Hollandia (CVE 97) - Naval Cruise Book

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taking photographs, developing and printing. And he did an excellent job, If you like this book, you must give loads of credit to Klotz, because the pictures are the book. Boss of the Air Department at commissioning, and for some time thereafter, was Lt, Cdr. Tom Bradbury. Brad organized the department and developed it to a high point of ethciency, and when he turned it over to Lt. Cdr. jim Leslie, it was a fine organization. Clarence Bartley, a lieutenant, was assistant air ofhcer until he was sent to another CVE. UNNERY was the baby of Lt. Cdr. Lee Shorty Bains, a Southern barrister, who never lost the opportunity to let one and all know he was a devotee of Blackstone. Organization was a tough task. The de- partment was big, and the men for the most part knew nothing, or next to it, about gunnery. Most of the men in the First, Second, and Third Divisions were land- lubbers. Indeed, Bains had only seven enlisted men who ever had been to sea before. Many had never seen an ocean until they boarded the HOLLANDIA. So, in addition to learning about gunnery, they had to learn how to live and work at sea. These men really had to work at learning their jobs. They had to know their guns throughout. They had to keep them in readiness to fire 24 hours a day. They had to know how to fire them-and to be able to hit a target when they did fire. Gunnery exercises were held often, and the men attained a line degree of efficiency in blasting away at towed sleeves or balloons. There was ,other work too. The Gunnery divisions are the deck divisions. When the men weren't on their guns, they seemed to spend every waking hour in cleaning, scrubbing or painting. And when they weren't doing that they were painting, scrubbing or cleaning! The three divisions were large ones, and as such were harder to handle than the smaller groups. But when Capt. Lee made his first per- sonnel inspection, he named the First Division as the best on the ship. And you don't have to remind Lieut. Kristofak to remind you of that. They were his boys. In addition to the division officers under him, Bains had an ace in Gunner Whittington. Every Navy gunner must know his stuff, and Whitting- ton was no exception. He taught everyone, ofhcers and men. When there was something to be done, the Gunner saw that it was done speedily and properly. He was always there with suggestions-and good suggestions. Bains had Neg England, jack Martin, Kris Kristofak, Bob Rosberg, Dave Rice, and Duke Wellington as his ofhcers when the ship put out to sea. Then Shorty went to the Hancock, Martin to the Colorzzdo, and England became Gunnery Officer. LIEUT. FERRELL ROLLINS was our Navigator, and one of the best. Capt. Lee soon found out that Red's ideas always were solid ones and followed his suggestions gation was under discussion. Red came to the 97 from the staff of Commander Task Force 22, on which he was Qs 761 flag lieutenant. He had - served aboard battleships, light and heavy cruisers, and destroyers-and several car- riers, including the Yorktown and Rd7Zg67'. He was a good man to have aboard. As assistant navigation officers he had Ray Russell, Rusty Gunther, and jack Ward at one time or another. And he had a real salt with him in Howard Thomas Fraser, Chief Quartermaster, who served as Red's third eye. Fraser was one of the 97's three veterans of World War One. QDavis and Cheney were the othersj He enlisted in 1915 and saw duty on both big oceans in that first great struggle. He was at sea on all types of warships. He was a photographer at Pearl on 7 December 1941. Many of the exciting pic- without question when navi- - X u I :Fifa

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all the other Air Department personnel as well. Of course the men had to learn most of this at sea, during actual operations. But they re- ceived their first taste of loading aircraft at San Diego before the first trip out. Chief Carrington was the big man. He had served aboard CV's and really knew his stuff. Truly an expert at loading and spotting planes, he could fit a TBM into a spot hardly big enough for a bicycle. His strident voice made the men hop to it. They beefed of coursegwhat would the Navy be without plenty of beefs ?-but they got the work done. Before long they were setting records in loading and unloading aircraft. Plane pushers and the men who worked on the barges which brought the planes to the ship in many ports-they all worked hard and well. Those barges had a wicked way of hopping around on the waves, but the men took it, and fixed slings and hooked the planes to the boom day and night during the loading and unloading operations. Lieut. George Rumsfeld's V-2 gang ran the hangar deck-and a hangar deck was something some of the men had only read about until they boarded the 97. That deck always was a busy place, planes or no planes. Bombs and tanks were stowed there. Gear was stowed in the ele- vator pits. And there were the elevators them- selves. If rain came and the elevators were not raised promptly, it meant water in the pits and on the hangar deck. V-2 boys spent plenty of time swabbing up rainwater. And when there were planes aboard, Rumsfeld and his gang had to check constantly to see that all were well lashed down, that no one had tampered with them. George's leading petty officer, Rood, was a valuable man to have around the hangar deck. And the rest of the boys pitched in also. They learned fast and they learned well. V-3 Division completed the Air Department. Lieut. Vance Alexander, our fighter director, was division officer. His specialty was radar, but he had to see that all was well in aerology and photography. He did a swell job until finally he was handed some of that lovely stateside duty and was succeeded by Lieut. Bill Lewis, who carried on without a break. All the radar boys had received good training -the officers at St. Simons, the men at Point Loma, San Clemente or aboard the Camblazmz. But they didn't really learn what radar was all about until they put to sea and ran into the actual situations they'd studied in almost exclu- sively synthetic form. At sea they learned what a pip looked like, what it meant, how to get a course and speed on an air or surface target quickly and accurately, how to determine how close it would pass to the 97, and when. They also learned that theyid be deeply concerned with navigation, that every time the HOLLANDIA drew close to land they'd hear from the Navigator. ln addition to Alexander and Lewis, radar had Lieut. Art Walsh, Lt. fjgj Lou Darscheid, Lt. Jim Caufield, Lt. joe Turke, and Lt. Qjgj Bob Holden as officers, with Lieut. Dave Thornton also pitching in now and then. Caufield and Turke were maintenance officers. They did a thoroughly capable job keeping the gear in operation. And they had an excellent man in Chief Poole, who knew his radars from A to Z. Fellows like Moyer, Allen, Kostowski, Lord, Lacy, Brandmeyer, Curry and Bafus-and all the rest-kept radar operating at a high peak throughout. Frank Arsenault, a warrant, broke in the aero- logy gang, with their daily forecast. They never missed. They sent up their balloons to see what the wind was doing and why. They sent them up for firing practice. When Arsenault went to another post, Sleeves Thornton replaced him. He's one of the best men anywhere in the Navy. Chief Craig organized photography and carried on well with three assistants. But when he was sent to another ship, two of the others also were transferred, leaving Leigh Klotz to handle the job alone. Klotz was kept busy, but he didn't learn what the LTOLLANDIA photography job could be until it was decided to publish this book. Then Klotz went to work. He took pic- tures of everything. He worked day and night, 9

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MN tures of that sneak attack by the 'laps were filkefl by his camera. Following that raid he went to sea again and saw action at Guadalcanal, New Georgia, Rendova, Kula Gulf, and Kolomban- gara. So he came to the 97 with a real background. He was invaluable to Red in breaking in the reserve enlisted men of N Division, who included a couple of buglers whose only fault was in blowing reveille when nobody was ready for it. Rollins and his gang always knew where the ship was to go, how it was to get there, and when it was to arrive. We always arrived where and when the orders indicated. HE ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT provided the power to make those long trips to the Far Pacific. It had an ' t a W 'fi May F' i M N - s, l,,- T :W if A ee 46 e' tv 3 x , , N 'S lj I I rg ' ' -ik cj 4 ,,.,3,,l enviable record. The Black Gang never got us under- way late, never caused us to run behind schedule. Close calls, but always on time. Lieut. Raymond Pete Shannon was our first engi- neering officer. Pete came to us after sea duty on other Navy ships and with years of experience as a merchantman engineer. He started right out breaking in the Black Gang and took the 97 out on its first trip to Espiritu, Manus, and Guadalcanal. And by the time we had returned to the States the engineering staff knew their stuff as well as any gang aboard ship. There is much to learn in an engineroom. The complexities of station-keeping, for example. We made our first trip out unescorted but when we reached Finschaven, en route from Espiritu to Manus, they shoved us in with a convoy which could make but eight knots. That presented a problem to the 97, which was no speed king but cruised normally at approximately 15 knots, The trip took about 50 hours, all of which were spent in continual jockeying back and forth in order to stay in position. The engineering staff was up against something quite new to most of them. Following that jockeying trip, liuwever, gi revolution splitter was rigged up in the form ot a vernier adjustment for the main engine tut-off levers. This worked out to perfection, lfrom that time on the Black Gang just followed orders from the bridge, proclaiming that if the 97 ever was caught off station, it was the fault of the officer of the deck and nobody else, Shannon's boys were in the clear. When we returned to the States Pete went to the hospital for a short time, then left the Navy to return to his old job of engineering ofiicer on a tanker. Lieut. O. K. johnson, who had been his assistant, took over with Lt, fjgj joe Ander- son becoming assistant engineering otiicer. Whisper Sturgis and Electrician Merchant also were hospitalized, and Lillig left for other duty, leaving Shaky Dubler, Murphy, Dillon, Chan- nel and Winklhofer. Through all personnel changes in the depart- ment one unforgettable character remained--XX'il- liams, the assistant oil king. Williams ran through four oil kings in rapid succession. Possibly they were unable to keep up with his pace. Or per- haps they were smothered under the weight of his omniscience-or possibly just his weight. .asr LIEUTENANT and Damage Control Otiicer was Lt. Cdr. Phil Cheney, Harvard graduate. artist, Vermont farmer and expert on the better things in life, which he'd tell you are liquor and wo- , , tiff-llilur-ffl menhor is it women and liquor? Phil's many duties included keeping the 97 T A shipshape, seeing that repair work was done when and where it was needed. He A! had to handle abandon ship 4' assignments. He had to issue lifebelts. He had to take care dd- lon of all berthing, for both ofii- i cers and men. He had to handle the same thing for passengers, Anyone who has served aboard can tell you that the Q7 HIWAYS WHS Ueflf and clean, always ready for any- fhmg that Came her way in the line- of duty. PASSCIUZCYS were almost unanimous in declaring