Customer Reviews

Heroes in Dungarees: The Story of the American Merchant Marine in World War II

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you have time to read only one book about the Merchant Marine in World War II, John Bunker's "Heroes in Dungarees" is a terrific read! Bunker's book would make a great gift for anyone --- from high school student to senior citizen.

Bunker writes with the feeling and enthusiasm of one who was there: he served in engine room crews during the War. He writes with the accomplishment of a professional writer: he was a reporter for the Christian Science Monitor and the San Diego Tribune. His writing is wonderfully easy to read as he paints wonderful pictures of wartime at sea. Bunker begins by telling us a little about the ships: the Libertys, Victorys, tankers, and Hog Islanders. He tells us about the men of the Merchant Marine and Naval Armed Guard and their life on board.

Bunker then covers World War II action by region: Atlantic Seaboard, North Atlantic, Murmansk run, Mediterranean, Caribbean, Pacific, and Indian Oceans. Each chapter starts with a broad introduction, followed by examples. The stories are well thought out, with many direct quotes from the participants or eyewitnesses. Reading the stories is almost like watching a movie: we can see the German submarine circling, the Captain's reaction when he realizes attack is imminent, the battle of outgunned merchant ship vs. raider, the moments of chaos when the torpedo hits, the abandoning of the ship, and the fight for survival on rafts and lifeboats.

Bunker gives thrilling accounts of the heroic crews of the SS Stanvac Calcutta, SS Stephen Hopkins, SS Cedar Mills, and SS Henry Bacon. He chronicles the disasters extremely well: Convoy PQ 17, the bombing at Bari, SS Jean Nicolet, SS Bienville, and the ships lost without a trace.

However, readers of Heroes in Dungarees will need a good map or globe by their side, because the major shortcoming of the book is the lack of good maps. To appreciate the experiences of the mariners, you need good maps to follow their voyages and to visualize their travails in lifeboats and rafts.

The Appendix listing U.S. ships sunk during the War would have been more useful and illustrative if it included the cause of sinking: submarine, bomber, mine, etc. as well as the date and place of sinking. I was baffled by the fact that this Appendix ended with the sinking of the SS Black Point off Rhode Island on May 5, 1945, since there were over 30 more war casualties before war's end on Dec. 31, 1946.

Anyone reading Heroes in Dungarees will wonder why the men and women of the U.S. Merchant Marine had to fight for over 40 years for recognition as veterans.

Granted, a Liberty Ship doesn't have the firepower of a battleship, the reach and awe-inspiring bulk of an aircraft carrier, or even the swashbuckling glamour of a destroyer or PT boat. Still, after reading this exhaustively researched book, it's hard to believe many Americans apparently considered merchant mariners little better than draft dodgers (one merchant sailor who'd had seven ships torpedoed out from under him was thrown out of a club for 'not being in the service'). It took nearly fifty years for them to officially be accorded 'veteran' status.

The story of World War II can't be told, the war itself couldn't have been fought, without the merchant marine. Merchant mariners, in turn, suffered a higher percentage of casualties -- nearly one in four -- than any (other) American armed service. John Bunker, himself a former merchant mariner, has produced a book that tells the merchant marine story in detail ... in an awful lot of detail, in fact. Not really a history of the Maritime Service, or of the strategy of merchant shipping, a slightly more accurate subtitle might have been 'The story of American merchant mariners in World War II.'

733 American merchant ships were lost during the war, and Bunker sometimes seems determined to tell us about every single one of them. I sometimes found myself skimming over tales that, for all their heroism and undoubted drama, still sounded similar to others he'd already told. One chapter, for example, is about ships being torpedoed and men surviving on rafts in the icy waters of the North Atlantic. The next chapter is about ships being torpedoed and men surviving on rafts in the shark-infested Caribbean. The next is about ships being torpedoed and men surviving on rafts in the trackless wastes of the Pacific. Then came the one about ships that went down in storms...

Despite the repetitive nature of some of this, however, many memorable stories do stand out. Men like Gustave Alm, Cadet Edwin O'Hara, or Rexford Dickey, or the crews of the 'Stanvac Calcutta,' the 'Stephen Hopkins' (O'Hara's ship), or the 'Cedar Mills' can rightfully take their place in any collection of genuine war heroes. I encourage any student of the war to study this story of shamefully neglected American heroes.

This book is a wonderful tribute to the Wartime valor of the US Merchant Marine. These largely unheralded heroes delivered desperately needed supplies across perilous seas to our beleagered Allies and to "Uncle Joe", the enemy of our Enemy. FDR's stated willingness to sacrifice up to 90% of convoys, with "all hands and cargoes", proved a staggeringly accurate prediction. Yet Merchant seamen and Naval Armed Guard gunners -- all volunteers -- gallantly braved the Uboats, torpedo planes, and mines, as well as freezing winter storms and other hazards of the sea to fulfill their duty. Without them, the War could not have been won. They deserve recognition, and this marvelous book provides it! Here are their own descriptions of sailing, camaraderie, and life aboard ship. Here too are their harrowing anecdotes of war, heroism, and loss. My father was skipper of a freighter and a survivor of the Murmansk runs, and these stories remind me of his. "Heroes in Dungarees" would make a great gift. I intend to give copies to all my family and friends! Anyone who appreciates the subject of this book will also enjoy Humphrey Bogart's "Action in the North Atlantic" and Jan DeHartog's novel "Captain".

Bunker provides a valuable insight to the USMM in World War II. The book is wonderful to read and feels as if you are there. Bunker also gives important insight to less remembered theatres of war like the Indian Ocean and Caribbean. The only possible error I found was the number of the U-Boat that sunk the USAT Dorchester I believe it was U-223, although I could be wrong. VERY WELL written book. Kudos to John Bunker.

Heroes in Dungares is a wonderful book depicting the 'forgottn', the Armed Guard US Sailors and the Merchant Marines. My husband was on the Henry Knox" June 19,1942 when it was torpedoed and the account in this book was like reading my husbands diary!! My husband was so impressed he purchased several of the books and sent them to his Navy buddies, and have given them to our grandchildren. Than you John Bunker for remembering the unmentionable. Sincerely, Annie Pauro

This book is an outstanding read! I'm only 4/10 of the way through it but I CAN'T PUT IT DOWN! I learn something new on every other page. This is not just a recitation of 733 ships going down in chronological order, the author does group similar events together to show the reader ways of survival or defence, while generally proceeding thru the WW2. He will talk about a theatre of the war giving a fortaste of events and ships involved, and later tell in detail specific adventures in this convoy or that, then move on to the next theatre. He covers ships other than Libertys and Victorys, such as Hog Islanders and foreign ships. Until reading this book, I never knew that countries under German domination (Poland, among others) had ships in our convoys! Or that Britain sent ships to the USA to protect OUR shores. One minor gripe: I wish he had included a column in the ship appendix to show which convoy a ship was in. It's hard to keep track of a certain convoy without it. It's well footnoted with his sources too.

At some times and places during World War I, an Allied merchant seaman stood considerably less than half a chance of coming back alive. Yet, according to John Bunker, no ship ever was held in port for lack of a crew.
"Keep 'em sailing" was the motto of the merchant navy, and it did, in the face of appalling difficulties.
The least of these, perhaps, was arriving at, say, Dubai, and swinging on the hook for two months, waiting to unload, with no shore leave, no drinks, no women and no recreation.
The worst, probably, was being adrift on a raft in moderate weather. Although there were magnificent feats of boat handling, and some survivors of sinkings made it to safety after six or seven weeks afloat, uncountable men perished of sun, thirst, hunger or sharks after days or weeks of suffering.
Somewhere in between, and very common, was the outlook when a ship was lost in the North Atlantic in winter. Death came here, too, but quickly.
It was worse to be sunk by the Japanese, who always tried to massacre the shipwrecked crews (and torture them, too, when they got the chance), than the Germans, who didn't.
Bunker, a seaman during the war and later a newspaper reporter, has gathered together hundreds of representative experiences, and a few that are almost hard to believe. For instance, that anybody would ship out with Zosimo Tabudlong or Jan Hoogerwerf, who were torpedoed five times during the war.
Submarines were the deadliest enemy of the cargo ship or tanker, although in narrow waters airplanes and mines were a threat. And storms and reefs always.
The spirit and heroism of the crews -- Bunker sticks to Americans, but the story was the same with men from many nations -- was remarkable. In the whole war, only one U.S. Navy surface warship was lost with all hands. It happened scores, if not hundreds, of times to the merchantmen.
It required courage to ride a ship full of explosives into waters where one's own navy was afraid to go. Some of the ship explosions during the war were equivalent to about a tenth of a Hiroshima atomic bomb.
Bunker presents the story as almost unvarnished valor. There was plenty of that, but these were ordinary men.
After the first few months of the war, merchant ships sailed with a Naval (occasionally Army) Armed Guard, who manned a deck gun and an anti-aircraft gun or two. The merchant sailors, who were unionized, were paid several times as much as the Navy men (mostly draftees), and there was ill feeling about that; although Bunker, who wrote an unpublished history of the Seafarers International Union, doesn't mention it.
More to the point for landlubbers was the behavior of tourist businessmen along the Atlantic Coast in 1942. Although the lights of the hotels made perfect background for German U-boats hunting at night, the resort owners used their considerable political clout to keep the lights on. Many workingmen died for that.
Bunker tells the tales in undramatic newspaper style.

This is not a scholarly work but rather, this book is a marvelous collection of wartime sea stories.