Gerald Powers White, TM3

I reported onboard the USS FRANK E. EVANS (DD 754) as a Torpedoman’s Mate 3rd Class (TM3) on 10 February 1969 in Long Beach, California. I joined the Navy in 1967 and my first assignment was the USS Somers (DDG 34), a brand new Guided Missile Destroyer that was still being built in Hunter’s Point Naval Shipyard in San Francisco, California. The Somers had changed home ports to Long Beach and I literary walked across the pier from a state of the art destroyer to relic from World War II. I went from aluminum bunks with lights and individual lockers under a thick mattress to a stretch canvas bunk with a small locker on the deck. My berthing area was in the stern of the ship just forward of the After Steering compartment. We would sleep to the vibration of the screws and awakened every time the ship changed speed.

On the way to Vietnam, I will always remember being in Pearl Harbor and watching Japanese Zeros flying over the harbor for the movie “TORA, TORA, TORA.” (My son later joined the Navy as a Corpsman, and was stationed in Pearl Harbor during the filming of the movie “Pearl Harbor”. He too remembers seeing Zeros and dogfights over the harbor.)

The Evans then sailed to Yokosuka, Japan where I bought a Bolivia diving watch which I still have but no longer works and a 35mm camera. We only stayed there a couple of days but long enough to visit a Japanese Bath House and get chased out of a bar.

Our next homeport was Subic Bay in the Philippines. As a single 19 year old sailor, I often went to Olongapo City and did a lot of what young sailors are known for doing. This included drinking warm San Miguel beer, eating monkey meat on the street and other activities.

After arriving on the firing line off the coast of Vietnam, we saw artillery rounds creeping from the shoreline toward our position. We and the Army were shooting at the same ridgeline and it was determined that the U. S. Army was over-shooting their target and getting closer to us. Shortly after that, we had a visit from an Australian cost watcher. While he was meeting with our Captain, the crew of his small boat showed us a sea snake they had caught and then did some waterskiing around our ship.

I won’t say it was hot in Vietnam but during the day the bulkheads would sweat and even the cold water in the showers was warm.

As I mentioned earlier, my berthing area was in the stern of the ship just below the after gun mount. Every time the gun fired, crap would fall out of the overhead and on to our bunks. One day a turret pin busted in the after gun mount and we did not have a replacement. We had to hand transfer all the ammunition from the after gun mount to the forward gun mounts until a replacement pin arrived.

As a Torpedomen, my General Quarters position was amidship on the torpedo deck but my watch station while underway or anchored was in the sonar room in the forward part of the ship, right behind the bridge. I remember being on watch and picking up small arms fire from the beach on the sonar scope. We could also see the tracer rounds at night. On the night of the accident, I was relieved of sonar duty and returned to my bunk in the after part of the ship. At around 3am I was thrown out of my bunk on to the deck and had 3 people on top of me. It felt like we had hit a log but there was no vibrations and no engine noise. I remember hearing the After Steering Watch yelling into his sound powered phone that he had control to the ship. After a few seconds, someone said to get up to the main deck. We did this in a quick and orderly manor since the emergency lights were working and the ship was still. There seemed to be a little more confusing on the main deck as we tried to determine what had happened. My instinct was to go to my battle station on the Torpedo deck. When I arrived there, I only saw one torpedo mount and then nothing but darkness. If I had walked a few feet further, I would have fell onto the ocean. I must have went into shock because I don’t remember anything except just standing there staring into the darkness where the front of the ship should have been.

After being nudged by a fellow shipmate, I realized it was time to move. By this time the HMAS Melbourne was next to us on our port side with a cargo net hanging down to the after section of the Evans. I climbed up the cargo net and joined the rest of the survivors aboard the Melbourne. I spent a couple of days on the Melbourne before transferring to the USS Kearsarge (CV 33) and then returning to Subic Bay.