[Richard Misenhimer] This is Side 1 of Tape 2 with
Chris Walker. Any other thing on the metals?
[Chris Walker] No, that's all.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay. What was the Second
Marine Division patch?
What did it look like?
[Chris Walker] It was a southern cross.
Arrowhead with a southern cross on it.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay. The First Marine Division had
one with a (crosstalk) and the Southern Cross too,
and it's like star-ish, right?
[Chris Walker] I'm not quite sure.
[Richard Misenhimer] Let me ask some more, Chris.
On April 12th, '45, President Roosevelt died.
Do you recall hearing about that at the time?
[Chris Walker] Yeah.
[Richard Misenhimer] Not much reaction.
[Chris Walker] No reaction. I don't
think there was any reaction to it. (laughing)
[Richard Misenhimer] Did you go back with any souvenirs?
[Chris Walker] I got back with a set of carpenting tools,
but they've disappeared.
[Richard Misenhimer] A Navy jacket. Anything you want to
tell me about it?
[Chris Walker] Yeah, Navy jacket. I got some
other things I'm sure.
Just a second
I can't think of it (crosstalk)
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh, okay.
[Chris Walker] That's the (inaudible)
[Richard Misenhimer] One-oh-five.
[Chris Walker] One-oh-five shell there, okay.
Thirty caliber and 45.
[Richard Misenhimer] I see.
[Chris Walker] It's an ashtray made out of
the bottom end or top end, whatever you want to call it.
The firing pin end of a (crosstalk).
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah.
[Chris Walker] One-oh-five shell. There's a 30
caliber M1 or 106.
Shell in the middle, and then the place that
your cigarettes in are out of the 45 shells.
[Richard Misenhimer] Never been used. (laughing)
[Chris Walker] Never been used. Okay. A little lamp.
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh, okay.
[Chris Walker] Main. (laughing)
[Richard Misenhimer] That's what? About 40 millimeters?
[Chris Walker] Thirty-seven, I believe.
[Richard Misenhimer] Thirty-seven millimeter. Okay.
It doesn't
say on the bottom what it was.
Thirty-seven millimeter. It's got
electric plug in there
and electric sockets so you can use electric lamp.
[Chris Walker] Did that engraving on it (crosstalk).
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh, my goodness. That engraving,
yes, Semper Fi.
Semper Fidelis. Who made this?
[Chris Walker] I did.
[Richard Misenhimer] You made it. Oh, okay.
[Chris Walker] I made this.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay. Where did you make these?
When you were in (crosstalk).
[Chris Walker] Camp Pendleton.
[Richard Misenhimer] On the way home?
[Chris Walker] No. First.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay. Before you left?
[Chris Walker] Before I left.
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh, yeah. I see.
I'm guessing you've got the whole,
the US and South America.
What's the two arrows represent here?
[Chris Walker] That's an anchor.
[Richard Misenhimer] That's anchor. Oh, I see.
Okay. That's the anchor. Now, I see it what it is.
[Chris Walker] Yes. (noise) Here during the campaign.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay.
[Chris Walker] Me in that. I had weapons that
couldn't use a Band-Aid.
[Richard Misenhimer] What was called the K-bar knife,
was it?
[Chris Walker] Well, that's a Powell.
[Richard Misenhimer] What kind?
[Chris Walker] Powell?
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh, okay.
[Chris Walker] Made by Powell.
[Richard Misenhimer] Now, this is the sheath knife
or like a big hunting knife.
[Chris Walker] Feet that how sharp that is. (crosstalk).
[Richard Misenhimer] I did. I just (crosstalk).
[Chris Walker] I haven't sharpened that one.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah.
[Chris Walker] Powell razor blades made that one.
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh, okay.
[Chris Walker] The handle was when it was given to me.
A dear friend gave that to me.
One of the most disillusioned men
that I've been across in a long time.
He's been in the Korean conflict and BAR man.
(crosstalk) Do you know what a BAR is?
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah. Browning automatic rifle.
[Chris Walker] That's the one they always go after.
[Richard Misenhimer] Right.
[Chris Walker] It cut an arm off on them.
Even one arm. He'd come back,
married, had some lovely kids.
But he was real disillusioned
with our company, our country.
He was real disturbed about our country and everything.
This is back in the 60s, I guess,
and he joined our church
and we had a pretty good relationship
on top of that. I think I really had
a relationship with him because I was a marine.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah.
[Chris Walker] He went to leave and he gave me this.
Back then Australia was offering
people real good deals to
go down there and live and work.
He was a schoolteacher and his wife was a schoolteacher.
In fact, he was a coach.
(noise) So he went down
there and stayed two years and come back.
I saw him after he came back and he told me,
he said, "Boy, this is a good country".
He said, "Even though I lost the arm,
it's a good, good country.
(noise) This is authentic.
I don't (inaudible) in a battle.
But I think (noise) (crosstalk).
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah, that's a Japanese flag.
[Chris Walker] Yeah. That's name of all the boys in
the company that we're paying to get (crosstalk).
[Richard Misenhimer] Your company?
[Chris Walker] Headquarters.
[Richard Misenhimer] Where did the flag come from?
Do you know?
[Chris Walker] Oh, they said they picked it up
there on Saturday, I think.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay. Everyone on your company
has signed it here?
[Chris Walker] Nearly all of them, yeah.
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh, yeah.
[Chris Walker] That's just before we left to go to Japan.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah. Okay.
I think that's really nice. Yeah.
[Chris Walker] Yeah. It really is.
It's getting faded and tattered and (noise).
[Richard Misenhimer] What's this bracelet?
[Chris Walker] I made that on Taipei.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay.
[Chris Walker] They said it was out of a Japanese Zero.
[Richard Misenhimer] Oh.
[Chris Walker] Whether it is or not, I don't know.
[Richard Misenhimer] Could be a watch in here?
Is that what it is?
[Chris Walker] Watch band.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah. Okay.
[Chris Walker] Of course, I had to take the watch off when
we went to combat.
We couldn't wear anything like that in combat.
[Richard Misenhimer] Sure.
[Chris Walker] But that was supposed to be made
out of a Zero.
I don't think it was
because that's been up there in a foot locker for years,
and I didn't shine it.
[Richard Misenhimer] It's rather bright and shiny now.
[Chris Walker] Yeah, it really is. It's made
out of real good material. (laughing)
[Richard Misenhimer] But it's not aluminum, it's really
strong steel.
Let me ask you. Did you ever have any experience
with seeing the USO shows? (noise)
[Chris Walker] Yeah. I wasn't real fond of a lot of them.
The one that I appreciated
most and I don't know whether it was,
I guess it was a USO show.
It was Ben (inaudible)
came to Camp Pendleton and put on a show.
Hayden got to talk to him.
He was a real gentleman, a real person.
Just a (inaudible) fellow.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay. You went to
some other USO shows too besides that one?
[Chris Walker] Yeah, we saw quite a lot of USO shows
[Richard Misenhimer] In the States not overseas?
[Chris Walker] Yeah. We saw some overseas.
We saw one oversees that,
I hate to say who it was.
I think it was Betty Hutton.
She got so vulgar
that we just walked away and left the show.
We got reprimanded for it
(laughing) by the upper people,
but she just got so wild.
(noise) I think it was Betty Hutton.
I'm not really sure, but it was one
of the famous movie stars.
She started out vulgar and she got worse as time went
on and we just
actually walked away from bunch of us. Yeah.
[Richard Misenhimer] Good gracious.
[Chris Walker] Yeah.
[Richard Misenhimer] How about mail?
When you were overseas,
could you get mail fairly regular?
[Chris Walker] Yeah, I got it real regular
except when I was
in the hospital and when (crosstalk).
[Richard Misenhimer] You were missing in action?
[Chris Walker] And when we were on board ship.
We had to wait until we got around a mail ship,
but we did get mail and it was always a highlight.
I could always expect every mail call I got mail.
Pauline wrote me after we got engaged.
I got engaged when he came home on furlough and
then she wrote me every day from then on out.
[Richard Misenhimer] That's good.
[Chris Walker] Sometimes I'd get
20 and 30 (laughing) letters at one time.
I think I got 60 maybe when I got back to
the unit (noise) after I'd been lost.
[Richard Misenhimer] What would you consider
your most frightening time?
[Chris Walker] Gosh, I don't know.
I had a whole bunch of them.
I just couldn't pick out one of anything. I don't think.
[Richard Misenhimer] It's going to look all.
[Chris Walker] Yeah. It was real scary at the
sun up and sun down,
they had general alert.
Sunup to sundown on ships,
and they always locked you down in the hole.
I don't know whether we were ever in an air raid but we
had a lot of air raid drills called.
To be locked down in that hole when that's going on,
it was not very nice. No.
[Richard Misenhimer] Now, looking back, do you ever
see the kamikazes?
[Chris Walker] No. I never saw him though. Yeah, I did do.
Okay.
No, I didn't see it.
When we went to make the initial landing on Okinawa.
We were here over ship here and another ship over here.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay.
[Chris Walker] We were ready go through
it eaten breakfast early that day.
That cars came down and jump straight this ship,
jumped up, and went into the mess hall of this ship.
There wasn't really saved it was at
the had already breakfast
for the landing and wasn't invited the mess hall home.
And (noise) it happened
so quick I don't know whether I saw it or I didn't.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah.
[Chris Walker] But overall marines,
we had abandoned ship drills all the time.
Don't know if he's ever
on the ship and having to abandon ship.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah
[Chris Walker] But you had them.
Put them all Marines is coming out and hatches.
Walkways on deck. Sometimes six or eight feet wider.
They're lighter I mean railing winding about so high.
[Richard Misenhimer] Four feet off the ground or some yeah.
[Chris Walker] They weren't touching that deck or that
way coming out of those ladders.
(laughing) (noise) Captain was hollering.
Stay aboard. Do not abort the ship.
(laughing) Who's had our Hagen boat
down in the water and getting rid of
that lane labeled up for
that fake land and then we just quit.
What around picking up the little boy. (laughing)
[Richard Misenhimer] An APA it hit, right?
[Chris Walker] Yeah.
[Richard Misenhimer] Transport.
[Chris Walker] Transport. He beached it.
Sometime after Allen was taken while he beached it.
He kept telling me weren't about to sink.
(laughing). That the alleged that she trained in.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah.
[Chris Walker] Courses, getting ready go up,
or Higgins boats.
They loaded, they lost
their equipment and everything else.
At one time we heard they going make them
pay for that equipment. (laughing)
[Richard Misenhimer] You mentioned you through your M1 over
the side when you've got the Thompson,
you aren't responsible for your M1 or whatever?
[Chris Walker] Yeah. What you used when you
got to the battle.
Usually didn't wind up
weapon you started out with anyhow.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay.
[Chris Walker] A lot of times you didn't?
Yeah.
We weren't taking we weren't
about that thing we wanted to carry around.
We heard what Thompson said.
[Speaker 1] No.
[Richard Misenhimer] Now the Thompson who's just 45
pistol amination.
[Chris Walker] Yeah.
[Richard Misenhimer] Why was there a box of it on there?
[Chris Walker] I don't know why it was all they had
all the officers carried 45 pistols.
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay. They all carried 45.
(crosstalk)He did the ammunition for
that so picture sub Thompson.
Okay. Yeah.
[Chris Walker] Okay. Theoretically, they said that you
can catch a leopard or
tiger or I mean a big cat jumping out of a tree.
You could shoot him as long as you shoot him,
he could suspend him in there.
I think that part of fort five bullet had
a forty-five hundred pounds striking force.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah.
[Chris Walker] Now, what we liked it if
fighting with all close range
and wherever it hit a man with that.
[Richard Misenhimer] You stopped him.
[Chris Walker] You stopped him with
that 30 caliber carbine it carbon bullet
was this big buddy.
[Richard Misenhimer] I want to have small powder.
[Chris Walker] Or that right in there.
You couldn't top jet with that thing.
Unless you got his heart.
If he's tanked up on Zaki he did.
Keep coming were you involved in any bands or charges?
No a lot of
wooden cart beans and
pick a better way more on even though it did weigh.
[Richard Misenhimer] £8 or something, £9,.
[Chris Walker] M1 was it replaced
the old three and they said on Okinawa,
those Japs would count
the bullets on you're shot five times.
They would charge you. Because all
the three only help pass shelves.
[Richard Misenhimer] Yeah.
[Chris Walker] But they only want to help her eat.
When they first got him
they'd shoot those first few
right-click and letting charge (laughing).
Then about winning the war and what won the war.
The thing that won the war was thinking of that
private and corporal.
Well, I'll say that thinking of the enlisted men.
They thought the Japs,
they weren't taught to think that
when somebody tell him
something to do they didn't know what to do.
[Richard Misenhimer] Same with the Germans.
The ingenuity of the American fighting man.
Unlisted man. Have you ever had any radians?
[Chris Walker] No. I'm in the reunion.
[Richard Misenhimer] The second brain has premiums though.
[Chris Walker] (noise) I guess they do.
[Richard Misenhimer] Mature haven't been bending.
[Chris Walker] I'm bend in it.
[Richard Misenhimer] Anything else you can think of?
[Chris Walker] No.
[Richard Misenhimer] They tried to get you to react
when they got out.
[Chris Walker] Yeah.
[Richard Misenhimer] What did you tell him?
[Chris Walker] I told him no. (laughing). I was elected.
I thought I was in there for years,
that's why Mr. Small,
didn't really make that much different to me.
Then one afternoon and
sent word up to me if I'd come down,
company Sergeant come up and say if he'll come
down and sign a release you
got enough points and go home.
I said if your sign statements you're take a discharge.
I did.
When he got there and I so where have you been?
(laughing) Anyhow, when we got home where we all
had to sit through lectures of reinvestment.
(laughing) They didn't have room in taker.
(crosstalk) They did. (laughing)
[Richard Misenhimer] They gathered your clothes up.
[Chris Walker] We gathered them up.
They gave us a brand new set,
two or three sets of
dungarees, and maybe one set of khakis.
It took rest of them and put them in
drones and took them out and sunk.
Without what we got home with.
He got home, they took those things up,
I believe and gave us don't camouflage grapes.
That was assigned using deportation.
Then when we got ready to leave,
when we just we got the discharge,
we were issued a complete new set of everything.
A set of greens and overcoat.
I don't know how many suits of dungarees,
separate sets of khaki.
(crosstalk) They've got one in Paris while we went
home with a brand new copy.
Which can buy any clothes.
[Richard Misenhimer] Cool wardrobe there.
[Chris Walker] They sent her home with that. When I
got home my father-in-law,
he worked in a in
a dry goods store, Winners,
and they've got in shipment of clothes.
When I got home, my head set of suit
back and two shirts.
I guess that's it I had a suit,
get married. (laughing). There wasn't anything.
[Richard Misenhimer] No.
[Chris Walker] Overhead was James Roosevelt.
His mother hated the marines.
I don't know if said that when
they brought the marine back,
they'll find them now and put them on and
rehabilitate him for about ten years with hair.
But everybody that I've ever heard that had any dealings
with the perfect chain goes well, he was a colonel.
Thought he was magnificent.
How about testy polar?
[Richard Misenhimer] Okay.
[Chris Walker] We had a Smith. That was good.
There was two Smith's there was.
Harlan man. But I'll
say that one thing for Roosevelt boys,
one-on-one service and all of this four comeback.
[Richard Misenhimer] That's right.
[Chris Walker] I believe they will, so they will come back.
[Speaker 1] This is the end of this tape.