Other warships claimed to have fired the last shot of World War II, but this difference applies to USS consonance The CL-10, a four-stage light cruiser, named after the city of Massachusetts, where the first order of the shot of the American revolution - “the shot heard all over the world” - was fired.
“I didn’t even suspect that I was present at this historic event,” Faddey Buchko from Salem, Massachusetts told me in a recent interview, until I read about it many years later in a veterans magazine. At the time, the 19-year-old Buchko served in the US Navy aboard the USS Bearss (pronounced "barce"). Bearss was one of the destroyers who completed Task Force 92, serving in the North Pacific, along with light cruisers Concord, Richmond and Trenton.
By August 15, 1945, Nazi Germany surrendered to Allied forces in Europe (May 8), and the atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima (August 6) and Nagasaki, Japan (August 9). Did Buchko and his comrades have the feeling that the war was over? “No,” says Buchko. “We heard that the Germans presented, but we all passed in the Pacific, we were still at war, to happen next. We were still under orders. ”
On August 15, 1945, Task Force 92 bombarded shipping and coastal facilities in the Japanese Kurile Islands. consonance was commissioned to open fire on the island of Sasukotan, firing a salvo after a volley with his six-inch "double guns" and five-inch guns of the Task Force destroyers, including Bearss , according to a report by Fred A. Ljumba, which Thaddeus Buchko read years later.
Lumb continues: “Finally, Captain CA Rumble, Commander consonance and a small group of tasks, the cave ceasefire order. in direct fire control, saw that another round was fired Concord. “Since the last shot was fired shortly before the cease-fire, the ship had to receive special permission from the commander of the Task Force in order to fire the last time, and not to restore the ammunition manually. This was the last shot of the war.
Ensign Robert P. Crossley of consonance described what happened next: "Japan News on the acceptance of the Potsdam surrender conditions ... were received on board consonance on the radio, when she flew towards the Aleuts after a final offensive strike by the fleet against Japanese territory. Shooting, heard all over the world from Musket Minitenov Concord and Lexington on April 19, 1775, repeated an even greater rage and meaning, as this proud carrier of a miniature tradition released the final naval salvo of World War II, a few seconds after 20:06 (Japanese time). "
Fred Lumb concludes: “For an hour Ens. Robert Crossley was in the coding room, near the radio shack, typing Consent & # 39; s claim to have fired the last American war shot. ” The Navy soon confirmed their claims.
Crew on board Bearss received news of Japanese capitulation by a loud speaker with very few details. Buchko recalls: “Even when we were told that the Japanese had surrendered, we were surprised if the Japanese ships and pilots knew there.
As for hearing, the war is over? “We were all just because of the fact,” says Buchko. We are very tired. There was no rapture, no jubilation, as you heard about everyone in the States. "On the Aleutian Islands Bearss and consonance repair damage to ships, re-set, re-armed and prepared for orders. landing sites. “We knew that we were going,” explains Buchko, “but we did not know when or how.”
On September 2, 1945, the Japanese and Americans signed an official surrender on board the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay.
On the Aleutian Islands, there were orders for Bearss and Hood, another destroyer in the Task Force, for a rendezvous with a Japanese ship carrying emissaries who will sign a soldier’s order for the US Navy's emergency number 1. The Order will turn the Ominato Guard area into the United States, in particular: “This part of Honshu Island and Hokkaido between the latitudes of forty degrees and thirty minutes and forty-two degrees in the north and between longitudes of 139 degrees and 142 degrees east, therefore, declared the area of emergency occupation of the Ominato region. "
Bearss and hood replaced the ship of the Japanese delegation in the Tsugaru Strait, “a reservoir fifteen miles wide dividing the north coast of Honshu and the islands of Hokkaido,” said quartermaster Edwin E. Douglas,
QM Douglass continues: “The Japanese crew drew a white cross on the funnel of their ship, the emblem of surrender. When the ships approached each other, it was a really tense moment for every person on board, until the Japanese raised the international flag code, giving us the assurance that her intentions were strictly peaceful, loving. ” However, although one of Hood & # 39; s small boats went out to transport emissions to Bearss, Bearss and hood circled over the Japanese ship, weapons trained in their potential target. Bearss also took part in the US Marine Corps and in the media. While all Bearss , Buczko was top-side, staffing two 36 “search lanterns, watching all of this, but“ not imagining what was happening, ”he recalls.
Japanese ship sent The Bears and hood through heavily mined Tsugaru Street in Matsu Bay for occupation. “When we came in,” recalls Buchko, “I remember watching the Japanese throwing the city in a hurry for the mountains, carrying their belongings, or using something with wheels. I think they were afraid of the occupying forces. ”
The United States and Japan signed Emergency Relief Order No. 1 on September 9, 1945 aboard the USS Panamint , the flagship of Vice-Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher, Commander of the Force and the Pacific region. Among the instructions of the Order, the Japanese provided:
- Lists of all Japanese "land, air and fog units, showing the places and strength of the officers and men"
- Lists of all aircraft (military, maritime and civil), ships and merchant ships, their type, condition and location
- Detailed information, including maps, “all mines, minefields and other obstacles for movement by land, sea or air”,
- "Locations and descriptions of all military facilities and institutions ... along with plans and drawings of all such rules, installations and institutions"
- “Locations of all camps and other places of detention for all United Nations prisoners of war”
Further provisions related to demining, as well as the provision of transport, labor, materials and facilities at the direction of Admiral Fletcher.
In his opening remarks to the occupation order, Admiral Fletcher expressed the hope that the occupation would continue without "any incident that would only increase the suffering of the Japanese people."
Having completed his personal record of signing, QM Douglass wrote: “Another great and useless war ended, another lesson was learned that showed that a person wrapped in a blanket of ideas and luxury, and then in a match put the world under fire, finding destroyed him also with the search for leadership and fame. "
Officers and crew Bearss held a flag raising ceremony at the Ominato base. QM Douglass noted: "The ancient empire today stands in favor of the flags of the United Nations." The destroyer and her crew received "well done" as the stars and stripes were raised over the Ominato, arguing that the united peoples would oppress anyone who intends to destroy humanity. "
Headline and Conclusions
After a period of occupation service, USS consonance went to Boston to participate in the naval bottom on October 27, 1945. According to the navy, she was the first navy cruiser named after the city or city of Massachusetts to visit the Commonwealth after the surrender of Japan. About 18,000 people lined up in Boston to board the ship and look at the twin six, which fired the last shot in the war. (The pistol and the mountain are now visible in the Naval Museum in Washington, DC). Visitors also saw a bronze copy of the famous statue of Concord Minutman, the monument to the first “shot heard all over the world” of the Revolution of War and the ship “talisman”.
consonance He received one combat star for his service in the Kuril Islands. After visiting Boston, she returned to her home port of Philadelphia, where she was decommissioned on December 12, 1945 and sold on January 21, 1947.
After her call of duty, USS The Bears went to Hakodate, Hokkaido, in Yokosuka in Tokyo Bay, and then returned to the States through the destroyers base in Hawaii in San Diego, California. From there Bearss passed through the Panama Canal and arrived in Charleston, South Carolina, December 23, 1945. She participated in eight sea strokes without cruelty. Bearss was returned to operation in 1951, decommissioned in 1963, and historically sold for scrap.
After a 30-day vacation, which allowed him to return home to Salem on Christmas 1945, Thaddeus Buchko (today, 89 years old) was assigned to the USS aircraft carrier. on the halfway until he quit his job.
He continued to receive a bachelor's degree from Norwich University (with honors) and was appointed second lieutenant in the US Army. While at the university at Boston University, in June 1949, Butsko was authorized by the US Army to serve as a reserve officer with a 304th tank regiment. He was recalled to active service in 1952, during the Korean War, where he served as commander of a tank division with the 3rd Armored Division and assistant assistant judge in the division. After the war, Buchko served with civil affairs units (military government). He commanded the 357th headquarters of the civil affairs area. He also served as chief of staff of the 94th Army Reserve Command, which contained more than 12,000 reservist soldiers in more than 100 reserve units in New England. In 1979, Buchko resigned as a colonel after 30 years of service in the army. For his service, he received the Medal of the Legion of Vengeance.
Thaddeus Buchko served as an adviser to the city of Salem, a Massachusetts state ambassador, Salem envoy (appointed by President John F. Kennedy), a Massachusetts state auditor, and the first judge of the county court and Essex County orphanage. He is credited with bringing Pope John Paul II to Boston in 1979. He continues to remain in Salem.
