Welcome to Veterans Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbas. Our guest in this edition is
Lewis Conter. Mister Conter's death made headlines in recent weeks because he was the
last surviving veteran of the USS Arizona, the battleship that was attacked and sunk
during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December seventh, nineteen forty one.
Mister Canter was one hundred and two years old. Today you'll hear all about
his experiences at Pearl Harbor and much more from a naval career spanning decades.
Lewis Conter was born in Ojibwe, Wisconsin, in nineteen twenty one. Not
long after that, his family was on the move to the Southwest and eventually
settling in the Denver, Colorado area. That's where he graduated from Heis School
in nineteen thirty nine, and later that year it was off to the Navy.
There was a neighbor of ours, Wicks, that joined the Navy nineteen
thirty five. He was a signaman third class sigamon on the airs on the
Nevada USS Nevada, and he came home. In those days, you'd come
home for ninety days before you had to sign up again for another four years.
Ship over and he signed up and he came home and so we were
all sitting around there and he says, come on, you guys, walk
go down with me. I got to sign up. So we went down
and across the navy recruiters grabbed us and said there's a nine month waiting list,
so once you take the exam. So we all took the exam and
passed and forgot about it. I went home and went back to swift over
night three thirty, and I was in bed one morning at eight o'clock.
They get home till twelve twelve thirty. My mother came up and said,
are you in troubles? And I said no, why? I said,
well, somebody's asking for you on the phone was Anthony Conter. So I
went down. We only had one phone down in the dining room, so
I went down and answering. It was the navy apartment and they said we're
six members short for our draft tonight at five forty five, and we got
to fill it up or I'd come out and talk to us. I said,
okay, I don't have to go to work till three thirty. So
I went down and talked to him, and they talked me into signing up
for four years and leaving that night at five forty five. So I called
my mother, and I called my girlfriend, and I called my dad at
work. He was worked at Swifting Company. And I went down, picked
up my check and we got paid every week. In the check, we're
getting thirty cents an hour Swifting Company, so forty hours weeks, about twelve
dollars a week. So we got a ten dollar bill and two one dollar
bills and then hope every week, and I got my twelve dollars and five
forty five. That night, I was on train for San Diego, and
that's how I started. After basic training, it was time to join a
ship for Loke Conter. It was the back Arizona. When I got three
months of boot camp San Diego, we were four or five us from that,
the division was sent to Long Beach. All of the ships were anchored
Long Meats. Then the Navy in San Diego and Seattle and San Francisco,
and we went to board the Arizona first of January of nineteen forty April first
the whole fleet went for the maneuvers outside of south of Honolulu, south of
the Hawaiian Islands. We first hit Oahu and Maui and Lino Roads. We
finished the maneuvers and Morston decided that it was going to keep the fleet in
Pearl. Then after that we operated half the fleet, half the battleships.
At that time we had battleship had four carriers. We had eight battleships out
there. We'd have whole division three battleship like our division Battleship Division number one.
We had the Oklahoma, Nevada, and Arizona, and then it was
the Western Virginia, California, and Maryland and each one at r Admiral his
commander Battleship Division. And when I first went aboard the Arizona, Captain as
you see, kid was our skipper. And then he left and Captain Train
came aboard, and then he left and Capt. Van Vakimer came board,
and an Admiral Kid came back as a radmal commander Battleship Division number one,
and he's still on the ship. He was buried. He was killed December
seventh, along with Camp Van Vakimer. The next step was getting assigned a
battle station responsibility, but it would not be long before Conter got an assignment
much closer to the top brass on board. I was in second division and
my battle station was a lower handing room and turret number two. Because at
that time the three fourteen inch guns they had round bags one hundred and five
pounds a piece, and they put four them in each barrel to shoot a
shell off, they put the shell in first fifteen to sixty pound and they
show four bags in and closed the hats, you know. So we had
over a million pounds of powder in the forward lower handling rooms. After a
while, Bob Sink, who was the chief quartermaster, came down there and
he said, Louis, see hers up there studying. You're not going to
shore much. You don't have that much money to go ashore, and how
would you like to be a quartermaster strucker? And I said, I'd love
to be because we all knew that the quartermasters were with the officers captain all
the time. They kept the logs, and they were on the bridge,
and they were on the quarterdeck. They didn't have to scrub decks, so
it's like an advancement. And so it wasn't a week later that I was
transferred from Second Division in the End Division, which is a navigation division,
and I had to learn maps and sharts and grids and latitude longitudes and everything
else because I navigated and star sites. And that's what I did and passed
my first exam third class Quartermaster, four months before the Pearl Harbor hit.
While Conter was serving at Pearl Harbor in nineteen forty, America was not at
war, but he says, everyone in the Navy and back home knew it
was coming. Everybody, dude there was coming, just didn't know when.
Even when I went home in November nineteen forty, a year before and my
younger sister's wedding. My older sister was going to Loretta Heights College. She's
two years old, and I am, and I was there for a couple
of three days and for a wedding and everything, and my older sister said,
Loos, I'm going into the convent. I'm going to be a nun,
Loretta nun. And I said, oh, you are, says yes,
says you're in the Navy and you're going to go to war and somebody
has to pray for you. And that was in November nineteen forty, so
everybody in the States knew that we were heading. Remember the Japanese, that
bar didn't start in Pearl Harbor. It started nineteen thirty two. The Japanese
went through Korea. Korea at that time was a one country. They went
through Korea, Manchuria, and Eastern China all the way down the East China
coast from nineteen thirty two to nineteen forty one. Must have killed five to
seven million Chinese on the way down. We knew that someday it was going
to come. We had Philip with our fleet. Asiatic Fleet was based in
the Philippines today at Manila, you know, Sue Bay, and we'd been
out there for years since nineteen o five. While serving in Hawaii as a
twenty year old sailor in nineteen forty one, lu Kanter started dating a local
seventeen year old girl, and that girl's father had some very well placed connections,
including an admiral who gave Kantor his blessing for a new assign that would
take him into the skies instead of keeping him on the seas. I was
over at their house for first of September when I had for dinner and Admiral
Calhoun came in, who was commander of based Force, and he wrote the
orders for Pencer Cole and everything. And so we're sitting there and he said,
well, lou, what are you doing everything? Going to college?
And he said, no, Admiral, I got to tell you, I'm
a third class quartermaster on the us IS Arizona. And he said, well,
that's fine. So I told him about Johnny, saying, let's go
to Flatscow. And he said, well, there's nothing the law against it.
He says, just that most of them are with the planes all the
time, and nobody else puts in for it. So he said, when
you go back to the Arizona, take your exams, have your request signed
by your executive officer. Captain's send it over to me and I'll see if
it passes. All right. So I went back to the ship. Now,
giant geez, let's take the test. So we got all the Lieutenant
Wraggzel, it was our pilot aboard the Arizona, one of our pilot.
It's a senior pilot. And the next time we went to sea, he
gave Johnny and a ride off number three catapult. We were at sea and
doing fifteen to eighteen knots into the wind and shot out in the first time
I'd ever been an airplane in my life. And so we shot off when
it five thousands of feet and they spun around and came back. At that
time the shipping to make a hard port turn and they make a big slick
there and they'd throw out a boom and the plane come in and land on
that slick. And we were in the open sea, and we tacks up
on a rope matt and then the pilot would reach over and hold our belt
where we stood up and we grabbed the hook and hook it into the plane.
They'd set us back on the catapult. And so we passed that and
we sent the request to order to Adual Calhouna and November. First week November
we got orders to Pensacola. But just when Contra thought he was headed to
Pensacola in November, he was told he'd have to wait, but only for
a few weeks. We made our reservations to go back to the twentieth and
November to on the learning and going back to Pittscola. Well, Captain Vauckenberg
called us down jeez often said Johnson you and Connor are not going back to
the learning and said, I'm not going to waste five thousand dollars in the
navy money. Said, we're going back December of the nineteenth the Long Beach
to pick up our one point one gun. So you go back with us
and go from there. And those days you said yes, sir captain,
and that was it. As mentioned, the Americans at Pearl Harbor knew it
was only a matter of time before they would be at war. As a
result, the Navy had the ships doing regular exercises out in the Pacific.
Conter says, the Pacific Fleet had a very consistent training pattern. Half the
fleet would go up and half from a four battleships you up fors or three
to go out with the cruisers and destroyers in one carrier, and the rest
of the stay. And on Monday when we come back, we'd stay out
and the other half went to see and then we'd come in. Because we
knew we were preparing for war, and so there was never over half the
ships to port. The Arizona, which was due to return to the US
mainland later in December, completed another round of training exercises on December fifth,
nineteen forty one. Contre says the commanders wish they could just keep plowing their
way back to California instead of waiting at Pearl Harbor, but they dutifully followed
orders. So we went to see the last week in November and came back
the fifth of December. We were coming into port on a Friday. We
were in a Friday. The fifth Admiral Kidd said that Captain Van and Baker,
we should not be going back into port period, but we had to
go in. When we come back, Lewis Conter shares his vivid memories of
the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. I'm Greg Corumbus and this is Veterans Chronicles
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and their families. Found that in nineteen twenty four, as the seventh chapter
in the state. The organization's presence is most visible through its drop off boxes,
bright green metal containers that can be found outside of grocery stores and on
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the edge of town, where they're met by another team of volunteers. For
more great veteran stories, just go to National Defense Network dot com. This
is Veterans Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbus. Our guest this week is Lewis Kanter,
who passed away in early April twenty twenty four. He was the last
survivor of the USS Arizona, a battleship sunk by the Japanese on December seventh,
nineteen forty one. We just heard mister Contre say that his commanders wished
they didn't have to go back to Pearl Harbor after concluding exercises on December fifth,
nineteen forty one. They wished they could get a head start on their
trip back to the US mainland, scheduled for December nineteenth, but they did
have to return to Pearl Harbor, and two days later, nearly three quarters
of the Arizona crew were killed when the Japanese attacked. And of course just
two days later the Japanese attack unfolded on the morning of Sunday, December seventh,
nineteen forty one, and Leuke Kanter remembered it vividly, so of course
of seventh cop and he's hit five minutes to eight in the morning, and
nine minutes after eight eight or nine minutes after I was keeping the log pay
well, but uh kurt Ains, my other quartermaster, went to the bridge
with the Captain Vaka Murgh and took the log book with him and everything.
And the captain and Admiral Kidd came through right the way they were heading for
the bridges, and he came down to vakners as Connor secured the quarterdet and
come to the bridge secured the lions. Because the best of his outboard of
us, so the quartermaster was on went forward to cut the lines forward on
the port side, and I pulled the gang plank in and uh nine minutes
after it started, a plane came across to probably ten twelve thousand feet with
the sixteen seventeen hundred pound bomb on it dropped and got a lucky hit.
They hit on the starboard side forward by number two turret on the starbde side,
and number two turret went through five decks and into the lower handling room,
and when it went into the lower handling room there went a million pounds
the powder that blew up, and that's when the pictures you all see of
it. And the bow came about thirty forty feet out of the water and
still straight back down and Bob came out of the from the bow from the
fire after throwing the lines off to the vestil and cut the lines, and
Comana Fruquas, who was our senior officer board then it was our first lieutenant,
came up on the quarter deck and he was over by number four and
we got a bomber with her, and he got knocked out for a while,
and we were over between number three turret and the bulkhead and didn't hit
us, about four of us over there, and so he came to and
took charge of the whole ship, and he order us to the guys were
running out of the fire and it was pretty bad. Then said docim my,
conscious if you have to, because they'll they jump over the side there
could burn the death of the fire. So we laid fifteen or six see
them down on the deck there they were coming out burned. And then about
forty minutes, about eight thirty or ninety nine, We don't know exactly what
time, but around that time kind of course that abandoned ship because it was
burning so bad. Forward over there else and the boats were tied up by
the dot and we were tied up by the Fox eight key, and the
liberty boats were tied up. There's fifty foot motor launches by the keys.
So we loaded the guys in the launches and to tell you to the hospital
ship, and we abandoned ship. While the exact timing certainly came as a
major surprise, Contrace says there was no confusion about what was happening. Everyone
knew immediately it was the Japanese. When the first planes came across, the
first ones hit Conyey and they came across the hill. When they came across
the hill, it was immediately that we sounded General quarters. Everybody saw the
reds and they knew immediately what it was, and their guns were firing within
thirty seconds on the ships and on the beach. We had two ways.
The first way he did most of the damage to We had eight battleships there
and they sunk though, so that that was the main part of the fleet.
When the Nevada pulled out to head up the channel, all of the
planes out of the hills headed for her because they wanted to sinker in the
channel. They had to close the fleet off for six eight months, so
they got her out of there, and that's when the chief quartermaster beached her
up there to Barber's point, and then they were a court martial him because
the captain hadn't told him to. But then they decided to give him the
Sting of Service Cross because it was the best thing in the world. He
knew it exactly what he was doing. Contre has always believed it was a
great mistake to have so many American battleships in Pearl Harbor at any one time,
and that made the Japanese attack much more devastat But he also says the
American response that day was very prompt given the circumstances, and by the second
wave, Japanese pilots were paying heavy prices. And the first wave was in
and out in fifteen minutes. You know, they don't spend too much time,
but everything happens, and then the second wave came in eight thirty.
That's when most of the Japanese got shot down as a second wave. The
Japanese attack killed more than two four hundred Americans, including one thousand, one
hundred and seventy seven on the USS Arizona. Only three hundred and thirty five
from the ship survived. The next day, as President Roosevelt declared December seventh
the Day of Infamy and asked Congress for a declaration of war against Japan.
Leu Kanter and others were doing very difficult work at Pearl Harbor. For the
next two days. We fought to fire with the ships, with them both
all noses, and on Tuesday the fire came down a little bit, so
we got out of the base force and slept for one night, and then
we went back and when the ship cooled down. Pete Who's offer was our
chief water tender, and he was our chief diver, and about twelve thirteen
of us went aboard the ship and dove with shallow water helmets, and he
dove with a helmet. He could stayed down three or four hours. We'd
stood on thirty forty five minutes with shallow water, the guys pumping air throst
on the deck. And after four or five days to that, why Pete
told command of Fruit, but it was just too dangerous for getting our arro
hose just caught on the jagged edges and the hatches them, and so they
called it off. Conter was also a man without a ship, so he
was soon given a new assignment on the streets of Honolulu. Pete and I
were transferred up to Honolulu because Captain guys Win was our executive off centership.
He was a full commander, but he made a captain immediately. They made
him pro West Marshall, and he wanted us up there because we were experienced
with forty five's, experienced and sharp shoal and everything else. And we put
out the order that nobody was to be on the streets after sunseter before sunrise
they get shot, and they knew we met it, and there was nobody
that upset that or try death, set or demonstrate or anything else. So
he just live with it until May nineteen forty five when it was pulled.
When we come Back, Lewis Conter leaves Pearl Harbor, but later returns to
serve in the Pacific. He'll also share some of his service in the Cold
War and how the tough jungle survival training course he taught proved to be an
invaluable gift to the leader of the American prisoners at the notorious Hanoi Hilton in
Vietnam. I'm Greg Corumbus and this is Veterans Chronicles. This is Veterans Chronicles.
I'm Greg Corumbus. Our guest in this edition is Lewis Conter, the
last surviving veteran of the uss Arizona. Mister Contra passed away in early April
twenty twenty four. He just shared his memories from the horrific Japanese attack at
Pearl Harbor and the immediate aftermath. A few weeks after the attacks, he
finally had time to visit his girlfriend and her family once again. He soon
ran into the same admiral who quickly wondered why Conter wasn't in flight school as
he had instructed. After Contra explained what had happened, the Admiral proved his
transfer again, and this time LEU Conter really was on his way to Pensacola.
When I'm at penser Cola and we started the third week your fourth week
in January, and that enlisted class, and we went seven days a week,
seven nights a week, studied. I helped with all the navigations of
the pilots. They other aviation ratings for enlisted. We were thirty men in
one class. Helped us with the trusts in the drag on the ships and
was caused a flight and everything else in stalls and engines and radios and everything
else. Because we all knew Morse code backwards, you know. Quartermaster.
I could stand on the bridge at that time and read signals from light signals
from another ship over here, and I'd give them to the chat before the
signal who brought them up here. But it was just like that, and
we did that jerk. So anyway, we got our wings November fifteenth,
nineteen forty two. Once training was done, Conter was flying PB wise and
sent back out to serve in the Pacific. I served VP eleven CHROs brought
eleven from you know, for the first couple of years. We left in
January last of john first February of nineteen forty three and went to Honolulu over
there two months and went to Perth, Australia, which went to six days.
It took us six days to fly to Perth, went Johnson Allen and
Fiji and Eldon Maya and Brisbane, Australia and Adelaide and over the Perth person
on the southwestern coast, and we operated an Indian Ocean out there, and
then went north and operated out of Excelluth Golf and out of Excelluth Golf,
some of us, a couple of us flew into the southern Philippines to pick
up women and children that had gotten out of Manila and gotten south down into
the jungle there and they were protecting them and we had to get him from
the natives area. Had to pick him up winter, pick him up and
get him back to Perth so they could come back to the States. And
we fly out of Excelluth Golf north which was northwestern corner Australia, past tomorrow
in Borneoia and we land at sea at two o'clock in the morning with a
submarine and gas up and then we're going into the Southern Philippines there in the
jungle and high land and pick up fifteen sixteen people, take off and go
back to eath Mac Golf and fly down to Perth. Then they get off
and we did two or three flight slidder first light we did up there and
we took it off and came in north of Tomorrow there and circled about three
times at one thirty in the morning, and there was no submarine Air Force,
so we had to go back to eight thousand feet and go all and
we ran out of gas. Twenty three point five hours in the air.
We ran out of gas going into the export golf and landed and they towed
us in, gassed us up and we took it off from the one down
the Perth dropped the people off. He was shot down twice during his service
off of Australia and beyond. Here is how the first of those harrowing experiences
unfolded. We got shot down one night a Peby. We carried twelve fourteen
parachute flares and the waist act there were two hundred and fifty thousand candle parer
and we'd go out at one thirty in the morning two thirty three thirty.
We'd fly over fifteen hundred feet and throw a couple of amount and keep light
on the Japanese ground positions and keep them awaken all night for a week or
ten days, and they'd be weak when our men are going to fighting.
And we went out and third week in uh September of forty three and up
alongside of the New Guinea about seven eight miles off shore. We got shot
at and uh a bullet went through the waist ats exploded one of these parachue
flares and uh I was in the right hand seat and Gordon Kenny was left
wait to land immediately opened see we landed and everybody came forward closed the ash,
so everything was on fire from the back and uh we had two thousand
pounders and two I entered under the wing when we landed. You went dropped
me just an hour before dark and they all got out the pilot's escape patch.
And Gordon Kennington is our senior pilot. He was lieutenant and he said
to the guys, we didn't get any life tracks or lifeboats. And he
said, you guys, say your prayers, because we're seven miles off short.
It's an hour a little dark, and I don't think any of us
can swim them that long till we get in the shore. And I said
bowl. I said get together and hold hands and tread lightly. And because
the plane was shifting away and the machine guns were firing all those fifty calibers
over the water, and I said, hold hands. If this guy you
get tired, hold him to to on each side, hold them up.
And so it was about thirty minutes and it was getting darker, and one
of our other peb wires was way over and the horizon saw some fire came
back over there. By the time he got over there, we'd been in
the water thirty to forty minutes, spread tread and water. And the guy
didn't say one word after I told him to shut up and do this.
And I was first class PTY officer at that time. I hanging out my
commission there. The Pby circle saw we didn't have a lifeboat and dropped one
of the other. We carried two ten man lifeboats, and the Pby dropped
it out because they couldn't inflate it flowing all the way so and I swam
out and got it landed one ways away from us that open sea, and
in Pensacola training as hard as to turn one of those lifeboats over in the
water, it's just impracticed and possible. And I grabbed that thing. I
fled that thing, I flipped it over and I dove into it, and
I said, Han the hell did I get in here anyway? If we
back got all the other nine guys. We got into the beach at about
two thirty three in the morning, at dark all night long and got into
New Guinea and I got him hiading in their force and uh TD four and
I was by playing captain. Uh watched the patrols, combined everything. He
kept the guys quiet, told him don't even make one sound. And the
next night pet boat. I listened to it about midnight and I said to
TD, I said, that's a pet boat. So we went out in
the in the cut the boat there and got out within one hundred feet of
it, and they had those fifty calibers pointing at hims as they turned those
gd gettings away from him, and so they said, that's Connor Klana board.
We went aboard and they had three d t me on a board,
and they wouldn't let me leave and go back and get the other guys.
Said no, we're going anything. So I briefed him exactly where they were,
names and everything they were in, and back in forty five minutes with
all other eight men and we got in that pet boat headed south full speed,
got into the Half Moon. We were operating off half Moon San Pablo,
and we had it in the next morning and went to breakfast, debriefed,
slept that night. Later on the next day and the next nine at
five point thirty, took another PBI out for thirteen and a half our mission.
That's how it was in those days. After serving for a couple of
years as a pilot, Leu Kanter was back on the US mainland by early
nineteen forty five, and he was here when the war ended with the US
dropping atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. To put it
mildly, it irritates Kanter when he hears that the US owes the Japanese an
apology for dropping those bombs. He says it was a blessing for both sides.
Before the seventy fifth anniversary, three Japanese reporters came here at the house
and any wanted to talk to me about to Pearl Harbor. They said that
they were going to meet Obama, the Prime minister. We're going to meet
Obama the last week in December in Honolulu, and they wanted to see if
he was going to apologize them for dropping the atomic yomb and I said,
hell, no, he's not going to pology. I hope he hasn't.
I said the Prime minister Japan should thank him for us dropping the atomic bomb,
because we only killed two hundred thousand Japanese and the war was over,
and if we would have gone on, we were training the million and a
half man to land there in November nineteen forty five, and we would have
lost probably five hundred thousand. But in doing that, we'd have had to
level the whole area before we landed, and probably five to seven million Japanese
where gotten killed. So we saved seven million lines by dropping the atomic bombs.
After after the war, lu Conter left the service to go to college,
not realizing that if he had just stayed in the Navy and waited a
couple of months, the government would have paid for his education, but it
would not be long before Conter was back in the Navy. Now it wasn't
about fighting Japan, though, it was about thwarting Soviet aggression and sinister intentions
during the Cold War. Contra describes a mission to Iceland that also demonstrates the
lengths to which the Soviets would try to gain an advantage back in those days.
When I went to the fifth feet, the Admiral said, Lewis said,
I want you to grew up to Kefler. We had three planes up
for Iceland, pvs pete to eat the view of their flyers somewhere whether the
Russians are getting into our telephone cable and listened to our conversation. I went
to Keplovic rode in the right seat of the PV with the pilot on the
other side. I was a pilot to it, you know, And I
said to the guys, now we're going out over the North Sea north of
Scotland, and you fly with the Russian fishing fleet. They got fifteen to
twenty boats there, fishing boats. You go down to fifty feet off the
water and you can see the four or five of them. The guys who
are standing the attention. They're spotless, there's no lines, are all coiled
up and everything else. The other the fishermen they got really looking a patch
and they're working like heck. So I went down fifty feet. It took
pictures of these Russian soldiers and they had divers down and they were diving to
the international cable. They're cutting into it and listen to the conversation. Nearly
fifties, for God's sakes. Before long, the Cold War heated up on
the Korean peninsula and loke Conter was called up on very short notice. When
I got to Intelle school, and then after that I went to International Relations
into ABC school, which is atomic biology or chemical warfare school. My wife
walked into the office when they said, what's this? I let telegram,
reported me, and he signed the DUDI Korean War twenty fifth of June in
nineteen fifties. That night, I was in San Diego and Carrier Group one
oh two as intelligence officer the Air Group Counter Service in Korea would be brief.
As an intelligence officer, his superiors did not want to risk him being
captured, so they grounded him and by the end of nineteen fifty one,
Leukanter was home after a difficult divorce and time investigating crimes within the Navy.
Conter was given assignments much more to his liking. One he is particularly proud
of was teaching service members tactics to survive in the jungle. And then he
sent me over to Fort brag North Carolina with the Army Special Forces. I
went through training and other special forces at Fort Bragnorth, Carolina. So I
did that. As soon as I got back to Norfolk, I was made
the first sheer officer in the Navy scre and thats survival and evasion, escape,
resistance to interrogation in an espionage And after that, my job was to
set up schools around the world and train pilots and our crewmen how to live
if they got shot down, how to live in the jungles, how to
evade and escape. Remember, thirty five percent of the world as jungles,
and our men were more afraid of the jungles than they were the Japanese.
It was hard. You don't know, I live in the jungles. You're
dead in a minute. Counts class was tough, so tough that it was
almost scrapped. But his class not only survived, it played a critical role
in preparing service members for the horrors to come in our nation's next war.
Jim Stockdale came out in Pendland. I had won Penland and attend day school
and fifty eight. That's after I went. I went to the Naval War
Caius Semi Naval War Giuds of fifty eight and I came back from that and
I went Pendland. I was often charged with this exercise and we he had
an air group out of Mirrormark come up. But this commander walked into my
office. I was also in charge of the whole exercise, and he said,
Louis, I'm from Washington Personnel, Navy Department. He was a Navy
pilot full commander, and he said, we've got a lot of reports from
mothers and fathers and senators that your schools are two damned hard on them and
they're guys who are losing ten or fifteen pounds and ten days. And I
said, well, maybe they should have lost it beforehand, but anyway,
he says, so they sent me out to go through the school of yours
and just to see the report back to him. So I says, okay,
don't tell them who I am. So I put him in the north
end. I had four green rays come out of Fort Bragnoth Cline. We
dropped him in the north end of Penland. I mean, Penland had two
hundred and thirty five marines for a grocer forces, and we built a pow
camp and so the green breeds led them down through the barbaryron everything else,
and we capture him. So we captured Jim and brought him in, put
him in the pits, run the water through the pits and everything, you
know, and some guys those pits you land on it, you run the
water, and they are four or five hours there. They'll look at acts.
They kissed my fanny, you know, there been some guys would be
in there fifteen minutes and they'll start crying and going to pieces. They can't
take it. So anyway, we had him in those pits and everything.
So finally the four terrogators were out of Army Air Force Colora springs the AIS,
which is intelligence squad for the Air Force interrogators. And this colonel said,
Loua, that guy is not in that squad, and I can tell
well. Anyway, the next morning I introduced him. He said it was
the best training he ever had in his life, and he's worth it.
Because they thought they were spending to Congressman thought they were spending too much money
that the guys could learn this off for computers. I said, you can't
even get a guy hungry in ten days, for God's sakes. You gotta
get him hungry to make him live in the jungles. So anyway, he
went back to Washington in fifty eight fifty nine and said the report was good.
Sixty eight sixty one a head. He's time up in Pentagon, and
they made a commanding officer over their group, and he went to the South
Pacific, and then Vietnam came along, and he was shot down in sixty
four or five and became a pow and he made vice admiral in the prison
camp. He was seven years in the podev camp in Vietnam. He got
rescued in seventy two and when he came back, he landed in Travis.
He made a vice admiral in the prison camp. You know, he was
a senior one on away over McCaine and everything. He called me personally on
the phone. He got my phone number and called me at home and said,
I want to thank you lou for being so damn tough and giving me
such tough training, because that saved my life. Fact, I've never lived
that long in that foundition with the food and the beatings and everything else without
knowing what was going on. Thank you very much. I'm glad if I
saved one person, I'm happy with one brief interruption. After World War Two,
Lewis Conter served our nation in the US Navy from nineteen thirty nine to
nineteen sixty seven, and for more than eighty two years, he carried the
stories and memories of his shipmates from the USS Arizona. As the survivors passed
away one by one, Contra's voice and work became more and more important,
including this past year, as he was the only living survivor. We're honored
to have recorded his story and we're very grateful for his service. I'm Greg
Corumbus, and this is Veterans Chronicles. Hi, this is Greg Corumbus,
and thanks for listening to Veterans Chronicles, a presentation of the American Veterans Center.
For more information, please visit American Veteranscenter dot org. You can also
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