Just before we entered the Straits of  Gibraltar we were treated to several schools of Flying Fish!  Very interesting to see hundreds of foot long fish shoot out of the water and glide on stubby wings for perhaps 50 to 100 yards!  Previously, we had been treated to the sight of a large whale rolling on the calm sea!   

Then came the Porpoises!   They were visible nearly a l/4 mile away coming toward us, and then, they as a group, in perfect, coordinated team work came up from the stern of the ship, for or five breaking water at once arced across our bow, then back under the ship and across the bow several times!  Beautiful!  I have three or four snapshots of them. 

The next two days on the Atlantic side of Gibraltar, were rough!  And I have said ever since, I am not a sailor!   With a Temporary Duty Furlough in late 1944, I was on the ocean four times, but I was S I C K  five times!!  No thanks. 

Our ship pulled into the New York Harbor just as the word about V-J (Victory in Japan) got to us…We of course had heard of the Atomic Bombs being dropped prior to that.

There has been a lot written that President Truman never should have used them, but as far as I am concerned, I believe it saved thousands of our service men’s lives, even at the cost of so many Japanese lives!  They were noted for their suicide missions and I believe the entire country never would have surrendered with out the bombs..

I hung around Arlington, VA. For a few weeks awaiting discharge orders, during which I was able to look up my old friend from Ft. Monmouth who got our Gospel Quartet going, and also ran into Capt. Mundinger who had come home in the mean time.  He asked me to write him.  I said I would on the condition he let me have one of the two typewriters he “liberated”.   He told me to write Capt. Coffey and have him send it.  I got it and still have it in running condition, though I never use it – nor did I ever write to him.     

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