Elmer Sinn was born to raise people’s spirits. As a veteran of the Second World War, being drafted right out of high school, one would think that this might be a bitter man. He served in the Navy as part of an entertainment group, helping to keep up the spirits of our boys in the Pacific. “No”, Elmer is an inspiration to anyone who he comes in contact with. Now, he lives in Pittsburg, retired from the construction business.

Mr. Sinn in 2005

I was born and raised right here in Pittsburg during the Depression days. Everybody was poor then. Nobody had anything to speak of. Still, life was pretty good. In those days, we created our own entertainment. We spent a lot of time ridin’ on bicycles where you guys, [today], spend a lot of time in automobiles. But anyway, I went to work when I was about thirteen. I carried the Headlight, which is the Morning Sun [newspaper] now. Back in that day there was two papers published a day; The Sun in the morning and The Headlight in the evening. I would go straight from school to the [newspaper] office and deliver my papers. [I] carried papers up until I was about fifteen, and then went to work for Armor Packing Company in town. In [those] days, they was packing poultry; ducks, geese, and chickens, [and such]. Well, then I worked at a little local store out of Tucker, Fourteenth and Tucker, and I was born and raised on sixteenth and Rouse.

I turned eighteen on January twenty-first, and they had me called up by the first of February. I was drafted right out of high school, so I did not graduate. Anyway, I had a choice when I went in service to either go into the Army or the Navy. I chose the Navy because I already had two brothers and a brother-in-law in the Army. None of them really liked [it] so they advised me [to] pick the Navy. That’s the only reason that I chose it.

So anyway, I was inducted into the Navy [and] went to Faraget, Idaho for what is ordinarily called Basic Training; but to us, it was Boot Camp. [I] spent eight weeks in boot camp. They were shovin’ ‘em through pretty fast at that time. They were pushin’ pretty hard because they knew they were already startin’ back through the Pacific [after Pearl Harbor]. [Boot camp was basic training], where you’re learnin’ to march and learn the strict rules of military life. You learn defense and learn how to handle a rifle. [Camp] was way up in the mountains. There was a huge lake. The name of it [was] Cordelaine, and that’s where we learned what little education we had on boats and things like that. But, that was beautiful country. It was just strictly wilderness up there. The only part of civilization was the town of Cordelaine and another little town…San something.

Came out of there and went to Millington, Tennessee [where] we had a chance to go to Aviation Radio School, which, back in that day, everybody wanted to fly. Aviation was more or less an infant [division] as far as that’s concerned. Everybody wanted to fly, so we latched onto it. Well, we got about half way through and then they decided they had plenty of Aviation Radio men. So, they shipped us out of there to San Francisco, California, and from there we shipped to Hawaii; but, we was only in Hawaii about three days. They wouldn’t let us out of camp. So, my trip to Hawaii has only been an imprisonment. They wouldn’t let us off the base.

But anyway, when we went over seas, we left Pearl Harbor. We were supposed to go on what they called an AVA, which was a troop transport; [but], for some reason we couldn’t get the transportation to get to Mog Mog, [the island] were we was goin’. So, we got on board the ol’ battleship North Carolina. See, back in that day, it took forever to get any place because the battleships or the fighting ships, whenever they went from one place to another, did not go in a straight line, they zig-zagged. They were harder to track and harder to hit with a torpedo when they zig-zagged. If they went in a straight line, a torpedo would hone in on ‘em and hit ‘em. Anyway, it seems like it took us almost thirty days to get out from Pearl Harbor to Mog Mog.

We was just passengers on the North Carolina. But, that was a battleship, which was a huge thing in that day. I think, maybe sixteen to seventeen hundred men [formed] the crew. It was quite a piece of machinery. [It had] nine sixteen-inch cannons. They were so big, that they were made in such a way that they could not point all nine guns broadside from the ship. I think they could fire six broadside at one time. We were aboard ship when they done it one time. That big ol’ battleship , when they fire, it would just squat in the water. Then after it went down as far as it would from the recoil, that thing would, just like a cork, come back up.

But, on the back end of that thing, [the North Carolina], there was a catapult that had a little one-engine plane on it. That [plane] was probably sixty feet long [with] pontoons on it so you could land on water. When they got ready to use it, the pilot would crawl in it. Of course, that was all [run by] propellers. They’d shoot him off that catapult out over the water; and he’d better be flyin’ when he leaves, if he don’t, he’s gone. That [plane] was just for communications between the battleship and some other ship or somethin’ like that. That little ol’ plane was a two-seater, ‘cause he could fly the captain of the ship or something like this, to a place. Then he’d come back, and he’d settle down in the water right next to the ship and [the ship] had a cable and a hook. They’d drop it down to him and that pilot would reach up there and take that bable and he had an eye right in front of him and he’d hook it into that eye and it’d pick him up on that cable, bring him back, and sit him on the catapult again. That could be a little treacherous when that sea was rough. A lot of times he had a heck of a time holding that hook or getting that hook in that eye or whatever. I know we spent a lot of time sitting watchin’ him. He had a heck of a job.

But anyway, we ended up in what they called, back in those days, the McKinsey Islands or the Ulithe Atoll. Nowadays, it’s called the Marianas, and [that] is where Guam is at. This Ulithe Atoll that we were on was in the form of a horseshoe [with] an opening that was only about a mile wide. The water was so shallow [between the islands] that a ship could not get through. It was a natural port, and we could protect it. Nothing could get to us from any side except right there at the horseshoe, where it was open. On the opening, which was, like I said, about a mile, they had a net. A steel net that was stationary on one side. The other side was [attached to] a cruise ship. It was just like a gate. [The cruise ship would move], and they would open it and close it. That kept any other enemy ships from getting in and giving us trouble. Except, the water was deep enough in that opening [that] our biggest problem in that part of the country, was suicide subs.

The Japanese had what they called a suicide sub, which was a small submarine that was run by one person. They were committed to the place that they were suicidal. Well, [these subs] were made so that they could ram anything. That little ol’ submarine would hang right on the tail, below the propeller, of that ship, that was coming in, and he’d follow it while the net was open and get inside the atoll. There was just no protection against it because even with radar, because they were so close to [the ship], and there was so many ships around, they couldn’t tell one signal from the other. Once [the sub] got inside the atoll, he raised hell. The first thing he would do [he would look for] tankers, which was carryin’ fuel. If they’re loaded, they lay low in the water. [The subs] would pick one of those ships, hit it, ram it, and blow it up. Well, when they blow that thing up like that, they spattered diesel fuel all over the water and of course, it was on fire. Lotta times, it would surround a boat and just burn it to a crisp. And if there was anybody in the water, your chance of survival is…very slight. So, that’s the reason that they had so much trouble with those cockeyed things.

I know the roughest part of duty I had was when one of those suicide subs come in and they’d hit a tanker. We’d go around the beaches and pick up body parts. Those body parts was usually pretty well burnt. We would get hands, and legs, and arms. Anything in the way of human flesh. I hope you never have the opportunity to smell human flesh rotting. We were required to work as long as we could; generally, we’d end up nauseated. I thought, “Oh God, you’ve got to be kiddin’ me!” But, it’s a reality of life and its there. It’s not going to change, and you gotta cope with it the best you can. To this day, its kind of funny, if I get just a little bit, a faint smell of Carbon Tet (an agent used for dry-cleaning), I don’t know, just reminds me of the smell of human flesh.

I probably shouldn’t say this, but the Japanese, during WWII, those people was not very well civilized because of various weird tales [I heard]. In the Japanese camps, our boys was not treated decently—period! When I say, “Those people was not civilized”, they thought it was funny and their entertainment was to…well…kill people, and they done it slowly. Even to this day, I’m not at ease with the Japanese as a whole. I mean, I’m not talkin’ about any of ‘em that might be in this country [now]. But they were cruel. They used to do things with our men that was in the prison camps nobody should ever have to deal with. And they would laugh and jump up and down. And whenever the boys would scream they thought it was funny. And to me, I was never satisfied that those type of people could be civilized. I don’t want anyone to think that I’m against any particular race, it was just the time.

But anyway, we were on what you called a recreation island. When we got over in the islands, the Seabees had [already] been there. The Seabees had come in and they set up. We had tents to live in. They were sixteen by sixteen [feet] and there was four of us in a tent. We didn’t have what you might call fresh water showers. But [the Seabees] come in and set up a filtration system. You were still showering with ocean water, [though]. You haven’t got a soap that’ll lather in salt water. It just absolutely will not work. When that salt water would dry on ya, you’d get sticky, gooey, all over. Well the thing about it is, we got to where we hated to take a bath and were probably pretty scroungy at times.

The Seabees had set up a mess tent with a kitchen, [too]. That’s the one thing that my brothers told me. They said take the Navy ‘cause they got in positions where they, [the army], missed a few meals, and I don’t think I ever missed a meal, whether it be a bologna sandwich and an apple or something like that. [But sometimes], we had trouble gettin’ supplies. That ol’ Seabee commander, he was a sharpie. He says, “You give me about three or four good cases of whiskey and a boat and I’ll get you all the supplies you want.” So, the thing about it was, the big ships, except for the officers, there was no booze allowed. He took those cases of whiskey out there, trade ‘em for slabs of meat, anything he could take in the way of food. He’d come back with that little ol’ boat just loaded.

Anyway, it was our [duty] to set up a recreation place where the guys from the fleet could come off the ships and come on to shore. Some of them had been out to sea for months and hadn’t had a foot on dry ground. But, they could come ashore and they would issue either three cokes or three beers, whichever one they wanted. Those guys could do whatever they wanted for that half day. We had baseball diamonds, tennis courts, everything that they had more or less in that day for recreation. A lot of times we would handle around three-thousand men a day from any number of ships.

In our entertainment group, there might have been around a hundred and fifty [men]. Course, we stayed on that little ol’ island day in day out. We never got off it. This other kid that I buddied with and I, we did get off [the island] to go to the big island to pick up supplies and that type of thing. So, we got off of the island once in a while. But, we had a pretty good deal going over there, he and I did.

[Sometimes], we’d catch the tide when it was low…we’d go out there and gather those compounded seashells (shows me a seashell necklace). When we’d get ‘em they’d have a little form of life in ‘em, and we had no way of getting that live animal out of there. But we’d get ‘em, gather ‘em up and bury ‘em underground and leave ‘em. Ants would eventually find ‘em and they’d clean ‘em. The thing about ‘em is, the animal had to be alive when you got ‘em, otherwise they lose their luster. They wouldn’t shine, like those are (indicates a sea shell necklace). But anyway, that’s what we’d spend a lot of time doin’.

An ornately carved coconut brought back to the States by Mr. Sinn

We had what we called Ship Store which is where the guys could come in and buy cigarettes, shaving supplies, soap, aftershave, that kind of stuff, personal items. [My buddy] and I run that during the day. This kid that I buddied with, he was quite a musician. He was a piano player. We had an amphitheatre with a screen that lowered, and it had a shelter built over it to keep it from getting wet. A lot of the times, in the afternoon, when we didn’t have anything going on in the store [he] would say, “I’m gonna go so and so.” I knew where he was going. He was heading for that piano on the stage there. He’d go up there on that stage and sit there on that piano. He told me later, “If it had not been for that piano, I think I would have gone off the deep end.” He used it for therapy, really. He sat there at that piano and would be there [an] hour [or] two and play and play. He played fair hand on the keyboard.

On the island, we had Army and we had Marines. The Army, they did have a little settlement, but those poor Marines. They were livin’ in puptents down on the beach and eatin’ C-Rations. A puptent is a two-man tent, and C-Rations is the worst excuse for food you ever saw in your life. Well, at first, we got to sneakin’ some of those guys into our mess halls. [Sometimes], we would go in and pick up a tray and take it back out to those guys on the outside because they didn’t know what fresh cooked food was all about. Boy, they had a rough go.

I’ll tell ya, like I tell a lot of people, I wouldn’t take a million dollars for my experience as far as being in the service. Of course, I wouldn’t want to do it again if they paid me a million dollars as far as that’s concerned. But, it’s over and done with and past. Why, I cannot complain about it. I had, like I said, awful good duty compaired with some of ‘em.

Norman, [who is my older brother], and I have often talked WWII will go down in the history books. There’s no doubt about that. But, the thing that bothers me more than anything--there’s gonna come a day when our generation is gone. Veterans nowadays from WWII, they’re all getting old enough they’re dying off pretty fast. I think, according to the Legion Journal, were losin’ like twelve [or] fifteen hundred WWII veterans per day in the U.S. So, it won’t be long before we’re all gone. I’ll tell ya what bothers me more than anything. I think WWII will be forgotten, except for the history books. It will always be in the history books, there’s no doubt about that. But, there’s so many people alive today that can remember WWII. And after that generation is gone, its gonna be….

This interview was conducted and written in 2005 by Cooper Neil.

[ ] indicates words not said by Mr. Sinn.