Veteran Transcript
Joseph E. McAndrews
[b. 3/26/1923]
[00:03]
“Today is May 5th, 2007. I am Kathryn Lerch with Shirley Gaughan and we are interviewing Mr. Joseph E. McAndrews at Park Tudor School. Mr. McAndrews is 84 years old and was born on March 26th, 1923. Mr. McAndrews served in World War II and was in the 32nd Infantry Division, and held the following rank of Private."
KL: I understand, Mr. McAndrews, that you have already done an interview for Senator Lugar's office for the Library of Congress and decided you wanted to tell some more of your story, so therefore since we haven't heard all of your story we'll ask you fill us in a bit and also expand on what you would like to particularly cover from your service in the Southwest Pacific and in the Philippines.
[01:03]
KL: Jogging your memory just a little bit, were you drafted or did you enlist?
JM: I was drafted and I went through the procedures and everything. They checked me all over and in the eye examination, the doctor said, "Are you in? Or are you out?" I said, "I'm in." I guess my eye test wasn't that great. But I've been getting along with my eyesight for a long time. I didn't want to be 4-F.
KL: So you had plenty of an opportunity to serve then?
JM: Yeah.
KL: Where were you living at the time that you were drafted?
JM: At home with my parents.
KL: What town were you in?
JM: Indianapolis. Address?
KL: Oh, Yes…
JM: 1135 South Richland Street, Indianapolis, Indiana.
KL: What age were you at the time that you were drafted? Were you still in high school?
JM: No, I was out of high school and I had been in CCC for a couple years in northern Indiana and I had come back and was working here, there and everywhere. Grocery stores and stuff. And I don't know what more to say!
[02:49]
KL: I haven't ever talked to someone who's worked in the CCC before, the Conservation Corps. Did you a particular project up north?
JM: Yes, they were doing— fixing so that there wouldn't be so much erosion of the land. Make a valley and let water run through it and so forth. Dams, here and there… earth dams. I was doing that. I come home on the weekend, would hitchhike. Not every week, but every once in a while. I enjoyed doing that.
KL: So you were drafted, you went through the inspection, where did you do your boot camp training?
JM: Camp Wheeler, Georgia.
KL: Had you ever been out of the state of Indiana before?
JM: I doubt it. I might've been to Illinois. Yes, my mother was born in Belleville, Illinois and we went gone over to visit the relatives over there. We were on our way back when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and we had an accident… stayed over there another day. We were on our way back and somebody was driving towards us. They might've heard the same news in the car that we heard.
KL: So they weren't paying attention, they were shocked!
JM: Right, and my brother was driving and he pulled over too far and hit a ditch and the car rolled over. Nobody was hurt, but sister got a little glass breakage. A cut, on her leg.
KL: That’s very memorable.
JM: Yeah, where was I on that day?
KL: How soon after December 7th were you drafted?
JM: I don't remember when that bombing took place…
KL: 1941
JM: Was it 1941? December 7th… Yeah. I hadn't thought about all these dates and everything.
KL: Dates are hard, sometimes, to remember. Your impressions of things are easier. How long were you down at boot camp in Georgia?
JM: Ninety days, I'm pretty sure it was ninety days.
[06:03]
KL: What they call the “Ninety Day Wonders”?
JM: Well, it was a wonder! Where we were it was clay, red clay and I don't know if they could grow anything around that place. They grow peaches and all that, but it wasn't a fun place to walk, run or march! It was okay.
KL: After you finished your boot camp, where did they send you next?
JM: Lawrenceburg, New York. There was a staging area. I don't know exactly what it was but we were there for about a month, I think. I think we left there, and then from New York we went to Brisbane, Australia. I think it was like the 15th of May and we got there on June 15th. It took one month to go through all of that. The ship went part-way out in to Atlantic then straight south in the Panama Canal and over.
KL: So you zigzagged your way across the Pacific?
JM: Yes, when we got past there was an island- Bora Bora. The Fiji Islands, I believe. We stopped there for water and weren't allowed to get off the ship. The Natives come out in their canoes and dove for coins or whatever we'd throw over the side. Anyhow, they stopped there for water from what I understand, and from there we to Brisbane. On the way there was some booming going on, like a Naval battle or something. I don't know exactly but it was in that time frame.
KL: What was your impression of Brisbane?
JM: Brisbane? Well, we didn't get to see much of Brisbane. We just unloaded the ship and Camp Cable.
[09:03]
KL: Tell me more about the camp.
JM: Camp Cable was a desert area, too. We went by train and when there was a hill, we had to unload and push! We got there already, it took maybe two or three days. I never could find it on the map.
KL: It was probably a temporary camp.
JM: I don't know how far in, but they always talked about this Ayers Rock. I think maybe we could see that because there was a big something or other out there.
KL: It's big and it's red.
JM: At Camp Cable we did basic training all over again. It was pretty strict, but not unexpected. We packed up, got on the ship and went around New Guinea. I guess north of New Guinea was an island called Goodenough Island. I don’t know how to spell that, but Goodenough. We were there for about a week and people started dropping. I think several people died of some kind of fever. One of the guys of Mallot got that and he got over it, they sent him back but he wasn't any good for anything after that, though.
[11:17]
KL: When you were at Camp Cable, what was the food like at that camp? Was it Australian food or American Army food?
JM: We had all kinds of food. They had mutton, it didn't smell good. It wasn't all mutton, but we had a good baker. He made donuts and rolls. Breakfasts were really good most of the time.
KL: Probably once you were off the ship, the food was better.
JM: Yeah, well after we left that Goodenough Island, we went to Theodore in northern New Guinea. We took that place, just an area, so Seabees come in and built an airstrip. So when planes left and come back, they need a place to refuel and they'd come in here.
KL: So Theodore was strategic for that reason, you say? To refuel American aircraft?
JM: One time there was about twenty-five planes come in, landing in the water and sliding. From what I understand, one pilot got his nose broke trying to get out of it before it sank.
KL: Had they run out of fuel? They weren't PBY's?
JM: They were land base planes and they were bombing the Philippines and I guess they stayed too long. I guess they had that gauged, but they didn't have enough gas to get all the way to our airstrip.
KL: Theodore was already secured by the time you got there?
JM: Yes.
KL: Where did you go after Theodore?
JM: While we was at Theodore, the Japs was still on New Guinea and there was a village on a hill, mountain, inside New Guinea and we went up there to see what the Japs were doing. They were retreating while the canal was cleared. They were running out of food and all that sort of thing. We went up there and watched them go back and forth, trying to escape and get back to some other base of theirs. But we had their supply lines— They just didn't have any supply lines anymore. That’s what we were there for, besides putting in the airstrip. From Theodore, some of the guys went to this place called the Mallot [?] River. I don’t remember. The Japs were on one side and they weren’t gonna let us cross—but we did. They [had used] up all their ammunition and everything, and they just vanished out in the jungle. From where we were then: I don’t know if we come back to Theodore, but we went from there to— You got a map?
KL: Yes. [Pause while searching for map.] This is probably not detailed enough. It might help. Is that big enough?
[16:34]
JM: There’s the place: Morotai Island. That’s what I was trying to think of.
KL: Ok, there’s Morotai.
JM: Yeah, I think it’s right in here somewhere. Like this Celebes. [Pointing at map.] Yeah, looks like it’s right in there. That was a staging area for us to go to Leyte and we were there maybe a month.
KL: So thirty days there. Did you have any breaks at all from this? I know some who were in the Navy often got to go to Mog Mog Island[?]. They kept you working?
JM: Yeah, well we got our vacation on the ship. [Laughs.]
KL: At this point, once you get off on an island and you would get on a ship, were the Japanese still pretty much in command pretty much of the air or not?
JM: At Morotai, they would come over and just buzz through. Sometimes they’d drop a bomb or something and all that sort of thing. I’d lay there on the ground and watch the machine gun fire and everything coming from the land, trying to hit the plane and all that. You know. Otherwise, that was kind of a vacation for us ‘cause we didn’t have anything really to do. It had a little tadpole island shape, and we had the tail end of it. We packed up and went into Leyte near Tacloban. We unloaded the ship, and while we were doing that, McArthur come in to return to the Philippines. [There was] a big deal on that.
KL: When did you leave Morotai—roughly? I know you don’t know the day of the week or anything, but was this—
JM: I don’t really know about those dates, but I would say that we were in, I think—I’ve got a note there when McArthur landed, come into the Philippines.
KL: It was October 1944.
JM: Yeah, so we were there just a little bit ahead of him. After he got there [and] the ship was unloaded, we weren’t in on the original landing. We had an assignment to put an outpost on Limon Mountain. And I got to be the lead scout on that. That took eight days to get up there, and eight days to get back.
KL: That’s on the northern end of that Leyte Peninsula? It’s up in that northern edge?
JM: No, it was in the middle. It’s like an hour glass. In the narrow part of the island. And the Japanese fleet was in the Philippine Sea and, of course, our fleet was in the Pacific.
[20:27]
KL: [Refers to map.] Is this Limon This is the enlarged portion of it here.
JM: Let’s see. I think we were down in here.
KL: Down by ?Armonck?
JM: Mhmm. Tacloban is that on here?
KL: Yes, there it is. It’s right over here.
JM: Yeah, that’s where we landed.
KL: So then you had to move from Tacloban then over this direction to ?Armonk?
JM: I suppose so, but the mountain top was Limon.
KL: Here’s Limon. That’s it. It’s up here.
JM: Well, I was really— I guess so.
KL: But steep. You’ve got mountains. I can see why it would take you eight days to get up there. Eight days back again.
JM: Well, I thought— No, I was all wrong [about the locations]. I thought it was in the middle.
KL: Going back again a little bit, once you left Australia and you headed up Moratai and through those islands, what was your impression of the Pacific? The geography of it? What you saw?
JM: Well, it was hot. It was like 100º, I think, most of the time during the day. And in the evening, it would cool off. I had plenty of pawpaws.
KL: Papayas, pawpaws. Yeah, the different fruit.
JM: Yeah, I think I lived on that stuff. In New Guinea and everyplace else I could find them. I thought it would be a good place to have a vacation. And I understand that in New Guinea, they have their own government now, but I don’t want to go there. It’s too far away. [Laughs.]
KL: It’s a long way. Sunsets in the South Pacific are supposed to be beautiful. I used to live in the Philippines, and I could remember them there. But, I imagine your impression, too, of going through the South China Sea and this whole area.
JM: Well, every beach that I saw really nice: all-white beach that was sandy and some of them were pretty wide. I know they were very long. And I guess somebody put up a hotel that had people coming.
KL: You would’ve seen the flying fish as well?
JM: No, I don’t remember anything like that, but the natives in New Guinea would go out.
KL:
JM:
JM: That would’ve been about twenty years afterwards and Malowica live in Milwaukee. I went up to see him one time, and he came down to see me while he was on his way to California. He died over there. We went to visit him out there, too. A lot of the ones that were in the Headquarters Company were from Grand Rapids, Michigan. I went to the Red Arrow Division convention there, and it was two years after the platoon sergeant in charge of [it] while I was there. He had died two years before us, and his wife was real nice and so were their kids. I don’t know what he died from, but I think a lot of us had malaria. I know we took Atabrine up until the time I got shot, and I don’t remember having another Atabrine pill until I already had the bug inside me. And when I got home on leave, I had the first attack while I was at the first vacation I got. Anyway, nobody knew what I had. I end up in the V.A. Hospital on Cold Spring Road, and they didn’t know what it was. They put me in with the people with spinal meningitis and other things. So they thought I had something contagious. Anyhow, they got my fever down, and I got ok. I think it was about three days in there. But there was something else that I popped in my mind, but I can’t get it back.
KL: Back to the Philippines. After you were taken down the mountain and sent to the town with the army hospital that was there, what was the type of care that you received? How good was the care? What about the staff that was there? How long were you there?
JM: Well, I really don’t know ‘cause I was sedated quite a bit I think. I don’t remember hurting at all, ever, even from the time I got shot. I know that I grabbed my arm and pushed the bones back in sleeve. I think, as far as the care was concerned, I got all I needed. I had that Thanksgiving dinner. I don’t really remember anything, but I had cans of beans and hardtack and all that stuff I had in my pack and the lieutenant took that off of me right away—and ammunition and everything. I had one hand grenade left. So I think that’s it.
KL: After you left the hospital, I assume they sent you back on a hospital ship?
JM: No, I flew back from _____ Island. I was there for a month for what they call quarantine. Then, I got on a plane and flew from there to Johnson Island, from there to Hawaii, and Hawaii to San Francisco. There was a pilot that was on the plane that was burnt all over. I always wondered if he managed to get by, you know, ‘cause they did take a lot of care. I hope he made it.
[34:47]
KL: While you were overseas, did you write letters frequently to members of your family? Or did you get letters from home?
JM: I got letters from home, but I didn’t do too much writing. I never was very good at writing. In fact, ____ asked me about that. I sent some—I don’t know what you call them—V-Mail, yeah. I did that quite a bit, but, I mean, that was it. I don’t know what happened to all that. But I was always alright. I had no problems with anything anywhere.
KL: What else did you do when you had some relaxation time at all? Did you ever have any entertainment for the troops , special days?
JM: I broke my glasses, and I went to Finchhaven—that was at Theodore. I went on the beach and I sat down on my glasses. [Laughs.] Anyway, they sent me to Finchhaven, and they did an eye examination and ordered some glasses for me. They gave me the prescription, and I sent it home. And they had it made and sent back to me. It took a month. I could see ok without my glasses but not to read or anything like that. And they had movies and things like that. I think we did see a stage play, too.
KL: Did you ever have Bob Hope or some of the other troupes come through the USO?
JM: I don’t think they ever got to the South Pacific. Yeah, there was somebody there, though I don’t know who it was. I didn’t think about that too much. I mean it was a time when I shouldn’t really have been there.
KL: I’ve always wondered what you’d do in combat if you lose your glasses or they get broken if you really had to rely on them. It would be kind of difficult.
JM: Yeah, it had to happen. This Dr. Wilbrath here said I was probably blind with 20/400 vision. When I was in grade school, I went through the first grade, and then back for the next year and they said I needed glasses. So I got some glasses, and I went to the second grade and I got better glasses. I had—what’d you call it—cataract removed, and that’s when he told me that I probably had 20/400 vision. I don’t know what that is, but you can see the big E. I remember sometimes that the doctor would say, “Which way are the table legs going?” And I didn’t even know what table legs were or anything like that. So they just made some for me. Anyhow, I finally got through school.
KL: It was a challenge.
JM: Yeah.
[38.51]
KL: After you came back, did you come back to Indianapolis? Eventually to your family and had the rest of your recovery here?
JM: Yes. After my discharge I came back to Indianapolis, and I went to work for the V.A. for a time. I worked for the state out at Fort Harrison when they had a bond program that—I forget exactly what it was—for veterans: some kind of a bond they had to apply for. I worked for that—whatever it was. I didn’t work for very long. But anyhow, I remember I got something. It didn’t really matter a whole lot, but war ____ get paid. From then I worked for the VA. Then I worked for Navy Avionics, and I liked that job. I got mononucleosis and I thought, “I��m gonna get fired.” So they didn’t fire me: I quit. [Laughs.] I found out what it was. I was in the hospital for that, and they told me I had to eat lean meat, good food, and all that kind of stuff. And I got over that, and I thought I’d go to school. So I went down to the University of Miami [in Florida], and I went through one semester of school there. And then the Marine Corps station needed me, so I went to work for them. That was good. I was kind of like a tourist there for about two years out of seven, so the other five years were— The work was alright, but I was tired of the temperature. It was hot in the summer, and cold in the winter. 45 degrees in Miami is like freezing.
KL: Do you have any particular stories that you can remember in the Pacific or things that you wanted to recount today that you had forgotten to tell during your earlier interview?
JM: Well, the people that I was with made everything worthwhile for me. I mean, they were all great. We had a Captain Gibbs. I had the Red Arrow Division reunion in Indianapolis two years in a row. I don’t even know what year they were. But anyhow, Captain Gibbs come for both of them. He was the, what’d you call it, he was the boss of the company. I never knew him, actually, except he was rough and tough and all that, you know: really a nasty character, supposedly. But he wasn’t. What he wanted done, was done. He was a good fella. He was from someplace, a resort in North Carolina, I think. He said, “If you want to come over…” I think he’s still going strong, too. I think that people— Malowica, Milan, Monta____, they were squad members—we were like brothers, really.
KL: Was it a coincidence that many of your names started with M?
JM: We were all drafted M, and I guess that’s how we ended up there.
KL: You said you guys were like a bunch of brothers.
JM: Yeah, Malowica, I know, was at Camp Willard, Georgia. And the others might’ve been there too, but it would’ve been different areas, and we didn’t get acquainted because we were all replacements.
KL: They made it back from the Philippines as well?
JM: No, they didn’t. Malowica did, but after I got out, they went to Luzon. I don’t know what all they did, but in that book they probably have something about Villa Verde Trail. It was, I guess, from Manila to Quezon City, which is the summer capital of the Philippines. The Japs—they wanted to take that Quezon City and get the Japs out there. And evidently (I missed out on that) I think Milan lived, Malowica lived, most of the rest of them died. That’s all I can say.
KL: Any other stories that you wanted to tell us today?
SG?: Tell about the one that you couldn’t come home till you could eat tomato soup with ___ [inaudible]. When you got your prosthesis, you couldn’t come home ‘til you could tie your shoe and eat soup, tomato soup with a spoon.
JM: Oh that was a guy named Springer—lived down the block from us on Richland Street. I don’t know what his first name was, but he was an arm amputee. And he’d come down about the second day I was home and said, “I want to show you how to tie your ties and tie your shoes.” And he did, and I could do it, but I broke my finger nails.
KL: Now, I imagine it was challenging to do things that you were used to doing and how to relearn.
JM: Well, I had slippers and everything like that. I didn’t have to tie my shoes, and then when I got civilian clothes, I had laces. I haven’t had laces for years.
KL: Save some breaking and wearing out.
JM: Yeah. [Laughs.] I can tie it once in a while…[next few words inaudible due to static in recording]…that’s easy.
KL: So adapting, what was it like coming home to your family? I bet they were very happy to see you.
JM: When I was discharged and I come home on a train, I went through St. Louis and a guy—J. H. Ray—was in the hospital. His leg was off here, and we got acquainted pretty well. He was across the aisle from me. We washed and shaved together and all that kind of stuff. I had a different kind of razor, and I was shaving with it. And he said, “I want to see that”—a Gillette, double-faced razor. I said, “You can try it out if you want.” So anyhow, he shaves too and it did a good job for him. Coming home, he was having an awful time with his leg. He wanted me to stop by and see his family in St. Louis. I had an hour layover, so his dad met me at the place and took me to his house. We had a big dinner and everything. I don’t know why anybody could… [long pause] I was kind of like just another member of the family, you know, for something like that. I think they gave me a little shot of wine, and I sit down, and they said, “It’s time to eat.” And I couldn’t get out of the chair.
KL: So then you got back on the train
JM: Yeah, I got back on the train and got home. I walked around Union Station, trying to find out how to get out of here. I should’ve known the place, you know. I walked around, walked around, and finally I followed somebody and went down some steps and everything and got to the street level and there was a bus that’d come by there. I had a suitcase to carry. I got on the bus, and it dropped me off at the corner of Richland and Morris Street. I walked home, and went up and the door was open. I went in. My mom was in the kitchen, and she come up, wondering who’s here. She had to cry and everything. I did, too. We had a hug and all that. I was happy to see her. And then she had to go and cry out. Sometime along the way while I was living at home, I had hair that grew over here, you know. Really long hair. “Let me see your other hand.” And then she realized I don’t have another hand, so she wanted to find out if I had hair on the other hand. That got to her, too.
KL: Did you have younger or older siblings?
JM: Oh yeah. I had Joyce and Josepha, and a brother, Jerry, was still home. My brother John went into the Navy before me, and Anthony, I think, got drafted and was over in Germany. I think Jerry, Joyce, and Josepha were home.
KL: So three of you boys were in the service at the same time? That’s pretty extraordinary.
JM: Yeah, John—his ship was sunk over by Italy, and he got out of that alright. Got on another one—I don’t know what happened. He didn’t talk much about it. Richard, he was in a submarine.
KL: Did he serve in the Atlantic? He was in a submarine?
JM: Mmhmm. Yeah, they didn’t talk too much about it either, except Rich: I guess that submarine was a smelly place.
KL: So you were all reunited after the war? All your brothers—were they able to come home?
JM: Yes. John had a back injury. I don’t think Rich had anything bothering him, and Anthony was in—what’d you call it—after the war in Germany. He seemed to enjoy being over there. He could go skiing. I don’t know what all he did, but he come back and got through school at _____ Tulane.
KL: Can you think of anything else you haven’t talked about?
JM: There’s not much more I can… Yeah, I met ?Edna?
SG?: There were six boys in his family and three girls.
KL: That’s a large-sized family. Nine altogether, but you said some of the younger ones were at home still.
JM: I’m the second boy. My sister Rosanne and then John and myself and Anthony, Rich—oh no: Tom. Tom and I were about the same age, but we’re not twins. Tom went into the merchant marines. He went to Panama. He was a pilot on the Panama Canal, and he wanted me to come down and see him all the time. I was in Miami—halfway there. But I never could accumulate enough money to buy a ticket to fly there, so I never did do it. But he’d come home sometimes when I was home, and he’d visit with mom. And I was married to Edna, but he didn’t have time to come over to us because mom would keep him up. [Laughs.] She was possessive, you might say. She wanted him all to herself—which is fine. I think that’s about it.
KL: Thank you very much. Five minutes left on the tape.
JM: You’ve got five minutes?
KL: Favorite foods of your war years? I saw cherry pie was not one of them. You ate too many cherry pies according to the story before.
JM: Oh that, yeah. In basic training, they had cherry pie every [day for] three months. That’d be ninety something days.
KL: Ninety days too many. So what were some of the other staples? I know you had C-rations—probably some K-rations, D bars.
JM: Well, I don’t really remember. We had a kitchen. We had a baker and other stuff, I don’t know, it was just food—nothing special. I mean you couldn’t really say what it was. The baker could make all kinds of things, you know. I would load up on that.
KL: Do you remember the names of any of the ships you were on?
JM: I didn’t know the names of the ships.
KL: I’d imagine most of them were transport ships.
JM: Yeah. Well, I can remember the first one that we got from New York was a President Line ship, but I don’t know what the name was. It wasn’t a bad ship or anything like that.
KL: Well, there as a President Wilson, but that was probably after the war. I sailed on that one, but there were other President Lines, and I know there was a long series that they had done on those through the Panama Canal.
JM: I never really knew that there was an American shipping line before or after the war. I don’t think there is any now.
KL: Nope. I know everybody wants to fly on airplanes. It takes less time.
JM: When I get on a plane now, they have to check my shoes and run something over my arm and all that. I don’t have to take anything off, except my shoes.
KL: Traveling isn’t the way it was.
JM: Yeah, I think maybe if I have to go somewhere, I’ll go through the motions—whatever they have [me] do, I’ll do it.
KL: Ok, I thank you very much.
JM: I thank you, too. I really didn’t know what I was going to say or talk about or anything like that, so I got it all said, I hope.
KL: Good, good. If you think of anything else, you let us know.
JM: I will.
KL: We can always add on. Thank you.
