Oral History Interview with Herman F. Jenkins

“START OF TAPE 12” Fugate: Let’s see, this is Tom Fugate and I’m interviewing Mr. Herman F. Jenkins in his home in Louisville of 3605 (Hertsinger?) Lane, as part of the… World War II Commemorative committees Oral History Program for the Military History Museum. I don’t know, I guess probably the best place for me to start off is… you were with Battery B of the Second to the One-hundred-thirty-eight… Jenkins: 138th Field Artillery Battalion, right.

Fugate: When did you join the, the 138th, it, obviously it was a National Guard unit we… Jenkins: No, I wasn’t with the National Guard… Fugate: You weren’t with the National Guard.

Jenkins: … We went down with the first bunch of draftees, (SWAT Team?) they called them then. That was in February nineteen and forty-two.

Fugate: February ’42.

Jenkins: …I mean 1941. Then, of course we stayed in the states a long time. Walter, Walter Winchell got on the ra… radio one Sunday afternoon, he wanted to know what the 1:00playboy ( ) [Chuckling] the playboy division of the South 38th Division was still in the states. And then they got us ready to go. Yeah, they got us ready and after Pearl Harbor was bombed we were sent down at Fort (Sumter?), Louisiana, with our bon… Fugate: Were you guys on the way to Pearl Harbor when it was bombed?

Jenkins: No, that was the second battalion.

Fugate: Yeah, Okay.

Jenkins: That was the 2nd Battalion, hundr…of the 38th Division, that be the 138th field artillery.

Fugate: Mm-mm. And you were in the first battalion?

Jenkins: I was first battalion, yeah.

Fugate: Okay.

Jenkins: Yeah. Yeah they were on their way, they were supposed to be going to the Philippines. They didn’t have any armament on their ship. So they brought them back and they set up defense there on Hawaii, and on Oahu. That’s when we relieved them. They went on to…I, I forget where they did go. But…we spent six months in Hawaii getting ready for to go down under. 2:00Then (clears throat) we left there and went to New Guinea and spent four months, and from there we went to Leyte and we was kind of on a mopping up exercise there at Leyte, but after--of course that’s when we were in New Guinea, Tokyo Rose come on the radio, we was loading our ships, said, “ha-ha, boys from the 38th Division, prepare [Chuckling] preparing to come into Leyte and we’ll have a nice reception waiting for you,” and we had one too. And… Fugate: Yeah, she knew where you guys were going… Jenkins: Yes… Fugate: …before you did.

Jenkins: …that’s right, she sure in hell did.

Fugate: Huh!

Jenkins: She…we were out just not too far from Leyte when they started crash diving down these ships. They sank a one ship in our convoy. Well, they didn’t sink it, they come in the Harbor there at Leyte and sank it there, and the pilot (clears throat). The pilot bailed out. 3:00This P-38 came in and, and shot him, and he bailed out but the 11th Airborne was on the beach and they cut his, cut his head off.

Fugate: The…those are the…a kamikaze attack or… Jenkins: Yeah, yeah, yeah they, they…we--I was on the flagship, and then they come towards us but those boys on the ship knocked that sucker out. But they got this one ship behind us. They were part of the 149th Infantry, I think they lost nineteen boys, and we had one driver out of our battery who was on that ship too. He survived it, he didn’t get hit. But they came on in the harbor and sank it, that ship, and I was on there with a bunch of us in charge of loa…loading ammunition, that one-o-five ammunition, boy it was scary time [Laughter – Jenkins and Fugate] Fugate: I can imagine.

Jenkins: But we didn’t do too much on Leyte, just a mopping up exercise, and we left there and went on to 4:00Ulan Bataan. We landed at (Sanorsecil?) January 29th, 1945, and it took only nineteen days to take Bataan, completely, but it took sixteen days to get through ZigZag Pass. That’s where, out in the artillery but, that 34th Regimental team, went, went in there first, and loss so many lives. They brought them back and they were stacked up like hardwood, and I was down the battalion headquarters and I got a call from a captain. One of the officers got sick and he sent me up on the FO party, and boy it was hell up there. And we fought on through ZigZag Pass and we went south to (Maribellus?) the 150th Artillery and 151st Infantry. Boy those boys got slaughtered down there. And…after 5:00we left there, we worked north to Clark Field, and back in the Zambales Mountains is where I got wounded.

Fugate: How were you wounded?

Jenkins: A piece of shrapnel. Five of us got hit, three of them lost their legs.

Fugate: What, with some…knee mortar round, or… Jenkins: Yeah, one of them was not a knee mortar, a mortar… Fugate: The regular mortar round?

Jenkins: …yeah, right. My radio operator lost his leg completely. Well they took it off the next morning. We got hit at eight in the morning and didn’t get in the hospital until nine that night, but they gave us plasma, at least, we called them gooks, Filipinos carrying us out. They stopped to give us plasma on the trail. But the next morning, I asked them to take me over, I wanted to see my radio operator and they had already taken his leg off. He said, “I know where I am going but you don’t know where you’re going.” So… Fugate: So how serious were your wounds? 6:00Jenkins: Well it was a piece of shrapnel went about half way through my leg. It was serious enough, but I was crazy and wasn’t going to apply for a pencil job. I was out two years.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: All I wanted to do was [Chuckling] to get out of that place.

Fugate: Well at, after the wound where did you go, I mean did they s… Jenkins: Okay, they sent me back, they…this major was treating me there on Luzon at Clarks Field, and he grafted some skin off this leg on to this one.

Fugate: That’s from the right to the left?

Jenkins: Yeah, from the left to the right.

Fugate: To…okay, left to the right.

Jenkins: But anyhow…I could smell that stuff out in the cast, the smell was rotten, and I told him, I said, “Major, something is wrong here. Smell my leg.” I said, “this, this is rotting.” So he took it off and all that meat fell out of it. So they sent me back to Leyte. That was a…one these big whole long hospital tents, I laid there for a long time, they treated it a little bit. This old Captain (Mossiri?) come by one morning, 7:00“I’m going to sew you up in the morning.” I said, “okay!” Man, I didn’t realize they had so many boys in worse shape, they didn’t give us anything. He sewed this leg up I think it was eight stitches, but man I sweated it out! [Laughter – Fugate and Jenkins].

Jenkins: Well, they were some times, I’ll tell you what.

Fugate: Oh!

Jenkins: Then, I spent about three months in that damn hospital in the casual camps. Then they sent me back to my battery. I was just east of Manila down, they was worked their way up there.

Fugate: When were you wounded, what date was that?

Jenkins: It was very close to my birthday. Let’s see, I believe it was March the 28th, my birthday was the 31st of March, yeah. President Roosevelt died when I was in the hospital. Then, when I got back to the outfit, they ran me through all kind of casual camps, and I was going through this casual camp and I spot a v…a vehicle from another battery, 8:00and I jumped out of it and it was Lieutenant (Paul?) was his name. I said, “Lieutenant (Paul?), check me out of this casual camp, I don’t want to go through another one.” So he did, he took me on back to my battery then, and I s… Fugate: Why were so bad, why did you want out of those camps? Why were they, why were they so bad, why did you want out of those camps so bad?

Jenkins: Well, because they w…they worked you and you weren’t able to really work.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: They had, they made you do everything, shoot, stand guard duty… Fugate: Huh!

Jenkins: oh shit. So, he took me on back to my battery, where B-Battery was located. Well I started to the battalion area and the old Colonel (Calbert?) called me, “Sergeant Jenkins!” And I saluted him, I said, “yes sir!” He said, “would you consider staying with T-Battery if I made you first sergeant?” I said, “no Sir Colonel, I want to go home.” “I don’t blame you son, I do too.” [Chuckling]. So I went on back to my battery and we had a new battery commander, and our captain was on the staff. So 9:00I went up and introduced myself to him. He was a heavy old tall guy, he said, “look, Sergeant Jenkins, you’re about due to go home,” he said, “don’t you worry about doing anything. If you feel like checking your equipment, if you don’t, the hell with it.” So, one of my buddies lives right down there, oh (Willies Limencooler?) (clears throat). He talked me into staying on machinegun with him all night. So, I did that. The next day they pulled us out of combat, B-Battery took us down Manila on damn ( ) had a nice setup there for a while, but I was over to the swimming pool, nice swimming pool at President’s Palace. That thing was long as near to almost that fence back there, and about forty foot wide, and I was over there off duty, and I enjoyed myself, and this Dutchman, (Limencooler?), here he comes over there and he said, “Sergeant Jenkins, you better get over to the orderly rooms, Sergeant (Quam?) wants you.” I said, “the hell with him, I’m off duty!” 10:00He was just coming up [Chuckling] to replace me, he didn’t know me, see, but anyhow, he finally talked me into going over there. I walked in, I said, “what the hell do you want with me, sergeant? I’m off duty.” Here he had my papers, “prepare to disembark to the United States.” Fugate: Oh!

Jenkins: I said, “oh man!” [Laughter – Fugate and Jenkins]. And, but we got on the damn ship and, and had to go back and pick up some more, and they were quarantined. It took us, I think, something like twenty-nine days to get back to California. But coming back to California, underneath the Golden Gates, they had a great big sign like up on the mountains, ‘Welcome Home, Job Well Done,’ and then they had a boat something like the Belle of Louisville, had these girls on there dancing and singing for us. Of course we couldn’t get off, they took us off there, took us up to Camp Stoneman, California, and that’s where I left. I had a--prisoners 11:00of war, German prisoners of war, was feeding us, had a steak about that big and fresh milk [Chuckling], man! [Laughter – Fugate]. I liked to foundered myself and then they put us on a train.

Fugate: That’s was before the w . . . before the Japanese had surrendered, or after?

Jenkins: Oh they done surrendered.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Yeah, we done whipped them off of that place, yeah. But…they put us on a train, sent us back to Atterbury, and I was discharged October the 4th, and I had high blood pressure, and this technician took my blood pressure, he said, “man, you got to go to the hospital!” I said, “God damn, I’m going to go home. I have to see my fa...” So, he marked it down and let me get out. I never even applied for a pension ‘til I was out two years.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: And I only got a ten percent then. I’m working on another one now though, but is there anything else you want to know now?

Fugate: Well you, with the 1st Battalion sec…1st Battalion of the 138th Field Artillery, 12:00you said that…were you with them down at Camp Shelby, Mississippi in 1941?

Jenkins: Oh yeah, yeah.

Fugate: Can you tell me a little bit about Camp Shelby, what went on down there… Jenkins: Oh man!

Fugate: …and all that training.

Jenkins: That was… Fugate: You guys were supposed to have being gone for a year and… Jenkins: That Camp Shelby was a me…it was a mess.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: We had a pretty nice area when we got down there, but after we got set up nice and everything, they moved us out, we had to build our own area [Laughing] and it was a dog, I’ll tell you, thew, I nev… Fugate: What, what, what did you build, like Quonset huts or something like… Jenkins: Yeah, well, we bui…had platforms and then tents over them, that’s all, just, just the tent. There they had, that…the original camp there at Shelby, they had these platforms up about that high, wooden floors and everything, see. They were pretty nice. We had a little stove in the wintertime, a little (samly?) stove, we stayed pretty warm, had nice mess halls and everything. But out there, it was, it was a dog [Chuckling]. Then we left there, we left Camp Shelby, 13:00and went to…down at…Panama Beach, or Panama…hell was, Apalachicola, no, what was that joint called? Let me think a minute. Went down and took that amphibious training.

Fugate: Mm-mm. That was down at…Camp Carrabello?

Jenkins: Carrabelle.

Fugate: Carrabelle?

Jenkins: Camp Carrabelle, Florida.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Yeah, we took that daggone train, man! Thew, go out and hit those beach [Chuckling] with water up to your neck carrying your equipment. Dog Island they called it. We spent a whole day out there and then they’d take you back in at night. You’d be full of…cold and, between January and February, now it gets cold down there.

Fugate: Yeah. What, I mean, what is involved in the amphibious training, during that time period?

Jenkins: We were the first division 14:00that tried it--who took that amphibious training, well (clears throat) they take you out on these landing crafts, and they drop those ramps, and you hit it. Well there one time nineteen boys in the 149th infantry drowned, they didn’t get up to the beach, but it was all new to everybody, see.

Fugate: Mm-mm. Those were LSTs they were dropping you out of?

Jenkins: Yeah, Landing craft infantry. They sure were, yeah. We spent…well it wasn’t all the training we had, they told us to climb up these ropes and all that stuff, man, it was rough.

Fugate: Mm-mm. You guys were basically in training there for what, a year? Was it…before you shipped out.

Jenkins: The amphibious training? Huh, let’s see.

Fugate: Between Camp Shelby and before you shipped out overseas, you know, about a y…about a year, I guess?

Jenkins: Oh no, it was more than that.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: See, we went, we left Carrabelle; we went to Livingston, Camp Livingston, Louisiana. That was a nice camp. There we took more training, and then…I’ll 15:00never forget, one Sunday afternoon, old Walter Winchell used to come on, the radio? Sitting there listening to the radio, Walter Winchell said, went to--“I wonder what the playboy division of the south is still doing in the states?” Talk about the thirty-eight, “the 38th Division,” he said, “I mean.” Boy it wasn’t long, they got our butts out of there; they got us ready to go. We left out of New Orleans, New Year’s Eve, nineteen and forty-three. And then went down, went down through--well, I say another thing we would--our battery did too, I forgot that. After Pearl Harbor was bombed they took B-Battery and put it down on a levee in the Mississippi River, looking for submarines that were sneaking up there and sinking, sinking ships.

Fugate: Did they use you guys as… Jenkins: And all we did was get drunk on orange wine [Laughing] and (them girls?) oh them was some days, I’ll tell you. [Laughter – Fugate] Old 16:00battery command had to build a guardhouse. Of course I never did a lot of ( ), I managed to take care of myself. I was just a corporal then. Boy it was rough! Then we left out went, right, went by Cuba. Boy, it was all lit up that night, I’ll never forget that; down through the Panama Canal. Man that was, that was something to go through those locks.

Fugate: What kind of a ship were you on when you’re doing this one?

Jenkins: It was the USS (Farland?) it was a converted…ship. There, we left on the USS (Farland?) and got to Hawaii. I think it took us seven--I mean twenty-seven days to get over there, after we went through the locks, and then… Fugate: And when you l…when you left Camp Livingston, headed to…to Panama, you had all your equipment, everything with you aboard ship?

Jenkins: Oh yeah.

Fugate: Those were one-hundred and fifty-five millimeter howitzers you were… Jenkins: Yeah, well we had a special sh…ship for them, that’s what they was loaded on special.

Fugate: Okay.

Jenkins: They were down underneath yeah, oh they was, they was all on there.

Fugate: So they had, they had the b…the, the men on one ship and the actual guns on another? 17:00Jenkins: Yeah, that’s right, and, and ammunition. I know we got into Leyte, I was put on [Chuckling] duty to help unload those ship, man you’re talk about scary, them Jap zeroes coming in on us, ho! And then I couldn’t wait, that old battery commander, he was, man, he said he was waiting at the beach for us (clears throat) Fugate: Well how much time did you guys spent in Hawaii? I mean did, where they, did you stopped in Hawaii and spent some time there, did you, before you went on?

Jenkins: We spent six months there.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Further training. Man, they had us walking on vines and everything [Chuckling] learned, I learned to swim, the ones who couldn’t swim, driving these ducks, yeah, it was just some heavy training went on there too.

Fugate: Yeah. Oh I know they also d…gave you guys an opportunity to enjoy yourself a little bit. I know that… Jenkins: Oh well yeah, yeah! They did… Fugate: …there was opportunity, USO put on a… Jenkins: [Chuckling] Yeah, that’s right.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: (Clears throat) Old…I’ll never forget old…oh shit what’s the old timer? Bob…oh shit, 18:00I (can’t remember the name?) he did all these USO shows.

Fugate: Bob Hope?

Jenkins: Bob Hope, and Frances Langford were there, they put on a heck of a show. I was down in Honolulu, going to a school down there. The captain sent me down at…to a s…a school, chemical warfare school, and they were there in Hawaii. I mean Honolulu, and I saw that show, it was really nice. Then old Kay Keyser came over in the Pacific. I can’t remember where that was at. It was on Bataan someplace, he and…put on a show for us. He had some of these good-looking gals.

Fugate: Mm-mm. I mean a lot of people enjoyed going to those USO programs, USO shows, is that… Jenkins: Oh yeah, yeah.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Nothing else to do, you know, really, to see them girls maybe [Laughing] Fugate: Yeah. Keep everybody occupied [Laughter – Fugate] Jenkins: Well they had some pretty nice gals on Hawaii too, of course. I, I, you, you 19:00c…co…recording all this?

Fugate: Mm-mm.

Jenkins: Oh, I can’t say some things, you know.

Fugate: Ah, don’t worry about it; it’s not that big a problem.

Jenkins: Are you sure? Just like there in Honolulu. I was sent down there at chemical warfare school. The school was over at noon, and these whorehouses down in town, well I’d sneak down there, you see, I mean guys in my outfit was lined up there [Laughing], there is… Fugate: What was a name of one or two of those places? I know a couple the Pearl Harbor survivors talk about one of those downtown… Jenkins: Boy, they had a nice, they had a nice, hum. I got my first blowjob there [Laughter – Fugate and Jenkins], five dollars for five minutes buddy, you had to be ready, but just a good-looking redhead, I’m telling you, thew, man, outside… Fugate: Once you guys finally got off Pearl Harbor, they head you toward New Guinea.

Jenkins: Right.

Fugate: How much time did you spend in New Guinea… Jenkins: We spent… Fugate: …and what was that like?

Jenkins: …we--well, that was hellhole really. There wasn’t much--we didn’t have too much fighting, but we took a little bit training 20:00and, and you know, got some of the chaps out of there, what was left. But that is where the damn, these Australians came in, boy they were some fighters, them big suckers, man they were tough.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: But anyhow, that’s where Tokyo Rose--we was loading our ships there… Fugate: That’s where she announced that she knew you were already there?

Jenkins: Yeah, we were going to have a nice, we’re going to have a nice reception. You know, the funny thing too, we were down there loading ships one night and a damn, these big snakes, or a cobra--no… Fugate: Python?

Jenkins: …no, kind that wraps around you and squeezes you to death. Cobra, I guess it is.

Fugate: I think it’s a python.

Jenkins: Well anyhow, one of them got wrapped around the drive shaft of our truck, and we were coming back, that damn thing’s head kept it in the floorboard, floorboard [Chuckling]. We didn’t have any ammunition, so we called the MPs, they come, they yanked that floorboard up, had to shoot that son-of-the-bitch about fifteen times. We drug him back to camp 21:00and it was a big sucker.

Fugate: Hah!

Jenkins: Yes sir, it sure was.

Fugate: The… Jenkins: Then we…of course we spent I think four months in New Guinea, mostly some training and muddy, hot, goddamn it, I got malaria fever, yeah I came back with it bad.

Fugate: I’d gu…I imagine just about everybody got malaria, didn’t they?

Jenkins: Not everybody… Fugate: No.

Jenkins: …but I, I, see, one thing, I came back before my outfit did and I was talking to General Dawson, he said that they told us to consider, you know, take your atabrine after you get back, and I was never told that. So I quit, but man I broke down with malaria, thew, I liked to died, I didn’t weigh a hundred-twenty pounds, sweat through the mattress.

Fugate: That’s after you got back to Kentucky?

Jenkins: Yeah.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Yeah we… Fugate: What kind of medicine did they give you, or what kind of a… Jenkins: Atabrine, they called it. It was yellow, little yellow pill. You too… I took it all while I was there.

Fugate: How much were you supposed to take every day?

Jenkins: I think it was two a day. 22:00But you carried them right with you, I never forget up in the mountains, thew, hum, I had a, a piece of cheese, you know, a K ration? I had that all peeled, I was going to eat it, and japs came in on us, and I made a dive toward the ground, I hit, dropped that cheese in the creek and mud and damn I took it, peeled that mud off it and ate it out, I was so hungry, thew, oh boy, hm! But the damn (Bolly?) mountains. See I lay there at Clark Field, like I told you, for a while. And my radio operator, they took his legs off, there was five, three infantry boys and my radio op and myself, and three of them lost their legs.

Fugate: Mm-mm. Yeah, there you are on an observation post… Jenkins: Right, I was… Fugate: …forward observer… Jenkins: Forward observer they called it, yeah.

Fugate: What, what w…really was your duty as a forward observer? What were you doing?

Jenkins: Really, my duty wasn’t that. I was chief of detail, 23:00I was head over the wire section…the radio section, and the telephone section and all of that.

Fugate: The communications of the… Jenkins: Uh-huh, but the lieutenant (Gazimbo?) got sick and that’s when the captain sent me up. Why I met another lieutenant up there. [Chuckling] I’ll never forget that--he is dead now too, he let me zero in on Japanese motor pool, and you talk about a thrill, that was really a thrill. I got the batteries e…one battery, our battery, D battery, zeroed in, then I called for the whole battalion. Man you could see vehicles and bodies flying ever which way.

Fugate: How far away were you from that?

Jenkins: Oh I’d say we was at least a…six thousand yards, probably, cause them guns would fire a long way. Now when I was with infantry, they set a perimeter up and put the radio and an operator right in the middle of that for protection. 24:00Then the artillery fire, harassing fire all nightlong, keep them suckers from coming in on us.

Fugate: What kind of rounds were they firing?

Jenkins: One-o-five.

Fugate: It was…high explosive stuff, or… Jenkins: Well they had smoke browns and everything, you all wanted--yeah these were high explosive rounds, yeah, yeah.

Fugate: White phosphorous was probably most of what was used, huh.

Jenkins: Yeah they had white phosphorous; they had…smoke, every kind.

Fugate: What was, what was a, a…a basic fire mission like? I mean how did the fire mission develop?

Jenkins: Okay! This was, like this you, this was not with the coordinates. You looked at your maps, you had your maps with you, you picked out coordinates for this, you could see these Japs, way over you know, pick out your coordinates, and you’d fire a round to see where it hit, and if it was under, you, you go over so much, and if it was over, you’d come back so much, until you got zeroed in and then you could call for the whole battalion. That’s the way that worked, SFO party.

Fugate: How many guns the…did 25:00the group have with them over there?

Jenkins: Well, let’s see now, this was a, just a, we probably call for one battery, but you could call the whole battalion in, like A battery’s got three, we each got three, she’s got three, that’s a…that’s not… Fugate: So each battery had three guns?

Jenkins: I mean four, four guns, each battery’s got four, so you could brought in all, the whole battalion, if you wanted to. But we just used the one battery because we didn’t think we wanted to waste the ammunition, but…artillery was great for at that harassing fire. Of course the morning that I got hit, we didn’t know it was highly, part of high angle fire. We discussed it, it might have been high angle fire, our own artillery could of hit us, or the Jap ( ) but that was a sad morning, boy.

Fugate: I, I…while you guys were out there, did you try to camouflage yourself in some way, or… Jenkins: Oh yeah, yeah, he… Fugate: What kind of a… Jenkins: …wha…you take a nighttime they’d dig in, foxholes. Yeah we tried to get as much cover as we get, you know.

Fugate: And I guess this is all tropical 26:00foliage, there was… Jenkins: Oh yeah.

Fugate: …I mean it was rainy and muddy… Jenkins: Oh cold, cold!

Fugate: …all that stuff, yeah.

Jenkins: on one of those mountains at night, buddy.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: See we was up about five thousand feet, Woodpecker Ridge, where I got hit.

Fugate: Woodpecker?

Jenkins: Woodpecker Ridge, yeah, I’ll never forget that.

Fugate: How did they get you out of there? I mean once, once the rounds came in and the, the men are obviously in pretty bad shape if they actually they ended up losing their legs, but how did they get you out of there?

Jenkins: Well, first thing, my radioman kept hollering, “my leg’s gone.” Well I started crawling over towards him, he…we was away from one another a piece, you know, when they hit, and when I started crawling toward him, I looked down and blood was just pouring out of my leg. So I went on over there. By the time I got there, the aide men were there. So I took my belt off real quick to stop my bleeding, but they put us on stretchers, like I say, the Filipinos carried us out of there, and they stopped and gave us plasma. 27:00Hell we’d have died if they hadn’t of. You, you get hit that early in the morning, get in the hospital at night. So…I’ll never forget the first guy that come to see me was a Catholic chaplain. I wasn’t Catholic, but he came to see me. And I got on the radio [Chuckling] after I got hit, because you couldn’t call the captain, you had to call him by his first name, I said, “Davy, Davy, I’m going home.” “What do you mean, why ain’t you…” I said, “I just got hit, and I can go home.” [Laughing] He came to see me in the hospital, and I told him, I said, “wire my mother and tell her I do…I’m all right, or call her or something.” He did, because damn good thing he did because she got a telegram that I was seriously wounded in action, you know, scarred her to death. But he got to her first, but, this one guy came home before me, that was the first sergeant. He had five children, but 28:00I followed right behind.

Fugate: Well they had notified her that you’d been seriously wounded in battle, I mean did… Jenkins: Yeah, it would have scarred her to death, you know.

Fugate: Yeah, and how did, how did she respond to you once you got home?

Jenkins: [Laughing] She, she was glad to see me, I’ll tell you. The funniest thing though, came out of Atterbury, had a Greyhound bus ticket to Louisville. Some guy there in a ’41 Chevrolet, “hey, I’m going to Louisville, take anybody in for eleven bucks.” I say [Chuckling] I went in the, the eleven bucks, I paid him and threw the ticket away, I was so glad to get home.

Fugate: Well I can imagine.

Jenkins: I had a brother, brother had a ser…service station at Second and Broadway, we came right in Second Street, I got off there. And then his wife spotted me; they come running now [Laughing], and he had booze saved up and everything [Laughter – Fugate]. But that was…that’s really getting home.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: I tell you, yes sir.

Fugate: You got a, a, after the…kamikazes had attacked there in Leyte, 29:00you guys were in the process of offloading all that ammunition…for the 105s, I mean, what else was going on there during that first landing, I mean it, were there any more of…encounters of the Japanese other than the… Jenkins: Oh yeah there was… Fugate: …the planes?

Jenkins: Yes sir, yeah, yeah, we was--stayed there for quite a while. Yeah, they had [Chuckling], they set up, they set up a, a place for a movie there, and every night this sta…one Japanese plane would come over and drop a bomb. We could hear him coming [Chuckling]. We called him ‘Washing Machine Charlie.’ But…we weren’t there too much, too much to do; it was pretty well clear when we got there.

Fugate: How did you move the guns and the ammunitions and everything from one point to another once you… Jenkins: On these big ship--oh you mean on land?

Fugate: Yeah, once you got there, wa… Jenkins: Oh well we had, we had those Caterpillars. Those Caterpillars would, we had one Caterpillar with a blade would dig in, and they had camouflaged nests, you know, at one, like first gun section had a blade, well he’d unhook his gun 30:00and he’d go dig the other, dig the one--the number one position in, and then dig the rest of them in. Then he put a camouflage nets. I’ll never forget there on Bataan, there at Subic Bay, we pulled in the station, the 150th was behind us, and later on at night, those big long Toms pulled in. Man one of them rounds went off, everything started shaking and [Chuckling], and liked to scared everybody to death until we found out what it was!

Fugate: Railroad cars being fired over your head.

Jenkins: Thew, I’m telling you, I think just… Fugate: Well how long did it take to actually move…the battery? I mean I’m…I know you didn’t stay in one position once you were in the, in the mountains up there, but… Jenkins: Well there at ZigZag Pass now we stayed in one position until we got through that, and then they pulled the guns out and come on across, and then we went down south to meet the 150th Field Artillery, and the 151st Infantry. That’s where I got the old Dudley--I mean 31:00McArthur, I was close enough to him to shake hands with him.

Fugate: Yeah, what did you think of him, he… Jenkins: I thought he was all right.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Let me tell you, he was a pretty brave man.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: He walked, he walked right up there, I tell you, man that’s where they landed there. He circled out there, that’s a hell of a feeling, knowing what you’re going to run into. You see him right there, we were all circling around there, and we landed at a little old place called--look at that ship--everybody going to church. I know I was in that bunch, I wasn’t too religious, but I was right there [Laughing].

Fugate: Pretty nervous sitting out there in the middle of that… Jenkins: You ain’t kidding buddy!

Fugate: …was that in Subic Bay?

Jenkins: Subic--well that--yeah, this was ru…(Sanarcecil?) Fugate: Right, okay.

Jenkins: We landed at (Sanarcecil?) and then we worked our way around to Subic Bay.

Fugate: So how long were you out there circling in… Jenkins: Well, it was, we got out there pretty early in the morning, you know, we didn’t hit until daybreak, 32:00but they put us on those damn things early and they kept circling, you know, until it, got, I went in, in the third wave (clears throat). My job was to get the gun with a…shit…exec officer picked out the gun places and then put the gun in position when they came in.

Fugate: Well the… Jenkins: And then I, being chief of detail, see I was supposed to, of course put the guns in, didn’t have to survey or anything, and then I was sent out, go down to (Putang?) Headquarters to compute coordinates. Well shit, went down there that, that’s when he brought all those 24th Infantry Regiment boys back there stacked up like hardwood, and I got a call from my battalion commander say come back Sergeant Jenkins, I want to talk to you. So I went back, he said, “Lieutenant (Gazimbo?) is sick. I want you to go out and meet this other lieutenant, out of another battery on the FO party. I had to go, nothing 33:00I could do but go, went all through ZigZag Pass, and, and then (clears throat) we fought on down the southern end to meet the 151st Infantry and the 150th Field Artillery. You saw those graveyards there, didn’t you?

Fugate: Mm-mm. Yeah, I mean the--I went up that’s, that’s one question I have, you, you know, they, they…after you guys got involved there you’re, you know, the, the term ‘Avengers of Bataan’ was, was what was attached to the 38th Division.

Jenkins: Right.

Fugate: I mean, when did they, when did they actually label you guys as the ‘Avengers of Bataan?’ Jenkins: Right after, soon as that…of course I didn’t know it until I got back to States, you know, but… Fugate: Well you guys were aware of the, the guys in the 38th tank company and the Harrodsburg group… Jenkins: Oh yeah… Fugate: …that they were… Jenkins: Yeah, oh yeah, we knew all about them.

Fugate: Yeah, you knew that they’d already gone through the Bataan… Jenkins: Right, right.

Fugate: …Death March and those things and… Jenkins: Now here is something that I saw bringing these (some?) books in. 34:00This (Lemmoncooler?), the guy who owns this book, now see I didn’t get a chance to get to this book, but he did. He was on M, m, on the--like I say we were put on MP duty and he [Chuckling] he had a job down there to go to prison. He had all kinds of Japanese officers. Funniest thing I’m thinking. I was supposed to go and check on him and he is having these Japanese climb these trees and shaking them, but there wasn’t nothing in them, and he had them saluting him and doing [Chuckling]…that crazy Dutchman, “come here look at them, I want you to see what I got them doing.” I had to laugh at him, because he, they were scared to death of him.

Fugate: I know they…talked about fighting there at the, the ZigZag Pass.

Jenkins: Oh, that was a hellhole.

Fugate: What, I, why do they call it the ZigZag Pass?

Jenkins: Well, because it was zigzag, that’s the way it was. Like this is. 35:00Fugate: Just a number of s curves, over and over, and over.

Jenkins: Yeah, everyone of these ( ) corners had a pillbox, underground hospitals and everything. They had to go in there and root them out, I mean it was rough, those ( ) boy was thew. That boy from the 149th infantry from Hazard and Harland, Kentucky, they were tough. They had to offer a reward to get them to take a prisoner. That’s the truth.

Fugate: Yeah. But, I know with the, when the artillery was firing in, what would, when they called the fire mission in on ZigZag… Jenkins: Well the fire, wasn’t, they would, you know, they knew where the Japs were, and they’d call for fire and they’d fire over our head, and you try to hit these pillbox, you know. Now Lieutenant (Vickery?) that exec officer in my battery, he was in a little la…( ) plane, and he knocked out a damn Jap tank. You talk about a thrill, that was a thrill for B-Battery and him too, you know, I’ll never forget, he was, he called in, “mission accomplished, knocked out the tank.” 36:00They do mention his name but it’s at a dinner.

Fugate: Yeah, I, I like saw, I saw it in there in his will that… Jenkins: I’ll say one thing, I wa… Fugate: …I remember he is standing on somebody, standing on the top of one of them? A good…an infantry man standing on the top of… Jenkins: Yeah, yeah. Now these, these, these people were a lot of help us too, too, that tribe up in the mountains, they, they, they were good.

Fugate: What kind of…I mean how, what kind of support did they give to you?

Jenkins: Well they led us around. They knew their way around, you know, where the Japs were hiding and everything. See them here?

Fugate: Mm-mm. Now the… Jenkins: There they are here see, in these little old boats? Yeah, we ran into a tribe of them, (they were?) a lot of help.

Fugate: Were you guys assigned…to support the 149th, or were you… Jenkins: Well… Fugate: …in close contact with the 149th the whole time you were there, or… Jenkins: Well we supported different ones too at times, but the 149th was mostly our combat team, that’s who I worked with when I was…with 37:00the 149th. I’ll never forget this, this Colonel (Skel?) he was a rough son-of-a-bitch [Chuckling]. He took, ah, you don’t have to record this, he caught this Jap jacking off and he shot that son-of-a-bitch all to pieces then he, “you dirty bastard,” and turned into him [Laughing]. I’m never getting ( ).

Fugate: Caught him out in the jungle?

Jenkins: He, he caught him right there behind a tree. Yeah boy. Now that was…I got to see some of those prisoners, those women prisoners from St. Thomas University, the rangers went in there, because I--we was close by and got to see them, man they was, they were pitiful, knocked up by those son-of-bitches Japs.

Fugate: How many of them were there in that?

Jenkins: Oh, there?

Fugate: When they liberated them, mm?

Jenkins: Oh 38:00there was quite a few of them. They had a couple of truckloads come out of there.

Fugate: How did they get, how did they get caught over there in the first place?

Jenkins: Well, that was the same way that the other boys got caught. You know, it, it happened so fast, it happened so fast.

Fugate: They, they just didn’t get time to get on the plane… Jenkins: You had to get of there.

Fugate: …to get out of there.

Jenkins: That’s right, that’s exactly right. I tell you about another funniest thing, here I have, shit, I was on this plane coming back from, from…Luzon to Leyte, one of the damn motors conked out. This flight nurse took her training at Bowman Field. Man, she was coming around telling everything was going to be all right. I knew goddamn good well [Chuckling] things won’t come all right, huh, she, shit, my kidneys locked and we did make it in. Shit I couldn’t even piss, I was [Chuckling] oh boy, and laid in that damn old field hospital there. Of course, 39:00the only serb…the only thrill I got, a little Filipino nurse come by every morning, “let me rub your back,” Su…I said “sure rub it.” While she did that I slipped my hand up underneath her dress [Laughing], oh-oh, that was some fine time, I’ll tell you. We had to have some kind of fun, I’ll tell you.

Fugate: Oh yeah, yeah. How old were you at that time?

Jenkins: Well, let’s see, I was twenty-one when I went in, so I was pretty close to twenty-five!

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Yeah, that damn near five years in that thing.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Thew.

Fugate: Oh what, what type of fighters were the Japanese soldiers? I mean as an individual soldier?

Jenkins: Well I think they, they were sneaky son-of-bitches. I guess they were pretty good. You know, but man they could, they could mock anything. They’d have themselves tied up in damn trees. I’ll never forget this little boy from Crab Orchard, Kentucky. He just came in as a replacement, as a scout. He always wanted to carry those (six san?) radio, 40:00you know, those transmissions. Shit, we were real glad to get rid of that thing, it was heavy. Let him carry it one morning, and he is walking up the trail, and the damn Jap dug in a hole and popped him right between the eyes, and he fell right back in my arms. Now that was one of the worse experience; you know, it was a damn shame.

Fugate: Did they fight--did they--I mean were they, did you encounter mostly in…as individuals in foxholes, or did you encounter large groups of them, or were they just scattered… Jenkins: Oh they scattered around, you know, they, they, they were treacherous. They’d hide…tied themselves up in trees. I’ll never forget there on, went up ZigZag Pass before that infantry boy got that son-of-a-bitch up in a tree, he killed a couple of guys before the infantry boy got him, but he sure popped him out of that tree. That’s, that’s a, well they were yellow belly son-of-the-bitches, I call them. 41:00Huh. I don’t know of anything else I can get… Fugate: You know, can you, you know, just a couple of the pillboxes that you guys were trying to knock, knock them out of, what, what were they constructed like? What were those pillboxes looked like?

Jenkins: Concrete man, concrete. See, actually that’s where the 38th Tank Company held up a long time there, you know, when the Japs took over, but they, they, it took them a long time for the Japs, for the Japs to get to, the 38th Tank Company out of there. But it didn’t take us too long to get sixteen days to go through there.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: But damn, they’d sneak up with grenades and throw them down them things, flame throwers and burn them alive, blow them up, hot damn… Fugate: So, basically the idea was just… Jenkins: …you could hear them son-of-a-bitches screaming, man, when they turned that flamethrower down, yeah. But artillery fire was mostly to knock out some of that dead vegetation around so you could see what the hell was going on, you know, so the boys could see.

Fugate: So basically 42:00you’re, you’re being pushed through there as quickly as you possibly could to just fight as rough and as hard as you could fight.

Jenkins: Yeah, that’s right, that’s right, that’s right.

Fugate: I guess that’s where all the training, I mean you’ve gone through so much training.

Jenkins: That’s right you went through so much training, and I, I understand now why it was for, even a whole Hawaii, man, we took a lot of training. We spent six months there, and it was all training. Now I did have a, in Hawaii, I had a observation post, looking over the ocean, with a section of, in a pillbox, with the opening about as wide from that door to here and have a BC scope. Now if I checked out there and saw anything coming in, I’d report it, anything ordinary--out of the ordinary. But I had four men operating in that window; we did our own cooking and everything. That was a, you know, down to Kahoka Beach [Chuckling] spot a girl down there and take--get in that jeep I would run down there [Chuckling]. We were--had a, right in the plant…pineapple plantation, got all the pineapple you wanted for nothing, 43:00that was… Fugate: Mm, it sounds like a lot of fun.

Jenkins: That was good duty, really. But it wasn’t…well we still have a lot of training there too. I was lucky that captain thought a lot of me. He sent me to two or three different schools, and I got out of a lot duty. Hot damn, we got them exercise every morning, I’m telling you, thew, doing the cakewalk, every damn…duck walk and everything, man, calisthenics for one hour. You were so damned pooped when you turned that alarm [Chuckling]. But that’s where they got me.

Fugate: Would… Jenkins: They had some WACs come in and Captain (Sutton?) appointed at me as a group to meet them, come to our battery. Oh man, this lieutenant saw me ushering around and on that ship they called my name out. Go on over there, report [Chuckling] then they cut my damn hair off, right down through the middle, 44:00and set me on a pan of water was charged up and made me play with my peter [Laughter – Jenkins and Fugate] and… Fugate: When was this? When you were crossing the, crossing the… Jenkins: When we crossed the equator [Chuckling] yeah.

Fugate: When you cross the equator?

Jenkins: Yeah [Chuckling].

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Come here I’ll show the ship. You know I got it around the wall. [Interruption] Fugate: Yeah, that is packed pretty tight, isn’t it.

Jenkins: That’s me right there.

Fugate: Right there in the center?

Jenkins: Uh-huh.

Fugate: I noticed it you know, everybody is, everybody is sort of out of uniform. I mean they’d… Jenkins: Oh yeah.

Fugate: …( ) Jenkins: It wasn’t really customary that these guys up here is all in uniform. That’s where I was supposed to be and I don’t know in the hell I got away with it [Chuckling].

Fugate: I notice there’s several more in there that are… Jenkins: Yeah, right.

Fugate: …that are running around bared, strip naked to the waist, if you will.

Jenkins: The old guards, they, we had this got together, once the old guys, that bald headed son-of-bitch here, just see I can show me back here some place. Oh, right here. 45:00Fugate: Yeah, it’s right here, yeah. Yeah, so when you went, you went across the equator, I mean what, what all did they do when they crossed the equator. I know there is all kinds of ceremonies going on and… Jenkins: Well they, see, well shit they did like they did me. This one first sergeant he had beautiful hair [Laughing] and, and when he was in it, and they stripped him on the floor, we had men like broke his arm [Laughter – Fugate]. I didn’t pay attention to it though. The only thing that kind of embarrassed me, make me play with my peter [Laughing – Fugate and Jenkins]. I sang ‘My Old Kentucky Home.’ Fugate: They made you do, do it while you were singing ‘My Old Kentucky Home.’ Jenkins: [Chuckling] Yeah, that’s right. You know we have our reunion here in Louisville? We have for thirty-five years, every year.

Fugate: Well, I, when is that, I’d… Jenkins: Huh, it will be…let me see, this year. Last week, last…in August we met. Let me get my pen right over here. I got to go to a meeting Saturday.

Fugate: So how many members of the 138th are… Jenkins: Still left… Jenkins: …here in Louisville, 46:00still left at all?

Jenkins: [Laughing] there is some left, not a hell of a lot.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Huh, June, August, okay, it’s the third weekend in August. One, two three, starts on a Friday, 21st, it’s going to be 20th, 21st, and 22nd, three days. It starts on a Friday night. We always had it the second weekend but the damn post, somebody got the post on us. We have it out of the VFW post.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: So that’s a…what we do, we, we used to have as many as three hundred there. But now it’s down to…we’re lucky to get a hundred and fifty. And of course they come from everywhere. Our whole state of Kentucky… Fugate: It’s still pretty good number of people.

Jenkins: …some from California, some from Louisiana, 47:00Michigan, but it is something.

Fugate: That’s got to be a lot of fun, you all getting back together again and… Jenkins: See those are all those damn trophies I got. There’s some old pictures.

Fugate: Yeah. Those are the reunions.

Jenkins: Yeah.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Different reunions. Of course this goddamn lawyer friend of mine. We were at Camp [Chuckling] Shelby and this one guy left his car with me. So we’d go out at night, go down in Hattiesburg, and that son-of-the-bitch pick up a girl and he tried to rape her right away, and [Chuckling] she, she scoot over next to me, and he comes off with this…( ) presented with--to me, (Hunsey?) was a nice boy he believed in ( ) the girls [Laughing – Fugate and Jenkins] ah shit. But he’s a pistol. I got a cup out there 48:00in the garage for him right now.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Son-of-a-bitch’s got a whole kind of money, that’s Jim (Green?) he is crooked sheriff in Louisville, I got a cup out there I’m going to give to him Saturday [Laughter – Fugate]. And he is a Democrat, he never voted ( ) a democrat ticket in his life.

Fugate: ( ) Jenkins: Well… [Interruption] Fugate: I don’t know if you had any…activity with…Fort Stotsenberg?

Jenkins: Yeah, Fort Stotsenberg, that’s, that’s right behind Clarks Field, yeah, I was there.

Fugate: Well can you, can you describe that area? What was the b…what was for… Jenkins: There was a big church there, as far as I recall. We had an observation post set up there for a while. Let’s see, pictures are in there, ought to be (pages turning sound). 49:00Fugate: What about Mount Pinatubo did you ever get a chance of dealing anything with that? There is a battle and stuff that went on there, or I guess you were… Jenkins: I was in the hospital at that time, yeah.

Fugate: You were in the hospital by that time, yeah.

Jenkins: Yeah.

Fugate: Where were you at when the Japanese surrendered and what did you… Jenkins: I was there at…on MP duty, but that was only a short time I got to come home. I got some pictures of that I think, in here.

Fugate: Okay. [Interruption] Jenkins: There’s Manila, ( ).

Fugate: Oh Lord, it’s, there is not much of it to look at, there is a… Jenkins: You ain’t kidding buddy. Now here, those three guys I was buddying with and they’re both dead except me, Gulfport, Mississippi.

Fugate: Who were they, what were their names?

Jenkins: Huh, Jim Moore, 50:00Paul (Hallard?). Now Paul (Hallard?) laid down in the middle of Bardstown and let a train ran over him. Smart boy too. Couldn’t get him to take a drink in the army. He ended up an alcoholic. He had a hell of a business there in Bardstown too.

Fugate: No. What type of…what type of equipment did you guys have other than the one-o-fives, as far as the jeeps and… Jenkins: Before I left, we had French seventy-fives [Chuckling]. They were, we never fired those things. There is a…some captured stuff.

Fugate: And I keep noticing the, the…the jeeps and stuff in the background here, you guys were… Jenkins: Yeah.

Fugate: Those things were pretty plentiful.

Jenkins: Oh man yeah, you ain’t kidding. I was scout corporal for a long time.

Fugate: Did you drive any of those jeeps that were… 51:00Jenkins: Oh yeah!

Fugate: …over there?

Jenkins: Heck, yeah.

Fugate: We’ve got one in the collection at the museum that’s marked with the 149th Infantry we are probably going to use in the exhibit.

Jenkins: Yeah. You know I got a, had a Japanese automatic pistol. My son-in-law has got it, I, I don’t think he ever used it. Have you all got any of those?

Fugate: No, we sure haven’t.

Jenkins: I believe I can get it back… Fugate: Okay.

Jenkins: …from him; I’ll bring it up for you some time.

Fugate: Yeah. That reminds me, would not that Japanese rifle that you gave us, how did you get a hold of that thing?

Jenkins: Well, just lucky. Some damn doughboy found it and give it to me. I was with him, you know. Let’s see here. That was taken over in Hawaii, on the top of that Mountain.

Fugate: From Oah…Oahu?

Jenkins: Oahu. I was young then.

Fugate: What was the uniform like that you guys actually used in the field? You’re dressed here in a khaki uniform with the… 52:00Jenkins: Yeah, but that was casual, we you know, d…dru…jeans.

Fugate: When you were, actually when you’re over on the, in the Philippines it was a, it was jeans?

Jenkins: Oh, you didn’t wear no dress uniforms over there.

Fugate: Yeah. What, what… Jenkins: That was a picture taken at ’41.

Fugate: Oh my gosh! Yeah, that’s great! Is there anyway I could borrow one of, one of these, or a couple of… Jenkins: Yeah, you can take it with you… Fugate: …and get copies made and… Jenkins: Look.

Fugate: …send them back to you?

Jenkins: [Laughing] there is (Lemmoncooler?) and me on Oahu, that Dutchman… Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: …I was telling you about?

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Service club, look at there I, I bet you can’t pick me out on there.

Fugate: No, I sure can’t, which one are you?

Jenkins: Here I show it to you. Shit, I was young and good-looking there [Laughter – Fugate]. I got a--right here.

Fugate: Huh, okay, yeah. 53:00Jenkins: She got Herman’s… Fugate: Yeah, okay. Well you were young compared to everybody else there.

Jenkins: [Laughing] I’m telling you I was. Here’s is one at Camp Shelby too that.

Fugate: Oh yeah.

Jenkins: That’s about the first weekend [Chuckling] I got there.

Fugate: Yeah, this has got one of those…class you were talking about they were the wooden floor on the background… Jenkins: Yeah.

Fugate: …but the tent hasn’t gone up yet.

Jenkins: Now here is…here I am with one of those little Filipinos, standing right in front of me.

Fugate: Yeah, the children there?

Jenkins: Uh-huh.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: We had that one boy was with us all the way through. Ha-ha, Gulfport. That boy there with me is, he is the one that laid down and let the train run over him. Now this boy right here, he lost his mind, on the (tarp?). 54:00Fugate: Who was he?

Jenkins: (Chouse?) was his name, but he went--cracked up. Now here is a good one you might want. That’s a Japanese piece, we captured.

Fugate: That little field piece?

Jenkins: Yeah.

Fugate: Yeah that’s the best got--you know that’s pretty good, that’s got a full view of the… Jenkins: You can take it, if you want it.

Fugate: …the jeep in the background and… Jenkins: Keep it and give--bring it back to me, or give it back to me.

Fugate: I’ll, I’ll make copies of them and mail them back to you.

Jenkins: There’s me on this Caterpillar, I just set there… Fugate: Yeah okay, that’s basically a bulldozer, huh. I guess you had to have a bulldozer… Jenkins: Oh yeah!

Fugate: …to get anything moved up there.

Jenkins: You had to, yeah! You had to.

Fugate: It was that, it was that muddy and… Third Party: Hello.

Jenkins: [Laughing] that’s one of them gals on Hawaii.

Fugate: Having fun in Hawaii.

Jenkins: Yes sir.

Fugate: Now this was part of the USO program, or they just had some place you go get some pictures made with them, or… Jenkins: Oh you could have pictures made.

Fugate: Yeah. 55:00Jenkins: Fucking around drunk.

Fugate: Yeah.

Jenkins: Send it back home.

Fugate: Yeah, that’s a great one there.

Jenkins: Let’s see, we got any pictures here to--on MP duty?

Fugate: No, I didn’t see any.

Jenkins: I thought I had some. I guess I didn’t. I got some, some place, I don’t know where in the hell I did--take what you want too of those.

Fugate: Okay, I’ll make, I’ll, actually I wouldn’t mind making copies of all of them, but I’ll send them back to you.

Jenkins: This old boy here, he is dead too, cancer. That was taken at Camp Shelby on the old area.

Fugate: Bill and Mo--Bill and me, okay who is who--what’s Bill’s last name?

Jenkins: Pu…Pusey, Pusey [Chuckling] P-u-s-e-y or something [Laughter – Fugate], old Bill Pusey. Now here is my… Fugate: I bet he caught a lot of hell for that.

Jenkins: That’s my family come down to see me there, out in the old area.

Fugate: Uh-huh.

Jenkins: Look at that Ford; that Ford belonged to me.

Fugate: Oh, that’s great.

Jenkins: The best looking son-of-bitch, ’39.

Fugate: Oh man! I wish I had it now.

Jenkins: I do too. 56:00[END OF INTERVIEW]