Is the History of the Mariners of World War II to Go Missing Without Trace?
IN CLIO'S CAUSE:
by Charles Dana Gibson Today's researching hi storian quickly discovers that many important facets of history's most important sea lift- that of World War II-are no longe r locatable within the public record. Why? In part because beginning in the 1960s, bureaucra'ts decided that much of the documentation relating to wartime shipping was " unnecessaril y" taking up valuable space in the National Archives. As res ult, much of the story was burned or shredded . For instance, evaluators of US Army records at the St . Louis Records Center, ordered the destruction of the log books of all Army-owned ships along with those which were under the Army's long term bareboat charter. Thus, the day-to-day details regarding events that took place aboard Army transports have been lost fo r all time. Another exampl e: In a search I once conducted th rough government fi les, I came across correspondence dated early in 1946 from a civilian master mariner who, while serving as an Army Transport Service Marine Superintendent , had charge of files of wartime troop and materiel movements. His letters were pleading in their tone as he addressed Transportation Corps Headquarters, Washington , questioning headquarter's instruction to burn the fi les identifying each and every troop movement through the New York Port of Embarkation. Following his third letter of protest, a sharp and final communication came from Washington: " Not sign ificant ; burn them! " As I fo und out later, this order was quietl y disregarded and the files were removed to the Superintendent's home. Unfortunately, the man eventuall y moved to another state and somewhere in the move, the fi les were sidetracked. He is now dead , and the fil es have disappeared . These are only a couple of examples of the loss to posterity which is taking place with our maritime heri tage of the 1940s. The horror show goes on. Recently, I requested a World War II file through the Maritime Commission. The file purportedly contained specifics of ship charter ag reements between the War Shipping Administration and other government agencies ; they were of special import to research I was doing. To my dismay, the file "could not be located within the Archives." When I as ked for an explanation , I was told " it has disappeared." One may hope it is still in existence in some dusty corner. But what corner? One reason such things are happening is that the United States Maritime Commission has no assigned in-house historian , so there is nobody wi th the expertise to guide National Archive personnel regarding the retention and cataloging of 10
important files . That judgment is left to Archives staff who may-or may nothave any grasp of the maritime field , specificall y the period of World War II. The present policy of sw itching about personnel within the Archives aggravates the situation; it does not allow an individual to acc umulate sufficient knowl edge with the records that are his "stack" responsibility. In other words, that undiscovered file in that "dusty corner" may always remain as such. All is not completely bleak , though . There are many records currentl y locatable within the histori cal files of the Department of Navy, the Modern Military Records Center of the National Archi ves, and within the Maritime Commission fi les at the National Archi ves which , when assem bl ed into a cohesive fashion , give a relatively clear picture of many of the face ts of the sea lift. Through private research efforts, some of this documentation has already been pieced together. A valuable example of this is the JO-year study by Captain Arthur Moore which resu lted in his publication , A Careless Word ... A Needless Sinking. In his work, Moore relates, ship by ship, the stories of American merchant ship losses during World War II . Another private effort-one wh ich has already been placed into the public record , but only temporarily-are four appl ications, voluminous in their total bulk , as addressed to the Department of Defense Civilian/Military Veterans' Rev iew Board. These applications were made on behalf of certai n wartime grou ps of the merchant marine fo r inclusion under veterans' laws as administered by the Veterans Administration. These group applications contain literall y hundreds of pages of historical data pertaining to the World War II sea lift. Much of the data in those applications has never before been assembled under one cover; much of it is unique in content. The effort represented in gathering and articulating this material, when reckoned against the usual charge rate of participating historians and attorneys has been estimated as having a monetary value in excess of $135,000. Nevertheless , I am told by Department of Defense employees that once these applications have been reviewed and held for a reasonable time, there is currentl y no mechanism by which they can be shepherded into the Archives fo r permanent preservation . This means that in time they, too, will find their way into the shredder. Many ofus who have studied the sea lift have developed our own private archi ves; some are modest in scope. However, col-
lections such as that assembled by Captai n Moore, wou ld be considered highl y significant both in volume and in content. I for one, know of no central depository to which anyo ne could with confidence bequeath his records with any surety that they would be preserved. If such a place were available, then I fee l certain that there are many li ke me who wou ld bequeath ou r files , so their availabi lity to future historians could be ass ured . I also feel certain that once the ex istence of such a depository became known , there wo uld be scores of veteran mariners who would be willing to contribute oral histories and photographs. To prevent further losses, some institution or fo undation is needed to come fo rwa rd and offer its fac ilities for the longterm preservation of such documentation. In my judgment , the minimal standards for such a place should be: I. No n-governmental: the law spec ifies that Archive records which are scheduled to be destroyed cannot be transferred to another federal install ation. 2. A permanent location with a strong, funded status. 3. A trained curator and staff with knowledge of both the World War II period and of the maritime industry ge nerally. T his is essential fo r proper evaluation and cataloging. 4. A public relations program to ask fo r personal collections and oral histories and then to announce what is available. Statues, parks, museums, and study cente rs are scattered across the country honoring the armed forces of every war in which this country has been a partici pant . Yet to date, the American people have done little to recognize, much less memorialize, its World War II merchant marine. The short-li ved era of the clipper ship, the story of the America's Cup defenders, and the era of whaling all individually have been given more shelf space than has the far more momentou s and significant undertaking of our me rchant mariners of World War II. I can think of no fin er tribute to the merchant seaman and Armed Guards who served their country in World War II than the creation of such a permanent depository. Preservation of the record is the onl y surety that historians of the future wi ll recognize the significance of the outstanding serv ice rendered the nation by the mariners of 1941-45. '1
Captain Gibson went to sea at 16 as an ordinary seaman in Army small craft in World War II. He is the author of The Ordeal of Convoy 119, and owns a marine consulting firm in Boca Grande, Florida. SEA HISTORY, SPRING 1985