Vet recalls rescue during WWII battle

Orville E. Olson, 96, says he enlisted the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor

Orville E. Olson poses for a photo Saturday at his home in New Boston. He served as an apprentice seaman on the carrier Lexington during World War II.
Orville E. Olson poses for a photo Saturday at his home in New Boston. He served as an apprentice seaman on the carrier Lexington during World War II.

NEW BOSTON, Texas-As a former seaman apprentice serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II, Orville E. Olson not only remembers hearing the song "Praise The Lord And Pass The Ammunition," he remembers living it.

 

While serving as an ammunition loader for anti-aircraft guns on the carrier Lexington during the Battle of Coral Sea-75 years ago this month-the New Boston resident couldn't see enemy dive bombers and torpedo planes hurling toward the floating flattop, but he sure could hear the reaction to them.

"I never saw the enemy planes fly in toward us because I was just below the deck level passing up the ammunition," he said. "As the enemy's torpedo planes got closer and closer, our smaller automatic machine guns got louder and louder."

Born in May 1921, Olson grew up in Streeter, N.D., close to Jamestown and about 100 miles from Fargo. There his dad ran a dairy farm.

At the war's outbreak, Olson, who worked at a U.S. Army depot in South Dakota, drove back to Fargo to enlist the next day.

"Sunday Dec. 7, 1941 Pearl Harbor came under attack. The next day, I volunteered to join," said Olson, who just turned 96.

"Upon volunteering for the U.S. Navy, the Navy sent me to Great Lakes, Illinois, to get my shots and medical check-up," he said. "From there I, along with a large group of other enlistees, took a passenger train to the West Coast."

Upon arrival, Olson and the other enlistees, who all had the initial rank as seaman apprentice, took an immediate personnel transport ride to Pearl Harbor.

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"When we arrived in the harbor you could still see the damaged ships standing in the water," he said. "At the time, neither me or any of the others had been through basic training yet, but they gave me a rifle anyway and told me to guard the beaches."

Eventually, Olson saw his temporary but future home sail into port at Pearl Harbor either some time in January or possibly even as late as March of 1942. The carrier came back to port after carrying out security patroling along with raiding an enemy-occupied village anchorage in New Guinea. She picked up her new crew members, including Olson.

"We actually didn't start our basic training until we got aboard her," Olson said. "We trained on all the (anti-aircraft) guns and did our exercises (out on the flight deck). We trained on all kinds of (anti-aircraft) guns. I learned a little bit of everything except how to swim."

Eventually, Olson acquired his steady job on the Lexington as an ammunition loader for anti-aircraft guns-a job that was in serious demand at that time.

Shortly after the Lexington left Pearl Harbor on April 15, 1942, to take part in high seas training exercises, Allied naval code-breakers found out at that the Japanese planned to conduct two amphibious landings-one on the southeastern side of New Guinea Island, the other in the far southeastern area of the Solomon Islands chain. Both the Lexington and her sister aircraft carrier the Yorktown received orders to break up the enemy's planned landings.

"That's when we started heading out for the New Hebrides Islands (which were in that same general are of the Coral Sea)," Olson said.

By May 8, 1942, both the Lexington and the Yorktown were on the prowl for two Japanese Navy fleet carriers, both of which were also looking for their two American counterparts. Both sets of flattops found each other early that morning of May 8 and commenced launching their attack planes at each other.

"We were already at our battle stations and combat quarters that morning," Olson said. "We already had our life jackets and our helmets on. The enemy flew in and attacked us on both the starboard (right side) and port (left side) of our carrier. I was on the port side."

Two torpedoes hit the carrier on the port side, not too far from Olson's station. The shock and concussion caused by torpedoes' impact slightly ruptured the flattop's aviation fuel tanks as well as the port side's primary water main. This started some serious flooding.

"You had shrapnel flying all around and the water started coming up from below," he said. It flooded our stations until it was knee deep. But the ship stayed afloat."

However, the good news about the flattop staying afloat soon melted away when a tremendous explosion caused by sparks igniting the accumulating fumes from the leaking aviation gasoline tanks erupted. The explosion instantly killed 25 crewmen. Then an explosion of similar size followed about two hours later. This started serious fires in the carrier's hangar deck and knocked out a lot of electrical power. Finally, a third massive explosion knocked out the vessel's firefighting water pressure and eventually forced all to "abandon ship," especially since a series of large explosions seemed to continue.

"I stayed until the call to abandon ship went out, but for me it really didn't do that much good since I couldn't swim anyway," Olson said. "I lowered myself by knotted rope into the water. I was floating around in my life jacket near the carrier when another explosion blew flight deck wood and shrapnel in my direction. Luckily a destroyer came by and dropped a raft out for me as well as for others who were wounded."

Once aboard the destroyer, Olson received transfer to the less crowded cruiser New Orleans.

"The New Orleans dumped us off at Tonga Island (the main island of the Tonga Island group just east of the Fiji Island group)," he said. "From there, a troop transport arrived from the states and took us back to San Diego."

Once back stateside, the Navy deployed Olson aboard a light aircraft carrier and assigned it to conduct anti-submarine patrols in the Atlantic against German U-boats. This went on for about a year, after which the Navy then sent Olson back to the Pacific for more then two years aboard another light carrier, the Monterrey-the same carrier which future U.S. President Gerald Ford served on during the war.

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"During that whole time I was there, I actually never remembered seeing Gerald Ford," he said. "I don't think I ever got to meet him. At that time, you were just put on a ship with thousands of other people you didn't know."

On his second and final deployment to the Pacific, Olson got to see more action, including watching the aircraft carrier Bunker Hill getting hit by a Japanese kamikaze plane off Okinawa during the battle for that island from April through most of June in 1945.

"I was near Okinawa on a transport, unloading a drum of gasoline," he said. "I was about to go on a 30-day leave when I heard that Japan surrendered. There, you could see our ships everywhere -just as far as you could see. We had most of the U.S. Seventh Army Division aboard that transport when I heard the news over the loud speaker."

Following the war, Olson would continue his government service by working for military depots-his last being the Red River Army Depot where he started working in the mid-1960s. He eventually retired from there in 1979 at age 58.

However, for Olson one of the finest moments in his life came when he received his military discharge on Thanksgiving Day 1945 in Minneapolis.

"For me, it really was Thanksgiving Day," he said.

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