Tending Submarines

Prewar to Submarines

Life Aboard Ship

Occupation Duty

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Dale Smith was assigned to the USS Proteus (AS-19), a submarine repair and supply ship. It was big and had about 800 people on board. They had a torpedo shop, plumbers, and electricians. They went to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii] for a short time. They then went to Guam [Annotator's Note: Guam, Mariana Islands] for almost a year. When the war was over, they went to Tokyo Bay [Annotator's Note: Tokyo Bay, Japan] for the surrender. When Smith first arrived at Pearl Harbor, he was put aboard the USS Holland (SS-1) to go to Midway [Annotator's Note: Midway Atoll] to catch the Proteus. They serviced submarines from there. They went back to Pearl and then Guam until the Japanese surrendered. They watched the surrender through binoculars. While at Midway, there was a small submarine fleet in the South China Sea. One of them had surfaced underneath a Chinese transport. The periscope pierced the bottom the of the ship. They believe it sunk. The submarine came in for repairs. They had to stay surfaced on the trip there. At Guam, there were several ships that came in but nothing serious.

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Dale Smith was born in Ontario, California in March 1925. His great grandfather moved there in 1892 and was a founder. His father was born there. He enlisted when the war broke out in his senior year of high school. He had always been partial to the Navy. He had been a Boy Scout and Sea Scout. He was kept in school for a short time. Five of them were put in the local college for about a month. They then were sent to the University of Texas [Annotator's Note: in Austin, Texas] to prepare for officer training. Something happened and they were sent to active duty. He went to San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California] for boot camp. His folks could come down on weekends. He made great friends there and kept in touch. One Christmas, he took home nine guys with him. His mother adopted the whole group and wrote them during the war. They all visited her after the war. He attended electrician school in San Diego. He went through gyrocompass school at Treasure Island [Annotator's Note: Naval Station Treasure Island, San Francisco Bay, California]. He then was a gyrocompass technician on the USS Proteus (AS-19).

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Dale Smith was aboard the USS Proteus (AS-19) 99 percent of the time. They had movies and a huge mess hall. If no submarines were in for repair, he would help others do their work. Everybody got along fine. At sea, they would not have movies. At Guam [Annotator's Note: Guam, Mariana Islands], they went across the island and took over a large Quonset hut where they built a rest camp for the submarine crews. When they were steaming into Guam, they began to smell a terrific odor. They entered Apra Harbor where there is a 900 foot tall cliff. Hundreds of Japanese had jumped off the cliff and committed suicide. Some of them were still alive there. They would steal clothes and things but mostly behaved themselves. At the rest camp, they had a movie screen. They had a lot of war pictures that showed Americans fighting the Japanese. Some of the Japanese in the trees would shoot the screens. They did not try to hit anybody, but they did not like the movies and gave their protest. Smith was on Guam when the atomic bombs [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945] were dropped. They were picked to go to Tokyo Bay [Annotator's Note: Japan], and they headed there as fast as they could. He could watch the ceremony. They then went to Kamakura [Annotator's Note: Kamakura, Japan] and were in charge of demilitarizing the base.

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[Annotator's Note: Dale Smith served in the Navy aboard the submarine tender USS Proteus (AS-19) and was at Kamakura, Japan demilitarizing the base after Japan surrendered.] He was housed with a Japanese family. [Annotator's Note: The tape breaks and then starts over.] They had no submarines to work on and Smith was bugging his division officer for something to do. The Navy took over a block of Kamakura. Two other men and Smith lived with three families. It was a red-light district [Annotator's Note: an area for prostitution]. The Navy had moved the prostitutes to one hotel where they assigned doctors to. Smith's job was to patrol the area and tell sailors to go to the hotel. The people were the most hospitable and friendly people. He wrote to them until most of them passed away. He was at Kamakura and was on the street when an old woman with some kids ran up and hugged him. She said "thank you for saving them." The Japanese had been told the Americans were going to kill them on sight. They had not wanted the war in the first place. The worst place he saw was Yokohama [Annotator's Note: Yokohama, Japan]. It had been almost completely wiped out. He "borrowed" a Japanese tugboat and took it there to see Yokohama. He was in Japan for about four weeks. He then returned to Pearl [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii] and he got off the ship. He returned to the United States on the USS Arkansas (BB-33). He went to Terminal Island [Annotator's Note: Los Angeles County, California] and got discharged. He returned to Ontario [Annotator's Note: Ontario, California]. One of his former crew members went into the movies and changed his name to Tony Curtis [Annotator's Note: Anthony Curtis; born Bernard Schwartz].

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