They were the greatest generation.
My friend Carl served aboard the USS Gambier Bay, in the battle off Samaar. That ship was the single US flattop sunk by gunfire during the war, after the Japanese got their 18” guns trained on her. Carl didn’t talk much about the war, he told me he spent 4 years sunburned, mostly because he was trained as an aircraft mechanic, but, during a tour fewer aircraft made it back to the ship, and they chewed up a lot of 38 gunners, so, he was moved into the net and spent most of the war hanging under the flight deck, manning a gun mount. He said he knew he could tread water for two days, he did it after the ship was sunk, but, didn’t know if he could do three days. He said when the 18” rounds passed through the ship, it looked like a Chevy Suburban had gone through it. He referred to the CVE designation for jeep carriers as meaning “ Combustible, Vulnerable and Expendable”. He wasn’t smiling when he said it. He lived to be 97, my family ended up being his family at the holidays.
Carl never married, and had no heirs when he died. I often wonder if the war put him on that trajectory. I think he would have been a great father. He was a great friend.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Gambier_BayBest,
Ted
