Above the Thunder (29 page)

To develop a correction factor to be applied in computing firing data for artillery, a unit establishes a base point and a number of check points within its sector of fire, each of these at a known location. By firing a registration on one of these points and stripping out known standard data from the adjusted data for the point, a correction factor is determined that then is applied to standard data for any target within transfer limits of the point. This enables delivery of reasonably accurate fires without necessity of observation and adjustment of fire. In combat, these registrations normally are conducted daily, shortly before dark, and in the jungle environment of New Guinea, where ground observers could see little, the registration job usually fell to Vineyard or me.

One afternoon I had registered on the base point and all the check points except the last one, Check Point #6, far around to the east end of our perimeter. The check point was a large dead tree at one end of a small jungle clearing, and as I got into position to observe the registration, I noted that a band of about eighty natives, whole families of men, women, and children, had set up one of their temporary brush camps in the clearing. I reported this to FDC.

“Huron 8, this is Huron 3—Roger—Wait. . . . Huron 8, prepare to observe battalion three rounds. Over.”

I could hardly believe the response. I had thought that I'd be told to skip the registration until a patrol could be sent tomorrow to clear out the natives, but now they were going to place a devastating concentration of fire on the people. Why? And then I remembered: the ignorant natives seemed to have little understanding of the war or of where their proper position in it might be. Some of them had made a practice of giving any information they had to either Americans or Japanese whenever asked. Further, they had occasionally picked off a soldier—American as well as Japanese—bringing up the rear or otherwise relatively exposed along the jungle trails. Their arrows and spears were deadly and silent. And so orders had been issued that our patrols would avoid being seen by natives if possible; if seen, they should kill every one involved. And none at all were to be permitted to remain within three miles of our perimeter. Check Point #6 was only about two miles out.

With a heavy heart, I replied, “Ready to observe.”

For a few seconds, the clearing and the nearby trees boiled with explosions as the people fled in all directions. When it was over and the smoke cleared away, I could see freshly turned earth, freshly fallen limbs and green leaves, motionless black bodies, and splotches of red. Obviously, we had the Check Point #6 data right to a T, so we skipped the registration.

Whenever I have nightmares about that war, they're about Check Point #6.

Uncle Bud Carlson was as fine an artillery technician and tactical planner as you will ever find. In fact, I could say he was an artist among redleg practitioners of warfare. But his position as our battalion commander afforded him little opportunity to do any shooting himself, to get out and call the shots and watch them hit the target. He missed that sorely. So one afternoon he came out to the airstrip and announced that today he was going to conduct the registrations. Away we went.

He registered the base point and five check points without a hitch,
and we proceeded out to the last check point—Check Point #6. He reported ready to observe. FDC reported “on the way,” and we saw the WP round burst well short and left of the target. For some reason I have never understood, Uncle Bud sensed it as right and over, so as soon as he let up on his mike button I said, “Cease fire!”

“Cease fire? Why cease fire? What's wrong?” asked Uncle Bud.

“Sir, your sensing is in the wrong direction. It'll put your next round back here in the perimeter.”

He scoffed at the idea. “Oh, no, no, no! You'll see.” He pushed his mike button. “Disregard cease fire. Fire on my original sensing. Over.”

I positioned the plane so Uncle Bud could see the check point out the right front, but I watched the left rear, where the line of our defense perimeter ran nearly parallel to our course. And I saw his round of WP burst—inside the perimeter. It burst high up on the trunk of a giant tree that had been left standing when the surrounding area was cleared. Chunks of the burning chemical, trailing thick, white smoke, showered down into a dump of 155 mm artillery shells standing on their bases on dunnage, and upon a pyramidal tent belonging to the ordnance ammo unit.

“There's your round, sir.”

“Where? Where?” Uncle Bud craned his neck, looking every direction except the right one.

“Back here, sir. Inside the perimeter.”

“Oh, my God! Take me down! Take me down!”

As soon as we got down, he hit his jeep on the run and was gone for about two hours. He returned somewhat calmed, since the only damage had been the burned tent, but he announced that henceforth he would leave the aerial shooting to those who were accustomed to it.

For some reason I never quite understood, the Navy wanted to shell the remains of Sarmi, the town that had once been the only settled place within a hundred miles or more in any direction. Two destroyers came up the coast, and Uncle Bud took me with him for a conference with the senior naval gunnery officer. We left one of our radio operators onboard to link me with that individual, and I set out to adjust naval gunfire for the only time in my life.

It was a notably unsuccessful venture. With the low, flat trajectories of the destroyers' guns, at least nine shells out of ten would either burst in the palms along the beach short of the town or would pass over and burst in the low hills back at the base of the peninsula on which the town was situated. I was soon disgusted with the effort and asked whether they could raise the trajectories by moving farther out to fire at greater range. They said they couldn't, but they kept firing. When I finally was able to report a hit on one of the few reasonably intact buildings left in Sarmi, they seemed satisfied.

On another occasion, I was heading out along Sawar Drome when I saw a vessel rounding the Sarmi peninsula and bearing rapidly down the coast toward Maffin. I reported it as an unidentified warship and was then asked to go out and see whether it was friend or foe. I took a diagonal course out to intercept the ship, flying at about five hundred feet. The farther I got from shore and the closer to the ship, the more I thought about pictures I'd seen of the antiaircraft fire naval vessels can put up. The L-4, too, was very sensitive to such things, and it was difficult, indeed, to keep it on the intercept course. I strained my eyes to make out a flag, a number, any marking that might clue me in, but I could not tell whose ship it was, and I just kept getting closer and closer. . . . And then FDC said never mind. Task Force Headquarters had gotten communication with the ship, an American destroyer.

On the morning of 2 December, Vin and I both went out to mark targets on air photos to be used for an air strike by an A-20 squadron. At their request, Sergeant Allen rode along with Vin, and T/4 Wendell Young went with me. When Young came out to the plane, he was carrying Mae West life vests for himself and me. Although Vin and I seldom used them, I humored Young by putting mine on without comment.

We had finished our task and were starting home. Coming eastward along the back side of Mount Haako, we heard Vin call for a fire mission against a Jap machine gun that had fired on him from the eastern end of Haako, just at the maximum range of our 105s. Young tapped me on the shoulder and asked whether we could watch the fire, since he had never seen a mission fired. We watched until Vin had clobbered the place, clearing
out a considerable amount of overhead cover in the process. I had often wondered what was there, and now was a chance to see, so I pulled on the carburetor heat and dived a little, passing over the site at about eight hundred feet and descending, using power to increase our speed to probably a hundred miles per hour. We had barely passed over the position, heading southeast, when either the same gun or another opened fire on us. Almost immediately, the engine sputtered badly, then surged, then died completely. The wooden prop stood motionless out in front.

I was on a perfect final approach to Sawar Drome, where I knew a company of Nips would welcome us warmly. To the right was the forest primeval, the deep jungle, where our landing would be in a treetop about 150 feet above ground and from which escape, if any, would take weeks. To our left was Maffin Bay, in whose blue waters we often saw sharks cruising. Behind us, of course, was Mount Haako and the handy machine gunner.

Vin and I had often discussed what might be best to do in such a case, and we had never really reached a conclusion. But at that moment, faced with the situation for real, I made up my mind in less than two seconds.

“Huron 3, this is Huron 8. My engine is dead over Sawar Creek. Am going to land in the ocean. Can you send a boat?”

I had already turned toward the water. Whether boat or sharks, it would all be over in short order. No treetop crash; no struggle to survive, evade the enemy, and get out of the jungle; no long imprisonment or tortured death at the enemy's hands.

“Roger, Huron 8. Wait. . . . We're calling the Beach. . . . The speedboat is over at Wakde but they're sending an LCVP. Over.”

“Huron 8. Roger. Thanks.”

“Crash, this is Vin. I'll keep an eye on you. Good luck.”

“Thanks, Vin.”

It occurred to me that Young, unaccustomed to flying, might be badly upset. I turned around and said, “I'll do the best I can for you, Wendy.”

He calmly replied, “I know you will, sir.”

The beach was behind us by then, and I was thinking about how best to ditch the plane, something we'd never been told about. While I was
thinking about it, Young asked whether he should loosen his safety belt or leave it fastened. I didn't know what to tell him, so I didn't answer. I did decide that I didn't want to get tangled in my headset and its wiring, so, when we were down to about fifty feet I called FDC again.

“Huron 3, this is Huron 8. Taking off my headset now. Checking out of the net. Over.”

That business about checking out of the net was my old radio operator training coming out, but the report and the calm way I said it impressed the people in FDC who were listening. They thought I was pretty cool.

“Uh—uh—Roger, Huron 8 . . . Lieutenant! Lieutenant!”

That was the last I heard. I don't know what else the operator want ed to say. Maybe he thought I was done for—and just wanted to say goodbye.

I flung off the headset and began holding off about ten feet above the tops of the waves, which were probably about six feet high. At the last minute, I flipped loose my safety belt, took the stick in my left hand, and braced myself with my right hand on the diagonal tube at the right of the windshield. The door and windows were open. The plane stalled and dropped into the side of a wave. It looked as if someone had jerked a white sheet up over the windshield. Vin said later that the plane momentarily disappeared into the water, then recoiled back to float with the wings on top of the water.

I was thrown forward rather violently but was not seriously hurt or stunned; however, about a quart of seawater was rammed down my throat, and in a very few seconds I had pulled myself to the surface in front of the right wing and spewed it out. Then I looked for Young. I ducked back under to see him kicking out behind the wing. He came up, gasping, “I can't swim!” I told him to pull the cords on his life vest. He did, and it instantly inflated. I pulled the cords on my jacket and nothing happened, so I was relieved when Vin flew by with Allen holding up our only inflatable rubber raft, indicating that they were going to drop it for us.

The raft hit the water about forty yards away, and I swam out to get it while Young scrambled up onto the plane. But the carbon dioxide bottle on the raft was empty, so I swam back empty-handed and feeling rather
exhausted. I joined Young on the floating plane, sick from the sea water and wishing we'd been more careful in maintaining our emergency gear. But on examining my Mae West carefully, I discovered that the inflation capsules were upside down. I pulled up on the cords, the vest inflated, and I was much happier.

The plane was settling farther and farther into the water, and I figured it wouldn't be long before the wings would be full of water coming in through the drain holes, and then the plane would go down. It was evident, too, that we were drifting nearer to the beach—to those bunkers along Sawar Drome—and I wondered whether I should try to get my carbine out of the plane. It was inside a waterproof plastic bag, and I could see it floating up against the Plexiglas in the top of the plane. I could kick out a panel and get it. However, there was also a large air bubble there, and I knew the plane would sink sooner if I let that escape, so I let the carbine go. We watched the horizon for the promised LCVP.

The plane floated for about thirty or forty minutes, and in the meantime Vin had to go down for refueling. While he was down, the enemy dropped one or two rounds of either artillery or mortar fire that missed us a long way. Before they had a chance to adjust the fire, Vin came back up and the Japanese put their gun away.