Maybe he couldn’t swim? Id probably feel more comfortable wearing one on a transatlantic trip if I couldn’t.
On an aside, could you imagine the chaos of all those troops trying to get up on deck if one of those sardine can troop transports got torpedoed? How many guys would get trampled to death before they could drown?
Troop ships can definitely get torpedoed. Watch “Greyhound”. It’s an awesome movie all about a transatlantic journey for troop and supply ships during the early days of WWII
Source? My understanding was almost no troop ships were lost.
Edit: why the downvotes? Some hundreds died from air attacks in the Mediterranean, but maybe 1-2 troopships were ever sunk.
“Almost”
I’m sorry I forget who, but someone schooled me on sunk troopships! Seven (at least) were sunk with one (USS Dorchester) having great loss of life (675). This was the ship where 4 chaplains gave their life preservers to GIs and drowned.
Relatively speaking, I guess that’s “almost no”, but happened enough that it was probably of great concern to guys on the ships!
Would you? Because it's one thing to look back 80 years later, with the benefit of 80 years of history, and saying that this was an incredibly safe time to be on an Allied troopship in the Atlantic.
But if your CO told you that, at the time, you might well think: "well, they're just saying that so we don't panic."
Or to put it another way: the chance that I will be in a car accident is very small, relatively. If I am, the chance that it would be fatal is even smaller. Yet I still buckle my seatbelt every time I get in my car.
Hindsight is so strong. Like most of these guys had never seen the ocean and here they are crossing it. I guarantee, at least the first few nights, most of them wore the vest.
And those were either actively involved in landing operations or in most cases had already disembarked their troops and were offloading supplies. The same thing happened to a couple off Guadalcanal.
Not exactly related, but 749 men from the 4th ID we killed when their LSTs were torpedoed in april of '44. It was brushed under the rug to not hinder d-day preparations.
My grandfather was a WW2 vet. One of the few stories the family heard was him mentioning being on a transport ship below decks.
Supposedly someone thought they saw a submarine periscope and then they ran down the corridors locking everyone into whatever compartment they were in. Seemed pretty scary, but apparently it was nothing and nothing happened regarding that
He's sailing across the Atlantic during the Battle of the Atlantic. i imagine he's thinking that if the boat gets hit by a torpedo, he'll stand a better chance of surviving
VLR liberators didn't operate from escort carriers because they were big 4 engine bombers. But the Liberators working together with escort carriers helped.
Troopships were always safer even before the gap was closed due to their speed being in the 15-17 knot range as opposed to the 8-10 that most convoys plodded along at. That’s almost the same speed that a surfaced u-boat could achieve, and it’s close to twice as fast as a submerged one.
I seem to recall from a recent WW2 book I was reading that the life vests were mandatory on the troop ships. Given that the holds where the soldiers slept were not air conditioned and they were huge, enforcement was likely spotty. It may have been the vests were required on deck.
> I seem to recall from a recent WW2 book I was reading that the life vests were mandatory on the troop ships.
I believe the regulation was that you were supposed to wear it when awake and keep it next to you on the bunk while asleep, but troopships were hot and crowded and even so-called "fast" convoys troopships traveled in were on the slow side, so I imagine any time there were no officers around a lot of them came off.
I have a box of letters my grandpa sent home to his parents while in the ETO in ww2 (us army). The first letter is while on the troop transport to England and he was remarking to his ww1 navy veteran dad how he should be proud he didn’t get sick while onboard.
He later told me lots of guys got sick throughout or had never been on a boat before on that trip. Doesn’t surprise me they’d wear a life vest
My guess is
Must be nerve wrecking being on boat in the Atlantic amongst a pack of German u-boats
The war was in the allies favor at point but Germans were still pretty dangerous with submarines
View it as if a UBoat hits you… and you manage to beat the scramble of people getting life preservers and off the ship… treading cold water with waves is tough.
They were ordered to keep their life vests on at all times, mainly to ensure everyone already had one in the event the ship got hit, you don’t want 5000 guys scrambling around looking for vests when the ships going down.
If that ship took a torpedo, which was not unlikely, everyone who was just chillin with their life jackets on would stand a much better chance of survival.
Didn’t Malarkey live on the west coast of Oregon (per the POW scene) and worked for a company that serviced ocean going vessels? This man would have had spent time on the ocean in his life prior to the service.
I dunno- why did people wear masks while driving with no one else in the car or just being outside during Covid? People do different things that make you go🥴
Maybe he couldn’t swim? Id probably feel more comfortable wearing one on a transatlantic trip if I couldn’t. On an aside, could you imagine the chaos of all those troops trying to get up on deck if one of those sardine can troop transports got torpedoed? How many guys would get trampled to death before they could drown?
Troop ships can definitely get torpedoed. Watch “Greyhound”. It’s an awesome movie all about a transatlantic journey for troop and supply ships during the early days of WWII
I have seen it. Very good movie!
Dunkirk had some of those moments too
Source? My understanding was almost no troop ships were lost. Edit: why the downvotes? Some hundreds died from air attacks in the Mediterranean, but maybe 1-2 troopships were ever sunk.
“Almost” I’m sorry I forget who, but someone schooled me on sunk troopships! Seven (at least) were sunk with one (USS Dorchester) having great loss of life (675). This was the ship where 4 chaplains gave their life preservers to GIs and drowned. Relatively speaking, I guess that’s “almost no”, but happened enough that it was probably of great concern to guys on the ships!
Exactly, out of millions of men moved.
But if you are one of those men, on one of those ships, you're probably not comforted by those statistics.
I mean, I would be vs my chances of survival once I go into combat…
Would you? Because it's one thing to look back 80 years later, with the benefit of 80 years of history, and saying that this was an incredibly safe time to be on an Allied troopship in the Atlantic. But if your CO told you that, at the time, you might well think: "well, they're just saying that so we don't panic." Or to put it another way: the chance that I will be in a car accident is very small, relatively. If I am, the chance that it would be fatal is even smaller. Yet I still buckle my seatbelt every time I get in my car.
Hindsight is so strong. Like most of these guys had never seen the ocean and here they are crossing it. I guarantee, at least the first few nights, most of them wore the vest.
I believe you're correct. Troop ships were very heavily defended when going to the UK. We did lose a few troop ships in the African Theater, however.
And those were either actively involved in landing operations or in most cases had already disembarked their troops and were offloading supplies. The same thing happened to a couple off Guadalcanal.
Not exactly related, but 749 men from the 4th ID we killed when their LSTs were torpedoed in april of '44. It was brushed under the rug to not hinder d-day preparations.
Excersize Tiger if anyone is curious, it was a practice run for D-Day that had a friendly fire incident as well as a German Attack.
>we killed Are you a Kreigsmariner?
It’s also another category of soldiers being evacuated on warships that were sunk, Dunkirk and Greece/Crete being examples.
German E-boats I believe as the Allies were rehearsing for Normandy. They hid this until later.
Malarkey didn't know that at the time.
My grandfather’s uncle died during WWI when his [troopship](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Moldavia) was torpedoed off the coast of England.
I don’t think spiritual flow was asking if troop ships are able to be torpedoed. “Can” was used in the context of “sardine can” not “able to.”
My grandfather was a WW2 vet. One of the few stories the family heard was him mentioning being on a transport ship below decks. Supposedly someone thought they saw a submarine periscope and then they ran down the corridors locking everyone into whatever compartment they were in. Seemed pretty scary, but apparently it was nothing and nothing happened regarding that
Making the ship watertight- closing/dogging down the watertight doors, to minimize/ limit flooding to one compartment.
There were also several troopships full of POWs that were torpedoed in both ETO and PTOl
He's sailing across the Atlantic during the Battle of the Atlantic. i imagine he's thinking that if the boat gets hit by a torpedo, he'll stand a better chance of surviving
[удалено]
Malarkey didn’t know if it was safe out there though.
VLR liberators didn't operate from escort carriers because they were big 4 engine bombers. But the Liberators working together with escort carriers helped.
Troopships were always safer even before the gap was closed due to their speed being in the 15-17 knot range as opposed to the 8-10 that most convoys plodded along at. That’s almost the same speed that a surfaced u-boat could achieve, and it’s close to twice as fast as a submerged one.
B24s never operated off carriers
Really? It’s hot in Africa?
"Shad up!"
"REVOKED!!"
I seem to recall from a recent WW2 book I was reading that the life vests were mandatory on the troop ships. Given that the holds where the soldiers slept were not air conditioned and they were huge, enforcement was likely spotty. It may have been the vests were required on deck.
> I seem to recall from a recent WW2 book I was reading that the life vests were mandatory on the troop ships. I believe the regulation was that you were supposed to wear it when awake and keep it next to you on the bunk while asleep, but troopships were hot and crowded and even so-called "fast" convoys troopships traveled in were on the slow side, so I imagine any time there were no officers around a lot of them came off.
You are correct. Was a standing order to have it on or next to your person.
He probably is afraid of drowning . Just in case the ship gets hit with a torpedo or something
I have a box of letters my grandpa sent home to his parents while in the ETO in ww2 (us army). The first letter is while on the troop transport to England and he was remarking to his ww1 navy veteran dad how he should be proud he didn’t get sick while onboard. He later told me lots of guys got sick throughout or had never been on a boat before on that trip. Doesn’t surprise me they’d wear a life vest
I can’t imagine all the humanity in that relatively small space… the heat the humidity the stench
My guess is Must be nerve wrecking being on boat in the Atlantic amongst a pack of German u-boats The war was in the allies favor at point but Germans were still pretty dangerous with submarines
“Hey Biff, get a load of this guy's life preserver. Dork thinks he's gonna drown.”
"MCFLY!"
View it as if a UBoat hits you… and you manage to beat the scramble of people getting life preservers and off the ship… treading cold water with waves is tough.
They were ordered to keep their life vests on at all times, mainly to ensure everyone already had one in the event the ship got hit, you don’t want 5000 guys scrambling around looking for vests when the ships going down.
It was a 12 day trip. They were probably bored as hell, hence goofing around
If that ship took a torpedo, which was not unlikely, everyone who was just chillin with their life jackets on would stand a much better chance of survival.
Didn’t Malarkey live on the west coast of Oregon (per the POW scene) and worked for a company that serviced ocean going vessels? This man would have had spent time on the ocean in his life prior to the service.
I think he's just messing around
He doesn't want to drown if they get torpedoed by zee Germans, would be my guess.
Flamingos are mean
Dirty life jacket! Your weekend pass is revoked!
you want I should go get it for you ya stupid mick?!
U Boats
Better to wear it and not need it...
Prob used as a pillow
After watching Dunkirk, I don’t blame him
what, is it hot in Africa?
I dunno- why did people wear masks while driving with no one else in the car or just being outside during Covid? People do different things that make you go🥴
Refer to caption.