Down to the Sea

by Bruce Henderson

  In April 1944, Spence conducted antisubmarine screening for aircraft carriers as they struck targets on New Guinea in support of landings at several locations. At the end of the month, the carriers struck enemy shipping and installations at Truk, the Japanese bastion in the Caroline Islands. Spence then returned to the naval base at Majuro for a period of routine upkeep. The first week of June found Spence again in action with a carrier group for the assault on the Marianas. As aircraft struck various islands, Spence and other ships bombarded enemy positions on Saipan and Guam in preparation for landings. At the “Marianas Turkey Shoot” in June, Spence was a plane guard for carriers during flight operations, rescuing several pilots down at sea.

  Lieutenant ( j.g.) Alphonso S. “Al” Krauchunas, twenty-four, of Kalamazoo, Michigan—he had been born in a Wisconsin farmhouse to Lithuanian parents—came aboard Spence in April 1944. A supply and disbursement officer, he was in charge of “S Division,” which had become the “pride and joy of the ship’s crew because of the excellent food provided them daily by a dedicated group of cooks and bakers,” and he was also the ship’s paymaster. Those duties made Krauchunas popular; in fact, his nickname among other officers soon became “Pay.” Beyond his dispensing food and money, all hands learned that the husky officer—five foot ten, 200 pounds—was a stalwart shipmate.

  A graduate of Western Michigan College (later Western Michigan University) in Kalamazoo, where he starred as a hard-hitting, smooth-fielding shortstop, Krauchunas was drafted by the Chicago White Sox and played second base for their farm team (batting .284) until “the war interrupted his dream to play professional baseball.” He enlisted in the Navy in February 1942 and went to boot camp as an enlisted man before receiving an ensign commission in the supply corps. His “athletic training”—a physical education major, he was “a strong swimmer” and competed in basketball, too—played a role during the Marianas campaign when Krauchunas twice “dove off the ship and swam 75 to 80 yards to assist floundering Navy pilots.” The second time he did so he “narrowly missed being attacked by a shark.”

  At 8:00 A.M. on July 8, while moored at Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands, Spence “executed colors.” Following the raising of Old Glory at the fantail, the crew was called to general quarters for drills. They went through their paces under the watchful gaze of a special guest who had been aboard for two days to learn the ship and observe the crew: the next skipper. At 9:15 A.M., the crew was “mustered at quarters and marched to the forecastle,” where “pursuant to Bureau of Personnel dispatch orders” Commander Henry J. Armstrong was relieved of command. The “impressive ceremony” was short—less than fifteen minutes. After a brief speech to the crew praising their accomplishments, Armstrong, who had shown an inclination for being “taut in all things pertaining to duty,” stepped back. The new commanding officer stepped forward and read aloud his official orders to command the vessel. Afterward, he made an about-face, saluted Armstrong, and said, “I relieve you, sir.” Armstrong returned the salute, and with that the deed was done. Armstrong, forty-one, was widely respected by the crew, who considered him a “very good captain,” “all business,” and “not afraid of anything.” After a round of goodbyes and a final meal with officers in the wardroom, Armstrong headed down Spence’s gangway for the last time. “I trained the crew to go to war,” the seasoned skipper said before departing, “and we went to war.” Gone was the man who had turned a new ship and her neophyte crew into decorated combat veterans, keeping them alive and well in the process.

  Spence’s future now rested with Lieutenant Commander James P. Andrea, thirty-one, of West New York, New Jersey, for whom taking command of his own ship represented the pinnacle of his naval career. Five foot nine, 160 pounds, with thick dark hair, brown eyes, and a ruddy complexion, Andrea was one of eight children born to Teresa (Favoino) and Michele Andrea, a cement mason; both came from the same region on the east coast of Italy, although they had not met until migrating to America. Growing up on the Jersey side of the Hudson River, Jim Andrea “wasn’t a natural student but he studied hard and got good grades” and was his class salutatorian in high school, where he also “distinguished himself as a basketball player.” After graduating at age sixteen and unable to afford college, Andrea went to work for Macy’s department store for two years until receiving an appointment to the Naval Academy. Congenial and with a “keen but gentle sense of humor,” Andrea made friends easily at Annapolis. “An actor on the side,” he spoke several languages, loved Italian opera, and was known to sing impromptu arias. He was playfully dubbed “the Dorothy Dix of the Academy”—after the popular author of the syndicated “Dear Dorothy” advice column—due to his willingness to “listen to everyone’s story.” At Annapolis, Andrea did not rise to the top academically, finishing near the bottom of the class of 1937, ranked 281st out of 323 graduating midshipmen. Andrea also “almost didn’t graduate” because he “couldn’t swim very well.” In his last Christmas home while at Annapolis, he told family members he was considering “going into the Marine Corps” after graduation, perhaps in the hope of staying on solid ground. In spite of his difficulties at the Academy, “the Navigator,” as he was called by his fellow Middies for his tireless efforts to learn navigation, was described heartily in the Lucky Bag 1937, the annual of the regiment of midshipmen:

  Jimmie has the enviable faculty of being able to believe that everything happens for the best. A ready smile and an eternal song are the outward manifestations of his contented nature. His congeniality and his ability to provide entertainment under the most depressing circumstances make him a welcome guest in any circle. Dancing is not the least of Jimmie’s abilities. Dim lights and rhythmic music never fail to allure him. Whatever the future may hold for Jimmie, we can be sure that his present course will lead him to the fullest enjoyment of life.

  Following his graduation from the Naval Academy, Andrea was assigned to the battleship Pennsylvania (BB-38). For three years he served as assistant engineering, division, and gun turret officer on the dreadnought, which took part in tactical exercises, battle practices, and fleet maneuvers in the Pacific and Caribbean. In early 1940, Andrea was transferred to the hydrographic survey ship Sumner (AG-32), then charting areas in the Caribbean and along the west coast of South America. Crew members on Sumner, where Andrea soon took over as gunnery officer after being promoted to lieutenant ( j.g.), found him to be “all Academy” but also thought “you couldn’t find a nicer guy…also shipmate all around.” In fact, Chief Gunner’s Mate John O. Hill “named one of his sons” after the friendly young officer. In receipt of secret orders to Surabaya, Indonesia, Sumner was en route in early December 1941 when she put in briefly at Pearl Harbor. When the first bombs fell during the Japanese attack, Andrea was dressing in his small cabin to attend morning mass. At the sound of roaring airplanes and a loud explosion, he raced up on deck to direct the gun crews. One of Sumner’s .50-caliber machine guns soon scored “a direct hit” on an enemy torpedo plane that was “making an approach” on Battleship Row. The aircraft “disintegrated in flames and sank in fragments” and its torpedo “sunk without exploding.” In rage and frustration that morning, Andrea was “seen firing his Colt .45” sidearm at an enemy plane as it flashed by. Sumner spent the next year and a half surveying new anchorages throughout the Pacific at places such as Samoa, New Caledonia, Tonga, the New Hebrides, the Solomon Islands, and New Guinea. In July 1943, Andrea was detached from Sumner and ordered to new construction/destroyers—a highly prized assignment among junior officers. He was to put into commission and serve as executive officer of the Fletcher-class destroyer Mertz (DD-691), a new “Bath boat” about to be launched. After a shakedown cruise off Bermuda, Mertz headed for Pearl Harbor. The destroyer began convoy escort duties in March 1944 and within weeks saw her first action: attacking in a hail of 5-inch shells and sinking an enemy merchant ship. In May, Mertz returned to Pearl Harbor to prepare for the Marianas campaign, which Andrea was to miss. On May 25, after six months
as Mertz’s second in command, he was ordered to Spence after attending a short technical school for prospective commanding officers.

  The personable style of the new Spence skipper, who was “much younger” than his predecessor and seemed to the crew “not much older than some of us,” soon became evident. Andrea let it be known that he had a motto: “An efficient ship can be a happy ship.” His actions showed that he also believed a happy ship could be an efficient ship. Among those appreciating Andrea’s style of command was supply officer Al Krauchunas, who noticed that when Andrea went to the wardroom it was often for “a friendly visit” and not just “to talk shop.” The new captain’s impromptu visits were not restricted to officer country. In fact, Krauchunas judged their new commander to be “an enlisted man’s skipper and a grand fellow.” No one aboard Spence had any way of knowing that Andrea had in his career been warned by higher-ranking officers against becoming “too close to the crew.” But that was what Torpedoman Al Rosley liked about the new skipper, finding him to be an “ordinary fellow who didn’t try to rise above you.” The ship newsletter was soon raving: “It would only be a waste of space to tell you that we have both the best ship and the best skipper. Who could ask for more? The height of our regard and affection is 4.0 unanimously.”

  Ordered stateside for a major shipyard overhaul, Spence departed Eniwetok in early August. Following an overnight stop at Pearl Harbor to fuel, the destroyer sailed for San Francisco, arriving August 18. After passing beneath the Golden Gate and Oakland Bay bridges, Spence eased into a berth at Hunter’s Point Shipyard. A week later, the destroyer was nudged by a yard tug into a nearby dry dock. Once the underwater caisson closed, pumping commenced. Within two hours, Spence was high and dry atop keel blocks.

  As the well-traveled ship underwent her first complete overhaul, a steady stream of men came and went with orders in hand and seabags on shoulders. In all, nearly 100 crew members transferred off in August and September—including half of the ship’s complement of twenty officers. Departing for schools and other assignments, many of these veterans would use their experience to help commission new ships and train their young crews.

  Gone were old hands such as Yeoman Al Bunin, already with more than two years of sea duty when he became a Spence plank owner and one of “5 percent” of the crew who put the ship into commission—now with enough sea time to request shore duty. Bunin, who “never wanted to be a hero,” transferred to a naval communications office in California, where he was to safely spend the remainder of the war.

  Replacing the veterans were newcomers such as Seaman 1st Class Ramon Zasadil, eighteen, of Cicero, Illinois. Fresh out of radio school, to which he had been sent after boot camp at Great Lakes in Illinois, Zasadil, who had been told “they needed radiomen in a hurry” in the fleet, had been surprised to be assigned to a warship sitting out of the water. For Zasadil, who had joined the Navy seven months earlier—two weeks before his eighteenth birthday—it would be a couple more months before he would have a chance to find his sea legs.

  Those crewmen who were to remain aboard Spence—all had been told they would be headed back to the Pacific when the overhaul was completed—were given twenty-day leaves. They left in droves to try to put the war behind them for a time. One who traveled home was Machinist’s Mate Robert Strand, the Pennsylvanian who had mailed to his parents from Purvis Bay the menu for Spence’s belated Thanksgiving after the Battle of Cape St. George.

  Stand, now twenty-three, had a serious girlfriend at home. He and Jane Michel, who was two years his junior, had dated since 1940, the year she graduated from high school. After Bob went in the Navy in 1942, Jane, a slim brunette, had considered joining the WAVES. He discouraged her, reasoning that their military leaves would never coincide. Instead, she had gone to work in an insurance office and waited for him. Now, with Bob home on leave, many believed he would propose to Jane—but he did not. A family friend who lived next door to the Strands later told Bob’s younger brother, Richard, that when he asked Bob why he and Jane were not getting married during his leave, “Bob got a funny look in his eyes and said, ‘I’m not coming back.’” He expressed a foreboding that “all of the luck” Spence had in the war was “going to catch up” with them, and he did not want to leave Jane a widow.

  Strand wrote his parents, Josephine and Alvin—a U.S. Army ammunition driver and veteran of the Battle of Argonne Forest in World War I—upon his return to Spence:

  Guess I wasn’t such good company while I was home but I had missed so darn much for the last year and a half that I had a lot of catching up to do. I really had the best 2 weeks that I’ve ever lived and that is no fooling. Jane was really swell and to me she is the one and only. Would have really liked to have been married but for the fact that I had to go back to the Pacific zone and that was the big reason. Should I get a decent break, I expect you will be a daddy-in-law and a mother-in-law. Of course, I have to get a break first.

  With Spence perched on keel blocks through September, Strand, who still hoped to one day own his own bowling alley, rediscovered his enjoyment of the sport. After visiting a bowling alley in nearby Redwood City, he was taken home for dinner by the owner and his wife, who had a son away in the military. Soon, in recognition of his competitive game, Strand was being sponsored in a tournament against “all the big name bowlers from Frisco, Oakland and Los Angeles.” Unfortunately, while working on shipboard machinery the day before, he injured his bowling hand, and played with a “very, very sore thumb.” He still rolled a strong score of 232 in the final game and finished with a 197 average in front of a cheering crowd, he proudly wrote his parents, “pulling for the sailor against all the big-time bowlers.” Thereafter, while many shipmates went drinking nightly—“it is no wonder they are broke” all the time—Strand regularly hopped a bus to Redwood City and bowled.

  Flooding of the dry dock commenced on September 14 and in two hours Spence was again “waterborne.” When the dock gates swung open, the destroyer was towed out by a tug and moored to a pier where the remaining work would be completed over the course of the next two weeks. Although a normal destroyer overhaul lasted about ninety days in peacetime, Spence’s overhaul took only half that long—a common occurrence during wartime.

  In the final days before their departure, the young skipper gave a tour of his new ship to his wife, the former Jean Barton, with whom he had fallen “in love at first sight” while still at the Naval Academy, and their two-year-old daughter, Judith, the first of what her father hoped would be “lots of kids.” The couple had met when she accompanied a girlfriend to a social function at Annapolis. In June 1939—two years after his graduation—they had returned to the Academy to be married in the chapel under tall stained-glass windows and a great dome rising higher than the Maryland state capitol. It had been a traditional military wedding in a beautiful setting, and the newlyweds exited the chapel under the raised swords of some of Andrea’s former classmates who, coming back for the affair, wore dress white uniforms with matching gloves and oxfords. A reception followed at the Alumni House, with drinks and canapés.

  Before sunrise on Saturday, September 30, fires were lit under Spence’s number three boiler. Two and a half hours later the ship was under way from the dock, “backing into the stream” at first, then “standing down the channel on various courses and speeds” heading for the ammunition depot at Mare Island. From 11:00 A.M. to 5:30 P.M. ammo was loaded aboard by a working party consisting of most of the crew not on watch. The ship then returned to Hunter’s Point.

  All hands knew that with live ammunition aboard, Spence would be leaving the shipyard shortly. Before they did, it was time for a bon voyage party. The supply division had accumulated extra goodies—such as cigarettes and candies—which were freely passed out that night in a large banquet room at the fashionable, seven-story Oakland Hotel across the bay. Tuxedoed bartenders were kept busy all evening—“everyone was half bombed”—and a local torch singer and band performed favorites, keeping the
dance floor filled with married couples and singles with girlfriends and dates; officers, chiefs, and sailors alike. Clearly enjoying the evening was a beaming Jim Andrea, and the new commanding officer warmly greeted all who approached him, regardless of rank. He often took his wife’s hand and adjourned to the dance floor—“such a romantic”—where they swung to popular numbers such as “I’ll Buy That Dream” and “Sentimental Journey.”

  After a run to the Farallon Islands—27 miles outside the Golden Gate—to test-fire weapons, and several other mornings and afternoons spent maneuvering in the San Francisco Bay calibrating the magnetic compass and testing new and refurbished equipment, Spence was ready.

  At 8:00 A.M. on October 5, the crew mustered with only a single absentee: a seaman 2nd class who would be reported as AWOL. Spence was under way at 9:10 A.M. for Pearl Harbor in the company of three other destroyers that had also concluded shipyard overhauls. Arriving five days later, Spence took on fuel and supplies, and replenished the ammunition that had been expended in gunnery drills during the crossing. For several days they conducted exercises in Hawaiian waters, during which they practiced antisubmarine warfare with a U.S. submarine.

  On October 26 Spence and six other ships—three of them the newly commissioned escort carriers Makin Island (CVE-93), Lunga Point (CVE-94), and Bismarck Sea (CVE-95), each carrying approximately thirty aircraft—left Pearl Harbor bound for a fueling stop at Eniwetok in the Marshall Islands. Things were moving quickly now, and there seemed an urgency behind fleet orders and ship movements. After a short layover at Eniwetok, Spence and the other ships pushed on westerly.