Lunga Point (CVE 94) - Naval Cruise Book

Page 61 text:

ghggr men was kt-1-iilytkilt hy .ill Ship rind sonnrl, hut wats iirtrptt-tl ill tht- . ngble spirit that is .tltxttys liotttid on tht- hg of one's Shiplliatrs, strontgly t-x1tl1'11t'1-tl ln, a grim determintttion to txirry on .ind lirintg honor to our ship :ind stittiidroii with t't'l'liIlll knowledge that thost' who hint- gout- lN'liUl't' tll't' equally responsililt' for httttrt' Alt'lllt'X't'llll'lllS. The Captain gittcttdt-tl the Mt-111o1'i41l St-1'x'i1-1-s the Squadron held lilbl' these 1111-11 411 l'Ullillll .Xir Strip on I7 Ijl'l't'lllllt'l' while tw txt-rc Qlllt'llHI't'tl at Mantis, i11 the .Xdinirtilty lsltinds. R 1f.v1aNo1-1 IS Sw 111113 1' After il rather lll't'SUlllt' sind 11ot too i11tt-1't-st- ing an ope1't1tion, and with our mission Sllt't't'SS- fully Complt'tt'd, wt' llt'2lill'l'l south, and tht- idea Oferossing the l'itittz1tort1g11i11zippt-ztllt-d to IllUSl of us on hoard, liergittst' the gl'l'2l.l. tiiatiority had at this time hceti trusty old Slit-llharks for at least four months, and the idea ol' gvttitig rt-- venge for all we took at tht' hands ol' King Neptune when we dt'st'rtt'd the ranks ol' tht- Pollywogs was most pleasing. WR- crossed the line this time on Sunday, Qti Ntivt-iiilit-t', and tht' great majority ol' ottr Pollywogs wt-rt' in tht' Sttll2itll'Ull. As at matter of fact, the only ones wt' 1't't'11ll otttsidt- oi' the Squadron that walked the fonts on this st-cond crossing were Lt. Cdr. Sands, l.t. tlorkran, Wat-r, Sic, Longoria, Flc, rind Mtilntosh, llA1t'. In any event, we had 111-otiiirl 1511 to work on, and when it was all ow-1' wt- lk-lt that, after all, it was worth being itiitizttcd jttst to wreak vengeance on that inno- t't-nt Zlllll ttiisuspt-citing hunch of 'cland- l1tl1l1t'1's.l' Wt- had hardly gotten the ship looking ship- shzipt' l1l'l.l'l' tht- crossing the line ceremonies NN'llt'Il till t'Mo11dziy, 27 Novcinher 1944: 118- 1 2 Str-arniiig as ht.-fore. 0813 Changed to 'lii111t- font- og st-t ship's clock hack one hour. o84o t' s to 414 knots. 0841 Stationed all the ztnrhoi' dt-tail. ogto Commenced manuvering on variotts courses and speeds to enter Seeadler llarhor, Adiniralty Islands. IOIO Anehored to tht- starhoard anchor in I2 fathoms of water, 43 fathoms of chain to the waterjs edge, in St't'2.lCllt'I' Harbor, Wlestern part of Admiralty Islands, in Berth XV-go. 1032 Secured the zinrhor detail. Set normal port routine. .' 't will Sol l . lictwvt-11 ollicers and chiefs 11t Pityilu. 57

Page 60 text:

address all hands over the general announcing system every night that he had something of interest to tell about our own operations or the progress of the war in general. He constantly kept us informed as far as he could conscien- tiously do so, and this expression of confidence in us undoubtedly made us try a little harder to deliver the goods. Between 1930 and Qojgo nearly every night while underway, it became quite common for us to hear the Boslnls Malta' sound attention over the general announcing system, followed by, 4'Testingg I-Q-3, Uh, this is the Executive Cfiicer speaking. I have the Captain here to talk to you, so everybody stand by. Everybody stand byf, Our mission in the Leyte operations was to proceed with CarDiv 29 to Leyte Gulf where our planes were to cover the convoys as they sailed through the Gulf in to the Leyte beaches. Our planes did a magnificent job of covering the convoys as well as our own Task Unit, and 74011-' i'Pollywogs', in supplicating attitude on occasion of our second crossing oi the line, bwlnw: Four 'tljollywogsi' with new 7 hair-do s, the work of the Royal Barbers. uianv at ship got salelx through to l.t-vie that might not otherwise hate inade it had it not been for our pilots. In tart, all the Squadrons in Cfarlliv QQ turned in a inost creditable per- fornianee. I nzs'r IM' I'i sixrvii. Tuesday, QI Noveinlier 1944: 08-ig Steaming as before. o9r,Q Sighted .lap 'Francis'. Ship went to Cieneral Qluarters. Plane passed overhead tiring her guns. Dis- tance about Boo yards. 11953-japanese plane disappeared bearing jgQ5O'.l'.'5 At 0952 uthat gong rang out its doleful notes. ln a llash, all hands were at their Battle Stations. Wfith all our speed, however, we did not fire a round at him. The Jap had paid us a surprise visit. Not a ship in our Division had picked him up until he was virtu- ally on us, having just sneaked in as they do occasionally. He came zooming by the Bis- marck Sea QCVE 955, which was dead ahead of us, crossed our bow, and new down our port side at about Qoo knots or better and only about 8oo feet above the water. He was strafing as he Hew by, but his strahng hit the waters of the Pacihc only. We could have opened fire with our Condition III guns very easily except for the fact that the Captain saw that our range was fouled by the Bzsmarclr Sm CCVE 955 and the iUa!fz'n Island QCVE 935, and they probably failed to open fire for the same reason. That Son of Nippon missed a golden opportunity to score, because it is not often that an enemy plane can get in that close without our knowing heas coming long before he gets within range of our guns. We will never know what he was up to, and, as he flew over the horizon, we again settled down to our routine with some- thing to talk about for the remainder of the Leyte operation, because it was the first Jap plane most of us had ever seen. We had a most unfortunate occurrence on the morning of 25 November when two of our Torpedo Bombers collided in mid-air at about 6ooo feet, within view of our ship. The cause ofthe collision was undetermined and resulted in the death of Ensign Wilbur Francis Bcrauer, USNR, the pilot of one of the planes, and his two Air Crcwmen, Emmett Douglas Fort, Jr., ARMQCT, and Cordon lvfalcolm Greene, AlXfIlVI jgc. The other plane made a successful forced landing and the entire crew was picked up by one of our screening destroyers. The loss of

Page 62 text:

THE ADMIRALTIES Long before reaching Manus, our base at Seeadler Harbor, we had begun to suffer from the heat worse than ever before. While the Top: Tango on Pityilu with his ration of beer, below: Liberty at Pityilu. i Santa Claus collects nickels and dimes at c'Times Squaren on Christmas Eve. air was hot and humid in New Guinea, we weren't bothered by it much because of the eX- citement of our first visit to a South Pacific island as well as the fact that we were hardly there long enough for it to Htake hold? We had now been cruising for several days in the Equatorial heat, and the Admiralties are prac- tically on the Equator. At first, the heat was almost unbearable, and nearly everyone aboard went to Sick Call daily for heat rash treatment. Even at night, we would lie in our bunks liter- ally wringing wet from perspiration, Al- though, it seemed impossible at first, we did finally become pretty well accustomed to the climate, in addition to which we were to have ample opportunity to swim in the beautiful, crystal clear waters of the Pacific, and this alleviated our discomfort from the heat some- what. Probably more than anything else, we simply became reconciled to the heat, because we had already heard the most reliable Scuttle- butt, straight from the Chow Line, that we . S