Lunga Point (CVE 94) - Naval Cruise Book

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ditions at night that closely resembled a Hblack- out, and all the way down we had religiously darkened ship one-half hour before sunset each evening, and no one was allowed to smoke in any exposed location. What could have been more surprising to us, then, than to learn that there would be no black-out in Finsehafen, even in our ship? That night, Finschafen and the surrounding military installations looked like Times Square. It seemed quite bold to us, what with thousands of japs entrapped just north of us around Wewak. At any rate, we had no attack that night and were able to pro- ceed with our job of unloading unmolested. We had another surprise in the distorted picture we had had of the natives. Naturally, we had all read books, and we had all seen movies about the South Pacific, and we ex- pected to find the natives not bad to look at to say the least. Since our stay there was to be short, very few were allowed to leave the dock. Fortunately, however, the Captain needed some khaki pants, and when the Old Man needs khaki pants the Shipis Service Officer has to go into action, in fact, when the Skipper needs anything, somebody has to go into ac- tion. The only good thing that ever came out of being Shipis Service 0Hicer was the oppor- tunity to go shopping for the Gaptainis pants in New Guinea. We, being Ship's Service Gflicer at the time, bright and early the next morning, took our Number 2 Jeep, hoping to find the Gaptainas pants at an Army Post Ex- change we had heard of about ten miles up the coast. We took along Bos'n Luck and Dr. MacDonald, UBoats,' to help us weigh an- chor in that mud, and Dr. MacDonald to treat us in case of snake bite, because we had already heard of an eight foot python crawling in the bunk of an Army Ofhcer his very first night there. W - After leaving the dock, we found that the SeaBees, as usual, had done an excellent job of building roads up and down the coast, so we headed north along a very good dirt road, only occasionally running into deep mud, We passed camp after camp of Army and SeaBee unitsas we drove along through the hot, humid groves of coconut palms. We finally found the Post Exchange we were looking for, but they didn't have the correct size pants for the Captain, so we began our return ourney to the ship. ' On the way up we had seen numerous natives in British uniform, patrolling the roads, but we hadn't seen any natives in their native dr road, we saw 'two intlivicltizils with a very g'sun-burn emerging from the jungle on port hand. Slowing down to get a good look it turned out that they were none other t New Guinea's lJagwood and Blondie,' out for a Sunday morning stroll. NVe had always heard that the natives in these parts made the women do all the work, and these two con- firmed it. Pop'i was out front, wearing a loin cloth and nothing else, and carrying about a six foot stall' in his right hand. He seemed to be awfully well built and in the best of shape physically. lt was, of course, impossible to tell his age, but, though he didn't look it, we guessed his age as about fifty. L'Mom was trudging along about six feet astern, wearing a length of what appeared to be brightly colored, but dirty, gingham wrapped around her body from her arm pits to just above her knees, and she was carrying a heavy burden on her back, suspended in a sort of sling from her head. She was diminutive to say the least, and appeared to be about I 5 years old, but not holding her youth too well under the burden imposed on her by being Dagwoodas spouse. She was everything but the Dorothy Lamour type we had expected to find. ess. lrilmlly, returning to the ship along this jungle dark our 9 han Returning to the ship, we found them load- ing old planes and a few passengers for trans- portation back to the States. We also found lots of visitors at our Gedunk,' Stand, buying ice cream and anything else we could sell them. These Army lads and SeaBees had been there a long time without too much in the way of luxuries, so it was a pleasure to let them have anything we could spare, including our upre- cious cargo. We also found three Army Nurses, not too glamorous looking in their cover-alls, waiting for the Shipis Service Gfiicer to see if he would sell each of them one of the pretty leather compacts that were reserved for the Ship's Company. After one good look at them we realized that they were in desperate need of something to combat the effects of the New Guinea climate on their complexionsg so we let them each have one, and they were three happy girls if we ever saw any. As 3 matter of fact, we believe they would gladly have paidfive times the price we charged them. The sight of these three girls, undergoing the same hardships as the men in New Guinea, convinced us of the many sacrifices they HFC

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Part of our cargo of army planes on Hght deck at Espiritu Santos. making in this war, and they are doing it happily, too. Having completed our loading of cargo and passengers, on 'cSunday, 16 july 1944: 16-18 Moored as before. 1617 Underway from Pier 11, Dreger Harbor, Finschafen, New Guinea, on various courses and speeds to con- form to channel. Pilot, Captain Bell, at the conn. Captain, Executive Officer and Navi- ,...,IW,5,,,,.!,., .,,, ,, .3 ,, , ,.. . ,. . .,, V ffiyyf My . G! f, ff , f . 1 ' . 'fvffcf gator on the bridge. 1631 Passc-cl Red Drum Buoy abeam 'to port, distance 50 yards. 1635 Pilot left the ship. 1637 Witli Nussing Island bearing o5oOT, distance M mile, took depar- ture. Ahead sys. 1642 Set base course 27o.5OT, 2700 p.g.c. and 260.50 p.s.c. 1645 Ahead full speed. 1735 cfc to oo5.5OT, oo5O p.g.c. and 357.50 p.s.c. 1738 Darkened ship? Again, we were underway for somewhere, and, shortly after leaving New Guinea, where we had been for little more than 24 hours, we were told that we were en route to Espiritu Santos, New Hebrides, where, if we were for- tunate enough to get on the beach,'j we might have the opportunity of trying out our French on the natives. The cruise up to Espiritu Santos was uneventful, just the everyday rou- tine, drills and more drills, classes and more classes, the entire Ship's Company being oc- cupied in teaching or learning to Hman a shipf' It was at this point that we began to see the re- sults of our indoctrination. The Captain, who had heretofore felt it advisable to remain on the bridge nearly all the time, except for a few hours at night, began to spend a little less time up there. There was also a definite atmos- phere of mutual confidence developing be- tween the Captain and the Shipis Company. S. Kg . Harbor view at Espiritu Santos. 2