C.G. "Guy" Langwell
- The following letter was received from C.G. Langwell, Mo. M.M. 2/c. by the Glen Haydens, last week:
- Dear Folks:
- Maybe you've wondered why I did not write sooner, but there just wasn't any thing to write about. And it really made me hump to write to Lois and my mother once in a while.
- Well, it has been a long way here but maybe it won't be so far back. We're in Tokyo Bay and this minesweeper was the first ship to enter the harbor. Am sending you the article below about it. It tells all about it a lot better than I possibly can, so I won't attempt to improve it.
- Lois wanted a set of Jap chop sticks and I got her a set off a Jap battleship that almost got us once. But as I told her, we don't have to worry about anything like that now.
- The navy has a point system but unless they change it, I still have eight months to serve. So I really don't know when I will get home.
The following is the press release concerning the U.S.S. Tumult, sent with the letter:
- Tokyo Harbor, Aug. 28 -- When the sun's early-morning rays reached across Tokyo and bathed gigantic Fujiyama in light, four fleet minesweepers followed by a host of smaller sweepers cautiously poked their noses through the headlands into Tokyo Harbor, the first mighty Japanese stronghold destined for occupation by Admiral Halsey's 3rd Fleet.
- Thus away from the protecting armament of the battleships, cruisers, and destroyers these ships paved the way for the fleet that was soon to follow, and by the same token becames the first naval vessels to enter Tokyo Harbor since the cessation of hostilities.
- While there was every reason to believe that the Japanese had no intentions other than passively allowing the ships to proceed unmolested with their assigned duties, the officers and men who composed this first foray couldn't help but glance warily at the well fortified shore still in the hands of the beaten enemy.
- But suspicions of treachery were quickly allayed by the pall of inactivity, peace and quiet which pervaded the atmosphere around the villages, military barracks and war industries lining the bay.
- It was indeed a picture of total defeat.
- With gear streamed in echelon formation, the first four ships, the REVENGE, TOKEN, TUMULT and POCHARD swept up the bay toward Yokosuka and thence to the vicinity of Yokahama, leaving behind them a swath of water free from mines.
- Few inhabitants were to be seen. Most of the settlements, relatively untouched by Allied bombing raids, seemed either to be abandoned or populated indoors. The sloping roofs covered with gray, unpainted, wooden-housed districts which surrounded camouflaged cement factories, only a short while ago bustling with activity.
- Occasionally a knot of curious Japanese formed to watch the proceedings without any apparent emotion.
- As the ships continued up the harbor, the full destruction wrought by our bombs became apparent. Industrial centers, business districts, and military installations were battered, smoke-stained shells.
- The cement forts and pillboxes strategically placed in the center of the harbor were leveled in the shapeless forms of cement blocks. Aground on a reef in the middle of the stream was an abandoned Wakatako class destroyer, her decks awash to port. Another small ship was a jumbled mass of steel, with her nose resting on the bottom.
- Even to those who had never seen Yokohama before and had no means of comparison, the skyline appeared nearly leveled.
- However, atop one ten-story remnant close to the water appeared a strange paradox. There in full view for all to see were printed the words "3 Cheers U.S. Navy." When the sign became visible, the men on deck suddenly broke out as if in one accord into a huge cheer.
- It was the first sign of friendliness in this lifeless sullen country.
- The nearest ship preceived, however, that all was not as it should be, for three parachutes were noticed nearby. One chute was hung on a crane. A mirror flashed and it became apparent that our own flyers had parachuted there.
- H.L. Barnes, a signalman aboard the TUMULT, from Hopewell, Va., leaped to the light and blinked back slowly, "Help is arriving." The mirror dot-dashed back "Roger" -- your message received.
- Help was indeed on its way.
- Some of the shattered remains of the Imperial Fleet showed themselves. The flag of the Rising Sun was still fluttering silently from the mainmast of the once powerful battleship Nagato, now reduced to a rusty, battered hulk. The remains of a cruiser were tied to a dock.
- The minesweeper had trouble in clearing out fleet anchorage because of sunken ships and other unchartered objects. The bulk of Japanese shipping in the harbor was surely on the bottom.
- When the job was done, Destroyer minesweepers which up to now had been clearing a mine area at the mouth of the harbor led the way and the Third Fleet, reported to the Japanese people by their government as sunk off Formosa last year steamed majestically in.
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