220326 Sentinel, Cold Shower

I still remember the night of the cold showers.
O'ahu, Hawaii

I was in Hawaii for training in November 1964. I attended several naval schools for maintenance of old radios, identification friend or foe and navigational equipment, none of which did I ever work on more than once because they were by that time being fazed out of use in the fleet. It was late in the year in Hawaii and it was surprising that while it was warm during daylight, it got very cold at night and being in Hawaii there was no heat in the barracks so blankets were prized posessions. The last school I attended was ‘Escape, Evasion and Survival’ school, before further transfer to Guam and eventual deployments to the Gulf of Tonkin for overnight radar coverage of the U. S. Seventh Fleet during the Vietnam War.
It seemed strange to be in paradise, on a remote beach during the survival part of the school, starving and shivering on the shore all night long, we managed to catch a few toads and gathered seaweed to heat and eat (nasty tasting seaweed). We had three days of little food. We packed up after that and went to the mountains for two more days of survival training. It happened that the guava trees were full of ripe fruit, so I gorged myself on that highly fiber filled fruit. I won't go into details of what that did to me. I'll only say it was not pleasant.
We were briefed on the evasion phase of training on the last day in the mountains in the mountains. We were given parachutes to use for shelter that night prior to the Marines arrival the next day, when they would begin searching for us as an enemy force would search for a downed plane. It rained that night and it was getting miserably cold under those leaky parachutes. The Marines arrived about two in the morning, trying to capture as many of us as possible before the prisoner of war phase of training. It was pitch black, so all I could see was the flashlights of the Marines searching for us. I slid out of my makeshift shelter and crawled into dense undergrowth, trying to be as small and invisible as possible. That’s where I spent the rest of the night, shivering with rain dripping down my forehead and soaked to the skin.
The next morning those of us not captured were broken into groups of two or three and given directions to a “safe” co-ordinate. I was paired with a Marine, a Navajo, who was very good at getting from one place to another undetected. He led me through thickets where a rabbit might not have gone without great discomfort. The Marines who were soon to be our “Soviet” captors never saw the two of us until we got to the “Safe” area. That was a setup too. As soon as we got there they just grabbed us and handcuffed us to a truck.
Later when everyone was rounded up, we were loaded into the trucks and taken back down the mountain. Along with the enlisted men, there were several Marine officers in the class. The Marines playing Soviets got to rough up the officers on the trip downhill. The “Soviet” Marines seemed to relish the opportunity to thump a few officers. Down on the flats, there was a prisoner camp setup, with machine gun towers, eight foot high fence, barbed wire along the top of the fence, some concrete block buildings and several bomb shelters, which our captors explained were there to protect us from bombing raids by our own Air Force.
Our captors spent the day squashing us into tiny wooden boxes (about 30 by 30 by 30 inches) in which an Indian Yogi couldn’t be comfortable. They would come by and kick the box every 20 minutes or so and we were required to call out our prisoner number so they would know if we were still conscious. Later we were lifted out of the boxes and taken to an interrogation area. My knees were locked up so tight I could not straighten them out so they carried me to interrogation. Refusal to answer questions resulted in being forced to kneel down and they would place a broom stick behind our knees and push us backwards to the floor. That may not sound so painful, but try it and you will be amazed at how incredibly painful it is.
That evening they fed us onions that we boiled in water. I can’t remember a better meal in my entire lifetime. It’s funny, that happened 57 years ago and I can remember it like it was yesterday.
Later that evening, after dark, the Soviet leader told us we were required to shower and clean up so we didn’t become infested with lice. Each man was required to give a guard his prisoner number, then strip naked and take his shower. I should mention the shower was from a huge steel drum of cold water suspended overhead, outside, with the night temperature at just about 55 degrees. I had a lucid moment, realizing these guards were going to wait until some poor prisoner was soaking wet, naked and shivering, then they were going to sound the air raid siren to send us running for the shelters. I kept delaying taking my shower for fear of being the poor guy caught in the trap. There was, I believe just over 50 of us. I waited until the very end and nothing happened. I was the last one so I gave the guard my number, stripped naked, and pulled the rope, drenching myself in bitter cold water. As soon as I was soaked, sure enough the siren went off and there I was running barefoot across a dusty, rocky compound, heading into the bomb shelter. The shelter roof wasn’t high enough to stand up and I wasn’t about to sit down on the dusty ground to put my clothes back on, so there I was crouched over, shivering and the only guy in there with no clothes on. At least it was dark. I don’t remember how long that went on, but I was happy when we were allowed to leave the shelter so I could put my clothes back on and warm myself. Cold water still reminds me of that night.