on the deck for about 3 days since he didn’t know where to go and no one could help him since none of them understood what he was saying

-Eventually a man from Tennessee came by and asked Freyou what he was doing on the deck
-Told him he didn’t know as no one told him where he was supposed to be or what division he was even in
-The man sort of understood Freyou and told him to talk a little bit slower and went to the chief to sort out where Freyou could go
-Told them he was a farmer from Louisiana

-They put him on “USS Maryland” (this ship had been at Pearl Harbor during the attack and was one of the few ships that survived) and that’s where he stayed till the end of the war
-He was a trey-man on 5”/51 gun as he had to put the trey down to protect the brass around the gun so when the breech was closed it wouldn’t be damaged when fired
-The ship had 10 of these guns and Freyou was number 10
-His ship was one of the first to have these guns and 16” guns, 20 mm, 40 mm, (names a few others in passing throughout the interview) as well as planes; 2,400 men aboard of the ship

(13:20) First Action
-Boarded the “Maryland” in October 1943 and saw action in Tarawa in November 1943
-Last stop was Okinawa; participated in 7 invasions and 2 sea battles—the Leyte Gulf battle and Surigao Strait battle
-They would shell the islands in the early morning hours till late at night before allowing the marines to take the land
-Use spotter planes to find the pillboxes and blow those up with the 16” guns; the shells weighed over a ton each and could shoot accurately from about 20 miles out
-Freyou was on the 5” guns and shot at planes mostly; everything ran on hydraulics
-The first encounter with a suicide plane (Kamikaze), the pilot was going for the stacks and when Freyou looked out his hole window he could see the pilot’s face
-They opened up the 5”, 20 mm, and 40 mm guns on him; took off the wing and the plane crashed onto the front deck
-As crashing the pilot dropped 2 bombs and one however went through 4 inches of steel straight into the bottom deck of the sick bay and blew up—killed everybody
-Had to go back to Pearl Harbor for repairs; referencing the book and an article that says that 31 men were killed and 29 injured in this attack

(19:53) Okinawa Kamikaze Attack
-The plane that hit them in Okinawa happened when they thought they were secured; weren’t too far off from the island but they had dropped back because they thought it was safe
-Freyou was laying out on the deck when he saw a plane leave the island
-Thought it was American plane circling them so no one shot at it since the ship had been firing on the island all day and had finally stopped that night
-Thought this until the plane dropped a torpedo that was going straight towards them
-Freyou jumped up and took off running towards his gun in the back; referencing a photo on where he was in the book

(22:16)
-After the war was over in Europe Freyou’s crew was sent back to the states to get ready to fight the Japanese
-Went on leave for 38 days and when he came back to the ship, it had been remodeled and his gun had been taken off
-(Looking at picture and commenting on how rough the sea was)
-The Philippine Sea was a rough sea and it was where they hit a really bad storm; was hitting 40-foot sea waves
-“Everybody was carrying a bucket. They'd ask me, "Frenchy, where in the hell is your bucket?" I'd say, "My bucket for what?" They said, "You ain't got sick yet?" I said, "Not yet, but when it gets rough I'm gonna get sick." They said, "well goddamn, how rough it's gotta get for you?" I never did get sick overseas.”

(23:36) Talking
-Looking at pictures; Hewitt and Freyou comparing nicknames for guns they used; war reunions Freyou has been too; only radio was from Tokyo Rose

(29:09) Battle of Leyte Gulf
-The worst sea battle of the war was at Leyte Gulf; was apart in the convoy with Nimitz but they were jammed in that gulf
-What saved them was when Nimitz was called back and he arrived with his planes and dive-bombers
-The last night when Nimitz came back they fought till about midnight using radar
-Sunk and messed up a bunch of Japanese ships—including 2 of the biggest Japanese battleships

(30:50) After the War
-Hewitt and Freyou comparing experiences of battles
-Spent his last year in the Bahamas; was left in charge as he was a hard worker
-His nickname was Frenchy; his wife wrote a letter everyday
-His ship could go 22 knots

-Was at a tent city on Okinawa and was there when a typhoon hit; this was after the war and he was there for occupation for 5 months
-Before being transferred the Marines left first and one had left about 5 tons of dynamite
-Told the younger boys to watch out around that tent; one wasn’t careful one day and set it off, the ground shook when it went off and killed a lot of young men from boot camp
-On Okinawa was in charge of shipping jeeps and equipment back to the states
-“Maryland” was being used as a transport to the states when the Japanese surrendered

-Eventually was given his orders so he left Okinawa to Pearl; at Pearl given orders to go to San Diego on a steam ship
-San Diego didn’t have his orders to so they sent him to Frisco, then Bremington and St. Pedro before sending him back to San Diego and the office had his papers
-Walked off the ship and caught a train in Chicago and went to New Orleans; was in the Navy for 2 years and 5 months
-Was given $300 and discharged; asked him to come back for Korea but he refused

(52:12)the group moves away from recorder and the voices are distant and then Theriot thanks Freyou for his service and cuts out

Transcription Begins:

Howard Freyou
Born January 1925
New Iberia
Battleship Gunner-USS Maryland

On Pearl Harbor Day I was on my way to the park in St. Martinsville in the car. I had my radio on and that's when I heard that they bombed Pearl Harbor. I was about 16. My ship was there; it was one of the few that got out.

After that day I left the farm and I went to work in Baton Rouge. I worked there for about a year. Then I worked at the shipyard in Morgan City for about a year. That's when my daddy called me, he said, "You got a yellow letter here, so you better come home." So I came home and it was a draft notice. But my daddy was on the draft board. He knew they were going to draft me. He told me, he said, "If you want to go you can go, but if you don't want to go I can take you off." So I said what the hell, I'll go.

I had tried to get into the merchant marines, but I wasn't 18 yet. I was at the dock, ready to board a ship when they came and got me, the draft board. They wanted me for the draft. They drafted me into the Navy in July 1943.

I went to San Diego for boot camp. Then I came home on leave for a few days and got married. I went back to California and I was ordered to report to the USS Tennessee. I went overseas on the Tennessee and we went to Pearl (Harbor, Hawaii). When we got there they told me that they didn't need me. So the Navy put me up in a hotel and morning I would go down to the dock and wait to see if I had duty that day. There were about 35 of us from New Iberia there. I walked there one morning and I saw my name on the board- 'Howard Freyou report to so and so dock.' So I asked the chief where was the dock. He told me to go down there and wait at the launch to get picked up. I didn't know where I was going or what ship I was assigned to. They didn't tell me anything. So I went down there at the launch and waited for a ship. He gave my orders to this captain and he told him, he said, "You need an extra man, so I brought you this fella here." So I went with him upstairs, but he couldn't understand me at first. There was a lot of difference in the language. I stayed sitten on that deck for about 3 days, because I didn't know where I was going and nobody could understand me.

Finally this one guy from Tennessee came by and he asked what I was doing. I told him I didn't know. He asked me, "Well what division are you with?" I told him, "I don't know that either, nobody come and tell me anything yet." He kind of understood me, so he said, "Just talk slowly and I'll get you to where you need to go." So he went and talked to the chief. He told the chief, "There's a man down there but he's hard to understand." So the chief asked me, he said, "Where you from?" So I told the boy from Tennessee, and I told him real slow, that I was a farmer from Louisiana. The chief said, "He's a farmer, he'll be a good hand." So they put me on the (USS) Maryland, and that's the ship I served on; all throughout WWII. I went aboard ship on October 14, 1943 as Seaman/3rd Class.

I was a trey-man on a 5”/51 gun. That was a pretty big gun; it was a 5" gun. We had 10-5" guns. I was on number 10. We worked in a small gunroom. It took ten men to fire one of those 5" guns. We had ammunition hanging on the racks in that little room. I helped load the round. I had to put that trey down before they loaded it. My job was to put the trey down to protect the brass around the gun so when they closed the breech it wouldn't damage it when fired.

We had the big 16" guns on there too and the torpedo tubes and the spotter planes. We had 20 mm and 40 mm guns too. There were 2,400 men on board that ship.

My first action was at Tarawa in November of '43. I took part in seven invasions and two sea battles. I was in the Surigao Strait sea battle and the Leyte Gulf sea battle (October 1944).

When we'd start an invasion we would shell an island from early in the morning till late at night. Then the marines would go in. We would use the spotter planes to locate the pillboxes and we'd blow that up with them 16" shells. The shells weighed over a ton each, but everything was run by hydraulics. We could shoot accurately from 20 miles out with those big guns.

But I was on a smaller gun, a 5". We shot at the planes mostly. We could shoot 50 rounds in a little while.

(June 22, 1944) One morning off the coast of Saipan we had dropped anchor. I was on the deck lying down. I had put my shoes under my cap and I saw a plane take off from that island. I thought it was an American plane. That plane came around, and he came around, and he dropped a torpedo and then went off about his business. Nobody even shot at him. Boy when that thing hit us, the deck of that ship jumped about 4 foot. (Two men were killed.) I was lying down and the explosion through me up on my feet. We weren't in general quarters at that time, everybody thought it was an American plane. It did some serious damage. It put a big hole in the bow of the ship. They had the new bow already built by the time we got to Pearl for repairs. They chopped off the front-in and welded that new bow on there.

I was in the worst ship battle in the world, the biggest sea battle ever. That was the Battle of Leyte Gulf (October 23-26, 1944). That's where we busted up the Jap fleet. We were jammed in that Gulf. The Japs tried to lure Nimitz away and they were going to come from behind, but we stayed right in that Gulf. When they called Nimitz back and he arrived with all his planes and dive-bombers, that's what saved us. On that last night we fought till about midnight. We had to use radar. And we sank quite a bit of them. And we messed up a bunch of ships. Two of the big Japanese battleships were sunk there.

(Leyte Gulf. November 29, 1944.) When that first suicide plane was coming to us, I mean it was coming right for the stack, I looked out my hole and I saw that pilot’s face. We opened up with our 5" guns and the 20's and the 40's. We knocked his wing off, but he crashed on the front deck. His bomb made it through four-inches of steel and went down to the bottom deck and blew up. It killed everybody in sick bay. We were in a hell of a fix. We had to come back in to Pearl for repairs.

“Everything close by was demolished in the area. Bulkheads were torn open, lockers smashed, plumbing, lighting and ventilation ducts were ruined as the ship caught fire. Only a few men survived the tremendous concussion in the nearby vicinity of the explosion. Thirty-one men were killed with one officer and 29 men injured.” (USS Maryland. Turner Publishing Company. 1997. P. 12)

(April 7, 1945) In Okinawa we got hit right on top of turret number three by a Kamikaze. I remember this boy was on fire and they jumped on him to try to put the fire out. Then boys kept firing at him, but he hit us. Seventeen were killed on that attack. Only one sailor made it off that turret alive. His name was Justin David.

"A Japanese Kamikaze plane crashed his plane with its 500-pound bomb into the top of turret III. The bomb exploded and all but one of the men manning these mounts were blown form their stations. The gallant seventeen men who stood by their guns on top of the turret until the enemy plane exploded in their midst, had made the supreme sacrifice." (USS Maryland. Turner Publishing Company. 1997. P. 13)

We ran into a storm in the Philippine Sea. We were in 40-foot seas. Everybody was carrying a bucket. They'd ask me, "Frenchy, where in the hell is your bucket?" I'd say, "My bucket for what?" They said, "You ain't got sick yet?" I said, "Not yet, but when it gets rough I'm gonna get sick." They said, "well goddamn, how rough it's gotta get for you?" I never did get sick overseas.

Before we were set to invade Japan they had sent us back to Washington to get remodeled. The war in Europe had just ended. I came home on leave for 38 days. When I got back to port they had changed everything. They added all kinds of new guns. They had added new 40's (mm) and new 20's (mm). The gun that I was on had been taken off.

On our way back to Pearl from getting repairs in the states the war with Japan ended. We dropped the bomb on them. So they let go half of the crew. I was transferred back to Okinawa. I stayed on the island for five-and-a-half months. I was in charge of shipping jeeps and equipment back to the states. I was there for that typhoon. I spent the night in the mess hall in-between two large iceboxes. I thought it was safe there. That wind blew like hell all night. I bet you it blew 200 mph.

After that I went down to the Marine barracks on the other end of the island to get some dry clothes, because all of my clothes were wet. There was a tent right next to my tent where this marine had stored five tons of dynamite and he they didn't tell anybody. He sat down to heat up his food and he wasn't paying attention. I told them boys to be careful when they were fooling around there, but this one boy he let his fire get away from him and that dynamite blew up. I mean it shock the whole island. So I was making my way back with my dry clothes and I could see these people running away. I asked what was going on. I felt the island shock. They said, "You lucky, because I don't believe there's anyone alive over there." That accident killed I don't know how many of them boys.

I'm lucky I'm still alive.

My wife and I wrote letters to each other every day. I was gone for two-and-a-half years.

One morning I went down to the dock and I saw my name on the board again, 'Howard Freyou report to so and so dock." So I went down and they told me to pack my gear; I was going home. Coming home, that was a tour out of this world. I took a steamship from Okinawa to Pearl then to San Diego for my orders. They didn't have my orders there so I went down to Frisco, then to Bremington, then to St. Pedro, then back to San Diego. I made about five ports right there. I went to the office and they finally got my orders. They gave me my papers, and goddamn it I walked off the ship, and that was it. I came back home.

I caught a train in Los Angles and I went to New Orleans. They discharged me and gave me $300 and sent me home.