Way OT- newspaper article about my Uncle

[TomB]

This is a local paper's interview of my uncle. He was on a ship that came under attack by the Japanese Navy during WWII. My uncle was one of the lucky ones.

At this very moment, he is in Kentucky for the 60th annual reunion of the event.

Although I knew of this when I was a kid, I never really heard him talk about it until I joined the Navy. One time when I was home on leave and stationed onboard my first ship he talked pretty openly about it. When I saw him a couple of days later, he said that I made him loose sleep because after talking to me, for the first time in a long time he had nightmares about his time onboard.

Also, for those of you who read the article, you will notice towards the end when it talks about him meeting his wife, Rita. Just to show how closely related we are, my Aunt Rita is my dad's sister, and my uncle that this article about is my mom's brother.

Please read if you are so inclined. If you don't feel like reading it, no need to feel compelled.

Sorry for the cut and paste, but I couldn't get it from this paper's online site.


Thanks for your time. All the Best, Tom

Tuesday, October 12, 2004

Vivid memory

Veterans recall Canberra Crew members gather to recall Canberra
Bill Fortier
T&G STAFF
wfortier@telegram.com




Ralph C. Julian of Sturbridge remembers the attack on the USS Canberra Oct. 13, 1944. (T&G Staff / DAN GOULD)
Enlarge photo






STURBRIDGE- Ralph C. Julian remembers Oct. 13, 1944, very, very well.

So do three of his closest friends on the USS Canberra heavy cruiser.

In fact, they all readily acknowledge that day as one of the benchmarks of their lives, something they really do remember as if it occurred yesterday.

With each passing year, the number of living members of the crew goes down, but at least 200 of them are expected to make the annual reunion of the USS Canberra. The reunion this year - the 60th anniversary of an attack that killed 23 members of the crew - is being held this week in Louisville, Ky.

It was about 6:40 p.m. Oct. 13, 1944, when the ship, carrying about 3,000 sailors, was rapidly approached by about 30 Japanese fighters as it was in position near Formosa off the coast of China.

As soon as the planes were spotted, everybody on the ship had to go to their battle station.

For Seaman First Class Mr. Julian, who is a former Sturbridge selectman, that meant getting into an approximately 4-by-4-foot steel enclosure at the bottom of mount three in a line of 5-inch, .38-caliber guns on the starboard side of the ship, where he was a trainer.


'In all my life I had never heard anything so loud, such a terrific explosion.'

RALPH C. JULIAN,
A SAILOR IN 1944
Enlarge photo



A trainer, Mr. Julian explained, steers the gun in the direction in which it is going to shoot while a pointer directs the gun to the height it will be at when it shoots the 55-pound explosives used by the weapon. The soldiers who place the 55-pound projectiles are called loaders.

Mr. Julian said the ship had endured "about seven or eight" similar attacks in recent days.

Like his three friends, Mr. Julian said the battles were a whirlwind of loud explosions, both from the ship's guns and the Japanese planes that were firing guns and torpedoes at the ships sailing in a convoy with the USS Canberra.

The crew members didn't have time to think about whether they might die in the sudden battle because they were too busy doing their jobs.

"You hear all the guns going off, and your heart is up here," Mr. Julian, pointing to the top of his head, said. "It's boom, boom, boom."

However, Oct. 13, 1944, brought a boom and resulting concussion in the mount unlike anything Mr. Julian had ever heard or felt.

"In all my life I had never heard anything so loud, such a terrific explosion," he said in a recent interview.

A torpedo dropped by one of the Japanese planes hit the nearby fireroom, killing 23 sailors and ripping a 140-by-50-foot hole in the ship. The fireroom supplies power for the ship, and the hit knocked all the power out.

"We were a sitting duck," Mr. Julian said.

The blast and concussion left Mr. Julian with perforated eardrums that eventually led to his hospitalization at the Chelsea Naval Hospital when the ship returned to Boston in early 1945.

Still, it could have been worse.

The USS Houston, which replaced the USS Canberra in the convoy, was hit the next night by a torpedo. The decision was made to set up the two powerless cruisers as bait to lure the Japanese into a trap.

"We were sitting ducks in the water," Mr. Julian said in a report he wrote of his time on the USS Canberra.

Meanwhile, legendary Japanese propaganda radio voice Tokyo Rose was telling the sailors they were all going to die.

"At this point, we had no choice but to believe her," Mr. Julian said in his report. "To this day, I cannot understand why they never sent a submarine to finish us off. The Japanese Navy never came near us."

Two days later, a tugboat began towing the ship to the South Pacific Island of Eniwetok for repairs that would take until Christmas to complete. While heading there, the ship moved into a daylong typhoon that confined the crew to their sleeping quarters.

The convoy was commanded by Adm. William F. "Bull" Halsey Jr., and he let the USS Canberra's crew know how he felt about their efforts.

"It took guts to spend day after day in the center of a bull's-eye, and it took seamenship to ride out a typhoon while under tow," Mr. Halsey wrote.

The torpedo struck the ship on Friday the 13th, but Mr. Julian feels it was his lucky day because he was not killed in the attack and the fire was put out so quickly the crew did not have to abandon the ship and swim.

There's also another reason that was his lucky day. In an attempt to gain extra points for his military record, Mr. Julian had signed up about a week earlier to work in the fireroom the night of the deadly attack.

However, on Oct. 12, he had second thoughts.

"Something told me to stay topside," Mr. Julian said in the recent interview. "I crossed my name off the list, and that was it."

"That's why the 13th is his lucky day," said Mr. Julian's wife, Rita, who is a former Sturbridge town treasurer.

Mr. Julian, who is 78, had another life-changing, lucky day about 10 months later.

After being discharged from the Navy on Aug. 20, he hitchhiked home and stopped by the old Blackington Pharmacy, where he asked a pretty young lady named Rita to buy him an ice-cream cone.

Ralph and Rita Julian have been married 58 years. When it comes to the reunions, Rita leaves the driving to Ralph.

"I like to ride, and he likes to drive," she said with a laugh.

Mr. Julian says he still thinks about Oct. 13, 1944, often.

"There were some nights, at least for a while, that I couldn't sleep," he said.

Three of Mr. Julian's closest friends on the ship were Gunner's Mate Third Class Edward "Eddie" Gallegos, 82, of Albuquerque, N.M.; Seaman Second Class Lloyd Arnold, 78, of Broseley, Mo.; and Seaman First Class Raymond O'Neill, 80, of Staten Island, N.Y.

Mr. Gallego was a loader of the 5-inch, .38 caliber guns at a mount near Mr. Julian's.

"When you're on a ship for a long time, especially under the conditions we experienced, you feel like brothers. When you have something where 23 of them die, it is very disturbing, and I know had nightmares for months. It stays with you every day," Mr. Gallego said.

Mr. Gallego remembers Mr. Julian as "a good-looking kid, just out of high school. He was very friendly, very kind."

Mr. Arnold, a retired captain of a riverboat that worked the Mississippi River, said he and Mr. Julian are good friends.

"We were good friends on the ship, and we stay in touch with each other," said Mr. Arnold, who also loaded the 55-pound explosives. "Sure, I think about it every once in a while."

Mr. O'Neill said the remaining crew members keep in touch with each other as much as possible. He said he has photographs of the ship and crew members on the walls of his home.

[spittin_in_the_wind]

Thanks for the article, Tom. It made me think of my dad who served on a ship in the Pacific in WWII. He was 17 when he entered the service--he lied about his age, but I guess they weren't checking too closely at that time. One time when he came up to visit me, we went to the Charlestown shipyard where there is docked a WWII era ship identical to the one he served on. I think it was quite an experience for him to be able to walk around and show me the radio room where he worked (he was a radioman). He rarely talked about the war, and certainly never in any detail. I know they were in close combat with Japanese ships and one was sunk, which he never discussed with me. I miss him a lot. He's been dead for 10 years now.

Robin

[jkrazy52]

Very interesting piece, Tom. Thanks for sharing a bit of your family history. At the rate we're losing the WWII veterans now, their stories need to be told. My dad served in the Army Air Force in the China-Burma-India theater. He has never said a lot about what happened or exactly what he did to my sisters & myself. My brothers, both Air Force veterans, know more. He finally told us he served as a liasion officer for Army Intelligence at one time. This story only came out because one brother wanted to show Dad a C-5 plane (I think?) on his base. The security officer had to check Dad's clearance and was amazed when Dad had higher clearance than he did. Dad had to share the laugh.

~Judy

[TomB]

Thanks for the article, Tom. It made me think of my dad who served on a ship in the Pacific in WWII. He was 17 when he entered the service--he lied about his age, but I guess they weren't checking too closely at that time. One time when he came up to visit me, we went to the Charlestown shipyard where there is docked a WWII era ship identical to the one he served on. I think it was quite an experience for him to be able to walk around and show me the radio room where he worked (he was a radioman). He rarely talked about the war, and certainly never in any detail. I know they were in close combat with Japanese ships and one was sunk, which he never discussed with me. I miss him a lot. He's been dead for 10 years now.

Robin

Robin: My dad was also a Radioman in WWII, and I was also a Radioman (not WWII though, I'm not quite that old ). I'm fortunate to still have my dad around, although he has had some serious medical problems the last several years.

All the Best, Tom

[TomB]

Very interesting piece, Tom. Thanks for sharing a bit of your family history. At the rate we're losing the WWII veterans now, their stories need to be told. My dad served in the Army Air Force in the China-Burma-India theater. He has never said a lot about what happened or exactly what he did to my sisters & myself. My brothers, both Air Force veterans, know more. He finally told us he served as a liasion officer for Army Intelligence at one time. This story only came out because one brother wanted to show Dad a C-5 plane (I think?) on his base. The security officer had to check Dad's clearance and was amazed when Dad had higher clearance than he did. Dad had to share the laugh.

~Judy

Judy: Thanks for sharing that. You are right, some the WWII vets will be gone. I'm fortunate enough to have my Dad and a couple of Uncles who served then and are still alive. I cherish each day with them.

There is also a cousin in my family who was a Medal of Honor winner during WWII.

All the Best, Tom

[susnfx]

Because we are losing WWII vets rapidly, the National D-Day Museum has a place on their website for WWII soldiers to tell their stories. It's a very good site.

http://www.ddaymuseum.org/

Susan

[JessieK]

Tom, my mom's aunt Gertrude is my mom's father's sister, and uncle Joe (Gertrude's husband) is (was) my mom's mother's first cousin. Not quite as close as yours, but Gertrude and Esther (my mom's mom) had babies on the exact same day (same year), and my mom always referred to her cousin Robby as her "twin cousin."

[TomB]

Because we are losing WWII vets rapidly, the National D-Day Museum has a place on their website for WWII soldiers to tell their stories. It's a very good site.

http://www.ddaymuseum.org/

Susan

Susan: Yes, this is a great site. I would urge anybody that has WWII vets in their family to take a look at it. You can also register the WWII vet there, for free, I believe. Don't assume that just because a person served in WWII, that they are listed at the Memorial. They are not, unless someone registers them- a very easy process.

All the Best, Tom

[TomB]

Tom, my mom's aunt Gertrude is my mom's father's sister, and uncle Joe (Gertrude's husband) is (was) my mom's mother's first cousin. Not quite as close as yours, but Gertrude and Esther (my mom's mom) had babies on the exact same day (same year), and my mom always referred to her cousin Robby as her "twin cousin."

Jessie: Neat story. Thanks.

All the Best, Tom