Joseph Cooper
U.S. Navy – USS Ommaney - Pacific Theater ’41-’45
US Army – Occupational Forces Germany and Japan ’48-‘50
U.S. Army - Infantry - Korean War. ’50-‘53
U.S. Navy – USS Ommaney - Pacific Theater ’41-’45
US Army – Occupational Forces Germany and Japan ’48-‘50
U.S. Army - Infantry - Korean War. ’50-‘53
Joe Cooper was born on July 6, 1921 in Ashville, North Carolina. When he was four years old the family moved to Brevard, NC where his father, a World War I veteran, opened a garage and started a business as an auto mechanic. Joe, his brother and two sisters grew up during the Great Depression and he remembers his father falling on hard times. “That Depression come all at once and bang everything was closed.”
“The Depression wiped him out and he had to work in the driveway. You wouldn’t see no money back then, you had to barter. You just worked for somebody, and they gave you some groceries or somethin’. That’s how you operated back then. Banks closed and everything.” Joe recalled only one community store in Brevard. Customers brought the clerk a list of what they wanted to purchase, and the clerk would go into a back room, fill the order, and bring it out to the customers. This system wasn’t designed with personalized customer service in mind. It was designed to control inventory and prevent pilferage. Joe recalled having food to eat but it was mostly beans, corn bread and butter milk. “I had to go bare foot. One time in the winter my mother had to go bare foot in the house because I needed her shoes.” The depression meant no shoes, no tv and no cars. “Always cold in the winter. My mother had to wrap up iron (heated in the wood stove) and put it by our feet in the bed. We had to huddle in one room (to keep warm).”
Joe went to school until he completed 9th grade and then tried to join the Marine Corps, but they wouldn’t take him because he was too young. The Navy was happy to take him and sent him to Norfolk, VA for training. Joe was trained to be a gunner’s mate. He learned how to handle ammunition and how to shoot 50 and 75 caliber guns and the 40mm twin barrel.
Joe saw quite a bit of action in the Pacific Theater. He was initially assigned to the USS PC 477. This ship, known as a Patrol Craft, hunted submarines. The ship was equipped with depth charges and torpedoes that were launched from the bow of the ship. Joe was on this vessel for 17 months and was involved in the battles of Midway, Guadalcanal and New Guinea.
Joe was later transferred to the escort aircraft carrier, USS Ommaney. This ship was considered a baby-flat top. These carriers were slower and half the size of a “fleet carrier”. The USS Ommaney was involved in the Mariana and Pelau campaigns and the Philippines campaign including the Battle of the Leyte Gulf. The carrier provided air cover and air strikes in support of the ground troops. In the battle of the Gulf of Leyte the ship played a major role in the battle. In addition to the number of air strikes launched, the USS Ommaney Bay helped destroy one Japanese ship, the destroyer Mogami, and seriously damage several others. The ship was under constant attack by Japanese fighter jets and kamikazes. I asked Joe if he remembered shooting down any Japanese fighters. “Twenty seven! Mostly at Leyte.” I asked him if he was ever scared. “You were too busy!”
On January 4, 1945 the Ommaney Bay was in the Sulu Sea and came under attack by 40 Japanese fighters hunting the US fleet. Twenty of the fighters were believed to be kamikazes. The fighters somehow evaded radar detection and were able to launch an attack around 5pm. Capitan Young, the ship’s captain, had posted numerous lookouts around the carrier’s deck, anticipating possible kamikaze attacks. At 5:15 pm a kamikaze began its attack on the Ommaney Bay. The blinding sun concealed the kamikaze, and the ship was caught completely unaware and was unable to mount a defense.
The plane’s wing hit the ship’s superstructure and then crashed into the flight deck. “I was finishing a meal when it happened”, Joe recalled. As the plane careened out of control across the flight deck two bombs were released. One bomb penetrated the flight deck and detonated below where a series of explosions took place as the fully fueled aircraft on the hanger deck ignited. The second bomb passed through the hanger deck and exploded near the starboard side. “We were throwing ammunition off (the side of the ship). I saw one man lying there with his leg off. I couldn’t help him. I saw one guy with a hole in his throat and blood gushing out.” At 5:50 Captain Young gave the order to abandon ship. “It was about 65 feet, so I just went over the side…I didn’t have a life jacket on. There were sharks. Looked like men were climbing on each other’s shoulders to get out of the water. A few sharks went by me”
At 8pm the Ommaney was scuttled by the USS Burns. Joe recalled being in the water for four or five hours before USS Helm picked him up. Later that night he was transferred to the USS Minneapolis where he became a gunner. 95 crew members of the Ommaney were killed.
In April of 1945, after having participated in most of the major battles in the Pacific, Joe returned to Fort Wooden in Port Townsend, Washington where he was discharged after the war ended. Joe was in Seattle when the Japanese surrendered. “They had to open all of the liquor stores, or they would break the windows.”
Joe returned to Brevard but had trouble finding work. “All of the women took the men’s jobs when they went to the war and when we came back, they wouldn’t give the jobs back.” With no way to earn money Joe decided to rejoin the military. This time he enlisted in the Army.
After initial training Joe headed to Berlin as part of the occupation forces that would ultimately rebuild Germany. He was there during the Berlin Airlift in 1948 when he was promoted to Sergeant. Joe came back to the US and was sent to Okinawa to be part of the occupation forces there. While he was there, he asked the company commander if he could go to Korea. The company commander told him he would have to go in as Infantry. Joe was sent to Camp Drake in Tokyo for some training and then he was off to Korea. It was 1950 and the Korean War was underway.
Joe was part of the 7th Recon Division and was involved in numerous battles. In July of 1951 both sides began negotiations for peace, but the fighting continued along the 38th parallel. This is sometimes referred to as the static phase of the war when each side hotly contested small pieces of geography, trying to hold territory until there was a peace agreement. The constant re-trading of small pieces of territory, also known as outposts, was among the bloodiest fighting of the war. The battles for these various outposts included small hills known as Heart Break Ridge, Papa-San, Triangle Hill, Jane Russel, Snipers Ridge, Punchbowl, Queen Jack and Charlie Outpost. Joe was involved in all these battles. He recalled the Chinese had taken Charlie Outpost and the US wanted it back. “The Chinese were good fighters…..we could see them up there on top of the mountain. They was hunkered down in the cold weather just like us.” Joe compared this fighting to the trench warfare in World War I.
Korea is often called the forgotten war and these outpost battles during the static phase are often called the forgotten battles.
I asked Joe what he recalled the most about the Korean War. “Cold weather and lots of ice. I didn’t see a candy bar or Coca-Cola for two years.”
In 1953 Joe was sent back to the United States and he was discharged. He returned to his hometown of Brevard, NC and this time was able to land work. He worked in Quality Control at Ecusta Paper for 32 years.
I asked Joe if he ever married. He said no. He had a girlfriend while he was in the Navy and they were planning to get married. One day he received a letter from a Marine at Camp Lejeune saying, “I just married your girlfriend and she’s my wife now. Please don’t write to her no more.” All is fair in love and war. Joe has remained single to this day and lived in Brevard until he recently became a resident of the Veterans Home in Black Mountain, North Carolina, just a stones throw from Brevard.
Joe, there is no way the people of the United States can thank you for all your time on the front lines of two major conflicts. You were even too tough for the sharks of the South Pacific!!
“The Depression wiped him out and he had to work in the driveway. You wouldn’t see no money back then, you had to barter. You just worked for somebody, and they gave you some groceries or somethin’. That’s how you operated back then. Banks closed and everything.” Joe recalled only one community store in Brevard. Customers brought the clerk a list of what they wanted to purchase, and the clerk would go into a back room, fill the order, and bring it out to the customers. This system wasn’t designed with personalized customer service in mind. It was designed to control inventory and prevent pilferage. Joe recalled having food to eat but it was mostly beans, corn bread and butter milk. “I had to go bare foot. One time in the winter my mother had to go bare foot in the house because I needed her shoes.” The depression meant no shoes, no tv and no cars. “Always cold in the winter. My mother had to wrap up iron (heated in the wood stove) and put it by our feet in the bed. We had to huddle in one room (to keep warm).”
Joe went to school until he completed 9th grade and then tried to join the Marine Corps, but they wouldn’t take him because he was too young. The Navy was happy to take him and sent him to Norfolk, VA for training. Joe was trained to be a gunner’s mate. He learned how to handle ammunition and how to shoot 50 and 75 caliber guns and the 40mm twin barrel.
Joe saw quite a bit of action in the Pacific Theater. He was initially assigned to the USS PC 477. This ship, known as a Patrol Craft, hunted submarines. The ship was equipped with depth charges and torpedoes that were launched from the bow of the ship. Joe was on this vessel for 17 months and was involved in the battles of Midway, Guadalcanal and New Guinea.
Joe was later transferred to the escort aircraft carrier, USS Ommaney. This ship was considered a baby-flat top. These carriers were slower and half the size of a “fleet carrier”. The USS Ommaney was involved in the Mariana and Pelau campaigns and the Philippines campaign including the Battle of the Leyte Gulf. The carrier provided air cover and air strikes in support of the ground troops. In the battle of the Gulf of Leyte the ship played a major role in the battle. In addition to the number of air strikes launched, the USS Ommaney Bay helped destroy one Japanese ship, the destroyer Mogami, and seriously damage several others. The ship was under constant attack by Japanese fighter jets and kamikazes. I asked Joe if he remembered shooting down any Japanese fighters. “Twenty seven! Mostly at Leyte.” I asked him if he was ever scared. “You were too busy!”
On January 4, 1945 the Ommaney Bay was in the Sulu Sea and came under attack by 40 Japanese fighters hunting the US fleet. Twenty of the fighters were believed to be kamikazes. The fighters somehow evaded radar detection and were able to launch an attack around 5pm. Capitan Young, the ship’s captain, had posted numerous lookouts around the carrier’s deck, anticipating possible kamikaze attacks. At 5:15 pm a kamikaze began its attack on the Ommaney Bay. The blinding sun concealed the kamikaze, and the ship was caught completely unaware and was unable to mount a defense.
The plane’s wing hit the ship’s superstructure and then crashed into the flight deck. “I was finishing a meal when it happened”, Joe recalled. As the plane careened out of control across the flight deck two bombs were released. One bomb penetrated the flight deck and detonated below where a series of explosions took place as the fully fueled aircraft on the hanger deck ignited. The second bomb passed through the hanger deck and exploded near the starboard side. “We were throwing ammunition off (the side of the ship). I saw one man lying there with his leg off. I couldn’t help him. I saw one guy with a hole in his throat and blood gushing out.” At 5:50 Captain Young gave the order to abandon ship. “It was about 65 feet, so I just went over the side…I didn’t have a life jacket on. There were sharks. Looked like men were climbing on each other’s shoulders to get out of the water. A few sharks went by me”
At 8pm the Ommaney was scuttled by the USS Burns. Joe recalled being in the water for four or five hours before USS Helm picked him up. Later that night he was transferred to the USS Minneapolis where he became a gunner. 95 crew members of the Ommaney were killed.
In April of 1945, after having participated in most of the major battles in the Pacific, Joe returned to Fort Wooden in Port Townsend, Washington where he was discharged after the war ended. Joe was in Seattle when the Japanese surrendered. “They had to open all of the liquor stores, or they would break the windows.”
Joe returned to Brevard but had trouble finding work. “All of the women took the men’s jobs when they went to the war and when we came back, they wouldn’t give the jobs back.” With no way to earn money Joe decided to rejoin the military. This time he enlisted in the Army.
After initial training Joe headed to Berlin as part of the occupation forces that would ultimately rebuild Germany. He was there during the Berlin Airlift in 1948 when he was promoted to Sergeant. Joe came back to the US and was sent to Okinawa to be part of the occupation forces there. While he was there, he asked the company commander if he could go to Korea. The company commander told him he would have to go in as Infantry. Joe was sent to Camp Drake in Tokyo for some training and then he was off to Korea. It was 1950 and the Korean War was underway.
Joe was part of the 7th Recon Division and was involved in numerous battles. In July of 1951 both sides began negotiations for peace, but the fighting continued along the 38th parallel. This is sometimes referred to as the static phase of the war when each side hotly contested small pieces of geography, trying to hold territory until there was a peace agreement. The constant re-trading of small pieces of territory, also known as outposts, was among the bloodiest fighting of the war. The battles for these various outposts included small hills known as Heart Break Ridge, Papa-San, Triangle Hill, Jane Russel, Snipers Ridge, Punchbowl, Queen Jack and Charlie Outpost. Joe was involved in all these battles. He recalled the Chinese had taken Charlie Outpost and the US wanted it back. “The Chinese were good fighters…..we could see them up there on top of the mountain. They was hunkered down in the cold weather just like us.” Joe compared this fighting to the trench warfare in World War I.
Korea is often called the forgotten war and these outpost battles during the static phase are often called the forgotten battles.
I asked Joe what he recalled the most about the Korean War. “Cold weather and lots of ice. I didn’t see a candy bar or Coca-Cola for two years.”
In 1953 Joe was sent back to the United States and he was discharged. He returned to his hometown of Brevard, NC and this time was able to land work. He worked in Quality Control at Ecusta Paper for 32 years.
I asked Joe if he ever married. He said no. He had a girlfriend while he was in the Navy and they were planning to get married. One day he received a letter from a Marine at Camp Lejeune saying, “I just married your girlfriend and she’s my wife now. Please don’t write to her no more.” All is fair in love and war. Joe has remained single to this day and lived in Brevard until he recently became a resident of the Veterans Home in Black Mountain, North Carolina, just a stones throw from Brevard.
Joe, there is no way the people of the United States can thank you for all your time on the front lines of two major conflicts. You were even too tough for the sharks of the South Pacific!!