LST (491) - Naval Cruise Book

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THE or! DOUBLE TROUBLE turned to Plymouth. When we returned to Plymouth we received aboard Commander J. C. Guillott, fCommander LST Group 295 USN, and his staff, including the following: Lt. fjgj A. C. Coates QGroup Communications Officerj, and Dr. C. E. Daugherty QMCQ Lt. USNR. Enlisted per- sonnel included: Chief Radioman Van der Tuig, Dick- inson, L. M., SM2!cg Connington, D. H., RM3!cg Hart, J. T., Y2!cg and Meyers, E., STM2!c. The wrecked city of Plymouth was a tragic example of the immorality and destructiveness of war. A great number of the historic old buildings and churches were in shambles. The city was blacked out each night and the air raids were numerous. Our ship was berthed astern of the Amphibious Force Flagship, U.S.S. Ancon. One night, during an attack by the Nazis, all hell seemed to break loose when the British Anti-aircraft land bat- teries opened iire fthe ships were instructed not to fire as they would disclose their positionj. Flak fell on our deck and wesaw a German plane come down in flames. 0ur next practice operation was again scheduled for May in Slapton Sands, the practice invasion area between Dartmouth and Brixham. It was on a much larger scale and many of our men thought that this time it was the real invasion coming off. Before we de- parted from Plymouth we had a new super-conn con- structed. We loaded the Army again at Brixham and the operation went according to plan. One of the LST 18

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' 1 I 7 1 l , A-LM-av -- i 9 i .t 'P 1'-l . -J . ' ff:-H iii ' 7 Q53 EASTWARD HO! -Q DESTINATION U. K. J A . f 'L V vb 2 Before leaving the unloading pier, we received our first inspection, personnel and material, by Commander L. F. Teuscher, USN, Commander LST Group 28, Flotilla 10, and his staff. The night before inspection the Captain informed the crew that all men were to have haircuts. Well, it seemed that his orders were strictly obeyed, as the Commander remarked, after com- pleting his inspection, I didn't find any man that re- quired a haircut, but you must have quite a variety of barbers aboard this ship. Our first practice operation or dry run started about a week later. Our ship, the LST 492 and LST 284 sailed for Brixham to load American soldiers and vehicles. Brixham is one of the small towns on the Southern coast of England, which we later learned, was to be one of the important staging centers for landing craft in preparation for the assault on the Normandy coast. Here at Brixham we learned what a hard was, and conducted our business with the Hardmaster in loading the ship. The loading of an LST under beach- ing conditions was a difficult job because of the tides which often ranged as high as 28 feet. The mock inva- sion occurred at Slapton Sands, which is known as the most invaded piece of land in the world. We arrived at H hour, dispatched our infantry waves, and later beached to off load our vehicles. Gur Easter weekend was spent waiting for the Army to finish its operations, and eating our first and C rations. On Easter Sunday afternoon we again loaded the troops from the beach and, after they disembarked at Brixham, we re- 17

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.......... .,..--.-m---- M..-M-..,.,.,. Q 1 4 if 5 E y EASTWARD Ho! -- DESTINATION U. K convoys did encounter some trouble. An undetermined number of German boats attacked the convoy as it was approaching the practice assault area, and caused considerable damage. When the practice operation was completed we sailed to Dartmouth, England, which is another of the beautiful little towns along the Southern shore of Eng- land. It was difficult to enter this harbor as the ap- proach channel was very narrow. The town seemed to be sandwiched between the hills, and the quaint little brightly painted houses presented a lovely picture. Many of our men visited Dartmouth College, which is located on the top of the hill overlooking the bay where the LST's were nested by two's and moored to buoys. Dartmouth College had been a military college similar to our West Point Military Academy. Now the buildings were being used by the American Navy as a headquarters base. We sailed in a few days for Weymouth, towing a rhino ferry, and remained at anchor there for several days. On May 6 Commander C. Guillott was ordered to report to Plymouth to assume command and duties of Commander LST Flotilla Ten. On May 7 we re- ceived orders to return to Plymouth. On entering Ply- mouth the next day we noticed a great number of new LST's which had recently arrived from the States. The harbor was so crowded that we had to anchor in the vicin- ity of the nets, very close to other ships. The condition of the tide was such that we would not swing and thus there was no danger. 19