This morning we have the pleasure of being able to interview Mr. Jack Ralph
Thompson 131 Edgewood Drive Bedford Indiana date of birth January the 13th
1922. Today's date is May the 19th 2005. My name is Pat McLean and I'm on the
staff at United States Senator Richard Lugar. With me is Rachel Ray an intern
from the St. Mary the Woods College. Mr. Thompson did you list into the Navy or
were you drafted into the service first? I listed in July 1942. Where were you sent once you enlisted? The Navy agreed to let us finish college. I was a junior in college so I wasn't
activated until a year and a day later and then I was ordered to Northwestern
University Midshipman School in Chicago. I spent four months there and from there I was
released my first duty station I used to go to Pearl Harbor that was in December
43. There I was displaced in an officer's pool and assigned to the Azure
light which had been William Mellon's private yacht which was called the
Vagabondia and he had donated that to the Navy for the duration of the war.
Unfortunately the ship had been built in Germany and all the specifications were in German and of course mostly civilians by now in the service and we could find very few people that could speak German which presented a number of problems. Plus I just didn't seem to adapt to that type of duty. It never left the shore and there was nothing going on and so 14 days later I was lucky enough I thought at the time to be reassigned to a ship that was
in Dry Dock which was in St. Joseph 629 which had been built up in Quincy Adams Yard in Boston. My first question to the
Canadian officer was how did they get this thing over here. It was only a hundred feet long, 17 feet wide right a hundred tons and that hurt his feelings because he came on his own farm. He came down the east coast to the canal up to San Diego Pearl Harbor and got on patrol for a couple of months. Plus he wanted an experienced officer and I had been an officer for 34 days and he said questions like did you have some sailing or something?
What was the experience? I said no. Did you know anything about engineering or anything? I said no. I bet you're interested in gunnery and it went hunting a lot. I said no. Is there anything you know? I said yes. I wondered why. I'm standing here with this ship in Dry Dock. How am I going to get on it? Well we climbed up the water and I stayed on that ship for almost 8 to 10 months. We were supposed to have that duty for just 12 months and then it was supposed to be rotated. There was a problem in getting qualified
people and we were, as I tell you, we went to Palma Island, Johnson Island, Inuitau, Lunafuti, and ended up in Esprit Sano. This is about 3,000 miles from the Evergies. On the way our sister ship became involved in the firing accident and they were doing target practice and some 20 men were in Luna Valley about 30. I was transferred to sea because
I've been in the pharmacist. There was something about first aid and immediately saw a terrible situation. It was certainly not clean. There was disorganization. There were no ice cubes. Fortunately I guess we had some fresh water. So I asked for assistance from YMS, Yard Mines Creek, and they sent over a chief pharmacist who was also a civilian pharmacist. We did the first aid and took care of them and were wounded the best we could and then the man
who was most seriously deceased died by the doctor. It was a terrible experience. He was only 18 years old. I felt very badly. We could do nothing. The seas were too rough to set a sea plane. There was no place to land a helicopter. Our convoy, which was 7 or 8 ships, did not have any medical personnel. We did not have a doctor. And in fact I had a doctor who had a diagnosis as I talked to physicians about the investigation. The man would have to have a surgeon.
We earned the name of the enemy and his penetration of the shell and exploded by the oxygen
of 300 mile limits and patrolling, et cetera, et cetera.
So then in December of 44, I think it was,
they decided to change our designation on a sub-taser
to a landing craft control LCC.
And that was in anticipating of landings in Japan
when they were already thinking ahead.
So we spent six weeks in Tulagi in the Solomon Islands
having all the work done by qualified Navy personnel,
which was all refused and denied, but we were ready to go.
So this was great.
We were ordered back to Pearl Harbor.
Well, that's a 25-mile trip for us,
because we all go 12 to 15 miles an hour.
So we went back to Pearl Harbor,
and they finished most of the work.
And from Pearl Harbor, we went the same route,
except we went to Guam.
Now, at Guam, we failed to keep the signal watch.
We failed to turn our radio on, and one day,
somebody came and was threatening to arrest
my commanding officer, because this ship was getting into
sort of a bad situation.
We had done things for a couple weeks.
We were ordered to, Okinawa, I think it was maybe four hours.
So we were at Okinawa, dodging the planes
and everything for a month or so.
I forgot to mention that in May,
when my commanding officer asked me to send home,
they sent orders for me to go home,
because I had been overseen as long as a little kid
had been overseen, and that's how exactly joyful it was
for him, because he was trying to get married, et cetera.
But the man that was coming to relay me couldn't find me.
He went to Guadalcanal, and I had to call my way
to Guadalcanal to Pearl Harbor.
They sent him to Pearl Harbor
when I found my way to Guam.
They sent him to Guam, and I was on my way to Okinawa,
and they just couldn't go down and buy a ticket
and went in on a plane or boat.
So I wonder, I think he's not coming,
because now we're up to a trip to Guam.
I've also been getting married when I get home,
and I just put everything on hold back home.
So he arrived at Okinawa, and I left him the other day
at my ship, when I was a passenger,
and the kids arrived at Guam.
That night at Guam, they arrived.
So we were all transported, transported into,
transferred into Quonset House.
And after two or three days in May,
we were going to a small town, a small hospital.
There was always rumors.
The rumor was that everybody in Quonset
was going to Japan to occupation forces.
Forget about this, we thought all of us
thought we were going home.
So we were all called in Quonset and had about 300 others.
This man got up and said,
the president of Polk will leave tomorrow morning,
and it's going to be the only ship
going to the United States for me.
And there's going to be 10,000 people.
I'm going to be very proud of him.
The cabins will be, have been redone
to hold nine people for two.
So this guy's standing next to me, raised his hand.
So I just shouldn't get the next ship,
and the commander, who's going to take the next ship,
goes to Okinawa.
And I said, I think I changed my mind.
I want to go on the ship and go to a place of labor.
It's good to be a graduate.
So then, 17 days later, I arrived in San Francisco,
and that was the first ship or the troops
on the wall after the president released the plane.
I didn't have much celebration,
so I got a chance to fly home,
got married, and was ordered to school
in the Brooklyn Navy Corps.
So I didn't have enough place to get out,
so I put Brooklyn and the guys there.
You don't have to go to school in the morning.
We were going to New York in the hall,
so I was just taking the sights.
So I was living in New York in the hotel,
getting paid so much a day in the state now.
And I called in every day at noon,
and I forget how to tell you, I've had 11 days.
You know, I'm also on a honeymoon with you.
Not too bad.
Way to be having a honeymoon.
Right, honeymoon paid for.
A lady in the good grades had ordered me from
Brooklyn, New York, to assassinate the man.
I didn't even know where assassinate Japan was.
Brooklyn, New York, look on a map.
You run off the edge of the map so far.
So we got on a train, got on a train,
we found out that we only had one ticket.
We could buy a ticket from the conductor,
and so we went and got a train,
took three or four days to get to San Francisco.
In San Francisco, I was put on the train,
holding the hospital ship,
and didn't know whether my wife got on a train
or not to run it before she was leaving.
Frank Colby went to Okinawa.
Okinawa, I've, first I was in a PB2 line
and something like that.
Flying boat, and couldn't take it off,
and then I went to jail, and I went on the back,
and I kept taxiing up and down the harbor.
I went to the ship that was short of officers,
and they had some money officers that I had sent out there
to take command of.
So I brought that ship with the commanding officer
when he was over in San Francisco.
We brought him back to San Francisco.
On the day that we arrived in San Francisco,
my wife came from Cincinnati,
and my change of command,
I became a commanding officer at the time,
I was about 79 feet at 60 men,
because the ship had been on him.
That night, I was in my hotel room in Chinatown,
in a place where I could get,
I got a call at 10 o'clock,
telling me we were back for four months to get there.
I said, I have to go home,
I said, we were back for four months for repairs,
rehabilitation, change of career.
I got called from my executive officer,
telling me that we ordered 72 hours
and a week off, with a bomb teller.
I know it was a good day, I took the Navy.
Next morning, we tried to get out of the war
and got to a lot of problems with the Navy.
I think I disagree.
So, a captain in the Navy finally kept our scenery,
so he wrote me orders to get off the ship
and throw hard at the best he could do.
And he also said, in a funny sort of way,
I never want to see you again, Thompson.
You've been here every day, and we've done all we can do.
I want to get off now and go back six hours.
So, we brewed the ship together,
but we had to go to the Treasure Island
and get new sailors, right?
We didn't have the sailors.
We got sailors, we never know about the ship.
Navy men are, Navy men 12, 14, 16 years,
knew more than I knew, you know, only 23 of them.
So, we got in a five-ship convoy.
I remember the demands, they didn't want to see me again.
They left me happy, but they didn't want me back in town.
300 miles to sea, we called fire.
I had just gone up on the bridge
because I didn't have to stand to watch.
I had the powers of fire.
Somebody said, there's a fire.
I said, where?
They said, there.
The smoke was pouring out of the galley
and the air was pouring out of it.
Well, the Navy has a watch, quarter, and station build.
That's where they tell everybody
where they're gonna go in every situation.
Tying up, untying, fire, artillery practice, whatever.
That's the place.
We had that land on our desk.
We had never finished it.
So, all these guys come on the ship.
They don't know what they're gonna do.
I was never so impressed.
The first thing I thought of was getting a muster
finding out if there's anybody down on the track.
So, and is anybody hurt?
Now, one guy had hurt his finger
because that was when he was ready for the fire.
So, we sent somebody down
and there was a rescue breather after that.
They said it was a galley, it was not a fire.
So, then we decided we used fire extinguishers
and used water.
And we realized then that next to the fire
is where we stored all the ammunition.
And that is where we had a lot of that.
4,000 rounds of 40 millimeter, that's a big boom.
So, we guys volunteered to throw that over the side.
Well, meanwhile, we're pumping water into the back.
Meanwhile, I've asked the convoy for permission
to stand away because there's 700 ships by the side.
And everybody wants to help.
So, we got the fire put out into the newspaper
like we said two and a half hours.
And, but we had pumped enough water in
that we probably better pumped one more out
or we were going to sink in the water.
So, there's a thing in the Navy called a handy bill.
It's this big of a boat up top.
We should have had two or three, we only had one.
It didn't work.
So, I had to ask the Commodore of the convoy
if he had one.
Get him, he's in a 7,000 ton ship, 400 feet long.
He wants to bring that big ship alongside my ship.
I said, sir, can we bring our ship alongside you?
Because we couldn't really move it,
but we got that far now.
But we had two more fires.
We threw the electrical system.
So, somebody went down in the fire brigade
and said, we've got to break these cables.
It's not that far.
Well, when they broke the cables,
turned off the power steam.
So, I had for two minutes on them
and they could only stay on for,
well, I told when I got tired of the hauling,
I didn't know what to do.
But the men who were new to the ship,
everybody turned too in such a way
that there were no other casualties.
This chief state woman went
and got threw down the gal at the refrigeration vault.
Now, they took it to this officer's food place
and made sandwiches with some help.
And there was an investigation.
But the first person I saw was that guy who said to me,
I want to see you again, Thompson.
And before I could say anything, his aide,
his aide was there.
I remember his aide's name was Taylor.
He and I had gotten the claim or something.
He had received it and said,
Mr. Thompson, this team's portrait doesn't fly away.
And the captain said, I guess he wants his orders changed.
I tried to speak up.
There were about four of those.
And he turned to his aide and said,
right, Mr. Thompson, forward, and there was a great place.
But I got to go home.
I went to Great Lakes.
Well, they're going to do me a great life.
I've really only got 45 days to get back to Disney.
And so they offered me a troop training.
I got to go get a kid.
I wanted to come into boot camp and teach kid sailors.
And I went to get a girl named Taylor.
I thought, well, duty and Cincinnati
is an recruiting station.
He said, would you say you are a tsunami?
Pharmacist.
Oh, that's too bad.
Cincinnati has a material redistribution and disposal.
It's a surplus property.
But you have to be an accountant normally.
I said, with due respect to accounts.
Send me the Navy, you'll never know the difference.
I said, I think you're right.
Turned to a young man and said, right, Mr. Thompson,
always report to Cincinnati.
I reported down there.
And it turns out, to make a long story short,
I extended my naval here in the state six months
to more than 18 miles from my office.
Downside was having six Enfields working for me
and having a second place I've never had in my life.
I didn't know what to do with that, really.
But we disposed of property.
We never was an investigation, like it was after World War II.
And we can have a half day off to go for a job.
I took that every week.
They were saying, let's go for a job.
My wife would ride a bus now.
And I would go eat for a little bit.
Maybe I'd go do my job.
And it was an interesting naval career.
I went into it my dad had been in World War I.
Well, I wasn't involved in that.
My cousin was in the submarine for 45 years.
I just thought that the emotion that we went through,
and we went through some of that after 9-1-1.
You know, we had blackouts in my town.
We had air raid wars.
I worked in the drug store.
And you could not get a two-to-two place
because you got a two-to-two.
Because we were silent aeronauts too.
That kind of stuff.
We couldn't use the climate.
We had tires, you know, we had five stories.
We had tires.
We couldn't use those tires.
That's the government release.
It never really was.
The end of the war, the tires were still there.
But then six months that I spent,
and since then I got to do some relief work
and find myself.
And I did look for a job.
That's my kids.
Richmond, Indiana.
You know, I've learned a lot about it.
I'm sure I've left out some great details
for that reason, because it's a fun experience.
I mean, the people I know now,
I have one ongoing relationship with Maryland.
That is September, my birthday.
And we talked every week.
We talked every week.
I was broken in his leg.
And six months old and I was a sister
in Fort Thomas, Kentucky.
And we went to the college together.
We went to the Navy together.
He went to Europe.
I was Pacific.
He was in my first wedding.
And we both had drug stories.
And we both had families.
And I like to see them,
but I just don't feel capable
to drive Fort Thomas, Kentucky
across the river, as a matter of fact.
And to explain,
he's just been in the nursing home
with this broken ankle.
And I'm so thankful that I couldn't get closer.
On the seventh of July,
every year, I'll get that phone call.
You know, so this is Commander White
and you've been ordered to active here.
It was a day.
We went to Northwestern.
There were seven of us.
Eight joined.
The Navy.
Seven went to Northwestern.
One was sent to Columbia.
Six joined the Air Corps.
The Navy was taking a beam
from South Pacific.
Everybody said, you guys weren't making it
for that year.
The Navy kept their word.
The guys in the Air Corps were going to the Navy.
But I'm so grateful that they didn't have
integrity and letting them stay.
Not exactly letting them stay.
I don't know if that was intentional
or just a way to work out.
In view of the fact that you
kept going to graduate from college,
did you use, do you have a bill
for anything at all?
Like hours?
Afterwards, I had enough to go back
from my detention for those studying
medicine.
I had enough for three years
after I got back.
I had a wife, I had a child,
and I also got the job.
I used it for some
short term.
I used it to buy a loan.
I used it to finance
a business that I had.
I used it for
correspondence with education courses.
And I used it for
dental.
Probably going through so much red tape.
I mean, I had some street dollars
and this guy had filled out so many papers
and I had to fill out some more papers
and get out money.
I wasn't discharged. I was ordered to
enact a duty.
I was in that state from 46 to 53.
The next
time I had to do a business,
I equipped my job
with going to a drug store the next day
of June, 1950
early in the war study.
I'm a deck officer,
a qualified deck officer.
I got the word
and that's what they were.
Then they had small craft.
All my training was small.
I was 10 feet up to 100 feet.
So I
swatted.
Anytime Mayo came to me, I should have known
that I wouldn't come except
ready to come in.
I was ordered to take a physical.
I drove to
Indianapolis to take a physical on the
doctor that was showing up.
He spent 6 hours making a trip to Indianapolis
and back home. Waited 4 hours
and 4 hours to go.
That's when I got fired.
I went from Maine,
which
you're not going to come back.
Some of the men that worked for me in
Cincinnati, 3 of those men I met
later, 2 of them anyway,
downtown Cincinnati, I made it.
Are you active in
any of the military
service organizations?
I belong to the American Union.
I contribute
although I'm not really accurate
I just say it better because
when my father
passed away,
then how did my mother
do it?
Over the years
I'm not at the same time
obviously.
My disability, when you put me into my ear
is to
tolerate.
You're wearing your jeans when you're
walking.
Can you think of anything that you haven't
discussed today that you would like to
share with us?
I think that your program is
amendable.
I'm impressed.
It seems that the older we get
we go back to this
and I have coffee every Tuesday morning
and there's 5 of them.
One younger
and two
the rest of us have all been there.
One true,
25 missions, and then it was called back to
South Korea.
The other one's in a small-cast position.
Although we don't talk
war stories
the camaraderie that exists
and one doesn't show up
I get concerned
and a couple of guys are not sure of their last name.
I just think
when you meet someone
the
organization fell and
Walmart didn't coffee
and the word came up
and she put them all
up for a day
and they were stuck
and we were both in a bunch of way with
25,000 other guys
at the same time
and then we talked
I do volunteer work
at Dunn. I work at Dunn
12 years. I do volunteer
I also work at the other one
I was doing volunteer
I was doing volunteer work
and the man I've known
for many years, a good friend
who created ammunition
was not just an ammunition
we were standing there talking
and I said well this should be the place I'm
going to throw the foodie
and turn around
and throw the foodie
I was always going to look at me
do you?
That's where we buried the boy that died
I said what were you doing?
He used to turn around and throw him at the room
because you know where the truck
and nobody told that
Dr. Benham
Dr. Benham and I were
imagine here I've known him for 25 years
Dr. Benham was a foodie
foodie
on the transport at Samaria
I was there in a hearing
because of it
and he told a lot of people
at the 50th
anniversary party they had
he and I were foodie foodie
it's not even called foodie foodie anymore
somebody else
all that's been renamed
but I mean this is the kind of thing
when you were
it furthered
did you ever get to see any
U.S.O. shows?
I thought Western
but on a show that's pretty standard
and Bob Hope
came to tour vlogging
a lot of Camille
the guys were so excited
I said I saw
I'll see Bob Hope later
I used to watch them all night
but I want everybody on these two ships to go
once we go
and I'll stay because we had to have a fire watch
so I said I'll stay
that's as close as I came to see Bob Hope
now the Salvation Army
gave us a notice on Bob Hope
that cause had a bad rep
or a bad rep
about charging
with the Salvation Army
on the street
I think about
I kind of wish that I would take me
back to going back
my kids just came back
two books
on the war
on the postcards they made in Japan
all the postcards they made
in Japan
that's why I found the telephone
there you go
and then they each sent me a different close card
and they sent me a hat
that I wore on Tuesday morning
but I think that
now there's trips to the islands
recreation
in other words
I could go to the Solomon Islands
maybe one
or Johnston
or Hayne
all we got out of the
all we got out of the topics
we'll be finished in just a few minutes
hi
how can I think of anything else?
do you have any questions
that you would like to ask us to talk?
that's an important question, make me a bit smarter
do you want me to write a story?
I went to work in the hospital
I reached the office and he asked me
I just
I retired from Orange County
retired three times
once one time
once one more time
with Walmart I worked fourteen times
fourteen times two days
and I tried five more times
and then I ended up
taking a recent part
do you have any questions?
no, I think I want to talk about them
I'm glad
well, you said you'd have breakfast
with people
I'm giving you my card
if any of them are interested
you can come back over
and try to get to any
days we've had
okay, that's fine
I'm shy
some of them
are just
some of them I don't want to talk about
I respect that
when I was stationed
my neighbor
went on a walk
he said you were on a walk
since you heard Joe
a year later
we're still editing there
and Joe went there
he sat down and talked
so it's funny because how they had
two or three airways every night
they were going by to make sure
with me in Malaria
I always wondered
multiply them by
again, maybe I'll
oh, my pleasure
thank you so much
oh yes sir
I shall keep it