Gathering like a storm in the Pacific, an armada of U.S. warships and hundreds of thousands of American troops under the command of Gen. Douglas MacArthur began preparations in October 1944 to recapture the Philippines. MacArthur, who had famously pledged that he would return, landed with his men at Leyte and waded ashore through the knee-high waves on October 20. (Expecting the invasion to begin on Luzon, to the North, the Japanese had left only a small ground force at Leyte.) Three days later the Japanese Imperial Navy tried to divide and conquer the U.S. Third and Seventh Fleets at Leyte Gulf, but, after the largest naval battle in world history, the Americans were victorious. On October 25, the last day of the mammoth sea battle, the Japanese introduced a terrifying new tactic—the kamikaze strike. Japanese for “divine wind,” kamikaze pilots intentionally flew their planes, loaded with explosives, straight into American warships. The ground battle for Leyte dragged on into December after the Japanese rushed in reinforcements, and the kamikaze suicide missions were beginning to inflict enormous casualties on the Americans. Twenty-year-old Chief Pharmacist’s Mate Fritz Houser watched as one bloodied young sailor after another was brought into the medical station aboard their destroyer as a result of the attacks and on December 9, he wrote the following letter to his parents while aboard the USS Mount McKinley. (Prevented from sending the letter due to censorship, Houser brought it home with him after the war. Portions of this letter include graphic descriptions of injuries that may not be suitable for younger readers.)
USS Mount McKinley (AGC-7)
Dear Folks,
This letter cannot be sent now but eventually I hope that you get to see it. The reason I am writing this is more or less to let you know what Hell this war can be.
About 1200 on the 6 of December I came up to sick bay from chow and Doctor Hopkins told me to get a few things ready to go on independent duty for a few days aboard another ship. I packed my things and a Lt. from a destroyer took me up to Captain Graham to get permission for me to leave. The Captain got quite angry because they were trying to take somebody from his ship to replace a PhM who had been taken ill. The Captain refused and said that he would not transfer me until he received written orders from the Chief of Staff. I went back to sick bay a little relieved because this Lt. said to forget about the whole deal but by the time I began to relax he was back and said I was going. We left the ship on the Crash boat and pulled along side the Destroyer and boarded her.
The Lt. introduced me to the Doctor and then I found out where we were going. This destroyer was to go with a convoy to take troops for a landing at Ormoc Bay on the opposite side of Leyte Gulf. This is the part of the island where the Japs had been bringing reenforcements in to help the Japs already on the island. There were no supplies sterilized on the destroyer so Ed Kissick, Hal C and myself got to work and started to make vasoline gauze, wrap instruments, gloves, and all the other hospital supplies needed to take care of casualties. We worked on that and sterilizing until 12 o’clock that night.
The supplies of a destroyer are pitifully small. In all we had about 30 units of blood plasma, 24 packages of 4x4 dressings, some battle dressings, 9 cans of vasoline gauze, roller bandages, sulfa powder, and an inexperienced doctor and a willing Hospital Apprentice and myself. I won’t say what I think of myself—that doesn’t count. What other people think of you is the important thing.
I tried to sleep but couldn’t do anything but roll around because I wasn’t used to the new surroundings. At 2 in the morning of 7 December we had GQ. My battle station was forward, topside. I had to cover the two forward five inch guns, three 20 mm guns, fire rooms 1 & 2, the bridge, radar shack, and the gunnery directors. We went to our battle stations and just sat around and watched the stars, moon, and water. The only thing we encountered on the way were some flares, probably dropped by Jap planes.
At 6 in the morning the destroyers opened up with a bombardment. Each destroyer fired about 200 rounds at the beach without any return fire from the beach. Six LCI’s went in close to the shore and opened up with rockets. When that was over the first wave of Higgins boats started to move in. We couldn’t quite see what opposition they were meeting but it sounded like a lot of machine gun fire. About this time six unidentified planes came in at a fast speed. They looked like they were going to dive bomb so the whole convoy opened up with anti-aircraft fire. One of the planes was hit and made a forced landing on the beach. We then realized that they were American P-47’s and ceased firing.
The landing continued and we found out that they were meeting no opposition from the beach. At 11:30 the ship’s began to form into a convoy ready to make the return trip back to Leyte Gulf. Just about this time about three or four Jap planes appeared overhead and the guns let loose. One of the planes came down but the other ships began to bomb the Destroyer Mahan. I don’t know if they hit her with the bombs or not but they followed up with a suicide dive and hit the bridge. We saw a big flash and then smoke rose high into the sky. Another destroyer pulled up along side to help but evidently she was too badly damaged because half an hour later one of our destroyers opened up and sank her (Mahan). The first few shots didn’t hit the right spot but the fourth or fifth one did. We saw a huge flash and that was the end of the ship.
The convoy was moving out by this time and things seemed to be a little quiet so I decided to sack out on the deck for a little while. I must have slept about an hour when our guns opened up. I couldn’t quite collect my senses for a few seconds because the firing had scared the living hell out of me. I tried to put on my helmet, put cotton in my ears, put my first aid kit on and get the hell out of the way without much success in any direction. I finally accomplished all of these things and watched what was going on. Our ship shot down one of the planes that was overhead. They were not after us on this particular occasion because they went over to the DD Lampson and three planes, one after the other went into a dive and crashed on the Lampson. We saw smoke rise from her and we hauled ass to give her assistance. Just as we were getting close to her a number of Jap planes started for us. We shot one down and some P-38’s took care of the rest. We went back to the scene of the crippled Lampson and found a lot of men floating in the water. I went to the Officer’s ward room to get ready for casualties. This was the battle dressing station on the ship. They started moving patients into the ward room and the first few we got weren’t too badly hurt. I thought this was going to mean a few hours work and that was all but how wrong I was on that thought.
We started to work on one fellow who was burned on the face, arms, hands, shoulders, and legs. We took care of him with comparative ease. Then the bad cases started to come in. One kid about 19 years old had his leg shattered about four or five inches from the hip. The leg was held on by a few shreds and could not be saved so with a few snips the leg was off The doctor tied off some of the veins and we bandaged the stump. The kid was in a hell of a lot of pain so morphine was administered. Another young fellow by the name of Tony Santos was laying on the table and looked as though he were taking his last breaths. The doctor started working on him while I mixed some blood plasma. I took the plasma over to the patient and started that. I looked him over to see what his wounds were and found out that he had four gaping wounds in his left arm, shrapnel wounds of both legs, and a shrapnel wound in the left eye. He was unconscious at this time and looked to be in very bad shape.
By this time the ward room was full of horribly wounded men, groaning, dying and pitifully helpless. We couldn’t work on them all at once so we did our best and went from one to the other. I have no idea in what order we worked on the patients but I’ll just describe them as I can remember them.
One fellow by the name of John B. Johns had flash burns that covered about 60% of his body. Most of the skin on his face was hanging down in shreds. His hands and legs were in the same shape. He was conscious but not in his right mind and I remember his eyes in particular. They had a terrified look and you could almost feel the pain yourself that he was going through. As soon as we tried to touch him he started to fight and we had to have someone hold him down while we bandaged his burns. He also had a shattered lower leg that looked pretty bad. Later on in the night he became unconscious and went into convulsions about every fifteen minutes. We had to have a constant watch on him but every once in a while we’d all be doing something and he’d go into one of these fits. Once he fell off the couch on to two other casualties.
Working on these few casualties took about two hours and it was beyond me how some of the other cases waited so patiently for us to get to them. One fellow sat on a chair and watched what we did, didn’t make a noise and when I went over to find out what was wrong with him I found a hole about 2 1/2 inches in diameter in his back through which was protruding part of his lung. I applied sulfanilamide powder to the wound and put on a compress dressing.
We had a CPhM who had numerous shrapnel wounds in his legs and abdomenal cavity. I noticed he was in a lot of pain but didn’t know at the time how badly wounded he was. The doctor had me working with other patients, making plasma, and doing a thousand and one other things that I had no chance to investigate the case. It turned out that the shrapnel had punctured the peritonium, broken the spleen, and penetrated some of his vital organs. We gave him penicillin, sulfa drugs, and bandaged his wounds. He later died on a hospital ship. I also found out that when he was picked up out of the water he was holding a fellow up by wrapping his legs around him. It just so happened that the man he was holding was dead but he had no idea what condition the man was in. It seems strange what a man will try to do to save another man’s life when his has almost been expended.
By this time we had most of the casualties taken care of with the exception of an officer who was badly burned and had a broken leg. Like many of the other cases his skin in a lot of places had been all but peeled off. As I looked at him I saw that he was a handsome fellow, young, and good natured. We applied vasoline gauze, cotton compresses, and roller gauze to his burns. I talked to him just before we transferred the patients to a hospital ship and he really was a swell fellow. He wanted to know if his face was going to be scarred, how the other fellows were doing, and where I was from. He thanked me several times for what we had done as though we were doing him a great favor. That is one of the strangest things about casualties. We are trained for one purpose—to take care of the sick and wounded—we know it’s our job and then they want to thank us. We should thank them for what they have given. We may work on them for 60 hours without sleep or a chance to even sit down but that is a damn small price to pay when they are going to bear the signs of battle for the rest of their life. When we thought we were almost caught up with ourselves and may get a minutes rest they told us we were taking more casualties from another ship and were going to leave the convoy and come back at full speed to Leyte Bay.
While all this was going on we were constantly under attack by the Jap planes. I hate to say this but I didn’t think much of the doctor we had. Whenever we were attacked and our ship opened fire the doctor stopped whatever he was doing, even if it was giving plasma or anything, grabbed his helmet and went under the table. The rest of us paid no attention and went right on with our work. I don’t know how the others felt but as for myself I figured that the patients couldn’t go for any added protection, so why should I. If a bomb was going to hit us I didn’t think that a table would help me much. I later found out that the ship shot down a number of Jap planes and also that they dropped eight bombs at us, two of them landing a hundred feet off our port and starboard bow.
About this time the other casualties were brought aboard and we started all over again. The ship got underway, darkness came and I thanked God we were getting out or at least starting to go towards safety. I know that when I prayed I was selfish and was thinking of my own skin a little more than I was thinking of what great help the hospital ship was going to be to the casualties.
The new casualties were practically the same as the other ones. One man had wounds of the head, a punctured lung, shrapnel wounds of his legs and was in shock. He had a horrible moan all the time and this bothered me more than anything that I saw. I can stand to see practically any kind of wound but when they start moaning it gets me because I can’t do much to help them.
Another of the new cases had a broken lower left leg but wasn’t in too bad shape. Another had a compound fracture of the femur plus a large flesh wound but he had been taken care of fairly well on the other ship so we left him for other cases until later.
Another fellow had a punctured lung and a shattered left arm. He was having a tough time breathing but never complained once. It’s patients like that who make you think that what you’re doing is really worthwhile. Many times he saw how busy we were and just waited until he saw we had a breathing spell and then would politely ask you for some water or some other small favor. I know that if I were in his place I’d probably be bitching to high heaven trying to get people to wait on me.
Some of the other minor cases we had were—a man with burns of the arms, chest and shoulders—a man with a broken ankle but no flesh wounds, another man with a three-inch open wound of the lower leg, and about eight or ten men with numerous small shrapnel wounds in many parts of their body.
After all the immediate first aid was taken care of we had to continue with the million and one jobs that are necessary to make a patient a little comfortable. We mixed plasma, gave albumin, dextrose, morphine, drinks of water so many times that it seemed I was always carrying water, explained to some what actually was wrong with them, turned them over from side to side to make them a little comfortable, gave them urinals and last but not least occasionally prayed for them.
By this time most of the men who were helping us had gone to get a little sleep and the doctor had retired to his state room likewise. Ed Kissick, myself and a radioman were the only ones left. We decided to have a little water and a cigarette ourselves and we took out about five minutes for a rest. While hunting for cigarettes we found a few bottles of brandy and we proceeded to drink that. It was a good bracer and morale builder.
We pulled up along side the hospital ship at 0400 in the morning and immediately started to transfer the patients. Almost every one that was conscious thanked us several times, wished us good luck—yes, wished us good luck when some of them will probably die soon.
When all the patients were finally on the hospital ship we sat down to look the situation over. The ward room was a mess of blood, skin and flesh. My clothes were soaking wet from sweat and blood, my eyes were blood shot, and I was damned tired but deep down in my heart I was happy that I had the chance to help such a swell bunch of fellows.
I have only one regret about the whole affair but there isn’t much that I can do about it. I regret that the sons-of-bitches back in the States who go on strike, think the war is over, think that it is somebody elses war, moan about the sacrifices they are making by working overtime, getting very little gas, butter and meat, and the inconveniences they must go through—can’t come out into a battle area and get a little or see a little of the HELL for themselves.
Love,
Fritz
Thousands of American servicemen were injured or killed as a result of the Japanese kamikaze attacks, and one of them was a forty-five-year-old father of three from Philadelphia named John Kremer. An extremely popular commander, Kremer was befriended by the movie star Douglas Fairbanks Jr., who served in the U.S. Navy, saw combat, rose to the rank of lieutenant commander, and earned, among other medals, the croix de guerre, the British Distinguished Service Cross, and the Silver Star. (Many celebrities fought in the war, including Clark Gable, Charlton Heston, Lee Marvin, Paul Newman, and Jimmy Stewart. And some, like the famed band leader Glenn Miller, were killed during their service.) On December 30, 1944, a kamikaze plane deflected off the water and crashed into the USS Orestes killing Commander Kremer and approximately twenty other men. When Fairbanks learned of his friend’s death, he immediately sent Mrs. Kremer the following handwritten letter:
Jan 9th
Dear Mrs. Kremer—
Word has just reached me about John.
No words of mine will supply the comfort and the strength which these days require. However, I could not let the day pass without letting you know how very deeply I am feeling the effects of this crushing news.
To say I was fond of John would merely be the echo of any and all who ever knew him. He was a man whose courage I admired, whose wisdom I respected and whose friendship I treasured. No one will miss him as much as you, but I know that I, for one, will remember him with affection and count myself fortunate for having known him,—for as long as I linger with “this mortal coil.”
Dick Barthelmess wrote me the news and said, in part, “I hope he is sitting on a nice comfortable cloud, conversing in Greek, with a quartet of harps playing soft chamber music to him. He’d like that.” I feel sure that’s right.
This sort of letter should be brief but I’ve gone on because I did want to say my say about a fine man, a courageous warrior and a great friend.
My wife joins me, dear Mrs. Kremer, in sending you and the children our most very sincere sympathy & friendship and the hope that the great sorrow you have will somehow be mitigated by the pride you must also feel.
Yours
Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
Lt. Commander USNR
John Steinbeck, who had earned international acclaim for Of Mice and Men in 1937 and The Grapes of Wrath in 1939, worked for the New York Herald during the war as a correspondent. Steinbeck and Kremer had also become close friends (Kremer was a featured character in several of Steinbeck’s wartime articles), and on January 14, 1945, Steinbeck sent Mrs. Kremer the following brief but heartfelt note:
Dear Mrs. Kremer:
There’s nothing whatever to say except I wish, very profoundly, that I had been with him. I’m so sorry.
John Steinbeck