Having survived boot camp with the U.S. Marine Corps, Carl was put into the Cooks and Bakers' School. He shook his head - "I wondered why the hell they picked me for Cooks and Bakers' School and I wanted to get out. ... Then I got talking to some of the guys, who said it was the best outfit to get in! So I stayed - sounded good to me!"
"We finally got into the 5th Marine Division - I finally had a place to go. So at Camp Pendleton (California) I started cooking. Then I got into butchering, because I found that I really didn't like cooking. I got into butchering because a buddy of mine was married to a Master Tech Sergeant's daughter! I liked butchering. It was a good deal - we had three days on, four days off! I was in L.A. more than I was on base! I spent a lot of time hitchhiking in L.A."
With more time to spend off base, I asked Carl the inevitable question: 'Did you ever get into much trouble when you had leave?'
"(Laughs) It always seemed like I was in trouble - jeez. We had a 15-mile radius pass, so you had to have a special pass to get to L.A. - it was over a hundred miles away. I would go all the time on my little card, and I was getting away with it. Then one night ... I got stinking drunk at Murphy's Tavern. Well, I had the right pass, but it expired at midnight and I didn't know it. So two MPs came in and started checking passes; it was about 9 at night. The MP says to me, 'Jeez, your time's up at midnight!' I said that I had plenty of time. I could make it back to L.A. Well, I'll be darned if the same two MPs came in at 11, and, of course, there I was! So they came over, and I said that I didn't care if they took me in or not. I was just that drunk; I didn't care because we were going overseas shortly. Well, the MP said that there were nine of us in that bar that didn't have the right pass, but he was just letting us go - he knew we were heading overseas."
Being a cook, in such circumstances Carl had special pull when it came to getting out of trouble. "I had ways in (the camp), working in the kitchen. There was this clerk, and we would take food to him at midnight. We did a lot of things like that - bribes! Hell, I never had a problem getting back in. I'd hitchhike all the way up from L.A. in the morning and get right back on base. In fact, the last night before we went overseas they said there was no liberty. Well, I had a buddy who had to take his car to his girlfriend's house in L.A. - he was a cook, too. I wanted to go, but I'd have to hitchhike back - no problem. So we went right up into L.A., and wouldn't you know it, I got stuck in that town! It was just unreal. At about 2 in the morning I was standing there, trying to catch a ride, when six guys pull up in a car - six sailors in one car! I said 'GOD am I glad to see you guys!' They got me back, just in time. Turns out the 1st Sgt. got so stinking drunk that night that he didn't know what was going on anyway!"
"I had a good time, really. When we butchered we used to take the tenderloin out and hide it. At night we'd go to the movies and we'd take the tenderloin to the guys down there. We'd fry up the tenderloin steaks, and we'd get in pretty good with those guys! We did a little bribing - what the heck!"
After Pendleton, Carl went to Hilo, Hawaii. The Marine Corps had Camp Tarawa, and the Pioneers found themselves just outside Hilo at a place they called Camp POW. Formally the site of a Japanese POW camp, the Marines deemed it a perfect site to continue training. "Liberty wasn't very good there, so we did a lot of swimming. There was a nice creek with a big hole and a 10-foot waterfall about a half-mile from us. We spent quite a bit of time out there."
By now, Carl had been assigned to the 5th Marine Pioneer Battalion. Every division had a Pioneer Battalion and, says Carl, "Our job was to unload ships and move supplies to the front lines." As deployment loomed closer, the 5th Marines practiced landing on and around Hawaii. "We made practice landings - that was something else. Whenever you moved from one ship into the landing craft you had to go down a rope ladder. Boy, when there was high waves that boat would go up and down, and if you didn't hit it just right you'd either get thrown back up or you'd drop like 10 feet! I never had any problems but some guys let go too soon and fell pretty high."
Now, the 5th Marines were Iwo-bound. As a Pioneer, Carl learned that they would be landing on Iwo Jima on D-Day plus two hours, at 11 a.m. This was two hours earlier than planned, because one of the other Pioneer Battalions had been nearly wiped out during an invasion. Steaming forward, toward the tiny volcanic island in the Pacific, one could only imagine what was in store for the 5th Marines.
- Dan Wegmueller is a columnist for The Monroe Times. He can be reached at dwegs@tds.net.
"We finally got into the 5th Marine Division - I finally had a place to go. So at Camp Pendleton (California) I started cooking. Then I got into butchering, because I found that I really didn't like cooking. I got into butchering because a buddy of mine was married to a Master Tech Sergeant's daughter! I liked butchering. It was a good deal - we had three days on, four days off! I was in L.A. more than I was on base! I spent a lot of time hitchhiking in L.A."
With more time to spend off base, I asked Carl the inevitable question: 'Did you ever get into much trouble when you had leave?'
"(Laughs) It always seemed like I was in trouble - jeez. We had a 15-mile radius pass, so you had to have a special pass to get to L.A. - it was over a hundred miles away. I would go all the time on my little card, and I was getting away with it. Then one night ... I got stinking drunk at Murphy's Tavern. Well, I had the right pass, but it expired at midnight and I didn't know it. So two MPs came in and started checking passes; it was about 9 at night. The MP says to me, 'Jeez, your time's up at midnight!' I said that I had plenty of time. I could make it back to L.A. Well, I'll be darned if the same two MPs came in at 11, and, of course, there I was! So they came over, and I said that I didn't care if they took me in or not. I was just that drunk; I didn't care because we were going overseas shortly. Well, the MP said that there were nine of us in that bar that didn't have the right pass, but he was just letting us go - he knew we were heading overseas."
Being a cook, in such circumstances Carl had special pull when it came to getting out of trouble. "I had ways in (the camp), working in the kitchen. There was this clerk, and we would take food to him at midnight. We did a lot of things like that - bribes! Hell, I never had a problem getting back in. I'd hitchhike all the way up from L.A. in the morning and get right back on base. In fact, the last night before we went overseas they said there was no liberty. Well, I had a buddy who had to take his car to his girlfriend's house in L.A. - he was a cook, too. I wanted to go, but I'd have to hitchhike back - no problem. So we went right up into L.A., and wouldn't you know it, I got stuck in that town! It was just unreal. At about 2 in the morning I was standing there, trying to catch a ride, when six guys pull up in a car - six sailors in one car! I said 'GOD am I glad to see you guys!' They got me back, just in time. Turns out the 1st Sgt. got so stinking drunk that night that he didn't know what was going on anyway!"
"I had a good time, really. When we butchered we used to take the tenderloin out and hide it. At night we'd go to the movies and we'd take the tenderloin to the guys down there. We'd fry up the tenderloin steaks, and we'd get in pretty good with those guys! We did a little bribing - what the heck!"
After Pendleton, Carl went to Hilo, Hawaii. The Marine Corps had Camp Tarawa, and the Pioneers found themselves just outside Hilo at a place they called Camp POW. Formally the site of a Japanese POW camp, the Marines deemed it a perfect site to continue training. "Liberty wasn't very good there, so we did a lot of swimming. There was a nice creek with a big hole and a 10-foot waterfall about a half-mile from us. We spent quite a bit of time out there."
By now, Carl had been assigned to the 5th Marine Pioneer Battalion. Every division had a Pioneer Battalion and, says Carl, "Our job was to unload ships and move supplies to the front lines." As deployment loomed closer, the 5th Marines practiced landing on and around Hawaii. "We made practice landings - that was something else. Whenever you moved from one ship into the landing craft you had to go down a rope ladder. Boy, when there was high waves that boat would go up and down, and if you didn't hit it just right you'd either get thrown back up or you'd drop like 10 feet! I never had any problems but some guys let go too soon and fell pretty high."
Now, the 5th Marines were Iwo-bound. As a Pioneer, Carl learned that they would be landing on Iwo Jima on D-Day plus two hours, at 11 a.m. This was two hours earlier than planned, because one of the other Pioneer Battalions had been nearly wiped out during an invasion. Steaming forward, toward the tiny volcanic island in the Pacific, one could only imagine what was in store for the 5th Marines.
- Dan Wegmueller is a columnist for The Monroe Times. He can be reached at dwegs@tds.net.
