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Subject: Bomb Fuses

Published: May 1999

By: Pastor Herbert Hemingway

 

First time for me to write.  I’m one of those shipmates that no one knows or remembers.  I went on the Savannah the summer of 1941 at Norfolk.  I was 18 at the time.  I will never forget my first working party.  About 50 box cars to unload.  Then off to convoy duty to England.

 

Sunday morning December 7, off Portland Maine, we were getting underway, heading to South America for Good Will tour.

 

For our first invasion I was in the 1st Division, 31 shell deck.  I than went to the V Division, made A03.  I was the one, after each flight, had to take the bomb fuses out and get the salt water out.  That’s when all hands would leave the hanger deck (didn’t trust me).  After the bomb hit us, and we made it back to Philadelphia, I was transferred to CU22 in Manteo, NC.  After the war I went in the US Coast Guard and retired AOC in 1963.

 

The last 35 years I have been a Baptist Preacher.  I’m 75 years old, in fair health, only been to one reunion, 1989 in Springfield VA.  Thanks for the NEWSLETTERS.  Please keep sending it.  GOD BLESS each & all of you.

 

Pastor Herbert Hemingway