PATY:   My name is Charles Paty, Jr., and my address is 2013 Charlotte, North Carolina.  I was born and raised in Charlotte and I’ve lived there most of my life, although I have been around the various cities on transfer from the company that I was employed by.  I’d like to talk to you today about my career so to speak on the USS North Carolina.

To begin with, I’ll talk about how I got into the Navy and before 1941, actually in 1941, I was 17 years old and going to high school in the 11th grade and I had never had a job other than carrying newspapers.  I carried the Charlotte News, which is an afternoon paper long ago observed by the Charlotte Observer.

On Sunday, December 7th, I was listening to music in our living room and the news flash came over that Pearl Harbor had been bombed.  Well first of all I had no idea where Pearl Harbor was or what it was.  So I sat and listened to the news for a while.  It sounded pretty bad.  It got worse as the afternoon went on.  They talked about damage, bad damage, lots of casualties, so forth and so on.

My parents had laid down in the bedroom and were taking a nap, Sunday afternoon nap.  So I went back, woke them up, told them what was happening.  Well they came rushing up to the living room and we listened to the news the rest of the afternoon.  About 2:00 or 3:00 I said, “Well this looks bad to me and I’m going to join the Navy”.  Well they hit the ceiling.  They said, “No, you’re not, you’re going to finish high school and you’re going to go on to college”.

Well this argument went on for the rest of the day and into the night.  About 11:00 in the evening, I convinced them to agree that I could go into the Navy.  Well the only reason they did is that they thought first of all I would not pass the physical and secondly they said if you do get in, you’ll never pass boot camp because they’ll kill you and wash you out in boot camp. 

My daddy had been to World War I and he said that too.  He was a small man the way I am and he said they had just about killed him and he was in the Army.  So he said you know you’re not going to pass, but you can go up there and try.  So Monday morning, he went to work at 7:30, dropped me off at the Navy recruiting office in downtown Charlotte and let me out.  I started walking up the steps to go in.  He drove off.

I thought, “My gosh, I’m a fool.  I’m going to get up there, there’s not going to be a soul there.  The Navy recruiting office won’t be open and I’ll be the only one”.  I got up there and there were 100 guys already in line.  The recruiting office had been open.  So you know the volunteers were just flocking in.  Well anyway, I went through the line, got up to where they examined me and the recruiter said, “Well you don’t weigh enough, you’re almost there, but you don’t weigh quite enough and you don’t have your parents’ approval”.

He said I should go home and get my parents’ written approval, eat a bunch of bananas and come back and I might pass.  I was back the next day and I’d eaten a bunch of bananas and I had my parents’ approval and I passed.  They took me.  They said go home and they would let me know in a few days when to report.  Well it was only about two days later that I got a postcard which said report to the Navy recruiting office. 

The tape blanks out for about 10 minutes and then picks up here:

PATY:   _____ staff rode him away from the ship.  All our 16-inch guns were trained off to the starboard side and the 5-inch on that side began t o wave up and down.  They elevated and lowered them.  What they were doing was waving goodbye to Captain Thatcher.  That was the only time it was ever done.

The crew was on deck at that time.  We were all standing at what’s called quarters.  We were in lines in our uniforms.  We all of course observed this as it was going on.  Shortly thereafter the ship was ordered to the Pacific.  We passed through the Panama Canal with a small task force and one of the instant things about going through the Panama Canal is you pass through a lake called Gatun Lake. 

It’s fresh water.  Actually the ship does not float as well in fresh water as it does in salt water meaning that it actually dropped down in the water an inch or so. I don’t remember exactly, but it was a small amount.  I’d never thought of that, never heard of it before.  We took the opportunity to wash the ship down thoroughly with fresh water because we had all the fresh water we needed as we were going through there.

We passed out into the Pacific and went up the west coast of Mexico and the west coast of the United States to San Francisco again.  We went into San Francisco, big city, I’d heard about it, read about it all my life up to that point and here I was, getting to go ashore in San Francisco, which I did.  But we didn't stay long.  We stayed through July 4th and there was a parade, big parade in downtown San Francisco for July 4th.

All the naval vessels in town plus the military installations in the vicinity supplied troops, units to be marching in the parade and we did too.  I was not in the parade, but I knew all about it and I saw our guys march off down the street toward the parade.  It was quite a big deal.  Patriotism was going full blast.  The town was just all wound up about July 4th.

Well we left there shortly and we headed for Pearl Harbor.  We entered Pearl Harbor and now we had reached what I call the real world, the real war.  As we came into the harbor, we circled around Ford Island and we passed by the Oklahoma, no first I think we passed by the Utah which was turned upside down.  Again the crew is all at quarters and we’re standing out on deck watching as we go by these things and we next pass the Arizona and she was still flying the flag, but it was just a carcass sticking up out of the water.

We passed the Oklahoma, which was turned upside down.  We docked, but in a few days we were able to see many other ships in Pearl Harbor that had been damaged, very badly damaged and we recognized what a devastating bomb raid that had been on our country.  After a few days there, I think about a week or so, we got underway and we headed south.

Again we were with other ships so it was a task force, a small task force and we were headed for Guadalcanal, the invasion of Guadalcanal.  This took place August 7, 1942.  We were part of a force of aircraft carriers.  There were no other battleships at that time active in the Pacific.  We were the only one that was capable of getting underway and taking part in the war.  So we were tied together with some other aircraft carriers, cruisers, destroyers, to form the best task force we could put together at that time.

We operated around Guadalcanal within about 100 miles of it for a couple of weeks as the Marines went in and landed and our carriers supplied bomber support, fighter coverage, ground support and so forth to the Marines.  In the meantime some of the ships, other ships, cruisers and so forth, had tangled with Japanese surface vessels and had been in several big night battles.

We were not involved.  We were still staying out with the carriers.  On August 24, we were operating about 150 miles southeast of Guadalcanal.  A Japanese task force was reported coming down from Truk Island, which is a big naval facility of Japan.  We picked them up, our planes picked them up, not our planes from our ship, but the planes from our carrier picked them up on a search at about 80 miles distance from me.  We tracked them on in as they approached.

Well about 40 miles away, when the planes were about 40 miles away, we sited general quarters which meant we had to go to our battle stations.  My battle station at that time was on a raider transmitter.  At that point in the war, radiomen and radar men were one of the same.  We didn't have any radar men per se.  Radiomen functioned as that.  I had a battle station in a small compartment underneath one of these secondary battery directors.

It was about a 4x4 compartment and the radar transmitter was a big box about as high as I was and it had a bunch of meters on it.  I had to watch it for fluctuation in voltage amperage.  Now I had dials to change to make the voltage and amperage stay the same because once the voltage started going up and down, the radar contact would disappear.  So you didn't want it to be jumping up and down.

That was my battle station.  Well I sat there with a pair of headphones on and I listened as reports came in saying enemy aircraft 40 miles, 30 miles, at 20 miles, and this is a group of 100 Japanese aircraft.  So my mind went wild.  I was imagining all kinds of things were going to happen.  This would be my first attack, baptism of fire as they say and so I was getting pretty nervous.

Finally the 5-inch guns opened up which meant that the planes had met their range of about 9 miles something like that, 10 miles maybe and from that point on, they kept firing.  Next came the 1.1’s.  This was a gun that was used for a short period of time in the early part of the war.  It turned out to be not very good, but it’s equivalent to what the 40mm’s are today.  But it opened up so that told me they’re closer now.  You know, the range is decreasing. 

The next thing I heard were the machine guns opening up.  Now they’re really close and again your mind races and you think is this bomb going to land right on me any minute.  Well it didn't do it.  We fired for 10 minutes, shot down 7 Japanese planes and repelled the whole raid.  Now we didn't do it alone.  We shot down the 7 planes alone, but other ships helped repel the raid. 

So the 100 plane raid was broken up, a lot of them were shot down by our fighter planes and they all left.  That was our first taste of war, battle.  It only lasted 10 minutes, but you live a lifetime in that 10 minutes.  You know, so many things will run through your mind about am I going to be killed and I’m an only child and I was only 17 and this is going to devastate my parents.  You think about that and then you think about well how is it I’m going to be killed.

Am I going to be roasted alive inside this darn place or will the ship sink and I go down with it.  You know, all this kind of stuff and it’s all going through your mind so fast that you know it probably didn't take a second for all that to go flying through my mind.  Nevertheless, we came through it okay and I was not hurt and the ship was not hurt.  We did have one man killed by strafing, but that was the only casualty we had. 

Just a short time later, on the 4th of September, we were torpedoed by a Japanese submarine and I happened to be standing on the bridge that day.  That’s the signal bridge and I’d gone up like some of us radiomen used to do just sightseeing.  We knew the signalmen because they were part of the communications division.  So I was standing on the signal bridge and observing the Wasp, an aircraft carrier that was in another part of our group about 10 miles away, but you could see it okay.

All of a sudden a lot of smoke started coming from the Wasp.  Well what had happened, the Japanese submarine I-19 had fired a spread of torpedoes and a couple of them hit the Wasp.  But the others went around the wasp, passed it, and across that span of water some 10 miles, 8 miles and one of them hit a destroyer which was off our port quarter back this way and blew the bough off of it.  The next one hit us.

As I said, I was standing on the bridge and one of the guys on the bridge yelled, “Torpedo wake”.  Well I had seen nothing up to that point, no torpedo wake and the O’Brien had not been torpedoed.  We had seen the smoke coming from the Wasp, but we didn't know what it was.  When he said torpedo wake, he didn't say which side, where was the wake?  Well we just had time to step back about one step and the thing hit and we all fell over, knocked us down.

I’d always heard these stories about ships that were torpedoed and the ships sank so I thought, “Oh my gosh, we’re going to sink”.  So the first thing I thought of was to find life preservers.  We had life preservers designated for us and we were told where they were and we knew where they were, but I wasn’t near those darn things.  Of course general quarters sounded, I’m supposed to go to my battle station.  So you can’t go looking for life preservers when you’re supposed to go to your battle station.

So I took off for my battle station and it turned out the ship didn't sink.  I didn't need a life preserver.  It did have a hole blown in the side about 30’ in diameter I think   We took in some water, had a little list, but we didn't slow down at all.  So we were separated from the task force and told to go back to Pearl Harbor for repairs and that’s what we did.  Following our repair at Pearl Harbor, it was back out to the South Pacific.

We had more campaigns to go through, more invasions, lots and lots of fighting to do yet, but one of the ports that we went into in preparation for this was an island, a free French island, it’s New Caledonia down near New Zealand.  We anchored at New Meel, of course that’s the name of the town, and we got to make liberty there.

Well that was my first experience of liberty in a French port.  It was kind of a strange place.  It was kind of a mixed bag because it happened to be a French port that did not want to give up to the allies.  It wanted to be a French port.  About half the population had that sentiment and the other half had free French sentiment.  So anyway it wasn’t a very fun place to be really and there was a lot of tension in the place so we didn't have a lot of fun there.

Following that, we started going through the central Pacific campaigns and we carried out island bombardments of Tawara, Mekin, Nauru, Kwadjolene, Panape and Sampan, but in September of 1944, the ship was designated to go back to Bremerton Navy Yard in Washington state for a major overhaul.  We’d always had problems with vibrations.  The ship had had a lot of vibration problems and we’d gone into Pearl Harbor several times and had propellers changed, work done on our shafts, this and that trying to solve the vibration.

They hadn’t been able to do it.  There were a lot of other things we needed to do.  We needed to upgrade our antiaircraft battery so back to Bremerton we went.  Well in Bremerton, we all got 30 day leave, but what they did was half the crew went at one time and half the other time so we were there two months.  As I say, the first half went for 30 days and the second half went.  I happened to be lucky enough to get the first half so I went home for my 30-day leave.

I was really uneasy.  As I mentioned earlier, I was an only child.  I did not have a whole lot of friends.  I did not have what the people might call a serious girlfriend, I didn't have a single one.  I had dated a girl a couple of times and I had two or three male friends, but when I got back home on my 30 day leave, this is 1944, almost all the males were in service.  A whole lot of the girls that I knew were off in college.  So I had a real difficult time for that reason for one, but the other was it seemed so unreal.

It didn't seem like back there they knew there was a war going on.  Don’t you know out there in the Pacific, you know, terrible things are happening.  They just seemed to be so far removed.  The only thing that kind of made you aware of it was gas rationing.  My parents said while you’re back here, you could use our car and do whatever you want to do.  He gave me his rationing card and said that I should go get the gas that I might need.

That didn't make a big impression on me.  I didn't drive around that much anyway.  It just seemed to be that the world did not know that there was a war going on.  My parents, my mother in particular, was just like a mother hen.  She wanted to give me everything.  She cooked everything in the world you know and mothered me to death.  It made me uncomfortable.  I just did not feel really comfortable there.

So it was not a real fun time.  You would have thought that after being gone that long from December 1941 to September 1944 without ever being home, I would be just raring to get home.  Well I was raring to get home, but when I got there, it turned to be not what I thought it was.  So I returned to the ship.  I stayed my 30 days, but I returned to the ship.

By the way I flew across country in a DC-3, which was a standard airline plane, but there’s no pressurized cabin and when you fly over the Rockies with no pressurized cabin, let me tell you, it is painful (laughter).  So anyway we got back to Seattle and then I had 30 days of time in Seattle because then we could get liberty off the ship in Seattle every day, just about every day.

The ship was all torn up.  There was nothing going on on the ship hardly although I think we did have one or two radiomen on duty all the time.  We had plenty of free time to go into Seattle.  Well I met a girl there, fell in love with her I thought and I just thought well this is it, I’m going to have to marry her when the war is over.  So I proposed to her.  Not at the beginning, it took about 30 days for me to screw up my courage in the first place.

But anyway she accepted.  So that was something that happened and it probably got aggravated by the fact that when I went home, things weren’t what I thought they ought to be you know.  So in a sense, you could say I was on the rebound and I was looking for somebody to help me get through this and she was a real nice person.  I think it would have been fine.

At any rate, I did not marry her.  That particular romance broke up after the war in a strange way.  She wrote me a letter.  At the same time I was sitting down trying to write her one and say I think this is a bad deal, we ought to call it off.  She did the same thing.  So we kind of mutually agreed, you know, it’s a bad deal and so we broke up. 

But back to the war.  The next thing we went into was the Saipan operation where we had a huge aerial battle there called the Battle of the Philippine Sea.  I don’t remember, I don’t recall now how many aircraft carriers were involved, but we had a large force of aircraft carriers by this time.  By this time, the Navy had gotten built up.  We had a lot of battleships, new battleships of the vintage the North Carolina was and carriers, cruisers, gangs of destroyers and we were providing air cover for Saipan, carrying out air attacks and we also carried a bombardment.

In other words, it was a fight between Japanese carrier planes and US carrier planes in large numbers, several hundred on each side.  It went on all day long and literally hundreds of Japanese planes were shot down.  The score was by far in our favor.  We shot down many more of theirs than they did of ours and by the end of the day, the Japanese carrier forces were in retreat. 

They had a group of battleships with them as well as we did.  So our commanding officers, task force commanders, decided this would be an opportunity to have a surface engagement of battleships to battleships which had not been fought in the war up to this point.  The US battleships were separated from the carriers and dispatched at high speed to try to catch the Japanese battleships. 

We raced most of the night at full speed trying to find them.  We knew about where they were, in the general direction, but they managed to get away from us.  The thought then was that we didn't want to be left exposed a long distance from the carriers so we turned around and went back to join them.  So we never had the big surface engagement that everybody thought might take place and really we were all looking forward to it, but it didn't happen.

So that ended the battle of the Philippine Sea.  The next event that we got involved in was the invasion of Iwo Jima.  A lot has been written about Iwo Jima and I won’t get in to a whole lot of details about the island itself, other than to tell you that we along with several other battleships carried out bombardments of the island in preparation of the Marines landing and in also in support of them actually on the island.

In this bombardment, we got into a distance of about two miles from the beach.  That’s pretty close for a battleship to be firing a main battery, these 16-inch guns, but we did.  The bombardment was very successful.  The next place of interest that we got to was in the invasion of Okinawa.  Again we carried out bombardments of Okinawa. 

Now at Okinawa we had our first experience with Japanese kamikaze pilots and we were attacked a number of times by kamikaze pilots, but none ever hit us.  They were shot down either on the way down or en route to us.  So we managed to evade them; however we did see a number of ships in our task force that were hit, badly damaged.  Lots of men were killed and injured and it was a frightful thing.

It’s a frightful thing to be looking up and you see an enemy plane coming down and you know in that plane is a pilot that doesn’t care whether he dies or not.  He’s going to put the plane on top of your ship and you know that somebody is going to be killed.  The point is is it going to be me.  Nevertheless, we managed to evade every one of them. 

The last event of any consequence that we were involved in from a combat standpoint was that we bombarded the Japanese town of Hitachi, Japan, and this is an industrial town on the coast north of Tokyo.  It was a night bombardment.  I think we were in company with two other battleships.  This was carried out almost totally by radar.  In other words, we couldn't see anything.  Total darkness.  But the points of reference were picked up on radar and we fired our main battery into Hitachi.

It was not really a great success.  We hit some of the targets we were firing on, but some of our projectiles landed in residential areas and non-combat type situations.  So we’ve now reached the point where it was August 1945 and the war was still going full blast.  We were preparing to invade Japan and everybody thought that this was going to be a terrible invasion.  It would be slaughter unbelievable because the Japanese were going to fight to the bitter end just like they did every island, every campaign that we’d been through.

There had been very few Japanese surrenders.  Almost all of them would fight down to the death and/or they’d commit suicide at the very end.  So the plans for the invasion of Japan were going forward and the war in Europe had ended so now they were transferring all the troops and ships from over there to the Pacific in preparation for this big event.

Well we dropped the atomic bomb and immediately, or almost immediately, I think the second bomb had to be dropped and finally the Japanese agreed that they would accept surrender terms.  The task force commanders passed the word that they were going to need volunteers to go ashore as a occupation for us from the ships until such time as Marines and Army could be brought in from other locations to do the permanent occupation.

So I volunteered along with about 100 other guys from our ship and we were equipped with full combat gear for a beach assault, packs, rifles, ammunition, canteens, all that paraphernalia that you take ashore with you and leggings, but we were dungarees, Navy dungarees and had helmets.  We transferred to a fast transport.  We transferred by breach’s buoy. 

Now this is an interesting exercise.  You ride a little thing across between the ships.  The ships are out at sea underway maybe 10 or 15 knots and you ride a little sling that takes you across from one ship to the other.  You have to cross about 30 or 40 feet of open water, real exciting.  All the time, you’re thinking the line is going to break and I’m going in and they’ll go off and leave me (laughter).

We got over and then we rode that little transport around for a week or so and then they announced that we were going to go ashore at Yokosuka Naval Base.  Now this is the largest Japanese naval base in Tokyo Bay at a town called Yokosuka.  Big place though.  It’s on the same level as Pearl Harbor in size and capabilities.  They’ve got four or five big dry docks and all kinds of machine shops and you name it for maintaining naval vessels.

We landed, we off loaded into landing craft.  We had the drop nose on them and we went ashore just like landing in a combat situation.  We had rifles, ammunition, everything else, but did not have the rifles loaded.  We were told before we left the ship that there could still be Japanese fanatics that would decide that they were going to die for the emperor in that Navy yard.

They were supposed to be all gone, but we would be the first Americans there so we’ll find out if there are any of them there.  So we were a little bit tense because we did not know, yeah, there may be some Samurai or kamikaze type guy that’s going do his last for the emperor.  Well we didn't have any problems.  We landed and the landing went without any hitches.  We advanced across the ground to the first building that we came to and there was one Japanese sentry setting outside the building unarmed.

He looked at us terrified like we were going to kill him or something, but of course we weren’t going to do that.  We just walked on by him, walked inside the building and looked around.  It was really eerie because they had left like the left 30 minutes before we got there.  The building was full of offices and every office had a desk of course and papers on it, things on the wall, typewriters, telephones, you name it.  The whole place just looked like it was fully equipped and everybody just got up and walked out.

So we started scrambling through doors and things trying to find souvenirs which we were told don’t do that before we left the ship because it could be booby-trapped.  Well temptation was too great.  Some of us found a few things and then we went upstairs to the next floor.  Up there we found a room with about 50 switchboards.  Maybe it wasn’t quite that many, maybe 30 or 40 anyway of switchboards, telephone switchboards.

They were all unoccupied except about three or four right at the front door.  They were occupied by three sailors and they were on the switchboard talking to people.  Well we found out they were talking to girls in Tokyo Bay, in the city of Tokyo.  So anyway they wanted to know if we wanted to talk, we said no. 

We left them there and went about our business.  The point was we were trying to occupy or check out every building in the Navy yard to see that there were no armed Japanese left and so on.  That exercise took about a week and then by that time we were told the Marines were coming in, they would take over the permanent occupation duties.  So we boarded our landing craft and went back to the North Carolina.

When we got back to the North Carolina, we were deloused and given a medical checkup.  We all got showers and shaves and haircuts.  We hadn’t had any shower by the way since we left the ship.  So we were feeling a little cruddy.  The ship immediately left Tokyo and we headed to Okinawa, picked up a few passengers and headed back to the States.

We went through the canal and came up the east coast and entered Boston harbor.  That was our first US port to get back to.  This was a real thrill.  We came into Boston harbor and we were greeted outside by what looked like hundreds of pleasure craft, plus a whole lot of small craft, tugs, coastal freighters, you name it.  They came out to meet us and they were tooting their whistles and as we came on in, there were bands on the piers playing and just a thrilling exercise as we came in.

There were big signs up on top of the buildings saying Welcome Home and so forth.  So we docked in Boston and we’d already been told which of the crew could get discharged immediately and I was one of many.  I wasn’t the only one, there were a lot of us.  They passed the word I could leave the next morning to go home.  Well actually I had to go to a discharge center and then go home.

That’s what I did.  I left there the next morning, caught a train, went to Norfolk.  I was discharged in Norfolk and I called my parents there and told them I’m out and I’d be home tomorrow or today maybe.  They said you take the first train to Raleigh and we’ll meet you there and that’s what happened.

(Paty is showing places in the North Carolina)

Inside here is that about 4 or 5 foot square compartment that has the radar transmitter.  It’s still in there, the original one.  It’s connected to this secondary battery connector.  It’s up on top.  This was the August 24th battle of the eastern Solomons where we experienced our first baptism fire so to speak.  It only lasted 10 minutes  We shot down seven Japanese planes and assisted on a number of others.

It was a frightening moment for me.  These 5-inch mounts right here were firing away and the shell cases were coming back out the back end of the mount right here, hit against the bulkhead and I couldn't conceive of what was going on.  The shell cases were stacked up out here about 2-1/2 feet deep all around here. 

INTERVIEWER:   That’s your first action, right?

PATY:   That’s right.  I thought we’d go up on the bridge and I’d show you where I was when we were torpedoed.  This is the signal bridge and this radio when we come up here and visit the signal.  They were also part of the communications department, what we call our first cousins.  This is where the signal plaque was kept.  It’s called…believe it or not, this is the flag bag.  It’s not much of a bag, but that’s what it’s called. 

This was what I talking about the day we were torpedoed.  I was standing right here and there were a couple of other fellows right here.  The Wasp was out over here about nine miles and we were watching the smoke. We didn't know what was wrong.  Actually at that time point in time she had already been torpedoed, but we didn't know it. 

Off about 2000 yards this way, which is a mile, the destroyer Orion was _____ by an escort.  One of the guys up here on the bridge yelled “Torpedo”.  Well we didn't see anything and he didn't say where it was.  He just said torpedo.  So we stepped back.  Just about the time we got right here, it hit right down here.  Knocked us all down.  I fell on my neck over here.  A big black cloud of smoke came up ____ the wall.  When it came down, it was all over everything.  We thought my God, the ship is going to sink.  When a ship is torpedoed, don’t most ships sink when they’re torpedoed. 

So we got up and we were looking for our life preservers.  Well we all had life preservers and they were kept in a certain place in each division.  Mine was down about three decks and further back on the ship.  I would have had to have gone down three decks and run back on that side of the ship to get my life preserver.  But by the time I got the ladder up there, the general quarters sounded which meant I had to go to my battle station which was down five decks. 

The decision is to go to your battle station or do you go get your life preserver.  I thought well I’ll never make it to the life preserver and then get to the battle station on time so I forgot the life preserver and it turned out to be the right move.  The ship didn't sink.  We took on about a 5 degree list and then straightened back up.  We did have a hole about 30’ in diameter on the side of the ship.

At the same time, although we didn't see it, us guys here on the bridge, the torpedo hit the Orion all by the same submarine.  It covered nine miles.  So it went down in the records as being the worst single torpedo attack by any submarine, Japanese or otherwise.

INTERVIEWER:   I notice it’s very windy here. 

PATY:   This is exactly right.  This is exactly what we were feeling the day that took place because the ship took about 20 knots so you get a 20 knot wind.  There’s no other wind out here.  Going into the wind, it’s already 20.  You’ve got a 40 knot wind in your face.  But it was about 20 knots that day.

INTERVIEWER:   Were you ever in any storms like hurricanes or anything?

PATY:   Oh yeah.  We were in typhoons, they were known as I think.  We were in one, probably the worst one, when we were part of Admiral Halsey’s task force.  The winds were over 100.  We had waves 50 feet high over these turrets here.  The ship was pounding.  If you’ve ever been in an outboard motor boat or a small boat, you know it will go up, bam, come down, bam.  We were doing that.  I couldn't believe this thing as being as it was sounded like that.

It would come down and it would shudder.  You could feel it and then of course it would come back up.  There were such big waves that once you went over the crest of one, you would come back down over the side and you just had to keep on going.  At that time three destroyers were sunk completely.  I think 300 or 400 crew members were lost. 

What would happen or what did happen – we needed fuel at this point in time.  We needed to be refueled.  Admiral Halsey gambled and said “I think I can outrun this storm and get across in front of it over to a place where it’s calmer”.  Well he miscalculated.  What happened is when he started across, he made a turn and actually we were just running along right into it.  The destroyers we had ran out of fuel.  When they do that, they lose their stability because that’s part of what keeps you _____, the keel is having a proper load of fuel.  He had to empty  his tanks.  When that happened, they capsized cause the slightest wave would knock them over.

In our case, we just had a lot of damage.  It pinned our gun shields out here and did that kind of damage, but we didn't have any serious damage. 

INTERVIEWER:   Wow, this is a view from up here down here.

PATY:   ____It just knocked a bunch of them off.  This is the bridge level.  The captain’s ____ cabin is right here that I told you about.  These are the quarters in here.  Didn't get much sleep up here.  This is the Wasp and Orion who were with us.  It didn't sink that day, they did a few repairs to it and then it started out for Pearl Harbor, but it went down on the way.  It couldn't keep moving.  So it had a fairly large loss of life too. 

The Wasp lost a lot because it burned the rest of the day.  It caught on fire when the torpedo hit it.  It burned all afternoon, into the night, the next day and it finally went down.

INTERVIEWER:   You say one torpedo torpedoed all three boats. 

PATY:   Yes, it fired a spread of six I believe it was.

INTERVIEWER:   And they did that at one time?

PATY:   At one time?

INTERVIEWER:   Really.

PATY:   It was the Japanese submarine I-19.  Interesting story about the I-19, just a few years ago, well first of all we have an association of former crew members.  I’m a member and anybody that served in the ship could be a member.  We have annual reunions here every year right on the ship.  Well about three or four years ago, we were contacted by I believe it was a Japanese business man in Raleigh.  He said he had a friend that had a friend and all that kind of stuff that served in the I-19 and that he wanted to come and meet some of the crew.

So we said some of the crew, all of us that can get around will be here on such and such a date.  So by gosh, I think it was seven or eight of the former crew members of the I-19 came over and had a reunion with us.  Now I’ll tell you, that was kind of a mixed bag because when we got here….

Tape ends