I loaned my 35mm Argus A2 camera on one occasion to a buddy who wanted to photograph some of his friends in one of the gun batteries. He gave me a set of the black & white pictures as a thank you gesture for the use of the camera. Therefore,I may not be able to comment on a few of the photos that are shown on some of my pages. Many of the pictures I took were of places that cannot be described or identified.
Left to right--Me,Personnel Clerk; Driscoll(WOJG); Clark, T/Sgt. My duties included typing up payrolls , pay vouchers for the officers, maintaining service records including those of our medical detachment, roster of troops, cargo manifests, allotments, immumization records,furloughs (Ha!)etc. During the almost two years we spent in the Pacific Theater my M1 rifle was never fired. The last time I fired any kind of weapon was back in Oahu while on a target range, when I had to use a grenade launcher attached to a rifle. I didn't hit my target! On the fourth day of Jungle Training in Oahu, I was busy typing up a payroll back in the personnel office while the other members of my Battery had the opportunity to fire their weapons. I also missed going to Maui that same day for an Amphibious Training exercise.
When the war in Europe ended, it was my job to calculate the number of points each member of Headquarters Battery had to his credit. Those with the most points would leave sooner than those having less. The sign reads "QUIET 61 Pointers relaxing". It would be four to six months before we would return home.
When the first typhoon hit all of our tents were blown down. We just weren't prepared. I took this picture of the other clerks hard at work re-enforcing the framework so we would be prepared for the next hit. After the next typhoon hit, ours was the only one left standing.
The double row of tents used by Headquarters Battery. We didn't have electric lights at first so we couldn't write any letters at night unless we used candles. What a blessing it was when electric lighting was installed!
Me again..under a torii. Another picture taking tour, looking for something interesting to photograph. Our letters were censored before they ever left our base by one of our own officers. So maybe photos returning from processing were also subjected to some kind of censorship.
When our outfit moved to the eastern side of the island in late April or early May, there weren't any signs,at least none that I could see as to the name of the peninsula we would be living on. Someone did mention however, that the body of water to the south of us was Buckner Bay, easier to pronounce than Nakagusuku Wan. Almost fifty five years later I bought a few books on the subject of Okinawa, The Last Battle etc., where I could read about Katchin and Katsuren Peninsulas. My guess was that we were on the Katsuren Peninsula,but I may be wrong.
