William N. Rom
Era: World War II
Military Branch: Navy
William N. Rom (Bill) entered the Navy in June of 1941. Home at entry: Ely, Minnesota.
He served as a Lieutenant Commander in the Pacific Theater for thirteen months on the USS Maryland, nine months in Guadalcanal and Tulagi, three months on JEEP carrier USS Bismarck Sea and seven months on attack transport USS Navarro. He reached the title of Lt. Commander of the USNR and was discharged on August 15, 1946.
This is Rom’s story (source unknown) of The Big Invasion:
April 1, 2001 - the 56th anniversary of the largest amphibious landing in the Pacific Theatre during WWII took place. We rendezvoused with 1,700 other ships at the Ulithi Atoll during the end of March 1945. It was there that we were told to lead the invasion of Okinawa, which was to be the jumping off spot for the invasion of Japan itself.
While awaiting departure we were sent ashore and given all the beer that we could drink. The giant carrier, USS Franklin, pulled along side of us as we were given a tour of the ship. She had just taken two Japanese bombs the week before blowing up the planes on the flight deck which were loaded with torpedoes. The bombs and torpedoes stored in the hanger deck also exploded as well as there were six huge holes in the flight deck, all which caused the ship to catch fire.
Heroic efforts put the fire out, but 700 men were still killed on board. Japan, only 350 miles and an hour’s flight away, was aware of Okinawa being the last stop before the mainland invasion and had stationed 129,000 soldiers, sailors and reservists to defend the island. With 50,000 residents ready for the action as well it was not an easy takeover. The Japanese had stationed 350 fast motor torpedo boats loaded with mines and explosives for suicidal action on Kermo Retta Island, only fourteen miles west of Okinawa.
They also had several hundred suicide boats in readiness on Japan itself for the expected invasion of the mainland (these suicide boats were similar to the one that hit the USS Cole off of Arabia in 2000). Lt. General Ushijima in command of the Japanese forces on Okinawa had placed full reliance on these torpedo boats and aerial kamikazes to devastate our landing force ships anchored off the landing site just north of the of Naha, so he pulled his troops inland and our landing thus was relatively unopposed. He expected to return and wipe out our troops who were thus stranded ashore.
Little did he know, through lack of communication, that we had already captured the small island and suicide boats that were moored there. The landing beach on Okinawa was being softened up by the bombardment from our battle wagons and other warships. I was a cargo officer and first lieutenant on one of the attack transports and in charge of unloading 32 landing craft and tons of ammo, food, armored vehicles and army troops that we had picked up at Guadalcanal.
It was Easter Sunday, and we had ecumenical services in the dark on top deck at 3 a.m. on our way to the landing site. When we anchored at daybreak we were so close to the beach that you could plainly see the red meatballs on Jap planes tied up on Yontan airport. Just in front of us lobbing sixteen shells ashore was my old battlewagon the USS Maryland, on which I had spent thirteen months earlier in the war.
Four British planes, spotting for the bombarding ships, were immediately shot down by friendly fire. We had a kamikaze directly overhead which a ship next to us knocked down. It took us six days to unload, taking off for the open sea every night to avoid being a sitting duck for Japanese subs.
We put 50,000 troops ashore the first day and eventually had 172,000 on the island. Fighting was fierce for three months until the island was finally secured. The Japanese navy in the meantime was just about wiped out including their pride and joy, the 60,000 ton Yamato with her eighteen inch guns, the largest battleship ever built. Japan was running out of fuel and experienced pilots, relying on less experienced personnel and conscripted kamikazes to carry on the battle.
Just before the battle of Okinawa ended, General Simon Bolivar Buckner, in charge of our land forces, was killed by shell fragments. The Japanese general in charge, Ushijima, committed suicide, his aides providing the coup de grace. This was the most costly endeavor in the Pacific war for the United States. We lost over twenty ships on radar picket duty while warning us of incoming attack forces. On April 6, the day we left the scene, the Japanese launched 355 suicide planes among 700 attackers. Of these, 476 Japanese planes were destroyed by our picket and other ships and planes.
They had damaged eleven of our ships but sank only three. Nine more missions followed with 3,000 kamikaze attacks in all. Our Navy lost 4,907 officers and men with 4,824 wounded. The war at Okinawa ended on June 22, 1945, after eleven weeks of the most intensive fighting of the Pacific war. On our way home in the mid-Pacific, we received word radioed to all of our ships at sea that the Commander in Chief, President Franklin Roosevelt, had passed away. It’s sad that he didn’t live to see the end of the war he led so valiantly. Alas, we didn’t need Okinawa at all as President Harry Truman ended the war by dropping two bombs.
Mr. Rom shared the following story (source is taken from the Hometown Heroes: The St. Louis County World War II Project)
"I applied for enrollment in the new 90 day Navy Midshipman school. My initial orders for active duty were lost in the mail, so I didn't get called until June 1941. Enrollment was from June to September 1941, at the school, resulting in commissioning as an ensign deck officer. My first assignment was in intellegence at the 13th Naval District, Seattle, Washington."
"When Pearl Harbor occurred, most of our group in Intelligence were transferred to sea duty and I ended up on the battlewagon USS Maryland, which was bombed at Pearl Harbor and had just completed repairs at the Bremerton Naval Yard, where I boarded her. I then spent 13 months on the Maryland including the Solomon Islands campaign (on which we were lucky enough to escape direct action)."
"In March of 1943, I left the USS Maryland at Espiritu Santo in the New Hebrides, and took a destroyer (six days of seasickness-she had a different roll than the battleship), to shore duty in Naval Operation on Guadalcanal. From there I was transferred to the island of Tulagi as senior officer of the day, where I spent seven months. We experienced numerous air raids while there, several ships being sunk in our harbor (18 air raids during April 1943). Ensign John Kennedy was at the Tulagi P.T. Base at this time. From Tulagi, I went back to Guadalcanal in operations on the Admiral's staff, in charge of assigning duties for smaller naval coastal vessels. After a total of nine months of shore duty in the Solomons, I was flown to Espiritu Santo in a C-47 and from there to Hawaii in a large PBM flying boat, where I boarded the cruiser USS St. Louis from the trip back to the States, and a welcome month's leave. I was able to come home to Ely for a month."
"I then received orders to the USS Bismarck Sea, a small carrier then being constructed in Portland, OR, as First Lieutenant and head of the ship's Hull Department. While the ship was being built in 1944, I attended the Naval Damage Control School in Philadelphia, PA, the Fire Fighting and Officer of the Day Schools in Bremeton, WA, where I became re-aquainted with my future wife, who had just graduated from the University of Washington (we were married that summer). I served for three months on the carrier before being transferred to a new attack transport then being built in New Richmond, CA, as First Lieutenant and Cargo Officer. In the meantime, I attended the Navy Cargo Loading School at the San Diego Marine Base. After leaving the carrier, she was blown in two by a kamikaze off Iwo Jima, with the loss of half her crew."
"We slipped out of Pearl Harbor in a spanking new Kaiser attack transport, the Navarro APA 215. The Crew was in an ugly mood as the captain had cancelled a part for the crew at Richardson Field which was organized by our chaplain without the captain's knowledge. Our brig was loaded with cases of beer for which the crew had pitched in to buy and consume on such shore binges."
"Our next stop was to be Guadalcanal to pick up troops and K-9 dogs for an unknown landing site on the island ladder to conquer Japan. Little did I realize I'd be returning as soon to Guadalcanal where I had spent the year of 1943 in operations duty on both Tulagi and Guadalcanal. After loading our troops, we proceeded east of "The Slot", passing over Iron Bottom Sound, the graveyard of 60 U.S. and Jap ships and my friend Steve Labor of Ely who went down with the cruiser USS Quincy."
"Next we slipped by the island of Bougainville where my cousin Louis Rom lay, a victim of a Jap sniper's bullet. When we finally anchored in the Ulithi Atoll, we were joined by 1,700 ships, the largest invasion fleet in history. There were scores of APA's, AKA's, tin cans and carriers. Among the latter was the giant carrier USS Franklin which had just taken six bomb hits diagonally across its flight deck with a loss of over 700 men. We were permitted to board her to observe the damage. She was still able to cruise home for repairs on her own as her engine room and steering were still intact. She was hit off Iwo Jima where another carrier, the USS Bismarck Sea was blown up by a kamikaze pilot that penetrated the hangar deck and set off the bombs and torpedoes stored there, killing half the crew. I knew most of the casualties as I had been the First Lieutenant on the Bismarck Sea a few months earlier and was on her commissioning detail at Astoria, Oregon, Luckily I was transferred to the commissioning detail of the attack transport I was now on before the battle of Iwo Jima."
"Word soon passed around that we were heading for Okinawa, the last jumping off place for the expected invasion of Japan. So we celebrated on shore at Ulithi Atoll with a vengeance and the brig full of beer was unlocked at last. There wasn't a sober soldier (or officer!) on the beach and it was a sight to see first the starboard and then the port watch returning to the ship, climbing up a cargo net as the skipper looked down upon us from the bridge above. It was our last chance to 'let loos' before attacking Okinawa with a landing force that was to rival the landing at Normandy in size. We would be in range of Tojo's air force and what remained of his battle fleet. Kamikazes would be a real threat as they had to fly just one way from Japan itself."
"Some years later while in Tokyo we were guided around the city by a fellow named Hiro who was in training as a kamikaze pilot when he was only 16 years old, during the Okinawa invasion. We kidded each other about him bombing me. He said his name may have been 'Hiro' but he was no hero and he didn't relish his assignment. Ironically, President Truman saved his life by ordering the atomic bomb attack, which ended the war and Hiro's training. We lost 7 destroyers to kamikazes during the invasion of Okinawa."
"A small diversionary landing was made on the east coast of Okinawa which fooled the Japs and as a result the main landing at daybreak on April 1, 1945, relatively unopposed. We pulled into anchorage off the west coast of Okinawa north of the city of Naha. At 3:00 a.m. we had ecumenical church services in the dark on top deck. It was Easter Sunday. At daybreak we could see Jap planes on Yontan Airport just ahead of us, with their red meatballs painted on the fuselage. Four planes flew between us and shore and were promplty picked off by friendly ship fire. They were British observation planes spotting for our battle wagons that were bombarding and softening the landing site."
"Just ahead of us was the Battleship USS Maryland, which was my home for a year in 1942. Our general quarters alarm went off as Jap kamikaze suddenly appeared over our fantail. Our skipper ignored our gunnery officer's request to open fire. He couldn't see the plane with a deck over his head, but fortunately a transport next to us blasted the plane which crashed in the water just off our stern. Our gun crews, who had been raring for months for a shot at an enemy plane, had 'for sale cheap' signs put up on all the 40 mm guns."
"We were off the coast for six days, first unloading our landing craft, troops, dogs, and 'hot' cargo (food, gas, and ammo). At night we lifted anchor and went out to sea to avoid being sitting ducks for Jap subs in the area. We had the fleet record for unloading our landing craft and later received a Cincpac commendation for it. Finally, we headed back for Guam and Pearl Harbor. En route we were radioed word that FDR had passed away at Warm Springs. FDR had led us through the terrible depression years followed by WWII when Hitler had conquered most of Europe and the Japs had overtaken the huge area of S.E. Asia, and the South and Southwest Pacific without losing a battle until Guadalcanal and at Midway Island."
"Our crew was made up of a number of Minnesotans. Our chaplain was from Roseau, marine transport quartermaster from Grand Rapids, and navigator and first division officers from St. Paul. Shipfitter Elmer Politch grew up on a farm across the Little Fork River from my Uncles Mike and John Rom of Greaney. I raised him to chief shipfitter before leaving the ship. My duty was as First Lieutenant and Cargo officer. I also did most of the duties of the Executive officer, second in command, as the skipper and he were not on speaking terms. Besides a full day each day, only three of us were qualified to stand night watches on the bridge while the captain slept. Being on a zig zag course with other ships, handling the night watch had to be particularly precise. No lights were permitted and we had to go by the phosphourous glow made by the screws of the ships ahead of us, all the way across the Pacific."
NINETY DAY WONDERS
Bill Rom
It has been said that WWII in the Pacific was won by Ninety Day Wonders. While not exactly true, the war could not have been won without them. With the rapid buildup of our Navy in the early 1940's to catch up with the massive Japanese fleet, the Naval Academy at Annapolis could not turn out naval officers fast enough to man our ships, so the Navy created an intensive training course to turn out commissioned officers in 90 days. At least two years of college were required of applicants. At first a month's cruise from New York City to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, was part of the training course, followed by three months of intensive class work, including seamanship, navigation, ordnance, naval regulations, and etc. The month's cruise was later dropped. Upon graduation a recruit would receive an ensign's commission paying $200.00 per month. This was equivalent in rank to a second lieutenant in the Army.
Upon graduation from the Midshipman's school at Northwestern University in September 1941, four of us ensigns were first assigned to naval intelligence at Seattle Naval Headquarters. We took delivery of a new car from Chicago to be driven to Seattle and visited all the sights in route, including climbing to the top of Washington's head at Mt. Rushmore, which was under construction by Gutzum Borglum at the time. We cruised the Badlands and drove through Yellowstone Park along the way, having a good time.
The four of us rented an apartment in Seattle until we were reassigned to fleet duty after Pearl Harbor occurred. One of my roommates stayed in naval intellegence until after the war and was raised to a rear admiral, though he had never been to sea. I was assigned to the 1916 battlewagon USS Maryland and spent 13 months on her until going on to various other interesting duties in the Pacific, including the Solomons, aircraft carrier and attack transport positions.
Ninety Day Wonders carried on their jobs shoulder to shoulder with Academy graduates, including commanding many of the smaller vessels of the fleet. My friend, the late Ted Nelson, was the skipper of an LSM, landing ship medium, for instance, seeing duty at various landings in the Pacific.
A number of my shipmate 90 dayers went down with the carrier, USS Bismarck Sea. Most of us after 5 or 6 years of active duty, came out as lieutenant commanders, equivalent to a major in the Army, having served our country well. A number of fellow graduates never did return, paying the supreme sacrifice. Ninety Day Wonders provided the muscle if not the backbone of the U.S. Navy during World War II.
Source: Hometown Heroes: The Saint Louis County World War II Project, 364.
