Encoded for the Experiencing War web site for the Veterans History Project.
The recording of the interview with Winsor "Ted" Larter was digitized.
This transcription was encoded with minimal changes to the original text in an effort to preserve original content and idiosyncrasies of the person interviewed. Period language and terminology are also retained. Encoding is literal with regard to the transcriptionist's capitalization, punctuation, and spelling. Spelling errors are indicated with [sic]; however, recurring errors in spelling within a single document have been marked the first time and not subsequently.
My name is Winsor E -- Ted is my nickname -- Larter, L-A-R-T-E-R.
And what war were you in?
World War II.
And Mr. Larter, just your birthdate, also.
7-6-24.
All right. Okay. This is just a recording log to help us go back on the tape and find various --
Are we being recorded now, then?
Is that all right?
Is It? Yes.
Yes. It's on right now. Is it --
Okay. But I want to tell you, I'm disappointed about something.
Okay.
I didn't see Airport High School marching band out here to greet me. How about that?
Well, we'll try harder next time.
We should have scheduled one for you -- next time. You didn't tell us to schedule it.
Maybe you don't even have one at the high school.
We do. We do.
Well, remember that the next time, then.
We will, absolutely (Laughter.)
All right. Start questions. I was just wondering if -- were you drafted into the war or were you -- did you enlist?
I was drafted; but, I had my choice of what service to go into.
Okay.
At that time it was either the Marines, the Navy or the Army. And I chose the Navy.
Why did you choose the Navy?
Well, I had two brothers that were in the Army. And when I heard their stories about what they had to put up with, I didn't want to do that. I felt as long as my ship stayed afloat, I would have three square meals a day and a place to sleep at night.
Yeah.
But my brother in the infantry, it was a catch as catch can, you know.
Yeah. Where were you sent during the war, most of the time?
Most of the time? Down south quite a bit of the time. I took the training at Sampson, New York. And then from there I went to -- let's see -- I went down to New Orleans. I was in New Orleans, down south. Alabama. I was in Alabama for awhile.
So, you got to see a lot of America for awhile.
Oh, I went from east coast to the west coast, and west coast to the east coast, and back to the west coast again, and then back to the east coast.
Now, did you -- Were you sent off -- out of the country any time?
Yes. Yes.
And when was that?
That would have been the fall of '44. I actually was assigned to a ship in the fall of '44, the U.S.S. Kochab, it's called, AKS-6. And from there we went -- that was down in Mobile, Alabama. And then from Mobile, Alabama, up to Norfolk, Virginia. From Norfolk, Virginia, we went through the Panama Canal. And then went out to the Pacific -- to the southwest Pacific.
So, you were in the Pacific for most of the time within the war?
Yes. About 13 months.
Were you in any battles during the war?
The most action we saw was at Okinawa.
Oh, really.
We finally -- of course we were expecting to go into Japan. But, the surrender -- Japan surrendered before we had to go into Japan.
Did you handle combat firsthand? Were you in --
No. Because the particular ship I was on was a defensive -- it was a noncombatant ship. It was a supply ship.
Oh.
We had armament on it, and we could fire our guns. But, our orders were not to fire our guns unless we were being directly attacked. And we never were really directly attacked.
Oh, that's good. What was your job on the boat? What was the main thing that you did?
Not a boat. It's a ship.
A ship. I'm sorry. Sorry.
A boat is something you put on a ship.
Okay. (Laughter.)
My job was a fire controlman. Now that isn't putting out fires, but that was to control the fire on the guns, as a Second Class fire control. And I took care of gun directors and gun sights, and that type of thing. But there was some electronics -- or, mostly electricity, there wasn't electronics back in those days. But, there was electricity and optics were involved in these gun sights and so forth. And I had to maintain them.
How old were you when you first went in?
19.
19. So you finished high school before you were in the service.
Yes. I graduated from Edison Technical Industrial High School, in the city.
Oh. Okay.
Okay.
And then were you planning on going to college or were you -- was enlisting a way of --
College was not really on my mind at that time. All we were thinking about, as kids at that time, was get the war over, you know.
Yeah.
And I did work -- after graduation I worked -- in fact before graduation I worked at Bausch & Lomb Optical Company --
Oh, wow.
-- On range finders and optical components. And I did that for about a year. And then when all of my buddies and friends left for the service, I thought maybe it was time that I left, too. And that's why I went -- I actually went to the draft board and said, I want to be drafted.
Wow.
And, so they said, well we can arrange that. All right. So, two weeks later I was at boot camp.
Oh, wow. (Laughter.)
How was that? I take it that was pretty bad -- bad situation at boot camp, or -- they weren't too hard on you? How was it?
Well, yeah. It was difficult. Because that was the first time I was -- any of us were really away from home. And to be thrown in with 110 other men, you know, at one time.
Yeah.
And getting up at 5 o'clock in the morning, and keeping going until seven, 8 o'clock at night, well -- yeah, it was kind of bad.
Really?
And it was in July. And it was a pretty hot summer. And, you know, and everything -- all of your exercises was compounded by the heat and the summer atmosphere, you know, at that time.
Now, where were you for boot camp, again?
Sampson, New York.
Sampson, New York.
Yeah. That's a state park down there, now. It's called -- I don't know if it's called Sampson State Park, or not, but it's a New York state park.
What sorts of activities and various things did you do at boot camp?
At boot camp?
Yeah.
March.
March.
And also you marched, and you usually marched again. And you had to keep everything in very, very good order; like your locker, your clothes. You had to be all squared up and very good shape. And you saluted a lot. And you said "sir" a lot. And you had to be very, very punctual at everything that you did.
I believe it. I believe it. Did they train you in artillery, or did they --
No, no, no. It was just -- the basics of the Navy; the Navy doctrine and Navy orientation. How to tie knots, actually. And at the same time you were given shots, and you were given -- you know, you were told what was port side and what was starboard side of the ship, and what was the keel and what was the mast, and all of that good stuff. It was just basic Naval orientation at boot camp. Yeah.
Right.
Yeah.
And then was this boot camp just for people being sent out to the Navy, or was it for a broad scope of people?
No. No. Just Navy personnel. Just Navy.
What -- the people you met at boot camp, did they -- I mean, obviously there was a lot of bondage (sic) with other men there.
Yeah.
Did you get sent out a lot of the times with those men that you had become friends with at boot camp? I mean, did you see a lot of them again later on, or --
No. No.
No.
No. We all went our separate ways.
You did? Okay.
Yeah. Yeah. Depending upon -- they would review your history, and so forth, and what your capabilities were, and so forth. And if you had any schooling, or if you had any smarts they would usually send you to a further training in some particular aspect of your -- of the Navy work that they wanted you to do. That's why I got sent to fire control school after boot camp, because I had -- I worked for Bausch & Lomb, and that meant optics.
Right.
And they looked it up and they said, well, optics are associated with fire control -- like in range finders and gun sights, and so forth. So we'll send you to fire control school. And that was it. But I never saw another piece of optics after I got in the fire control school. It was all integraters and mechanical components. And I actually did see a range finder there once, and that was about it. And a lot of electricity.
Right.
And plane recognition. You had to know your own planes, your friendly planes, and enemy planes, and so forth. You had to do a lot of that type of stuff, too.
Now, you said your friends from school -- from high school -- were all enlisted or being drafted. Did you see any of those -- your friends --
No. No.
-- while you were involved in the war?
No. You've got to remember that as far as friends were concerned, in high school, and graduating with them, those were turbulent years. And there wasn't all that camaraderie -- camaraderie, and so forth, associated with schooling at that time. It was just get through school, get into a war job, and get the job done. And there wasn't too much --
So, all of your friends mainly felt the same, of going into the war, helping out with the war?
That's correct. That's correct.
It's a lot different, then, today?
Yeah.
During the war, how did you stay in touch with your family? Did you not speak to them for the whole time?
Oh, no. No.
Or did you write letters?
I phoned quite a bit, used the telephone quite a bit, and wrote letters -- letters quite a bit. And, no, there was good contact there. Except when we were aboard ship. But even then our mail would get off the ship. And when we got into a port someplace or an anchorage where we dropped anchor, the first thing we would think about would be getting the mail off the ship and getting the mail that was coming to the ship.
Yeah.
So, no, there was good communications. Yeah.
Did you make any friends while on the ship -- or traveling around the U.S., during your time --
Did I keep in contact with them, and so forth?
Yeah.
No, we didn't. No, I didn't. I remember -- really, I only remember a couple of people. My chief aboard the ship, his name was Hackert -- last name was Hackert. And a guy that was on the -- general quarters with -- general quarters was when we thought we were in enemy territory, or enemies were coming -- another older man, his name was Paul Gillio. And he was located someplace in Massachusetts. But, I never did follow up on that, visiting him. I never followed up on visiting any of my shipmates at that time. We weren't all that close. You just had a job to do, and you went ahead and did it. Yeah.
What is this picture right here of?
This picture is of boot camp.
Oh, wow. And where are you within this picture?
Right here.
Oh, wow.
Pretty good looking guy there, huh?
Yeah.
May I see?
A lot of people look pretty young.
That's me there, too. That's me there, too, that's me.
Oh, wow.
That's even nicer looking.
Yeah, it is.
That's the one I sent to my girlfriend, who is now my wife.
Oh, wow. So you had met your wife before you went off to war?
Oh, yes. We were real good friends before we went off to war. We were dating, I guess you would say that. I'm the second row up. I think. I'm on the end, the second row up.
All right. You look ready to go.
And it's all that boot camp, because of those things -- those leggins that we had on. I guess that's why they call it boot camp, is because of those leggins on their legs there. I don't know if they wear those at boot camp today, or not. They were a real pain in the neck. You had to stitch them up every time you pulled them up.
Yeah.
Lace them up. Lace them up every time you put them on.
What form of entertainment did you guys -- when you were on -- traveling, or on the ship?
Movies.
Really?
Yeah. We sometimes got the fairly latest movies. I think -- the one that I distinctly remember, and really having a good laugh over, was Danny Kay. You guys probably don't remember Danny Kay.
No.
But, he was a comedian. I mean, he was just good. He made up a movie -- he made a movie, Up In Arms, it was called -- Danny Kay, in Up In Arms. And it was a parody of Navy life.
Oh, really.
And it showed on the ship. And I think I saw it two or three times. And it was just great.
Did you end up playing cards a lot when you were on ship, or --
Yeah. I liked to play pinochle.
Huh.
Gambling -- it was prevalent; but, I didn't make much money at all, and I didn't care about it. But, I liked pinochle. That was a little bit of a brain game, I guess. And it kept you a little on the alert. Kept you sharp.
What did you head into after you were finished with the war? What --
I kind of stumbled around a little bit. Let's see. What did I do? I know I -- I went to Rochester Business Institute on the G.I. Bill.
Oh. Okay.
Okay. I went there for two years. I went to -- my first job -- I went back to Bausch & Lomb, because that's where I was working before I was drafted. And they said -- they had to give you your job back again, if you went into the service. When you got out of the service, they had to give you your job back. But they offered me something like -- after being gone for about two years, they said they would give me a nickel raise -- which was 95 cents an hour -- and one week's vacation. And I didn't think that was all that good.
Yeah. That's not.
So I went with -- I lived just a short distance from General Railway Signal Company. And I thought, oh, I'll check them out. And, they said sure, we'll take you on. We'll give you a dollar an hour and two weeks' vacation. Well, hey, you know, that's great. So I worked for General Railway Signal for a year. And then went to RBI for two years, and got a Business Administration Certificate -- not a degree. Then finally the Korean thing came along -- Korean War came along in 1950. And Kodak was looking for people at that time, that had some skills. So I went with Kodak in 1949; and, I worked for them for 35 years after that.
Wow. So, you decided not to go into the Korean War; correct?
No. I didn't want anything more with war. I stayed away from the Korean War.
What scared you the most out of not entering the draft in the Korean War -- enlisting for the Korean War, from World War II?
What bothered me the most?
Yeah. Why didn't you --
Why didn't I --
-- Reapply or enlist? Did you feel it was -- you were just older and most of the --
Yeah. I was married by then.
Oh, okay.
I was married. And I had at least one child. And I thought there's -- I thought I had done my part. So, let somebody else take up the slack and do their part.
Absolutely. In terms of the experience of World War II, how has that affected your thinking of war, maybe, you know, with what's going on in the world now? How do you feel about war? What are your thoughts as to whether or not we should go to war, or we should not?
I'm not a peacenik, I'll tell you that right now. I love my country.
Right.
And I will say there's been some disappointing political events over the years, since I was in war.
Absolutely.
But I'm still a flag waver. I still love my country. And at the present time if you're referring to the political situation that exists today, in 19 -- or in 2003, I think that we are again being in danger. And I think if I was a younger person, and had the capabilities, I'd go to war again. No. I'm -- I'm not out to create a fight; but, if there's one there, in my country, and -- is in danger, I would be very willing to go again.
Wow. So you feel the same patriotism after the war as you did before you entered?
Probably more so.
Really?
Because now -- now I've got -- I've got three years of my life spent in supporting the cause of the United States --
Uh-huh.
-- In supporting freedom. I've got three years there. And I don't want to see that going down the tubes. So I'll do what I can to maintain the status quo, as far as our country -- our freedom-loving country.
I think that's very important, especially for today, when it seems that a lot of people are against going to war right now.
Yeah.
And I think more and more people should be supporting the country, if anything. So --
Actually, I very much enjoy hearing the opinions of Veterans from previous wars, as to their opinions and whether or not we should in fact go to war. Because I think they offer a lot of good insight, rather than just, you know, naive middle class American who has no experience. I mean, I believe you have a very good insight.
Yeah.
It's very important, I believe, so --
I said I've been disappointed in some political maneuverings and things that have taken place -- taken place since I was in the war. And I would view -- now that I know the complete story behind Vietnam --
Right.
-- I would say that was one thing that disappoints me, as far as our leadership is concerned. And what they did to your young men back in the sixties.
Yes.
But still in all, they were the -- he was the president -- Kennedy and Johnson were our presidents. And as far as we knew, they knew what they were doing. And we were supposed to support them. You're supposed to support -- as a citizen, you're supposed to support the presidency, our leaders. And your young men during the Vietnam war did so.
Absolutely.
But, as it turns out, it was a war for really no reason at all.
Right.
And that's one big disappointment I've had since I served back in the forties, in the mid-forties.
What is the G.I. Bill, actually? I read a little bit about it in the packet that we received; but, I didn't quite understand the complete package.
Probably the biggest benefit of the G.I. Bill was that they actually paid you to go to school. You were paid to go to school. I think I got something like -- I think at that time it was something like $25 a month, or maybe it was $20 a week or $80 a month. But you not only got your books paid for, your tuition paid for, but you actually got paid to go to school, as long as you kept your marks up, and did well, and so forth. But, If you goofed up, then everything came to a screeching halt. But, it was -- it was a real good thing; real good boost for our men and women at that time.
And it was available for everyone that served in the war; correct?
That's true. To a degree. But then the colleges got so crowded, they wouldn't just take anybody. They started being more selective, and having you to pass entrance tests. Entrance -- take entrance examinations. For instance I would like to have gone to R.I.T. -- it wasn't R.I.T. at that time, it was -- I forgot the name of it now; but, anyway, in order to get in I had to take an entrance exam. Well, I wasn't a real scholar at the time, anyway. And then being away from studying, and that, for three years, I just didn't feel like I could hack it as far as that was concerned. And I guess you have to -- well, you've got to take entrance -- but I think that was the start of having people having to take entrance exams in order to start going to college. That's true today, isn't it?
Oh, yeah. It is. Yeah. Are you involved with any Veterans' Associations today?
No, I'm not.
You're not.
No.
Is there any particular reason?
Well, they're mostly social. I'm not a drinker. I'm not a social butterfly, or whatever you call them. And an awful lot of these Veterans' organizations, they put a lot of emphasis on bending the elbow, and that type of thing. And I'm not that type of a person.
Right. Right. Are there any other stories about the war that you could tell us about, maybe when you were on the boat, such as --
Excuse me, on what?
On the ship. Sorry.
Okay. (Laughter.)
Or anything in your piece, here, that you might want to share, just to have on tape, to share with us?
Well, yes. I would like to share an incident that -- When I was -- when I went through it, it reminded me of my life in my -- as a family member, and so forth. My family -- my mother and father are Christians -- or, were Christians; they're deceased now. And they brought us up to review the Bible and God's word; brought us up very conservatively. And at one point in my life, when I was around 12 or 13 years old, why I made the choice that I feel everybody has to make today, and that's that I accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal savior. And that was a turning point in my life. I just felt that I needed to do -- both my mother and father were Christians, and they were -- wanted us to follow in their footsteps, and follow the Lord Jesus Christ. So I did. And I remembered that occasion well, while in the southwest Pacific one night, I was called up to stand watch aboard ship. There was -- there was somebody -- three or four people on deck all the time, with binoculars, scanning the ocean for enemy ships, such as submarines. And this one night we happened to slip below the equator, and now you're south of the equator, oh, about 15,000 miles from the west coast of the United States. And I come up on -- for midnight watch. And the first thing you have to do is get yourself oriented, get your eyes adapted to the darkness and so forth. Then you put the binoculars up to your eyes, and you have to keep scanning the horizon. You're really -- the requirement is that you're supposed to look through the binoculars the whole time you're on duty -- on watch. But that's almost an impossibility, you know. But anyway, this night, while I was -- put my binoculars up, and I was scanning the horizon, I saw a formation of the cross by the stars. And I had heard about it, somehow, somewhere, that when you're -- any time south of the equator, there is a constellation there called the southern cross. And, I -- but as I was scanning the horizon I saw this formation -- a very definite formation of stars forming a cross.
Wow.
And that had an immediate impact on me, and recalled the time that I had made a decision, when I was years old, to be a follower of Jesus Christ. And it also reminded me that the Lord in Heaven was still watching over me. I might be 15,000 miles away from my Godly parents, and all of my church friends and associates, and so forth; but, that cross up there in the sky -- it was formed by the stars -- reminded me that God was still looking over me.
Absolutely.
And watching over me. And that was important, because about a month later, we were in a typhoon. And it was as we were approaching -- about 200 miles outside Okinawa, as we were approaching Okinawa. We thought we were avoiding a typhoon; but, we ended up being in the middle of it. And the winds were blowing 150, 160 miles an hour. The waves were 30 and 40 feet high. And the ship, as big as it was, was bobbing around like a cork in the water. And we were told that the ship could take, at the most, about an 18-degree roll, you know, rolling from side -- before it would capsize and actually roll over. And at this time -- we found out later that the ship was rolling 17 degrees, one side to the other. So we were very close to capsizing.
Wow. Was everything moving around and things --
Yeah. We knew we were going to get into some rough waters, so we had pretty well fastened everything down, and so forth. And we were in a convoy of 40 other ships. And we were the tallest ship, so they were taking their bearing on us. But we all scattered, so we wouldn't be knocking into each other. But a little patrol craft never made it back. So there was only 39 of us that actually arrived at Okinawa. But I'll tell ya, during that storm, I was a pretty sick -- pretty sick sailor. I went up and opened one of the portholes on what they call the leeward side of the ship. And I couldn't see anything but a wall of water. And then the next second I couldn't see anything. The wave had gone underneath the ship, and it was just open space. And the ship of course was bobbing up and down. Well, I slammed the porthole shut, got down in my bunk, strapped myself in -- because that's the only way you're going to stay in your bunk.
Right.
And just said, well, Lord, it's up to you. But that was a time when I really felt the Lord was with me and kept me safe.
Wow. Did most sailors just stay in their bunks, or -- I mean --
The Captain's order was everybody below decks except those that were actually running the ship. And --
You probably don't find anybody out on the deck?
No. No. No. No. No. No.
How big were the bunks, usually? Were they just enough to fit you, or --
Just about to fit me. And the bunks were actually, like canvas -- canvas stretched across industrial tubing, you know. And they were chained, so that they were six bunks high --
Wow.
-- with maybe about three or four inches between you and the next bunk that was above you.
Tight. I was in Buffalo a few years -- well, more than a few years, for Boy Scouts. We were staying overnight in a battleship, I think it was in Buffalo. And we -- you know, we got to sleep in the bunks. And I remember very clearly being crammed in there.
Yeah.
It was kind of cozy. But, I don't know if I would want to be in there with a whole bunch of other --
It was real hot, you know. We were in the Pacific, and it got pretty hot sometimes. And sometimes I wouldn't even sleep below decks. If we were in a tropical situation, I might sleep above deck --
Wow.
Or take a -- just go by my general quarters -- my range finder, and curl around that, and sleep out there under the stars, you know.
That's very nice. What was the longest time that you spent on the ship -- most of the time?
Well, the longest time, probably -- and the most boring time -- was when we went from the -- from Panama Canal to our first Port of Call, or our first anchorage, and I think that was in the Marshall Islands -- I don't know, about 13,000 miles away. It took us 40 days and 40 nights.
Wow.
And we saw nothing but water and sky, sky and water.
Did you get a little seasick from that?
Well, not really seasick, because the water is fairly calm all the time. But the first time we saw a seagull, I thought the guys would go nuts, you know. Because that meant we were coming somewhere near land, you know. If there was a seagull around, there had to be some land somewhere. So that created a lot of excitement. But that was 40 days without seeing any land at all.
I'm not exactly sure how big your boat was; but, I mean, I can only imagine if I was contained in a boat --
Ship.
Ship, excuse me, for 40 days and 40 nights, with the same group of people --
Yep.
-- I can imagine by the end of that tenure, I guess, there would be a lot of tension between shipmates.
Well, they would keep you pretty busy, though. You had to stay on your watches. That would be four hours on and eight hours off, and right around the clock, 24 hours. You had to maintain the equipment that you're responsible for. I would have to go around and start up all of my computers, or my converters, and my gun sights, and wash them down, because of the sea spray, and everything getting on all of the equipment. But the same guys, you got to know them real well.
Right.
But -- what it came down to was that you were all there for the same purpose, you know. And you -- you got along because you had to get along.
Uh-huh.
It wasn't all that bad.
Yeah. When you had gone to Okinawa, did you -- could you hear the fighting or the gunshots in the --
Oh, yeah. When we approached Okinawa, it wasn't secured yet. Oftentimes we went -- went into islands and anchorages after the invasion had occurred, and it was pretty well secured. The enemy was defeated -- the Japanese. But at Okinawa, as we were maybe 50 to a hundred miles outside Okinawa, we could actually hear the battleships -- and -- firing their guns. And you could actually see the trajectory of the -- of the shells as they were going through the air, because they were 16 inches. And, I mean, that's 16 inches round.
That's like a bowling ball.
Not like a bowling ball; but, it would be about, two, three foot long. And you get -- and then -- flew out of the gun hot -- red hot. And you could see them arcing in through the sky. And then you'd see them bursting kind of on shore, you know. And so we knew that we were getting into kind of a -- we were getting into --
Bad. Different.
-- We were getting into -- into the heat of it. We were getting into the thick of it at Okinawa. But that was the only time, was at Okinawa. But then, of course, after being in Okinawa, the Japanese started these Kamikaze attacks -- the suicide airplane attacks. And that gave us a fit. There would be an awful lot of these Kamikazes flying around. But because we were not a combatant ship, they would put us under smoke -- and -- to hide us from the ships -- from the airplanes.
How did they -- how did they --
They had what they call smoke generators, and smoke pots. And as soon as we were alerted that planes were coming in, they would send out these smoke pots. And they would cover the whole ship with smoke. And then there would be little LCDP's out in front of the ship, with a smoke generator on the back. And that would -- and any ship that actually wasn't in the battle, wasn't actually firing its gun, would have to be covered up with smoke.
I didn't even know about that. That's pretty cool. So that's to prevent you from being attacked?
Being seen, and being attacked.
Right. Right. Were the Japanese pretty -- I mean, would they see that and say, I'm going to attack you anyway?
Oh, yes. Yes.
Really. And was --
You take -- the planes would come in. We would put up the smoke screen and cover every ship that we possibly could. But, a ship might be just too big. Now the U.S.S. Pennsylvania -- the battleship Pennsylvania, they were off of our port, the left side of our ship -- quite aways away -- but they got hit. They got hit by a suicide that -- he finally ran out of fuel, you know. And he had to land somewhere, so he just came down into the middle of the bay. And he hit the Pennsylvania. And -- but, did quite a bit of damage. But it was far enough below the water line, I guess, where it didn't really wipe off the top part of the ship, and all. But, it started to sink. But the guys really worked real hard, and closed all of the water tight doors and the bulkheads and so forth, and -- though it settled down in the stern; but, they saved it. They were able to pump it. And eventually it got towed back to Guam, and put in the dry dock, enough to get repaired to return to Hawaii -- Okinawa -- Hawaii. Yeah.
Do you think movies today depict the war pretty good, such as Pearl Harbor?
I saw the Pearl Harbor. Of course that focused on that one --
Right.
-- particular battle there. And that was very dramatic. That was not typical of what I saw in Okinawa. But what I saw in Okinawa was -- I wasn't allowed to go aboard -- or I wasn't allowed to leave the ship and go on land. None of us were. Because there was still fighting there, and the place wasn't secure. So, I didn't see anything like -- like was at Pearl Harbor. And I don't think anybody else did. As the war progressed, and went further west and into the islands in the South Pacific, it -- it wasn't nearly as bad. There were some tremendous sea battles that took place; but, I didn't see any of that, either.
Did you hear from your family members about other people within the war? Other families' sons and --
That's a good question. My brother, when he was actually drafted, he went into the infantry. And he was in there for three years. And nobody -- and nobody heard from him. Until my parents -- my parents finally contacted the Red Cross and said, please find out where our son is. You know, what's happening? And he was just in all kinds of combat, and they couldn't get mail out. He couldn't write. And it was just -- He never got home from the time he left -- well, from when he was drafted, until he finally got discharged. And that was tough on my parents. That's another thing that the folks today don't understand. Is that -- like my parents, they had three sons in the war. I had two older brothers. One was in the infantry, the other was in the Army Air Force -- there wasn't a separate Air Force at that time, it was the Army Air Force -- and then myself. So they had a lot to think and worry about, and pray about; which they did.
Now, did your brothers ever share any experiences with you from the war?
Not the one that was in the infantry. He was pretty quiet. He went through Guadal Canal, and all of those islands there. And he didn't talk too much about that. But my brother Vernon, who was a crew chief, on a P-17 bomber -- and he was stationed in England. Because we had relatives in England -- my wife did -- my dad came from England, too -- he shared a lot of the -- of the places he went to. And he was there during the time the buzz bombs started leaving Germany and falling on -- well, more than once he heard these buzz bombs going overhead. Then, when they stopped, that's when you worried, because that meant they were coming down.
Yeah.
And that was a concern for them. But --
I was actually born in England. Just --
You were born in England?
Just a little random --
What part.
It was a town called Lakenheath.
Lakenheath.
England. It's about an hour north of London.
Okay.
Big Air Force family here. I have a lot of history in the Air Force. So I can relate, sort of, to where you're coming from. But never -- never any serious stories like what you've got. But -- so. What did your brother actually do in the Air Force? Did he actually fly the planes?
He would patch up the planes again and get them back -- to go back out again. He was a crew chief. He and his men that were with -- they had to patch them up the best they could, and tune up the engines, and make sure that they were flyable to go out on another mission. But, to make sure they did their job right, the first time they were tested, he would have to fly with them. (Laughter.)
Oh, man. Sort of scary. That would make me work extra hard, to get it right the first time.
But when he signed that this plane is okay, they said, well, that's fine. Let's go for a ride. Yeah.
Now, I did a project on -- for World History, actually. I did a project on the Air Force. And did you -- being in the Navy, did you really see how the Air Force and the other branches kind of combined to work towards one common goal? Or did you kind of feel like it was the Navy, out there by itself?
Well, it was the Navy that won the war. You understand that.
Of course it was. (Laughter).
I don't have a feeling for that. No.
No?
Actually, before I volunteered to be drafted, I did volunteer to go into the Navy Air Corps.
Okay.
I took a trip down to New York City, and had a physical, and so on and so forth. But, inasmuch as I had motion sickness, and I got dizzy pretty quick, and so forth, why that pretty much eliminated me --
Yeah.
-- right then and there. Like they put you on a centrifuge, or something of that nature there.
Oh, yeah.
And I got completely disoriented. And they said, sorry, Mr. Larter, you're no candidate for the Navy -- Air Force, at least, you know. But -- no. I didn't have a real feeling for that. I saw an awful lot of large carriers. For instance, when we were in Guam, and they were preparing to get ready -- or was it -- one of the islands anyway, when they were preparing for -- to invade Okinawa -- the last island before Japan, why the aircraft carriers were in abundance, you know. That was a fantastic sight. We knew that when the aircraft carriers started moving out, along with the battle group -- the battle wagons and the cruisers, and so forth, we knew that there was a big -- something pretty big going to be taking place.
Yeah.
And that was the Easter of '45. Easter of '45.
So, did you -- I'm sure you probably supported the dropping of the Nuclear Bomb; right? I mean --
Never knew a thing about it.
Oh, you didn't? Wow.
We didn't even know -- when the first one was dropped, we didn't even know what it was. When we heard nuclear -- what's that? I mean, you know, I was just a kid.
Wow. Yeah.
No. I knew nothing about it. Nothing.
So they kept that under pretty good wraps.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. I don't know -- I had no idea what fusion was, or any of that good stuff. All we know is that they did drop one awfully big bomb -- what it was made of, I didn't have a clue. And then when they dropped the second one, in Nagasaki, why -- why -- And then, what was it? A week later? A few days later? They surrendered.
Yeah. What kind of -- were you pretty excited about being able to go home? Or were you able to go home when Japan surrendered?
All right. When the word got around, and we were out in the middle of nowhere -- I can tell you -- we were still at Okinawa -- what it meant to us was there was not going to be any more smoke pots; there weren't going to be any -- there wasn't going to be any more general quarters; there wasn't going to be -- you know, there wasn't going to be up most of the night and maybe trying to get a little sleep during the day. There was going to be a time of quiet. And, that meant a lot to us. Then it started to dawn on us, well maybe we're going to go home, you know. But we still didn't know what there was going to be -- a certain amount of troops occupying Japan. We didn't know if we were going to be involved with the occupation of Japan --
Right.
-- or support in the occupation of Japan. So, yeah, we knew that somewhere down the road fairly soon we were going to be going home. But for the immediate future it was still rather uncertain. But just -- but just knowing that the battle routine would not be taking place anymore was a tremendous relief.
I believe it. When was that? Do you remember the date that -- or the month?
Well, It was August -- August -- August of 1945. What was it the 8th -- around the 8th or 10th of August? Say in the middle of August of '45, that the war was over -- Japan had surrendered. That was tremendous.
Did you feel pretty lucky about being able to go over in the Pacific? I mean, out of all the different places you could go -- could have gone, and could have been doing, I mean, how did you feel you faired in terms of lucking out? I mean --
Well, from what I know now, and from what I was hearing at the time --
Yeah.
-- I think it was a real break. I was disappointed I wasn't going to get to Europe, by all of the ships that were going to England and so on and so forth. But we had also been hearing the horror stories of what was happening to our ships when they went across the north Atlantic. The German submarines were knocking them off like fish in a barrel, you know.
Yeah.
And, no -- And the weather of course, North Atlantic was bitter cold, and very rough water, and so on and so forth. No. I wasn't too disappointed that I was in that part of the Pacific; even though we did get some rough water.
Right. So, about how long after the war was declared to be over -- about how long after that were you able to go home?
Okay. I -- we got into San Francisco on the west coast, I would say the first week of December. So let's say that the surrender was in August. Okay? So then we were still sailing around, and out in the Pacific, for September, October, November. But that all wasn't all that bad, because we knew we were going home. We knew that we were going to get orders to go home. What we had to do, instead of having supplies -- the normal supplies -- our ship was down-loaded, or off-loaded, and we took on personnel. We took on a bunch of Marines -- about 200 Marines.
Wow.
See. And outfitted the cargo spaces that would normally hold cargo, we outfitted them with hammocks and bunks and so forth, in order to take a load of Marines back. For -- and then -- then we started back. We actually were able to stop in Hawaii, Oahu --
Oh, that's nice.
-- on the way back. Usually liberty, as we call it, was given to port and starboard. So, one side of the ship got to go into Oahu, or Hawaii, for twelve hours; and then the next day the other side of the ship was able to go. So we were just a couple of days in Hawaii. And then from Hawaii, we left for San Francisco. And sometime around the first week of December, we landed in San Francisco, tied up to a wharf. And I don't know all of the details, but I started -- we were worried whether we were going to get home for Christmas -- Christmas of 1945. And that was probably one of the worst experiences, was getting out of Oakland, California, and getting back to Rochester by the time -- Christmas. And here you had millions -- literally millions of men trying to go from the west coast to the east coast. And there's just so many troop trains that could handle all of those people. And, so my buddy and I -- we finally got tickets, our travel -- our travel -- what do you call it -- Officer -- Officer in charge of travel for the sailors, gave us our tickets. We got our ticket. We had to buy them, but very cheap. We went down to the train station. The train was there -- steam locomotive, by the way; this wasn't diesel. This was -- (Laughter.) (END OF SIDE ONE, TAPE ONE; BEGIN SIDE TWO, TAPE ONE.)
Sorry.
Locomotive. They were at the train terminal. And here are thousands -- literally thousands of military personnel trying to get aboard this train. And, but anyway, my buddy and I, we were very, very fortunate to get a seat. And they kept filling that train up. All of the coaches. I don't know how many there were. All of the coaches were filled. And men were standing. They were sitting on their suitcases in the aisle.
Wow.
And that had to go from -- then that train had to go from Oakland, California, to some place on the east coast. So, we understood that we were fortunate having seats.
Yeah.
But what we did was, we got up and took turns standing or sitting on suitcases, or whatever, let the other guys sit down for awhile, you know, and so on and so forth. There was one incident that I want to really make sure is known in my --
Absolutely.
On the way from the west coast, through Nebraska, there was no hot water, no food -- nothing. And this train had to give way to other troop trains that were going by. Well, actually, to finalize it, we had -- it took us four days to go from Oakland to Chicago -- or three days -- no, four days. And the only real oasis in that terrible trip was a city called North Platte, Nebraska. They had -- the whole town of North Platte was organized all during the war, and after the war, as long as troop trains was going through there, they had every troop train stop, had all of the men get off that train and partake of the refreshments and the hot water -- and everything -- and the entertainment that -- for whatever period of time that troop train was able to stay there. And that was -- they had sandwiches and pies and desserts. And of course the train depot did have restrooms that had hot water and toilets. And we were very thankful for that. But we only had about a half an hour stay there; but, everybody got off the train. We were greeted very friendly. And we were given all kinds of food. We found out later that the whole town of North Platte was divided up into quarters. And each quarter, each day, had the responsibility of doing that for the troops as we went through the town.
Wow. Did you think most of the other places that you traveled through were pretty much dead, or like desert, or --
Yeah. They were -- Well, they just weren't set up in order to take care of -- not just a hundred men; they would take maybe 2,000 men or more.
Wow.
And they all hit the terminal all at one time. And to be able to make sure that they were provided for, and back on the troop train within a half an hour, so the train could get moving again --
Yeah.
-- that was really something. And I will never forget that -- never forget the hospitality of North Platte, Nebraska, as we went through there.
That must have been pretty comforting, I guess, after being at war for so long.
Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, it's not even your family; but, just to know that people are thankful for your effort in the war is probably a pretty heartwarming -- heartwarming thing. Now -- so, after that, you continued on to Chicago?
Continued on to Chicago. And they were having a snowstorm like they hadn't known in quite awhile. So I had to go from that train terminal, over to another train terminal. I think we came in on Union Pacific, and I had to get over to the Lafayette Station, or something like that, in order to continue east. And it was terrible. It snowed about a foot deep. And I missed the first train. It was coming to Rochester. And there was supposed to have been another train leaving at 5 o'clock; but, when I got on it -- but because of my -- I don't know -- being so tired and being in -- I got on a coach that was terribly hot. And I -- almost immediately I felt sick to my stomach. I thought, I've got to get out of here. So I missed that train going -- coming to Rochester. And, five hours later, though, about 10 o'clock in the morning, they said another train was coming, leaving for Rochester. I got on that. And, actually we beat that first train that left at five in the morning, because that was a local. And the train that I got on five hours later was an express, and it took us right straight through to Rochester.
Quite a difference coming to Chicago, after you spent a few days in Hawaii?
Yeah. Yes. I was frozen, really. Because all of my time I was in the Pacific -- tropical climates. And -- and when I hit -- when we hit the west coast in December -- that's supposed to be warm -- but, we nearly froze.
Now, when --
One of the jobs they gave me just to occupy my time, after I went back, after my 30-day leave, went back to San Francisco, Treasure Island -- they actually call it T.I. -- they made me a shore patrol. And they put me in the middle of an intersection at midnight, at night, when there was nobody around, you know, except seagulls. But the wind was blowing in off of the bay there, you know. And I nearly froze to death, you know. And then they made me guard a prisoner in the hospital there. Because -- to give me a break from the cold, you know. Then the next thing I had to do was to fight to not go to sleep. Because if I was caught sleeping on guard duty, why I could have ended up in the brig, you know. Goes from one excess -- one extreme to the other, you know. (Laughter.)
Wow. Now, when you got home, were your other two brothers already home, or were you the first one home.
Good question. No, they were not home. No. The one that was in the Air Force -- They were both home. I'm pretty sure that they were both home. But I can't be sure of that. I can't be sure of that. Yeah.
What were things like at home? I mean, did you at all miss being with your comrades, and kind of miss -- I don't know -- I'm sure you had some good times, good laughs. I mean, did you miss those? Was it weird or different being back at home?
Again, it wasn't a big social event. It wasn't a big social event. We did our thing. All of my buddies -- about 14 of them, that I knew -- we had done our thing. And now we were coming home and we wanted to get on with business as usual.
Yeah.
We wanted to get jobs. I was going with Mary at the time. Well, we were engaged. All the time that I was aboard ship and overseas, we were engaged.
It must have been hard.
We wanted to plan on a wedding. In fact, we did. That was -- we came -- Well, I was discharged in April of '46, and we were married in May of '46, you know. So, within six weeks we were married.
Wow.
But that first time home, at -- after coming back from overseas at Christmas-time, everybody -- I was meeting -- not so many of my buddies, but my family. We were an -- we had a large family. And that was a joyous time, of course.
Right.
But, when I finally got home and got discharged, and so forth, no, there wasn't a whole lot of socializing. We just wanted to get ourselves established. Get a job. Get married. And start having a family. And doing all the good things you have to do in order to establish a family. Get a house.
Oh, yeah.
Which I didn't do for a couple of years after I -- after I got back.
Did you find that a lot of people were asking about your experiences? And how did you respond to that?
Did anybody want to know my experiences? No.
No?
No.
Probably -- I mean, were you happy about that? Were you just so sick, and fed up with it, like you said, you just wanted to get on with it, and not think backwards?
No. If they wanted to know, I would give them an earful, you know. But nobody really wanted to know. So I just kept it to myself. Until -- until this project came up, really. This project that came up -- what -- a couple of years ago or so -- wanted us to be involved in this veterans' project. And I said, you know, it's a good time for me to maybe think about what happened back there.
Yeah. We were ecstatic when we heard. We really wanted to hear what you had to say, and stuff, so --
That's great. I didn't think young people today would really want to hear about this stuff.
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Unless you're a history buff. And I was a history buff. That was my favorite subject when I was in high school, was history.
I just like hearing about the war, and things.
Me too. That's my favorite part of history, is the conflicts. And my big tie in it, for me, was, like I said, I have a very large Air Force background --
Yeah.
-- in my family. And I actually lost a father. My dad died when I was like two years old. So, I mean, I've got a lot of interest in, you know, wars --
The military.
-- and the military, in general. So it was -- kind of hit home for me, you know. So it's very interesting to hear your story.
Possibly -- I got another thought -- is that the type of service that I was in, and the ship that I was in, probably the one word that would probably describe it the best was that it was boring.
Boring?
Boring. I don't know if you ever read the book, The Caine Mutiny? Or maybe saw the movie -- this was a long time ago -- if you -- I would advise that. If you want to follow up on what I've told you today, and what you want to read here, is get the book The Caine Mutiny. That was very, very much like -- Mr. Roberts, or -- another title for ya is Mr. Roberts. I think that was the main character, Mr. Roberts. But, the Captain of that ship, the Caine -- the Caine, was not our Captain -- our Captain was a good guy. Whereas in The Caine Mutiny, the Captain, he was a -- he was a little -- what do you call it -- he wasn't hitting on all cylinders. (Laughter.)
A little loony. The Caine -- K-A-N-E?
K-A-I-N.
K-A-I-N?
Caine Mutiny.
I should write that down.
So that -- it was a supply ship, and an awful lot of the incidents that happened aboard it were very similar to what happened in our supply ship.
Well, if you don't have anything else to share, thank you for your time, and stuff, today.
Okay.
I had a great time listening. Do you have anything else? I mean --
You can have this.
I would love to read through it.
I've got a few illustrations. I've got other junk here, but -- There is that same picture that I did.
All right.
That's in my boot camp. And just some -- memorabilia, I guess you call it.
Do you have your story -- I assume your story is in there.
Yeah. The whole thing is there. That's a picture of my ship. It's painted camouflaged. But we changed that after a few months aboard it. We got a painting party together and painted it battleship gray, you know, made it all gray. But it's about 600 feet long -- 40 feet wide. It was a liberty ship. And the liberty ships did a tremendous effort over -- during the war. And we lost a tremendous amount of them during the war, especially in the North Atlantic. They would try to get cargo from the United States over to England, especially. And --
How long was that? Does it say down there?
He said 600 feet.
Wait a minute. I might be wrong on that. It might have been 400-and-something feet.
Now, when did you type this story?
Let's see. No, I can't see too well.
38 -- K, which is probably kilometers. kilometers. That says size, right here.
That's in the metric system.
441 feet?
441 feet.
That's a pretty good-sized boat.
I beg your pardon.
Ship.
There you go.
Sorry. When did you type this story? I mean, did you do it relatively --
This past summer. July. All through the month of July. I went over it three times. I had to rewrite it. And then I made a tape of it, too.
Oh, great.
But you're not getting that.
Oh, we're not. Okay. Well, I think I'm going to make a copy of this and send it in, and make a copy for you, too. I would really love to look through it.
And fortunately I got aboard the ship while it was being built down in Alabama Ship Building and Dry Dock -- Dry Dock Company in Alabama -- Mobile, Alabama. I volunteered for it. I thought my number was coming up very quickly to go aboard, like a destroyer, or something of that nature.
Yeah.
And I said, I -- I actually installed the fire control equipment aboard this ship.
Oh.
And I said, well, what better ship to be on than the ship that you've actually made the installation of the equipment on.
Yeah.
So I volunteered for it.
At least you know it's good, too.
And I know it's good, I did it myself. And, so that's how come I got to go aboard it. That would have been a tremendous ship for somebody to buy and continue on using. All it ever made was one round trip trip from Norfolk, Virginia, over to the Islands. We made several inter-island trips with it. It came back to the United States -- scrapped two years later.
Gosh.
They put a welding torch to it, or put a torch to it, and scrapped it.
Wow. You'd think they would have saved it, or something, for --
I don't know. There were a thousand. These liberty ships were being built during the war. They could make one in 72 hours -- every three days a liberty ship would come off that --
And what did your wife do during the time that --
Well, we weren't married of course; but, she was working at Kodak.
Oh, she was?
She was at the Kodak office on State Street during the war.
How long -- this is -- around -- curiosity. How long before you went off to war had you been engaged? How long before you had gone to war?
No. We got engaged after I was in the service.
Oh, after you were in the service. I apologize. Okay. Must have missed -- But you had been dating beforehand, and had been good friends?
We had been dating. And maybe that was when, kind of -- God kind of pushed me over the brink. Some other guy kind of cut in on me.
Oh, man.
And she didn't think that it was gonna -- you know, she didn't want to date any longer. And that was just before I went to boot camp. That was just before I went in the Navy. I said, okay. So, I was at boot camp. And I went down to Newport, Rhode Island, for my training school. And then I came back on delayed orders from Newport, after my training there. That would be like about five months after I was in the Navy. And we had a -- kind of a reconciliation, or kind of a rethinking this thing through.
Yeah.
And so we kind of wrote to each other, and dated whenever I could get home.
Wow.
So then, in about the middle of '44, it was, why -- that would be, what? Almost a year.
After you went in. Just around.
After I went in. And I asked her to marry me. And I did it the old-fashioned way. I went to her father to ask for permission.
Good man. (Laughter.)
It's very nice speaking with you, I must say.
Okay.
Very, very interesting.
Let me get your names.
All right.
Who was that -- Tim McGraw was a baseball player. Wasn't he a baseball player?
He was a baseball player, and he's also a country singer, now, too.
Oh, he is.
Yeah.
But, you're no relation.
No relation. A lot of people ask me about that, actually.
But, you're Matt -- Matthew.
Oh, wait. You know, what? Sorry. Jonathan.
Hey, my favorite pen, because of my eyesight. Matthew. M-A-T-H.
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