The Corncob Fleet on D-Day

From chapter 17

        On my final voyage on the West Honaker, the ship's cargo was discharged in Newport, near Cardiff. Then, suddenly, the ship was boarded by crews of shipyard workers. They went into the holds, cutting large holes in strategic places and doing other mysterious things. We were told nothing, but it was obvious the holes were to prevent air pockets. The ship was being prepared for sinking. The mysterious packs brought into the hold must be explosives. We speculated that the large ring bolt welded to the deck was for a marker buoy. (We later found it was really for attaching a barrage balloon.)
        When the workmen were finished, we were told to pack all our gear and send it ashore, keeping only a change of clothes and toiletries. Each crewman was issued a backpack filled with K-rations and a special life preserver with a few survival implements attached. Then we sailed to the north of Scotland, dropping anchor in a loch near Oban. Other ships joined us there, until there was a fleet of twenty-four.
        We were at last told the truth, but were not allowed to go ashore lest we divulge it. These twenty-four vessels comprised the Corncob Fleet, to be used in an invasion of Europe. They would be sunk to form a breakwater off the French coast, as part of an artificial harbor. After we had maneuvered our ship into the spot where it was to be sunk, we would be sent back to England.
        We then waited five weeks for the big day. This was the longest and most tedious five weeks of my life. One of the compensations of life at sea, is that you always have the feeling that you are making progress, that you are going somewhere; perhaps to a place where things will be better, more interesting, or at least different. On an idle ship, life stagnates. It's like being locked up; the entire crew complained about this feeling.
        Finally, we were ordered to sail south, in a convoy through the Irish Sea. Most of the time, the convoy had to sail at only three knots (about three and a half miles per hour). Our diesel engine couldn't run at such a slow speed, so we had to start the engines every few minutes, let the propeller turn a few times, and then shut it down again. The compressed air used for starting caused each of the six cylinders to make a loud, chugging noise, like a locomotive exhausting steam up the stack to improve the draft. It was difficult to sleep through this racket, so I spent a lot of time on deck, watching the unusual, close-packed convoy, which was occasionally joined by more ships. It became evident that the speed changes of the convoy were to cause it to arrive somewhere at just the right time.
        Off the south coast of England, we made a rendezvous with an amazing flotilla of ships—battleships, destroyers, cruisers, freighters, landing craft, and every other type of ship imaginable. It was an unforgettable sight. In an ordinary convoy, there were seldom more than about ten ships in view at any given time, but now we could see scores of ships all around us, all sailing east toward France. The great allied invasion of Europe was about to begin.
        We sailed with this armada all day. By the end of the day, the ships had separated from each other, heading for different positions on the French coast. The Corncob Fleet stayed well separated to avoid presenting too tempting a target for the Germans, so that by nightfall, we were all alone. Two very special, powerful light bulbs had been brought aboard and it was my job to rig one of them with a switch so that it could be used for signaling. (The other was a spare.) This was our sole means of communicating with other ships, since radio silence was imposed. Near midnight, I changed into clean clothes and prepared to get into bed. It was standard procedure during the war for seamen to sleep fully clothed.
        Just then, I heard an airplane approaching the ship. It got closer, as if diving into us, and I could hear our gun crew shooting at it. The sound of the plane faded in the distance, but then there was a loud explosion, just forward of my cabin. The entire ship shuddered and shook. I grabbed my survival knapsack and life jacket and ran up to the boat deck along with everyone else except the watch. We had been hit by an aerial torpedo.  The West Honaker was shipping water in the number two hold, and we wondered anxiously if we were sinking. The captain determined that the ship was close enough to make it to the spot where it was to be scuttled, so he ordered about half the crew into a lifeboat. I climbed down a rope ladder into the lifeboat, along with about twenty other men. We cast off, and drifted away into the darkness. The invasion had been planned for a moonless night, so no other ship was visible. Soon our own ship faded into the night, and we were left feeling very much alone on a perilous sea.
        After a few hours, airplanes flew over us, occasionally dropping flares which hung in the air for a long time, lighting up the ocean beneath. Even then, we could see no other ships. The Second Mate reasoned that these must be German planes, for it seemed unlikely that Allied planes would draw attention to the invasion. We hoped that, if they were Germans, they wouldn't waste ammunition on a mere lifeboat. After the flares, the dark seemed much more comfortable. We alternated between hoping to be found by another ship and worrying about getting rammed by a ship in the darkness or strafed by a German plane. Someone suggested we start rowing but most of us didn't like that idea. There was no sense heading for shore, into the arms of the Germans, and no sense rowing out to sea.
        We were all greatly relieved when, at the first light of day, an English trawler came and took us aboard, leaving the lifeboat to drift away. The trawler had been a French fishing boat before the war. Now, equipped with sonar and other equipment, it was a British Naval vessel. Its mission during the invasion was to patrol the coast of France for submarines.
        All through D-Day, we patrolled up and down the French coast in the trawler. We saw landing craft heading for the shore, battleships and cruisers firing salvos inland, and numerous smaller craft bustling about. The water was covered with flotsam and jetsam. There were life belts, hatch covers, clothes, life preservers, life boats with no one in them, and all manner of empty crates and boxes. One strange sight was three men standing on a scaffold, painting the seaward side of an American battleship as it fired into the German positions.
        The crew of the trawler were a hardy lot, who had none of the amenities we Americans were accustomed to. They worked two six-hour watches each day and had nothing to eat but turnips and a tough, leathery substance they called bacon. This, they ate three times a day, with no bread and nothing to drink but water. We shared our K-rations with them. I was greatly moved when I gave one of them a can of cheese and a can of Spam from my K-rations, and he asked whether I would mind if he saved them to take home to his wife.
        After patrolling the coast of France all during D-Day, the trawler headed back to England, with the West Honaker crewmen sleeping all night on the deck. The next morning, we were just inside the sea wall at Plymouth, when a radio message ordered the captain to take us to Portsmouth, about one hundred fifty miles to the east. When we got to the pilot station at Portsmouth, another radio message directed us to Bournemouth. We were about ready to dock at Bournemouth, when we were directed to go back to Plymouth. I never knew whether this was an example of the English "muddling through" I had heard about, or whether it was the U.S. Army not knowing what to do with us while they were so busy with the invasion.
        When we finally stepped ashore in Plymouth, we were greeted by the U.S. Army, and were each given a kit of toiletries and cautioned not to say a word to anyone about anything. To make sure we didn't, they locked us up in a hotel, three to a room, with guards at each door. After six hours, we were put aboard some Army trucks and brought to an Army encampment about five miles away, where we got a hot meal and spent the night. The next day, we were taken to Bournemouth, which we had seen the previous day from the deck of the trawler.
        Of course, we didn't know we were going to Bournemouth; full secrecy was still being maintained. We spent the entire trip standing in the back of an Army truck, waving to the many people standing by the roadside. They did not officially know of the invasion but must have guessed it from seeing thousands of men and tons of equipment being transported toward various port cities. They all gave us the V for victory sign and cheered us on. We accepted their cheers with some guilt. They undoubtedly thought we were on our way to the French beaches to battle Germans, while here we were, back from the beaches and out of harm's way.
        At Bournemouth, we were given quarters in a luxurious resort hotel, then operating under Spartan conditions. There, we were joined by the rest of the West Honaker crew and most of the other crews of the twenty-four vessels in the Corncob Fleet. A number of kind volunteer ladies served us three meals a day, cafeteria style. The diet was totally fat-free, also lean-free. We were given gray bread, coarse vegetables and a liquid beverage which I think was meant to be an imitation of either coffee or tea. The poverty of the food was not completely compensated for by the splendor of our surroundings. I made daily visits to local restaurants, where I could choose from the menu such things as lamb chops, steaks, roast beef, and even game. After choosing, I had to settle for what was actually in the kitchen: sausage and chips or fish and chips. I heard that the sausage was on the bread ration, since that was its principle ingredient.
        At the hotel, we were entertained a few times by a local singing group of four or five women and two men. They sang in the ballroom of the hotel, and had a repertoire of ancient songs with lengthy titles like, "Wilt thou Love me Still in Cold December as Thou Dids't when Flowers Bloomed on Yonder Hill." There was not enough seating for the five hundred or so men, but that didn't matter because ten minutes of entertainment seemed to suffice. There was a constant turmoil at the door between entertainment-starved men wanting to squeeze in, and men who had been entertained as much as they could stand and were desperate to get out.
        One day, the Corncob Fleet crews were told to go to the town hall to attend a meeting with Navy and Maritime Service officials. The hall was large enough to accommodate all of us. An Admiral started out with some complimentary remarks about our great service to our country and our great help to the war effort. Most of us had been happy to be of help, but a well-organized handful of seamen from the National Maritime Union began howling and screaming at the Admiral in rather vile terms, complaining about the injustice of having been sent into a military operation despite our civilian status. This led to a closed-door session between the officials and the union men, and ended with an agreement to pay each of us an extra amount of money in compensation. I spoke with several seamen who, like myself, felt that with men giving their lives on the beaches of France at that very moment, we should count our blessings and keep quiet. However, there was no use in protesting against the union men, no matter how much we despised their attitude.
        I believe that it was because of this dispute, that the Corncob Fleet is never mentioned. Every time I have heard or seen a war narrative I have looked for some mention or picture of our operation. I have never been able to learn which beach we were at. [Since writing this, Cesar Poropat has  learned from the Merchant Marine that the West Honaker was at Utah Beach—Ed.] Of course, the Corncob Fleet was only one of many groups who helped in the invasion and are never heard about. But, we were unique, both for the size of the operation and the fact that we were civilians. I have a laudatory letter from the War Shipping Administration but it carefully avoids mentioning what I am being praised for.
        After a month in Bournemouth, we were put aboard a train, which traveled all night and arrived in Glasgow the next morning. We were not told where we were going but I had a map of Britain with me and sat up all night marking our route by drawing a line between the stations we passed. Years later, I was able to find a spot on that map where I had passed, in the tiny Scottish village of Howwood, right by the foot of the garden of the young girl whom I would meet and marry two years later.
        We ended up in Greencock, where we were lined up in a large courtyard and were treated to complimentary speeches about our valuable contribution to the war effort, laced with warnings not to divulge anything about the matter to anyone. We were then ferried aboard the Queen Elizabeth, which was standing out in the harbor, too large to tie up at a wharf. The Queen Elizabeth was fast enough to outrun a submarine so, instead of crossing the ocean in a convoy, it sailed alone on a course which zigzagged in a random pattern that, it was hoped, would bewilder a submarine captain and cause his torpedoes to miss. In fact, I heard (after the war) that at least one submarine had fired four torpedoes at it and missed.
        In six days, the Queen Elizabeth entered New York Harbor and tied up to a wharf near Forty-Fifth Street. I was eager to dash ashore; this was my old stomping ground. But, first I had to wait for my turn to sit at a large, round table where about a dozen officials from various agencies asked me questions about what I did on the French coast, my feelings, my health, my thoughts, and anything else they could think of. Far away, I could hear a band playing. Finally, after still another admonition that I speak to no one about my experience, they let me go ashore. I was home.