40th NCB Record
Between the 27th and the 30th of April, the first battalion echelons landed on the east coast of Okinawa and developed their own beach. The remaining echelons landed during May.
Although the 40th Battalion was scheduled to immediately begin work on rehabilitating and expanding Chimu Airfield, the site was still in the heart of the battle zone and the work could not begin until May 6. The battalion built its camp near Chimu and was under Japanese attack from light mortar and small-arms fire through May. The Japanese also attempted to sabotage equipment and supplies with explosive charges. Frequent enemy contacts were made by Seabee reconnaissance survey parties and by Seabee outpost guards intercepting small enemy patrols and armed stragglers.
Upon the cessation of organized Japanese resistance on Okinawa, the 40th Battalion could exert most of its effort on building the airfield and working on base development projects. During the morning of July 1, one hundred United States planes arrived and Chimu airfield was put in operation on schedule. All the work was completed on the last day of the war.
Greatly diminished in strength because many Seabees had already left for the United States and demobilization in Operation Magic Carpet, the 40th Naval Construction Battalion was inactivated on Okinawa in November 1945. Thus the battalion ended three glorious years of building and fighting to defeat the Japanese on many islands of the Pacific Ocean.
40th NCB Cruisebook
On a Tuesday afternoon in September, 1944, the Fortieth stood at attention on the black-topped drill field of Camp Parks as Major General Bonesteel presented them with the Presidential Unit Citation for distinguishing themselves in action at Los Negros.
Back from their thirty days leave, the men settled down to stateside life at Camp Parks, with military training and technical schools during the day and liberty every other night. Camp Parks wasn't home but it tried to make up for it. As replacements came from all over the states the battalion was re-formed and on the thirty-first of October, Lt. Comdr. Rumbarger assumed command with Lt. Comdr. Grant as executive officer.
The holiday season went by, followed by the first soft breeze of scuttle-butt. We spent a week at the rifle range getting used to the carbine. When we received our inoculations and overseas equipment we felt that our time in the states was drawing to a close.
The first of February was cold and wet, and was the day we boarded our ship, the Adabelle Lykes, a small transport with practically every branch of the service represented in her complement. We anchored in the bay that night with the lights of San Francisco casting their reflections dimly on the waters around our ship. Outside, the air was damp and chilly with wisps of gray fog brushing by; while down in the holds the men were trying to acclimate themselves to the crowded and stuffy conditions.
Some of the ships in the harbor pulled out the next afternoon. The Adabelle's innards emitted a dull rumbling, pulled anchor, and took after them. As the sky darkened we passed under the Golden Gate Bridge and out to sea.
"Old Man Neptune" played havoc with many appetites for the first few days. The weather was bad and our little ship tossed like a cork in a washing-machine. Our convoy cut through the blue hillocks, bearing south-west. The weather cleared in a few days and as they passed, the sun appeared nearer and warmer. The decks were covered with small groups of men playing interminable games of cards. The days turned hot, at night the holds were stifling but on deck it was cool and serene.
We knew that our destination was the code word "HODE." In a short while we learned it meant Saipan, our staging area. We stopped at Pearl Harbor and spent two weeks; during which the Adabelle was repaired and waited for another convoy. We went on liberty five or six times, invading Honolulu, Waikiki and Fleet Landing. These unexpected liberties caught us unprepared and we had to borrow money and whites... At Eniwetok in the Marshalls we stopped again and spent another nine days, monotonously hot in the flat lagoon. By now we were well sick of the Adabelle with its dingy holds, inadequate food and imposing restrictions. The afternoons were long and the music played on deck only deepened our melancholy.
On the 18th of March the Adabelle Lykes finally docked in Tanapag Harbor, Saipan. By evening all but a few who remained for unloading and guard duty had gone ashore. Meanwhile trucks had been loaded with men and left for our camp site. It was a flat, level area overlooking the sea; and in the back- ground were the tall, grey cliffs, shell-blotched in a battle that is now history.
16'x50's were set up in the semi-darkness. Cots were handed out and small groups gathered outside the tents, mulling over the latest rumors. Our target area was called "BIVE" in code. In a short while we learned it meant Okinawa.
The temporary camp was erected quickly. Tents rose up and the mess hall was in use in a few days. After the staging work had been started, carbines were issued and target practice began... By the end of the month news came in that our Ryukyus were being blasted by the fleet... Then on Easter Sunday, the mess hall's radio announced that Okinawa had been invaded. The next day trucks began loading for our future home, all staging work had been secured and by the end of the week LST lists had been posted with approximately seven hundred men scheduled for the first echelon. An advance group of fifty-one men had been selected which included the bomb disposal unit, surveyors, and water-supply men. They embarked on the 11th.
Two days later the first echelon's LST's had been loaded. The troops went on board, carrying bulging packs, rifles, helmets, and other gear. Some were lucky enough to be assigned bunks in the hold, the majority rigged up sleeping quarters on deck between the superstructure, trucks, and other Seabee equip- age. Two days passed; and we moved; but only to anchor in the harbor. Down in the hold the radio spoke of increasing resistance on Okinawa. The days passed... and we wondered.
A week after boarding ship we left for Okinawa. The weather was excellent during the days, a calm sea and a clear sky, but the nights were rainy. Men awoke to find the rain pelting down on them and their gear under the cots floating away on the small lakes of rain water that washed across the deck. At dawn and dusk we went below as the gunnery crews took their battle stations. Submarine alerts came- but nothing happened. Our convoy went on, and on the 26th we passed a task force. It was good to see all that power and on our side. The sight of the ships put us in a mood of eager anticipation.
Our LST's steamed into Nakagusuku Wan the next afternoon and anchored off-shore; then a bar- rage of signaling began. The bay itself seemed strange. The air was quiet except for the occasional distant, hollow booming of the fleet shelling the opposite shore. American planes were diving out of the clouds in the distance and skimming above the tree-tops, then zooming away. They were dive bombing but little could be heard except for a distant pounding. Towards evening the bombarding of the fleet increased in tempo. Our air-raid signal clanged and we went below as the ship's crew raced to their gun positions. Down in the holds we settled about as comfortably as possible, smoking and playing poker with our invasion currency. The alert lasted for hours and another followed it. We were restless and the morning brought no signs of our going ashore.
During the latter part of the day our small convoy pulled anchor and steamed to the next bay up, Kimmu Wan. It was dark by the time we anchored and soon after the first alert was sounded. Fingering beams of light scraped the sky and when a Jap plane was found, four or five lights converged on him. Streams of 40's poured up as he crawled slowly above. A blotch of yellow fire mushroomed, followed by a dull "Errupmp" as the 90's opened up. The Jap blossomed into fire and began his dive... then in a few minutes all was quiet again except for the distant fleet and the artillery in the hills beyond. Alerts came and went, the steady rumbling kept on.
We set up a temporary camp near the beach where we unloaded. A few days later we moved on to Kin, a town of twenty thousand, most of whom appeared to be old people and children. A few days after our arrival the children of Kin, literally hordes of them, were out mooching cigarettes and rations from us, and yelling "Haba-Haba" at the passing trucks. By July it was a ghost town, for the "Gooks" as we termed the Okinawans had been moved to the northern sector of the island and the town had been torn down by our men and equipment; nothing remained but piles of rubble.
In the meantime, the second echelon had arrived from Saipan in two ships, the Mormacport and the Josiah Snelling, arriving in Nakagusuku Bay on the 14th of May. Two weeks later the Snelling, still being unloaded, was struck by a Kamikaze plane. Five thousand sacks of cement were lost but luckily none of our men were hurt.
Our permanent camp was set on four hills, overlooking the bay and not far from the town. Work in the camp went on, day after day. Roads were cut in the area, offices, shops, mess-halls and tents were erected. It was many weeks before common luxuries such as a movie area, electric lights and tent decks were installed because a more important job had been started as soon as we arrived. Our main assignment was to build an airfield for Marine Corsair flyers and have it in operation by July 1st. That meant we had less than two months and the rainy season was already upon us. When the days were dry the roads lay covered with a dusty powder which rose in clouds as the trucks roared by. When the rain came it was all transformed into a syrupy mire. Despite sixteen days of rain in May alone, the work went on. The site for our airfield was a nondescript little valley of rice paddies and cane fields. Under steady work the tran- sition was becoming apparent. We worked in shifts, all day and all night, grading the runway, cutting down hills and clearing the way. Hardstands and taxi-ways were completed, more were started. In the coral pit the dynamite crews were sweating over their jack-hammers and wagon-drills, blasting loose the coral for the shovels that loaded the never-ending stream of trucks. The men on night shift worked under flood lights, despite alerts unless the enemy planes were directly above.
More trouble broke loose as infiltrating snipers using knee mortars, lobbed shells into our transportation area injuring four guards and causing minor damage to machinery and at the same time fifty drums of our fuel were blown up by a time bomb. Alerts came nearly every night, sometimes three or four of them. Men stood on their foxholes, draped in towels or shorts, helmets on heads as they waited for the planes, watching red ribbons of tracers unravelling to the sky as a plane was caught in the web of lights. The strip worried us, it was close to camp and when the moon was full it was visible from a great distance. We crossed our fingers and hoped we would not be hit, and our luck held fast. The morning of July 1st one hundred planes arrived-Chimu Airfield was in operation on schedule. Everyone took a deep breath-then went back to work, for the strip had to be lengthened, broadened, and more hardstands were needed.
Besides our main job we had a tank farm to build and when it was partially completed we were assigned the construction of a Fleet Recreation Base on Tsugen Shima and the transforming of Route No. 13 from a native foot road to a super highway. Bridges were constructed on the highway and labor crews helped cut down hills for the widening of the road. The strip itself was completed on the last day of war. We didn't get to Tokyo but we succeeded in building the nearest Seabee airfield to Japan. Back in camp the Navy point system became the number one topic of the day.
After the hours of work the time passed slowly and monotonously but during August a little enter- tainment helped relieve it. We had two stage shows, the first featuring native religious dancing and the second, Kay Kyser and his troupe. Kyser's audience began streaming into the movie area from early morning, carrying home-made chairs and ration boxes for seats. The sun was hot and heavy and by the time Kyser arrived there were thousands in the audience. It was good to see American girls again.
Our camp area was wrecked twice by typhoons. We hardly had finished repairing the damage of the first one, when the second struck, almost completely demolishing the camp. Tents, offices, shops, and mess-halls alike were ruined. Quonset huts were twisted and torn from their concrete foundations during the height of the storm. We built the camp up once more, but it was only a half-hearted attempt since everyone was thinking of going home. The battalion had shrunk to two-thirds its original size and more men were leaving the outfit each month. But for all of us civilian life wasn't far off. We were thankful of that...
