Walter Amoss was born in 1924 in Lake Charles [Annotator's Note: Lake Charles, Louisiana] and grew up in New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] until he went to a boy's boarding school just outside Asheville, North Carolina. He was a freshman when he entered the school in 1938. The boys did all the work for the school except cooking. The head of the school was a veteran of World War 1 [Annotator's Note: World War 1, global war originating in Europe; 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918] who had been wounded in France. The students greatly admired him. That was where he was when he heard the news of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on that Sunday morning [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. The Depression [Annotator's Note: the Great Depression was a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1939 in the United States] was fully underway when he entered the school in 1938. By the time the Depression hit, Amoss somewhat understood what was going on. His immediately related families moved in with his grandmother who owned a house. The house was full and had about 20 people inhabiting it. He had few anxieties until his father left his job in 1930. His father was a Tulane [Annotator's Note: Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana] engineering graduate and worked all along the Mississippi River dredging it. At one point, the family moved to Venezuela with his work. When the collapse came and money disappeared, his father lost his job. He became a meter reader for the New Orleans public utilities. In 1938, Amoss was getting with a wild crowd at school, so his father sent him to the religious school in North Carolina. Amoss' father had received many promotions by that time and became vice-president of the utility company. When the war started in 1941, Amoss heard the news of the attack [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor attack] after church service. His father was invited by the Navy to recruit engineers for them and was sent to Washington [Annotator's Note: Washington, D.C.] in 1943. Not knowing what to do with officers who were not seamen, the Navy placed Amoss' father in charge of a project to plan for the demobilization of the Navy and Marine Corps. With the sudden end of the war, his plan was immediately needed. For his efforts, he received many commendations including the Legion of Merit [Annotator's Note: the Legion of Merit is awarded to members of the United States Armed Forces for exceptionally meritorious conduct and outstanding service]. Amoss' father returned to New Orleans and picked up his life. Had the war not ended, Amoss was being prepared to participate in the invasion of Honshu [Annotator's Note: Operation Downfall was to commence in November 1945 with the invasion of Honshu, Japan planned for March 1946].

Walter Amoss was 17 years of age when the war started. Like his fellow students, he wanted to join the military and go fight the Japs [Annotator's Note: a period derogatory term for Japanese]. He wanted to be a Naval aviator, but his father talked him out of it. He joined a program which was a forerunner of the V-12 program [Annotator's Note: V-12 US Navy College Training Program, 1943 to 1946]. He enlisted in the Navy and applied for NROTC [Annotator's Note: Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps] program at Tulane [Annotator's Note: Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana]. He completed an accelerated program and was commissioned as an ensign [Annotator's Note: lowest rank of commissioned officer in the US Navy and Coast Guard] in late 1944. After a nine-day leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time], he was put on a ship in San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California] to meet the ship he was to report to. His assigned ship was to be at Guam [Annotator's Note: Guam, Solomon Islands]. The ship traveled with the fleet and made various emergency repairs on battle damages sustained by other warships. It was called the USS Oceanus [Annotator's Note: USS Oceanus (ARB-2)] and had just left Guam headed to Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan] when he reached there. The ship would help many vessels damaged at Okinawa including removing bodies in hard hit compartments. The repairs would at least get the injured ships to a forward base with drydocks. Kamikazes [Annotator's Note: Japanese Special Attack Units, also called shimbu-tai, who flew suicide missions in aircraft] came over the White Beach every day. It became commonplace. Amoss was first division deck commander for a group of quad 40s [Annotator's Note: Bofors 40mm antiaircraft automatic cannon] set for the Oceanus' defense. His battle station was with the men in the gun tubs up forward. He is not sure his crew hit anything, but he observed many kamikazes hitting other ships. One enemy plane hit a ship nearby that had set up chairs for Sunday morning service on deck. Another incident involved a cruiser nearby at the main Okinawa anchorage. The kamikaze flew straight down on the warship. It was impossible to hit it before it struck the Columbia [Annotator's Note: USS Columbia (CL-56)] which took a loss of a couple of hundred men. The other technique the Japanese suicide pilots used was to fly close to the water before impacting a target so that American antiaircraft guns could not be lowered enough to fire on them. The invasion of Okinawa started in April [Annotator's Note: Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, 1 April to 22 June 1945 at Okinawa, Japan]. In June [Annotator's Note: June 1945], the Oceanus sailed into Leyte Gulf [Annotator's Note: Leyte Gulf, Philippines] where a huge fleet was being gathered for the upcoming invasion of Japan. Amoss was transferred to a rocket firing landing craft, LCI(R)-785. He was to participate in offshore bombardment of inland targets during the invasion of Japan. Amoss had no training in rockets, but he studied and found it to be very simple. Fortunately, the first bomb was dropped on Hiroshima [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapon dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, 6 August 1945]. The fleet was incredulous. The news was stunning that the indescribable device was dropped on a city and destroyed everyone in it. Days later another bomb was dropped [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapon dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, 9 August 1945] and shortly thereafter the word was received that the emperor [Annotator's Note: Emperor Hirohito, also called Emperor Showa, Emperor of Japan] decided to surrender. It was lucky because without the leader's direction it may have been chaos in Japan. When Amoss went ashore, he was amazed at how docile the local population was. He went to MacArthur's [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area] headquarters and spent four days there after the surrender.

Walter Amoss reached the Imperial Hotel [Annotator's Note: in Tokyo, Japan] where the headquarters for MacArthur [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area] was not yet established. Meanwhile, Amoss enjoyed his stay having anything and everything he wanted or needed at no cost. When MacArthur's people did take over the hotel, they ordered everyone out. When a group of Russians including a marshal did not immediately comply, an MP [Annotator's Note: military police] pulled his .45 [Annotator's Note: .45 caliber M1911 semi-automatic pistol] and poked it in the chest of one of the Soviets and ordered them to get out. They soon moved out of the hotel. Amoss relocated to the Dai-ichi Hotel [Annotator's Note: in Tokyo, Japan]. The streets were empty. Women were only seen in department stores. He bought bolts of silk for his mother and soon to be wife. The organ music in the department store must have been the only American song known by the organist. It was "The Old Gray Mare Ain't What She Used to Be" [Annotator's Note: The Old Gray Mare, American folk song]. His LCI rocket ship [Annotator's Note: LCI(R)-785 or landing craft, infantry fitted for launching rockets] was turned over to another group and Amoss was reassigned to a cruiser, the Vicksburg [Annotator's Note: USS Vicksburg (CL-86)]. He went to Tokyo Bay to board the ship, but it had left the day before. He was flown to San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California] and joined the Vicksburg for the famous Navy Day Parade in October 1945. Amoss returned to New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] where he had one semester left to complete his academic requirements at Tulane [Annotator's Note: Tulane University in New Orleans]. Having accomplished that, he went to work for Lykes Steamship Company [Annotator's Note: Lykes Brothers Steamship Company] in New Orleans. It was a big company. Interested in transportation, he stayed with the company for 47 years and retired as Chairman of the Board. He was President of the company for 20 years. He was assigned overseas for the company and had a great career with them. He retired in 1993.

Walter Amoss was interested in Naval aviation but never had much interest in serving in other branches. He passed the entrance examinations for the Naval Academy [Annotator's Note: United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland], but his eyesight prevented his entry. He was always interested in the Navy though. War is a combination of boredom and terror. It would be worse for an infantryman or Marine who had to fight on land, hand to hand. The kamikazes [Annotator's Note: Japanese Special Attack Units, also called shimbu-tai, who flew suicide missions in aircraft] did not cause him fear at Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Battle of Okinawa, codenamed Operation Iceberg, 1 April to 22 June 1945 at Okinawa, Japan] because he grew used to their attacks. The only caveat being when they flew close to the water to prevent defensive fire from their targets. The fleet made a nasty smelling smoke to camouflage the anchorage. Amoss got used to the attacks and the danger they represented. A few kamikazes hit close to him. The men fighting on the ground amaze him. Amoss loved the sea and wanted to be in the Navy. His business life continued that passion [Annotator's Note: he was President and Chairman of the Board for Lykes Steamship Company, a large shipping company based in New Orleans, Louisiana. His career with Lykes spanned 47 years]. When he was President of Lykes, he signed a contract to build large container ships with two companies in Japan. He attended launch ceremonies in Japan and was introduced to an individual who had a special distinction. He survived nuclear bombings in both Hiroshima and Nagasaki [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945]. Returning to Japan many times, he observed the rebuilding of the devastated land. He saw the rejuvenation of the country in a short time. World War 2 left its mark on anyone involved whether fighting or not. It made a deep impression on Amoss. People moved all about the country and saw places in Europe and the Pacific they would never have seen otherwise. It made a tremendous impact on their intellectual life. The war pulled the country out of the Depression [Annotator's Note: the Great Depression was a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1939 in the United States] and put money in people's pockets. The great migration from rural to urban life transformed the country. It was a source of the move for equality for Black people who had been everything but slaves before. Interactions with white people, who took their status for granted, got the ball rolling on something that should have happened previously. Morals were affected as well as intellectual lives. It brought on more social justice than in prewar society. The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana] is absolutely wonderful. Amoss, as President of Lykes, knew Steve Ambrose [Annotator's Note: Historian and author Stephen E. Ambrose; founder of National D-Day Museum, now The National World War II Museum, New Orleans, Louisiana]. The museum is an asset for the community. Many veterans and people from all over the world come to see it. In "Beyond All Boundaries" [Annotator's Note: Beyond All Boundaries, a 2009 short film depicting the battles of World War 2 at The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana] when Tom Hanks [Annotator's Note: Thomas Jeffrey Hanks, American actor, filmmaker] talks of casualties, he mentions Russia's contribution of 23 million lives lost in the defeat of Nazism. That contribution is not adequately covered in the museum. America lost not quite 500,000 people where the Soviets lost 23 million. That should be more prominent in the displays at the museum. It is important that future generations know what veterans did in the war, or it will be like the Civil War [Annotator's Note: American Civil War, 1861 to 1865]. Amoss did not know much about that war. People now have an interest in that period of a young country coming to prominence. The veterans of World War 2 wanted to forget their experiences and go on with their lives in a bright new world. Now as those veterans fade [Annotator's Note: die], the people who come after them need to be reminded of what they did. The museum is doing a good job of telling the story of what it took to make the America that we have today.

Walter Amoss feels nostalgic when he visits the museum [Annotator's Note: The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana]. The nostalgia comes from memories of his youth. His father joined the Navy at a more advanced age. There were many older men who made the sacrifices during the war despite being in their 40s. Saipan [Annotator's Note: Battle of Saipan, part of Operation Forager, 15 June to 9 July 1944; Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands] and Iwo [Annotator's Note: Battle of Iwo Jima, 19 February to 26 March 1945 at Iwo Jima, Japan] were two miserable battles. Amoss reached Saipan en route to his ship [Annotator's Note: the USS Oceanus (ARB-2)] in March 1945. He walked the cliffs where they jumped off [Annotator's Note: mass suicide involving civilians jumping from seaside cliffs occurred in the latter stages of the Battle of Saipan]. He swam in the beaches where the destroyed amtracks [Annotator's Note: Landing Vehicle, Tracked or LVT; also referred to as amtrack or alligator] still remained. Those that survived those two battles led charmed lives. There were high casualties for men who were inexperienced in combat during those battles. [Annotator's Note: Interview terminates at 0:46:26:000.]