Interview with Robert Walsh, World War II Veteran. CCSU Veterans History Project

in which war did you serve Second World War what was your branch of service Navy United States Navy and what was your highest rank petty officer first class and in what general location did you serve I started in Newport Rhode Island Virginia Gibraltar North Africa Sicily Salerno Italy NGO Italy I waded through blood on this Shore anyways but my hands you know and it'll be the court status and then Normandy and but to England from England to Normandy and normally I went ashore I brought troops ashore 19 times and never stepped off the beach in France I've been to French 19 times I've never been off the sand never been on ya terra firma okay were you drafted or did you enlist I enlisted do you recall the date yeah August 19th 19:42 why did you choose to join patriotic I suppose I don't know just wanted to be a sailor why did you pick the service branch that you did cuz I love to see how did your first day of service feel and can you tell us about it yeah we got up at five o'clock ran a mile around drill field went back to the barracks showered changed went to breakfast and then started they started indoctrination that of us telling us this and all the stuff about the Navy can you tell me about your boot camp experience yeah we get five o'clock I ran you know Rhonda we alway had it run around the drill field which we had a run of Milo I just he had to come back shower eat breakfast and then we had a lay out all of our sea bag full of gear and it all had and chief petty officer showed us how to how to fold and tie it off so it hop all fit in the sea bag that's each see Bank stood about this high yeah do you remember any of your instructors specifically yeah my chief's name was D Giacomo it was a chief bosun me any specific experiences with them you know I'm sure Phyllis and give us all the nomenclature of different things in the Navy after boot camp where did you go and what was your first assignment after boot camp when I was sent to Navy Pier Chicago for training on diesel engines I decided I was I had these four engines I was mechanically inclined mechanically inclined so they sent me to Navy Pier in Chicago for a diesel school and I came out of there with the rank of fireman three months later Oh into Little Creek Virginia which was the amphibious base from Little Creek Virginia I went there was sent me to Norfolk Virginia why oh I picked up a ship in Little Creek Virginia lcil 13 landing craft infantry ship number 13 it was in flotilla number two and she was a hundred and fifty foot landing craft and the men that built her and Philadelphia Navy Yard whole head told us that we were lucky because we would never go to seeing those ships because they weren't seaworthy and we crossed the Atlantic in it in midwinter in 1943 it took 21 days it took three days to get from Norfolk to Bermuda and it took 21 days to get from Bermuda to Gibraltar and thence into the Mediterranean to North Africa and of course in North Africa we were fighting the Germans army under the German General Earl Rommels North Africa we worked all the way through North Africa makin them runs beachy troops and from there we went to Sicily and after the Aachen we were able to occupy a lot which determines on Sicily we made we met our next innovation was Salerno Italy and after Salerno ngo Italy an angio was blood how many thousands and thousands of troops we lost in Asia I remember one time it was so bad my job was to go ashore and you know bring a lifeline too short so that the truce could all ourselves a short without tipping over and the taps ended up on a surface in their legs like turtles and on true get up they pee drowning so I would save them in the meantime they kicked wells and my shins terrible I was bleeding football but chance they kept the hell out of me yeah they were dying from joy they were drowning I picked a heads up and get a month toward their feet touched one after the other and what oh yeah it gets but fighting the German shooting got so heavy that the ship pulled out and left me on the beach all on I mean I wasn't one which with all the truth but I was sick I was supposed to be back on my ship you know but so I was standing there and their shipment I mean out of the sands and in Anzio with prayer shorts on sneakers a chambray shirt no helmet I had given my helmet took one of the troops that lost his on his way in so I gave him my blue navy helmet on he must have been a good target but anyway and then that this ship pulled out and left me there and I jumped in the water and started to swim and I figured I'd cuz we had Oh hundreds of ships out there so I figured I'd get alongside some ship and they'd pick me up and finally your ship did pick me up and it was my ship and the next day the skipper told me the captain said call me up a toothbrush and he told me when he seen me swimming out back out to sea that he had to he turned it decided to turn around the ship and pick me up rather than let me yeah that was nice where did you go from there from tempest NGO Oh then from angio we went to England and from England we invaded Normandy France and I went ashore in France 19 times and I've never been off the beach in France I've never been tun joy it I'm actually glad that it's always on the beach 19 times we make trips to France each time discharging a 185 army troops plus their officers yeah where did you go from France France to Boston what'd you do in Boston they sent me home for 30 days late I had been gone two years at that time so after leave they sent me to San Francisco yeah San Francisco and in San Francisco they I was put on a troop transport for the Philippines then I went to the Philippines I didn't see any fighting in the Philippines but I ended up again repairing small craft for the landing in Japan so from the Philippines I went to Okinawa Japan and I landed here yeah I didn't have to fight there I was well I thought was just maybe so all I had to do was keep them it's a bogus runner and okinawan yeah in from okinawa their years sent me to China I spent two years China what you do in China I was in charge of what they call a yard oiler that's a small tanker yeah we take fuel from big tankers and bringing alongside pumping on to Navy ships that were in the Wang Poole river and I did that for two years in China and back to United States excuse me that was a sign to San Diego Naval Base in San Diego San Diego in San Diego I was assigned to LSM our floral fort which is landing ship medium number 404 our main batteries on the landing ship port 10 boom rocket launchers and Mike my assignment there was I was in the first class petty officer in charge of the main engine room like he's in charge of all the machinery yes but a couple years doing that then Pope then I was assigned to the Arctic and I spent one year in the Arctic off the coast of Greenland I had a nice small icebreaker a small I mean she was 150 feet 160 feet long the red button was turning hurriediy beauty it was a farmer Coast Guard buoy tender I spent a year and spent a year under I think I got out if I had eight years in yeah nineteen he's making fifty by then I got out did I you had intended to stay in for twenty years for my retirement but I was married at the time my wife kept them like back and sorry if you don't mind discussing it were there casualties in your unit oh yes oh yeah we lost out of the 24 ships we lost eight eight ships herself and it was casualties on auto ships except ours number thirteen we never had any casualties all the other ships had casualties or were sunk yeah that's in there were you awarded any medals or citations yeah I got a whole kitchen yeah I'm sure you do after yeah okay can you tell me which ones and how did you get them oh yeah okay did you ever sustain any injuries no no how did you stay in touch with your family yeah they had mail what did he call Slough I forgot they call the father of mail it that you could write a note practically on it that song and they would send it back home to your address but it was memory nd any indication of where it came from so nobody whatever the enemy would never build if they recovered it before it got there he would never be able to tell where you were where you were going you know where you been what was the food like good maybe good to me still here 93 how did you entertain yourself in your spare time reading do you recall any particularly humorous or unusual events how about the ponies tell me about the ponies you got stuck in the ice in there they sent for supplies oh yeah yeah what one time when I was on the ice breaker off the coast of Greenland about 1,000 miles north of the southern tip of Greenland and we got caught in the ice and we couldn't go forward and we couldn't get back out of the ice cuz the ice froze around us so we're in the ice for days and all of a sudden one day we saw a packed train coming across the ice made up of ponies pulling sweats and it was led by a man who I talk to and he said he was an Eskimo chief and I asked him why why they there were women driving the carts the little dish so I said I asked him I said how come the you got women none too slow but driving the slides instead of men he says always just he says men don't wanted to take a chance and fall in India in the water fulfillment why do you dot goes the extra dude actually the water with seawater was bloat freezing yeah it's like 28 degrees did you keep a journal partner did you keep a journal I did but I lost three years ago where were you when your service ended [Music] sandy publish San Diego what was your homecoming like well by time I got back with the war had been over a couple years and paid any attention at all oh yeah just too much better over two years that was all pass sake did you work or go back to school no I ain't graduated from high school before I left when I was 18 I graduated from New Britain high school senior high school did you make any close friends in the service oh yeah did you continue continue any of those relationships yeah by mail for number of years yeah what did you go on to do as a career after the service I became policeman did you tell me a little bit about that yeah I was relational with it I became a policeman after six years in uniform I became I got an assignment he said they detect the division in another few years I made reg through civil service examinations I made regular detective and I retired as sergeant the police department after 31 years how did your military experience influence your thinking about war gotta have a lot of luck that's about it did you join any veteran organizations yeah I belong to the VFW Veterans of Foreign Wars and I went outside going to my another one - yeah American Legion I don't but I don't think I go once a year yeah do you attend any reunions part do you attend any reunions I did they had reunions for a number of years for the LC I know that would have reunions and I went i tented those but now of course I don't know I may be the only one left alive I'm 93 I don't know what how did your service and experiences affect your life gave me a lot of fortitude is there anything else you would like to add that has not been covered in the interview oh yeah good thing but I don't know I don't remember anything right now how many Wendy's did you make Oh altogether in my green wire I made 71 landings from the ship one of them was at Little Creek Virginia one was in a horseshoe in North Africa and all the rest were on enemy beachheads 669 6901 I went ashore on an enemy beaches 69 times I'm verify a min pervious bullets I shall not die by the sword did you enjoy your time in the service yeah absolutely I've loved it is there anything else you would like to add that has not been covered in this interview yeah when I was crossing the Pacific the war ended on a day that just I was on the Dutch Dutch merchant meant for transportation and when the war ended we pulled into Ulithi which is in the Caroline islands near the equator and we pulled in there and won into the Dutch crewmen gave me a bottle of beer to celebrate with yeah then I went to Japan Okinawa Japan no I'm with them to Philippines yeah what was your favorite place to see you well you were in service Naples Italy the most beautiful place in the world Bay of Naples is the most beautiful place I've been all around the world and that was the most beautiful place in the world at that time of course the water was clearly in probably maybe I don't know but the water was clear the people were nice but and I went to I saw the Soviets we were in that while we were in the bay and April's mom for Soviet erupted on us and the ship and it spewed pumice all over the ship right over right after we had spent the day painting the ship so I ship was cooked from the top of the mast to the waterline was non-skid pain but I went to Pompeii you must be aware of the last days of Pompeii I went to visit Pompeii with a shipmate and I and we got lost in Pompeii and the night fell and we couldn't find our way yeah frou-frou I took us a while to find our way out of Pompeii so I got less than fun to be oh yeah one time in the article when I was on the icebreaker they put they put the small boat over to the side hey ed to an Opel open patch of water next to us and so the small boat the starter got flooded with seawater so what when I had hurry they sent me down to replace the starter on that and the small boat we were sitting in the ice and oh my gosh I was able to change it starter and they sent me down because I was most knowledgeable I get yeah and by the time I finished changing the starter my hands were so cold they had a they had a cargo net over the side of the ship so I could climb down to the boat and my hands were frozen and I couldn't climb back up with the Tongass ship so they threw a line down and another guy came off the ship tied it around my waist and they only back and I got a ship at all I was crying because you know how you hear something oh they were frozen I couldn't move I couldn't move and there's such horrible pain yeah yeah yeah oh my gosh took awhile stop if I tell my yeah mr. Walsh I'd like to thank you for your service and also thank you for taking the time to be interviewed today

Channel: ccsuvhp

Views: 841

Rating: 4.2941175 out of 5

Keywords: WWII, Navy, US, CCSU, VHP, Veteran, Interview, History, Project, Veterans

Id: -llD__TCWj4

Length: 30min 45sec (1845 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 22 2018