Coming Home to Daddy - A Tribute to the Silent WW2 Hero

Carson Family, Easter 1963, Arlington, VA

It was never my dad's dream to have a large family.  

I know that.    He wasn’t against it either, necessarily.  That was just my dad.  If my mom wanted a big family, that was okay with him.  He was along for the ride.  (And what a sport, for I can only imagine raising a family twice the size of the one I had.)  

Carson Family, On Vacation in Detroit Michigan, Summer 1967

Most anything was okay with him.  He was the most easy-going man I knew.  

And yet, getting to know him, I mean really getting to know him, was one of the hardest things in the world.  

He was such a quiet, personal man.  And he got a lot quieter after my mom died. 

She died suddenly when I was nine – shortly after he retired and we settled in the Virgin Island for his dream life.  That left the poor, bereft widower with the six of us kids, ages 16 to 6, and that definitely wasn’t part of the "dream life" plan. 

Daddy and Me, Christmas 1980, Lucerne Valley, CA

My dad and I always had a special, unspoken bond.  I was the kind of child people called ‘an old soul.’  Old and wise and intuitive beyond my years, I understood my father’s unspoken side beyond the friendly exterior that drew so many to him.   I understood him even in the silence.  

It’s only now, thirty years after his death that I am getting to really know him better.

PT Boat

I knew from the little bits and dribbles of stories he did tell about his past that he was on a PT boat in the South Pacific during WW2, and its there that he first met Jack Kennedy.  

But I never knew any of the specifics until recently. 

After having my brother and sister and the kids over this past Memorial Day, I got serious about it again.  When they were here, I saw my chance to ask everyone what they knew about his days in the war.

Daddy's Officers' Drink Coupon booklet  (Looks Like He Didn't Drink Much)

I shared with them what I knew and showed them the scraps of his war memorabilia that I had in hopes that it would stir up any memories they might have of old World War 2 stories they might have heard from him long ago.  Maybe they could help dust off some long-forgotten tidbits we could share with each other.

There were little bits and scraps my dad had saved from his years in the South Pacific.  Military payment certificates (military 'monopoly' money) in twenty-five cent and one dollar dimensions   

Dad's Beer Ticket.  Apparently He Was On Leave In Late October?

There were a coupon booklet for beers at the Beer Mess (the grog shop on base) on MTB Base #7 (which is Green Island), a visitor's map for Sydney, Australia (where he must've gone on leave?), and a top secret encoded dispatch telling Squadron 23 their travel plans, with dates, times route,  to Guadalcanal.  In the margins, in my dad's handwriting, were transcribed the islands, arrival and departure times, decoded in pencil.

John F. "Jack" Kennedy

One of my siblings  told the story of how it was that our dad first met JFK: 

They were sitting down to eat in the mess hall at the base on the island - sometime after the wreck of PT 109 - and Kennedy, who was sitting all alone said, “Hey Kit, come sit with me.  Everyone is staring at me!”  And that’s how they became acquainted and their lifetime friendship began.

But nobody knew what PT boat our father was on – we knew it wasn’t the same boat as Kennedy – or what islands.  And so my search began! 

I went back to the Internet for the umpteenth time.  This time I stumbled across an entry on a PT board where a man named Ted Walther had found the name and number of a man’s PT boat and where it had served.  I immediately contacted him and asked if he knew where I could look to find such information on my dad, (at the time) Lieutenant E.I. Carson. 

Kit Carson (seated front) and the men of PT 286

Bless his heart, the dear man went to work himself, along with several of his friends, searching hither and yon and found not only the number of my dad’s boat (which was PT 286) but a photo of him on board the boat with his entire crew – and yes, he wasn't just on the PT boat.  He was the commanding officer!  Lieutenant Kit Carson and crew on PT 286, aka “The Rough Knight.”

PT Boat

The PT boats (PT stands for "patrol torpedo"), I found, were 80' boats made of wood (yes wood!) that these brave young men zipped around the South Pacific islands on, primarily cutting off supplies to the Japanese enemies encamped on the islands.

Artist's Rendering of WW2

They would go out mostly at night and blow up ships, planes or barges that were trying to get supplies in to the Japanese soldiers and bases on the islands.  Or they would run along close to the shoreline, or up river, and strafe the installations on shore, then blow out a cloud of smoke from the smoke machine and zip away in a zigzag fashion to dodge the bullets or missiles launched at them as they retreated.

My Dad's Boat (PT 286) Is On the Far Right.
Notice the Jungle Camouflage Paint.

The PT boats would go out on patrols for 24 to 48 hours at a time and then back to base on island for a day or two of rest before going out and risking their lives all over again.  Mr. Walther suggested I go look at a site called Fold3.com and search their WW2 War Diaries to see if there were any daily reports of Squadron 23 that showed the missions of PT 286. (The boat in the near right corner of the photo above was my father's.)

PT Boat Under Way

I immersed myself in the folds of Fold3 for the next three weeks following my father’s boat and squadron from island to island through the dark nights of the South Pacific, hunting barges, strafing villages, rescuing pilots from downed planes, being hit by other PT’s in the dark of night and almost losing his own boat in a collision in the dark…until I was physically drained myself.

But I wanted now to see what he saw on the other days – the days when he was not out on his boat in the dark of night.  The “off” days when he was about during the daylight.  So I went on Google Maps and first mapped out the route that he followed during those two years as he and his fellow sailors closed in from Espiritu Santo, New Hebrides to the Philippines. 

The Route My Dad's Journey Followed During His WW2 Campaign

From Espiritu Santo…. to such foreign sounding places as Pavuvu, Rendova, Treasury Island, Vella Lavella (which most likely was where he met JFK), Pinipel, Nissan Island, Emirau, Manus, Mios Woendi, Palawan, Busuanga, Mindoro and Leyte.

Then back to Google I went…this time for pictures.  I suddenly had a burning need to see what these places looked like.  

Vanuatu, South Pacific

And when I saw the pictures, I knew that I had been there before - through my father’s eyes, in the silence.  

I understood now how it is that we ended up growing up in the Virgin Islands, when I saw the oceans of the South Pacific.

You see, when we were kids, we lived way out on the eastern end of the island, seven miles out of town.  About half way home, there was a fork in the road at South Gate Farm.  

You could stay left and go along the north shore, and get there faster, OR you could cut to the right and go toward Seven Hills and Tipperary.  

It would bring you out the south side of the island in a couple of miles at Great Salt Pond, and the most glorious shades of turquoise blue water on the island, followed by a deep ultramarine where the ocean floor drops off beyond.

Great Salt Pond Bay, St. Croix

I absolutely loved the South Shore drive and would always vote very vociferously for a right turn whenever he asked for a vote as the car approached South Gate Farm.  

Usually if he asked for a vote, it would only be him and me voting for South Shore – the others wanting to get home as quickly as possible, and knowing he and I would want to stop and get out and just stare at the ocean for a while. 

A Mini Moke Like the One My Father Drove On St. Croix

They would all moan and groan out load as he cranked the wheel of our jeep-like Mini Moke to the right and it dipped down over the burmed bank onto Tipperary Road, bound for our beloved South Shore.

The wildness of the waves crashing on the cliffs farther east thrilled and terrified me all at once, and the power of winning the battle of North Shore vs. South Shore drive home empowered me exponentially in a family of six kids where I was otherwise invisible.

Great Pond Bay

But more than that, there was a secret, invisible, unexplainable emotional bond my dad and I had with each other and that stretch of ocean.  He knew that I knew how he felt without words; that there was pleasure and elation and pain and loss all wrapped up in his feelings for this beautiful scenery.  And the two of us could just stand there together in the beauty and the silence and feel it together, and breathe and let go.  It was our magic place. 

Puerto Princesa, Palawan

But I never knew why until I saw those pictures of the South Pacific last week.  I know now why it was so for him.  And I am honored that he shard it with me - a young girl of ten or twelve, way too old for her years.  

I have a great admiration for all those valiant men of WW2 who fought so bravely in a world gone mad all those decades ago.

"Kit and Pal Aboard PT 286"

I never realized that at the time he did that, he was just a young man of twenty-six - barely the age of my son-in-law, Brett!  He was barely a kid himself, barreling across the waves of the Pacific Ocean in enemy

territory, most often in the dark of night, in a boat made not of steel like the other Navy vessels, but of fragile planks of wood!  

Under his command, as they bated the enemy, shot at planes and launched torpedoes at supply ships were young men of eighteen fresh off the farm in Kansas or of nineteen fresh out of Glee club in Pennsylvania.  

My Dad (Lower Left)
and Three Unnamed Companions

Our young men in the South Pacific nearly all had a run-in with malaria or intestinal parasites, by most accounts.  By the looks of my dad in this picture (lower left), he undoubtedly was not the exception if one compares his emaciated state to that of his three companions.

But they banded together, and bonded together, in some of the most beautiful settings on this planet to fight some of the blackest nights of their lives, I am sure wondering at times if their "Rough Knight" would see it through the rough night.

"Landing on Pinipel - 1944"

So it is no wonder that my dad was drawn to the Virgin Islands upon his retirement from the Navy with his thirty years of service in.   

It wasn't just the natural decision after finding he liked the climate of Guantanamo Bay so much as his last posting, as I always assumed.  It was much more than that.

He was coming home, I think.  He was making the circle complete.  Maybe finding redemption; really and truly putting an end to the whole story and making peace with some ghosts forever.  Maybe even recapturing a bit of his youth.

My brother and me playing with our horse, Aragorn,
on out beach in front of our house in St. Croix.
November, 1968=

This way, he could enjoy the beauty without the night runs, boat the open waters at full throttle without looking over his shoulder looking for the enemy, and raise his kids in a place where they could run wild and free.

Thanks Daddy.  I love you and all you tried to do for us...

                                                     Liz Carson Rosas  -- 26 June 2015