Momma Said Yes

The following is a story I wrote, based on conversations I had with my Dad. I have taken a few creative liberties but this story is based on actual events and facts my Dad relayed to me about joining the U.S. Navy in 1941……Steve

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Mother’s Day, 1942

I stood on the bow of the tiny vessel as it headed toward the orange and yellow glow of the setting sun. The water had a calming effect during these minutes before the sun said goodbye and welcomed its evening counterpart. My only beacon of security would soon find its hiding place, leaving me once again all alone on the vast sea of blue.

At 17, I was, it seemed, an eternity away from my home in Baton Rouge; away from my garden, my cows, my brothers and sisters, my momma.

I missed my mother, brothers and sisters. I missed my dad, although five years had passed since he was taken from me when I was 12. The Pacific Ocean was now my destination, with no place to settle, only miles of openness to travel, to think, to work, to survive. The USS Halibut was my home and the men cramped in this diesel tin can were now my family. I was growing up fast, learning good and bad habits from my brothers and fathers whom I sweated with, laughed with, worked with, cried with, prayed with and fought alongside.

The South Pacific air was humid, balmy, and the thought of returning below deck did not bring comfort just yet. In just a few moments the command would be given to dive below the waves, leaving the sunset behind and returning to a world of darkness and a rotation of submarine duties. After I had secured things topside, I walked to the forward hatch to begin my descent into the bowels of the ship. Reaching up to close the hatch, I took one more peak at the setting sun, the calmness of the sea and for a few moments, the solitude calmed my anxious spirit and strengthened me somewhat. Perhaps the reality of war, death, pain, misery and the unknown actions of each day somehow dissipated during this briefest of moments. Alone now, with only my thoughts, I was reluctant to close the hatch and ease my body down the narrow steps below deck.

Time had moved quickly and abruptly since December of the previous year when I was enjoying my first job since graduating high school in May. I was working at the Baton Rouge airport, servicing planes, cutting grass, cleaning the hangers, doing just about anything that needed to be done. I liked what I did and the job showed promise, especially for a lad of only 17. Jobs were hard to come by during this time and although the money was not great, it was steady and I was able to make enough money to help my momma with some of the bills.

I grew up and lived in the area known as Tiger Bend, a rural area about 10 miles from downtown Baton Rouge. My older brother Alton had helped me buy an old Model A Ford to drive back and forth to work. The engine was in good shape, but finding decent tires was always a problem. Driving on gravel and dirt roads did not help, but I was not one to complain, especially since my previous form of transportation had been a horse.

On Sunday afternoon, December 7^th, I was out in the barn, cleaning out stalls, making sure there was plenty of hay for the animals because I knew the night was going to be cold. Well, I guess you could say I was trying to stay busy and work off the huge lunch my sisters and my momma had fixed for all of us. It does not take too many sea rations before you miss your momma’s cooking. A typical Sunday would be fried chicken, with plenty of vegetables and of course homemade pies and cakes. The first time I told one of my shipmates that my two favorite vegetables were rice and gravy, he looked at me like I was crazy. I guess that’s a South Louisiana thing.

After completing my chores and returning to the house, I heard the crunch of tires on gravel and looked out the front window to see a car winding its way down the drive to our house. I stood in front of a small table my grandfather had made for my momma as a wedding present. On the table my momma proudly displayed a few figurines she had bought when my daddy took her into downtown Baton Rouge one Saturday to shop and catch a movie at the Paramount Theatre on Third Street. I know they weren’t worth much but momma was so proud of those ceramic treasures. After a moment I recognized the car and the man exiting from the driver’s side, still wearing his Sunday suit.

Mr. Boudreaux was my boss at the airport. In the time I had worked with him, he had been fair and helpful to this country boy making his first entry into employment in the big city. The rumor around the hangar from some of the pilots was Mr. Boudreaux had wanted to be a pilot more than anything in the world but poor eyesight and a farming accident working in the sugar cane fields when he was 13 or 14 caused him to not have full function of his left hand. I guess he accepted what fate had dealt him and felt this was the closest thing he was going to get to flying planes and he seemed to really enjoy running the Baton Rouge airport.

I opened the door before Mr. Boudreaux had a chance to knock and welcomed him inside our house. He took two steps in, stopped in the foyer, removed his fedora and apologized for coming out to our home on Sunday afternoon. “Have you heard the news on the radio,” he asked? I told him no, we missed church that morning due to a sick calf and we had just finished eating and cleaning up the dishes. He told me I’d better get my mother and if any of my sisters or brothers were around, grab them too, as he had some very important news to share. I quickly went to the kitchen and told my momma that Mr. Boudreaux from work was here and needed to see the family. “Lordy, what’s wrong now,” I remember her saying as she wiped her wet hands on a dish towel she kept hanging on a metal rack below the sink.

A couple of my sisters and one brother were still in the house drinking coffee and came out to meet Mr. Boudreaux in the living room. Once again Mr. Boudreaux apologized for interrupting family time but thought we should know what had happened that morning and how it would change things at work for me the next day. From there, he went through the grim and terrible news of what had happened at 8 am on a Naval Base called Pearl Harbor on the Pacific Island of Hawaii. I thought I had heard about Hawaii from school but I honestly couldn’t tell anyone for sure where it was. It was a world away from our little farm in East Baton Rouge Parish. At that moment if someone had told me less than a year later our country would be at war and I would be on a submarine in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, I would have said that person must have drank too much sour milk from old man Kleinpeter’s farm and it made them sick in the head.

The following week, the anger and animosity against our enemies in the Pacific Ocean, North Africa and Europe had taken over our country, including Baton Rouge. At the military recruiting station downtown, large crowds of men stood around shouting pro-American slogans and made promises about going to fight in the war to kill those murderous Japs and Germans. There were lots of men in those days standing on the sidewalks, drinking Cokes, smoking cigarettes and shooting their mouths off about what they were going to do and not do. Each day the crowds grew smaller, the tempers less severe and those eager men eased back into their daily routine and tried to forget about an event happening somewhere else. Most afternoons after work, I would see another man I knew and we would read the newspaper articles about the war and listen to the radio in the recruiter’s office. The week before Christmas we decided that if we were going to sign up, we needed to do it or get back to our regular lives and wait to see if Uncle Sam was going to draft us. We decided we needed to go and fight for our country so we went in and talked to the man from the Navy.

We answered the questions asked, completed the paperwork given and signed on the lines where we were told. I remember asking the recruiter how soon before we would leave. He looked at his watch, smiled, and said, “well there is one more train coming through later today, I can have you on it if you like.” This was real and I was acutely aware I was sweating and suddenly unsure of the decision I was about to make. The recruiter looked over at me from his desk and said, “just kidding boy, you are only 17. You can’t go anywhere until your momma signs your papers and says yes.” With that he dismissed me and said to come back the next day with my momma and be ready to get on a train and head to a basic training base in Michigan.

Momma cried when I told her what I wanted to do. I was the youngest of 12 boys and girls, barely out of school, had never been anywhere and now I wanted to leave her and go off and fight in some war. Later that evening she told me she knew eventually she couldn’t stop me from joining the Navy so she said yes. After we were to say goodbye to my sisters and brothers, she said she would go with me to the recruiting station the next day and see me off. I’m sure if I had not done it right away I probably would have chickened out but in the end, I went through with my decision.

With tears in her eyes and her hand shaking, she signed her name to the documents. Momma said yes to the recruiter when asked if she was giving her boy permission to join the Navy and go and fight in the war.

But here I was, Arthur Thomas Achord, a poor kid from Baton Rouge fighting in a war for my country and missing my momma and family very much and so homesick it hurt.  I felt tears swell up in my eyes as I tried to focus on securing the hatch and returning to the torpedo room where I was learning to be a gunner’s mate. Until a shipmate told me, I had no idea there was such a day as Mother’s Day but I knew if I was not on this piece of tin floating in these rolling waves, I would be home with my momma, eating good food, having good coffee, laughing and talking and not taking for granted the simple life I’d enjoyed before the war. I wondered if I would survive the war and one day get married and have kids of my own. If I did, how would my children and I celebrate Mother’s Day? At that moment, I wondered if I would even see my own momma again.

After I returned to the torpedo room, subdued, scared and suddenly very tired, I said a little prayer thanking God for my momma, asking God for a chance to see her again and one day have a family of my own.

Years later, God answered my prayer and together with my wife and our three kids, we would celebrate many Mother’s Days together.

From Son of a Preacher Man, by Steve Achord