The last day of the war arrived without warning in Ashio on August 15, 1945. As usual, the first shift of POWs left for the mine at sunup while others languished in camp, many asleep. Just before noon, the guards unexpectedly left their posts, gathering around a radio in the commandant’s office where the Japanese national anthem blared. Then an announcer said the emperor would speak to the nation.
In a quavering, high-pitched voice that none in Ashio had ever heard, Hirohito began by defending Japan’s declaration of war on America four years earlier, saying it was the only way to ensure Japan’s self-preservation. But the war had gone badly. And now, he said, “the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the power of which to do damage is indeed incalculable, taking the toll of many innocent lives. Should we continue to fight, it would not only result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but would also lead to the total extinction of human civilization.” There was no alternative to surrender, he said. For the first time in 2,600 years, Japan would submit to a conqueror. He appealed to the nation to resist no further. “The hard-ships to which our nation is to be subjected hereafter will certainly be great. We are keenly aware of all ye, our subjects. However, it is according to the dictate of time and fate that we have resolved to pave the way for a grand peace for all the generations to come by enduring the unendurable and suffering what is insufferable.”
The Ashio guards, faces in their hands, were stunned. Some grieved openly, tears rolling down their cheeks. The POWs, witnessing the scene from the barracks, couldn’t understand what was going on. “We sent a man up onto the roof of the building,” explained Keller. “We thought the emperor had died and if flags were at half-mast, we would know. But half an hour later, there was no indication this had happened. Then someone mentioned maybe there’s an armistice. We waited and then the first shift of workers was brought back from the mines at about one o’clock in the afternoon. Normally, they didn’t return until between four and five. This really stirred up excitement.”
“We knew something was up,” said Rocek. “We thought the Allies had made a landing and the Japanese wanted to keep us in camp to keep an eye on us just in case we tried to rebel or escape.”
The prisoners sought out the Japanese camp interpreter, who told them that since winter was coming, mine officials wanted to give them extra time off to build up their bodies. “Is the war over?” asked one. “No! The war isn’t over!” he replied. But the captives didn’t believe him. They decided to break a camp rule to see what would happen. “The worst thing you could do was to smoke on your rice mat. Fire could destroy the barracks,” explained Keller. “So a couple of POWs took cigarettes and sat on their mats smoking when the guard came through. These men had taken a great chance of being severely beaten. But when the guard stopped, all he screamed was ‘Danger! Danger!’ The POWs hollered back, ‘We know! We know!’ The guard then ran out and got the interpreter who returned with him and told the POWs, ‘Please don’t smoke on the beds!’ We then knew the war was over.”
Work was suspended permanently at the mine for the POWs. Several days later, the guards brought in cans of yellow paint and directed the survivors to paint “PW” letters 20 feet high on one barrack roof. Still, no one would confirm the surrender. Rather, the men were told the lettering would keep U.S. planes from bombing the barracks. Numajiri began distributing beef and horsemeat, plus stores of Red Cross food, clothing, and other items that had long been withheld.
On August 27, three fighter planes from USS Shangri-La (CV-38) located the cliffside prison. One pilot swooped down just over the barracks, tipping his wings in a salute as the prisoners cheered from the ground. Then the fighters zoomed in, dropping with pinpoint accuracy seabags loaded with candy, cigarettes, and other supplies. Clearly, liberation was at hand. On August 30, a B-29 roared low over the river valley. Ten large parachutes blossomed in the sky, dangling crates filled with clothing and food, which fell gracefully to earth close to the camp. One, however, damaged a house and another the town hall. The euphoric POWs rushed the containers, devouring the food as fast as it could be unpacked.
Ashio was too remote for freedom to come quickly. But the POWs knew it wouldn’t be long. As they waited, they were grateful for deliverance. A certain nobility came over them, a spirit of benevolence, even to a woman who lived near the camp and had caused one POW to be severely beaten earlier that summer. The men gave chewing gum and candy to her children. “Upon witnessing this, the Japanese woman burst into tears,” said Lt. Cdr. Arthur G. McIntyre. “She could not understand why these prisoners would give her children these things after she had caused one of them to be punished for taking a vegetable from her garden.”
The survivors summoned to the barracks all Korean and Japanese civilians who had aided them, including Smiling Charlie and Kiichi Katoku, lavishing on them blankets, food, and other materials. They asked them to share them with their families or those in need in the village. In a note to the Katoku family, Major Kinzell reassured them. “Please do not worry, although the Americans are taking over here. There is nothing to fear. You will not be mistreated. I am very happy that these two nations have quit fighting. I have many Japanese friends in America, so please write to me at any time. I should be very happy to hear from all of you. Thanks, Mr. Kato, for all you have done for us boys here in camp.”
The camp commandant, Numajiri, watched in astonishment from a window in his office. “The PWs took the Japanese into their barracks and gave them food and blankets, clothing, shoes, etc.,” he later wrote. “When the Japanese returned to the mine, the PWs carried those articles for them to the gate to bid them farewell. . . . I watched all this from the window of my room. Suddenly I became speechless and felt tears in my eyes.”
Pappy, the civilian guard who had befriended the prisoners, was likewise repaid for his kindness. He was summoned to the prison camp from his home in Ashio. “When Pappy entered our compound, you could see the fear of death on his face,” recalled one POW. “That is, until the Americans started shouting, ‘Pappy, Pappy Tomodachi [friend], Nakayoshi [good friend],’ and rushed up to him offering cigarettes, candy, and cigars. At one time he had five cigarettes lit by Americans in his mouth. . . . Pappy was loaded down with blankets, shoes, clothing, food, cigarettes, medical supplies, candy, etc. The one cart assigned to our camp was rolled out and loaded so high, Pappy could not budge it. We had the [Japanese] commander assign four guards to help him pull it. Along with the cartload of supplies went an inventory of the supplies and a letter to American and Japanese authorities, stating that Pappy had been good to the prisoners and all that he had was a gift. This letter was signed by all the officers and most of the 300 men in camp. Pappy went out the gate a relatively wealthy man with a broad smile that did justice to that one and only gold tooth.”
Later, the POWs drew up a list of those who had mistreated them, to be turned over to American authorities for prosecution. At the head was Numajiri’s name.
On September 5, twenty Japanese marines under the command of a lieutenant came into the camp with orders from the Americans to escort the survivors to the Ashio train station. Japanese police cleared civilians from the streets as the POWs packed their few belongings. Then they left together, making their final trek across the bridge over the Watarase River. Many took a last look back at the bleak barracks, fixing in their minds the view of what had almost taken their lives. They marched in silence through the city for three-quarters of a mile. Children ran alongside, begging for candy, which some of the POWs handed out. No one came to cheer or boo. Residents hung back, crowded into alleys, watching as the Americans passed in the street.
The survivors quickly boarded a waiting train and it rumbled away to the south out of the valley toward Yokohama. From the windows, the men watched as the spiny mountains gave way to the Tokyo plains. The train skirted the city, out of sight of the firebombings that had leveled most of it. As men who had barely survived, they felt no remorse for the enemy. “Maybe if we had seen Hiroshima, we might have felt sorry for them,” said Keller. POWs on other trains applauded when a devastated city came into view. “By the time we had passed a dozen such cities and towns, we stopped cheering,” said Army Capt. Kenneth Day. “The devastation was so total that it overpowered our senses. . . . We said little but stared out the windows. . . . I began to feel sorry for them. I still wanted to kill them, but a feeling of sympathy crept in alongside the hatred.”
The Sculpin survivors arrived in Yokohama and were greeted by an Army nurse, offering cigarettes and candy bars to the men. “What a beautiful sight! She was the first American female we had seen in two years,” said Rocek.
The men boarded buses that shuttled them to the city’s wharf where a decontamination center had been set up. There they bumped into George Brown, who had just arrived with forty-three small wooden boxes and his own incredible story. The Sculpin’s only surviving officer had been a prisoner at Ofuna until March 1945, when he was transferred to Omari to make room for Capt. Richard H. O’Kane and other survivors of the USS Tang (SS-306). Brown was put to work sewing canteen covers. One morning he overslept and was punished by standing at attention all day in the compound in 35° weather. “I was soon freezing,” he recalled. “Finally another POW walked by me and whispered, ‘Get permission to go to the head.’ I did and when I entered one of the stalls a bowl of hot soup came over the partition from the next stall. I got soup three times that day and it literally saved my life. However, I did get a severe case of pneumonia and still have scars on my lungs as a result.”
In April, Brown was transferred to the Matushima prison camp about 125 miles west of Tokyo. The camp was home to 200 American and British enlisted men forced to excavate a sluice for a hydroelectric plant at a nearby dam. In his 4½ months at Matushima, Brown presided over the funerals of forty-three Americans who died of pneumonia. “About six men would carry the dead man in a big poled box about one-half mile up the mountain side to a spot where the Japanese had an incinerator. We started a fire and placed the body in the oven. I, as the senior American officer, would say prayers which I had to make up since there was no Bible or prayer book available. Then the coffin bearers took the box back down the mountain while I waited with a guard to collect the ashes in a tin can. I would later transfer the ashes to a small wooden box properly identified with the name, rank, and serial number.”
After liberation, Brown caught a train to the coast with the forty-three boxes and then hopped a U.S. destroyer, which took him to the reunion with the other Sculpin survivors. Some, including Brown and Keller, flew back to the States, while others, including Rocek, embarked on a hospital ship.
Miraculously, all twenty-one who arrived in Japan in December 1943 came out alive on September 5, 1945. Mike Gorman (S2c), one of the youngest, sank to his knees in prayer on the fantail as the hospital ship steamed out of Tokyo Bay. He watched as the mountains hiding Ashio slowly sank below the horizon.
For the next few days, the survivors feasted aboard the ship. “We ate whatever we could and it was just like putting food down an acid bath,” said Rocek. “We were still hungry at night and the captain broke out K rations. That’s all you heard all night long—guys munching.” Now in safe hands, the men relaxed and began to think about what they had endured. Troubled by nightmares, some snapped, shouting and punching the air, requiring medics to calm them with tranquilizers.
The ship stopped in Guam and Pearl Harbor before sailing on to San Francisco, arriving in early October. “All the submarine men were the first to depart,” said Rocek. “The Submarine Force had individual cars, with an officer assigned to each, and they took us to a hotel for a large welcoming dinner. We were all impressed and proud and knew that we were not forgotten.”
After a brief stay at Oak Knoll Hospital in Oakland, Rocek and others received orders to transfer to hospitals closer to their homes. “They put us on a train to Chicago. That’s when I called my sister to meet me. It was heart-wrenching, with all the crying and sobbing . . .“ said Rocek, trailing off. She hardly recognized him when he arrived. After visiting a few hours, he continued on to the Great Lakes Naval Hospital just outside the city. Then, a few days later, he headed home, taking a bus to Chicago and an elevated train west to Cicero. The train dropped him two blocks away. “I came in unannounced. My dad was working in the tailor shop. I could see the look on his face. I could see he was happy to see me but I also saw the look of surprise that I was so thin. My mother heard the commotion in the shop and came running out, crying.”
For Rocek and his fellow Sculpin survivors, the long rehabilitation had begun. For many, the scars of their ordeal never quite healed, particularly for Rocek. At night, haunting memories catapulted him back time after time to his harrowing escape from the sinking Sculpin, to his near drowning on the Chuyo, to the torture on Truk, and to the years of starvation in Ashio. But at least he was home.
The people of Maine and New Hampshire had hoped for a homecoming of their own—for the Sailfish. But the Navy had other plans. For the last six months of the war, she had been used as a training boat in New London and at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. On the day the war ended, the boat arrived at the Philadelphia Navy Yard just as city church bells, factory whistles, and sirens celebrated Japan’s surrender. The Navy, faced with a huge inventory of submarines, decided the boat would be decommissioned and scrapped at the yard. But when word filtered back to Portsmouth that the Sailfish would not be coming home, shipyard machinists bitterly objected, asking President Truman to intercede. Soon the Portsmouth Chamber of Commerce, the city’s Elks and Kiwanis clubs, and others swamped Secretary of the Navy James V. Forrestal with telegrams, letters, and petitions. The congressional delegations of Maine and New Hampshire joined in. The world’s most famous submarine, they argued, could not simply pass into oblivion in Philadelphia as so much useless nautical junk to be made into refrigerators. She should be returned to her home to become a permanent memorial to the Squalus rescue and all World War II submariners.
After initially resisting, the Navy gave in amid a torrent of press coverage. Thus, on October 1 the Sailfish’s crew reassembled and the boat embarked from Philadelphia, steaming up the Atlantic coast for the last time.
In a poignant two-day voyage, she sailed past the benchmarks of her early life . . . New London where all her crews had been trained through the war years . . . along the ragged coast of New England where divers from Washington, D.C., raced with a police escort through barricaded cities in the spring of 1939 to reach the stranded Squalus; . . . past Cape Cod where the captain of the Falcon, the naval tug bearing the McCann rescue bell, opened the throttle wide, wondering if he could possibly reach the boat and her survivors before their air ran out; . . . and further up, to the barren Isles of Shoals where Captain Naquin and his crew were trapped 40 fathoms down, a depth no one had survived before.
For the young sailors now serving on the Sailfish, men like Laverne “Bud” Pike (Ylc), who had been aboard since the attack on the Chuyo, it was an incredible journey. He was just a kid when the Squalus went down, and he remembered the newspaper headlines well. “We hung onto that news,” he said. “And never did I dream that I would be the last one off that boat.” Yet here he was, six years later, bringing her home to Portsmouth.
At the Isles of Shoals, the Sailfish turned inland past a lighthouse, toward the mouth of the Piscataqua River. The familiar numbers “192” loomed large on her conning tower, like a mirage to coastal residents who remembered the Squalus and now watched the gallant boat enter the river, three miles from Portsmouth. They stood on beaches and hillsides, cheering or in silent wonder as the tiny boat slid by. She cut a narrow wake against the heavy tide, which was doing all it could to slow her fade into history.
To those watching, those who had waged the fight to bring her home, the boat seemed a part of them as she passed. The “ghost ship” of the fleet, the boat always referred to as the “ill-fated Squalus,” the one that many predicted would never survive the war, had overcome all the odds. She had criss-crossed more than 132,000 miles of the Pacific and Indian oceans, sailing into battle alone from Pearl Harbor, Manila, Perth, Albany, Brisbane, Java, Midway, and Saipan. Although attacked by destroyers and dive bombers, she somehow persevered. “She was like a cat,” one crewman said. “SS 192 seemed to have many lives.” In her time, she had redeemed herself from the disaster of 1939 to touch the lives of a great general, several admirals—on both sides of the war—two presidents and one grateful nation.
Now she turned into the home stretch, battling the rip tides as she rounded Pull-and-be-damned Point and came into view of Portsmouth. With a surge of power, she came alongside a drydock at the navy yard to the wild ovation of yard workers who turned out in force to welcome her back.
For the next three weeks, they bent to the task of readying the boat for her formal decommissioning on October 27—Navy Day at the yard.
More than 30,000 people packed into Portsmouth for the event. Men and women from throughout the region, workers from the naval yard, and officers of the line stood with tears welling in their eyes as the great boat settled into the river for the final time at 1100. Near the pier where she was born, with the cruiser USS Portsmouth (CL-102) standing by, she roared with blasts of compressed air, dipping below the river in a ceremonial last dive. Her deck tipped to port just beneath the waves, leaving her conning tower jutting above the water. Then she surfaced and returned to the dock.
As the end approached, her crew stood at attention on deck, hugging her rails in two straight lines of white hatted officers and enlisted men. A silent throng pressed forward around her, from every vantage point in the yard. Among them was Margaret Batick, the widow of John J. Batick (EMlc) who died on the boat. His daughter, Betty, now 7, held tightly to her mother’s hand, her eyes fixed on the submarine. And on the deck of the boat, below the bridge and standing back from the crewmen, was the solitary figure of an older man, dressed in a long overcoat—Harold Preble, the only civilian to survive the Squalus sinking.
The boat’s last skipper, Lt. Cdr. Berkeley I. Freedman, stood before his crew and the world and summed up what the Squalus / Sailfish had come to represent. “Those who served aboard her and those who helped to build her know deep in their hearts that she is an eternal symbol of what courage, fine workmanship and faith in God and one another can accomplish.”
In the eerie silence that followed, the boat’s commissioning pennant was lowered as the last act of her existence. Winds stiffened, roaring in off the ocean as gulls cried, cartwheeling in the sky above the Sailfish. An aging CPO, fighting back tears, stood near the drydock and raised his hand in a firm salute. Beneath his breath, he whispered the thoughts of many.
“May God let her rest in peace.”