In Their Words; Oral History with John Paul Hammerschmidt

Okay Congressman, the way the interview is going to work is it'll just be a conversation between you and myself. Okay. We'll start before the war, go over what you were doing here in Harrison and then we'll take us through the war and a little bit after the war and then I'll resist the temptation to talk for another hour about what you did after the war because primarily this is your history on the war too, Harrison. Before we begin, if at any time you would like to get up and use restroom or drink water, just edit it all out so you just let us know and after we're finished you'll receive an unubridged unedited copy about three weeks after the interview is finished and that year is to keep and you can make as many copies of as you'd like. Before we start we always identify who was present at the day that the interview was recorded. So I'll start. My name is Gabe Gentry, we're in Harrison, Arkansas today, recording the oral history testimony of John Paul Hammerschmitt for ATN's World War II oral history project and their words.

Okay. Congressman, my first question has to do with the knowledge you had of the war overseas prior to the events of Pearl Harbor. I've been going on for a while and I just wondered how closely he kept up with it. Well I kept up with it fairly closely because for one thing I was in school in 1938 and 1939 at the Citadel which is a military college and we knew that four clouds were gathering in Europe. That Hitler was on the rise, of course I was quite gone, I was just 15 when I got out of the high school so I was 16 when I was there in 1938 and so I had some knowledge of it but practically no knowledge of the Pacific but of the European problems at that time. I sense that something we're going to have it probably. What was the dialogue like amongst your friends the day when you talked about, oh not a lot.

In fact I didn't think of that much about it either, you know, it was just something at that age you don't think that much about it but you're observant and you know something has happened. I hear my folks talk about it, my father, the protector. Was your father in World War I? Yes, he was actually, he was on the border in the Pancho Villa days and followed by him but he didn't go overseas in World War I. What was it like being that young and having to say goodbye to your family and to go to the Citadel? Well, there was a new experience for me of course going to the East Coast, it was a very disciplinary school and it's kind of known as the West Point of the South, there were three of us went from Harris to Arkansas, one of those others by the way went on through West Point and so he had to go through the Polyvier twice because it was practically the same training at the Citadel as it is at West Point and incident that he became a fighter pilot

and spent 30 years in the Air Force, started out in the Army Air Corps and then he finished from the West Point and of course he changed over the Air Force but you can see what we do with what your day was like at the Citadel, what was your class like, what was your routine? Well, you carry a pretty heavy load, I forgot how many hours, probably 16 or 18 hours and it's a very disciplined, not really eat square meals, you do all those things that you've probably read about that good debts have to do. It was good for you because it was very disciplined and if you got in trouble you had to walk tours on the quadrangle and they always keep you in line there but we had to wear a uniform and had to have a uniform on all times even when you went into Charleston to eat or you always had to have a class here, a full collar uniform, in those days you had collars

that kind of stiff but it was enjoyable of course, how did you adapt to that routine? It was fine, I liked it actually, it just so happens I'd gone to an entity called CMTC camp, which most people don't remember, but that before I went to the Citadel and it was down at Camp Robinson, that's a citizen military training corps and so I'd gone there for two summers with also this same printer with the Citadel with me and so it was supposed to be 14 when you went there and I was 12 but I got in anyway and so I'd already had a little bit of touch and military training even at that young age so it was helpful to me when I went to Citadel. Let's talk for a moment about December 7th, 1941 and how you came to learn about the attack at Pearl.

Well, after I was to Citadel, I had an appointment to anapolis from Congressman Clyde Ellis and so about that for a moment actually before we go into the next question, how did that come about? Well, it was just a regular political appointment to anapolis, a naval academy, but my classmate David Fitton had an appointment to West Point, but his appointment was a year after mine. So our folks sort of wanted us to go at the same time or we'd get out at the same time. So I went to the University of Arkansas and David was also, we were remote supposed to send it out to the University of Arkansas in the Pike A house, both Pike A and so I would sort of take it more classes while I was waiting for David towards both to go together. And then in December, during between semesters, I was working for a cosy butane company. I got a job driving a butane truck and that's where I was when I heard about Pearl Harbor.

I had driven the butane truck from my evan Oklahoma to the bullshows dam site and they had a contract to pretty propane gas butane was those days to that site and I was there in that truck listening to the radio while I was emptying that load of gas when I heard about Pearl Harbor. I didn't know where Pearl Harbor was. I knew nothing about it. So that is my first knowledge. I had a lot more experience later. I guess I can go into that now. I was going to see, you know, immediately following September 11th, I think the gravity of the situation was such that we knew that things would almost forever be changed as a result of that instant. Did you have the sense that while you were unloading your butane that this one attack had altered your life? In other words, it had the weight of it. When did the weight of it set in? Not in any way. It did not. It was a very serious affair. I had no idea what it would

end up being. But just coincidentally, instead of going to anapolis, I want out to see that December. I want out to see my cousin who lived in Bakersfield, California, without my folks blessing. So I got out there and I thought it was amazing where I was going alone and things were exciting and things were really underway out there and blazed on accident and Bakersfield first. Then I decided to get a job while I was there and said going back to University of Arkansas, I got a job at the Maryland Navy Yard. I signed out a lot of experience more than I was old. I think they were trying to get a job as a pipe cover or a fitter or something like that. So they gave me a job as a general helper and then they

assigned me to be an asbestos worker. I had never heard of that before. So I was just a third man and told him to pull me in an asbestos worker. So they began to bring in ships from Pearl Harbor. So I began to feel the real excitement of the war at that time because I was out there where it was really all happening. They brought in the USS Shaw from Pearl Harbor. I was there low enough to where they brought in the Chester from the Battle of the Coral Sea and a little bit later. So I worked on those ships and I didn't go to anapolis. And then over time, instead of going, which was very much the dismay of my congressman and as well as my folks, I joined the Army Air Corps. But in the interim, I was out there working in Maryland, I leave you out. And things were lively in Vallejo at four in the morning. They worked four in the afternoon during those four years. So that was a very exciting time.

And so I did get, and I had barrage balloons up at that time because there was a perceived air threat to the West Coast from Japanese airplanes. So there was a real sense of excitement out there. You knew that there was a war on there. As a quick side note, in 13 terms as the United States Congressman, you must have signed many referials to the Citadel and to West Point. Did any of them Welch on you? And if they did, did you have to remember back to what you had done and forgive them? Well, no, I don't remember any of them doing that. I was on the other side to that. When I was in Congress, Fidelis, former Congressman, who had been defeated by Senator McClellan in an earlier contest, told on me to keep him in an appointment at the White House at that time after Johnson left and Nixon was in.

And I went ahead with that. And then as they found out that he was a very acting Democrat while they finally didn't like, he was a National Water Commission, if I remember right. But anyway, he had to leave that post. But on down the road, I spoke applied out since she knew. History has a funny way of a lot of twists. So you're a boy from the Ozarks of Arkansas. You find yourself on the West Coast with barrage balloons. How did you adjust to being away from home from it? It sounds like for the first time in your life you were flirting with the idea of not being obligated to do something that you were kind of following another path. How did that period treat you? Well, it treated me very well. I had a friend, another friend that I had a Arkansas that also left college

and I told him to come on out there and he'd join me out there. Frank Lee Kaufman, he's a Harrison boy. And so we had a great time over there, of course. But they were just out of San Francisco. So we would go to San Francisco a lot. And I worked on the swing shift, which was four to twelve o'clock. And it was an interesting time, exciting. And you know, at that young age, there's a lot going on, things I'd never seen before. I've been on the East Coast and I was on the West Coast. I was seeing the world. What made you decide to join the Air Corps? Air Corps? Well, I sort of wanted to fly and I looked over the opportunities at that time. And I saw a worry that they were asking for aviation cadets to sign up. One day I took a test and passed that and got in as a aviation cadet and went through cadet training.

And I knew it was a way to get to be a pilot much quicker than going through anapolis. And I was kind of ready to help with the war at that time. What was it, you know, I've talked to several pilots, several... They usually have a story about what was it about flight? Was it the romance or the allure of being a pilot or was it the idea of being able to leave the earth for a little bit and glide a combination of the two?

What was it that really drew you to? Oh, it might have been the combination too. I think it was just a new experience. Air planes were not new, but then they were friendly new to most ordinary citizens. And I think it was a great satisfaction just learning how to fly. And I know I want to get a pair of those silver wings and they had a song at that time. He wore a pair of silver wings. That was very intriguing to a young man and going through the training and finally getting those wings and bars penned on you. I don't know, self-satisfaction, I guess. And it was a way to get into the war too. What was your training like initially? Well, it was... I went to San Antonio first and I went through regular basic training at Wichita Falls Texas. And then we took a troop train down to Texas A&M and we were put in a school area, kind of a holding position,

before we started extra training. And so we took a lot of ground school courses which I had already because of my college training. But it was interesting being on the A&M campus. And then after that we went to... I went to Stanford, Oklahoma for my primary training with PT19, which is a great primary trainer. Made it... made a purpose of design where you had to fly it precisely. So it was a great training type flight and exercise. And then after that I went on to Greenville, Texas, and flew a BT13, which was made by Voltae. And it was called basic training. And then I went on to an 187 in Frederick, Oklahoma, which was multi-engine training.

And hoping that I can fly a P38 because of that training. But first I didn't get assigned to P38. I was assigned after I finished, after I got my wings and was a second lieutenant. I was assigned to San Marcus Texas to fly navigators. I paused you there. What... tell me about you first time I saw a... were you nervous to walk me through that story? I was. I had a wonderful instructor. Of course he was severely... those were severe instructors. But he was very demanding, but just great. And I wasn't particularly nervous. He gave you enough confidence where you knew how you could do it. I guess the most nervous on flying solar was at night flying and basic in a dusty training field in Greenville, Texas. It's just out of Greenville, Texas. And whenever the instructor out said, you've got it after about it.

He made one pass around the field at night. He said, you've got it. And it was night and you tend to land on top of that dust and said the field was a depth perception problem. But it came down hard. That was a nervous feeling. It was fine. Everybody was in the same boat. A lot of planes in the traffic pattern. You know, you're probably six planes in the traffic pattern at an old time. I'm popping this here for a second. There's something. How did you get along with your fellow pilots? Well, fine. I made a lot of friends. You know, what you do. You bond with all your colleagues. And so in primary, basic and advanced all the way through. I still stay in touch with some of them. Got along fine with them. What to you was the most demanding part of learning how to fly?

Just learning the technical skills that it took to make everything work right. Safety is always a utmost concern in flying. You have to pay strict attention to that. You can't make too many mistakes while you're flying. After your solo, you said you went and took some twin engine training. Right. We went to primary and then basic training and then twin engine advances called. And that was in Frederick, Oklahoma. And that's where I received my wings. And got my first secular tent at bars. And then from there I was assigned to San Marcus, Texas. I fly advanced train AT7s, which was a twin engine plane. And I flew navigator trainees. I didn't do the navigation training, but I had three trainees and an instructor in that AT7.

And I flew them according to the mission that was laid out at that time. So we flew from San Marcus mainly toward the west coast, many times two west coasts, especially to Palm Springs, California. I'm from one destination. I never flown around high mountains before. And I flew into Palm Springs. And then when I woke up the next morning I looked out and flew in there at night. And I saw those high mountains around me. Of course they were obviously on the map. I knew they were there. But it gave me a different feeling. I didn't know that it could be much higher mountains like I'm down the road. But that was an experience. And so while I was in San Marcus, it was kind of a routine thing to be doing. It was good training for the pilots as well as for those navigators. Usually a pilot is a pretty good navigator himself. You have to be. So you didn't want those kids to get you lost.

I said kids. They were probably all my age. Probably 18 or 19. But while we were there, there was a notice on the bulletin board. Twin engine pilots wanted. And it gave all its specifics, but didn't tell what kind of plane it was. But it said for overseas duty, almost immediately. I forgot what the wording was. So about three or four of us said, hey, let's try to sign up for that. We're getting the war that way. And it said for overseas duty. So I did. And immediately received orders to go to West Palm Beach, Florida. And that was very interesting. We got down there and found out while we were there that we were going to be assigned to a group. At that time, I don't think it had a designation, but it turned out to be the third combat cargo group. And it had four squadrons in it, one hundred airplanes.

And we were going to leave for overseas. We had no idea where. They weren't allowed to tell us where this whole thing was rather top secret operation for good reason. And in those days, you know, confidential secret orders were very important during the war, and everybody respected that. And so we were offering under those orders and found out we were going to fly C-47 or C-47-A, which was a combat type aircraft for troops. And so we'd never been checked out in a C-47. We got checked out it briefly there with a couple of maybe one or two flights. We just just feel what the plane was like and see where the flaps were and where the hydraulic system was, let down the year, and so on and so forth, but didn't have any training at that time.

But in that group, they had one hundred seasoned pilots that they've gotten from troop carrier, they've gotten from a lot of different from the commercial airlines. And it did understand that airplane quite well. So we went over there as part-time co-pilot to that senior pilot. And so when we left West Palm Beach, we hadn't told us where we were going. We were allowed to open up the orders two hours out. And so when we were two hours out, we were excitedly opening up the orders. And we saw all this long stacks of maps and everything about where we were going, but we were going to Karachi, India. But the first stop was Meringue Field in Puerto Rico. That was about a six-hour flight from West Palm down to Puerto Rico. And then that's where we knew where we were going. And of course, we had the right laid out for us and all the documents that they gave us.

And from there, we went to Georgetown, British, Ghana, and then to Belém, Brazil, and Belém, incidentally, these airplanes were equipped with four big special tanks to give us range. And they put in their just temporary tanks, made a masonite, remember what that is. And the plumbing was rather crude, but all the feeds and everything, we had to learn, get briefs on how that worked. But that gave us a lot of range, which we needed to fly those planes where we were going. So at Belém, Brazil, our tanks were going to leak. We had about, of those hundred airplanes, there were about four, maybe six planes that had leaky tanks. So we had to wait there until they brought new tanks in from Miami and put new tanks in, which let us stay in Belém there for about three days longer.

So we got to see part of Brazil, very poor part of Brazil, I might say. Then when we got those fixed, we went down to Natal, Brazil. And I'll digress here for a minute. At the same time we left, there was another group, another hundred airplanes. I think there were 100. I'm not sure. It was a B-24 group, they might have only had 12 in each squadron, so they might have been 50 B-24s. But we all left at the same time. So when we were landing, there were also B-24s landing, we were all kind of, every time we just saw it, we'd been the same Oscars Club and the same places together. But from Natal, Brazil, we flew to a little place, a volcano, a place out in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean called the Ascension Islands. And that was a major stop for all the Army Air Corps, because that was the way you got from South America to Europe or to Africa.

So incidentally, we had a navigator, a train navigator, and train radio operators that they furnished. And so the navigator was what they call a trench navigator. So he got us the Ascension Islands, that was the biggest thing. He left early before daylight to get in the Ascension Islands by daylight. He spent our way in, or it remained overnight in the Ascension Islands through into Accraw, which is Gold Coast Africa. The B-24s went on north, they went to Descartes, I think, and they were going to Italy, probably. And then from Accraw, Gold Coast Africa, we went to about three stops, Cartoon, Nigeria, Cartoon, Aiden Arabia, Missouri Island, and then into Karachi, India. That all took, I don't know, 10 days or something.

And when we got to Karachi, we thought, well, this is something, not even an ore here. But to find out that was just a staging area. And since we were running a little behind the main force that was ahead of us, we had missed the greetings by the man who was our commanding officer of that squadron. But anyway, we went on through, to where we were really going, which was to the Burma border on the Indian side, Salat India. One stop in between Karachi and Salat was Hagra, India, which is where the Taj Mahal is. So right off, we, you know, the Mystic Orient in those days, people hadn't really discovered the world like we did later. And so we saw the Taj Mahal on that trip. I saw it several times later. And so we ended up in Salat India.

But we were going to have to start flying combat without any training in those airplanes. Before we get into that, I wanted to ask you a couple of questions. You had to wait two hours before you opened your orders. Did you have anything that you were hoping for? No, I had no idea where we were going. I knew we were going to someplace. We were sure we were flying combat someplace because we were in those type airplanes. But I guess the question was, did you have a preference? Did you hope that you were going to Europe? Yes, we assumed we were probably going to Europe because we knew an invasion. The sooner the layer was going to happen. And after all, we were in transport airplanes. But it turned out that we didn't know anything about that war. It was kind of a forgotten theater where they were in China, Birmingham, India. And so we really didn't know about that. We learned and heard about it. But if you remember, the Japanese had taken all of China. They had taken the Malay Peninsula. They had taken all of Burma.

And they were almost ready to come into India about the time we arrived there. To give a background scenario. We had been defeated. General Stilwell was in a command of a group that got defeated over there. And he had Shanghai-Shak Chinese-nacist army helpers at that time. And they had, they got a bad defeat. So, at that time, things were very tense on that theater. That's really one of the reasons we were put together in such a hurry because they had to have some help over there in that theater. And Lord Mountbatten, who was in the theater commander of the entire theater, British Lord Admiralty. Anyway, he told us why we were there. They called it the Bond Project. Do you know why they called it the Bond Project?

I don't know where it got its name. But it was put together so, so quickly. And he told us that we were different than the other people who had been trained, you know, as trip air pilots. They've been trained about drop missions, been trained about anything. We hadn't had that training at all. But they told us right off that we were going to have to start flying combat. And they told us that the British 36 Division was trapped in the Infal Valley. They were literally starving to death. We had to get supplies to them. And that we'd get enemy fire, no doubt, because there's Japanese control nearly all that. And of course we were unarmed, and they had Japanese zeroes, rather prevalent over there. And we had no fighter cover or anything. So that's why it was somewhat dangerous. And so we started flying right off into the Infal Valley, a little place called Polel. Before I go there, there was a couple other questions that I thought were interesting.

What was the difference between a C-47 and a C-47-A? Well, a C-47-A, I don't really know, specifically, except we had parodrop racks and everything. When we first went over there, where you would put parodrop racks, you'd send anything, and just put a lever and got rid of the stuff underneath. Well, that may have been one difference, but we learned one thing right off. It didn't work. So we stripped all that off. Over time, we totally converted those airplanes where we could survive, and not get killed just because of the rudimentary. But you know, the real test of an airplane, you know, what you do with it in combat, and that type airplane. So it said at home, 2800 pounds. We realized we had to hold about 6,000 pounds. And so we took the doors off the airplanes.

That's another story about drop missions. But we took the de-ISRA boots off because we couldn't maintain them. And ice was also damaged even so bad that they weren't practical. So we had to take out, even though we flew through a lot of ice, we took off the de-ISRA boots. We took out the behind-the-piles head. There's an ice-approval alcohol, which is de-ISRA fluid. It went out to the airplane propellers to de-ISRA propellers. We took that out because a tracer bullet coming through and you did get a lot of ground fire. It could explode right there in the airplane. So anything like that, we just took out and made things work. Which brings up a question in all these interviews that I've been able to do, Congressman. One of the things that I've always thought was really interesting is something that I've dubbed it, but I've heard it before. GI ingenuity. In other words, you get to the hedge rows. You realize you can't get through them.

They figure out a way to weld the beach obstacles to the front to dig a hole. You figured out the parts of your aircraft weren't working. So collectively, you decided to dismantle it and make it work. Yeah, we didn't do that immediately. Through trial and error, you know, we could say, hey, that's end working. If we had this, who would fix this, it would work better. So my question is, did those, was it something that came down from the chain of commander? Was it something that went up? No, it went up the other way. We had a tough commander who was very tough on us. And he gave you a lot of leeway. And he thought you had a good idea. And it was for the good of the survival of the aircraft or for the good of the mission. He likes to use your own ingenuity and judgment. So we had a lot of different ideas. We'd sit around, you know, at night and discuss these things as well and properly. So it was just way to get the job done.

They were, they actually put carrier pigeons on our trip over. We had carrier pigeons. That's kind of a rude and menary thing in those days. And we'd drop those carriers off and each stop and refresh. And in case you went down, you know, our communication went very good in those days. And so here I think if you went down in the jungles or somewhere that was, or you couldn't communicate, or you released those pigeons with the message, I don't know if anybody had ever really used them, but we had them in case we did. I don't know if I've ever really ever asked this question of a veteran, but I will this time. They called your life preserver as Maywests. Why did they do that? I guess because of the way they look. Yes, that's definitely the reason.

They called it the Gooney Bird. Yeah, that was one of the nicknames for that plane. I thought it kind of a drug or a name for it, but I heard it if you referred to it a few times as that. But we didn't call it that. We learned to love that airplane. That airplane saved that. That just a great airplane. Excuse me. Anyway, that airplane would take a whole kind of punishment and say, love lines. Let's talk about the Infall Valley Campaign and your first mission. You would tell in that story.

Well, we'd fly into Polail Burma. And at that time, as Japanese, we would have the strip part of the time. And then we'd have it part of the time. And the first missions they would give you a red light or a green light. They'd go down there on the ground, the British. And know where you could land or not land. They were also loving mortars over on the strip. But the British were starving. And one of the first things I remember we carried in there. Remember, at this time, I was still flying because the Copilot, because those first pilots had all this experience. And we'd very flown the airplane, but we were learning fast. But we flew in what they call big hammers or leechy nuts. And leechy nut is sort of like a grape. It has a hard shell. I mean, it's one of those cracks easy. And they're very nutritional. So you get water and you get nutrition at the same time.

And I guess they were smart enough to send those in the survival food. But we flew a lot of things in there. And they got the Japanese out of there. And if I remember right in a three-fold week or something like that, in that particular campaign. But that was very important. Because it definitely was trying to get into India at that time. And they did get as far as the sales chart tracks in India. That's 75 miles inside the Indian border. That's as far as they got. And it was time for us, US, the British, the Chinese, to begin to try to take Burma back. So that's sort of the beginning of that campaign. There were a lot of jungle fighters over there, very famous jungle fighters. Merrill's Marauders, General Merrill. We dropped to them.

The Mars Task Force, which I guess succeeded him after he got killed. Ord Wingate was one of the early fighters. British General Slam, another British General. They were all grilled. They had grilled troops in there. And they also had Gurkhas that they would bring in, which were British troops, you know, the young Gurkhas out of Nepal. A very stealthy, deadly type fighters, very quiet. They carried those Gurkha knives. And I guess the Japanese feared the most, the Gurkhas, because they were so stealthy. And they would go in and cut their throats at night. And he's never know they've been there. So they had a mix of all kinds of fighters, the Chindets, that is another group of fighters in the Burma area. We had the Hill people, the Cachins and the Nagas, were native fighters that we enlisted through our OSS detachment.

That's the Office of Strategic Service, which later became the CIA. But the Nagas were headhunters. And the Cachins were Hill people also. And then the other native group over there, who were more people lived in the valleys, were shons. And they were the Japanese allies. So it was a funny mix of people over there. You know, as just young Second Lieutenant flying and doing what you told, we didn't know much about world politics or about all this. I've read a lot about it later, but we didn't know about the Cachins and the shons, because we wore a map on our back that said if you return this flyer to this destination where you'll be rewarded. And we also wore, we didn't wear them, but we had them to wear, a hundred silver rupees on a belt, and then two tens of opium up here.

And the opium was like the flat aspirin boxes, like they used to have. And they leaked some time. They got black leaves out of there. And the aircraft commander was responsible for all that, because there was a lot of value there. And everybody hung there. And nobody wanted to wear those little heavy belts. But if you went down, that's what you were supposed to have on. Well, I wear parachutes, so. But everybody hung those things up. And the commander had to really watch that, but somebody didn't take off with a belt or a bunch of opium. You know, opium this day in time. We hear about it. Those days it was a no-no for everybody. You know, the pilots, those days, never gotten in a drug, doing any kind of what they said, singing that culture when I grew up. My microphone came off and I fixed it. Oh, I'm sorry.

It's okay. It's good. Yeah. There you go. Talk to me for a moment about your first non-milk run mission. In other words, the first time you remember experience, flack, or when you realize that moment that it had gone from training to someone's trying to shoot at me now. Well, over there, weather was a bigger enemy than enemy airplanes. They were both hazardous. But weather over there was incredibly bad. You know, where we're flying over these high mountains to get a little bit from your question. But the first time I flew over the little hump, it's from India to Burma. And you went through what's called the Lido Pass. You look on the map and you'd have big, white places, unsurveyed, unsurveyed. But you knew all around you, you had 21,000 foot mountains,

and anything down about mountains, but I was sitting on that airplane with about 16,000 feet. So, and you were flying instruments. You know, you had a lot of faith that you knew where you were going to. And our instruments on the airplane were very, very limited. All we had was a radio compass and a ball, gyro compass. And that was about it. But so that was more treacherous or more of a pucker fracture than enemy airplanes. But Japanese, that was kind of a bad theater for them too, I think, because they were all tied up in the Pacific, real activity, even though they'd taken all that Asian landmass. Fortunately, they, I don't think they sent their best zero pilots and best planes up there just because they had them all committed someplace else.

But they had enough because we were totally on arm, so it didn't matter. But when I became a first pilot, I was delighted to do that. I felt like I was totally ready. I know one time we were flying, I was flying with a first pilot as he's co-pilot. And we were in just terrible weather. And I had a feeling that he didn't quite know where we were, because it was so lightning and weather was so bad that the radio compass just jumps all around when you have lightning. And it's hard to get a fix on a homing beacon. And so I could tell he was worried and frustrated and we'd kept changing headings a little bit. So I had on earphones. And so I reached up there and kept messing with the radio. And so I said to him, I said, I think I'm getting an R-O-No.

Like 74 degrees. He said, R-O-No. Yeah. Kind of like he'd forgotten there was such a thing, you know. But I'd just been through training with Naviators. And so I remember that. And R-O-No is a bigot spot on the frequency where you turn around your antenna around and you can kind of zero in that way, instead of depending on the needle. So that kind of impressed him. And so he had me checked out the next day at the first five. So I kind of helped me get there quicker, I think. Well, this guy knows what he's doing again. Is the pilot where you always aware of your payload, which your cargo was? Oh, yeah. We did a lot of different, a lot of different flying, but one of the most dangerous type flying we did were drop missions. Because they were down there, way down in valleys.

The weather was just terrible. And you were in there with a number of other planes. You might have 15 planes in a drop pattern. And they put out those panels way down in the jungle. And you dropped only, if it was free drop, you dropped only about 10 and 12 foot above the ground. You went down just like you were going to land, and you did a very low airspeed, too. You did like it, maybe 80 miles an hour, 85 miles an hour. But the people who did the dropping, the pushing out of the cargo were quartermaster people. They got paid extra for this. They volunteered for it, but they got paid, I think it was $50 a month or something like that extra. But they also, maybe like the adventure, I'm not sitting around in the way it happens. But it was a very dangerous job. And they were supposed to, on this big open door airplanes, you know, double open doors.

They were supposed to tie a rope on the other side. There was a bar over there from the do that, and onto their own thing that they had put around their waist. So they wouldn't go out with the cargo. Well, when you're pushing out, let's say, mule feet out of what they call over there, it'd be an easy thing to drop. We had these 80 pound, 90 pound bags. It took about five or six passes to get rid of all of it. But, well, when you're doing that, you have to get coordinated with the pilot, because the pilot would say, okay, drop, and just measure, you know, and the copilot would put his hand down, and they'd push, it's very rudimentary, but that's the way he got rid of. But then, on the next pass, you had to be coordinated, because when you put an airplane in a 60 degree bank,

it was a 100 pound sack, which was 200 pounds, your 2G push, so they can't lift it. So they had to do their lifting in between the different turns and all these patterns, and everybody had to be coordinated that way. It was a very interesting process, but also, usually when you were dropping, you were dropping to our troops, but they were also right next to the Japanese line. That's why they were there. So you were pulling out a lot of times over a lot of ground fire, and so they didn't have much, they had kind of rudimentary ground fire, but it didn't have to worry, they could put it over your airplane, and put it over to anybody else. But drop message were dangerous from a weather standpoint. We flew in the mountains soon, so there was less about three or three or four months. The wettest place in the world is 40 miles from where we were, and it rains just day and night,

just constantly. We never, we never, ever, aborted missions because of weather. Our outfit was known for that, and we flew in the worst weather, all kind of weather. We were always damp, our stuff would get mildewed, and we lived in bamboo bashes where we had bamboo sides, and patch roofs, and of course we got a set pattern of mosquito nets, because it was all kind of creeping and crawling things. During the mom's soon, these air strips were built on a little higher land, and water would be all around, and that upper sand ballot, just like it was a lake up there. And anyway, so all the animals wanted to find the dryest place. They would, yeah, all the creeping and crawling things were up there, and they had a lot of deadly snakes, crutch snakes were deadly. Cobras, of course, and you had to watch for scorpions. You know, when you went in and out,

you took out your cover before you put the mosquito net back down, and then you checked your shoes next morning, made sure there wasn't a scorpion in there. So you had all that part of living over there. It's my own fault. I think it's just not going to stay, but your microphone keeps popping out. One of the things that the Japanese were known for during the war was a brand of cruelty to POWs. I was wondering if during the war, rumor had spread that, you know, if you go down behind lines, chances are that you won't be coming back and how you prepared for that. Well, that was one of our worst dreads, was to not let that happen, and I don't think any of our people ever fell into the hands of the Japanese, although we were just north,

or where the bridge of the river required was. We were flying just north of that, but first it was up in that jungle warfare, and that was down more toward the melee finish, so near Rangu, further down that way. But yeah, everybody dreaded being a Japanese prisoner, and we had several planes go down, I mean, and survive, but we didn't have parachutes, so if you landed, if you didn't land a ride, you weren't going to survive. You didn't even carry parachutes? No, we didn't carry parachutes. Why? Well, they run practical. They took weight, and they were cumbersome things, and then something else, we flew a pipe. We flew four-inch pipe, which were, I guess, twenty-foot long, and we flew eight or nine hundred miles of pipe from Calcutta to Orzup Burma

and two or three other stations of Burma, so they could build a hundred mile, I mean, for a hundred oxygen gasoline, about nine hundred miles, we finally got that completed, so at that time, then you could get fuel into Burma. See, they were, when we got there, they were totally dependent on air in China, in Kunming, China, in Chengyu, China, in Burma, anywhere up there, because the Burma road had been closed, as Japanese closed it a long time ago, and we started building a new road from Lido, India, to Burma, Shimbuang Burma, and Ten Cox-A-Can Burma, and that was a picture of that. It goes like this. It was used to fly over every day, you know, so we'll go over that legal path. And one time I happened to fly General Pick, who was the chief engineer there, incidentally later, I've met his son, way later when I was in Congress,

but I'm talking about flying this day. But his dad was standing up here between me and the copilot, just standing there looking out, and I said, I understand they're going to name that Picks Peak, or Picks Pike. What was it? They didn't end up naming it after him, but we landed at Shimbuang, and he got off, he was just hitching a ride. He was a general. But it was an interesting part of the country there. What was your interactions with local people, the natives? Well, we had what we call basher boys that worked for us, that swept our bashes, and they were hardworking. We call them all wags, you know, but we'll stay in time. They probably won't let you do that. We got along fine with them. We weren't off the base that much. We were just so busy,

but we got along fine with the ones that were there. Well, on R&R, I was in Calcutta. I had the experience going down to Calcutta, and I had the experience going down to Bangalore, India, to mix with civilians. And the caste system was in force. The British were. They were still the British Empire. And they still pulled Rickshaw, and you hired him to pull you on the Rickshaw. Do you recall one of the most memorable letters you received while you were overseas? Well, not in particular, except my folks were all over the regular basis. I don't have any particular memory rememberable letters. You flew over 217 missions, I think, around there. Was there a mission where you didn't think you were going to be coming back?

Well, I had some interesting experiences, but I thought I'd make all of you. I had a really hairy mission. Didn't have to do with enemy fighters or weather. I was flying out, dropped mission, from about 200 foot, and we were dropping gasoline, 55 gallon barrels of gasoline, and they were big, colored parachutes on the study line, and they pushed out this gasoline, and you had to be very careful to try to get it on target from that altitude. And there were probably, I don't know, eight planes in the dropped zone. And there was a plane just above me dropped, and I saw these things moving up just right in front of me. I mean, they all just ballooned right in front of me,

and I thought, anyway, I went up, I didn't know which way to go, but I went up, but I got a really big disaster. That still sticks to my memory. I can see that picture, but that didn't have anything to do with combat. I had to do with procedure, but it was scary. When we took mission all Burma, mission all was a major spot in Burma, a very important spot on the Irwadi River, very important to the ground troops, to still well, to the Chinese, to everyone, and it was a joint operation where we took mission all. And we took the air strip, which was just a muddy air strip at that time, some gravel, but muddy on each side. And we took that town, and I don't think we took the town of mission all, which was only about 10 miles away.

The Japanese, we took one say in January, and we found, March and April, and something like that. And P-40s were there, and P-40s, you know, it's the old fly-and-tiger type airplane. They were still flying, not to fly-and-tiger. It's a lot of the same old airplanes. Some of them still had the markings on them. And they would fly these sorties off of that strip and bomb the town of mission all. While they were doing that, they had a total preference over us, planes in the traffic pattern. Maybe more. But they had a preference because they had that short fuel, and they just fly a sortie and come right back in. But if enemy fighters came up there, then everybody had to get on the ground real quick, and to where they, you know, you could protect yourself. I get down low, and you had that camouflage color, and you were down there over jungle stuff anyway. And then,

after the fighter's last, depending on what happened there, you'd have to get back in the traffic pattern, sort all that stuff out again, and you know, everybody had fuel problems. And that was kind of an interesting exercise in mission all. But, after that got to be such a densely used airport, because of all the supplies that were going there, I'd have my radio operator call in on the regular frequency and get a landing pattern while we were leaving Denjian, which was 45 minutes away. Instead of being 45 in the traffic pattern, I'd be number four. You know, we had that time pretty good. Everybody got to do that, and then they said, you can't do that anymore. You know, we had that time radio, because then you couldn't call in until you were inside of the airport. You had a direct line of sight,

but that kind of an interesting experience. But, mission all is on the Airwater River, which is the road to Mandalay, the famous song that is the road to Mandalay, the Airwater, and later on, I was stationed after I had done most of my flying, I probably had 200 missions in at that time. I was made the air traffic control australia at Lashio, Burma, and we'd just taken up the Japanese, and so I stayed in the old Japanese hanger there. There was a very bummer that they'd shot down there right next to that barracks where I stayed. But the interesting part about Lashio is right there on the Airwater was a famous old hospital call if Dr. Seager is hospital, and he was a missionary surgeon. A lot of been written about him called Burma Surgeon. They finally got him to go into the Army.

He was giving him a commission. He became a US Army guy. But his hospital was right there near Lashio, which always intrigued me, because I'd heard the Burma Surgeon never did see him, and I'd pause it just for a second. In your own words, what do you think Garsman was the biggest difference between yourself and the people overseas that you were living with? The biggest difference. Between the citizens of Harris and Arkansas and the citizens of Burma. Oh, you know, we didn't have that much contact with the citizens of Burma. We were pretty well isolated, because of the nature of our duty over there. But yet, I did see a lot of my seam around. In Burma, they had such a different culture. They called them, they spoke to white

shiruts, you know, you'd see them in these opium dens. I've seen those, where they just sit there and they'd be in a stupor, smoking an opium. There was some of that that went on over there. Not in Burma, but over next to Tibet. The Tibetan nays would come down from the hills from Tibet across the Bromland-Petra River, which was just ten miles from where we were at Dengian. And they would bring tribes of women with them. And they were always smelly and a little bit aloof. Not necessarily arrogant, but they were standoffish. And they'd have little stones that they want to say, precious stones. You never knew where they were. They were bad or what.

They were kind of traitors, they had such a body over with them. As well as their whole entourage. They didn't want to talk to them too long. But they were totally different culture, for sure. People from the hills were Tibet. The call was the most memorable experience you had while you were overseas. I mean, for example, if I say World War II or if someone says World War II to you, is there a particular story or image or smell that comes back more than others? Oh. I don't know. I lost it. I don't know. I know one thing. I've been on R&R with them. And now we're in a rickshaw together

and we spent some time. Got to know each other fairly well. And then just a few days later, we were flying back from Burma in the India, actually, up there Fort Hertz to the northern part. And they said that they were bandits spotted. We got into a cloud cover and I don't know. Paul Gordon was about the same area I was and later he was probably shot down. And he was just hearing more about it. He was shot down. I remember that was a emotional thing at that time. Our historian for our unit for 10th Squadron who was killed by enemy fire, just not long before we do to come home. So, you know,

there's several things like that happen. But I guess that. I don't know what. Everybody had fun over there. Everybody, you know. We enjoyed. The U.S.O. people we ever had was Jinx Falcon Bird, who I never would see. I'll tell you that. It's a different story. And Pettobrand, the movie actor, those the only two we ever had, I know of. And we didn't have a kind of a third-rate one called Smokes the Fire, something kind of a little entertainment group out of the room. And I was always flying what they call a shuttle, which it was kind of like a day off. You had to fly pastures instead of cargo and you didn't fly a

combat. You just went to a certain place and you picked up people and let out people. It was kind of a transport thing that they had over there for people to get around home. So, ten cocks of can Burma, which is right in the middle of that Hong Kong valley. It's just cut out of the Eucalyptus trees. You see it in the air. It's just like a long board taking out the 120-foot tree. Well, they did the engineers actually what they did. They took those Eucalyptus trees and they laid them down and took them down. So, I was flying the shuttle and I had reached nearly lift off speed and had a blow out. And my right tire after rubber left called him one of those logs. And I cartwheeled around this way and went off in the ditch

and ended up with a wing torn off. So, I was flying the shuttle and get ready to take off with a wing torn off and but I was really worried about the fuel. So, I got the pasture got out in a hurry. I only had probably maybe 15 people on there. Something like that. I forgot. And my kuchis and I went out that top. There's a little hatch right on top. And we got out and it did not explode or anything. The jacks are imports and all that stuff. Was it? I was going to pick up general James Falcon and Mora Zootburner and Tiger to NNJ. Miss all the whole opportunity. I could not only see her as you had been flown with. I could have changed the entire course of history.

Who knows. I think we've kind of covered this already, but did you associate any smell or taste with your time overseas today? Well, let me think. I don't know, you know, our food was. We had a lot of sea rations, but we had water buffalo, and we had a lot of time. I didn't know. I don't guess how required any taste. You know, just kind of the side. We took adabron tablets, you know, from malaria. It's an herbite turned yellow, you know. And our flight server was docked on salt. We always call that the unsolved blush. He made his, everybody had a table. He had to take him once a day. And something else.

Under the rules of regulation or something, I'm not sure what. You were allowed to take one ounce of whiskey. One ounce or two. I guess one and a jigger of whiskey. For every mission when you got back. And so nobody really wanted to do it in order to sit and take a hand away. So dock on salt fix it where you could accumulate that. Or you could get it up with a fifth of a mood for the Ballsters Club. And, I guess somebody would do that but not all. But that was kind of a clear regulation. We asked these questions for the students. Do you be able to keep up with perhaps a favorite sports team or something like that? Why you were overseas? How did you keep up with the news from back home?

No. Communication was very poor over there. You know, we were exactly on the other side of the world those days. And we were on the meridian just exactly opposite us and we were going to it home. That's what we always laughed at that. But we were so isolated over there. One like me and in Europe or Southeast Asia. There was a bet board in a long way in those days. Of course, we got that news. We got it late. We just keep up with it. Make your basis. We had a lot of friends and it was stressful and it was hard. But we were also young kids. And so there was bound to be a lot of humor and pranks. I was wondering if you had any pranks that you remember being pulled or having pulled on you

that were particularly humorous? Well, not particularly that way. I can tell you a prank that we pulled one time. We had another outfit and we stole a motorcycle in a different deal. You know, we were on another base and we thought, well, we needed that. So we just, in a Jeep, it's a hard thing to put into a C47. But we got one. And they discovered, finally they discovered what happened to that. But, you know, we weren't staying there. We were just transferring the motorcycle that way. One time. You know, you could get away in those days when you're in war. You know, you could do a lot of things and drive your own rules, city grades. It didn't too far out. And, and our commander, even though he was a very tough

guy, I remember the first time we started flying, you know, the first loss we had, the very first loss we had. He got us all in there and he said, okay. So, he said, we lost sewers today. He said, it won't be the first. Now, he gave us a tough way out of it. He said, it won't be the first. He said, let me tell you something. He said, when you go down, the worst thing that happened is if you don't, if you have your bunk, and he said, and I've forgotten what happened. But, you know, we gave us that kind of, it's all we said. It's all forget it. So, in other words, the worst thing in the world is for you to go down with that beer car. You want to leave it for us. That's right. Everybody did. They had to lay us up there and

we were all carried forty-five, too, you know. And sometimes guys wouldn't, they'd leave their forty-five. They wouldn't carry it. They were kind of cumbersome to carry, too. The hump. We talked about it just briefly earlier. What made it so dangerous? Terrible weather. Terrible storms and thunderstorms that build up. Now, the regular hump pilots, most of them, C-47, were flew the hump a lot. But, forty-sixes were a shuttle line. Chaboy India took coming in. It was kind of a routine deal. And C-46 was had a little more altitude, more engine, engines, and a little bit safer

plane to fly. But the hump is a four-boat-in-place over there. The Himalayas. Remember, airplane didn't afford the days of the jets, you know. That was when you're out of the food. It's just eighteen-nine, you know. We didn't carry oxygen. We didn't do it and have oxygen tank. We didn't fly about ten-nine foot without oxygen. We flew all the time. It's sixteen-nine foot without oxygen. But we looked at each other very carefully because you looked at your pilot and called out a six-year-lifter current blue or anything that's happening. You're getting an anoxia. So we've been very careful to guard that. But, anyway, the hump is just the Himalayas mountains twenty-two, twenty-three-thousand-foot mountains all around you. And, uh... Do you recall VJ Day? I do.

I recall VE Day. Let me tell you about that. How's it in Casablanca? Put it away back home. On VE Day. It's in May six, I guess, or somewhere right now. Because I left India and I was going to wait, I don't know. Maybe I would get the blank of the way back home. And I heard all these whistles in the harbor and then I heard sirens and everything. And I thought, well, there must be an air raid. And so, I went down to some place. They said, VE Day. I thought it was just an air raid because I'm assuming that's what the world was in. It was VE Day. That's where I was. VJ Day, I was in the sights. And VE Day, like that night, was there a tremendous celebration there in Casablanca? Oh, yeah. Yeah, there was all kind of revelry and everything. Yeah, it was really fun. I didn't necessarily participate, I observed, but I was ready to.

Yeah, I'll be playing next morning. I can go on the... I was going to Asia, or was I guess? So VJ Day, you were back at home. Tell us that story. Well... Okay, I... Something else came to mind. I thought it might be a minute or so. Anyway, I'll go ahead with it. You were talking about board. You were observing. You wanted to get on the plane and head back home. And you said that you were stuck somewhere. Amsoir, I don't recall. Oh. Oh, I was getting ready to go to the Azores. Yes. Then I wanted from the Azores I wanted in Miami. Okay. We had a choice to go to Miami or New York because I chose Miami. Well, we got to Miami. A bunch of us were coming in at the same time. And the fun guy said, when I get back, I'm going to get a hundred coal beers. Yeah, he always said that.

So we got there. I got there, I don't know, a bar in the hotel, where we were all... Austria's club, or whatever it was. And they had a hundred beers lined up, all getting flat, of course, but they were all lined up, because they lived up to me. But we learned to drink warm beer over there. And I got to where I liked it. In fact, coal beer tasted almost fun to me when I got back. Because I drank so much warm beer. And your taste gets used to it. And... When you got back home, how difficult was the... You know, you would... You would gotten yourself into a routine of having to take malaria tablets. You're hanging beer rations, coupons up, because you might not survive a flight. You establish a routine that in a large way is based off survival. And then after a series of weeks, you find yourself back at home and you have to adjust back to civilian life. What was that process like for you? Oh, that was easy to do.

I'd tell you. When I came back, it seemed me like I got an R&R of two weeks or something like that at home. And then I went on to Santa Ana, California. And we just assumed we were going to get ready to go to Japan and start all over again on that front. And I went to Santa Ana, and I was... There was a rumor that... Well, that the war was... That that might not develop. I don't know what... It was way before we dropped the bomb. I mean, it was... Between July and when we dropped the bomb in August, except in August. But anyway, I was in there, and the fella came in, and I just lay him back on the bunk. And I had to... I still have my shirt, but I had the ribbons on there. And he looked over and he said,

you're out. I laughed. I said, what's that? He said, one of the ribbons, he said, you had enough points for your out. They were letting you out. If you had 100 points or something like that. And DFCs were worth a lot. I mean, you can just see it made it. I said, you're kidding. He said, no, they got a new race. They could go read on the Bolton Board. So I did it. So sure enough, I was just before getting out because they were getting ready to process me. So I went over and flew my last flight for the Army Air Corps at San Ana, California. And then I went back to Fort Chaffin. It was this bad. Just very surprising. I was just amazed. And then, BJ, I was here. Do you recall who you saw first when you got back to Harrison and what the family or friends and what the conversation was like? How did you explain what you had seen

over in Burma? Oh, I'm sure I saw my mother dead. I was in my sister's family. I don't know why. I don't think we disgusted all that much. I didn't discuss it very much. I don't know. They had me down at the Rotary Club. I had several of us down there. They had just gotten back. Some of them made kind of long talks about their experience. But I didn't. I said, well, I went over to Asian. I flew around a lot and came back. That's about what I said. They all kind of laughed. I think they were just born. I didn't say something more about it and that's really about the truth. Because you know, everybody, everybody that came back, you know, they just went and did their thing and came back. I think that's what I just met. Everybody fell about four or two. Did you take advantage of the GI bill? I did. Yeah, I did. That's a great bill.

Also, I served in Congress. The guy who wrote that bill. Tiger Teague, who was a great punter hero in Europe. But yeah, I went to Oklahoma State University. I went to Oklahoma State University. I went to Oklahoma and I'm paying the money. But you know, it's like a lot of veterans who talk about Truman's decision to drop the bombs and how absolutely convinced they are that it had not happened, that there was a strong likelihood that they would not be in the room talking to me then. I'm happy that I way told me. Yeah. Even though I got out, I was convinced. You know, we had a big win loss. I don't know how many, maybe in the Japanese it lost more. I just realized you might know this man. It's a congressman from West Virginia. He served in Truman's administration. His name escapes me for the moment. He's a speechwriter for Perry Truman.

And I'm going to almost be positive that you all have served together. Gosh, why can't I think of it? He was in town just a few months back. He had written a book about an Arkansas World War II better. Now, it'll come to me later. Meet Guy. I can't figure it out really. Not West Virginia. Yes, it's from West Virginia. Yeah. He's really, he's a carpenter. He came into West Virginia to win that seat. Did he? Yeah. He's a very liberal individual. Yeah, he's full of it. He's written several books. Several books. I can't name right now, but I know it. He came in just to win that seat from New York. Really? Yeah. Yeah. He's got a little bit of stuff. Questions, a little bit. Well, he was, he's a, well, he's written his 90s.

He served with Truman. Yeah. This is a generally thing out. I'll play really big in a second. I can't, I can't think about either. Anyhow. Currently, there's a few questions that we ask here at the end. About, and this will wrap up our World War II section. And then I'm going to, I'm going to ask you a few questions about. Okay, Congress. And then we'll be, we'll be finished today. We ask five questions of all the World War II veterans that we interviewed. The first question is, what is your definition of liberty? Well, it's the ability to have the freedom in whatever process you're living under, whatever government process you are, to make your own choices. What do you consider to be the greatest threat inside or to the United States today? Well, inside, I think it's a diminishing of our, diminishing of our culture.

I really worry about which way we've headed in our character and their integrity. I don't want to put that wrong, because there's so many fine young people. But still, you can see how it's degraded through my lifetime, for sure. And that worries me. I have more than the outside threat, because I think we can handle that. You consider to be the greatest hope in the United States. Well, to continue to, my greatest hope would be that we continue our democratic experiment that we started 220 years ago to survive, that our republic survived. What are your thoughts on war having fought in war?

Well, I don't know, we may go to war too easy. In retrospect, it's pretty obvious that the Vietnam War probably didn't have to be fought. At that time, I was very concerned about the dominole theory, I'm coming in, and that may have happened, but I doubt it. I think that they need to think low and low in heart about going to war. There are other better options probably. And then the last question is, what advice would you give to a future generation that may stumble upon the tape, something you've tried to live by in your own life? Perhaps you failed more often than you succeeded, but it's something that you've learned from experience.

Well, I think that, of course, there are many different cultures, many different denominations and religions. I happen to be a Christian, and I think that the more a person can develop his faith and his communication with God, whatever his approach to that is, I think that's so important in an undergirding, undergirding part of your life. It's just so important, because after all, we're all putting here on this earth to serve other people, no matter what we do, whether we're a Sushan boy, or a barber, or a banker, or a congressman. We all conserve others, and that's why we're here. And that's very important that people approach life, anyway.

And if they accept everybody just as they are, that's very important to you. And I can't help but ask this, what would be your advice to Congress today if you could talk to them as a collective whole? I know a lot of those suspects. I'd say that Congress is far too polarized now, and I don't know how they unravel that. It started probably in the Gingrich Revolution. At that time, I'll use one of my committees as an example, Public Works and Transportation Committee. The Democrats had 80 staff members. We had 18, suddenly the Democrats had 18. We had 80.

That created great dissension because they weren't used to it. They've been in power for 40 years. And out of that particular event, that polarization began to happen. The Democrats didn't know how to handle their loss of power. They probably didn't know how to handle their gain power all that well. All that put together, it's created that polarizing effect. And now it's reversed again, and probably this next election that Democrats could easily have a veto-proof majority. They could have 60 votes in the Senate that would become filibusters. So they might get, like, when Lyndon Johnson was in, where he had total power. He ran the war himself because he had that power to do it. And it could get that way again. So I don't know that the key is cooperation between the two parties. But goodness, we've been through this up and down for 220 years. I don't worry about it falling apart.

You know, Lincoln was 29 years old and he was talking to a men's group in Illinois. He was talking about the coming Civil War. But I think if you think of it today in terms of general apathy or lack of compromise inside Congress, it still holds true. And he said, when should we expect this coming war? When some transatlantic giant stepped the boundaries of our oceans and crushed us with the blow? And then he answered his own question. He said, all the armies of Europe and Asia, Africa combined with all the wealth in the world, couldn't take a drink from the Ohio River or a step on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. They said, destruction be our lot. We must ourselves be the author and finisher for a nation of free people we live forever. Or we die by suicide. And I think about that a lot. And I agree with you that I've never really worried about an outside threat. That they couldn't get too far. It's like what Admiral Yamamoto said about there would be a rifle behind these blade of grass. You couldn't invade the mainland in the United States.

I agree with that. But what we forget is over time that a republic requires maintenance. And you have to own up to inconvenient truths. And that's something that we're not very good at doing. And we haven't done for a long time. You know, back to Lincoln. Probably the most ill-prepared person we've ever had to be present. Yet he became the greatest present that we've ever had. Probably greater than Washington because he held a nation together. April of 1865 was probably the most defining month of our country's history. Because that was when Robert E. Lee and his surrender at Appomattox. Instead of taking to the hills or before that and creating guerrilla warfare, he thought that through. And he looked at Missouri and the terrible thing that happened to Missouri during the war.

And he thought our nation would be renaissance for the next 25 years or longer if we take to the hills and become guerrilla war fighters. So he did his finest thing when he decided made that decision. But on the other hand, Grant representing Lincoln. And Lincoln said, let them up easy. Instead of him executing generals all across the country having executions or trees and all that, Grant then followed through by saluting General Lee. Anyway, that was the greatest event, maybe in our history, April 1865, where Lee and Grant acted the way they did. They saved the nation really.

And that was under Lincoln's order from Grant's side. Two great generals. And Grant, you know, being a scruffy guy without much education and Lee being a very patriotic guy out of Virginia, a very heartland of the country and related access to Washington himself through marriage. And the Lee's of Virginia, you know, held every responsible office. If people would study history, if they would study that one month, they would get to the key of the Civil War. Perhaps the key of the American spirit. I mean, they're in General Lee and General Grant. You had enough force. And they were not being reactive. They were being proactive and very quick. And against what you would normally expect from either of them to do. Well, and you think about what the people wanted. The South wanted them to go to the hills. Pride, don't stop fight.

The North wanted them to be punished for what they had been done. The leaders of the day had this extraordinary responsibility. And that's another question I'd love to ask you, Congressman, and we're almost out of time. But the difference between your allegiance to your own conscience versus your constituency. Because sometimes you have more information or you have thought this out further. And perhaps something that's not only best for your district, here in Arkansas, but also for the country as a whole, meant that you had to vote a certain way. How did you wrestle with that? Well, I nearly always voted with what my knowledge was and what my convictions were nearly always. Many times I'd make a vote on certain issues. You know, you vote so many times. But I'd lay awake at night sometimes, literally, and think, did I make that vote right or did I not? You know, you don't know there's gray areas on anything. Most things. But I nearly always voted because if I thought I had the knowledge

to make the right judgment, I used to use my own thoughts and convictions because I did have that knowledge. That's why you're there. It's to study and get yourself informed. Congressman, was there a question that you hoped I would ask today that I didn't know? No. My idea of what you want to ask. Maybe you think about a lot of things I hadn't thought of in a long time. If you could, Congressman, look here into the camera lens for the first time.