Biography of Lee LeBlanc
CCC Man, Company 6418, Camp No. S220, Corvallis Arboretum, Corvalis, Oregon
PFC, A Troop, 1st Squadron, 12th Cavalry Regiment, First Cavalry Division, WWII, US Army
I was born and raised in the country in South Louisiana. Thibodaux, on the Westbank, is where I was located. In the hard days of the depression, we was eating grass. The people next door had a big cabbage patch, I would go over there and steal it so we could eat. The Trust used to go by and give momma a sack of flour, 24 lbs, and she would make bread. Put two cabbage between it and some salt and thats what you took to school for your lunch. Depression was hard some places more than others. In the city people worked in the WPA. My Dad worked for the WPA. Fed our family. The whole world was in depression. Stock market got down to zero, if that happens again we would be in a deep depression. Before I went to the CCC camp, we were living like animals then. We didn't have a house, no clothes, no nothing. So it was pretty rough.
I joined the C's in the last part of 40. 1940. The CCC camp was the thing for the young men in those days. There was no work, the depression was on. The CCCs gave men some kind of work. It was put on by President Roosevelt, we were making $21 a month good enough for cigs toothpaste, half of that I sent to my mother. We were in the hard days of the depression, it was tough on my family. I can tell you that.
I was in four camps, (then) we got on this troop train went to Corvallis Oregon. It was all over the country. I didn't know that.
We went out by train, ate slept on it, never got off that thing. We was up high right before we got into mountains, high up, snow all over the place. Little bitty bears running along the tracks. We threw them bread. I thought that was wonderful.
Now the Company I was in was 6418 , Camp Number S-220, Camp Arboretum, near Corvallis, Oregon. We were 250 men in the camp. Camp was something like I've never seen before. But after I got in the army, when I was drafted, well then I knew what the CCC camp was all about. We had four large barracks, in between the barracks, more or less to the South or whatever, we had another big barrack where you could play pool and buy cigarettes and stuff like that. To the North, that was the big kitchen (and mess hall), just as long as our barracks, you see. And then in between the recreation hall and the kitchen we had barrack one, two, then cross over, you had three, four, and then in the middle of all that was, that's where my offices used to be. And the man that I had was Captain Arthur Brooks. He was the captain of the CCC camp and he had a house that he was living in up on the hill, a little bit more to the right and that's where he was at with his wife, I guess, or whatever he had, but his office was right in the middle of the camp. It was nice. I was in Barracks number two and Barracks number four with the medics really, all up and down in there, because I came down with the mumps and they put me in that thing and I mean I had it on both sides. I was puffed up like a 400 pound hog. (laugh).
I sent a picture home to my mother and my family. The way we lived back in them days, you had an armoire where your clothes were folded and stacked in there. If you wanted to wear something, you had to dig and dig. It was awful. And there was no clothes hangers to be and this and that. We're not saying that --- lied around that house, not that, if they could fold that picture up and get a cardboard tube they'd stick it in there and seal it on both ends, we'd have it today. But they didn't have none of that, so I'm glad I've got, what's left of it is very, very poor.
We would go into town. We had to be back 11 O'clock rules regulations. I had a girlfriend up there. When I got into the camp I was only 16. Cybill Hanson. She had a brother that used to be in the symphony orchestra, Jack. When WWII hit us in the butt, the symphony up and busted up.
The group before we were going into town Friday Saturday night like we were. One of them missed the truck back to camp. It was six miles, he got killed. No traffic was there, what killed him I do not know.
I missed a truck one of those nights. R. C. Carroll was our cook (I understand that in Corvallis, Oregon, there is still a Carroll in that city), he brought me to the camp a couple times, but one time I had to walk back to my camp. Nothing out there just wilderness, and a rail road track. I had to walk six miles. Only thing that disturbed the silence was me walking, smoking my cigarette. Then I could hear those wolves howling, and howling, getting closer to where I was at. Didn't take ten fifteen feet getting to that railroad track. I got the biggest rock I could find. I threw a rock at 'em and hit one. He ran back and the rest followed him. I picked up two more rocks like that, when i got to the sign on the road to the CCC camp.
The cycle before me when that ole boy got killed on, and it wasn't no tree that killed him, it wasn't no car that killed him. Because when I walked that night, I didn't see no tree, I didn't see no car, but I still hit that six miles to walk. So what killed him, I don't know, unless the wolves got him.
The cycle before us refused to work in the rain. The rainy season is like a drizzle all the time. We planted trees up and down the mountain. 300, 400 feet (a day). This was in the Summer.
The time I was in there during the summer time we did a lot of forest fighting, summertime was strictly forest fire. That was a rough deal, if you could see that today how these people are in there, any forest fires where them men is trying to dig a trench to go along and they're trying to chop down trees to make a distance between their tree and this tree. See, you can't stop the fire. You were cutting down trees making a firebreak, basically. But oh yeah, let me tell you something, that was pretty rough. You better believe it.
In the winter time we would drill up a mountain a week or two and then we would blow it up. We would do that all the winter time.
First we would drill into the mountain side, 15 to 20 feet in, all along the Highway going in, and going out. One man 1 1/2 each way down the road, we would be up road on the left and on the right. You ever seen these guys work them Jack hammers, rock crushing deals, on the street out there, they have to dig the cement up, ruttutututut. Well, that's what we had. The same kind of tool. The tool that gives you a lot of vibration, too because you're going, not down, you're going sideways into that mountain with it. So it's a pretty good job, I'll tell you that.
After it was all over, you just put that dynamite thing in there, and put a cap on the end of it and the wires would run, maybe a hundred, 200 feet away, and after it was all done, all them wires was put together over here and its one of them things when you had a, its like a, it'll give you a hell of a shock if you was to hold onto it without them wires, I can tell you that. Because you'd raise up that handle just like you'd see an old cavalry movie or whatever, and then just hold on and shout, "Fire in the hole!"
When you pushed the handle down and hit bottom, the current was running through there and ignite that gap, from the gap to the dynamite, and that whole mountain would explode., hell of a blow out, rocks all over the place.
So it would all fall out where we wanted it to fall. Then we would chop up the rocks. in half, with sledge hammers, or jack hammers if too big. We'd do that until it was small enough to get into a V shaped chute to the machine that crushed the rocks. Then it was loading it up and shipping it out throughout the United States, wherever there was a demand for it. It went out by train all over the country, I think, the little grey rocks.
I put two years in all together. I was in when Pearl Harbor hit, 1940-42. When Pearl Harbor was hit we could not leave we. We were put under manual of arms and went into the mountain looking down onto the beach. We had a whole '03 rifle. Its not everybody that did this. I don't know if anybody did Washington or California or where they was. But they alerted us for battle and I knew a little bit of manual arms and that's where I learned it right there. We stayed there couple days, couple nights, then went back to camp and registered for the army.
We stayed in the job --- after they hit Pearl Harbor. Then they sent us home. That was the end of our days at CCC camp. I heard the Federal Government was doing something with that property, I don't know what it was.
We went home on a troop train.
I come home and a friend of mine says, why don't you come and live with my house. Lady says, uh, we'll give you room and board for $7.00 a week. See we were just coming out of a hard depression. So this --- must have been about 60-80 miles from where we used to live, see. If you look at the State of Louisiana, you can find Morgan City, you can find Thibodaux, you can find Humma, but Thibodaux is where I was located, more or less out in the country. Well, I said I don't have no way to get up there, I don't own a car. He said I will bring you. So I left this man. I went to work, we went into the City of Marrero, its across the river from New Orleans and if you look at the map across the river from New Orleans today, you're going to see Westwego, Marrero, Algiers, Gretna, all along the river.
When I got there I was even living in Westwego. I was working on board for houses, and believe it or not, I did nine months before they grabbed me. Because when I left Oregon, I had my papers with me and I was living at St. Mary Parrish. From St. Mary Parrish I had to tell them people to transfer me to Tarabon Parrish because we're going back to the country. From there I told them, when I left there, I was working at the station, I have to transfer me to Jefferson Parish and that's where they caught a hold of me and just gave me Tuesday to report.
And I went to report, we were all stripped naked, just a bunch of men. All of us passed, went home to tell your family goodbye because you'll be on a freight train heading west. And when I told mamma and them that, well, I caught this train in a little town called Shreva where its just straight through, the Southern Pacific railroad track, runs right smack into where we were going. And once again, just like we did in the CCC camp, we were on a troop train where they feed you, the last car in the back, and we had places where you can put the seats down and sleep at night because there we go again, it was six days and six nights to get to Fort Ord in California.
We had basic training in Camp Roberts, California. The CCCs helped me adjust my life when I got into the service quite a bit. It taught me how to get along with personnel. It learned me how to take orders from personnel that was higher than I was and I enjoyed it.
After training, I come home for seven days, tell everybody goodbye. and from there we went to Camp Stallman.
I was in the Twelfth Calvary, First Cavalry Division, though we were infantry. The Division had given up its horses. I was in a troop. A Troop. The Twelfth Cavalry was first squadron to second squadron. The first squadron was A, B, C and D Troops. Now I was in A. Now we were 200 men, 250 men. You put that all down the line, we had our own thing, we had our own aircraft, we had our own artilleries. All this put together was 40,000 men. And we were powerful. We didn't back off to nobody. But I was on the front line. The highest I ever got was PFC. I had this job, well I should have had three stripes, several times, but it just wasn't issued.
From Camp Stallman, we loaded up on a ship and went to Australia.
We went over on the Sea Snipe. She carried pretty close to 2,000 men. It was a transport really.
Well, going over seas now they had Japanese in the area around Guadalcanal where the Marines was fighting in there, and I believe the 7th Division was fighting, so we couldn't hang around there. We had to drop way south. We went down near to the South Pole. Turned to the west a little bit and then come back up, I don't know maybe a 1,000 miles to get to Australia.
We got off right there and we went to a place called Strasburn (author's note, I think he means Camp Strathpine) and we built housing for our troops. And then one thing and then another and put our beds up in there, cots, you know, and set up our kitchen, one thing and then another and then we started off training. Basic, more like basic training all over again.
Well, the CCCs learned me one thing. Manual of Arms. I knew a little bit about that when I got there. I used to shoot from the left shoulder. And I used to be a country boy and I could hit what I was shooting at. I knew what to do with it. They didn't want me to do that. They forced me to use it on my right shoulder and I could not hit nothing. And they had everyone, some treaties, maybe two or three hundred feet away, these men were over there in a trench, and they were put up a decoy and you hit that decoy to see how hard you can fire into it. I had a hard time hitting the hole thing. Its just about the size of a stop sign, 200 feet away. In Australia, that shoulder was gone and I went back to my left shoulder. And that's what saved my life cause I, I'm not bragging about what I did, I don't want to do that. But it had to be from my left shoulder or not shoulder at all.
But mostly, we had to learn to get on this boat that when you get to that island, that boat, the front end of it would go down. The Higgins Boat.
From Australia, we went to New Guinea. And New Guinea got them headhunters and you can find a flashlight at night and look up in the bush over there, all you can see is eyes staring at you.
Our first operation was located in the Admiralty Islands, Los Negros. It's a little bit north of New Guinea. Manus was another Admiralty Island that had to be invaded, but I was not in that part at all. It was said to have very few Japs that was on there.
When I left New Guinea to go to the Admiralty Islands, I don't know how far it was, but a lot of the LSTs they carried us on the LSTs.
Well, up there we invaded Los Negros. When the boat comes up to the Island, the front end, on the Higgins Boat, the front end will go down and you have to get off regardless, you've got to get in there and fight. I had a good friend of mine and he was a doctor, and his name was Augustine Gonzales. So, underhand hard pitch, you know, he did that and he was a champ and he had another fellow by the name of Simons. He come out of Missouri. But anyway that point, him and I would fight side to side and on in the Battle of Manila. We called it hell. I got hit so bad that he lost track of me and I lost track of him, a good friend of mine.
And after I got home I got to find out where Gonzales was at. I thought he had gotten killed. And we used to hold our Division Reunions, you know, we'd go to Port Hood. In the heart of Texas. And we'd have office meetings and we'd have meetings over here, meetings over there, we'd go out in the field. And they had this one ole boy from California, Savera, he was in the service with me. He remembered me and I remembered him. And I asked him, whatever happened to Augustine Gonzales man. He said I was told that Augustine Gonzales turned out to be a priest. Well, that got me right there by saying where? He's somewhere in the San Diego area. So I always had a motor home where we'd go out camping and traveling with my friends and, uh, we went to San Diego two different times. I went and talked to priest after priest and nobody knew anything about him. And then I don't remember who it was that made me listen to a conversation on the phone. He said Augustine Gonzales is still living and he is right now in the State of Oregon. Man, this is the life story to my life. What part of Oregon. He said he's somewhere around Corvallis. I said well look at that. That's the CCC camp. So we started making calls and people would call me and I was looking for a Monk Camp because they said he was a Monk.
Well, it was out of Oregon maybe 30, 40 miles and a little place, Lafayette, Lafayette, Oregon. So I called up there and he was just getting back from a nice trip that I should have been on with him. When I mentioned to you that we had invaded the Leyte Islands in the Philippines October 20, 1944, we had a bunch was in a plane free, it went back for a reunion on the island of Leyte. And he was just getting back from stateside when the phone was ringing. It was me. This lady says can I help you. I say yes mam, I'm looking for a fellow who's supposed to be a Monk by the name of Augustine Gonzales. She said we don't have that here, we have a brother Martin Gonzales. I said, put him on the phone, I think I know him. And that's how him and I started and we've been communicating with one another for the last two years. But he's a chaplain, but he's not in no CCC camp.
Back to Los Negros, after taking it, we stayed there and built, set up camp, a beautiful camp with tents. We used to live in tents.
The CBs built a runway, an airfield where the planes could take off from there and go north and bomb somewhere, bomb Manila or bomb wherever they were going. And I used to love planes so I'd walk over there and see them take off.
The planes would come back all shot up. We can see them coming in in the afternoon. Some of them had two motors that were on fire and they'd land them big things with two motors. And I seen one time when it was coming in to land, we had already went out and that man was trying to land that thing with one motor. He had it wide open. The B24. I wouldn't put it to that. The Navy used to take it over and put it into hangers and then try to overhaul that thing is what they did, before they could turn it back because these guys flied these things. Well, they needed some people to go up and test fly these things.
And I got caught in all that test flight. They needed some volunteers to go up with these planes the Navy was overhauling the planes for the Army. So I said, hell, I'll go. So I went up six or seven different times, you know. I was always looking when I was in there, looking for something to shoot at. And I had the experience but I ain't never seen anything to shoot at, but I could see one of our engines catching on fire on one side and the other one over here backfiring and missing and I seen myself on one of them planes that we came down and landed with only two of them. The B24 Liberator. And that was a big bomber (laugh).
So I mean I volunteered, just about every time to go up there, you know. And I was always the nose gunner, in front of the pilot. I could see him up in back of me. I used to talk to him and everything. (laugh). If you know anything about what the B24 is, it's a heavy bomber.
And we stayed there, we stayed at the island, I don't know, maybe three months, six months after everything was all picked up, you know.
Now from there we had to go back, like across the sand, he told the Philippino people I shall return. You know, so I was in that detail, October 20, 1944 we landed on Leyte Island, in the Philippines.
Now we had an APA when we left the Admiralty Islands to go over to the Philipine Island., I can remember coming down on a rope, you know. About ten men before us used to come down on that rope and get into that Higgins Boat down there.
We were there about six months. After that we went to Luzon Island, and took, we were the first that saw Manilla. Six days and six nights and that, that city was about twice the size of New York City. So that was a lot of fighting that went on.
Everything you have to do on the island, its either the Higgins Boat or LST. I had a brother who was drafted in World War II and he was thrown in the Navy and he got stuck on LST. His name is E.J. LeBlanc.
Well, Milo O'Connor told me in a letter and the little bitty ole things we used to receive that there was (Victory Mail), this guy said he was in the Pacific but he was in the Navy. And he said he was on a boat, LST-587. Well, when I inquired about that, it was the LST, one of them flat bottom deals and it was rough riding when the seas is rough.
And we were staked in Manila and all that and we pushed south about 80 miles but before we went south we had the opportunity to get back in Manila and the USO had set up a coffee and donut stuff, you know. And that was 48 books --- up in there and one of them said Louisiana so I opened it up and some of the boys had their names in there. I didn't know who they were, but I put my name in there. Well, everything was taken, it was all over with, --- for that part, so they landed on this LST in the Manila harbor and they came onshore and got coffee and donuts and they seen these books. And they opened up that Louisiana book and said, hey man, this is my brother. So somebody said well Jay, where ---. Jay said I don't know, we can find out. So he inquired a little bit about it and first thing you know he got the headquarters of the first cav division and he was talking to them about me. He said would you like to see your brother and he said right. Well, he's fighting a little bit south of us right now and mopping up operations and he said if you want to go, we'll take our jeep to you as --- this man right here. So he gave us each a rifle and we went down 80 miles. It was about 9, 10:00 in the morning when he got to where we was at. Well there was a big bridge that used to be there was blown out so they had to put pontoon bridge for us to go across and after we got across, they took those pontoon bridges back up. You know what I'm saying?
So my brother Jay was stopped right there. We can't go any farther, but you can hear shooting over there.
You can hear the firing going on all over the place. Well, I didn't know this til after I got home and he was discharged and he was telling me about that. And I said well, Jay, you can bet your life on this man. You come within three blocks of seeing me. --- I didn't see my brother after that for a whole year. I was discharged before him and then here he comes.
Well, anyway, we got, after I went to Manila, I went south for all them mopping up operations.
We had to get our division up to strength. Truth is, out of 200 men or more in our Troop, we were down to 35-40 men. So we had a bunch of replacements come in there from stateside and, believe it or not, these men were married and had two or three kids that they were sending to us because I had a good friend from Des Moine, Iowa his last name was Rich. He got books through the mail for him to read. Now you can imagine how low we were to send that man to fight with us.
So that tells you a point right there how come we come so close to losing that war, that if Truman would have not dropped them two bombs. I can tell you this, right at the end of the war, people don't really know how close we come to losing this war. Now I'm going to say this, but that's my opinion and a lot of other people's opinion. When Truman dropped them two bombs, he's the one that saved our lives. Because I had a sketch one time, which I gave it to Augustine, brother Martin Gonzales, I gave it to him, showing every wave after wave after wave that we were (going to be in) hitting the island of Japan. And they don't know, when they dropped them two bombs, I guarantee you one thing. They said we'd have won the war but there wouldn't have been enough left of us afterwards.
Then we were prepared to go into Japan, which I did. When we got into Japan, that was like another war. Believe me, those people didn't want to give up. But every squad had one of their everyday cops from a city or whatever, to tell them people, put your arms down, we done lost the war and that is it. Put it down. And I thought sure as hell we were fixing to go into another battle. And we was --- And the First Cavalry Division was the first into Tokyo and I got picked or drafted in my division of First Cav Division, the last page in the back is where the first Cav got another first. First in Manila, first in Tokyo and the last page there was a little cartoon and it showed the First Cavalry Troop and the Marine Troop and they're both going to the trees in the back, you know where the trees is. So its another first for the Cav. (laugh).
We stayed there for a while, that was pretty rough, that was like another battle and then from that point, we were shipped home, the United States.
I came home on a APA ship. I never rode a big one like that until I got into Japan and headed back home. I thought it might have been the Harris or something like that (Author's note, the USS Harris APA-2 departed Japan for the US in November of 1945. The 1st Cav remained in Japan but it is likely that Mr. LeBlanc would have rotated home sooner given his length of time overseas under the point system). We hit, we hit one of them stumps (pilings?), we had to leave the harbor and leave fast because that one of them Typhoons was coming in. And the Captain told us to lock all hatches, everybody downstairs, nobody on the deck, and we're fixing to fight this storm, that's why we have to leave the harbor. So we fought that storm for 24 hours with our ship going down in the front, back up, under water, back up. It was horrible.
We came home into the Columbia River, which separates Oregon to Washington. Well, we got off of that ship and they fed us coffee and milk, anything we wanted to drink like that. You know, we had never tasted anything like that. And you've got to remember this, the --- it was so good, and the coffee was good, because when I left home before I was drafted, before I went to the CCC camp, we didn't have anything like that.
So the ship come up the Colombia River and then we reboarded and went to the northern part in Washington, to Vancouver. Then from Vancouver we went back over in a troop train again. We were heading for El Paso to get our discharge. We had our years on it and it reminded me so much when I was in the CCC Camp. Believe me or not, the railroad went through Corvallis and I looked out there, I didn't know anybody, didn't recognize anybody, because the train was moving so fast. And then we spent about four or five more days and got into El Paso where I got my discharge, so much money.
When I come out of the service, I got married and my wife and I raised three children. I went with my brothers and my dad and all them, I went in the oil field and then I started working --- 7 on, 7 off. And we were fighting them hurricanes coming in to, you know. And one of them went across the gulf when we was supposed to be coming in. We found out we don't have to leave, its going across the gulf. Its supposed to hit around Brownsville, Texas but it didn't. It turned and it come up that coast and went into Vermillion Bay, see look at that map, and it split and came down the Louisiana coast and they called us. They couldn't catch it, they couldn't come get us and we had to fight it out. And I want you to know, that was worse than combat. Worse than fighting in the war. Just digging them out of the dirt, standing straight up. But we had gotten the telescope. We had got half of it down on a barge and we pumped all the water out of all the --- and it went like a ship, we had all the lines away from the --- where we were making that well. And the water got rougher and rougher, shoved us off location. We was on a --- something like maybe a 100x100x100x100 and the bottom of the back could have been about 200x200x200x200..
We were floating there cause we knew it was going to hit us, it couldn't get us off. You can hold a pencil up in your hand on your desk and bring it over to a 45 degree angle. 2-3 seconds or a minute later, bring it back up and bring it to the opposite side to a 45 degree angle and come back up. The men was in the kitchen down there and I got caught in the wheelhouse. That's where all the controls is at where I can start three of them engines, one in the front, two in the rear and for short --- and I could start them things off, I was a decent mechanic, and put that thing back in location. And I could hear the men through a vent in the kitchen and I was standing up there in that ---. These people down there were on their knees saying their prayers because they knew we were gone and that was it. The life. So we were all seasick. I was sick too.
When it comes near there we were. And my boss told me, can you start the engines off. I say, Yes sir. And I said where do we go. I had a big windshield out the front but stripped, I could see nearly all the way around. I said where do we go. He said hell I don't know now. So we have to get help from a plane to tell us where we was at location. Believe this man, this is worse than combat.
We were seven miles off location, rocking back and forth and pushing and pushing and pushing us. Can you imagine something like that? I knew that we were all going to drown. There was no hope. I had a life preserver on me. I had a tire on my hip. I had two of them on. It would've never held me. The winds were too high, too strong and splashing all over the place. There would've been nobody that was. I never thought I'd go through something so terrible that it reminded me being through in the war, in World War II in the South Pacific. That's about it brother.
I got two purple hearts. I got shrapnel, I like to lost a foot. I was on the front lines against the Japanese in the South Pacific. It was 45 years later before I got my occupation of Japan and another medal. The Colonel or somebody at Maple State presented them to me and they took my picture.
I married a year after I got home from the war, raised three children, all very well educated and seven grandkids have all got real good jobs and we've been married 61 years this November. My wife and I traveled by RV all over the country. I joined the Knights of Columbus, still active in that. I was raised very poor, but with the CCC I sure made up. As my wife says, "He made a big deal out of his life I tell you." I had a good life.
----- Lee LeBlanc
Email: GML1221 AT aol.com
Copy the above into your mail address window and replace spaceATspace with @
This is to avoid spam mailing.
LINKS
BACK TO James F. Justin Civilian Conservation Corps Museum Biographies
BACK TO JUSTIN ORAL HISTORY ARMY BIOGRAPHIES HISTORY PAGE
Also Be Sure to Visit
James F. Justin, Civilian Conservation Corps Museum
Justin Museum of Military History
Please Share your Stories! E-mail the Curator to share or discuss or with any questions!
The URL of this page is below
http://www.justinmuseum.com/oralbio/leblancleebio.html
Copyright 2020 John Justin, All Rights Reserved