Veteran Interview with Dan Miller (A)
Mr. Miller describes his experiences in Army basic training before shipping overseas during World War II. (9:04)Florence-Lauderdale Public Library Digital Archive Interview with Dan Miller June 24, 2011 Florence, Alabama Conducted by Clint Alley and Rhonda Haygood Also present are Mr. Miller’s wife,...
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| Format: | Electronic |
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Florence-Lauderdale County Public Library
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| Online Access: | https://cdm15947.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/war/id/137 |
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Electronic |
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War Years at Home and Abroad Collection |
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Florence-Lauderdale County Public Library |
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Florence-Lauderdale County Public Library |
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Military life |
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Military life Veteran Interview with Dan Miller (A) Florence-Lauderdale Public Library |
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Military life World War 1939-1945; Military training |
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Mr. Miller describes his experiences in Army basic training before shipping overseas during World War II. (9:04)Florence-Lauderdale Public Library Digital Archive
Interview with Dan Miller
June 24, 2011
Florence, Alabama
Conducted by Clint Alley and Rhonda Haygood
Also present are Mr. Miller’s wife, Winnie Miller and his son, Larry Miller
Clip 1
Clint Alley: All right, well, today is June 24, 2011. I’m Clint Alley with Rhonda Haygood and we’re here with Mr. Dan Miller. He’s a World War II veteran; he’s gonna tell us about his service, there. Ah, Mr. Miller we’d like to start out by asking you, “When and where were you born?”
Dan Miller: I was born in Mississippi in 1921. Out in the country; grew up in the country and finished high school out there in a small high school, had 11 seniors. And graduated in 1942, that’s during the war.
CA: Um-hm.
DM: They didn’t pull me out of high school, but they didn’t wait, wait long that summer till they got me.
CA: Oh, okay.
DM: So, anyway, I entered the service in 1942. Went to Camp Shelby, Mississippi and stayed there for about a couple of weeks and they shipped me to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Stayed there about a month or so for basic. And then they shipped me to Tampa, Florida, in the sand, for more basic, marching and doing the about-face in sand and that was hard.
CA: Hm.
DM: And at night we slept in tents and then the next morning, while we was in that area, you’d get up in the morning and turn your head over and the sand would fall out of your ears, so we, we had to keep our head covered at night just keeping the sand off. And it was kind of, that was part of the training. And that’s where we did a lot of training in breaking down our rifles; we was using M-1, Army M-1s at that time, and we had to tear them down and take them apart. So many times that we could take it apart and blindfold us and feel for the parts and know where they go. Because they stressed to us that if you fall out there in the, in the war zone, get the guns dirty, that gun’s no good to you. You know how to put it together, clean it, put it together, ready to shoot. That was, ah, that was part of the basic and that’s when I knew I was in the army. But, anyway, well I could go all the way into they shipped me from there to Chicago, to the Chicago Technical Institute for basic, for my training in, ah, communications. And I was Morse Code; they put me on that because I played the guitar and I could distinguish tones and that’s what they‘d tested me for and then you can learn the dots and dashes in the communications, so that’s where I learned to do, to do all that. That’s where I learned to train. From there, I’ll just give you the history of the company.
CA: Okay.
[Mr. Miller reads from a written summary of the history of his company.]
DM: The history of 421st Signal Company Aviation began in Bolling Field, in Washington, D.C. in early ’42, 1942. Early part of ’43, cadre of enlisted men moved to Camp Pinedale, Fresno, California. The company grew from day to day and men coming in from various Army schools and basic trainings met there. In 1942, let me go back to this, we had a Army soldier, Wolfskill, and was in our service and he married a lady in Washington, D.C. in 19—later in, during the service, after the war or whatever, but she was, in 1942, when they started the Signal Unit, she was the technician that wrote down the Army, German Army code to learn how to operate their, to, ah, find out what they was saying and everything [unintelligible] and so she helped develop that code for the United States to make our own code that, I operated a radio operators, I was a operator to code the messages on Morse Code where they could, could not understand it and developed a computer, I’d say then at that time, it was a computer, it was a machine that would decode, you know, when we’d send a message to a company they’d have a machine that they could take the code and decode it where they’d know what the, where we could commute without the Germans finding out.
CA: Wow.
Rhonda Haygood: Ah.
DM: Okay, with the table of organization, go back to the, to the company, the table of organization near the field, we started our first problem, simulate actual conditions of war that we would face and actual field combat. The training site was Eucalyptus Grove, twenty miles from Pinedale in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. Here actual signal operations was set up; we immediately began operations with Camp Pinedale. I remained at camp myself to take the messages; I did not go on the training in the mountains. I wish I had, cause I was, I was on the base by myself with the radio operator in the buildings, nobody in the camp for a month but myself. So it was just boring. I’d rather been up there in the mountains. While we was at Camp Pinedale we, we manned the camp there and, and just, you know, practiced and everything on our communications and learned how to speed—learned how operate that machine a little better, the code and learning—I didn’t know typing before I went in there and the Army taught me to type. And part of that training when we’d do it up there, course, we didn’t have the batteries and communication that we have now, so in order to get some power, they, they had a machine, they developed a machine that generated electricity. You know what the old spinning wheels looked like? We’d set a-spraddle of that thing and p—like a bicycle, and pedal our feet hard and fast enough to turn that generator to make electricity. And you talking about hard to pump! You couldn’t stay on it but about three minutes and you’d have to switch partners and let somebody else get on it for about three minutes to get enough electricity going. Anyway, that’s just part of the training that we went through at that time. And while we was in camp there we fired our weapons and took our training in machine guns, ah operating. And I made expert in machine guns because I—I think I tricked them, because I, I’d hit, just hit the trigger and let it hit four or five shots and while I was aimed on it and then I’d cut off and I’d aim again, so I made expert on it. So anyway, ah, I had fun doing it. They didn’t know that. But anyway, on June 18, 1943 we moved to Silver Lake, sixty miles—that’s talking about the camp group and stuff, I stayed at the camp, but the group went to sixty miles from Camp Pinedale and set up a campsite and became, it was known as Camp [unintelligible] establishing communication with Camp Pinedale with me. Later we broke camp and headed back down to Pinedale where we took more training and we had to, ah, experience gas. We had our full pack with a gasmask in it, they put us in a tent, so we had to hold our breath, they didn’t tell us when they was going to turn the gas on us. When we smelled gas, we had to go into our pack, get our mask on, put it on, we had to hold our breath that long, sometimes it seemed like it was four or five minutes, but I think I got mine on in about one and a half or two minutes. But, anyway, you knew you had to get it on there or you had to run out to get to the door, one. But anyway we, of course we had to take training in scaling the walls, you know, physical training and sliding under barbed wire fences, barbed wire up there’s about [Mr. Miller indicated the height of the barbed wire as about 3 feet off the ground] down on our hands and knees and you had to do it in a certain length of time, you had to scrambled across that thing. Anyway, and we had to jump big puddled water, and then we went on a ten mile hike and the temperature there was 115˚ in Pinedale, California when we went on a ten mile hike with a full pack and one container of water, you know you’ve seen these army containers, that’s all we had—
CA: Golly.
DM: —for the day. And he wanted us to tank up on water before you leave, drink every drop of water you can drink and put in your stomach before you leave. They, they warned us that. And it was hard just to make it with that. But, anyway, I survived it. While we was on that hike, I’ll tell you this personal thing, one of my buddies on the side of me was walking with me with his pack, he was smaller than I was. I was pretty well physical, I, I didn’t weigh but 140 pounds, but I was, I’d played basketball and first one thing and another and he wasn’t that strong and he was just about to pass out walking so I reached and got his pack and put it on mine and carried his pack for him.
CA: Oh, my goodness.
DM: Yeah, he was, he was about to go down. |
| title |
Veteran Interview with Dan Miller (A) |
| titleStr |
Veteran Interview with Dan Miller (A) |
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Florence-Lauderdale Public Library |
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Florence-Lauderdale Public Library |
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FLCPLwar137 |
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https://cdm15947.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/war/id/137 |
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http://cdm15947.contentdm.oclc.org/utils/getthumbnail/collection/war/id/137 |
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1705462192790306816 |
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Veteran Interview with Dan Miller (A)World War 1939-1945; Military trainingMr. Miller describes his experiences in Army basic training before shipping overseas during World War II. (9:04)Florence-Lauderdale Public LibraryFlorence-Lauderdale Public LibraryDan Miller2011-06-24sound; textaudio/mp3; text/pdfEnglishPart of the Florence-Lauderdale Public Library CollectionMay be protected by U.S. Copyright laws. Contact the Florence-Lauderdale Public Library for permission to use.Florence-Lauderdale Public Library Digital Archive
Interview with Dan Miller
June 24, 2011
Florence, Alabama
Conducted by Clint Alley and Rhonda Haygood
Also present are Mr. Miller’s wife, Winnie Miller and his son, Larry Miller
Clip 1
Clint Alley: All right, well, today is June 24, 2011. I’m Clint Alley with Rhonda Haygood and we’re here with Mr. Dan Miller. He’s a World War II veteran; he’s gonna tell us about his service, there. Ah, Mr. Miller we’d like to start out by asking you, “When and where were you born?”
Dan Miller: I was born in Mississippi in 1921. Out in the country; grew up in the country and finished high school out there in a small high school, had 11 seniors. And graduated in 1942, that’s during the war.
CA: Um-hm.
DM: They didn’t pull me out of high school, but they didn’t wait, wait long that summer till they got me.
CA: Oh, okay.
DM: So, anyway, I entered the service in 1942. Went to Camp Shelby, Mississippi and stayed there for about a couple of weeks and they shipped me to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Stayed there about a month or so for basic. And then they shipped me to Tampa, Florida, in the sand, for more basic, marching and doing the about-face in sand and that was hard.
CA: Hm.
DM: And at night we slept in tents and then the next morning, while we was in that area, you’d get up in the morning and turn your head over and the sand would fall out of your ears, so we, we had to keep our head covered at night just keeping the sand off. And it was kind of, that was part of the training. And that’s where we did a lot of training in breaking down our rifles; we was using M-1, Army M-1s at that time, and we had to tear them down and take them apart. So many times that we could take it apart and blindfold us and feel for the parts and know where they go. Because they stressed to us that if you fall out there in the, in the war zone, get the guns dirty, that gun’s no good to you. You know how to put it together, clean it, put it together, ready to shoot. That was, ah, that was part of the basic and that’s when I knew I was in the army. But, anyway, well I could go all the way into they shipped me from there to Chicago, to the Chicago Technical Institute for basic, for my training in, ah, communications. And I was Morse Code; they put me on that because I played the guitar and I could distinguish tones and that’s what they‘d tested me for and then you can learn the dots and dashes in the communications, so that’s where I learned to do, to do all that. That’s where I learned to train. From there, I’ll just give you the history of the company.
CA: Okay.
[Mr. Miller reads from a written summary of the history of his company.]
DM: The history of 421st Signal Company Aviation began in Bolling Field, in Washington, D.C. in early ’42, 1942. Early part of ’43, cadre of enlisted men moved to Camp Pinedale, Fresno, California. The company grew from day to day and men coming in from various Army schools and basic trainings met there. In 1942, let me go back to this, we had a Army soldier, Wolfskill, and was in our service and he married a lady in Washington, D.C. in 19—later in, during the service, after the war or whatever, but she was, in 1942, when they started the Signal Unit, she was the technician that wrote down the Army, German Army code to learn how to operate their, to, ah, find out what they was saying and everything [unintelligible] and so she helped develop that code for the United States to make our own code that, I operated a radio operators, I was a operator to code the messages on Morse Code where they could, could not understand it and developed a computer, I’d say then at that time, it was a computer, it was a machine that would decode, you know, when we’d send a message to a company they’d have a machine that they could take the code and decode it where they’d know what the, where we could commute without the Germans finding out.
CA: Wow.
Rhonda Haygood: Ah.
DM: Okay, with the table of organization, go back to the, to the company, the table of organization near the field, we started our first problem, simulate actual conditions of war that we would face and actual field combat. The training site was Eucalyptus Grove, twenty miles from Pinedale in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. Here actual signal operations was set up; we immediately began operations with Camp Pinedale. I remained at camp myself to take the messages; I did not go on the training in the mountains. I wish I had, cause I was, I was on the base by myself with the radio operator in the buildings, nobody in the camp for a month but myself. So it was just boring. I’d rather been up there in the mountains. While we was at Camp Pinedale we, we manned the camp there and, and just, you know, practiced and everything on our communications and learned how to speed—learned how operate that machine a little better, the code and learning—I didn’t know typing before I went in there and the Army taught me to type. And part of that training when we’d do it up there, course, we didn’t have the batteries and communication that we have now, so in order to get some power, they, they had a machine, they developed a machine that generated electricity. You know what the old spinning wheels looked like? We’d set a-spraddle of that thing and p—like a bicycle, and pedal our feet hard and fast enough to turn that generator to make electricity. And you talking about hard to pump! You couldn’t stay on it but about three minutes and you’d have to switch partners and let somebody else get on it for about three minutes to get enough electricity going. Anyway, that’s just part of the training that we went through at that time. And while we was in camp there we fired our weapons and took our training in machine guns, ah operating. And I made expert in machine guns because I—I think I tricked them, because I, I’d hit, just hit the trigger and let it hit four or five shots and while I was aimed on it and then I’d cut off and I’d aim again, so I made expert on it. So anyway, ah, I had fun doing it. They didn’t know that. But anyway, on June 18, 1943 we moved to Silver Lake, sixty miles—that’s talking about the camp group and stuff, I stayed at the camp, but the group went to sixty miles from Camp Pinedale and set up a campsite and became, it was known as Camp [unintelligible] establishing communication with Camp Pinedale with me. Later we broke camp and headed back down to Pinedale where we took more training and we had to, ah, experience gas. We had our full pack with a gasmask in it, they put us in a tent, so we had to hold our breath, they didn’t tell us when they was going to turn the gas on us. When we smelled gas, we had to go into our pack, get our mask on, put it on, we had to hold our breath that long, sometimes it seemed like it was four or five minutes, but I think I got mine on in about one and a half or two minutes. But, anyway, you knew you had to get it on there or you had to run out to get to the door, one. But anyway we, of course we had to take training in scaling the walls, you know, physical training and sliding under barbed wire fences, barbed wire up there’s about [Mr. Miller indicated the height of the barbed wire as about 3 feet off the ground] down on our hands and knees and you had to do it in a certain length of time, you had to scrambled across that thing. Anyway, and we had to jump big puddled water, and then we went on a ten mile hike and the temperature there was 115˚ in Pinedale, California when we went on a ten mile hike with a full pack and one container of water, you know you’ve seen these army containers, that’s all we had—
CA: Golly.
DM: —for the day. And he wanted us to tank up on water before you leave, drink every drop of water you can drink and put in your stomach before you leave. They, they warned us that. And it was hard just to make it with that. But, anyway, I survived it. While we was on that hike, I’ll tell you this personal thing, one of my buddies on the side of me was walking with me with his pack, he was smaller than I was. I was pretty well physical, I, I didn’t weigh but 140 pounds, but I was, I’d played basketball and first one thing and another and he wasn’t that strong and he was just about to pass out walking so I reached and got his pack and put it on mine and carried his pack for him.
CA: Oh, my goodness.
DM: Yeah, he was, he was about to go down.http://server15947.contentdm.oclc.org/u?/war,137 |