Lasseter, Norman
Norman Lasseter: World War II
Interviewed by Keith Tucker
Interview date May 11, 2004
Q: OK, tell me your name.
A: Norman W. Lasseter.
Q: When and where were you born?
A: Hammond, Texas, 1922, June 30.
Q: When did you first begin thinking that the US might get involved in World War II?
A: When I graduated from high school in 1941, there were a lot of fellows already going right out of high school into the military.
Q: Did that occur after the attack at Pearl Harbor or did you think that US involvement in the war was inevitable prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor?
A: I really didn’t know, but I was interested in, ah, military, and particularly flying and I enlisted the twenty-first of July 1941.
Q: What was your reaction and the reaction of your family and friends when Pearl Harbor was attacked?
A: I was really dismayed. I was stated at Brooks Field, San Antonio, Texas, and has no idea where Pearl Harbor was. But we found out very quickly after getting back to the base. I was on a weekend pass to San Angelo, Texas, just visiting relatives there and we got back to the base that night about midnight and we found out right quick where Pearl Harbor was.
Q: What was the reaction of your family and friends?
A: Well, they were all scared to death, especially my mother, that I was going to shipped out the next day, which didn’t happen, but that was the reaction of them. My friends were sort of like we were – the fellows in the military. We were just astonished. We had – didn’t know what to think, really.
Q: OK, how old were you in December 1941?
A: Eighteen.
Q: Were you already in the military in December of ’41?
A: Yes. Ah-huh.
Q: So you enlisted?
A: Enlisted, ah-huh.
Q: OK. In what branch of the military did you serve?
A: Ah, well at that particular time it was the U.S. Army Air Corps, later became the U.S. Air Force.
Q: How did the other men in your area feel about serving in the military?
A: Oh, they were all happy about it. Some of them were a little upset, especially the ones that were drafted. They weren’t too satisfied because they knew they weren’t going to get out after that one year. The ones that enlisted, we enlisted for three years, and we knew we was going to be there that long, anyway.
Q: How did you family, wife, or girlfriend feel about you going off to war? Were you married then?
A: No, no.
Q: Did you have a girlfriend then?
A: Not particularly. When I was in high school, we ran around in, ah, gangs, not the kind of gangs that you’ve got today, but it would be two or three couples going together all the time. Never too serious about anything, really.
Q: And how did they feel about you going off to war?
A: Oh, some of them weren’t too happy about it, but some of them didn’t care.
Q: Where did you undertake basic training?
A: Brooks Field, San Antonio, Texas.
Q: And what was that experience like?
A: That was pretty rough because I had knew that there were sergeants – three stripers – but I didn’t know that there was such thing as a technical sergeant until I met him, and he was tough. We had some pretty rough times.
Q: What about your – anything else you want to say about your training specifically?
A: Yes, we, ah, ah, were trained pretty roughly for about six weeks, and it’s much longer training now, but at the end of that time we were placed in, ah, ah, whatever field we asked to be put into, and I – and the training was rough because we had no set basic examples to go by. Whatever that sergeant thought up, that’s what we did.
Q: I see.
A: Whether it was a 25-mile hike or a baseball game. Whatever he decided.
Q: What about your interactions with men from all parts of the country?
A: Well, I wasn’t a man, really, I was still a kid in a lot of ways, but, ah, my reaction with some of the men that were drafted, it was a case of I’d been in a while and they thought that I knew everything, and it was pretty tough sometimes trying to convince them that I didn’t know much more than they did because I hadn’t been in that long. But some of them were great men – schoolteachers, all different kinds. We got along real well.
Q: What were relations like between blacks and whites in the military at that time?
A: They were separate organizations. We had one black organization on the base who were truck drivers, mechanics, and did a lot of the mess hall work, and we liked them. They were fine fellows, and the problem was that they always won the parades because they were better at parades than we were.
Q: After basic training, where did the military send you?
A: I stayed there at Brooks Field for about another seven months and then activated Eagle Pass Army Air Field. Stayed there about seven months and went overseas.
Q: Now where is Eagle Pass?
A: It’s down on the Mexican border between Del Rio and Laredo.
Q: I see.
A: Right on the Mexican border.
Q: And did that go on to become a base?
A: Yes, it was an advanced training school. Pilots graduating out of flight training.
Q: I see. So in what capacity did you serve during World War II? What was your duty, rank, and the places at which you served?
A: I started out in the control tower and I was, well, I was in a month and I made corporal, which was unheard of at that time, but I made corporal, and a month later I made buck sergeant, and was the tower chief. The chief had been a staff sergeant and he’d been shipped out and I took over as tower chief at Brooks. And when they transferred me to Eagle Pass, I took over the control tower, opening the base down there.
Q: And so what rank were you then?
A: I was still a buck sergeant, but a another month later I made staff. So in less than four months time in the military, I was promoted to staff sergeant.
Q: Wow. And what places did you serve during the war?
A: Well, after I left Eagle Pass, I went to Denver, Colorado, Lowry Field and was there a short time attending school – advanced school – and then was shipped out to, ah, ah, California to go overseas in the, oh, Pittsburgh, California, I think is where the base where we left from at that particular time. And I went from there overseas.
Q: Where abouts overseas did you wind up?
A: Well, we started out – I first landed in Hawaii and, ah, went from there then to Henderson Field in Guadalcanal, which had just been taken not too long before that. And then from there to, ah, ah, New Guinea. From New Guinea to Moritai, Moritai to the Philippines – in the course of several, or two or three years in all different places.
Q: And when you left California to go into Hawaii, when was that in the war? What year was it, do you remember?
A: Ah, late 1942.
Q: OK. In terms of your own experience during World War II, under what kinds of conditions did you live and work?
A: Fortunately, we had – being the air force – we usually had a decent place to sleep at night and decent living conditions. We weren’t always on the front lines, however, we sure would bombing raids a lot and things like that. And then there were times when, well, after we got to the Philippines one time, they dropped a bunch of paratroopers on us – the Japanese did – we had a time, then. But, ah, most of the time we had a decent place to sleep and plenty of decent food to eat. Most of the time.
Q: What about clothing?
A: Clothing, ah, well, ah, it was funny – when we shipped out from Pittsburgh, California, they gave us all winter clothing and we thought, well we’re going to Alaska or the Aleutians. Wound up in Hawaii with nothing by winter clothing! And there we were changed into our khakis then and then went on south from there.
Q: I see. What were your working conditions?
A: Working conditions were good. We were on twelve and off twelve whenever we could be that way in the control towers or in, ah, different jobs like that. Most everybody – seven days a week and you work twelve and off twelve.
Q: So what kind of different jobs did you hold once you were overseas?
A: Well, I don’t like to talk about it too much, but I became a gunner in a B-25. And, ah, did that until we had a mishap and I went back to the air traffic control field. That was about seven or eight months that that went on. And when we got grounded and were given where we wanted to go back to, well, I was already in the control – qualified air traffic controller, so they put me back in air traffic control.
Q: I see.
A: And from there we went to the Philippines.
Q: And what kind of contact did you have with the people back home?
A: We wrote letters back and forth and sometimes you’d get a letter and within a couple or three weeks – sometimes it would take two or three months. And, ah, I smoked at that particular time – this is funny – I smoked at that particular time and my oldest brother back in the states figured I needed some cigars, so he sent me a box of cigars and it took me three months to get them and they were pretty well mildewed and not much good by the time I did get them! But kind of stuff happened. Boys would write home that they’d like to have cookies or something like that and by the time you got them, you couldn’t eat them. But you wrote back home and told them you really enjoyed them whether you did or not.
Q: I see. Did the military restrict any of your mail or read your mail?
A: Oh, yes. Every letter we wrote was censored and if you mentioned something that you shouldn’t mention, it was cut out and, fortunately, I never did do that. Once or twice they cut some stuff out of my letters, but sometimes the guys would get a letter back from home that said we couldn’t read your letter, everything was cut out of it. They would take scissors and clip different things out of the letters.
Q: Coming back to something you said earlier, it says if you feel comfortable talking about combat, describe those experiences you had, if any. You mentioned you were a gunner?
A: Well, I don’t like to talk about that too much, but, ah, yes, for several months, and, ah, unfortunately, we were knocked down and stayed in the water awhile. The coast guard picked us up and that’s when I was wounded. And – from the flak – and, ah, we were picked up. The co-pilot was dead in the water. The pilot and the rest of us got out and were picked up by the coast guard and patched up on board the ship. They didn’t have a doctor on board that little coast guard ship, but they patched us up by a medic, who was real good – a real good medic. And, ah, from then on, the rest of my combat was on the ground and, ah, throughout the Philippines, and before that we’d been flying out of Moritai Islands that particular time.
Q: Now in the particular mission you were on where you were shot down, what was the mission that you were on? What were you trying to accomplish?
A: Well, we were – had been bombing in Halmaheras, which was what back in the old days was Java, Borneo, and those islands in there. And we had dropped our bombs and did a straffing run and the right engine got set fire, and as we pulled up and decided we better head back to the base if we could make it, and the left engine caught, so they told us to bail out. The pilot did.
Q: I see. And was that particular area controlled by the Japanese at the time?
A: They thought it was, but we stayed in the water a while and the reason they didn’t pick us up – they saw us go down – the reason they didn’t pick us up right away was because they were afraid of Jap subs, but there were no Jap subs in that area, we found out later. But they picked us up in ample time. I don’t know if the rest of them are still alive or not. I haven’t seen or heard anything out of any of them in thirty years.
Q: I see. Well, what was your most memorable experience during World War II, combat or otherwise? Something that stands out?
A: Well, I guess it was seeing my brother – my younger brother. After I got to the Philippines, we’d gone up there in a convoy, and, ah, several ships were sunk and I didn’t even know that my younger brother was in the coast guard and he was in the convoy and when I got there, why, things kind of calmed down after about two months later, I guess, and he came back over there, and we didn’t know anything about it. But they had scheduled us for shots and we were over at the hospital – field hospital getting shots – malaria, and first one thing, then another – and there was a phone call there and somebody said “Is there a Sergeant Lasseter here?” And I said yes, and they said, “Well, your brother’s on the telephone.” And he was down at the docks – Leyte Island in the Philippines. He wanted me to come down and get him and I said, “How do you think I’m going to come down there – I don’t have any transportation!” Well, this buddy commander was there and he said, “Take my Jeep and go on down and get your brother.” So I took his Jeep and went down and got him and we spent a couple of days together. And that was a – that was a – like somebody from home, you know.
Q: Oh, yeah, that’s cool! Now when you were on your mission – your bombing mission – do you remember about when that was?
A: Well, we were knocked down the twenty-fourth of November, 1944.
Q: Twenty-fourth of November ’44.
A: Just before Thanksgiving.
Q: And so, how long did you serve during World War II?
A: Well, from 1941 to 1946 I was, ah, I was not discharged, but I was – I stayed in reserve and was placed on inactive duty the first day of January 1946.
Q: After the war ended, where did they send you?
A: I stayed out for a little while and was recalled during the Korean War and was recalled to Kelly Field, San Antonio. I served at Kelly Field, San Marcos Air Force Base, and then was shipped to France. Came back from France to Langley, Virginia, Langley, Virginia back to Tinker, or to Tinker, and then stayed at Tinker for several years. Went to Okinawa with my family – my family went with me to France and all. By then we were taking our family with us most of the time. And then we went to Okinawa and stayed there. From there I went TDY to Vietnam twice, 179 days each time, while my family was on Okinawa. And then when we came back from there, why, I stayed at Tinker long enough to retire.
Q: I see. So at the end of World War II and your return to the United States, what kind of reception did you receive?
A: Not anything in particular. We landed at Camp Hahn – and by the way we came home on an LST from Sumara Island in the Philippines. It took us thirty days. We left on the twenty-sixth of November and, ah, 1945, and got to the states on the twenty-fourth of December 1945.
Q: Good night!
A: It took us 45 days. If you’re familiar with an LST, they’re 300 feet long and they’re flat-bottom and when you’re riding in it as long as you’re in the middle of the ship, you’re fine. If you’re on either end, it’s going up and down this way. (laughing) There was only 79 crew on board and 75 military or army air force guys going home, so we really had a good ride, although it took a long time.
Q: Yeah. In terms of your war experiences, how did those experiences affect, if at all, your relations and your interactions with your family, friends, spouse?
A: It was rather strange. I didn’t know my wife now – I didn’t know her before the war. And I didn’t know her after the war for several months. When I got back in January, why, my dad wanted to go to south Texas to visit his brother – half-brother – who lived down there and he wanted me to drive him, so I drove him down there. And, ah, the lady I’m married to now – her sister was married to my cousin. And I met her through him. And that was in January, and then six months later, why, we got married.
Q: And how long have you been married?
A: It will be 58 years in July.
Q: Awesome! Do you still keep in touch with some of the people you served with?
A: I haven’t seen or talked to any of them since I retired in 1968. They – none of them – well, while I was – just before I retired, the engineer, who had come back to the states during the war and went to pilot training and was a major – he came by to see me when I was living on-base at Tinker. And that’s the last contact I had with any of them.
Q: How has your World War II experience impacted your life?
A: I think it made me more of a settled person. I was pretty wild out of high school and when I first went in the military. And a lot of us – I don’t know – I really shouldn’t say this, I guess, but a lot of us had the idea that “eat, drink and be merry, you might die tomorrow?” We thought that. And although I was a Christian – I had accepted the Lord, and – when I was 12 years old – 13 years old – and I knew I was doing wrong, but I kept doing it because the rest of the guys did.
Q: Sure.
A: And it, ah, it hurt my family in a lot of ways. But then when I got married and I married a young lady who was a Christian and she helped me settle down quite a bit. And has kept me settled down quite a bit! (laughing)
Q: Did you World War II experience have any affect on your views of other wars the US became involved in after World War II? You mentioned the Korean War and the Vietnam War. . .
A: The only thing that I really – I wanted in them. I wanted to be involved. I wasn’t afraid of, of, anymore, of being killed. I wasn’t afraid of dying the war or anything like that. I never get to combat in the Korean War. But I saw some combat in Vietnam – not when I was looking for it. I was over there twice on inspection teams for the air force – Thirteenth Air Force and Fifteenth Air Force on inspection teams and we got shot at quite a few times in the bases where we were. One time a Bien Hua and one time at Phnom Penh we were shot at. Fortunately, we didn’t get hit.
Q: And what kind of general observations and conclusions do you have about World War II and your World War II experience? Just general observations about World War II.
A: I’m certainly happy that we had the leaders that we had. Ah, all of my Pacific service was under the command of General MacArthur. A lot of people thought that he was kind of hard to get along with, and he was, but he knew what he was doing. And General MacArthur and General Hap Arnold and some of the others like and, ah, I think without them we would not have won that war in the Pacific. Because most things were going to Europe at that particular time. They wanted to get the war in Europe and then come and help us get ours over with. And MacArthur said no, we’re going to fight them anyway, and we did. And, ah, I think he was right about it. They knew what they were doing.
Q: Back when you were eighteen, when you were coming out of high school, were you aware of what was going on in Europe?
A: Basically, probably we knew something about it, but I was playing professional baseball at the time right after I came out of high school. And, ah, knew I wasn’t going to make the big leagues and the guys were enlisting, so I did, too. That’s one of the reasons I enlisted. I thought some of these days I’ll be playing for the Saint Louis Cardinals, and I didn’t – I was playing for the Beaumont Exporters that summer, which was the Texas league at that time. You didn’t have AAA and AA and all that. You had class A ball and then the majors. And I knew I’d never make the majors. I wasn’t that good. So, ah, three of us decided we’d enlist and we did. Wanted to get into whatever was going to happen.
Q: Yeah.
A: We figured a war was coming.
Q: So you really felt like there was a war brewing based on . . .
A: I sure did because I knew several of the guys that had already gone in the military and I’d talk to them when they came back on leave and things like that when they’d come back home.
Q: Now when you enlisted, did you choose the branch, or did they choose for you?
A: No, they gave us our choice and then we had a test. They gave us a test, which really wasn’t much of a test. It was difficult because some of the questions were tricky questions. And we asked for the United States Army Air Force. And, ah, we got it – all three of us.
[tape stopped, then restarts]
Q: Continuing with some general discussion about the war and you were talking about landing with General MacArthur and identifying bases. Tell me about that.
A: Well, first when we got on shore, when the island – Leyte Island in the Philippines – and I went ashore with a radio control chief to control the aircraft that would be coming in to air strip because the army had taken Cheeky Air Dome so we named it Cheeky Air Dome, which was on the island – the peninsula of Leyte Island. And we were going to land the air craft on that. And, ah, they had taken it and we went ashore there, but the Japanese were only about ten miles up the road at that particular time. We didn’t know that. The army didn’t tell us that, but we got in there anyway, and, ah, that tower got shot up some after we got in the control tower. They had built a – Seabees – took them about three or four days to set up a temporary and they got that set up. And then, ah, we went – I went from there to Sabu Island, the same – same situation to activate that island where we could fly airplanes in and out of it. From Sabu I went to Panay, which is another island in the Philippine Islands and set it up. Went from there to Mindanao, and this was a good time. We landed in Malabang and went overland to Zamboanga and set up operations at Zamboanga. There were no Japanese around there. They had pulled out. We didn’t know that. And we’d been there about two weeks and looked out to the bay and in the control tower you could see everything in the bay and all these landing craft were coming in one day. Man it was – we thought – my gosh, the Japs are landing behind us. And it wasn’t – it was MacArthur wading ashore on D-Day, which was three weeks after we’d been there! (garbled) But it was his privilege – he was a five star general.
And then we went from there – from Mindanao to Mindoro and Mindoro to Negros, and from Negros on to Luzon, which was the later part of the war in the Pacific when we went to Luzon. I had the unfortunate experience to see those gentlemen who came out of the Santo Thomas Prison in Manila – our American soldiers that had been there since the war started. Those guys waists’ weren’t as big around as my arm. They were starved to death. But you talk about running – they could run! And hobble to meet us when we went in there. The army – we went in right behind the army – curious – we were curiosities is what we were – the army was actually the ones that liberated them. And, ah, it was great to be able to get those guys out of there. And they began to put them on boats and take them other islands where there were no Japanese or anything around for sure, and then put them on planes. And most of them got on a hospital ship. They brought a hospital ship in there and a lot of them were put on the hospital ship and sent home.
And then from then on it kind of wound down – wartime wound down. And I had the privilege of going into Japan, ah, Atsugi Airdrome – that’s where we landed after the peace treaty was signed and we went in there. And they took a C-47 for our control tower and they set it on blocks, took the landing gear out from under, the wings off of it and we operated for three days from the cab of that C-47. And then a week later I went back to the Philippines to come home. And that was November ’44 – or ’45 – 1945.
Q: What was your perspective on Japan, since you were there?
A: Scared to death.
Q: You were?
A: We just knew – when we landed there were Japanese soldiers standing maybe five feet apart completely lining the runway. I mean, just from one end of it to another, and we didn’t know – had no idea what was going to happen. But when we landed they did the prettiest about-face you ever saw and turned their backs to us and stood there. So we did whatever we wanted to do, and then they left and (unclear) – but we were scared to death to start with because we didn’t know if they were going to turn around and start shooting us or what. But they didn’t, they just acted like – everyday life to them at that particular time.
Q: Were you landing at a civilian or military base?
A: I think it was a military, I’m not sure, of course, there were no military planes there. . .
Q: Yeah.
A: . . .anymore – no Japanese planes there. But Atsugi Airdrome was the main airdrome in Manila [sic], but Itazuke was actually a training field, I guess you’d call it there. But I didn’t to with that very long, and I was ready to go home anyway. And, ah, but I made a mistake – I didn’t know it. They offered me a first lieutenant’s commission if I’d stay there in the Philippines and clear out the air traffic control facilities, you know, pack up – we had GCA [ground controlled approach radar] by then in a couple of places – pack them up and ship them home. But, no, I wanted to go home. What they didn’t tell me was that I could come home for 90 days and then go back and do that.
Q: Oh. . .
A: Had I known that, I would have accepted the commission, but they didn’t tell me that, so I didn’t do it. But it didn’t make any difference. I retired chief master sergeant anyway.
Q: And where were you and how did you find out about the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs?
A: I was at Luzon – at Clark Field – Nichols Field, actually, Clark was outside of Manila and Nichols Field was kind of downtown. And we heard about it. What we heard was “they dropped the bomb. They dropped the bomb.” Who dropped what bomb, we had no idea! Well, “we dropped a bomb.” “What kind of bomb?” “An atomic bomb.” “What kind of bomb is that?” That was all the questions that were coming out, you know, and then we began to hear and know, ah, I think it was H. V. Kaltenborn, that newscaster, that we got some records of it of something somewhere out in the Pacific and they began to play them and he was describing what he had been told about what this bomb had done. And, ah, we wanted to go up and fly over it, but they wouldn’t let us. We wanted to fly over it and look around, but they said no, you can’t go up there. And we didn’t get to go and see the devastation. But one thing – we were happy when the war was over. We knew then that it was over with. And when they did declare Japan’s surrender – I think it was September 6 or something like that – I forget the date exactly – well, we were back on Leyte Island, then, and, ah, all hell broke loose. Everything – every gun on that island started firing! Soldiers did. The navy was firing things out in the harbor. And a friend of mine was laying on his bunk right next to me. And he was laying there in his drawers. And a shell – a spent shell hit him in the back of the leg and severed a vein and he almost bled to death before we got him to the hospital!
Q: Just celebrating?
A: Yeah, celebrating! And it was real funny. He said, “Six months ago my records were lost. I haven’t been paid in six months. I can’t find anything to go home on and here they – my own men shoot me so I can get on a hospital ship and go home!” (laughing) Those were funny things that happened, stuff like that. But then order to get on the LST to come home, I had to go over to Mindanao, which was not too far and they flew us over there in a C-47. Wanted to know why they didn’t dock at Leyte Island and pick us up where we were. They said well, they couldn’t get close to the dock for all the boats – that was an excuse, so we had to go over there.
So we got on board it and was coming home. I stayed back in the chief’s quarters with them. And we had a guy that served our meals to us. Boy the chiefs in the navy – they lived high on the hog. And I was ranking enlisted man on board the ship, so I got to stay back there with the chiefs. That was kind of funny, too. I had already picked me out a bunk in amidships of that thing, and this young seaman came walking up there and said, “Are you Sergeant Lasseter?” And I said, “That’s right.” He said, “Chief Whitman wants to see you back in the chief’s quarters.” I said, “well, you tell Chief Whitman where I am if he wants to see me.” I didn’t figure the navy was going to order me around, you know? He said, “No, you don’t understand,” he said, “he wants you to come back there.” I said, “Alright,” so I went back there and he introduced himself and said, “We got a bunk for you back here, sergeant. You live back here with us.” And just two chiefs on board and they had three bunks in there, so I got to stay with them. They brought us out breakfast. They brought us our lunch. . . we had it made! So I really enjoyed that trip.
And the guys – there wasn’t anything to do. They didn’t want us doing anything on the ship. Some of the guys volunteered to go to the mess hall and work, and some of them volunteered to clean up or whatever there was to do just to have something to do. You got bored and you could play cards only so much. Nobody had any money. Nobody – I hadn’t been paid in about four months and they hadn’t either because we were moving all that time and our records. So finally, the skipper – they had a whole bunch of ammunition in the hold of that thing, and he told them to drag it up and throw it overboard. Those guys took those 50-caliber – taking one shell at a time and threw it overboard – it took longer that way! (laughing) Just to have something to do, you know, on board that thing.
And then when we got to the dock, and we docked right south of Los Angeles there, and we got – put us in small boats and took us in to the docks. Well, I had my duffle bag on my shoulder and I crawled off that small boat and got up on the dock and promptly fell on my face! I looked around and everybody else was doing the same thing! And this tech sergeant standing there and these guys were laughing, and he said, “how long you been on that tub right there?” I said, “thirty days,” and he said “that’s the reason you can’t walk.” And we couldn’t. We could not walk. We had to have help to get to the trucks!
Q: Really.
A: Yeah, that ship rolled so much, you know, thirty days of it. It was – crazy – crazy things happened like that. And then my younger brother met me there, too, at Camp (unclear). He had got back and forth – I had to kind of settle him down, he come in that camp where two other air force guys and me were saying how the coast guard won the war and wasn’t going to listen to that! So I had to settle him down.
