November 11, 2019 • 24 mins
Fresh out of high school in Brooklyn, New York, Frank Devita joined the Coast Guard in the summer of 1943. He then met adulthood in the bloody waters off of the Normandy beaches on D-Day and while criss-crossing oceans between additional battles. A finicky eater from an Italian foodie family, Frank found some sneaky ways for him and others to eat in his 33 months in Service.
A gentle warning: Frank shares engrossing details about D-Day and death in this episode. We hear these memories as we step back in time together.
Find photos from this episode, an episode transcription, and more at www.ServicePodcast.org and on Instagram and Facebook, where you can also share your stories and leave messages for all of the veterans you hear on Service.
Thank you to the Greatest Generations Foundation for connecting us with Frank for this episode. Explore how you can support a veteran’s visit to memorials and hallowed grounds at www.tggf.org, and see more on Facebook and Instagram.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This episode re enacts scenes of war. You'll hear gunfire
and descriptions of violence. Listener discretion advised. Japan is at
well with the United States and Great Britain. Tokyo has
so announced in the declaration. In a few months, we
were switched to points where batles are raising in the Pacific.
From personal let's hear from Turkey where the news of this.
(00:24):
I'm Jacqueline Proposo. That's the beginning of a news clip
from December seven, the day of the Japanese Empire bombed
Pearl Harbor and the day before the United States officially
joined the Allies in World War Two. As I listened
to veterans at this time share their stories, I can't
help but notice how on that one day the size
of their world exploded. To the Navy were idle and
(00:48):
halpen great and iwa Jima Alkan. Now, while I was
in Paris August sixteenth with a free French, we took
the big ship from Manila to Mindoro and after the
war and we took another L S D. Whatever was
to men to know. Welcome to Service, Stories of Hunger
and War A production from I Heart Radio and me
(01:10):
your host. That last clip you heard was from our
episode with pasquald' ambrosio, who left his New Hampshire home
with the army to sail to the Philippines. Today we
spend time with Frank da Vita, a Brooklyn boy who
crossed the globe over almost three years in the Coast Guard.
Pat and Frank and our next few veterans all came
(01:31):
from close knit communities. They knew their neighbors and after
the war married childhood sweethearts. They had to wait for
the news, listening on the radio or going to the
movie theater. They couldn't internet, research more download a map,
as words like epernay and okinawa became part of their
common language, like I'm doing as I listen and learn.
(01:53):
Before they deployed, there were things about the world they
just couldn't know. So we're all the same page. Here
are a few things they could have known. They would
definitely have known that the four big Allied powers were Britain, France,
and the Soviet Union along with the United States and
the Axis powers were the German Nazis, the Italian fascists,
(02:14):
and the Japanese. By late nineteen forty one had occupied
most of Europe and so many of the Pacific islands.
They might have known that in North Africa, Italian colonized
Libyans were fighting British colonized Egyptians, and thousands of Africans
were being forced to fight for their colonizers abroad. With
a Spanish only recently post Civil War and Latin American
(02:36):
countries pulled between access and Allied loyalties, They might not
know what to make of such civilians. While they would
have known of the heavy bombing all over Britain by
the German Luftwaffe, they might not quite have understood how
vital civilian farming was for survival there, and as rumors
about the barbarity of the Japanese were flying stateside after
(02:57):
Pearl Harbor, There's no way these kids could have known
who they were going to face when they then headed
to the Pacific themselves, such as the case today. A feisty,
patriotic seventeen year old Frank joined the Coastguard because they
were the branch that could send him out the soonest,
and he knew he wanted to defend his country. What
(03:17):
he couldn't know was that what light ahead was active combat,
facing fears and foreigners and decisions that would shove him
into adulthood. But what he ate and how he found
or shared food seemed to bring Frank a little sense
of home and a little sense of fun, no matter
where on the globe he was floating. So now from
(03:39):
his home in New Jersey, let's slow down and sit
with Frank da Vita. My name is Frank Vida of
the US Coast Guard. I was a gun his may
third class. Yeah. I had a very good family life.
(04:02):
He bought the raised and broken death. My dad worked
for the Navy for thirty years and my mom they
all all the time, and she raised all these children
and four children. My sister raved Us was the oldest,
and my brother Sylvia came along, and I came along,
and then my brother Daniel came along. We had a
good family life. But we were born during the Depression.
(04:22):
I would say we were poor, but we were on
the borderline and we didn't feel it. Because the depression,
everybody was poor. I mean, the subway was five cents,
Love for bread was five cents, Paula Lucas five cents.
We lived near Coney Island and it was a trolley
that went from near my street to Corney Island. It
was five cents. I walked and saved the five cents
(04:43):
so I could buy a hot talk and Cody hot
talk was five cents. My mom was not a good cook,
but she was a wonderful mother. And my dad so
he designed all the uniforms for the Navy, and he
came acrourse a lot of big animals in general and
all that kind of stuff. Once a month, one of
these generals, or rather was would comfort dinner, and my
(05:04):
mom's favorite dinner at that time. She used to make
roast beef with rice and brown gravy, and she made
a great kip pro Probably day there was an arval
there and a captain, And when we used to have company,
my mom was very strict no children at the table,
(05:25):
so she was fetus early and then when the company came,
we would leave. But I was a big Giant fan
football Jameson and I wanted to listen to the Giant game.
So I was in the living room, had the radio
every little and they were in the kitchen doing their thing.
They interrupted the game to say that the Japanese just
bumped along. I regret to tell you that very many
(05:49):
American lives I've been lost. In addition, American ships have
been reported to torpedoed on the high seas between San
Francisco and So I went into the dining room and
I said, excuse me, and my mom says, I told
you not to come with you like this, But I
having portant news. What's so important? The Japanese just worn pearla.
(06:15):
This animal kept him, but they was they left, and
that's how I remember pearl ha ha. My mother had
a very hard time. She had three sons and we
roll in combat. My oldest brother was in the Army.
(06:38):
I was in the Coast Guard, my young brother was
in the Marines. She kept it hidden because she was
a very quiet person, but I'm sure she prayed a lot.
I was a gun his mate in the back of
the ship called Stern. It was formed in the aircraft
guns twenty millimeter. When there wasn't an invasion, I was
in charge of thats four guns. Since I was a
(06:59):
gun his mate, they gave me what's called a gunna
be shock, which was a room about eight feet by
eight feet, and in that shock had all my tools
to fix the guns and ammunition. And I decided that's
where I was going to live because you see, I'm
a very finicky hear. I was just the day I
was born. When I went through the child line. The
first time you got a trade with five or six
(07:19):
complements in it, and they slopped the food on. So
the first time I went through the child line, that's spaghetti.
It looked like globe. So this guy had this thing
up like this, I don't want any You said, how
come you look like you're tying. I said, that's why
I don't want any. I decided I was gonna live
in that shock. So when we were in Boris, I
(07:40):
stopped in Borson. I bought a frying pan, coffee pot plate.
I stocked up all the king was I could find
pork and beans and soup, and I was all set.
But then out of his eye, I want the meat
or fish or something like that. I used to have
to watch sometimes what they called them four you want
to watch before you offering it out. So I had
(08:01):
the night wastch that time, and my job was to
walk around and see if then he was wrong. And
I went to the officers quarters. I opened the refrigerated steaks,
so I stole some steaks from the offices, and I
brought it back to my jack and I cooked steaks
aboard ship, very tight compartments the guys. The next day
(08:22):
they said, goddamn office and really slakes last night. I
never told him. I'm like a Neil. I don't get caught.
Samuel Chase is an attack transport used to bring the
troops into the beach with little Higgins boats. Higgins boat
is about thirty ft long and the holes between thirty
(08:45):
and thirty two troops and this flat bottom so to
go up on the beach. But we had a living
hunt the troops aboard ship that we took it to
the beach. And normally five thousand ships went into the invasion.
Five thousand. We went in with three other ships, the
Pickman and the Billy and the Enrico, all attack transports,
(09:06):
all Coast Guard. People don't realize that most of the
troops I went into the beach were brought in by
Coast Guard. And since I was a gunner's mate, I
was assigning one of the machine guns. About three weeks
before the invasion, they took all the machine guns away
and my job. There's a ramp in front of the
boat that's the only steel on the whole boat, because
the boat is made out of plywood. So my job
(09:28):
became to drop this ramp. We're supposed to invade on
June five, but there was a big storm and we
called off the invasion till June six. It was a
little foggy and jusily. It was a June day, but
it felt like an October November day. It was not
not a good day. So the water was still very
(09:50):
rough and you wouldn't think, you know the English Channel,
but it was like an ocean. The waves are very
high and the boat was going like this. Well, we
want to load the troops about four o'clock. About two
o'clock we started feeding them eggs, sources, pancakes, ice cream,
everything that you could think of. It was the worst
(10:12):
thing we could have done. We overfed them. Some of
these guys were never out a boat in the whole life.
They will sea sick. On the first wave. You know,
six boats immediately. One boat that was hit by an
eight ad. It is a gun that the journeys had,
(10:32):
the best gun of the whole wall. This hid one
of our boats and killed one of them men on
the boat and two of the men. They were blown
out of the boat into the water, and they called ashore.
They took the guns and dead soldiers and fought with
the army all day long. We could get on the
(10:52):
beach because there were too many obstacles on the beach.
Now I'm in the back of the boat and these
guys are in front of me all and the wind
took it. I was a little bothered. So we got
maybe twenty and thirty yards away from the beach and
the cox as they dropped the rint, I never heard
him because the fire of the cannons and two big
(11:14):
diesel engines behind me. The yo again, he says, dropped
the rint, and this time I heard him. But the
only problem was it was thirty machine goes along the
beach there and they were firing at us, and they
were hitting the ramp of the boat or the ramp
was steel and the machine was like a type of
(11:37):
hitting that ramp. And he told me to dropped the ramp.
And I knew, even though I was a little kid,
I knew when I dropped that ramp. The machine guns
that were hitting the ramp we came into the boat
and killed me. I froze through a wall, and then
he says, goddamn bebated dropped the f and ramp and
I had no choice. I dropped the rim and the
machine guns came into the boat and about fourteen guys
(12:04):
immediately were killed. So now I was the three cards
of the way back. And there was two kids next
to me. I was nineteen, they were nineteen. When I
called them kids, they were standing next to me. They
thought they would be safe. But if German's sad machine
goes up on the hill. One guy was maybe four
(12:25):
feet away from me. He got hit across the building,
machine gun mollis across the building. I don't know how
this guy survived. His belly was ripped wide open. He
was bleeding, and we couldn't do anything for we had
no morphine. And the other kid who had red hair.
Never forget the machine guys took his holy looks, as
(12:51):
I said, and he fell in front of me. And
even as the fallacy everybody thinks when the soldiers dying,
he reaches out to God, it's not true. He reached
out to Bama. And did they cry, Mamma. He was crying, help, help, help.
(13:14):
I couldn't help him. I couldn't even help myself. I
had no morphine to give him. I knew he was
going to die because I said was done. I didn't
know what to do and nothing, so I started praying, well,
it's bread. I don't know if you heard me, but
for some reason he stops saying, help me, help me out.
(13:34):
We're lying at my feet, and I reached down and
I touched his hand because I want them to know
he wasn't wrong. He squeezed my hand and he died.
It was just a little boy. Yeah, after the break,
(14:04):
and I said to myself, what that'll just happen to you?
And why am I alive? Stay with us? Welcome back
(14:28):
to service stories of hunger and war from my Heart Radio.
I'm Jacqueline Proposo, and we left Coast Guard Gunner's mate
Frank Tavita on d Day, June. Here's President Roosevelt, the
morning after. My fellow Americans, last night, when I spoke
(14:48):
with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at
that moment the proofs of the United States and our
allies we're crossing the channel in Anola and greater operation.
It has come to pass with success thus far. And
so in this poignant hour I asked you to join
(15:13):
with me in prayer. Frank doesn't know how many wounded
they carried back to the Lucky Chase that day, but
three hundred and eighty soldiers bodies returned to his ship alone.
When all is said and done. Between that June six
and August, when the Germans retreated back across the Seine,
(15:34):
four hundred and twenty five thousand casualties were split almost
equally between the Allied and Axis forces. We pick up
Frank's story when his eighteen hour battle finally starts winding down.
After the fifteenth way, they started bringing the boats up.
(15:55):
Crane came down like a cherry picker to take the boat,
put it on the deck. The boat looked like shedded
paper for the machine gun bullets. And all the crews
went down to the mess hall at cheese, sandwiches and coffee,
and my stomach was a rumble. I could eat anything,
so I didn't want to go down. Plus I was
(16:19):
full of blood and vomit all over my uniform. I
must have stunked that I hadn't. I walked to my
guns and just starting of the ship. Somehow I felt
like I was safe there. It was late at night
and I sat down on the cold deck, and I
said to myself, what he would just happen to you?
(16:40):
And why am I alive? It got dark and I
turned it around to see if anybody was with me,
and then I saw stuck against the bulkhead like a
quarter of wood all the bottom, and I cried myself
to sleep. I just want everybody to know I am
(17:03):
not a hero. I'm a survivor. How I survived with
all the machine gun bullets flying around me. God was
with me, and my mom was with me. I survived.
Lolon did not survive m I slept for three days,
(17:24):
and the captain knew what we went through, so he
didn't bother us. But after three days he got on
the loudspeaker. He says, the fun is over. Let's get
back to work. My ship went back up to Glasgow, Scotland.
That's what our own base was. When we pulled into
the euclide, and everybody's waving as a ship went in
(17:45):
because we were bringing food, so they were very happy
to see us. And I spotted this girl. We made
eye contact. So the next day I was walking along
the street and behold, I saw this girl. It was
one movie out in old town. I said that you
want to go to the movies. I walked home that
night and I met her mom and she made some
(18:05):
teeth that had nothing. The at that time was very
strict rational. I said to myself, I'm going to get
something to feed these people. I had a friend of mine,
he was a cook aboard ship, and I said, Jerry,
I need a hand. They used to have a hand.
They had a tin shaped the van. So he gave
me one of those chins. So the next night I
(18:26):
went back and I said, I got a present for
your mom, and I gave her that hand. Well she
split the hand with all the neighbors. But you think
I gave a gold. I was in the service thirty
three months. Altogether, twenty seven months was a board ship. See.
(18:46):
I love my mom, love I love my family. They're
very family. Or yet you know Italians are Saturday you
gotta have the veil covers. Sunday you have to have
the posta otherwise you go. I missed that. I missed that. Yeah,
And my mom had a sister. She was a great,
great cook. She used to send me packages female they
called it. And sometime I get a package ache plane
(19:09):
in the jars and the guys would say, what the
hell is that? I said, that's ache. Plane tasted no,
then they tasted big mistake. Haven't made the how to
split it with them. August fifteen, we went down to
Marseille and did the second invasion. And the second invasion
was a lot easier. They didn't have that many machine
(19:29):
guns or no one was wounded or killed aboard my
ship and we went through the Panamacanal. My ship was
not big enough to go by itself, so we tied
the submarine alongside of us and we went through the
canal together. Now we had an ice cream machine a
boy ship, and then submarines wanted ice cream, so we
will make the trade for you. Torpedoes were on an alcohol.
(19:51):
We'll give you ice cream and you give us alcohol.
We got the alcohol, they got the ice cream, and
we all got drunk. We got drunk, and then we
went to the Philippines. You know the Japanese. The war
was coming to an end, but they wouldn't surrender. So
that these are planes used to put the five rounds
of problem bomb in it. They would fly into the
ships with the suicide mission and the planes would fly
(20:16):
and I would fire that I don't know if I
have had I'll be honest, but I did fire at
the Tama class, but they sank a lot of lots
and they end up my war in Osaka and Yokohama
in Japan. The war I just ended. That was an
empty They gave me a gun and the police stood.
(20:38):
There was the wall there. I stood next to that
wall for four hours. I didn't move. I was scared,
and I had so many stories about the Japanese. They
had pressed his heads off. I think if my mother
came along, I would have shot at It was warm.
The Japanese people was so nice. One time I was
walking along the street and this Japanese woman came up
(21:00):
to me, thank you, thank you, thank you. Why are
you thanking me? She's the war's over. These are the people,
not the government. They suffered terribly. We bombed the all album.
They had no food. We started feeding them basic arm
before k rash and stuff like that. We started feeding them.
That's the first thing to do. I was discharged in
(21:27):
n I had a lot more knowledge than I never
had when I first went in the service. They told
me a lot and going from country to country, meeting
different people, that was an education in itself. A lot
of the military guys hated the Japanese after the war.
I didn't feel like that. I felt once the war
was over, our randomies became our friends. During the war,
(21:51):
I hated them, I actually hated them, and see that
you were them. But then when the war was over,
Why should I hate some people? The human beings. They
get up in the morning, put their shoes on the
same way, apple in my shoes on. Different nationality and
different religion, but they're just like us. They're just like us.
You can't hold grudge on them the best of you.
(22:12):
Like I'm a lucky person. I'm lucky that I survived
the day. My mom was on my shoulder all the time.
You see, when the servicemen is killed, they said a
telegram to the mother, Mrs Devita, sorry to notify you,
but your son has been killed. I don't want my
mother to get that telegram. That was the term when
(22:34):
she was not going to get that telligra and she didn't. Yeah.
Frank's brother Silvio and Daniel came home safely to there
are no gold stars in their family. He went on
to marry his high school sweetheart, Dorothy. They had three children,
(22:54):
six grandchildren and five great grandchildren. Dot was a prolific
cook and Frank misses her chicken and rice more than anything.
Frank has since returned to Scotland and to the beaches
of Normandy. He says he still sees a very different
beach than most people see there. In our next episode,
(23:15):
we spend time with John Bastrica, and Army infantryman from Ohio,
who was aboard Frank's Lucky Chase on that June six
Before continuing into Normandy. We'll hear that finding food during
wartime is not quite as easy without your own personal
gunnery shot kitchen, but that no matter where you are,
V mail that's victory mail is always always appreciated. And
(23:36):
along those lines, I invite you to leave some v
email for our veterans via a message form at Service
podcast dot org. And you can find more audio clips
of Frank and photos of him and the Lucky Chase
on Instagram and Facebook. We are at Service Podcast and
please invite your veteran loved ones to the table too
to share their stories. Service as a production of I
(23:56):
Heart Radio. This episode was produced and edited by me
Jack Lemurposo. Our Supervising producer is Gabrielle Collins. Our executive
producer is Christopher Hasiotas. Our art is by Girl Friday.
The soundscape behind Frank's D Day story was crafted by
Ambience Hub. Thank you to the Greatest Generations Foundation for
connecting us with the Davidas for this episode. You can
sponsor a veterans visit to Hollow Grounds Memorials and Cemeteries
(24:20):
through their foundation at t g g F dot org.
Thank you for listening, and thank you those who are
serving and those who have served.
This episode re enacts scenes of war. You'll hear gunfire
and descriptions of violence. Listener discretion advised. Japan is at
well with the United States and Great Britain. Tokyo has
so announced in the declaration. In a few months, we
were switched to points where batles are raising in the Pacific.
From personal let's hear from Turkey where the news of this.
(00:24):
I'm Jacqueline Proposo. That's the beginning of a news clip
from December seven, the day of the Japanese Empire bombed
Pearl Harbor and the day before the United States officially
joined the Allies in World War Two. As I listened
to veterans at this time share their stories, I can't
help but notice how on that one day the size
of their world exploded. To the Navy were idle and
(00:48):
halpen great and iwa Jima Alkan. Now, while I was
in Paris August sixteenth with a free French, we took
the big ship from Manila to Mindoro and after the
war and we took another L S D. Whatever was
to men to know. Welcome to Service, Stories of Hunger
and War A production from I Heart Radio and me
(01:10):
your host. That last clip you heard was from our
episode with pasquald' ambrosio, who left his New Hampshire home
with the army to sail to the Philippines. Today we
spend time with Frank da Vita, a Brooklyn boy who
crossed the globe over almost three years in the Coast Guard.
Pat and Frank and our next few veterans all came
(01:31):
from close knit communities. They knew their neighbors and after
the war married childhood sweethearts. They had to wait for
the news, listening on the radio or going to the
movie theater. They couldn't internet, research more download a map,
as words like epernay and okinawa became part of their
common language, like I'm doing as I listen and learn.
(01:53):
Before they deployed, there were things about the world they
just couldn't know. So we're all the same page. Here
are a few things they could have known. They would
definitely have known that the four big Allied powers were Britain, France,
and the Soviet Union along with the United States and
the Axis powers were the German Nazis, the Italian fascists,
(02:14):
and the Japanese. By late nineteen forty one had occupied
most of Europe and so many of the Pacific islands.
They might have known that in North Africa, Italian colonized
Libyans were fighting British colonized Egyptians, and thousands of Africans
were being forced to fight for their colonizers abroad. With
a Spanish only recently post Civil War and Latin American
(02:36):
countries pulled between access and Allied loyalties, They might not
know what to make of such civilians. While they would
have known of the heavy bombing all over Britain by
the German Luftwaffe, they might not quite have understood how
vital civilian farming was for survival there, and as rumors
about the barbarity of the Japanese were flying stateside after
(02:57):
Pearl Harbor, There's no way these kids could have known
who they were going to face when they then headed
to the Pacific themselves, such as the case today. A feisty,
patriotic seventeen year old Frank joined the Coastguard because they
were the branch that could send him out the soonest,
and he knew he wanted to defend his country. What
(03:17):
he couldn't know was that what light ahead was active combat,
facing fears and foreigners and decisions that would shove him
into adulthood. But what he ate and how he found
or shared food seemed to bring Frank a little sense
of home and a little sense of fun, no matter
where on the globe he was floating. So now from
(03:39):
his home in New Jersey, let's slow down and sit
with Frank da Vita. My name is Frank Vida of
the US Coast Guard. I was a gun his may
third class. Yeah. I had a very good family life.
(04:02):
He bought the raised and broken death. My dad worked
for the Navy for thirty years and my mom they
all all the time, and she raised all these children
and four children. My sister raved Us was the oldest,
and my brother Sylvia came along, and I came along,
and then my brother Daniel came along. We had a
good family life. But we were born during the Depression.
(04:22):
I would say we were poor, but we were on
the borderline and we didn't feel it. Because the depression,
everybody was poor. I mean, the subway was five cents,
Love for bread was five cents, Paula Lucas five cents.
We lived near Coney Island and it was a trolley
that went from near my street to Corney Island. It
was five cents. I walked and saved the five cents
(04:43):
so I could buy a hot talk and Cody hot
talk was five cents. My mom was not a good cook,
but she was a wonderful mother. And my dad so
he designed all the uniforms for the Navy, and he
came acrourse a lot of big animals in general and
all that kind of stuff. Once a month, one of
these generals, or rather was would comfort dinner, and my
(05:04):
mom's favorite dinner at that time. She used to make
roast beef with rice and brown gravy, and she made
a great kip pro Probably day there was an arval
there and a captain, And when we used to have company,
my mom was very strict no children at the table,
(05:25):
so she was fetus early and then when the company came,
we would leave. But I was a big Giant fan
football Jameson and I wanted to listen to the Giant game.
So I was in the living room, had the radio
every little and they were in the kitchen doing their thing.
They interrupted the game to say that the Japanese just
bumped along. I regret to tell you that very many
(05:49):
American lives I've been lost. In addition, American ships have
been reported to torpedoed on the high seas between San
Francisco and So I went into the dining room and
I said, excuse me, and my mom says, I told
you not to come with you like this, But I
having portant news. What's so important? The Japanese just worn pearla.
(06:15):
This animal kept him, but they was they left, and
that's how I remember pearl ha ha. My mother had
a very hard time. She had three sons and we
roll in combat. My oldest brother was in the Army.
(06:38):
I was in the Coast Guard, my young brother was
in the Marines. She kept it hidden because she was
a very quiet person, but I'm sure she prayed a lot.
I was a gun his mate in the back of
the ship called Stern. It was formed in the aircraft
guns twenty millimeter. When there wasn't an invasion, I was
in charge of thats four guns. Since I was a
(06:59):
gun his mate, they gave me what's called a gunna
be shock, which was a room about eight feet by
eight feet, and in that shock had all my tools
to fix the guns and ammunition. And I decided that's
where I was going to live because you see, I'm
a very finicky hear. I was just the day I
was born. When I went through the child line. The
first time you got a trade with five or six
(07:19):
complements in it, and they slopped the food on. So
the first time I went through the child line, that's spaghetti.
It looked like globe. So this guy had this thing
up like this, I don't want any You said, how
come you look like you're tying. I said, that's why
I don't want any. I decided I was gonna live
in that shock. So when we were in Boris, I
(07:40):
stopped in Borson. I bought a frying pan, coffee pot plate.
I stocked up all the king was I could find
pork and beans and soup, and I was all set.
But then out of his eye, I want the meat
or fish or something like that. I used to have
to watch sometimes what they called them four you want
to watch before you offering it out. So I had
(08:01):
the night wastch that time, and my job was to
walk around and see if then he was wrong. And
I went to the officers quarters. I opened the refrigerated steaks,
so I stole some steaks from the offices, and I
brought it back to my jack and I cooked steaks
aboard ship, very tight compartments the guys. The next day
(08:22):
they said, goddamn office and really slakes last night. I
never told him. I'm like a Neil. I don't get caught.
Samuel Chase is an attack transport used to bring the
troops into the beach with little Higgins boats. Higgins boat
is about thirty ft long and the holes between thirty
(08:45):
and thirty two troops and this flat bottom so to
go up on the beach. But we had a living
hunt the troops aboard ship that we took it to
the beach. And normally five thousand ships went into the invasion.
Five thousand. We went in with three other ships, the
Pickman and the Billy and the Enrico, all attack transports,
(09:06):
all Coast Guard. People don't realize that most of the
troops I went into the beach were brought in by
Coast Guard. And since I was a gunner's mate, I
was assigning one of the machine guns. About three weeks
before the invasion, they took all the machine guns away
and my job. There's a ramp in front of the
boat that's the only steel on the whole boat, because
the boat is made out of plywood. So my job
(09:28):
became to drop this ramp. We're supposed to invade on
June five, but there was a big storm and we
called off the invasion till June six. It was a
little foggy and jusily. It was a June day, but
it felt like an October November day. It was not
not a good day. So the water was still very
(09:50):
rough and you wouldn't think, you know the English Channel,
but it was like an ocean. The waves are very
high and the boat was going like this. Well, we
want to load the troops about four o'clock. About two
o'clock we started feeding them eggs, sources, pancakes, ice cream,
everything that you could think of. It was the worst
(10:12):
thing we could have done. We overfed them. Some of
these guys were never out a boat in the whole life.
They will sea sick. On the first wave. You know,
six boats immediately. One boat that was hit by an
eight ad. It is a gun that the journeys had,
(10:32):
the best gun of the whole wall. This hid one
of our boats and killed one of them men on
the boat and two of the men. They were blown
out of the boat into the water, and they called ashore.
They took the guns and dead soldiers and fought with
the army all day long. We could get on the
(10:52):
beach because there were too many obstacles on the beach.
Now I'm in the back of the boat and these
guys are in front of me all and the wind
took it. I was a little bothered. So we got
maybe twenty and thirty yards away from the beach and
the cox as they dropped the rint, I never heard
him because the fire of the cannons and two big
(11:14):
diesel engines behind me. The yo again, he says, dropped
the rint, and this time I heard him. But the
only problem was it was thirty machine goes along the
beach there and they were firing at us, and they
were hitting the ramp of the boat or the ramp
was steel and the machine was like a type of
(11:37):
hitting that ramp. And he told me to dropped the ramp.
And I knew, even though I was a little kid,
I knew when I dropped that ramp. The machine guns
that were hitting the ramp we came into the boat
and killed me. I froze through a wall, and then
he says, goddamn bebated dropped the f and ramp and
I had no choice. I dropped the rim and the
machine guns came into the boat and about fourteen guys
(12:04):
immediately were killed. So now I was the three cards
of the way back. And there was two kids next
to me. I was nineteen, they were nineteen. When I
called them kids, they were standing next to me. They
thought they would be safe. But if German's sad machine
goes up on the hill. One guy was maybe four
(12:25):
feet away from me. He got hit across the building,
machine gun mollis across the building. I don't know how
this guy survived. His belly was ripped wide open. He
was bleeding, and we couldn't do anything for we had
no morphine. And the other kid who had red hair.
Never forget the machine guys took his holy looks, as
(12:51):
I said, and he fell in front of me. And
even as the fallacy everybody thinks when the soldiers dying,
he reaches out to God, it's not true. He reached
out to Bama. And did they cry, Mamma. He was crying, help, help, help.
(13:14):
I couldn't help him. I couldn't even help myself. I
had no morphine to give him. I knew he was
going to die because I said was done. I didn't
know what to do and nothing, so I started praying, well,
it's bread. I don't know if you heard me, but
for some reason he stops saying, help me, help me out.
(13:34):
We're lying at my feet, and I reached down and
I touched his hand because I want them to know
he wasn't wrong. He squeezed my hand and he died.
It was just a little boy. Yeah, after the break,
(14:04):
and I said to myself, what that'll just happen to you?
And why am I alive? Stay with us? Welcome back
(14:28):
to service stories of hunger and war from my Heart Radio.
I'm Jacqueline Proposo, and we left Coast Guard Gunner's mate
Frank Tavita on d Day, June. Here's President Roosevelt, the
morning after. My fellow Americans, last night, when I spoke
(14:48):
with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at
that moment the proofs of the United States and our
allies we're crossing the channel in Anola and greater operation.
It has come to pass with success thus far. And
so in this poignant hour I asked you to join
(15:13):
with me in prayer. Frank doesn't know how many wounded
they carried back to the Lucky Chase that day, but
three hundred and eighty soldiers bodies returned to his ship alone.
When all is said and done. Between that June six
and August, when the Germans retreated back across the Seine,
(15:34):
four hundred and twenty five thousand casualties were split almost
equally between the Allied and Axis forces. We pick up
Frank's story when his eighteen hour battle finally starts winding down.
After the fifteenth way, they started bringing the boats up.
(15:55):
Crane came down like a cherry picker to take the boat,
put it on the deck. The boat looked like shedded
paper for the machine gun bullets. And all the crews
went down to the mess hall at cheese, sandwiches and coffee,
and my stomach was a rumble. I could eat anything,
so I didn't want to go down. Plus I was
(16:19):
full of blood and vomit all over my uniform. I
must have stunked that I hadn't. I walked to my
guns and just starting of the ship. Somehow I felt
like I was safe there. It was late at night
and I sat down on the cold deck, and I
said to myself, what he would just happen to you?
(16:40):
And why am I alive? It got dark and I
turned it around to see if anybody was with me,
and then I saw stuck against the bulkhead like a
quarter of wood all the bottom, and I cried myself
to sleep. I just want everybody to know I am
(17:03):
not a hero. I'm a survivor. How I survived with
all the machine gun bullets flying around me. God was
with me, and my mom was with me. I survived.
Lolon did not survive m I slept for three days,
(17:24):
and the captain knew what we went through, so he
didn't bother us. But after three days he got on
the loudspeaker. He says, the fun is over. Let's get
back to work. My ship went back up to Glasgow, Scotland.
That's what our own base was. When we pulled into
the euclide, and everybody's waving as a ship went in
(17:45):
because we were bringing food, so they were very happy
to see us. And I spotted this girl. We made
eye contact. So the next day I was walking along
the street and behold, I saw this girl. It was
one movie out in old town. I said that you
want to go to the movies. I walked home that
night and I met her mom and she made some
(18:05):
teeth that had nothing. The at that time was very
strict rational. I said to myself, I'm going to get
something to feed these people. I had a friend of mine,
he was a cook aboard ship, and I said, Jerry,
I need a hand. They used to have a hand.
They had a tin shaped the van. So he gave
me one of those chins. So the next night I
(18:26):
went back and I said, I got a present for
your mom, and I gave her that hand. Well she
split the hand with all the neighbors. But you think
I gave a gold. I was in the service thirty
three months. Altogether, twenty seven months was a board ship. See.
(18:46):
I love my mom, love I love my family. They're
very family. Or yet you know Italians are Saturday you
gotta have the veil covers. Sunday you have to have
the posta otherwise you go. I missed that. I missed that. Yeah,
And my mom had a sister. She was a great,
great cook. She used to send me packages female they
called it. And sometime I get a package ache plane
(19:09):
in the jars and the guys would say, what the
hell is that? I said, that's ache. Plane tasted no,
then they tasted big mistake. Haven't made the how to
split it with them. August fifteen, we went down to
Marseille and did the second invasion. And the second invasion
was a lot easier. They didn't have that many machine
(19:29):
guns or no one was wounded or killed aboard my
ship and we went through the Panamacanal. My ship was
not big enough to go by itself, so we tied
the submarine alongside of us and we went through the
canal together. Now we had an ice cream machine a
boy ship, and then submarines wanted ice cream, so we
will make the trade for you. Torpedoes were on an alcohol.
(19:51):
We'll give you ice cream and you give us alcohol.
We got the alcohol, they got the ice cream, and
we all got drunk. We got drunk, and then we
went to the Philippines. You know the Japanese. The war
was coming to an end, but they wouldn't surrender. So
that these are planes used to put the five rounds
of problem bomb in it. They would fly into the
ships with the suicide mission and the planes would fly
(20:16):
and I would fire that I don't know if I
have had I'll be honest, but I did fire at
the Tama class, but they sank a lot of lots
and they end up my war in Osaka and Yokohama
in Japan. The war I just ended. That was an
empty They gave me a gun and the police stood.
(20:38):
There was the wall there. I stood next to that
wall for four hours. I didn't move. I was scared,
and I had so many stories about the Japanese. They
had pressed his heads off. I think if my mother
came along, I would have shot at It was warm.
The Japanese people was so nice. One time I was
walking along the street and this Japanese woman came up
(21:00):
to me, thank you, thank you, thank you. Why are
you thanking me? She's the war's over. These are the people,
not the government. They suffered terribly. We bombed the all album.
They had no food. We started feeding them basic arm
before k rash and stuff like that. We started feeding them.
That's the first thing to do. I was discharged in
(21:27):
n I had a lot more knowledge than I never
had when I first went in the service. They told
me a lot and going from country to country, meeting
different people, that was an education in itself. A lot
of the military guys hated the Japanese after the war.
I didn't feel like that. I felt once the war
was over, our randomies became our friends. During the war,
(21:51):
I hated them, I actually hated them, and see that
you were them. But then when the war was over,
Why should I hate some people? The human beings. They
get up in the morning, put their shoes on the
same way, apple in my shoes on. Different nationality and
different religion, but they're just like us. They're just like us.
You can't hold grudge on them the best of you.
(22:12):
Like I'm a lucky person. I'm lucky that I survived
the day. My mom was on my shoulder all the time.
You see, when the servicemen is killed, they said a
telegram to the mother, Mrs Devita, sorry to notify you,
but your son has been killed. I don't want my
mother to get that telegram. That was the term when
(22:34):
she was not going to get that telligra and she didn't. Yeah.
Frank's brother Silvio and Daniel came home safely to there
are no gold stars in their family. He went on
to marry his high school sweetheart, Dorothy. They had three children,
(22:54):
six grandchildren and five great grandchildren. Dot was a prolific
cook and Frank misses her chicken and rice more than anything.
Frank has since returned to Scotland and to the beaches
of Normandy. He says he still sees a very different
beach than most people see there. In our next episode,
(23:15):
we spend time with John Bastrica, and Army infantryman from Ohio,
who was aboard Frank's Lucky Chase on that June six
Before continuing into Normandy. We'll hear that finding food during
wartime is not quite as easy without your own personal
gunnery shot kitchen, but that no matter where you are,
V mail that's victory mail is always always appreciated. And
(23:36):
along those lines, I invite you to leave some v
email for our veterans via a message form at Service
podcast dot org. And you can find more audio clips
of Frank and photos of him and the Lucky Chase
on Instagram and Facebook. We are at Service Podcast and
please invite your veteran loved ones to the table too
to share their stories. Service as a production of I
(23:56):
Heart Radio. This episode was produced and edited by me
Jack Lemurposo. Our Supervising producer is Gabrielle Collins. Our executive
producer is Christopher Hasiotas. Our art is by Girl Friday.
The soundscape behind Frank's D Day story was crafted by
Ambience Hub. Thank you to the Greatest Generations Foundation for
connecting us with the Davidas for this episode. You can
sponsor a veterans visit to Hollow Grounds Memorials and Cemeteries
(24:20):
through their foundation at t g g F dot org.
Thank you for listening, and thank you those who are
serving and those who have served.
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