Naval Aviation Firsts
Tom Phillips
I enjoyed reading Edward Marolda's summary of the Korean War, "The Cold War's First Conflict"—(June 2010, pp. 18-25). But I think the caption with the photo of Ensign Jesse Brown in the cockpit of his Corsair stating that he was the first African-American naval aviator is incorrect. According to "Oscar Holmes: A Place in Naval Aviation" (Naval Aviation News, January-February 1998, by Robert J. Schneller Jr.), Oscar Holmes was the first African-American naval aviator. Already a qualified pilot, he was designated a naval aviator when he completed flight instructor training on 30 June 1943. He served as an instructor and did not deploy from the continental United States. Ensign Brown was the first African American to earn his Navy wings by going through the standard undergraduate naval-flight-training pipeline, the first to go into combat, and the first to be killed in action.
Lieutenant (junior grade) Thomas Hudner received the Medal of Honor for his extraordinary efforts to rescue his wingman Brown. The only other Medal of Honor awarded a naval airman in the Korean War went to Lieutenant (junior grade) John Koelsch for his efforts in the failed rescue attempt of a downed Corsair pilot, nine days of evasion with the injured pilot, and his subsequent captivity, during which he stubbornly resisted his captors unto death.
Koelsch's crewman during the rescue attempt and evasion was Aviation Machinist's Mate Third Class George Neal of Helicopter Utility Squadron 1 (HU-1), an African American. Neal was awarded the Navy Cross for his valiant actions in the nine-day tragedy.Having canvassed the surviving HU-1 members from that era active on the unit's Web site, it seems clear that Neal was certainly one of the first, if not the first African-American naval aircrewman.
There is no evidence, text or pictorial, of any other contemporary African-American naval airmen. There is no mention of Neal's ethnicity in any accounts of the Koelsch story, and the photo of his POW release was only discovered by luck.Now, I wonder why George Neal, first African-American naval aircrewman or not, has never been accorded the attention given Doris Miller, the first African American to earn the Navy Cross, for his actions during the Pearl Harbor attack. Can anyone recall ever seeing Neal's name with other pioneering African-American men in the naval service
Apportioning the War Effort
Roger Beaumont
The respective assertions in the Mark StotzerIn Contact," pp. 8-9) that "the United States only expended about 25 percent of our total war effort to defeat Japan in World War II" and that the "One obvious metric" of "American [Army] battle deaths" totaling "181,720 in Atlantic and 103,571 in Pacific theaters . . . roughly echoed the distribution of combat forces" may be considered in light of the following ratios.
Richard Frank exchange in the June Naval History ("Historian John Erickson averred that such apportioning of shares of victory was a kind of sick game. If such assaying may be defended on the grounds of searching for truth in the broadest sense, perhaps a disciple of the Quaker mathematician Lewis Richardson, coauthor of Statistics of Deadly Quarrels, might wade into the morass and apportion more precisely the fragments of glory. But cui bono
Korean War Recollections
Captain Thomas W. Glickman, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The June 2010 issue of Naval History, particularly Paul Stillwell's "Looking Back" (p. 6) and Edward J. Marolda's "The Cold War's First Conflict" (pp. 18 25), brought back vivid memories.
I reported to my first destroyer, the USS James E. Kyes (DD-787) in August 1948 as a brand new ET3 fresh out of school at Treasure Island. It didn't take long to realize that our ship and others were somewhat "cash strapped." We were in the engineering department at the time, and the chief engineer allocated us $800 per year for electronic repairs. Fortunately, our supply officer required a requisition for every item we expended. Whether that requisition left the ship was a different story.
We departed San Diego
in company with the USS Higbee (DDR-806) on 23 June 1950 for what was to be one of those cruises only recruiters could conjure. Needless to say, President Harry S. Truman's 27 June commitment of U.S. forces to defend South Korea changed our itinerary considerably. One thing was for certain: The money dam had been breached, as upon our arrival at Pearl Harbor all of our backlogged requisitions were submitted and filled.From Pearl we went to Yokosuka and soon learned that we were to be part of TF-90 that was to transport Regimental Combat Teams 5 and 8 of the 1st Cavalry Division to, and land them at, Pohang, South Korea. The elapsed time from concept to execution of the operation was nine days! The task force left Yokosuka on the afternoon of 15 July 1950. As it was payday, a number of us made our last foray to the Navy Exchange. As we walked back to the ship, we passed Forrestal Causeway, where the USS Cavalier (APA-37) was moored and in the process of combat loading and embarking her troops.
For the most part, those Soldiers were dressed in their summer tan garrison uniforms complete with knife-edge creases. Some carried M1s with polished stocks, some had cosmoline-smeared weapons in pyrofilm bags, some had shiny helmet liners. But the strangest sight was the number of women who stood in line with their troopers waiting to embark. The cover of the June Naval History reminds me of the sunken ships we saw as we passed through Bungo Suido en route to the Strait of Shimonoseki. When we arrived at Pohang on 18 July, existing conditions permitted an administrative rather than an opposed landing.
When we left Pohang, we were assigned to naval gunfire support up the coast at Yongdok and northward. Because of a change in our communications suite, we no longer had the equipment necessary to communicate with the Army for gunfire-support purposes. Fortunately, the USS DeHaven (DD-727) and Lyman K. Swenson (DD-729) were assigned to our task unit and had the proper communications equipment to provide the Army with the needed gunfire support.
Spy Ring Fallout
Norman T. Marten Jr.
I read "The Navy's Biggest Betrayal" (June 2010, pp. 36 45) with both interest and outrage, as I expect was done by many others. One can't help but wonder if there is a present-day John Walker continuing to do irreparable harm to our national security. It is incredible that this person will possibly be released from a "life" sentence in 2015.
There is much interesting information in the article, but one key event seems to be missing. I think there is little question the information furnished to the Soviets by Walker in early 1968 combined with the capture of an encryption device and manuals from the USS Pueblo (AGER-2) were a primary reason that the Soviets were able to locate and sink the USS Scorpion (SSN-589) in May of that same year. For apparent political-correctness reasons, that event has never received much attention, and it was not even mentioned in the article. I would recommend reading All Hands Down: The True Story of the Soviet Attack on the USS Scorpion, by Kenneth Sewell and Jerome Preisler. I think that readers will have little doubt after reading their account. I had the privilege of hearing Mr. Sewell speak on the subject at the U.S. Navy's Naval Undersea Museum in Keyport, Washington, an appropriate location for me.
Considering that 99 lives were lost in the Scorpion, I would hope that arrangements can be made to ensure that Walker never sees the other side of his prison walls. The officers and Sailors entombed in the wreckage will never see the outside of their prison walls.
Deserving of Recognition
Commander Harold H. Sacks, U.S. Navy (Retired)
Great praise is due for the brilliant April 2010 edition of Naval History. Richard B. Frank's work is particularly excellent. One small objection: A ship sunk is a ship sunk, and destroyers sunk deserve to be named. Thus in "First Contact with the Enemy," the sentence, "The USS Hornet (CV-8) and a destroyer were sunk" at the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands (p. 34) might better have read, "The USS Hornet (CV-8) and the USS Porter (DD-356) were sunk."
Ditto for the three destroyers lost in the November 14-15 Naval Battle of Guadalcanal: the USS Walke (DD-416), Preston (DD-379), and Benham (DD-397). We would never fail to name a battalion or company of Marines wiped out in battle.
Record-Setting Sub
Norman Polmar
The commemoration of the U.S. submarine Triton's around-the-world-cruise by Carl LaVO in Naval History (June 2010, pp. 50-57) is marred by several factual errors. For example, the statement that the Triton "at 448 feet . . . [was] more than 100 feet longer than any previous submarine," fails to take into account the several Japanese I-400-class submarines constructed during World War II that were 400 feet, 3 inches in length. The Triton did not have a pointed bow, but the rounded bow derived from the German Type XXI design and found in most U.S. postwar submarines before development of the Albacore (AGSS-569) hull form. The Triton was not the first submarine with two reactors; by the end of 1960 the Soviet Navy had three Project 658/Hotel and five Project 627/November submarines at sea, each with two reactors. And the Triton's operating depth was 700 feet, not 800 feet.
The submarine did not serve the Navy "for the next decade as a radar picket sub, attack sub, emergency presidential command post." She began deactivation in the fall of 1968 after less than a decade of active service. Even before the Triton was launched in 1958, the Navy had announced the end of the submarine radar picket program and the pending deactivation of half of the Fleet's ten active radar picket submarines. The Triton never served in that role. While the concept of an underwater presidential command post was discussed within the Navy, no action was taken on the proposal. As for the Triton even operating as an attack submarine, her size and other limitations made that role improbable. I do not believe that she ever deployed as such.
Mr. LaVO responds: I highly respect naval historian Norman Polmar's knowledge of the U.S. Navy. I would like, however, to respond to some of his points. There are many sources that describe the Triton (SSN-586) as having a narrow, "knife-like" bow. Also skipper Edward L. Beach in his account of the around-the-world voyage (Around the World Submerged) noted that the "extremely slim bow" proved to be a "serious deficiency." Beach also declared that within the Triton "for the first time not one but two reactors were included in a nuclear submarine." Obviously, revelations about the Soviet twin-nuke boats came later. After the Triton's globe-circling voyage, she joined the Second Fleet in August 1960 and was deployed to European waters as a radar picket submarine in a series of NATO exercises. In March 1961, the Triton was reclassified as an attack submarine and overhauled at Portsmouth between 1962 and 1964 to convert her to that new role. Though she proved to be too large as an attack boat, she served from Norfolk as the flagship of commander, Submarine Forces, Atlantic, until June 1967. Plans were laid down to convert her to an alternative national emergency command post for the President or other high officials but those plans were canceled due to defense cutbacks. Mr. Polmar is right about the boat's operating depth of 700 feet, though the sub could descend to at least 1,000 feet in an emergency.
Reservists Served, Too
Albert W. Rasmussen
Charles P. Neimeyer'sLeathernecks in Korea" (June 2010, pp. 26-29) was very interesting and gave a good thumbnail sketch of the Korean War from its start to finish. However, I think one very important issue would have further explained the U. S. Marine Corps' ability to field the 1st Marine Division in full force in time for the Inchon landing and should have been given a few brief words. That was the call-up of all of Marine Reservists.
article "I joined the Marine Reserves while a senior in high school, class of '47. While at reserve summer camp on 20 July 1950, our CO called a formation and informed us
we were being "activated" and had ten days to get our affairs squared and to report in at Treasure Island at 0700, 1 August. We left San Francisco on 2 August and arrived at Camp Pendleton the next day. I was sent to Weapons Company, 2d Battalion, 1st Marines on the 6th. We loaded aboard the USS President Jackson (APA-18) on 14 August and landed at Kobe, Japan, on 28 August. Loaded aboard LSTs, we headed for the Inchon landing the afternoon of 15 September.Without the officers and NCOs from World War II who had joined the reserves, we would not have made the grade. We were drilled every day, all day,
from 6 August to 15 September on (in my case) the .30-caliber water-cooled machine gun.We reservists were able to function with the best of them during our time in Korea. I have no real complaints. I realize that I was a very lucky Marine.