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We were the first one's to come back there. They never had any debarkation there they had embarkation but they didn't really know what to do with us first. When we got up there, and got off the boat early that morning and it was cold and sleeting. All these guys had been in the tropics for years and we didn't have any winter clothes. These guys were running around with blankets wrapped around them and I was lucky I still had my flying jacket, so I had a coat. We got on the truck and they took us to Fort Lawton and they took us to breakfast because we did not get breakfast on the boat. Well now, we got in there and they got the German POW's working in the mess hall as KP's and things. They are frying these eggs right on the grill in front of you know.. and we did not have any eggs in years a fresh egg that was out of the question. We had been living on powdered eggs and they turned green ....you ever heard of green eggs? Mr. Misenhimer: Oh yes right. Mr. Ebel: One of these guys wanted more than one or two you know... these Germans they did not know what to do and we were the first one's to come back and we were kind of roudy bunch anyway. He says, the mess Sergeant says, "just give them anything they want." One guy took 4 or 5 eggs and I took 2. Man, we had all this fine food you know, and baked ham and what have you. Most of them went wild over the fresh milk. They could get all the fresh milk they wanted, we never had none before. Well, I was never was a milk drinker so it did not mean anything to me.
We finished breakfast and they took us out there and they told so many of us to certain barracks you know.
The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an oral interview with Doyle Ebel. Ebel was drafted into the Army Air Forces in March, 1943 and trained at Miami Beach before going to radio operator school in Missouri. He also attended gunnery school before becoming a crewmember on a B-24 and shipping overseas in July 1944. He was assigned to the 26th Bomb Squadron, 11th Bomb Group at Saipan in October. Ebel recalls an emergency landing on Iwo Jima. He flew 37 combat missions before the war ended and returned to the US in November, 1945.
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Ebel, Doyle.Oral History Interview with Doyle Ebel, July 30, 2013,
text,
July 30, 2013;
Fredericksburg, Texas.
(https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1606583/m1/39/:
accessed July 16, 2024),
University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu;
crediting National Museum of the Pacific War/Admiral Nimitz Foundation.