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Thu, 3 Apr 2003
LIBCONNER to: Milton W. BUSH
PT Ron 19, 23
The Skipper Speaks
A WWII Chronicle of William Raney
Robert Ankers
Robert Ankers was the senior radar officer for an MTB squadron. He was with RON 19 and when it was decommissioned (as you have in your treatise) on May 15, l944,, he went to RON 23 where he was until being ordered back to the States in August 44. He also told me about the "black cats" and how they patrolled at night over to Rabaul. He has an interesting story about finding out his brother was to be at Guadalcanal and a black cat flew him down there. He spent 4 days hunting, only to find the boat the brother was on just as it was departing.
They lived in tents at the PT base and SeaBees built floors for some of them (called by them "hotels"). Of course they had to sleep by day as they patrolled by night and it was HOT. The tents (or at least some of them) were pyramid tents with 8 cots and that was the type he slept in with JFK, not at Green Islands, however.
The SeaBees also built some docks for the boats, but they tied the boats to coconut trees with 3 inch rope, using 2 lines, bow and stern, per boat.
His three best friends were: Bob Helsby and William Raney of RON 19 and Ed Parker of RON 23. Ed was the radar man for 23.
Raney compiled his daily chronicles and some letters from his wife into a volume: The Skipper Speaks. I have brought it home to Xerox two pages of names --there are 2 names for each boat in 19 and the ones of 19 after they went into 23. It appears hastily typed on an old typerwriter. 10 type, many misprints and often a bad ribbon, enough to slow you down. (It was a daily chronicle which Raney wrote out in hand and then typed on an old typewriter as he got a chance.) 142 pages are diary, 60 of them from the Green Islands. The last nine pages are handwritten. I have glanced thruough to see what he says during the Green Islands period. There are detailed descriptions of every patrol (he must have kept a diary because he couldn't remember such detail) but nothing I could find which describes any layout, e.g. he goes to refuel but it doesnt say where.) Then his wife's letters and a few of his own which seem to end before he goes overseas.