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The Personal War History by Robert Bob Carlile as provided by his Surviving Wife Olga Carlile We obtained this diary primarily through the efforts of Michael Verville who contacted Olga Carlile shortly before the 2012 Chicago reunion. Mike learned at that time that Bob Carlile had passed away. Here is his story as recorded by his wife Olga: After many years, it's time to have Bob Carlile tell his story. There were many years of "No, no!". I'm not listening in 2007. So we talked. At that time - upon graduation from high school - it was not a question of being drafted; it was a question of when your draft number would be called. Soon the boys in the senior class of Boswell High School in Indiana were scattered across the world - Iwo Jima, Normandy, the Baffle of the Bulge. Bob squeezed in two quarters of studies at Indiana State Teachers College in Terre Haute before his draft number came up. Immediately, he was off to the Navy for basic training at Great Lakes in Chicago, followed by Storekeepers School in Bainbridge, Maryland. 1
Finishing next to the top of his class allowed him to choose the type of ship he wanted to serve on. His choices: Battleships, landing crafts, cruisers and aircraft carriers. He chose the carrier because he thought there would be "more going on." Little did he know. Bob was assigned to the USS Hancock, CV-I9 - a carrier, which was still being built at Bethlehem Steel shipyards in Boston. America was playing catch up. He stayed for a time at the Newport Rhode Island Naval Base, where he actually slept in a hammock. Boston was his next "home." The ship was still under construction. There were miles of cable and wires being strung throughout the ship. Parts were being welded and the pounding went on incessantly day and night. The young sailors were quartered on this half-done ship, and they slept through it all. Bob was assigned to the supply office. In April 1944, the huge warship was launched with a bottle of champagne - broken over the bow - and she ever so gracefully slid from the dry-dock into the water for the first time. All were elated: It floated! The young sailors were put through a series of shakedown cruises off of Boston Harbor. Soon, the first plane landed on the deck. They kept coming in and shortly there were 100 fighters, bombers and torpedo planes on the deck. Everything in place - including a crew of 3,000 men. The USS Hancock was off to Trinidad. Continual drills and 2
flights were carried on to get the ship crew "working as a team." Throughout the day, the crew still had the battle station drills to get down pat. These took place daily - one hour before daybreak and one hour after sunset. Bob's battle station was as a "first loader' on a 40mm gun just aft of the island on the carrier. His job was to place the clip of four shells into the gun. The practicing went on and on. It was continual, Bob said. They shot at targets being pulled behind a plane. The USS Hancock went back to Boston for final fittings before sailing off through the Panama Canal to the war zone. The ship was built to get through the canal. Bob said the Hancock cleared the canal wall by just a few inches. "It scraped the sides a few times," Bob recalls. After clearing the canal, the Hancock went up the coast to San Diego and then to Pearl Harbor - and finally to the war in the Pacific. Hancock was the flagship of Admiral McCain. The Hancock joined the fleet just before the Battle of Leyte Gulf. They first saw action off Formosa in the South China Sea. The Japanese had just started using kamikaze pilots. "We shot down our first plane. It became a big ball of flames as it dropped into the ocean. It was like a Fourth of 3
July display, we thought. Then we realized he was trying to hit our ship. This was war. This was the first plane of the 33 which our ship was credited with downing." As they headed back to the Philippines, the fleet encountered a big typhoon. The flight deck was 60 feet above the water line. The waves were breaking over the flight deck. Three ships were lost due to the high winds and massive waves. At meal time, Bob said it was difficult to keep meals on trays on the mess table. Though huge, the carrier - which was like a floating city - had a tough time of it. Since the war years, a number of books have chronicled that fierce typhoon. The Battle of Leyte Gulf was about to begin. The fleet of the United States was against the major fleet of the Japanese. Bob recalls that we lost two ships in the typhoon; the Japanese lost three carriers and a couple of battleships and numerous other ships. The Battle of Leyte Gulf made the later invasion possible, including the landing in the Philippines. After this battle, the Hancock was restocked and refueled. This was done in a bay of small islands - a circle of them - making it a quiet place to anchor. From there they were off to have the planes attack various Japanese installations. "We were constantly under the threat of the kamikaze," he said. "He remembers how 4
on a Sunday afternoon one of our own planes - returning from a bombing run - exploded on the deck under his gun station, killing 56 of our own crew. Later, they learned that a bomb had not dropped as it was supposed to and fell to the deck when the plane landed. He still can't erase the great sadness from his memory - even these many years later - of that massive burial at sea. While operating off the coast of Iwo Jima on one particular occasion - as they were refueling and restocking - a destroyer* tied to the ship - about 200 yards away - was hit by a kamikaze. It came in over Bob's station - narrowly missing them - and hit the destroyer killing several crewmembers. 5
Halsey Powell, takes a bomb and engine from a Kamikaze, shot 500 feet overhead.. causing an emergency breakaway and a near collision... passing by inches from the Hancock\'s bow... a very tense moment in our ship\'s history - Go Here: Earl P. Ayres Extended WWII Photo Gallery During the invasion of Okinawa, a kamikaze hit the ship again, hitting the flight deck just aft of Bob's gun station, killing 89 of the crew. The planes from the Hancock provided air support before and during the invasion of Okinawa. They were operating off the coast of Japan when the news of the surrender came. Wars End Unbelievable! At first a great silence. Then suddenly the reality - followed by ecstatically loud, rousing and wild cheering. Before the treaty was signed, Bob was asked to join the admiral, the captain and the supply officer to go ashore in Japan Bay. They went off according to rank - he an enlisted man - lowest in rank - was last. The supply officer and Bob had one job. It was to go to the Japanese supply depot and find some fish netting. This they did. Mission accomplished. On the Hancock, the netting became a backdrop for softball games on the flight deck Bob is sure that the Hancock was the first ship to do so. This thoughtfulness of the captain has pleased Bob these many years. 6
With the war over, the hangar deck was outfitted with bunks and the Hancock stayed on to bring troops back home. The USS Hancock went on to serve in two more wars - the Korean conflict** and the Viet Nam war. It was finally sold to the Japanese for scrap - the very people it was built to destroy. This is the story of one veteran - an 18-year-old farm boy from Indiana. * The Destroyer that was hit by Kamikaze was the USS Halsey Powell DD-636 (see story by one of the Associations Late members, Capt Herschel A. Pahl. (http://usshancockcv19.com/websites/herschpahlbooks.or g/). The End 7
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