Recollections of Kenneth Thompson, Navy and Sargeant

Recollections recorded 23 August 2001

(by his son)

I am trying to remember the things from over the past 57 years. I got a notice from the Draft Board in Green Bay, Wisconsin, in July 1943. I did not want the Draft Board to determine my fate, and after Pearl Harbor, I was determined to enlist anyway, so I volunteered to go into the Navy CBs. I went home and told your mother, that I was going to enlist. I knew I had to do something to help with the war besides building PT boats. They gave me a month to get my life in order, pay bills, make arrangements for anything and everything, before being shipped to Boot Camp.

I went on active duty the 31st of July 1943, and entered Navy Boot Training near Williamsburg and Macgruder, Virginia, and spent 30 days at Boot. I found out that I had been transferred into the Marines while still in Boot training, although they failed to mention that to our company. We then got a 72 hour leave and I went home to Peshtigo, Wis. to see your mother, and say goodbye, as we knew it would be some length of time before I would return home from who-knows-where. When I got back to camp, we were told to get ready to ship out to California. By the time we got to California, we were put back into the Navy Seabees and went to camp at Hueneme for more training.

My Training Company was then shipped to Camp Pendleton, near Los Angles, Calif. While there we were told we were now Marine Combat Engineers, not too much different than Navy CBs. We were issued Marine Corps uniforms and told to ship our Navy uniforms home, or throw them away. While at Pendleton, some Hollywood filmmakers from Republic Pictures came by and had asked if they could use us to help make a movie. That movie turned out to be “The Fighting Seabees”, which starred John Wayne, Dennis O’Keefe, and Susan Hayward. We were filmed in quite a few movie scenes, but it seems most of them were not in the final movie that was released to the theaters. Our Marine unit is shown in the bayonet training scene of the movie. We were not Seabees then, but Marines. We also helped in some of the construction scenes, but there were either one or two other Navy Seabee units that participated in making the movie also. The Seabees and Marines that were in the movie all ate lunch together, and hung around together for the duration of the filming. Sometimes we were dressed as Japanese soldiers for background shots. We were not happy wearing Japanese uniforms. We were also offered the going rate for movie extras, which at the time, I think it was $5.00 a day, but our commanding officer refused the offer for us, so we never got the extra pay from Republic.

A few of the stars, like John Wayne, Paul Fix, Duncan Renaldo, who played the “Cisco Kid” and William Frawley, who was in the “I Lovy Lucy” TV show, would often come by and visit with the troops. They were nice guys. John Wayne was particularly interested in how the troops were doing. Over the course of the filming he spent, probably several hours, visiting with the Seabees and Marines. We felt pretty good about the fact that the movie stars would take time out just to visit with us. It sure boosted our moral.

Right after the filming was done we were transferred back into the Navy, and again issued new uniforms. I think we were in the 2nd Naval Construction Brigade at that time. Then within a few short weeks, we were back with the Marine Corps as Combat Engineers, this time with the 36th Marine Replacement Draft, and began more training. The rumor was we were training to go in with the Army under General Douglas MacArthur, as Combat Engineers, and would be heading to Australia, but we never went. This was some rough and tough Marine training, the hardest we had been through so far. We were then transferred to Camp Elliot near San Diego, and back into the Navy, and again got a new Navy uniform issue. I could have kept my original Navy issue had I known we were going to be shuffled back and forth between the two services. Within a month we got transferred once more into the 4th Marines, but had no idea were we would go. Again I sent my Navy uniforms home. Marine uniforms, I would learn, were to play a role in my time with the Seabees. Then we headed out to Pearl Harbor, were we finally ended up in the Navy with the 76th Seabees. I was in the Navy 5th Brigade for awhile, as well. I was transferred so many times its hard to recall.

Since I had been a Technical Sergeant in the Marine Corp, and was a Petty Officer 1st class, in the Navy, my 76th Seabee company Lieutenant had me getting the guys squared away after being transferred back into the Navy. One day while at Pearl we had an in-ranks inspection by our C.O., and I was the only fella in the unit in Marine Corp uniform. Having been assigned to caring for the other guys, I had not yet gotten my new Navy issue. Our Skipper, Commander Frank Endebrock, was reviewing the troops, and he abruptly stopped right in front of me during inspection, and eyeballed me front top to bottom. He then asked, “Are you a Seabee or a Marine?” After being transferred so many times I had to think about it for a few seconds, and then answered that I was a Seabee. I don’t think he liked my hesitation to his question. He then said, “Well, whatever you are, when this inspection is over, I want to see you in my office. Understood?” I answered up with an immediate Navy, AYE, AYE, SIR! Right after we broke formation our Lieutenant said to me that he was coming along to see what the skipper had in mind for me. The old man let me have it, telling me what nerve I had to show up in HIS formation in Marine Corp Khakis. The Lt. stood up for me, explaining that it was his fault for having kept me so busy, as to not draw a uniform issue. From that time onward, our skipper had it in for me. I had to out perform nearly everybody in the Company to keep him from getting on my case. I would have thought he had better things to do, running an entire battalion, than to check up on me, but apparently that episode put me in his sights. My performance eventually paid off and got me promoted to Chief Carpenter’s Mate, but this was over a year later.

While at Pearl we were assigned various jobs building things for the Navy and Marine Corp. Some of us helped salvage ships and wreckage from the Pearl Harbor Attack in 1942, and build new structures where old ones had been bombed or burned. About half of the 76th Battalion was shipped to Palmyra atoll and built an airstrip and other facilities. We were reunited on Oahu and were told to get ready to ship out. We boarded ship, the SS Hawaiian Shipper, and headed for Eniwetok atoll and got there about the 30th of June, spending about 30 days in the lagoon. Some of us got to go ashore, but I was not one of them. Most of us slept on the steel deck as it was too hot below decks. Ray Swart and I were almost always together during that cruise. From Eniwetok we sailed to Guam in a huge task force, and stood off shore for a few days, hearing and seeing some major battles going on. There were a lot of combat troops that landed ahead of us. Navy gun ships threw shells on the island, and our planes made many bomb runs. We thought it would be easy once it was our turn to land.

Some of us went in ahead of the rest of the battalion on August 3rd to look over the area at Piti, which was to be our camp. We waded ashore with some Marines from 3rd Division, with our packs and weapons because the landing craft got stuck on a sand bar. There were only about 30 of us from A and B Companies that landed early. We were part of an advance team from the battalion, and some of the Chiefs, Warrants and Officers helped with determining what needs there were to get Apra Harbor back in shape. I don’t know how or why I got selected for going ashore early. It may have had something to do with me and Marine Uniforms, and the skipper’s attitude about that. What now seems so funny about the whole uniform episode is that most of us were now wearing Marine combat uniforms.

We got pinned down by the enemy soon after landing that first day and night. We though there were no more Japanese around. We were wrong, scared and a bit angry about that. We were in an old rice paddy around the Piti area, and they tried to get into our position as it got dark. A few of them were killed and that seemed to change their attitude about trying any more. The worst thing about that day and night was it started raining cats and dogs. It rained so hard I couldn’t see my hand when I held my arm out. No one was hurt that day or night from our small group, but it sure was not pleasant. More Marines came by in the morning and shot up the place, and probably took care of whomever it was that had shot at us. By the time the sun came up our first morning we were laying in over two inches of water. Our first bath on Guam.

We then went back to the beachhead area to await the rest of our equipment and the arrival of the battalion. We received the first of our trucks from LSTs, and got them ready for the battalion to load up and we all went to Piti and started to build our Camp, and repair some of the nearby roads.

I was assigned various tasks at first, while on Guam. We helped string electrical wire and repair the Piti Power Generator Plant that had been damaged during our attack on the island. We set poles and strung electrical wires all over the place, and build a road to an Army Air Strip. Our battalion also built hundreds of shop buildings, ware houses and Quonset huts for other units in and around Orote Navy Base. We also went around the island in our trucks and closed up tunnels and caves where Japanese soldiers might have been hiding. We had armed guards with us wherever we went and around our own camp and shop buildings. Most of us, if we could, carried small arms, or had them handy nearby, even when we were running equipment.

Since I was older than a lot of the men in my company and platoon, some of the guys called me Pops. We did not have much of the traditional Navy attitude, and rank didn’t seem too important with the enlisted men. We got along and got the job done. We depended on each other, and became like brothers. After being on this island for almost two years, we just wanted to go home. One of my closest buddies was Lee Gentry.

Our largest projects were at Apra Harbor and building the breakwater. There was no breakwater before we built it, just a natural reef line that we followed to lay down the rip rap, rocks and coral that we blasted from Cabras island and from other gravel pits on the big island. Some concrete barges were sunk to make part of the breakwater then we dumped loads of rock, (rip rap) to build the break higher and wider. We built the whole thing from scratch, and it took us from September '44 to the end of the war to actually finish its full length. I don’t think it was fully completed when the battalion left as we were always adding to it. Some of it would erode from the huge waves that struck it from the ocean side.

I was the leading petty officer for one of many a convoy of ‘Seabee Specials’, as we called them, GMC 6 by 6 gravel dump trucks. I was a Carpenters’ Mate 1st class most of my time in the 76th Battalion, and it was my job to make sure we kept our trucks running to pick up rip rap and dump it onto the end of the breakwater that was already built. Then the dozers would level out what we had dumped. A few of the trucks actually went into the ocean as they dumped their loads, but none of our men went in with the trucks. They all got out safe, but there were some close calls. I drove the lead truck of my convoy most of the time. Our trucks also carried armed Seabees, as from time to time we were shot at by enemy holdouts. Life on Guam with the Seabees was hard and tough. We worked almost every day, and it all became pretty boring and tiresome.

We had three of our men killed on the island, and one was shot by friendly fire. They are listed in the battalion book. We were sniped at frequently while working and even in camp. One of the snipers lived in a tunnel in the hill next to our camp and caused us trouble for quite some time. You can see the hill in the camp picture. Our Parade was a target for the sniper as people were walking across it everyday, and were out in the open. I guess it took awhile before someone actually saw where he was hiding or where the shots were coming from. Our guards and a blast crew were sent to blow up his tunnel near lunchtime one day. It was a huge explosion. I think they used too much dynamite, and it scared the willies out of most of us as it was so close to camp, and everybody hit the dirt. Some thought the enemy was bombing us. We didn’t hear about the blast crew closing the tunnel until later. After that, we were never bothered again by snipers in camp.

In late October 1945 we learned the battalion was to be deactivated and shipped home. Deactivation was on November 11th, and everything after that was at a blinding pace. It all went fast. We were put aboard ship and landed at San Diego. From San Diego each man was sent to a Navy base close to his hometown for discharge. We had guys from nearly everywhere in the states, but the bulk of our men were from the south or southwest. I went to Great Lakes Naval Station in Illinois for release, and was home in Peshtigo, Wis. by the 18th of November 1945.

Our reunions did not take place until some years after the war. I suppose many of the guys just wanted to forget about the tough time they had being away from family, friends and hometowns. I did not learn about the reunions until I saw an ad in the VFW Magazine for the 76th. Since most of our guys were from the south and southwest, we held our reunions in Jacksboro, Texas. I was the 76th NCB Reunion President for ten years, 1984 to 1994, and decided that that was long enough. It needed to be passed to someone else, and especially someone younger than me. At our reunion in 1994 at Jacksboro, Texas, J.C. Wright was elected as the 76th NCB Reunion President. There were only about 17 of us at that reunion, the last one I attended.

We built things that have stood up after all these years. We talked over some of the old times at the reunions, and caught up on each other’s lives. Remarks about being sent to a tropical paradise, only to have our butts worked off were often made at the reunions. This was just our way of being humorous. I think every man had a deep sense of pride in what we accomplished. I served with a first rate, great bunch of guys, and our officers were top notch. I don’t think any of us thought that way during the war.


				*76th SEABEES of World War II* *Recollections of Kenneth Thompson, Navy Chief Carpenter's Mate and Marine Technical Sargeant*



	Home \| Guam Order of Battle \| Units of the 5th Naval Construction Brigade \| 5th NavConBrig War Diary Report \| WWII SEABEE Accounterments & Symbols \| SECRET Work of Building Bees \| 76th Bees - An Untold Story \| 76th SEABEES Enlisted Ratings \| 76th SEABEES Archived Record \| 76th NCB Cruise Book \| 76th REUNION \| Song of the Seabees \| SEABEES in Marine Uniform \| Insight from a CEC Officer \| Recollections of Harry Spence, EM3c \| Recollections of Kenneth Thompson, Navy Chief Carpenter's Mate and Marine Technical Sargeant \| SEABEE MEMORIAL \| Guest Book \| LINKS


		*Recollections of Kenneth C. Thompson, Navy Chief and Marine Sargeant*



		Recollections recorded 23 August 2001 (by his son) I am trying to remember the things from over the past 57 years. I got a notice from the Draft Board in Green Bay, Wisconsin, in July 1943. I did not want the Draft Board to determine my fate, and after Pearl Harbor, I was determined to enlist anyway, so I volunteered to go into the Navy CBs. I went home and told your mother, that I was going to enlist. I knew I had to do something to help with the war besides building PT boats. They gave me a month to get my life in order, pay bills, make arrangements for anything and everything, before being shipped to Boot Camp. I went on active duty the 31st of July 1943, and entered Navy Boot Training near Williamsburg and Macgruder, Virginia, and spent 30 days at Boot. I found out that I had been transferred into the Marines while still in Boot training, although they failed to mention that to our company. We then got a 72 hour leave and I went home to Peshtigo, Wis. to see your mother, and say goodbye, as we knew it would be some length of time before I would return home from who-knows-where. When I got back to camp, we were told to get ready to ship out to California. By the time we got to California, we were put back into the Navy Seabees and went to camp at Hueneme for more training. My Training Company was then shipped to Camp Pendleton, near Los Angles, Calif. While there we were told we were now Marine Combat Engineers, not too much different than Navy CBs. We were issued Marine Corps uniforms and told to ship our Navy uniforms home, or throw them away. While at Pendleton, some Hollywood filmmakers from Republic Pictures came by and had asked if they could use us to help make a movie. That movie turned out to be “The Fighting Seabees”, which starred John Wayne, Dennis O’Keefe, and Susan Hayward. We were filmed in quite a few movie scenes, but it seems most of them were not in the final movie that was released to the theaters. Our Marine unit is shown in the bayonet training scene of the movie. We were not Seabees then, but Marines. We also helped in some of the construction scenes, but there were either one or two other Navy Seabee units that participated in making the movie also. The Seabees and Marines that were in the movie all ate lunch together, and hung around together for the duration of the filming. Sometimes we were dressed as Japanese soldiers for background shots. We were not happy wearing Japanese uniforms. We were also offered the going rate for movie extras, which at the time, I think it was $5.00 a day, but our commanding officer refused the offer for us, so we never got the extra pay from Republic. A few of the stars, like John Wayne, Paul Fix, Duncan Renaldo, who played the “Cisco Kid” and William Frawley, who was in the “I Lovy Lucy” TV show, would often come by and visit with the troops. They were nice guys. John Wayne was particularly interested in how the troops were doing. Over the course of the filming he spent, probably several hours, visiting with the Seabees and Marines. We felt pretty good about the fact that the movie stars would take time out just to visit with us. It sure boosted our moral. Right after the filming was done we were transferred back into the Navy, and again issued new uniforms. I think we were in the 2nd Naval Construction Brigade at that time. Then within a few short weeks, we were back with the Marine Corps as Combat Engineers, this time with the 36th Marine Replacement Draft, and began more training. The rumor was we were training to go in with the Army under General Douglas MacArthur, as Combat Engineers, and would be heading to Australia, but we never went. This was some rough and tough Marine training, the hardest we had been through so far. We were then transferred to Camp Elliot near San Diego, and back into the Navy, and again got a new Navy uniform issue. I could have kept my original Navy issue had I known we were going to be shuffled back and forth between the two services. Within a month we got transferred once more into the 4th Marines, but had no idea were we would go. Again I sent my Navy uniforms home. Marine uniforms, I would learn, were to play a role in my time with the Seabees. Then we headed out to Pearl Harbor, were we finally ended up in the Navy with the 76th Seabees. I was in the Navy 5th Brigade for awhile, as well. I was transferred so many times its hard to recall. Since I had been a Technical Sergeant in the Marine Corp, and was a Petty Officer 1st class, in the Navy, my 76th Seabee company Lieutenant had me getting the guys squared away after being transferred back into the Navy. One day while at Pearl we had an in-ranks inspection by our C.O., and I was the only fella in the unit in Marine Corp uniform. Having been assigned to caring for the other guys, I had not yet gotten my new Navy issue. Our Skipper, Commander Frank Endebrock, was reviewing the troops, and he abruptly stopped right in front of me during inspection, and eyeballed me front top to bottom. He then asked, “Are you a Seabee or a Marine?” After being transferred so many times I had to think about it for a few seconds, and then answered that I was a Seabee. I don’t think he liked my hesitation to his question. He then said, “Well, whatever you are, when this inspection is over, I want to see you in my office. Understood?” I answered up with an immediate Navy, AYE, AYE, SIR! Right after we broke formation our Lieutenant said to me that he was coming along to see what the skipper had in mind for me. The old man let me have it, telling me what nerve I had to show up in HIS formation in Marine Corp Khakis. The Lt. stood up for me, explaining that it was his fault for having kept me so busy, as to not draw a uniform issue. From that time onward, our skipper had it in for me. I had to out perform nearly everybody in the Company to keep him from getting on my case. I would have thought he had better things to do, running an entire battalion, than to check up on me, but apparently that episode put me in his sights. My performance eventually paid off and got me promoted to Chief Carpenter’s Mate, but this was over a year later. While at Pearl we were assigned various jobs building things for the Navy and Marine Corp. Some of us helped salvage ships and wreckage from the Pearl Harbor Attack in 1942, and build new structures where old ones had been bombed or burned. About half of the 76th Battalion was shipped to Palmyra atoll and built an airstrip and other facilities. We were reunited on Oahu and were told to get ready to ship out. We boarded ship, the SS Hawaiian Shipper, and headed for Eniwetok atoll and got there about the 30th of June, spending about 30 days in the lagoon. Some of us got to go ashore, but I was not one of them. Most of us slept on the steel deck as it was too hot below decks. Ray Swart and I were almost always together during that cruise. From Eniwetok we sailed to Guam in a huge task force, and stood off shore for a few days, hearing and seeing some major battles going on. There were a lot of combat troops that landed ahead of us. Navy gun ships threw shells on the island, and our planes made many bomb runs. We thought it would be easy once it was our turn to land. Some of us went in ahead of the rest of the battalion on August 3rd to look over the area at Piti, which was to be our camp. We waded ashore with some Marines from 3rd Division, with our packs and weapons because the landing craft got stuck on a sand bar. There were only about 30 of us from A and B Companies that landed early. We were part of an advance team from the battalion, and some of the Chiefs, Warrants and Officers helped with determining what needs there were to get Apra Harbor back in shape. I don’t know how or why I got selected for going ashore early. It may have had something to do with me and Marine Uniforms, and the skipper’s attitude about that. What now seems so funny about the whole uniform episode is that most of us were now wearing Marine combat uniforms. We got pinned down by the enemy soon after landing that first day and night. We though there were no more Japanese around. We were wrong, scared and a bit angry about that. We were in an old rice paddy around the Piti area, and they tried to get into our position as it got dark. A few of them were killed and that seemed to change their attitude about trying any more. The worst thing about that day and night was it started raining cats and dogs. It rained so hard I couldn’t see my hand when I held my arm out. No one was hurt that day or night from our small group, but it sure was not pleasant. More Marines came by in the morning and shot up the place, and probably took care of whomever it was that had shot at us. By the time the sun came up our first morning we were laying in over two inches of water. Our first bath on Guam. We then went back to the beachhead area to await the rest of our equipment and the arrival of the battalion. We received the first of our trucks from LSTs, and got them ready for the battalion to load up and we all went to Piti and started to build our Camp, and repair some of the nearby roads. I was assigned various tasks at first, while on Guam. We helped string electrical wire and repair the Piti Power Generator Plant that had been damaged during our attack on the island. We set poles and strung electrical wires all over the place, and build a road to an Army Air Strip. Our battalion also built hundreds of shop buildings, ware houses and Quonset huts for other units in and around Orote Navy Base. We also went around the island in our trucks and closed up tunnels and caves where Japanese soldiers might have been hiding. We had armed guards with us wherever we went and around our own camp and shop buildings. Most of us, if we could, carried small arms, or had them handy nearby, even when we were running equipment. Since I was older than a lot of the men in my company and platoon, some of the guys called me Pops. We did not have much of the traditional Navy attitude, and rank didn’t seem too important with the enlisted men. We got along and got the job done. We depended on each other, and became like brothers. After being on this island for almost two years, we just wanted to go home. One of my closest buddies was Lee Gentry. Our largest projects were at Apra Harbor and building the breakwater. There was no breakwater before we built it, just a natural reef line that we followed to lay down the rip rap, rocks and coral that we blasted from Cabras island and from other gravel pits on the big island. Some concrete barges were sunk to make part of the breakwater then we dumped loads of rock, (rip rap) to build the break higher and wider. We built the whole thing from scratch, and it took us from September '44 to the end of the war to actually finish its full length. I don’t think it was fully completed when the battalion left as we were always adding to it. Some of it would erode from the huge waves that struck it from the ocean side. I was the leading petty officer for one of many a convoy of ‘Seabee Specials’, as we called them, GMC 6 by 6 gravel dump trucks. I was a Carpenters’ Mate 1st class most of my time in the 76th Battalion, and it was my job to make sure we kept our trucks running to pick up rip rap and dump it onto the end of the breakwater that was already built. Then the dozers would level out what we had dumped. A few of the trucks actually went into the ocean as they dumped their loads, but none of our men went in with the trucks. They all got out safe, but there were some close calls. I drove the lead truck of my convoy most of the time. Our trucks also carried armed Seabees, as from time to time we were shot at by enemy holdouts. Life on Guam with the Seabees was hard and tough. We worked almost every day, and it all became pretty boring and tiresome. We had three of our men killed on the island, and one was shot by friendly fire. They are listed in the battalion book. We were sniped at frequently while working and even in camp. One of the snipers lived in a tunnel in the hill next to our camp and caused us trouble for quite some time. You can see the hill in the camp picture. Our Parade was a target for the sniper as people were walking across it everyday, and were out in the open. I guess it took awhile before someone actually saw where he was hiding or where the shots were coming from. Our guards and a blast crew were sent to blow up his tunnel near lunchtime one day. It was a huge explosion. I think they used too much dynamite, and it scared the willies out of most of us as it was so close to camp, and everybody hit the dirt. Some thought the enemy was bombing us. We didn’t hear about the blast crew closing the tunnel until later. After that, we were never bothered again by snipers in camp. In late October 1945 we learned the battalion was to be deactivated and shipped home. Deactivation was on November 11th, and everything after that was at a blinding pace. It all went fast. We were put aboard ship and landed at San Diego. From San Diego each man was sent to a Navy base close to his hometown for discharge. We had guys from nearly everywhere in the states, but the bulk of our men were from the south or southwest. I went to Great Lakes Naval Station in Illinois for release, and was home in Peshtigo, Wis. by the 18th of November 1945. Our reunions did not take place until some years after the war. I suppose many of the guys just wanted to forget about the tough time they had being away from family, friends and hometowns. I did not learn about the reunions until I saw an ad in the VFW Magazine for the 76th. Since most of our guys were from the south and southwest, we held our reunions in Jacksboro, Texas. I was the 76th NCB Reunion President for ten years, 1984 to 1994, and decided that that was long enough. It needed to be passed to someone else, and especially someone younger than me. At our reunion in 1994 at Jacksboro, Texas, J.C. Wright was elected as the 76th NCB Reunion President. There were only about 17 of us at that reunion, the last one I attended. We built things that have stood up after all these years. We talked over some of the old times at the reunions, and caught up on each other’s lives. Remarks about being sent to a tropical paradise, only to have our butts worked off were often made at the reunions. This was just our way of being humorous. I think every man had a deep sense of pride in what we accomplished. I served with a first rate, great bunch of guys, and our officers were top notch. I don’t think any of us thought that way during the war.