Chapter 8: 1944-1945, New Guinea

The U.S.S. West Point zigzagged across the Pacific and somehow avoided any contact with the Japanese Navy. Clayton Jones also managed to keep the seasickness which had afflicted many of his buddies at bay.

2 After a brief stop in Noumea (the capital of New Caledonia), the ship proceeded on to Australia. In March, they finally dropped anchor at Gamadodo on Milne Bay in Papua New Guinea.

3 The Seabees quickly disembarked and took possession of the camp that had just been prepared for them by the 104^th Construction Battalion. Although the accommodations were adequate, the tropical climate took some getting used to. The warm and humid weather meant that they were sweating all the time, even with limited exertion and activity.

4 Nevertheless, Clayton quickly snagged a cushy job. He was put in charge of running the projector that was used to entertain his buddies with movies from home. They watched films like My Gal Sal and You Were Never Lovelier with Rita Hayworth, Down Argentine Way and Moon over Miami with Betty Grable, Honky Tonk and Johnny Eager with Lana Turner, and Boom Town and Ziegfeld Girl with Hedy Lamar.

5 It wasn’t rare for the same film to run over and over again – sometimes a film that they hadn’t seen recently was hard to come by. Still, Clayton didn’t complain, and neither did most of the men who were usually appreciative of the distraction of a little entertainment to take their minds off of the reality of their present circumstances.

6 Even so, Clayton couldn’t help but be distracted by the exotic place where they had been stationed. The sights, smells and sounds of New Guinea were strange and interesting to an Alabama boy. He wondered at the bare breasts of the native women and the jungles that surrounded them.

7 One day, the urge to explore finally got the best of him. He and one of his buddies decided to explore the jungle. The best thing about Jim was that he was willing to tramp along with Clayton. They walked forever and got lost.

8 They climbed up the side of a mountain and down the other and finally wandered into a native village. “What in the hell did the Japs want with this place?” Jim asked.

9 Lost and completely on their own, they decided to settle down for the night in a dry creek bed. Jim immediately drifted off to sleep and began snoring. Clayton stayed awake and tried to fend off mosquitos for most of the night.

10 The following morning, they got up and headed back in the direction of camp. Although they were a bit apprehensive, they didn’t know that one of their buddies got worried about them and had reported them missing to one of the officers. Thus, when they stumbled back into camp, they were both in trouble.

11 Clayton was assigned duty at the docks – helping to unload freight from the supply ships. Even so, his luck had not entirely deserted him. The first ship that he had been assigned to unload was carrying a large cache of Australian beer! Clayton and his buddies managed to ease their pain by lifting a bottle of beer here and there and enjoying them out of sight of the officers who had been assigned to oversee their detail.

12 One evening while he was unloading, Clayton looked down into the water and saw an old sailor swim up alongside the dock. The salty old character motioned to him with a big grin on his face. Clayton looked both ways, and then lowered one of his crates into the water.

13 The man quickly secured it with a rope and began swimming back to his ship. “I’ll be damned!” Clayton chuckled as he turned to grab another crate.

14 Unfortunately, the situation along the northern coast of New Guinea was not at all humorous at the moment. Indeed, around the same time that the 119^th was getting established at Gamadodo, the Allies had decided to take Hollandia away from the Japanese. It would be critical to making further headway against the enemy.

15 Hollandia was an important settlement on Humboldt Bay. The Cyclops Mountains flanked it on the west, and beyond them lay Tanahmerah Bay. A few miles to the southwest, the Japanese had constructed three airstrips on the plain north of Lake Sentani.

16 Operation Reckless began in late March and was brought to a successful conclusion by the end of the first week in June. American B-24 Liberators and P-38 Lightnings conducted bombing raids over the area to soften up Japanese defenses in anticipation of the landing of over 80,000 American troops on April 22. By the end of the battle, the United States had suffered 1,200 casualties (mostly wounded); but those same forces had killed over 3,000 Japanese soldiers and had taken hundreds of prisoners.

17 A week later, Clayton and his comrades were setting up shop at Hollandia. By July, the men had been dispersed to the areas around Humboldt Bay, Lake Sentani and Tanahmerah Bay.

18 The 119^th Construction Battalion immediately set about the task of repairing what had been damaged in the invasion and building adequate facilities from which American forces could launch further operations. They would remain there until March of the following year.