Issue 43.11
This is the first of a series of articles from Sam Wyrouck that relate personal stories of events during WWII.
Richard G. “Smitty” Smith is a resident of Quail Lake Estates in Hurricane and a proud Pearl Harbor survivor. Smitty was on the battleship, California, on December 7th, 1941 when the Japs sank her. Smitty was then assigned to be the machinist on the brand new fuel tanker, a floating gas station, named the U. S. Thikasia.
The ship had finished her shakedown cruise and was in port at Baltimore awaiting her first assignment. Just before leaving port Smitty looked down and saw a jeep drive up on the adjacent pier. An Army officer got out of the jeep driven by an enlisted man. The officer walked up the gangplank and left the driver with the jeep. Smitty and the deck officer had a plan.
Smitty went down and talked to the army driver. He said “Come on up and have some navy chow on the navy. Your officer will be busy for some time and he said it would be OK.” Hesitantly the G. I. went to get some navy chow.
The ship’s crew extended the boom, lowered the cargo net, pushed the jeep onto the net and hoisted the jeep up to the deck. Before chow was over, that jeep had a new coat of navy gray paint.
After lunch, the G. I. was told to meet his officer two blocks away and the officer was told to meet his driver at the same place.
Within minutes the Thikasia was under way with a jeep aboard that would be invaluable when visiting ports around the world. The ship’s captain didn’t understand why the paperwork for the jeep never did catch up to him.
Smitty never did find out how the driver of the jeep explained the loss of the jeep.
This story is written as told to Sam Wyrouck by Richard Smith