Cuthbert Robinson WWII Memories

Seaman Robinson in very center, front row

My trip to Okinawa and events there

Seaman Robinson on left, taken at Camp Peary

May 30, 1945 San Fransico

Having finished his training in Camp Peary Virgina early 1945, seaman Robinson set off aboard the USS Braxton (APA -138) with the rest of his crew from San Francisco to dock in Pearl Harbor. This is his first hand account of his journey from California to his eventual destination at Okinawa, Japan. Presumably he took most of these pictures himself.

Seaman Robinson on left, taken at Camp Peary

USS Braxton (APA -138), Haskell-class attack transport.

Jeep I built body for at Camp Peary

Waiting at Camp Peary, Robinson (r)

A little time to relax

June 9, 1945 Eniwetok Island (South Pacific)

June 9th Robinson arrived at Eniwetok Island, a small atoll part of the Marshall Island Group. The atoll had been taken by the Americans in February of 1944, so by 1945 fighting had ceased by the time the USS Braxton anchored. Eniwetok Island would go onto become a testing ground for atomic bombs by the 1950s. Consider now, with climate change, most —if not all— of the Marshall Island people are loosing their ocean home to rising sea waters.

June 19, 1945 Saipan Island

Seaman Robinson arrived with the USS Braxton at Marianne Islands at Saipan on June 19. While at port for a number of days, he only goes ashore here for a brief shore leave before sailing onto Ulithi Island later on. This whole island group was the scene for a very important battles between the Japanese and Americans in 1944.

Saipan Island

June 28, 1945 Ulithi Island

For 7 months,, Ulithi was one of the biggest naval ports in the world. It also provided recreation for thousands of tired sailors. Seaman Robinson might have come on base to one of the "beer gardens" like this one pictured.

While Seaman Robinson apparently was lucky enough to escape seeing much suicide attacks from Japanese airplanes, he was now at this time in an area where such attacks were a constant danger.

July 24, 1945 Okinawa Japan

Enola Gay

Seaman Robinson arrived at his destination to the largest island he would see during the war. His job was related to the oxygen tanks used by the aircraft then. It is conceivable, but not known if he worked on or saw the Enola Gay, which would have landed there after the dropping atom bomb on Nagasaki by the B-29 Bockscar. Okinawa was still in the process of being cleared of Japanese soldiers and regular air raids from the mainland occurred frequently. Despite this state of affairs, he had the opportunity to document the people, their life, and how the war affected their homeland. One the last American ships to be sunk by a kamikaze attack, the USS Callaghan, sank on the same day Robinson arrived at Okinawa. Also going on at this time, a little to the south near the Philippines, the Japanese navy were forcing one their last great naval battles with submarines.