William Anderson enlisted in the Navy. It took him five days to get through because they found a spot on his lungs from pneumonia as a child. He went to boot camp and he had no real trouble with it. It was three meals a day and no hard work. He learned how to swim better. He had one day on the firing range. He then went to San Diego [Annotator's Note: California] to the US Naval Training Station torpedo school. Four months later, he went to the destroyer base to advanced torpedo school. Two months after that, he received his third class torpedoman rating. Training was basically how they were made and how to maintain them. They learned how to fire them aboard ship. Nothing was mentioned about how they did not work. The advanced school was more detailed. He then went to Treasure Island, San Francisco and boarded a troop ship to Ulithi Island [Annotator's Note: Caroline Islands, Micronesia], where he boarded the USS Conyngham (DD-371). He thought it was something different. He had never really been aboard a ship. The torpedo gang had a chief, two first class, two second-class, and one third-class torpedomen besides him. They were good about accepting him and he liked them very much.

William Anderson was born in August 1924 in Weldon, Iowa. He grew up on a farm and remembers milking cows before he went to school. He graduated high school at 16 and worked on the farm. The Great Depression affected his family but they had plenty of food due to the farm. They went bare footed in the summer and only got new shoes in the fall for school. They had two pairs overalls, one to work in and one to wear to school. When he graduated the eighth grade, he got his first pair of store purchased long pants. He never had a bicycle growing up. The family listened to the news on a battery powered radio and they knew of the troubles brewing. His father only let them listen to the news. They did not have running water on the farm or electricity. He remembers Pearl Harbor distinctly. He was at his grandmother's house. After Sunday dinner, he was laying on the floor reading the newspaper when the news came over the radio that Pearl Harbor William Anderson was born 22 August 1924 in Weldon, Iowa. He grew up on a farm and remembers he was milking cows before he went to school. He graduated high school at 16 and worked on the farm. The Depression affected his family – they had plenty of food due to the farm. They went bare-footed in the summer and only got new shoes in the fall for school. They had two pairs overalls – one to work in and one to wear to school. When he graduated the eighth grade, he got his first pair of store-purchased long pants. He never had a bicycle growing up. The family listened to the news on a battery-powered radio and they knew of the troubles brewing. His father only let them listen to the news. They did not have running water on the farm or electricity. He remembers Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Hawaii; Japanese attack, 7 December 1941] distinctly. He was at his grandmother's house. After Sunday dinner, he was laying on the floor reading the newspaper when the news came over the radio that Pearl Harbor had been attacked. He had no idea where Hawaii was, and it did not seem very close. The draft had already started, and several local boys were picked up in 1940, but it intensified after the attack. A lot of people were joining. Most of them were older than him and a lot of them joined to beat the draft. His parents were aware he would be drafted eventually. He had seen Army people on the newsreels walking and sleeping in the mud, so he joined the Navy. He had never seen the ocean before.

As a torpedoman on the USS Conyngham (DD-371), William Anderson's general quarters station was the starboard torpedo mount on the main deck. It was a four tube mount. His job was to maintain them. The invasion of Leyte [Annotator's Note: Battle of Leyte, 17 October to 26 December 1944, invasion of Leyte, Philippines] was his first combat. He was at general quarters and the kamikazes came over. They would make a Christian out of you. They would come over, drop their bombs and then circle back and aim right at the ship. They were strafed once but never hit by a kamikazes. The plane came in from the aft of the ship. The guys in the Number 3, five inch gun turret thought the plane was going to hit the fantail so they jumped off. It did not hit them and went down just off the port side. He can still see the pilot's eyes. They picked the men up. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer points out that this is a court martial offense.] Nobody got charged with abandoning ship. That would have been a kick in the teeth. During the invasion of Leyte, there were many ships there. After the landing, they took another force to Ormoc Bay on the other side. On the way there, they were attacked by a lot of kamikazes. Two hit the USS Reid (DD-369) right ahead of them and it went down real fast [Annotator's Note: on 11 December 1944]. One plane hit the number three magazine. They were fortunate and they made it around escorting the landing craft. Seeing that has stuck with him. Occasionally at night, when he cannot sleep, he is still thinking about some of the things that happened. They were not able to come to the aid of anyone from the Reid. They were under orders to just keep going. Some ships behind them might have picked up survivors.

William Anderson first saw the new destroyers with the twin, five inch guns after the USS Reid (DD-369) had been hit by kamikazes. One of them got hit too but it did not sink. He figured the Japanese were trying to kill them all the time. When the Bettys [Annotator's Note: Japanese Mistubishi G4M, or, Mitsubishi Navy Type 1 attack bomber, also known as the Betty] came over, they would just drop their bombs and go back to where they came from. After Leyte [Annotator's Note: Battle of Leyte, 17 October to 26 December 1944], they made many landings in the Philippines and the next big one was Lingayen Gulf [Annotator's Note: Invasion of Lingayen Gulf; Philippines, 6 January 1945]. After that, they went down to Corregidor [Annotator's Note: Corregidor Island, Philippines] with a Dutch cruiser. They bombarded Corregidor for two days before the Army landed paratroopers. There were a lot of them whose parachutes did not open, and he saw them hit the rock. At the entrance to Manila Harbor, they detected a Japanese submarine and dropped many 600 pound depth charges on them. He does not know whether they hit it or not, but they saw oil and bed sheets coming to the surface. Before they went into the harbor, three minesweepers went in ahead of them. They were the first man-o-war that went in behind them and Anderson remembers the first thing he saw was a white smokestack sticking out the water with a red cross on it. It was a hospital ship the Japanese had sunk. After that they made landings in the Philippines chain for quite a while. He was not aware of the significance of retaking Corregidor until after the war. After the war, Anderson worked for an engineering company at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico. A man who worked for him had been captured on Corregidor and spent the war mining coal in northern Japan. That man had some stories to tell. He had made the march with a damaged leg. Anderson does not recall being told about Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] dying. Anderson's last operation was on 4 July 1945, landing Australian troops [Annotator's Note: Australian 7th Division] on Balikpapan, Borneo. An Australian Army officer was on board and those guys were bitter. They had been in North Africa, England and the United States and had not been home in five years. About one week later, they had everything secure there. They never took one Japanese prisoner. At Leyte, a big deal was made of MacArthur [Annotator's Note: US Army General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area] going back on the beach. At the time of the landing, he came over in his airplane surrounded by P-38s [Annotator's Note: Lockheed P-38 Lightning fighter aircraft]. The fleet had already gone up north and they had no air protection from the kamikazes. When MacArthur went ashore, the beach was secure. There was no problem at all.

William Anderson returned to San Diego [Annotator's Note: California] on Thanksgiving Day [Annotator's Note: 22 November] 1945. There was a band at the pier. Anderson had duty that day and did not get liberty until the next day. It was great to be home. His first liberty had been in Manila [Annotator's Note: Philippines] on the way home. He took a three day train trip back to Iowa. It was great to get home in one piece. He had twin brothers younger than him. They joined the Navy in 1944 right out of high school. They stayed together the whole time and were discharged before he was. He recently went to a restaurant in Santa Rosa, California. He was waiting to be seated and saw an elderly gentleman sitting in a booth all by himself. Anderson had his cap on, and they talked. They had both been at Leyte [Annotator's Note: Philippines] and Anderson said he recalled MacArthur's [Annotator's Note: US Army General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area] plane being surrounded by P-38s [Annotator's Note: Lockheed P-38 Lightning fighter aircraft]. The gentleman told him that he had been flying one of those very P-38s. Anderson feels that The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] is very important. He has been to Washington D.C. and saw the museum there. Kids today must study and learn about World War 2. He lived in Southern California for 41 years and a Japanese family moved across the street from him. Anderson's wife asked the Japanese man what Japan teaches about World War 2. He told her there is one paragraph about how the Americans attacked the Japanese islands but nothing about Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. The G.I. Bill is the greatest thing we ever did. Anderson was 25 when he used it to attend Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. He thought he wanted to be a school teacher until he did his practice teaching. This was on the east side of Des Moines in the packing house district. The students were low class whites, blacks, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, 9A and 9B [Annotator's Note: unable to locate definition] kids for algebra and general science. It was like trying to teach a wall something. [Annotator's Note: Anderson speaks with poor grammar relating something said to him.] Anderson says he was not cut out to be a teacher, so he switched to major in Physics. He got a job with the Air Force as a civilian engineer. He worked for them for ten years. He wants people to know that they live in the greatest country in the world and that they are fortunate to be born in the United States. [Annotator’s Note: Anderson gets emotional.]