My mother, for some reason saved every letter I mailed home from my service on the U.S.S. Chara Here are some exerpts from a few of those letters from a very young sailor.
December 13, 1952
We left Sasebo on 25 November and went to Ulsan Wan, 33 miles up the coast from Pusan. Ulsan is one of the prettiest
places I have seen in the Orient so far. Seems quite un-touched by the war. We unloaded quite a bit of ammo and junk there,
then we pulled out and steamed up to Wonsan (39th parallel) and gave some shells and stuff to some of the blockade force there.
It was cold there. I'm really glad I'm not a ground pounder now. The temperature hit close to zero degrees
F and what with a 30 knot wind and high humidity and all, the ship iced over.
December 18, 1952
One thing I am glad of is that I don't get heaving messy sea sick at all any more. I get queasy in the gut
now and then, but so do the best of them!
December 18, 1952
I got to see a Cruiser and a Destroyer bombard the beach yesterday. The guys on the shore didn't have a chance.
That Cruiser just walked up and shoved those 8" guns down their throat and let fly.
December 27, 1952
I survived my first collision at sea. We swere re-arming some Carriers and Destroyers up on the line.
We had finished up and were along side the U.S.S. Taluga with the Philippine Sea on the other side of
the Taluga. All of a sudden the tanker started swinging toward us. We tried our darndest to get away but they swung too fast
for us and with a mighty bump, BUMP that tanker smacked us broadside. I was down in #2 hold at the time in the
Radar room writing up reports, orders for new stock etc. and that BUMP came it took just 2 seconds to
get out of there and up to CIC. It only scraped some of our paint off and curled up a hunk of deck aft of the superstructure, but
it certainly scared everyone. Thousands of tons of metal, ammo and Avaiation Gasoline grinding together.
I am surprised that a ship as large as an Aircraft Carrier can move as fast as that one did.
January 27, 1953
We didn't rearm much, but we covered a lot of ground. Went as far north as Sonjin and lay to off the coast
there about 8 to 10 miles. However nothing big came off there. Some time later we were rearming TF77
and what should appear but a very old and extremely horny mine. It was broken up and sunk by the heros of the fleet and the Chara plodded her weary way.
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