<Begin Segment 27>

TI: Okay, so you're, you did this extra training or additional training with the replacements, and then what happened next?

GS: Then after that we had orders to go to France, so we, our group got together and we marched and we went into Marseilles, France, and we got on these damn barges. You had to climb off these rope ladders down to these little boats that, Humphrey boats that they called them, I don't know what they... but we had to go round and around for a whole hour before everybody got off the ship, before we landed, got together and landed. Patton had already come through and took most of the Germans out of there.

TI: Oh, so you thought initially that there might be some heavy fighting...

GS: There might be fighting.

TI: ...on the beach, but it was already cleared.

GS: So when we got there, there was nothing there.

TI: You're lucky.

GS: But we get on board, then after that we had to pitch tents out in the hills and do a little basic training, and got on trains to go to, up north.

TI: And while this is happening, while you're doing this basic training and traveling, did the more experienced guys ever give you advice? Did they kind of tell you, "When the fighting happens, this is what you have to do," or, "This is what it sounds like in battle," or anything like that? Did they explain anything like that?

GS: They says, "Well, there's incoming and outgoing, and then when it's something, hit the ground," hit it. So like I say, so the first day of battle is what I have to tell you about. And so we got out --

TI: And just to give you a sense, so this is about, what, October 1944?

GS: No, this is August.

TI: Still August, okay.

GS: And going up to Epinal, so we took these trains, they go up five miles and then they would back up two miles and wait, then they go to, one of the, five, six miles and they'd back up. So it was getting, so they finally put us on trucks and trucked us to, just this side of Epinal, and from there we had to start marching. So we marched towards the hills, raining, muddy, mud's up this deep, you're walking through mud, that's where the picture shows. But most of those were all in Camp Blanding, soldiers, all recruits, Tanimachi, me, Roy Machida, Kurihara, all these. Kurihara was the first draftee and somebody else was, Kasano, short guy, but all from Camp Blanding were on this page, marching.

TI: So this picture that is really kind of well-known, kind of double file, and you're marching.

GS: So that's, the Associated Press was with us, so they took these pictures from, as we were boarding the trucks and marching down. So we got to the area, and then we had to climb that hill. Climb the hills, but the damn thing's about a forty-five degree angle, and you're trying to pull yourself up, and I couldn't get up and I had my pack, George Kanatani takes my pack, somebody else took my shovel, all I had was a rifle. Pulling myself with the tree roots, I was the last one up the hill. The damn hills are sure dang, god, I couldn't climb 'em. I'd have to rest every feet I go, and then I get another ten feet. So when I finally got up there, everybody else was already up there. But I got...

TI: But they all helped you, though, Kanatani carried your pack, somebody else took your shovel...

GS: Somebody else took my shovel.

TI: And was that kind of the spirit of the unit, that everyone would try to help each other out?

GS: Oh yeah, helped each other out.

<End Segment 27> - Copyright © 2008 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.