Once They Were Eagles

by Frank Walton

  “I wasn’t fully awake till then,” Boyington told me, “but I sure as hell woke up fast.”

  Holding into his run, the Black Sheep skipper poured a long burst into three bombers parked on the end of the strip. They exploded as he passed over them. Coming out into the clear over the water, he circled to the left and hurtled into the mouth of Tonolei Harbor, strafing the small boats anchored there.

  The antiaircraft batteries opened up, and in their flashes he made out the outline of a huge destroyer at anchor. He kicked slight right rudder, bore-sighted the destroyer, and held his trigger down. The ground fire intensified as Boyington poured hundreds of rounds into the warship, skimmed over it, and out over the ridge back of the harbor.

  Circling out to the right, he stayed low and searched the coves along the coast of northern Choiseul until he found an enemy barge. He destroyed it with the remainder of his ammunition. Then he returned to Munda and gave Doc back his shoes.

  Later that day, 12 Black Sheep went out again to Bougainville as cover, but not a single enemy plane rose to challenge them. The next day, eight more Black Sheep covered a Marine dive bomber strike on the Kakasa area of Choiseul, and again no enemy planes were sighted.

  Finally, our squadron received a characteristic dispatch from Admiral Halsey: “Your steeplechase over; you are retired to stud.”

  The following morning we all flew to the Russell Islands and got ready to go out of the combat area. While the rest read mail, ate and slept, or went swimming, I worked over my books, bringing squadron records up to date and preparing official reports. The last few days at Munda had been so hectic, I was way behind.

  Busily writing, I heard the door open and a voice say, “Hello, Red.”

  It was Quill Skull Groover, his hair standing straight up as usual. I let out a whoop. “How are you? Are the leg and arm O.K.? Can you fly?”

  “Sure, I can fly. I appreciated your letters and I read about what the Black Sheep were doing, and I sure wished I was along.”

  “Hell, you did your share, boy. But we’ve missed you.”

  About that time some of the gang came in, and an impromptu celebration began.

  A couple of days later, we all loaded into transport planes at 7:30 one morning, flew to Guadalcanal, changed planes, and then flew on down to Espiritu Santo.

  By the time we got loaded into trucks and hauled over to the camp at Espiritu Santo, it was about 4:00 P.M. After the combat area, the place looked like a country club to us. Set in a coconut grove, the camp was quiet and well kept. Cool green grass covered the ground between the Dallas huts. The coral roads were smooth and white. A clean, sandy beach ran down to the warm water of the channel. A dock jutted out some 150 feet, and a bathing platform was anchored 50 yards away.

  There was even a mascot—a lady goat smuggled in from Sydney when she was very young. Under loving attention from so many pilots, however, she had grown difficult to handle. One day, after a squadron consultation, it was decided that Nanny needed a boyfriend. She was taken back to Sydney; a groom was found; and she was married off with 40 pilots attending the ceremony.

  The hut that Boyington, Bailey, Doc, and I shared had just been vacated by a squadron going north. It was dirty; the previous occupants had moved out in a hurry. Papers littered the ground about it, but we were too tired to care.

  “We’ll clean up in the morning,” Boyington said.

  It was well after midnight when a flashlight beam swept over our little hut.

  “Boyington.”

  “Yeah. What is it?” And then, recognizing the colonel commanding the Group, Boyington swung his feet to the floor, stood at attention, dressed only in a pair of shorts and said, “Yes, sir?”

  “You know the rules around here. Why haven’t you and your men got your mosquito nets up? I’ve been around to the huts of all your squadron, and not one of them has his net up.

  “Furthermore, your area is dirty. Why isn’t it cleaned up? You know the rules. You’re the commanding officer of your squadron. You will take immediate steps the first thing in the morning to remedy this situation, understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And report to me as soon as you do. We don’t live like a bunch of pigs down here.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The door slammed.

  The colonel had developed an intense dislike of Boyington, stemming from earlier conflicts. When he made out the next fitness reports (which become part of each officer’s individual file jacket in Washington), he marked Pappy as low as he possibly could without Boyington’s having to write a reply and thus see it. He added a notation: “This officer is a good combat pilot, but can’t command men because of his drinking.”

  When we got the boys together first thing in the morning I told them what had happened and then Boyington took over.

  “We want to make it a point to conduct ourselves so that there won’t be the slightest cause for complaint. The first thing we’ll do is clean up our huts and our camp area. Do a thorough job; don’t even leave a cigarette butt. After everything is cleaned up, get your mosquito nets set up—and use them. I know it’s silly, here where there are no mosquitos and where our huts are screened in, but the regulations say that we must sleep under mosquito nets—so we’ll sleep under mosquito nets. Now, let’s get to work.”

  We cleaned our camp area and our huts as they had never been cleaned before. Even Bragdon, Sims, Mullen, and Fisher—who had never been known to hang up a shirt or touch a broom—polished up their quarters. Then we all went swimming in the lukewarm water off the channel that ran in front of the club.

  We spent the next few days turning in final reports on the tour, getting physical exams, writing letters, lying in the sun, swimming, and getting ready to go to Sydney.

  Rollie Rinabarger, wounded on the 27th of September, joined us. The boys crowded around him and brought him up to date. We’d missed his lanky figure and his dry wit.

  However, he didn’t look at all well. He was pale, gaunt, and his eyes were deeply sunken. We suspected he had talked the doctors into letting him out of the hospital in time to go to Sydney with us.

  14 | Sydney

  Daily, the tales grew wilder of that wonderland to the south, Australia, where the food was fresh and varied; the liquor excellent and plentiful; the girls beautiful and plentiful, too.

  Ah, Australia, where everything was upside down—where it was summer when it was supposed to be winter and vice versa; where it was spring in the fall and fall in the spring. Land of peculiar animals: the duckbilled platypus, the kangaroo, the koala bear.

  Australia, where you had to pay $6.00 not to vote. Where the men are pretty tough customers but don’t let their “cobbers” (pals) down. Where the highest compliment you can pay a man is to tell him he’s “game as Ned Kelly” (a “bushranger,” or backwoods highwayman, about whom the Aussies talk as we talk of Jesse James).

  The Aussies are rough and tough, we were told; the best thing they can say about you is that you’re a “bloody fine barstud.” They are confused by all the “pleases” and “thank you’s” tossed about by the Yanks. They think all that is sissified. Yet their Sunday “Blue Laws” fixed it so you couldn’t get a drink, go to a dance, or even to a movie on Sunday. But the girls had learned how to make Sundays pleasant for the visiting Yanks in spite of the Blue Laws.

  The stories flew thick and fast as we completed our physical exams and cleaned up our squadron paperwork.

  Everyone took his atabrine faithfully because he didn’t want a little thing like malaria holding up his trip to Sydney.

  We stood in a long line outside the laboratory tent to have our malaria smears taken. Spears of sunlight through the coconut palms shattered on the hard-packed coral pathway and bounced to tanned, sweating faces and bodies.

  Physical exams over, it was back to our quarters, bathing trunks on, and out to the beach to swim and lie in the sun, to get those “clear blue eyes, rippling muscles, and bronzed body that looks good o
n white sheets.”

  Tom Emrich combed his black hair, doublechecked his technique. He hadn’t tried it on Aussie girls yet. Would he enjoy the same success he always had in the States?

  A period of anxious waiting for our blood tests to come back. A positive malaria would mean you couldn’t go. Doc was the man of the hour, and the men pestered him regularly.

  Then one day, he brought in a sheet of paper.

  “Well, I got the report, fellas. It’s all O.K., except one man got a positive malaria smear.”

  Everyone was apprehensive, waiting for the bad news. Doc raised his head. ‘I’m sorry, Tom,” he said to Emrich.

  Emrich’s face paled. “Oh, well, I might have got in trouble anyway,” he said, but his tone was not as jaunty as his words.

  Then we looked at Doc. He had his head down again, but we could see he was having trouble hiding a grin.

  “I was just kidding, Tom. Everyone goes.”

  After our formal report and request for transportation had been turned in, we were in a turmoil of preparation—26 eager young men planning to cram over 10,000 minutes of fun into their seven-day leave, living each minute as though there would never be another opportunity for them to see civilization, streets, buildings, civilians, real food, women, again. “What should I take?” was the standard question.

  Since we were to fly, we were limited on weight: 300 pounds total, including yourself, was the rule. Mo Fisher heard this with a long face. With his huge bulk, he would barely be able to get aboard himself, let alone take any trade goods.

  Yes, we took trade goods. American cigarettes, we’d heard, were extremely hard to come by in Australia, and the Aussies liked them better than their own brands. You could get anything for cigarettes, from a bottle of whiskey to a taxi ride, a car, an apartment, food, or a girl.

  Of course, there were regulations, there were customs inspectors, and dire repercussions threatened anyone caught trying to smuggle cigarettes into Sydney. You were supposed to take only what you would normally need for your own use. Each man’s interpretation of that, of course, was different. Most of us figured that we could squeeze through the seven days on 20 cartons, but Mo managed to get 50 into an oversized parachute bag. We took only Camels, Lucky Strikes, and Chesterfields; the Aussies looked askance at some of the “Joe Magee” brands that had been shipped out for free distribution to the troops on the fighting fronts.

  Be sure to take your own soap and toilet paper, too, we were told—they’re very scarce in Sydney.

  We were divided into two groups of 13 each, to go on successive days. The last night came for the first group. We were to be picked up by trucks at midnight and driven out to the transport field across the island. The evening was long and loud as we celebrated our departure; the singing put particular emphasis on “I’m Gonna Lay Down My F-4-U.” Some of the boys folded up early in order to catch a little sleep; others stayed with it till time to catch our trucks.

  The men were quiet as we waited beside our mess hall. The moon was down. The sky was clear. The broad whiteness of the coral road narrowed away from us. We could hear the crunch of the sentry’s feet as he walked his post. There was a damp chill in the air.

  Then the trucks rolled up and we piled aboard. With the usual stop and starts—where’s Fisher?—we finally were on our way, screaming a raucous goodbye to the old MAG 11 camp as we rolled out. Our choral society—Ashmun, Fisher, Olander, Mullen, Sims, Matheson—took over and roused the owls in the jungles.

  At transport headquarters, our first job was to weigh in—and straighten out small arguments over the weight of our gear.

  Looking about, I saw a sign on the wall. How different from stateside airline offices. It read:

  SOUTH PACIFIC COMBAT AIR TRANSPORT COMMAND

  • We give you the privilege of carrying your own baggage.

  • We carry combat supplies; sorry that you have to sit on them.

  • When you get there, watch your own gear—SCAT valets will be noticeably absent.

  • It may seem silly to get you up at 2:00 A.M. to take off, but this is war and schedules come before personal comfort.

  • Stay put when we take you to the plane. Wanderers get lost in the jungle while the plane takes off without them.

  • Men to keep planes clean are scarce. Stuff that half-eaten sandwich in your pocket.

  • We do not run hotels. If you happen to find any bed bugs, they do not belong to us.

  I’d barely had time to read this message when an open truck backed up, and we were told to throw our gear aboard. We did, piled aboard ourselves, and jostled out to our plane.

  It was similar in shape to a civilian airliner, but there the resemblance ended. An unsightly coat of dirty dull brown paint covered its normally gleaming silver sides. Comfortable seats were nowhere in evidence, just a bare, empty fuselage. A stack of parachutes was secured in one corner. I counted them: eight. Thirteen passengers climbed aboard. I mentally reviewed the scramble that would ensue if 13 men should try to divide 8 chutes in an emergency.

  The extra gear began to come aboard. Boxes, bags, packages, and crates were thrown in, stacked high and tied down. When the pilot climbed aboard, he barely had room to crawl over the top of the pile.

  We squirmed about on the boxes and crates and made ourselves as comfortable as possible. The pilot started the engines; the big plane jerked around and lumbered down the taxiway, engines coughing. Everything was matter of fact. As we stared out the little windows into the darkness, we could see an occasional mechanic working on a plane, but they didn’t even turn to watch us rumble by. And we were going to Sydney.

  The plane paused at the end of the runway, reared its head and roared, coughing and spitting blue flame from its exhaust stacks. Then it began to move, gathering speed slowly as the pilot pushed the throttle forward. The Black Sheep halted their babble of conversation to help “sweat” the ship off.

  The big ship wasn’t gaining speed fast enough.

  “She’ll never make it.”

  “Jesus, get the tail up.”

  “Here we go, boys.”

  “Everybody forward.” And with the last shout, we all scrambled to take some of the weight off the tail and put it on the wing. We lay there like groaning sardines, each mentally saying a quick prayer!

  “Don’t let us crash—not when we’re on our way to Sydney!”

  The plane staggered off the ground and strained upward, protesting to its very last rivet the load it was required to lift.

  Some three and a half hours and 460 miles later, we jarred down onto the runway at Tontouta, New Caledonia. It was barely daylight. We halted only long enough for a sleepy driver to bring up a gas truck and service the plane.

  Then we sweated out another takeoff for the 1,200-mile hop across the southern edge of the Coral Sea. There was no place to go but forward or back once you took off, not even a coral reef on the way. In an emergency landing, we’d have had about four minutes to scramble out the emergency exits. We screamed ineffectually at each other for a while, and then gave up any attempt at conversation, since it was practically impossible over the racket of the engines. The choral society gathered as usual, however, and our combined voices joined the engines’ roar. We sang “Silver Dollar” several times, and there was a strong leaning toward the old western favorite, “Back in the Saddle Again.”

  We droned along some 8,000 feet above the surface of the water; outside, just the water and a few clouds. No land was in sight in any direction. It was a matter of sweating out the eight-hour flight.

  We all crowded eagerly to the windows when land finally came into sight. We floated slowly across Sydney’s red buildings and slanted into the airport. Everything was bustling efficiency. Trucks stood by to haul us into town. An officer handed each of us a slip of paper that told us when we were due to return and where to call to check on our return trip. We were hauled into town past huge factories engaged in what is apparently one of Australia’s major industries, the
tanning of sheep hides.

  Sydney was a city of about a million and a half people, and to say that it looked wonderful to us after months of life in the jungles, where the tallest building was a ten foot tent, is to put it mildly.

  And the girls—real girls. It had been months since we’d seen a white woman; nurses and Red Cross workers hadn’t gotten to Munda yet. The wolf whistles were loud and long and frequent.

  We found that we could stay in dormitories, hotels, or apartments. Doc Reames and I rented an apartment, paying $100 for the week we were to be there, though it was worth probably $35 a month. But it had a “wireless” and a “lift”—in most of the apartment houses, you had to walk up, no matter how many floors the place had.

  Doc and I threw our gear on the floor and looked over our vacation home. It had a bedroom, living room, kitchen, bath, and a simple color scheme: red plush sofa and chairs, red curtains, red rug, red rose wallpaper, red bedspread, red draperies, and a floor lamp with a red shade.

  Doc and I cleaned up, changed from our crumpled khakis, and went out to see the sights. Most of us wanted food, liquor, and women—not necessarily in that order. Next, there were the secondary things: steam bath, massage, shave, manicure, movies, golf, and shopping.

  Everyone naturally gravitated to the lobby of the Australia Hotel (and the sidewalk in front of it) and its bar, which was called the “Snake Pit” or “Passion Pit,”. It was known throughout the South Pacific. The “Passion Pit” was filled nightly with females of all sizes, shapes, and ages, usually with but one inclination: to have a good time and to help the Yanks have a good time.

  We soon learned that the two local clip joints were Princes and Romanos. Both had their eyes open for suckers—Yanks a bit under the weather. In one of these, we paid our bill three times; in the other, twice.

  And suckers we were; we had seven days leave, and we might never have another. We figured on spending a month’s pay each; some of the boys spent as much as a year’s salary.