Problems in the Pacific
John E. Peterson, Special to the Gazette
Thursday, September 2, 2010
I had just paid for my purchases and had taken a couple of steps toward leaving Graves Drug Store when a gentleman stopped me. He said, “Excuse me, Dr. Peterson, but I must make a comment.” He went on to tell me how much he enjoyed my last column about my Navy days on Manus Island in the Pacific.
I thanked him and told him I had been thinking about writing some more about my experiences there. He said I certainly should do that. So, here I go in telling you about some of our problems on Manus. I would do that, if I had my way.
The biggest problem we had on Manus was malaria. The darned mosquitos were biting us and passing it on to us. We were all supposed to take a yellow anti-malarial drug called atabrine, but lots of us would not take it.
Our enlisted men were each given one at the front of the food line. Many of them tossed the pill on the ground because the rumor was that it would ruin their sexuality. That was not true, but it caused a problem.
One of our warrant officers refused to take his daily atabrine. He growsed that he had been in the Navy 25 years, had been all over the world and had never had malaria. Wow! Did he get it! He was sick for days and took his atabrine regularly thereafter.
I took my atabrine faithfully, but still got a mild dose of malaria. Three men and I had to go rather far away to another island. We could not get back on the same day, so we anchored the boat on a reef about 50 feet off the shore and slept in it.
We thought there would be no mosquito problems that far out. Wrong! We were bitten several times. Three days later, malaria hit me. It was not bad, however, and I was only down for three days. I think that the atabrine helped much.
A second problem was “jungle rot,” as it was called out there. It was a fungal-bacterial infection in lots of the body places, in armpits, ears, crotch, feet. Everyone who went into the water got it, but it came without going into the water, also.
It was not very treatable. Our physician had been a gynecologist in California. He knew little about malaria and jungle rot, but he worked hard at it. A couple of our men had the rot so severely that they had to be sent back to the states. I never had it and could even go into the water. That meant that, even though I was the officer in charge of the repair beach, I was the one who went into the water to retrieve a boat part or a tool. Still no jungle rot for me, however.
Our third problem. A big ship full of ammunition landed in front of our repair beach, but well out. We sent out boats to carry the explosives from that ship to other ships out there. That went on for a couple of days.
On about the third day, I had to go into the water to retrieve a piece that had fallen off a boat during repair. Just as I came out of the water and turned around, the big ammunition ship exploded. Huge waves soon came up on our beach and knocked things all about.
It certainly was good luck for me that the explosion was not five minutes earlier when I was still in the water. That would have been disastrous for me. As it was, we had seven boats around the ship when it happened. They were being loaded to take the stuff to other ships. There were three men on each boat, so we lost 21 of our men. That was our nastiest problem while on Manus Island.
This last event started as a pleasure, but ended as somewhat of a problem. A big English battleship came into our harbor. We sent out boats to take the English sailors over to another island. We had come to think of it as a recreation island. It was good for them to have some time ashore and do some different things.
After a few days, as the English ship was ready to leave, the English leaders sent us four cartons of Scotch liquor. Such was not allowed in the U.S. Navy, although we did get some beer sometimes, but it was routine with the British.
The problem started. We officers had a huge party night. It got out of hand. Some glassware was broken, a couple of light bulbs were knocked out, there was some wild behavior. Unfortunately, the officer of the day was a young Ensign from a fine, non-alcohol background such as Hope College in Michigan, a Dutch Reform school. He had no idea how to handle alcohol-activated, superior-ranking officers. Lots of hangovers the next day.
Well! Those were the big problems during my 15 months on Manus. There were lots of small ones, most of which I do not remember. I would not dare to tell you about any more problems anyway, if I had my way.