"Rescue Sailors"

He took the lead of a voluntary motor whaleboat crew helping rescue USS BUSH survivors. His diary entry noted, "A lot of them we saw were dead and didn't have time to bother with their bodies .... A lot of them were blind from salt water and flash burns."

Acting as engineer in the whaleboat with Martin Tschirhart, George recalls, "The skipper said he'd leave the mast light on for us, an action which really took guts. There were still enemy planes in the area." George worked and worked on one BUSH sailor that was in distress, and the sailor lived thanks to George's direct attention.

Gave artificial respiration to a BUSH survivor in bad shape. Recalling the incident in a July 1945 letter Don Berg wrote, "All the time another fellow and I were working on him, I was wishing I had learned how better in school, because now I was afraid that if I didn't do it right, I might kill him. After a couple hours, he pulled out of it and felt pretty good."

Among other things, Mr. Wing worked hard to save a young BUSH sailor name David Davey. "I was giving A. R. to a young man, the name on his shirt was Davey. Our Corpsman came by at one point and said he thought he felt a faint pulse, but after about two hours he told me to give up as the man had passed. The name Davey has stuck in my mind all these years."

One of the volunteers in the PAKANA whaleboats.

The PAKANA's one and only Pharmacist's Mate (their "Corpsman").

After receiving orders to stop search and rescue operations, Lt. Russell would make one more search. His reluctance to leave saved two men, one believed to be the USS BUSH doctor, Lt. George Johnson. The two men were adrift from the rafts and would likely have drowned without that "one last search".

"We stayed in the area all night, and when daylight came we found three more sailors, but it was too late, they were all dead."

Pharmacist's Mates like Gil had a busy night after the USS BUSH sunk, as did many of their shipmates who pitched in to help.

Gil Molstein, the Pharmacist's Mate above, worked side by side with Ensign Wisner and several other men as the bodies of seven USS BUSH sailors were recovered by the LCS 37. The bodies were placed on the fantail of the ship until instructions were received after daybreak (on April 7th) from Graves Registration.

Unlike ships such as the USS BUSH, on an LCS(L), the 40MM anti-aircraft guns did not have any radar assistance in aiming the gun at approaching enemy targets. On ship's like the LCS 40, these guns were trained, sighted, and fired manually. Mr. Brafford notes, "The gunnery officer stood right behind me."

This is the gun that Clifford Brafford fired. As he reminisced about his days in combat on the LCS 40 Mr. Brafford remarked, "We did a lot of shooting."

The LCS(L) 64 was the first to locate survivors, rescuing 95 BUSH sailors.

When the PCER 855 reached the search zone late on the night of April 6, 1945, the USS BUSH was already gone. William Retallick was at his GQ station, the forward port 20MM gun. A few hours later he notes, "One of the men on the starboard forward 20MM, Paul Tucker, saw a tiny light about 2AM on April 7th. That's how we spotted the 17 men we rescued in two life rafts."

Bob Henne-MoMM3c
Ray Giles-MoMM2c
Louis Minerding-MoMM3c
William Retallick-MoMM2c

Recalled Bill Retallick of his shipmate Louis Minerding's efforts in the rescue of USS BUSH sailors, "We had some trouble trying to get a line to them because of the strong currents. Louis Minerding, MoMM3c, then swam a line out to the Bush survivors ... a dangerous thing to do."