I regret to announce the death of my Father, Kenneth Moore Mintz, on 6 March, 2000. Motor Machinist's Mate First Class Kenneth M. Mintz served on board the Bangust against the Japanese during WWII. He was proud of his time on this vessel and though he like many of his time and experience talked little of what he had seen and felt, when he could be coaxed he most often spoke of his time on the Bangust.

For instance, the time when he was tasked along with others to recover cork from the hull of the sunken Japanese submarine using a steel bucket tied to a rope. The bucket was flung into the water in hopes of scooping up some of the cork fragments but it would sink before this could be done. In frustration Dad said that he decided dive in and get the cork by hand. An officer, the Captain as I recall, ordered him to stop. Just then one of the bridge officers hat blew overboard and hit the water once, twice and a shark hit the hat. They had been feeding on the sub crew below. The choppy surface had prevented anyone from seeing them but the officer knew they were there. As a child this was one of my favorite stories from the Bangust. Dad said that his life was saved that day by the Captain.

My brother, John Mark Mintz, and I, Kenneth Randall Mintz, along with our sister and Mother, Mabel K. Mintz interred his remains at the Sandhills State Veterans Cemetery just outside Fayetteville, N.C. where he was born and grew up on the very day of what would have been his 78th birthday on 10 March, 2000, with a small Naval ceremony.

I would like to hear more of what transpired on the Bangust during this time from anyone who would like to tell me about it. Dad served in the Navy from 27 Jan. 1941 to 6 Nov. 1945 starting in the Atlantic convoys against the Germans on the USS Tourmaline PY20.

If I or my brother can be of any assistance to the Bangust crew please contact me: Kenneth R. Mintz, 501 Engel Ave., Henderson, NV 89015. phone: 702 567-1938 email kmintz@worldnet.att.net

When I went aboard the Bangust, I was a young seventeen year old sailor. The following is a story I remember fondly:

One day at sea, the P.A. system clicked on..."All hands turn topside to take on stores." Naturally, I went to do my part. After the stores were unloaded aboard, I was on my way back to my work station, which was the laundry, when I heard the P.A. system click on once AGAIN! "ALL hands...UNLOCK your lockers." I unlocked my locker and upon arriving at the laundry, Dick Davis instructed me to look and see where the Captain and Boats were. At that time, they were in the compartment where I slept, getting ready to come into the engineers compartment. We used steam to heat our water. Dick quickly opened the steam valve WIDE OPEN! The Captain and Boats came in and as you can imagine...it was unbelieveably HOT in there. Due to the heat, Davis and I worked in our shorts and shower clogs all the time. A Fifty-five gallon barrell full of soap powder was close by. Boats proceeded to run his arm down into the barrell of soap powder, right up to his armpit, hoping to locate those missing peaches. The washing machine was still running and Davis looked at Boats and said, "Boats, do you want to look in the washing machine?" And Boats replied, "ANYBODY has got more damned sense than to put PEACHES into a washing machine!!!" Not finding the peaches in the barrell of soap, the Captain and Boats continued on their way in search for the missing peaches. After they left, Davis turned the steam off and yelled to me, "Bob...open the chemical warfare hatch!" He stopped the washing machine and began retrieving gallon sized cans of peaches...in heavy syrup, no less!!! Later that night, we opened up those peaches over in the carpenters and ship fitters shop. Tommy Thompson took some 3/8's inch dowel pins and made spears for eating our peaches, in that HEAVY syrup, straight out of the can! We had quite a party...Davis, Thompson, Fiddler, a torpedoman, a pharmacists mate, and myself. We sure were enjoying those peaches when all of a sudden, the hatch flew open! Lo, and behold, who should be standing there but an Ensign. Fiddler announced in a booming voice, "COME IN, SIR!" He then handed the young Ensign a peach on one of the spears! "Go ahead, Sir, have a bite....and then you can't tell on us!" Then young Ensign smiled and asked if there was enough for his Buddy. We replied, "...by all means!"

Those peaches sure were GOOD...for the short time they lasted!

Robert R. Lee

A Navy Working Party is like an Ad Hoc committee but, without a vote. There is a specific job to be done, in addition to routine duties, and people are assigned to a working party to complete that special job. A working party may consist of any number of people all of whom will normally work under the direction of a petty officer.

And so it was, one morning in early February 1944, that the U S S Bangust DE739, anchored in Tarawa Lagoon, furnished a working party consisting of ten or twelve sailors to help expedite the unloading of stores to Betio Island. The invasion was over and the island was secure but the Japanese still had many powerful ships and planes within easy striking distance. Japanese reconnaissance flights were routine as were occasional bomb drops. Smoky fires were still burning on the island. Wreckage and debris was everywhere on the island. Cleanup crews still had much work to do. The need to rapidly stock and supply the island against a possible counterattack was obvious even to us lowly sailors in the working party.

The ship's 26 foot motor whaleboat deposited the working party on a finger pier extending out from "Red Beach" into the lagoon on the the north side of Betio Island. LCT size landing craft were being used to "lighter" stores from deep draft supply ships through the shallow water of Tarawa lagoon to the pier where they were manhandled by working parties. Those who know the battle for Tarawa will recall that the unexpected neap tide and a shallow reef offshore made the amphibious landing by the U S Marines extremely difficult with very high casualties. That same reef prevented deep draft supply ships from unloading directly to the pier.

Unloading went well despite the heat because we improvised by falling overboard with some regularity. This allowed a quick cool down followed by the evaporative cooling as our clothing dried. When it became unbearable again we clumsily fell back into the lagoon. (Tarawa is only about 50 miles north of the Equator) During one of the unauthorized "swim calls" a Bangust sailor noticed several hundred apparently sealed unlabeled bottles lying on the sand bottom of the lagoon. Probably no deeper than 10 or 15 feet. After ascertaining that the bottles were not booby trapped one was brought to the surface and opened. Wow! - Beer! Offloading the LCTs continued at a rapid pace. Now we were also onloading beer into the Bangust motor whaleboat which managed to make a trip or two back to the ship where the beer was safely stored in a reefer until later that night. We had a beer party aboard the Bangust that night knowing that our beer resupply was safe on the bottom of the lagoon and we were scheduled to help unload more LCTs at the finger pier tomorrow. We had no end of people volunteering for that working party.

When we arrived at the finger pier next morning we found a loaded LCT waiting to be unloaded at exactly the same place but - Surprise! - not one bottle of beer on the bottom of the lagoon. Needless to say, unloading that day was not nearly as pleasant as the day before. We soon learned from one of the Beachmasters (unloading logistics officers) that the natives had worked late the previous night unloading another LCT after the Bangust working party returned to the ship.

The explanation - The Japanese had removed all natives from Betio Island to other islands around Tarawa Atoll when they first occupied Betio Island . Natives were brought to Betio only as forced labor and carefully supervised during the day being returned to the other islands at nightfall. They had little or no knowledge of beer or the fact the Japanese had beer on the island After we invaded some U. S. do-gooder decided to improve the local economy by hiring natives to help unload supplies. They were paid to work - not forced to work as before. They were working alongside us unloading the LCT on the day we found the beer. They saw a few sailors drinking from the bottles as we unloaded the LCT and obviously decided the stuff in the bottles was something drinkable. It had to be better than their own rotgut which was made by fermenting cocoanut milk and saliva. After we returned to the Bangust at the end of the work day the natives simply picked up the remainder of the bottles for themselves.

Damn do-gooders! Actually, its probably just as well that the natives got the remaining bottles. We got away with the first beer party aboard but by the second day too many enlisted men knew about the first party and a second party would surely have not gone unnoticed.

Postwar update: Tarawa has been renamed Kiribati, and is a principal source of much of the tuna in your tuna sandwiches.

This part of the story comes much later; ca 1975. The unlabeled bottles found on the lagoon floor had a very distinctive shape. Probably as distinctive as the Coca Cola bottle. Obviously the labels soaked off the bottles from being in the water. We did not know it was Kirin at the time (who cared - it was free beer) but one need only compare the neck of a Kirin bottle with any other beer bottle to see how easy it is to identify. My wife finally convinced me to try Sushi sometime around 1975. When my Sushi order was delivered to the table I ordered a "beer" to go with it. When asked what kind I said I don't know - "just some kind of Japanese beer". When the beer was delivered to the table the hair on the back of my neck stood straight out. I had not seen that bottle for more than 30 years. The neck on that beer bottle was the same as the ones in the lagoon and I learned for the first time that the beer at the Bangust beer party was "Kirin".

Circa 1944 (facsimile) and December 2000

On Thursday 09 March 1944, while at anchor in Tarawa Lagoon, the U. S. S. Bangust received a dispatch request from the Executive Officer of a YO and verbal orders from CTU 57.1.1 to form a boarding party and investigate a possible mutiny or rebellion on that YO which was also anchored in Tarawa Lagoon . The order was to investigate and, if necessary, take command and control of the YO.

As DE is the Navy designation for Destroyer Escort, YO is the navy designation for Yard Oiler. YO's are essentially floating fuel tanks often referred to as fuel barges. They are towed to a harbor or port (yard) where they are anchored and remain as long as necessary to service fleet units requiring fuel. The YO, itself, may be resupplied with fuel from seagoing Fleet Oilers or commercial tankers. Thus, once anchored, they generally do not move on until the war does. This YO(G) carried a primary supply of High Octane Aviation Gasoline used to fuel PT Boats. The (G) suffix indicates Gasoline. It also carried a secondary supply of Diesel fuel. It was a barge, a cement concrete hull with no propulsion machinery. Power for pumps, lights, winches, ground tackle and reefers was provided by engine-generator sets which were essentially the only engines aboard. The crew of 15 handled lines and hoses from customer ships but otherwise had little to do.

In compliance with the order, Lieutenant Commander C. F. MacNish, Captain of the U. S. S. Bangust, departed Bangust at 1235 09 March 1944 in the ship's 26 foot motor whaleboat with a heavily armed boarding party consisting of 6 or 8 of Bangust's most experienced sailors. Arriving a few minutes later at the YO(G) they boarded unopposed, secured the quarterdeck, and mustered the crew on deck with the exception of the Commanding Officer who had barricaded himself in his quarters. The fifteen man crew was held on deck and individually questioned regarding problems on board.

This revealed that two miscreants were responsible for the ongoing trouble. A Chief Boatswains Mate who served as Commanding Officer of the YO(G) and a Seaman 1/c. Furthering questioning determined that in addition to an extreme dislike for each other, both always carried sidearms and both were seriously heavy boozers with a seemingly inexhaustible supply of liquor. Not a healthy situation!

The Seaman 1/c was immediately disarmed and placed in irons by the boarding party. The Chief was ordered out of his quarters , disarmed, and also placed in irons. Both were delivered, in irons, to custody of the Tarawa Port Captain. A Boatswains Mate 1/c from the 15 man crew was designated acting Commanding Officer of the YO(G) and the Boarding Party returned to Bangust and disbanded. A good afternoons work, well and safely handled, by the Captain and crew of the Bangust.

Most of the information for this brief story was provided by Bangust crewman William Earley who was selected by the Captain to be signalman on the Boarding Party. Bill believes he was selected because he had transferred from the YO(G) to the Bangust just 12 days before the boarding. He knew the YO(G) crew well, and could provide valuable knowledge about them and the YO(G) to the Boarding Party.

It had left San Pedro, California fully laden in late 1943 being towed directly to Funafuti, in the Ellice Islands* by a commercial Standard Oil Company Tanker. The YO(G) was anchored in Funafuti and remained there for a period of time during which they observed some of the rehearsal for the imminent amphibious invasion of Tarawa.

Shortly after the invasion of Tarawa the YO(G) was towed from Funafuti to Tarawa, a distance of about 800 miles, where it provided fuel for various post invasion needs.

* The Ellis Islands became the Nation of Tuvalu (a Constitutional Monarchy) in 1978.

CTU is Navy for Commander Task Unit.

Bill Earley is Bangust for the great trumpet player in the ship's band.

May 2001 H. E. Davis

I was assigned to the U.S.S. Bangust in the year 1943. In February of 1944, 1 found myself in the South Pacific escorting all classes of navy ships over the entire Pacific.

The one thing we all had in common was that we all loved coffee. Standing the 8:00 to 12:00 watch, or the 12:00 to 4:00, was hell without a good cup of coffee. We could not go to the mess deck for coffee! I then thought it would be great to have coffee right on our watch!

Being a Torpedo Man, my watch was on the 01 deck where the torpedo tubes were located. The 40mm was there also. I looked at the 40mm gun director forward of the gun and that's when the idea came to me. I had found my spot for the coffee pot!

My next door neighbor and pal from Quincy, Ma. was aboard the U.S.S. Caliente AO53. I received permission to visit him and the whaleboat took me to his ship. His ship carried 5" guns so I asked if I could have two aluminum powder cases. Permission was granted and I took them aboard our ship.

It took me a week or more to make the pot. All the figuring, the hammering and then stealing the handle from a swab. I got a brown medicine bottle from the pharmacist so the coffee could perk. I found an element somewhere and a square five gallon can. I cut the can in half, turned it upside down, cut a round hole in the bottom the size of the element, attached a four inch collar to the bottom and installed the element. An Electrician 1/C wired it for me. I then secured the bottom of the can to withstand heavy seas. I filled the pot with water and coffee and turned it on. From that day on we had coffee while we stood watch. The Captain said it was the best coffee aboard the ship. I'll always be thankful to the shipmates who helped me with this project.

This coffee pot made it through two typhoons: Dec 18, 1944, and one in February of 1945. I revere this coffee pot for the many hours of camaraderie and good coffee while on watch which has left me with many great memories.

This coffee pot retired with me to Quincy, Ma., in 1946. Since then, this coffee pot has been a conversational piece at the reunions I have attended. At our St. Petersburg reunions, coffee was once again served from this historical pot. It now has a permanent home in St. Petersburg, Florida. where I now reside.

John E. Bye
Torpedoman 1/C
USS Bangust DE 739

Dear Don,

I am sending you some information about two photographs that I am sending to you via the "U S Mule". One of them was taken when our company was near graduation at Boot Camp, which, incidentally was Company152-43, Regiment 4, Battalion 14 at U.S. Naval Training Center, Farragut Idaho. I remember riding the Southern Pacific railroad train from Oakland to Portland, Oregon with a two hour layover in Portland. The second part of the trip was from Portland on the Spokane, Portland & Seattle Railroad, up the north shore of the Columbia River Canyon to Pasco Washington, where they changed locomotives and serviced the train. It was late at night when we pulled into Spokane. Then, not too much later we reached a railroad depot called ATHOL, which caused a number of comments from any one who was still awake. About a half hour later we pulled into Farragut (about 2 AM. They rousted us out of the cars and I remember slipping on the snow and ice and falling on my butt. Some one yelled welcome to Boot Camp. They took us in big trailers, called cattle cars, pulled by tractors to a two story barracks building and handed us each a new wool blanket. Told everyone to get a good nights sleep because 5:30 would be around pretty fast.

There was something familiar about the barracks and the next day when I checked my address book I realized it was the address of my West Berkeley buddy Albert Costa who had signed up at the same time as I but had been called before me. He was on his way to Kansas to go to Refrigeration School.

The other photograph was taken on the steps of another pal I had first met when we moved to San Anselmo in Marin County. Dick Galleher had come up to San Anselmo from Redwood City and we hit it off pretty well. He, Al Costa and myself decided we would join the Navy together, naturally thinking that the Navy would never split us up and that we would go on through the war and be hero's together. Ha! Ha! Any how, When the Bangust arrived in San Francisco Bay and moored at Treasure Island in January of 1944, I got to go home for a 72 hour Pass. Dick’s mother took this picture and sent me a copy. I think we got it when the ship was in Tarawa. Albert Costa, after the navy, eventually moved here to Forestville in Sonoma County and we still get together a lot.

Use either one or both if you wish.

Best regards to both of you and I hope to see you one of these days.