Descending from the Clouds

by Wurst, Spencer F. ; Wurst, Gayle;

  Shortly after I enlisted, we were told that the 28th Division would participate in field army maneuvers at a base camp near Ogdensburg, in upstate New York. Annual training time was extended to three weeks from the usual two. We were billeted in six- or eight-man tents laid out in company streets. I was impressed with what I saw: the horse cavalry units, many large artillery guns, observation balloons, and Army planes. As I was only fifteen and had never been away from home for so long, I did feel homesick. The song “Sierra Sue” still sticks in my mind and reminds me of those days: Just like the song, I was full of sadness and loneliness. I went to town once but quickly returned to camp because the soldiers were so thick I could hardly walk on the streets.

  I sometimes wonder if the Army maneuvers of 1940 weren’t undertaken just to publicize the shortage of weapons and training. When we went on maneuvers in August, our only real weapons were the .45-caliber pistols we carried as individual weapons, and .30-caliber water-cooled machine guns dating from World War I. The antitank platoon built wooden mock-ups of the .50-caliber machine gun, and the 81mm mortar platoon carried lengths of stovepipe or steel pipe with a wooden base plate to simulate actual weapons.

  Mobility was also a real problem. The machine gun platoon had a two-wheeled cart for each machine gun squad, with rubber-tired wheels and a draw bar so two men could pull the cart. We mounted the tripod on the cart, mounted the gun on the tripod, and then lugged away. If we were lucky, we got to pull the cart along a road; if we were unlucky, we would have to hand-carry the gun across rough terrain. This meant we had to carry either a 51-pound tripod or a 33-pound water-cooled gun or two 20-pound ammo boxes—quite a load for a kid like me at 5 feet 8 inches and 128 pounds. We also carried heavy-walled steel water cans used to cool the barrel of the .30-caliber machine guns. Once the guns started firing and heating up the barrels, the water moved from the jacket around the barrel into the water can and recirculated.

  Thus was our condition when we participated in a parade of division-size or larger, where the honored guests were the President of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and the Prime Minister of Canada. We marched a good number of miles to the parade grounds, all the while lugging those damn machine gun carts in the August sun. We were in our old Class A uniforms—wool trousers, khaki shirt, heavy blouse, issue shoes, canvas leggings, and World War I helmets—the round type seen in the British Army up into World War II. We must have looked downright silly marching in review in this get-up with relics and painted sticks for weapons, especially when we tried to perform the order “eyes right” while pulling a machine gun cart.

  As for our training, the situation reminds me of a remark by a soldier I later had under my command, who was pretty dull about learning. The major general commanding our division dropped in on our training exercises and asked this soldier exactly what he thought he was doing. He replied, “Well, Sir, I think I’m just following them there fellers.” That was about what a lot of us were doing in the Army maneuvers of 1940—just following them there fellers. Very seldom, if ever, did we understand the tactical situation or the types of maneuvers in which we were involved.

  During this time, I was also learning (or not learning) how to handle my full-blown adolescent rebellion. I could not tolerate what I considered to be unfairness or stupidity on the part of my superiors. This regularly earned me the opportunity to reconsider the wisdom of my fifteen years while performing extra work details. One incident had to do with the garbage pit. The Army was leasing the land for maneuvers from private owners, and the leases protected the owners’ rights. Each company had a garbage pit five to six feet deep, and one of the stipulations was that no solid matter would be buried in the ground above a certain depth. Once when we were cleaning camp, we threw some excess blocks of ice in the pit and covered them with dirt. That day, the owner came with a long metal rod, checking for buried solid material. He sank the rod into the garbage pit, and of course he had to hit an ice block. He just would not believe it was a chunk of ice. I got on the work detail to dig up the whole damn sloppy mess, while he stood over us and looked on. By the time we’d finished, I felt like burying him in the pit with the ice.

  I also vividly remember the huge 30-gallon “piss cans” that were set up in the company street after dark, with an oil lantern marking each location. Every morning, a work detail carried the brimming, sloshing cans to a latrine dug some distance from the end of the company street. It was a bad duty, especially if some of the older men had had a beer party. The carrying detail served as punishment for soldiers who got on some NCO’s list. I managed to get that detail a couple of times too.

  My life, however, was soon to change in a very big way. When the draft bill was passed in 1940, Congress gave the President the authority to call up the National Guard and bring it into Federal service, and FDR issued mobilization orders. I think all Guardsmen would have been called up sooner, but the Army had no camps or billeting areas for them, and hadn’t yet developed the logistical support base to enlarge rapidly. As a result, the Guard divisions and some smaller units were ordered to active duty as the housing became available. Initially, soldiers were to serve one year on active duty, then return home to inactive duty status. In a popular song, a soldier sang farewell to his sweetheart. The lyrics were sad enough, but the idea was that he would be back in a year. I thought of those lyrics many times while soldiering throughout 1942, 1943, 1944, and 1945.

  I quit school the day before I was inducted into the Army. My induction took place on a cold, blustery February 17, 1941. We fell into company formation, Sergeant Rohaly called the roll, and we each took one step forward and answered “Here!” At the end of roll call, we all raised our right hand, an officer read the oath of office to us, and we all repeated it. And so we went from being a National Guard unit to a unit of the Army of the United States.

  Quitting high school to go into the Army as a sixteen-year-old was completely in keeping with my private circumstances and the larger social context. In those times, one did not plan the future in terms of years—high school, college, career, and so forth—but in terms of days, weeks, and months. We were in a long and hard depression; jobs were scarce, and young men went into Civilian Conservation Corps camps to send money home to feed their families. The percentage of youths completing high school was low because children had to quit school to help support their families. Only the rich could afford to send their children to college. Even families that maintained strong family ties and loyalties had difficulty keeping themselves together.

  I had not been part of a family group for years; I had been living with others, more or less as an intruder. I mean no criticism of my sister or others who took me in; the fact is, I felt like a perpetual outsider. My brother Vern, who was three years older, was off in Florida much of the time, searching for our mother. He was having a hard enough time scrounging up jobs to take care of himself alone. He finally joined the Navy just to get something to eat, enlisting for a six-year stint in December 1940.

  These were the bleak facts of my family life. Because of them, I might have romanticized the Army. The restlessness of youth and the possibility of being recognized as an individual certainly played a part in my enlistment.

  The entire 2d Battalion, 112th Infantry, was stationed at the Armory in Erie, which is still in use at 6th and Parade Street. Everyone had to take a thorough physical examination to make sure he met the standards and didn’t hide any defects or history of illnesses. An Army formation call, “short-arm inspection,” was also my introduction to sex education. The uniform was raincoats only. A medical officer inspected our private parts for VD, body lice, and crabs. I had never heard of VD or body lice before this.

  Once we were in the Army, all the underage soldiers were especially eager to prove how adult we really were by indulging in excessive drinking. In civilian establishments, no one wearing a uniform was ever asked to show an ID. We could buy alcohol at any store that sold it, or step right up to a bar and be s
erved. The surge of assurance this gave us made us think that drinking was one of the main benefits of enlisted life. Starting with our first days at the Armory, for many of us underage soldiers drinking simply became synonymous with fun.

  In the beginning, of course, it didn’t take much alcohol to make us lose control. I remember one underage friend going to the PX for a drink. The entrance had a landing with six to eight steps. Coming out, he tripped on the first one, rolled head-over-heels to the bottom, got up, dusted himself off, and wobbled back to the barracks. I know he didn’t have more than one beer. It is said that God looks after drunks and babies, and we were living proof that this is true.

  Not long after we were inducted, we moved to Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania, where the new military reservation was still under construction. I arranged for my father to pick up a girl I’d been dating and bring her to the station so we could say our good-byes. My dad did pick my girlfriend up, but in the turmoil and commotion we couldn’t find each other. I was bitterly disappointed as we re-formed ranks and loaded onto the train. We had Pullman sleepers and were riding first-class now that we were in the Army, and I shed a few tears in the loneliness of my bunk that evening as the train made its way toward Indiantown Gap.

  Chapter 2

  Mobilization, Basic, and Small Unit Training

  We arrived at Indiantown Gap Military Reservation the next day. Big packages in cardboard boxes were stacked in snowdrifts outside our barracks. These, we discovered, were our bunks and mattresses. Before we could go to bed, we had to break them out of the piles of snow and ice and set them up. We also had to make a fire, but we hadn’t had much experience with coal-fired hot-air heating systems. It took a few days to get the technique, and we spent some pretty cold nights before we got the hang of it.

  We immediately started on basic training, as if we’d been freshly inducted. At 5:00 or 5:30 A.M., we fell out for reveille, while the regimental band marched up and down the street playing snappy tunes like “Roll Out the Barrel” and “You Are My Sunshine.” The reveille gun, a 105mm cannon on the top of a big hill, boomed out every morning, but First Sergeant Rohaly was usually into the squad rooms long before, blowing on his whistle to shock us out of bed.

  Our training area was on a high point, Gobbler’s Knob. We formed up in the company streets, marched out into a battalion column, and on past the band. Indiantown Gap still lacked sufficient accommodations to conduct large classes indoors, so regardless of snowstorms and blizzards, up the hill we marched to huddle together in the freezing weather to listen to basic training lectures on “military courtesy” and “customs of the service.” Literally shivering in our boots, we learned when to salute officers, how to request permission to speak to the company commander, who should walk to the right or left in a group of mixed rank, and other such items of vital combat interest.

  Many of our officers and NCOs were inexperienced, and we suffered from the lack of qualified instructors. And so I discovered field manuals. These were issued for every training subject, and I found I could get better information by studying on my own. Before long, I got the reputation of being a little smart ass. This didn’t bother me. Maybe I wasn’t too diplomatic in correcting my instructors, but afterward they hit the manuals themselves. I thought that having to learn the wrong way was twice as bad as learning the right way, because first you had to unlearn before you could learn.

  After our morning lectures, we engaged in training until 5:30 P.M. At the end of the day, we always stood retreat, an honor ceremony conducted while the national colors were lowered. Preceding this, we underwent strict personal, uniform, and weapons inspection, during which we were often asked questions on military subjects. Some of the slower men had trouble remembering their serial numbers. The platoon leader always asked me: “Have you shaved today?” Being only sixteen, I didn’t have a beard; let’s just say I was a little fuzzy. The first time I answered, “No, I didn’t think I had a beard, Sir.” He instructed me to shave daily, whether I needed it or not. And so I came to grow a heavy beard in my youth.

  It was a pretty full day for a sixteen-year-old. Many nights I went to bed around 8:00, and slept through until 5:00 the next morning. In addition to two heavy wool blankets, they issued us a good quality, single-size comforter. We did manage to sleep warm, after we got the knack of maintaining a good, hot fire in the coal boilers, but we experienced so many respiratory diseases that we were often placed in quarantine. Finally, we erected shelter halves between bunks in an attempt to block the spread of germs from coughing and sneezing. Treatment did not include antibiotics; penicillin was yet to come as the wonder drug of the future.

  Part of our basic training was learning to perform interior guard. This is the type of guard seen in movies, where the soldier marches back and forth with a rifle on his shoulder. Among the duties was guarding prisoners in the regimental guardhouse. Confinements lasted up to twenty-four hours while a prisoner’s punishment was decided. Every regiment had a couple people who thought they knew everything about the military judicial system. We had one of these “guardhouse lawyers” in Company H who maintained that if a prisoner escaped from an interior guard, the guard would have to serve the prisoner’s term.

  I had a good scare about this early on when I was guarding a prisoner in the regimental area. I had an urgent call of nature, and informed the prisoner I was going to the barracks. I told him to stay close, and he gave me his word. I do not know why I did not take him in with me. I was certainly too pressed to go through the correct procedures, which required putting the prisoner under lock-and-key before going to the latrine, or calling for the corporal-of-the-guard. This would have meant hollering out, “Corporal-of-the-guard, post number five,” then waiting as the guard at each post passed the call all the way up to the guardhouse, and the corporal came running to see what I needed.

  When I came out of the latrine, my prisoner was nowhere in sight. I almost panicked; I was sure I would have to serve his sentence. As it turned out, he’d noted my inexperience, and decided to hide as a joke. Fortunately, he came out before I called the corporal-of-the-guard. This experience taught me two lessons right from the start: never trust a prisoner, and follow regulations.

  I also pulled kitchen police duty. This was a very tough proposition. KP meant reporting to the mess hall at 3:30 or 4:00 A.M., and often working until 8:30 or 9:00 P.M. How bad it was depended on the mess sergeant, and ours was inexperienced and difficult. Being young and a bit of a rebel, I got into heated discussions with him. One day, in retaliation for some lip, he gave me the filthiest job of all, cleaning the grease trap for the kitchen sinks. This was a metal box about two and a half feet long, a foot and a half wide, and a good two feet deep, that caught all the greasy drainage from the kitchen.

  It was a dirty, stinking job—and he ordered me to clean it out with my bare hands. I rebelled and said I wasn’t about to do it without a tool. When he retorted that he didn’t have any tools, I said that in that case, they’d better call the first sergeant to escort me to the guardhouse. So they called Sergeant Rohaly, and a compromise was reached. I was provided with a long-handled dipper and was allowed to wear my gas mask. I didn’t make many friends in the mess hall.

  We trained from Monday morning until Saturday noon. When we started small-unit training, we added one or two periods of night training a week. Saturday morning was usually reserved for a thorough inspection of the barracks, grounds, weapons, and vehicles. Some inspecting officers wore white gloves and ran their hands over window sills and beams to find the smallest bit of dirt or dust.

  In good weather, we marched out to an open field with full field packs, set up our pup tents in a row, and displayed our equipment in front of them. Even mess kits had to be laid out with knife, fork, and spoon properly aligned. The letters stamped on the knife had better be face up, or it was a gig. The clothes on the rack at the end of our bunk had to hang perfectly and in the right sequence; one button undone meant another gig. These minor dis
crepancies often resulted in company punishment for the offenders, or mass punishment to the entire company for the errors of individuals.

  The limitations on administering company punishment were quite strict. A soldier could be confined to quarters on his off-duty training time or be punished with extra work details. This choice was the prerogative of the company commander only, and had to be administered on a formal basis. Nevertheless, between the wars, the Army was very small and the company officers had gotten into the habit of allowing the corporals, sergeants and first sergeant to run the company.

  Further, if anyone did question the NCOs or first sergeant about administering punishment, there was nothing in the manual about additional training. Any NCO who wanted to punish a man could give him a pick and shovel after duty hours and say, “You didn’t dig your last foxhole well enough on the last tactical training exercise, so dig a pit resembling a foxhole.”

  Anything that did not grow was policed up every morning, so if a soldier was caught throwing a cigarette butt on the ground, an NCO could make the offender dig a hole, say four feet deep and three feet across, toss the butt in, and cover it up. The first sergeants called this “extra training to learn the correct way of disposing of a cigarette butt.” We called it chickenshit.

  Rohaly had been indoctrinated in this system of discipline, and he ran the company with an iron hand. Technically, he needed to have the company commander’s approval, and our first lieutenant, an ex-Marine officer, gave him a free rein.

  By spring of 1941, we had several times been quarantined for a week or two because of respiratory illnesses. When we weren’t quarantined, Rohaly punished us for minor discrepancies on Saturday inspections. For a total of six to eight gigs, the whole company would be stuck in camp without passes. He also gave out a lot of extra duty for small violations. We were then forming company streets, trying to get out of the mud by laying rock and shale from a pit about half a mile from our company area. I could often be seen on the shale pile after training hours.