Rodent Wars
A day or so later, I was summoned to
Headquarters to be interviewed by a Navy Lt., Junior Grade. After hearing about my 2 1/2 years of
Wildlife Management in college, he asked two questions: could I trap small
mammals and could I do taxidermy? I
quickly told him that I had run a trap line along Holiday Creek for years and
was a Graduate (correspondence course) of the famous Northwest School of
Taxidermy. He informed me that he was in charge of Rodent Control at a Navy
Malaria and Epidemic Control Unit in Noumea and was looking for someone who
could make a collection of South Pacific rodents and he had just found his
man. (How that EM in Major Parks 'office
found that job in the Navy, I don't know, but I hope he got a promotion out of
it). Just before leaving, the Navy Lt. said,
"By the way, Sparks, you'll have to drive yourself to do this rodent
collection; you can drive, can't you?".
I thought, "Oh shit, I'm going to be killed because my family never
owned a car". I replied, "Lt.,
have you ever met a 20 year old American boy who couldn't drive a car?"
Fortunately, he took the bait, "Sorry, Sparks, that was a stupid
question".
A
couple of days later I was notified at morning formation that I was being
assigned to the 27th Station Hospital in Noumea, detached to the Island Surgeon
General's Office and on special duty to the Naval Malaria and Epidemic Control
Unit. I happily crammed all my
possessions into my two duffel bags and climbed, along with several other
hilarious escapees of jungle rot and combat fatigue in islands we hadn't even heard of, into the
back of a 6by6 (a six wheeled truck with, when needed, six wheel drive-the mule
of World War II) for a ride into Noumea, the Paris of the Pacific.
I reported in at the
Headquarters of the 27th Station Hospital and was officially made a member of
it and spent the night in a transient EM's tent, the only night I spent in my
parent organization in the entire time I was assigned to it. The next morning I was taken to the Surgeon
General's Office for further processing, and then Corporal Ralph Abel drove me
the few blocks to the Quarters, still in tents, of the Island Headquarters
enlisted men. I stuffed my duffel bags under the cot assigned to me and rode
with Ralph Abel to the Navy Malaria and Epidemic Control Unit, where he
introduced me to all the officers and enlisted men. There weren't many of either and Abel and I
were the only Army personnel.
Ralph was in Rodent Control
because he had grown up in a family owned pest control business in Dallas,
Texas. He was assigned to the Surgeon
General's Office and detailed to the Rodent Control task with the Navy Malaria
and Epidemic Control Unit. We didn't do
much that day and I rode back to Headquarters Company with Ralph where we had
dinner and I was glad to go to bed, feeling for the first time in months that I
belonged.
The next morning reality reared
its ugly head. I was given my traps and
a "trip ticket" (authorization to drive a specific vehicle) and told
to go trap rats. I had figured I would
be assigned a jeep, small enough I assumed to be easy to drive. When I went outside
to begin my duties, I discovered I had been given a Command Car, a huge
vehicle. I sauntered out to it and
climbed aboard; it seemed to me that everyone in the Unit was standing on the
sidewalk to see if I could drive. My
life was saved by the military's requirement that the gear shift sequence be
permanently attached to the dash. I got
it into low with the clutch in, started it, and carefully let the clutch out. I
turned right at the first corner, pulled over to the curb and practiced
shifting. When I attained sufficient
confidence I headed to the hills to practice steering. I didn't trap any rats that day, but I got
back to the Unit with a lot more confidence in my driving ability.
A major part of my job was to
help Ralph in rodent control. The exciting part was blowing cyanide gas down
rat holes and shooting the rats with .22 Cal. shot shells when they came
boiling out of their lairs, usually around docks or major food depots. Mostly, we went to mess halls that had
requested help with their rat problems.
For them, we mixed Red Squill with canned salmon or tuna. Red Squill is a ground up root product that
causes any mammal eating it to regurgitate; I've thrown up just mixing it. Its
effectiveness against rats lies in the fact that rats can't throw up--they
choke to death. We were celebrated for
the way we could solve the rat problems at mess halls all over the area. Mess Sergeants almost always invited Ralph in
for coffee and (special) cake before we began our rodent control. We would then stroll through the area,
randomly dispensing Red Squill-laden canned fish with a big spoon from our
mixture. Rats loved it and so did the
cats; we were usually followed by at least one mess hall cat, begging for some
of that fish. Not especially caring for
cats, I occasionally slipped one a little and watched it turn wrong side out
after eating it.
Ralph knew better than any of
the officers how much we could do in a day's work. I soon learned that he and a couple of
friends had something really great in mind. Relatively early when I worked with
him, we went to a house near the Headquarters Company Quarters to work on
building an apartment in the unfinished bottom floor. It, like many of the larger houses in Noumea,
had the living quarters on the second floor, the ground floor was bare ground
except for a small servants quarters.
There was a frame around the sides and back, but the front was open to
provide ventilation for the living quarters.
The arrangement was for the
American soldiers to provide all the material and labor and build a lower
floor, in return for which they were to live in it as long as they were in
Noumea for a modest rent. It was to be
left intact when they left and the property of the owners. Able had been in New Caledonia for several
years, originally as a member of the 112th Cavalry, a National Guard unit from
Dallas, Texas, and had lots of contacts in the Noumea area. However, the other two members of the
triumvirate were the REAL entrepreneurs.
Tech Sgt George Sheldon was the
ranking enlisted man in the Island Command Veterinary Office and (then)
Corporal Bronko Wolitik was his assistant.
They didn't do anything with dogs or cats or even horses, after the
112th Cavalry got rid of their horses and went north into combat with the
Americal Division, but they DID inspect all food brought into New Caledonia for
the US Armed Forces. That may not sound
like much, but they probably had more power than Admiral Halsey. One word from them and a shipload of beef
could be condemned. They were constantly
given "gifts" (NOT bribes) from Merchant Marine captains, Officer's
Club managers and various others with interest in food from all sides of the
delivery-procurement spectrum.
Once we began working on their
new "Quarters", Army, Navy and civilian trucks began dropping off
brand new lumber (2X4's, tongue and groove flooring, etc), paint, electrical
wiring and light fixtures. They probably
could have had the Sea Bees build the whole thing for them; we did get quite a
bit from those master scroungers, including some help with the wiring. I was glad to help with the job; they seemed
appreciative and I'd rather do that than kill rats, besides it was screwing the
Army.
When we finished the place, they asked me to move in with
them. That's one of the few times in my
life that I was totally overwhelmed; I had no idea when I was working on it
that there was any chance they'd take a kid, buck private and overseas less
than a month, into their, by enlisted men's standards, palace. Of course the
whole thing was not only illegal, but Court's Martialable for numerous
reasons. To begin with we technically
were AWOL (Absent Without Leave) every night we didn't sleep in our assigned
quarters without a pass, which was every night. Even if that were overlooked
(and a lot of American GI's were living with French women with the Army trying
not to find out), but explaining where
all the supplies to build the place came from might have been difficult. It wouldn't have been for me; I didn't have
the foggiest notion how any of it was procured, what's more I didn't give a
damn.
We
built our own beds with 2X6 frames and strips from inner tubes closely and
tightly interwoven for springs.
Mattresses, sheets, pillows and pillow cases in quantity appeared. Each occupant had a huge wooden storage
locker for underwear and socks under the bed and a hanging space for shirts,
pants and field jackets. I didn't need
much of any of that space with my GI issue of two of everything: khaki shirts
and pants, shorts, undershirts, combat boots, pairs of socks, fatigues; except field jacket, overseas cap,
helmet liner, steel helmet and gas mask, of which there was only one of
each.
That
was soon rectified; shortly after we moved in, George Sheldon gave me eight
suits of khaki's, immaculately washed and ironed, with the removed Tech Sgt
stripes leaving a lighter area on each arm and tapered so they fit like they
had been tailor made. In an offhand
manner he said something like, "if you're going to live here, you can't
dress like that". Because we had to
maintain the pretense of a presence at our official presence, I moved all my GI
issued clothes and equipment in my barracks bag to my assigned bunk at Island
Headquarters enlisted men's quarters. I made up my bunk, put a pair of shined
combat boots under the bunk, stowed the barracks bag at the foot of the bunk and
left, never to return.
The
three who took me in and under their collective wing, were fabulous, even in
the retrospect of 45 years. George Sheldon
grew up in Sheldon, Iowa, named for his grandfather who established the
town. He went to Iowa State on a
football scholarship and on his first play of varsity football, he caught a
pass for a touchdown against Notre Dame.
He told me once that was his thrill of a lifetime, from then on
everything in football was downhill.
George was quietly impressive; he was big, well built and handsome. He didn't have much to say, but everybody
listened when he said something.
Bronko
Woolotic was a Yugoslavian from the steel mills of Gary, Indiana. In civilian life, he was a trainer of race
horses. He was mostly an ebullient
person. He loved to play cribbage,
taught me the game, and told me of his hopes to have a successful race horse
stable after the war; I've looked for his name for years, but he's never won
the Kentucky Derby unless he has changed his name.
Corporal
Ralph Abel was a tall, slender, charming Texan; he knew everyone, especially
the females, in Noumea. He also knew all
the good places to eat; shortly after I moved in he took me to a family home
restaurant. After talking to them in
French, he informed me that they had eggs.
I said, "I'll have six fried and then six scrambled". I hadn't had a fresh egg in about six weeks;
I ate the whole dozen, along with appropriate accompanying items, to the
astonishment of a hidden audience of tittering French adolescents. I spent most of my time, when I wasn't doing
my rodent collection, with Ralph. He
spoke better than passable French, all learned in New Caledonia, and
immediately began teaching me key phrases.
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