Paul Sartori Jr.’s father was an immigrant from northern Italy. They were carriage makers and blacksmiths. His father knew how to work when he was eight years old. His mother’s side had been in the United States since the Revolution [Annotator’s Note: the American Revolution, 1765 to 1783]. Sartori was born in July 1924 in Shreveport, Louisiana. He has one sister and one brother. He was on two different tankers in the South Pacific. The Australians would drop depth charges [Annotator's Note: also called a depth bomb; an anti-submarine explosive munition resembling a metal barrel or drum] on the submarines. They had a five-inch gun on the stern. They did not want to engage anyone. They wanted to run and get the oil.

Paul Sartori Jr. was a boatsman’s mate second class. He did maintenance work and was a gunner. They were on the ship for 13 or 14 months. They were in the South Pacific and Australia getting oil. They were an easy target for the Japanese submarines. They went into the Indian Ocean, then into the Persian Gulf [Annotator’s Note: an extension of the Indian Ocean between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula]. The Persian Gulf kept the war going. They shuttled back and forth to England getting fuel. It was so hot in the Persian Gulf that the deck was over 100 degrees. They had cargo ships with them. They were waiting on orders in July 1944 and were sent to South Africa. The people there loved cigarettes. They had to get the ship fixed before they could start hauling again.

Paul Sartori Jr. went home on leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] and then went to Treasure Island [Annotator's Note: Naval Station Treasure Island near San Francisco, California] to get shipped out again. He was sent to California for landing craft school [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft Vehicle, Personnel or LCVP; also known as the Higgins boat] and then he was sent to the Philippines. The airplanes would come over them in the mornings and they would be on fire. They had to carry cargo over to the islands. When they got to the Philippines, there was still fighting in Leyte. They worked in the water and learned how to do things in the boats. Some of the men got impetigo [Annotator’s Note: Iimpetigo occurs when the skin becomes infected with bacteria]. They had to take penicillin to help with the infection. The next day they did not have any blisters. It would have taken everyone to invade Japan. The Japanese did not give up. They picked up a Japanese pilot who bailed out of his plane. The Japanese pilot cut one of their arms wide open. The coxswain [Annotator's Note: person in charge of a small boat and its crew] had to knock him over the head. Then they took both of them to the sick bay.

Paul Sartori Jr. was in the Philippines when the atomic bombs were dropped [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945]. It was a large staging area. The Japanese did not give up after the first bomb. Truman [Annotator's Note: Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States] said they had to drop the second one. After the second bomb, they quit. They started clearing the area. They had to sink some of the boats. They hid their barrels of diesel on the islands of the Philippines. They took the engines out of the boats and then would sink them.

Paul Sartori Jr. returned home in January 1946. His father was waiting for him. He needed him to go to work. He was a second-class boatmate [Annotator’s Note: Boatswain’s mate second class]. He stayed in the reserves. He went out to the Caribbean. They would take recruits down to Puerto Rico. He was in the reserves for four years. He got married and had three children. He chose to get out after that and went back to work. His sister had graduated with a degree in chemistry. His brother was in law school. When he returned home, his skin was yellow. They had to take a pill on the islands to prevent mosquito bites [Annotator's Note: they took atabrine, a trade name for mepacrine, or quinacrine; an anti-malarial medication]. His mother wanted to feed him to help with his color and weight. His mother wanted him to go back to school. His father needed him to go to work and help get things started in the right direction. He worked on heavy trucks and did bodywork. He did commercial work on tanks. They worked on 2700 bomb containers for Vietnam [Annotator's Note: Vietnam War, or Second Indochina War, 1 November 1955 to 30 April 1975]. Sartori retired in 2001.

Paul Sartori Jr. was proud of serving in the Navy. He felt good about doing something for his country. He served with people from all walks of life. He does not think young people understand what they went through. [Annotator’s Note: Sartori talks about his grandsons.] He remembers when he went on a trip to Portland [Annotator’s Note: Portland, Oregon]. Then they went to Guam. They were in the Coral Sea and it was difficult for submarines to navigate. Parrots would land on the ship. He had never seen birds like this before. He learned about the Aboriginal people. He thinks the museum is wonderful [Annotator's Note: The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana]. It brought back so many memories. His three daughters cried during the show at the museum. His father had to wait until he was a citizen to join the service for World War One [Annotator's Note: World War 1, global war originating in Europe; 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918]. The day his father was supposed to ship out, the armistice was signed. His father regretted he never got to serve because of his citizenship.