World War II account of Charles S. Phillips, US 4th Naval Beach Battalion

September 28, 2006:

 

Sixtythree years later, Charles S. Phillips, who will be 88 years old, related his memories of his service to our country to your webmaster, Rand Townley.  I spoke to Mr. Phillips on several occasions by telephone to prepare this report.  He is a very energetic man who says he’s “still kickin’ after all these years."   He had me on speaker phone with his wife of 59 years, Ruth, who assisted him with details.  Thanks to his daughter Carolyn for introducing me to Mr. Phillips.  Mr. Phillips knew the webmaster’s Dad, Jim Townley “pretty well” and remembers that he was in A-1 Company and remembered him being on the Salerno beach.  He remembers that the officers would come down to the beach, have their ”pow-wows” then go back inland.  Here is Mr. Charles Phillips' account.

 

 

 

I enlisted in the Navy and went to diesel school in Richmond and Norfolk, Virginia.  I stayed at Camp Allen and Camp Bedford.  We were in big tents that would hold 4 or 5 guys.

After training as a mechanic, I boarded a train to New York City with a bunch of other sailors who had also just received various training.  We arrived in New York expecting liberty but instead were marched right to a ship (USS Arcadia ?) and put down in the hold.  After the ship finally cast off and when we were about 15 miles out, we were allowed to come topside.  We never got to see New York except while marching from the train to the ship!

That ship took us to Oran, Algeria in Northern Africa.  They kept us aboard the ship for about a week while they prepared a place for us to camp.  We then got off the ship with our gear and drove to Arzew.   I heard that the ship went back to New York and was converted to a hospital ship.

 

At Arzew, we were put on top of a hill in 2-man pup tents overlooking the port.  There were many air raid alerts, but never an attack.  It was so windy up there that our white mattress covers were always brown with dust.  Finally, we were able to move into Quonset huts, which were a bit more comfortable.

We trained at Arzew in preparation for the invasion of Italy.  I was assigned to the 4^th Naval Beach Battalion, Company A-2. 

We invaded Sicily along with the 36^th Division of the Army Infantry and preparations began for the invasion of the mainland.  There was talk that Italy would surrender, especially after Mussolini fell from power.

In September as we were aboard ships awaiting the invasion of Salerno Italy there was the announcement that Italy had surrendered.  There was a great celebration and expectation that the invasion would be a cakewalk.  Remember, it was the Italians that surrendered, not the Germans.  There were waiting for us.

 

We in the Beach Party 4^th Beach Battalion, Company A-2, hit the beach in the 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd waves along with the 36^th Texas Army Infantry.  We wore the same uniforms that they did.  We were under immediate and constant attack by the Germans who were only a mile away in a town.

As we dug foxholes, the German 88s were screaming in all around us.  In addition to all of the loud booms and sharp crack of the exploding German artillery we could feel the ground shaking under us and sand collapsing into our foxholes as the 88mm shells hit and exploded.

 

We could also see and hear the constant German machine guns from the mountains around us.  We could also hear the difference from the German machine guns and the slower sounding American Thompson machine guns.  Those German machine guns were ten times quicker with a loud braaaaaat against the slower ratt-tat-tat-tat-tat of the American Thompson.

Imagine all of this in one constant sound all around us and only the sea behind us.  We thought for a while that we might be pushed back into the sea!  I’ll tell you, D-Day got a lot of attention as being bloody and horrendous, but they weren’t at Salerno where it was rumored that the whole 4^th Beach Battalion got wiped out!

As I lay in my foxhole waiting for the Germans to come over the hill, I looked right up into the bomb bay of many B-25 Mitchell two-engine bombers flying low to the deck.  I then watched as the bombs fell out onto the Germans, only a mile away.  Wave after wave of those bombers went in and leveled that town to one foot high debris.  I don’t know how many Germans there were there or how many got away, but those B-25s left nothing.  They came in from Sicily.  Those were rough times.

 

That first couple of nights we were alerted to the possibility that the German Paratroopers would be coming in.  No one got any sleep.  Instead of the Germans coming in though, the Americans dropped Paratroopers into the German held areas.

Well anyway, one thing I forgot to tell you earlier was, right before the Sicily invasion I was carrying my guitar with me in its guitar case. There was nowhere to stow that guitar in the ship.  One of the men who were handling the cargo agreed to let me put my guitar in a big crate that was holding a pyramid tent.  It fit in there nicely.  Anyway, we invaded Sicily and were there for three to four weeks.  Well, I thought that my guitar was long gone by then.  I told whoever was still out on the ship to go ahead and use the guitar if they found it.

 

Then we invaded Salerno and it was a bloody invasion with many, many casualties that I already told you about.  Right after all the shelling and when the Germans were licked, oh about the 4^th or 5^th day on Salerno, here comes this Army guy with my guitar!  It sure was nice of him to bring it back to me.  They were good guys.

 

Well anyway, after Salerno we went to the Southern France invasion along the Riviera.  All I really remember about that was we stayed at this big house with 14 to 16 rooms and it was run by these two old gals, one French and one Italian.  They were rich.  They used to have the rich people come and stay with them during the winter, but that was before the war.  These old gals offered to give us a tour of Europe after the war if we came back.  I never went back.

 

After Southern France I got liberty for 25 days.  I had been in Europe for 18 months by then.

 

Next I went to San Francisco.  There I went aboard the USS Bowie (APA137) which was an Amphibious Attack Transport ship and we headed for Okinawa.   Between February and July 1945 the Bowie operated out of Pearl Harbor on troop and cargo runs to Eniwetok, Marshall Islands; Guam; Saipan; Ulithl; and Okinawa.  We also went to Japanese waters to support the occupation.

 

I remember steaming up this one river for about 2 miles during high tide and we docked at a Japanese Naval Base.  The tide was so high that we just walked off the ship onto the dock.  Low tide though was a different matter.  The big river looked like a little stream!

My duties aboard the “137” were fueling and operations in the machine shop.  We kept the auxiliary generators and compressors running.

 

When the troops reached Okinawa, we thought that we were part of a Beach Party ready to go in, but they told us that there were already too many Navy Beach Party members there already and we were told to stay on ship.

 

The USS Bowie received one battle star for her participation in the Okinawa operation (10-16 May 1945).

 

These brave men of the Naval Beach Battalions are truly forgotten heroes.  
The webmaster thanks Mr. and Mrs. Phillips for sharing these memories and wishes them many more healthy years.   
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