“Pile ‘em up right here!!”
“Fall in right there!!”
The eighty soldiers swiftly fell into formation facing the platform, a group of freshly built barracks directly behind them. An officer stood facing them, hands on his hips. There was an air of confidence about him. It seemed everyone here, officers as well as NCOs, had that swagger.
“Welcome to Airborne Basic Jump School. My name is Lieutenant Colonel Reuben H. Tucker and I’m the XO of the Five-oh-four PIR. There are a few things you need to know before you begin here.” Tucker paced slowly from one end of the platform to the other.
“First, half of you won’t make it through the next four weeks. Hell, you might not even make it through the first four hours!” He stopped and looked directly at the middle of the formation. “You know who you are so why don’t you save us all a lot of time and just quit right now.” Johnny Kilroy believed the colonel was looking directly at him. No one moved.
“Fine! Then we’ll do it your way, the hard way,” Tucker continued while the instructors slowly circled the formation like sharks stalking prey. “At this school, we double-time everywhere. If you’re not running it means you’re seated or you’re dead. Do not ever let anyone see you walking anywhere or leaning on anything or you will do enough pushups to slow the earth’s rotation.” Tucker began pacing again.
“If you’re given an order or if you are asked a question in which you wish to respond in the affirmative, you will yell, ‘Strike-Hold!’ at the top of your lungs. Do you understand?” Two or three men yelled, “Strike-Hold!” Tucker shook his head. “This is not a good start, you can do better than that. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?”
The whole formation screamed, “STRIKE HOLD!”
“Better.” Tucker stopped pacing again. “The last thing you need to know is that this is a cadre trained regiment. Most of the instructors will become part of the Five-oh-four or Five-oh-five after this class is trained. They may become your squad or platoon leaders. You’ll go into combat with them.” The subtle meaning was clear. Since they will likely be going to war with these instructors, they will not cut the students any slack.
“Captain Wolff, take over,” Tucker descended the steps from the platform. Captain Louis Wolff ascended the steps at the same time, saluted, smiled and whispered as they passed each other, “Sir? Slow the earth’s rotation, sir?”
“Right, Captain,” he smiled back. “I need to come up with a better one than that.” Colonel Tucker hopped into his jeep. His driver sped off quickly, spraying dirt and gravel.
Wolff looked out over the sweating and shaken group of trainees. “I’m Captain Louis Wolff. I’m the training officer for this class.” Wolff scanned the faces of the men before him. “I think I recruited some of you.” He paused. “What the hell was I thinking?” He shook his head in disgust. “Well, let’s get this over with. When you hear your name, go find your bag and report to the barracks directly behind you. On the double!” He nodded to the instructor at the head of the formation.
“Adams!” yelled the instructor. A soldier broke out of the second rank, ran behind the formation, fished around for his bag with sharp, fast movements, found it and ran inside the barracks. Before Adams found his own bag the instructor had already yelled, “Brown!” That soldier did the same. The instructor continued down the alphabetical list as a group of searching soldiers milled about the pile, shoving, pushing, and trying to get close enough to read the names stenciled on the canvas bags. All the while another instructor was yelling at the group to hurry. The names were being called faster than the soldiers could find their bags. The crowd around the pile got larger and more unruly.
“Kilroy!” the instructor hollered. “Shit, we got two.” He looked up at Captain Wolff, shrugged and yelled, “Kilroy, John! Fuck, we got two of them.”
Two men broke out of the ranks from opposite sides of the formation. They both waded into the mass of scrambling GIs.
Johnny pushed his way in and started to turn the bags to see the names. Arms and bodies were struggling to do the same thing. It was chaos and the instructors continued yelling for the men to move faster. Johnny turned over a bag, heard a soldier yell behind him, “that’s mine” and he tossed the bag back.
“Thanks, Mac.”
He continued prowling the pile under the constant barrage of insults. The group began to thin out as more men found their own bags and fewer men looking at fewer bags sped up the process. Finally, there was one bag left. It was older and more worn than his. He turned it over, read the name. It was not his bag.
“What’s the matter, little girl? Let’s move, hubba-hubba,” an instructor yelled.
“Not my bag, Sergeant,” Johnny answered, his voice seething with anger and frustration. “I’m John P. Kilroy, this bag belongs to John No-Middle-Initial Kilroy.”
“Well, pick it up sweetheart and we’ll go find that dumb ass.”
Johnny hoisted the bag on his shoulder and followed the instructor into the barracks. Double bunk beds lined the walls. Bunks were also set up in the center corridor. Instructors continued yelling and screaming. The barracks was bedlam.
“Attention!” the older instructor yelled and the barracks became silent, each man standing rigid at the foot of his bunk. Johnny dropped his bag and stood at attention in the middle of the corridor. “I’m Staff Sergeant Bancroft. I’ll be running this platoon through this training cycle.” Bancroft had thin lips and a hawk-like nose. His eyes scanned the room, black and piercing. “Don’t worry about the crowding situation, by the end of the week there’ll be plenty of room and we’ll remove these extra bunks.” He walked slowly up the corridor weaving between the soldiers. “Do you candy ass pussies really think you have what it takes to become paratroopers?” Before anyone could answer he continued in a louder voice. “Do you sorry pieces of dogshit think you have the physical toughness and intelligence to be paratroopers? I don’t think so. Some of you can’t even fucking read! Where’s Kilroy?” he screamed.
“Right here Sergeant,” a voice from the back answered.
“C’mon,” Bancroft motioned to Johnny who picked up the bag and followed.
They moved quickly to the last bunk in the back. Jake Kilroy was standing there, at attention, the barracks bag he took unopened on the bunk.
Bancroft got right up in Jake’s face; his fiery eyes boring into Jake’s soul. “You took the wrong bag, lady. Can’t you fucking read?”
“I realized it when I got in here…” Jake tried to explain. Bancroft was having none of it.
“You are John NMI Kilroy. That bag says John P. Kilroy. Belongs to this soldier here,” he pointed his thumb over his shoulder. “If you can’t even read your own name and serial number, how the hell are you supposed to identify landmarks, road signs, read maps?”
“I can read, Sergeant. It was a mistake.”
“Oh, we rushed you too much? We made too much noise? Is that what you do under pressure, make mistakes?” Bancroft was nose to nose with Jake who realized answering his tirade was just getting Bancroft more agitated. Jake said nothing. Bancroft backed away.
“You’re John NMI Kilroy. I can’t just yell Kilroy when I want you because I got two of you …so your name from now on is Enema. Get it…N-M-I… En-em-a? You better answer to that name. Know why, ‘cause you’re dumber than shit.” Bancroft grabbed the bag on Jake’s bunk and tossed it to Johnny, looked at him and said, “Take that bunk.” He pointed to one a few feet away. He took Jake’s bag from Johnny and tossed it on Jake’s bunk. “I’ll be watching you,” turned to Johnny, “you too!” Bancroft stormed out of the barracks.
“That’s great,” Johnny complained out loud. “As if this wasn’t going to be hard enough.”
“Sorry, Mac. I’m Jake,” Jake held out his hand.
Johnny looked at Jake’s hand in disgust and backed away. “Fuck you. You’re Enema. And it’s an appropriate name for you too. If you didn’t have your head up your ass, neither of us would be noticed. Now we’re b
oth on his shit list.” Johnny felt his anger rising.
Jake clenched his fists and took a step forward. “I have to take his crap but I don’t have to take yours.”
Johnny didn’t back down. He didn’t know how. He dropped the barracks bag and took a step forward. “Why not? Let’s go!”
Just then a blond haired, blue-eyed soldier stepped in between the two of them. “C’mon boys. This is not the time. You can settle this later. No reason to drag the rest of us into it.” Some of the other soldiers murmured their agreement. Johnny stepped back.
Jake dropped his hands and pointed at Johnny. “This is not over.”
Johnny replied, “Not by a long shot.”
The soldier picked up Johnny’s barracks bag and walked him over to his bunk. He put his hand on Johnny’s shoulder. “It was an honest mistake. We can’t be turning on each other. That’s what they want.”
Johnny exhaled, the stress of the moment leaving his body. “I know. It’s just that I wanted to stay unnoticed.” He managed a slight smirk. “So much for that. Thanks for stepping in. My name is Johnny Kilroy. Some of the boys call me Yank.” He extended his hand.
The soldier shook it. “I’m Schuyler Johnson. My friends call me Sky.”
Chapter Nineteen
L’Enfant Plaza Hotel – January 13, 1997
“Every man's memory is his private literature.”
Aldous Huxley (1894 - 1963)
The waitress approached the table with five salad dishes balanced on her forearm. J.P. leaned back as she placed a plate before everyone. The restaurant was filling up and the din and clatter of utensils on plates and muted conversations became more noticeable. J.P. ordered another round of drinks and looked at Sky. “So, you knew them both pretty well from the beginning?”
Sky stabbed at a piece of lettuce. “It’s funny, I can remember the most insignificant details way back then but I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast yesterday.”
“Amen.” Frank added. Harley nodded.
“So how did Jake and dad become friends?” J.P. tried to jump-start Sky into continuing his story.
Sky chewed on some salad, put his fork down and picked up his Vodka Collins. “They really didn’t like each other from the first time they met. There was a mix-up with their gear on the first day in jump school. Johnny blamed Jake for taking the wrong barracks bag and Jake blamed Johnny for ratting him out to Bancroft.” Sky took a long pull on his drink. “For three weeks they eyed each other looking for an opportunity to settle it. They were always near each other because we did everything in alphabetical order, which meant I was near them, too. Then finally, they got the entire company in hot water.”
“And they became friends after that?” asked J.P.
“From bitter enemies to the best of friends, closer than brothers.”
“How did that happen?” J.P. asked.
“Before it got better, it got a whole lot worse. In A-Stage the instructors were brutal. They spent the entire first week weeding out the boys who couldn’t keep up.” Sky put down his drink and picked up his fork and poked at the air with it. “You see, anyone could sign up for the paratroopers. Some were curious, some were bored, others wanted the extra pay but not everybody was cut out for the airborne.” Sky looked at Frank who was munching on his salad. “Did you find that to be true?”
Frank nodded. “The instructors in my jump school class could wash anyone out at any time but in reality, that was rare. They would rather push people to their limits and have them quit. They only kicked out the obvious psycho misfits who caused a lot of trouble.”
“Same here,” Sky agreed. “Problem was Bancroft labeled the Kilroys as eight-balls and rode them both the whole time, trying to get them to quit. Jake got the worst of it.”
“How so?” asked J.P.
“Like I said, A-Stage was all about calisthenics. We double-timed everywhere. Then there were the long runs in the Georgia summer heat. Let me tell you, guys were passing out left and right. When they recovered, they would be given the chance to finish, a test of character and determination. Some did and stayed in. Most just quit right there.” Sky glanced at Frank.
“Same thing,” Frank agreed.
Sky paused to take a sip of his drink. “If you got caught wiping your sweat or scratching your nose you were ordered to drop and do pushups. Bancroft would drop Jake down for no reason. Jake was wiry and strong, not to mention stubborn, and he did the pushups every time, no problem. Johnny just got out of basic like me so we were in decent shape and able to keep up.” Sky quickly chewed a mouthful of salad and continued. “We had four hours of calisthenics, an hour running, an hour of rope climbing, an hour tumbling and an hour of hand-to-hand combat. It was brutal.” Sky looked over to Frank and smiled. “I can’t believe I remember all this crap.”
“You got it right,” Frank confirmed.
Sky wiped his mouth and continued. “But old Bancroft was right about one thing. By the end of that first week the bunks down the center of the barracks were gone and in the bunks that were left, well most of the boys had the double rack all to themselves. We lost almost half the freakin’ platoon that first week.”
Frank put his fork on his empty salad plate, thought he’d give Sky a chance to finish his food. “In the summer of forty-two this airborne stuff was all new. The army was feeling their way along, trying different methods, looking for answers. What kind of equipment, training and command structure would be required? But in forty-two all this was still an experiment, a work in progress and there were growing pains. One thing we did know right from the start. A paratrooper had to be a unique and special breed. So we were trained, almost brainwashed, to believe we were an invincible force. We had to withstand the physical challenges of jumping from planes and landing hard, day or night, with over one hundred pounds on our backs and then come together with whoever was left standing and complete the mission. If you can find people who would do that, they also had to be smart enough to read maps, and landmarks and decide where they were and where to go.” Frank stopped for a moment to gather his thoughts.
“If I recall correctly, your dad was very good at that. He had a photographic memory for maps and stuff, “ Frank remembered. J.P. looked surprised but noticed Harley gave Frank a slight scowl. Frank continued without acknowledging either of their looks.
“If paratroopers were too far from their objective, they had to decide how to best disrupt the enemy in his rear areas. Cut phone lines, blow bridges, and hide road signs, anything to cause confusion. They had to decide whether to engage or evade the enemy they encountered. Use their initiative and judgment. If a corporal were the senior rank in a large group of troopers, he would be expected to take command at the platoon or company level. If a colonel found himself in command of a small group of troopers, he would be expected to lead them using squad tactics. They would have to be resourceful enough to use every weapon authorized for their regiment and enemy weapons as well. Finally, if you could find people who could do all that, they would also have to have balls of steel. They were expected to stand and fight regardless of the odds, to attack superior positions without hesitation, to accomplish their mission regardless of the obstacles, to be unstoppable.” Frank leaned forward on the table, clasped his hands and looked directly at J.P. “It’s not surprising we lost so many. It’s a wonder so many volunteered.”
They all leaned back slightly as the waitress removed their plates and placed appetizers before each of them. Frank continued. “That weeding out process and that severe training was supposed to flush out those who couldn’t cut it. It wasn’t perfect. We let some good ones get away. And we let some bad apples in, guys that belonged in a psych ward, you know, steal from other troopers, loot from civilians, shoot prisoners, that kinda’ stuff. But, by and large, if you made it through the training and got your wings you had the right stuff to be a good paratrooper.”
The table became momentarily quiet as they began eating. J.P. took advantage of the brie
f lull to change the tape in his recorder. He smiled at Cynthia who smiled back. She was regaining her composure. He was anxious to hear the rest of the story. After giving Sky a few minutes to work on his appetizer, J.P. flipped on the recorder and prompted Sky to get him speaking again.
“Why did you volunteer for the airborne, Sky?”
“Why?” Sky smiled and shook his head. “Why did we do the stupid things we did when we were nineteen?” He continued after a brief pause. “I was born in LA, flunked out of U.C.L.A. after a year and saw an article in Life Magazine so I joined, mostly for the adventure. Knowing what I know now, I would never do it again, but I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything.”
“Same here,” Frank added.
“What did you do when you got out?” J.P. asked.
“Like a lot of guys, I went back to school on the G.I. Bill. Got my degree in engineering, went into the demolition business and retired a few years ago.”
“Demolition?” asked J.P.
“Yeah, I really like to blow shit up.” Sky smiled and reached for another clam.
Both Harley and Frank laughed. They understood how difficult it was for some to adjust from the adrenaline pumping high of constant combat to the relatively lethargic pace of civilian life.
“So, Sky, the tension between Jake and Dad, you say it got worse before it got better? They almost got the whole platoon in hot water?”
Sky scooped out the last clam into his mouth, chewed and swallowed and wiped his lips. “The whole damn company,” he corrected. “On the last day of C-Stage. I would have bet they wouldn’t have waited that long but somehow they managed to get that far before they finally threw down on each other.” Sky waved his glass in the direction of the waitress and continued.
The Last Jump: A Novel of World War II Page 14