Cover: plain with \u201cAIR MAIL\u201d stamped below censor stamp<\/p>\n
From: Ens CR Cummins<\/p>\n
USS LST 661
\nFPO San Francisco Cal<\/p>\n
To: The Cummins<\/p>\n
6109 Greenwood Ave.<\/p>\n
Chicago, 37, Illinois<\/p>\n
Postmark: U.S. NAVY with 2 stars at 3 and 9 o\u2019clock, 16 JUN 1944 over 6\u00a2 red airmail stamp<\/p>\n
Censor: PASSED BY NAVAL CENSOR, initialed (maybe ER)<\/p>\n
Stationery: red stripes, blue globe with place and \u201cAIR MAIL\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
15 July<\/p>\n
2330<\/p>\n
Aloha, aloha, dear ones.<\/p>\n
You would guess my whereabouts. Propaganda has it that when God was creating the earth, as he looked over his product he decided that the globe was not complete. Therefore he drop a few jewels and here we are \u2013in the land of the grass skirts and fair-skinned maidens. Of course, the war has desecrated this land of the wonderful climate with instruments of war, and uniforms.<\/p>\n
Our journey over here was quite quiet\u2014in other words uneventful. I have been very busy with my work in gunnery, having had only time for a magazine or two in the way of reading matter. Have been preparing tests for my men for advancement in rates\u2014then many sundry items, of exceeding uninterest.<\/p>\n
The watch schedule was rigid, but a different system evolved and we will have adequate sleep with time for our \u201cprivate lives.\u201d This is the first night in a long time that I feel like a healthy, happy red-blooded man\u2014due to a football game.<\/p>\n
Since leaving California we have had our decks covered so that our basketball court was displaced\u2014so we haven\u2019t even had morning calisthentics. But tonight I had my exercise, just finished a shower\u2014so, with a few scratches from the rough terrain, I feel that I, for a few minutes, drifted away from the sedentary existence of a naval officer.<\/p>\n
The days here have passed with strolls thro\u2019 town and numerous movies. Honolulu itself is a dingy, one-storied, dark-painted city. The major source of entertainment is movies, and we have full-length features on the main deck of our ship each night\u2014giving me a supply sufficient for a while.<\/p>\n
Yesterday I had a pleasant day in Waikiki\u2014at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel\u2014a magnificent structure that the navy has taken over. Here they have the renown Waikiki Beach, out-rigger canoes, surf boards, swimming, basketball, boxing, ping pong\u2014anything you can think of. During the afternoon (liberty expires at 1800 for the enlisted men, 2200 for officers\u2014necessitating the start of liberty in the morning) when the piano duo was not playing, the dance band was. They had various earing places, an officers\u2019 lounge, etc. all in this enormous structure. In the lounge I met several U. of C. fellows\u2014Louise will remember Dale Johnson, of H.P. and the U. of C.<\/p>\n
He has been in small boats for quite a while\u2014going thro\u2019 Little Creek and starting the base at Fort Pierce. He is on board a transport\u2014says we, on an LST, have the better set-up. They went thro\u2019 Quajlelinn, Entwietok and Saipan (my spelling is not guaranteed, chillum\u2019). In these campaigns they, from 29 boats, have lost only one man. They have used their guns only once\u2014at Saipan as this lone Jap bomber finished its bombing run coming back in strafing\u2014with the boats in the water and the guns on the beach, there were at least a thousand guns firing at one place\u2014they hit him, too, with one of the little small boat .30 cal. machine guns. The pilots\u2019 opinion was that the Japanese air force was but a butt for wisecracks in comparison to the US planes and men.<\/p>\n
Tomorrow, if we are still here, I am visiting these friends of Joan. It will be marvelous to be inside of a home, probably tho\u2019 not without a few inward pangs.<\/p>\n
The two best thinks about hitting port are getting mail and setting foot on dry land\u2014then, too, to simply \u201cget away from it all\u201d\u2014to get off the ship, forget about gunnery, boats, etc.\u2014even the war, almost. You almost forget what civilian clothes and women look like.<\/p>\n
At any rate, it has been passive genuine fun\u2014a lovely vacation spot.<\/p>\n
Goodnight pop, mom,<\/p>\n
Louise, Loyd<\/p>\n
Bob<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Cover: plain with \u201cAIR MAIL\u201d stamped below censor stamp From: Ens CR Cummins USS LST 661 FPO San Francisco Cal To: The Cummins 6109 Greenwood Ave. Chicago, 37, Illinois Postmark: U.S. NAVY with 2 stars at 3 and 9 o\u2019clock, 16 JUN 1944 over 6\u00a2 red airmail stamp Censor: PASSED BY NAVAL CENSOR, initialed (maybe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,9,10,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-99","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-6","category-aboard-ship","category-letters","category-world-war-ii"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=99"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100,"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions\/100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=99"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=99"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cumminsclan.net\/rc\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=99"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}