Preserving The Oral HistorIES of Combat Veterans
6:12 | Recalled from the reserve for Korea, engineering officer Bob DeBoo was assigned to LST 803, another amphibious assault ship. The crew's first task was ferrying prisoners, then they performed general duties, sometimes in bone chilling sub-zero weather.
He was in his last year of college pursuing a mechanical engineering degree when Bob DeBoo was drafted into the Navy. They sent him to finish his degree, then to midshipmen's school, and then he was ready to deploy. When he got to Pearl Harbor in 1945, though, the war had wound down and his ship was sent home and he was discharged into the reserve.
As an engineering officer on an LSM, which stands for Landing Ship, Medium, Bob DeBoo was responsible for all mechanical operations on the ship. It was a flat-bottomed vessel, so it rolled mercilessly in whne the water got rough. While he was in the reserve, between the wars, he got a taste of life on the bigger ships.
While serving on an LST off the coast of Korea, engineering officer Bob DeBoo was entertained by a dog someone had smuggled on board as a pet. He was less amused by Inchon Charlie, piloting a North Korean biplane that would harass the ships. What nearly did the ship in, however, was a typhoon.
