~ITEMS OF INTEREST~



LSM-18 Crew members at our 2002 Reunion at Memphis, Tennessee.

l-r Harold Holbrook, Al Giese, Bill Schmidt, George Gebhardt and "Doc" Terrell.



At the 1992 National LSM Reunion in Nashville, it was moved and seconded to make the poem "Men From Little Creek" by Edwin C. Townsend, the official poem of the Association. As Ed Townsend is a crew member of USS LSM-18, it is only fitting that his moving poem should be placed here as part of the USS LSM-18 webpage.

"MEN FROM LITTLE CREEK"

We all joined the Navy about 1942,
         Red blooded Americans all true and blue.
         We trained at San Diego, Great Lakes, and Bainbridge
         To learn to be sailors and fight the war through.

          We came to Little Creek to become LSM crews,
And then went to Galveston, and other ports too.
For assignment on ships to cross the wide sea
To perform the job we were trained to do.

We sailed for New Guinea, and places afar
To help Nimitz and MacArthur fight the amphibious war.
Some landed troops at Leyte and Corregidor, and some at Luzon.
Others beached at Iwo Jima and Okinawa, and other atolls.

We were ready to assault Japan, when the big bomb blew
Which saved many of our lives, as we then well knew.
The Kamikaze planes ceased, and the guns were silenced,
And we had victory at last for all but a few.

We left some of our ships for the sea to keep
In the waters off Okinawa and the Philippine deeps.
Under watch of our shipmates, who got the last call
For mother and country, they had given their all.

We came home from the war and went on with our lives.
We have since done many things and we've paid our tithes
But...We reminisce, and remember, as the years go by.
Of people and places, and brave men who died.

Last night at the bar, I heard an old sailor ponder...
"Would we do it again, if they called over yonder?"
After a long pause...One was heard to say
"Yes, I suppose we would,

Because, you see...we are still red blooded Americans,
True and blue...
As we were...way back...
In 1942."          
(by Edwin C. Townsend, USS LSM-18)







                                       





(photo courtesy of George E. Beinke)










Medals from WWII and China Service


courtesy of Art McElroy, LSM-18






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