Nagasaki
1945
U.S. Atomic Veterans
Basil Duncan
My story.
Basil Duncan in Nagasaki Japan--1945
Most of my time in the Marines was spent with the Fourth Marine Division
and I was with them from the formation of the Division through the Marshall Islands,
Saipan and Tinian campaign. On the Last operation I was injured and
subsequently returned to the states. I remained stateside until July
1945 at which time I was returned overseas to the Marine Transit Center on the island
of Oahu in Hawaii, near Pearl Harbor.
We were scheduled to remain there until we could be transferred to specific
units who were preparing for the invasion of Japan. Somehow I learned I would
be assigned to the 2nd Marine Division who had apparently been assigned as one
of the spearhead units to invade the island of Kyushu on which is located the
port city of Nagasaki.
One evening in August 1945, while sitting in the base theater watching a
movie, and about half way through, the movie was stopped and the house lights came
on. A sailor came out on stage and announced the war was over and that Japan
had surrendered. At that moment the house suddenly became deathly quiet.
Not a single sound was uttered until someone in the back stood up and said, “ to hell with the war, lets have the movie.” The light went out and we resumed watching the
movie. On the way back to our barracks no one spoke and each person I suppose wanted to be alone with his own personal thoughts. It was
difficult to believe the Japanese had given up after experiencing
their determination and persistence in battle and their belief in
fighting to the death. To them surrender was and had always been
out of the question. It was considered shameful and dishonorable and one was taught to take his own life rather than do so.
So after fighting them so long we had to sort out our own thoughts and
tomorrow would be soon enough to talk.
Activity in the camp picked up and rumors were everywhere. People
were being discharged from the service according to the number of points
they had. Most of us had been in quite a lot of combat so we had
plenty of points and were looking forward to going home.
A day or two before the 30th of August I , for reasons unknown to this
day, could not get the song Sentimental Journey out of my mind and
all day long and into the evening I was either singing or humming
that tune. The other guys threatened to stuff my mouth full of
anything available if I didn’t shut up. It seemed I couldn't help
it I kept singing the song.
On the evening of August 29, 1945 I think, we were all ordered
outside for an important announcement. We knew of course we were
going home and this was it. The old Top Sgt. Then advised he was
going to call out names and those he called were to fall in on the
side. The rest would return to the barracks. My name starting
with ‘D’ was one of the first called and along with the rest , was
pleased we were going home . It seemed obvious because of the 84
called out all of them that I knew had been in lots of combat and had
plenty of points.
When he finished calling names and had dismissed the rest , he informed
us to pack our gear immediately and that we would be boarding an LST the
next morning at exactly 7:00 AM which would take us to Saipan were
we would join up with units of the 2nd Marine Division, and proceed from
there to Nagasaki Japan for occupation duty. Needless to say this
was not what we expected. When we returned to our barracks I think
half the guys who were going suddenly remembered that darn song and
proceeded to remind by tossing anything in sight at my bunk.
After asking numerous times why we were singled out to go to
Nagasaki we were told it was because of our experience in our particular
field of expertise and we were needed to help in the occupation as well
as with reestablishing services in the city.
Exactly at 0700 on the morning of August 30, we boarded this
old tub of an LST and were under way. We arrived at Saipan on
September 17, 1945 and immediately boarded the USS Cambria which
sailed the same day for Japan.
We arrived on 23 September 1945 but none of us was prepared for the sight
that greeted us on arrival. If we thought we had seen war
devastation before we were wrong. This was war damage
beyond belief. We all stood along the rail in awe of the
total destruction caused by one bomb. In addition to that the
waters of the bay were littered with dead bodies even though it had been
several days since the bomb was dropped.
Shortly after landing different units were assigned to specific
duties. Some were given the responsibility of releasing American
prisoners of war from the large prison camp located nearby, others were
assigned to disarm all Japanese Army units, and so one. Some of us
were assigned to take over Japanese barracks, as well as an abandoned
school, and prepare it for housing our troops. To do most of the
work we used Japanese civilians and in short order we were more or less
settled in. Things really moved fast and the first few
days. At first we would have to travel throughout the city in
small groups of five or more and would have to be armed with rifles
and machine guns. This continued until such time as the army
personnel were convinced the war was really over. There were a few
incidents with the Japanese military but they were minor and as a
rule things went very smooth.
As I remember events unfolding one of our first duties was seeing the
children were taken care of and fed as necessary. Even though the
Japanese had done a very good job of taking care of the dead there was
still quite a lot of work to do in that area. Our main
responsibility in that area was in organization and control with
Japanese doing the work.
There are several incidents I remember in my association with the
people of Nagasaki. What stood out in my mind at the time was how
much more friendly the women, all ages from little girls to old
women, were than were the men. There was little doubt the men still
held much resentment toward the americans. I also recall the people
were hungry, very hungry when we arrived. I recall on one occasion
as we were traveling back to our camp from a work detain downtown
when standing along side the road was a man his wife and a small
girl who looked to be about ten or 12 years of age. They were
asking for food and I remember them being so hungry they offered us
their daughter for food. To the credit of the marines on that truck
to a man we gave them all our rations and as best we could told them
to never feel they have to sacrifice their daughter for food. I
don't think there was a dry eye in any of the Marines but they would
never admit it. After we gave the man and woman the food and placed
the little girl in their arms they were so happy they were still
bowing when we went out of sight.
I think the offer to sacrifice their daughter was a result of the
Japanese people being taught by their military that Marines would
first rape and then kill all young girls and women. From that day
forward we all sort of made a vow to ourselves that we would help
these civilians as much as we could if we had to give them our
rations, especially the children. It made you feel good inside.
Around our barracks were always one to two hundreds women of all
ages who were looking for work, any kind of work such as repairing
window panes, cooking, cleaning the barracks etc. We had rigged up
outdoor showers and I never got used to having the women come into
our showers to help us bathe. At first it was more or less funny
but it got to be a real hassle. They of course could see nothing
wrong with the idea because they used public bathing all the time.
It was almost impossible to maintain any privacy. When you woke up
in the morning there would be one or two girls in your room cleaning
and waiting for you to wake up so they could make up your bed.
Great room service!!
All in all the people were very passive and seemed to be happy it
was finally over. As we patrolled the countryside all the people we
met were friendly or at least acted so and we never had any
difficulty with them. We had Marine MP's working alongside of
Japanese Policemen and there was never a major incident. Of course
the MP was in charge but he depended on the cooperation of the
Japanese COP for assistance in any situation involving the native
population.
After most of the obvious emergency work had been completed we were
assigned to work in areas of our so called expertise. My main job
with the Marines had been in infantry communications and specifically in
telephone communications. It therefore became our job
to restore telephone communication, especially to all military
units in the area. In addition to that we also had to restore some
of the electric lines to different camps so that all personal had power
to their quarters and offices.
When our field work was completed for the day then we would grab our
weapons and go on patrol duty. It seems that went on as long as we
were there. As far as danger was concerned there was very little in
dealing with the people but we in working on the electric system had some
major problems. Several people were injured in falls, some
were injured in electric short-circuits coursing through their body, and
some who simply didn’t take precaution. One guy however and a good
friend at the time was the worst injury I witnessed.
We were trying to restore power to our barracks using the
antiquated system employed in Japan at the time which was called ground
return circuits. This meant that only one line was wired to your
building and to complete the circuit they literally used the
ground. It worked rather well in wet weather but when the ground
was dry it almost never worked. That was the situation when
we took over this building. As a favor to the guys in the barracks
who wanted to use their radio and or a record player several of us agreed
to volunteer and work on the power. This was in spite of the fact
that a storm was approaching the area. We thought we could complete
the job before the storm broke and so proceeded to continue. The
line was in more of a mess than we thought and so we decided to replace
part and splice it into the old section. I elected to go up
on the pole first and in those days one used gaffs or pole
climbers. There was no such thing as a lift or hoist. You
simply stood on the pole with your gaffs imbedded in the pole and
your safety belt in place. After I had been up for about two hours
my legs were almost numb so I decided to come down and advised the
others that we wouldn’t have time to finish before the storm broke.
Lightening was beginning to flash already. My friend, whose name I
can’t recall after more than 50 years. Volunteered to go up and try to at
least get some power to the building. On the next pole down there
was a transformer and just as my friend began to join the wires together
in a temporary union, lightening struck the transformer sending a
giant ball of fire down the wire striking the Marine full force. At
the time he was holding the line in his right hand. In a fraction
of a second the line disintegrated and my friend’s whole lift side was
instantly cooked to the bone. Not knowing if he was still alive<
I land another marine climbed and saw the terrible condition he was in
and since he was not breathing at the time we had to hurry as much as
possible. This man weighed almost two hundred pounds and one can
imagine the difficulty we had bringing him down that pole one or two
inches at a time. To this day I don’t know if he survived or not
and I can never forget how badly his body was burned.
This routine continued on as long as we were there and it required us to
be all over the city of Nagasaki almost every day. In so doing we
were exposed to unclear radiation every minute we spent in
Nagasaki. Never were we told of any danger for radiation poisoning
and it was not until I was about ready to leave that some scientist or
doctor advised us to stay away from what was called ground zero if at all
possible because it could be dangerous. Big deal---we had combed
that entire area for weeks and it was a little late for a warning.
I don’t think even the top brass knew that it was dangerous and if
they had we would still have had the responsibility to do our job o
occupation duty. There was also no such thing as protective
clothing used in the area and I doubt that it was even available at the
time.
We were told that the bomb was exploded a little over 500 feet in
the air over the city and so the force was downward and outward. At
exactly ground zero some structures were still standing but were
gutted by fire.
It was strange but I saw very little melted sand and glass but then
I was not aware at the time of this phenomenon. There were many
weird sights such as one lone item sitting or standing completely
undamaged and for hundreds of feet around everything else was total
destruction.
It was not until recent years that I learned just how dirty that
bomb was and how much radiation we were all exposed to. Once in a
great while the VA now tells me if I have any symptoms I can go to the VA
Hospital and request to be tested.
I left Japan in December 1945, arrived in Camp Pendleton on 20
December 1945 and was discharged on January 1, 1946.
Note: Basil has an excellent Veterans website. Be sure to have a look:
Dunc's Home Page
Basil Duncan
Email: duncone@hotmail.com
Keith Whittle
August 29, 1998
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