Densho Digital Repository - Katsugo Miho Interview V (Densho ID: ddr-densho-1022-5-3)

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MN: You know, as an artilleryman, you're handling, you know, charges and everything. Were there any instances where you folks got hurt?

KM: Fortunately, we did... the 105 Howitzer was pretty safe in terms of mechanical maladjustments, but the 155 gun, which was a bigger gun, and it wasn't a Howitzer, it was a gun, it fired a bigger projectile. But that gun was well-known to have what they call a muzzle burst. A muzzle burst is when the projectile would burst as it leaves the gun. And so they were, when this happens, you would almost have some casualties of the gun crew. But the 155 gun was supposed to be very unreliable in that regard. But they always, always were firing further back than we were. They had a greater capacity of firing the projectile. And so there was a long range gun, but it was very, it had a bad reputation.

MN: Then I've been told that sometimes when you're doing artillery, and you're shooting a lot, the barrel of the gun gets really hot.

KM: Well, the Hill 140 is a good example. The barrels of our guns became so hot that we had to stop firing. We had to stop firing on a gun to let it cool off a little bit, and the other three guns would fire. But it was so hot you couldn't touch the barrel, you would get burned. And we thought, well, how can you... so we tried a couple of times. What we did was we would lower the gun barrel a little bit, and we poured water in the barrel to see if it would help cooling off the gun. But it never did help at all, basically, when the gun was too hot. So we just had to let it idle and cool off by itself. But that's how bad it was during the 140. And as I said, 105 Howitzer had two legs, so to speak, which would brace the gun from the recoil. But the natural recoil, the old World War I guns, it had no recoil, the gun would jump back, and there was a recoil. But as you would see on the, remember the pirate ships, you would see the gun, the gun will be rolling back, ten feet back, and then they would roll it back forward. Well, the 105 had a recoil system where the gun barrel would recoil. The 105 cannon with the cannon company had no recoil, but there wasn't that much of a difference. But that was a short distance gun. But the 105 had a recoil mechanism, which was a big help. But as I said, 140 was, we were firing so many rounds that the guns had to be always readjusted, we had to brace up the two shovels that we have in the back of the guns and re-engage the gun, re-registering the gun because of the fierce firing that we constantly, without rest. As I said, the twenty-four hour period, we fired close to five thousand rounds and you figure twenty-four hours and five thousand, you can just imagine how badly we were.

MN: With so many rounds being shot off, whose responsibility, whose responsibility was it to be providing you folks with all these rounds?

KM: We had one service battery, we had five batteries, headquarters battery, three gun batteries, and one service battery. It was the job of the service battery to keep us supplied with ammunition. It was their job to make sure that we were fully supplied. The only time we didn't have adequate shortage of fire was sometime in France, sometime in France, I remember there was a shortage of ammunition and it was rationed out so to speak. But the rationed out didn't affect us, the 522, because the 522 was the outfit to which whatever available shell was given first, we received the ammunition first, because the 442 was always in the forefront of any battle. And when the 100th was first put into battle, it was always the frontal battalion leading the Americans, but 100th would only move as far as both flanks keep up with them. They're the lead attacking battalion. You can go just so far because if you go too far up and without your, both flanks undefended, they would be encircled completely. A good example as I understand it, in the Battle of Cassino, the 100th had reached their objectives, but both sides were unable to do so, so they had to come back and withdraw. My best recollection is on three different occasions, the 100th had met their objective, but they had to withdraw again because both of their flanks did not keep up with them and prolonged the Battle of Cassino as a result. But in the case of the 442, you had three battalions, and we were able to protect our both flanks with our own group, which in the battle like in France with all of the, being in the forest, you know, it was not a big battle area. It was in confined battlefields, like wide open fields like in Italy.

MN: You know, before we get into France, say like at Hill 140 where the fighting was so intense, I was just wondering, how did all that firing affect the artillery men who are so close to the equipment? Say your hearing or in other ways affect you?

KM: Well, from maneuvers, from training, we got exposed to all this cannon fire. And we did not realize until after we got discharged and all that, that if, that there was anything wrong with our hearing, but we learned, like in my case, I'm the closest to the gun barrel, the breech. And every time the gun is fired, I would open my mouth to offset the concussion. And it didn't seem to bother me until years after discharge and among the, talk among the veterans, you know, "You should go and get your hearing checked," and all that. But the Veterans Administration very early did not recognize the fact that the ringing in the ears of the veterans was the cause of, was caused by all the gunfire. Years later, the Veterans changed their policy and became very liberal in recognizing the fact that the ringing of the ear and the gradual, early loss of hearing was due to all the gunfire. But it took them a long time to recognize this fact.