BULLETIN NUMBER 28
MEET GEORGE SCHEER
What makes George Scheer so remarkable is that he is so typical. If there is a common thread that binds all submariners together that thread is pride. From S boat sailors to Trident riders each man stands tall with the certain knowledge that he is a cut above all others in the military. George is an example of a life shaped by the events that took place many years ago under the sea.
He's in his December years, now. His body is crippled by illness, but his mind is in the van of submarine thought. He's busy revising his submarine study plan for high school students. He speaks with a gruff certainty molded from years in fleet type submarines and refers to admirals by their first names as though they are his best friends. And maybe they are, because the person who outranks an admiral is an old salt who supports submarines through letters, programs and support of submarine museums.
That's not to say that he isn't a good family man. Given half a chance he'll show you pictures of his grown children, grandchildren and their kids. And there's plenty of pictures of Sallie, his life long sweetheart. But the driving force that keeps George going is submarines. Living near Kings Bay, Georgia he takes every opportunity to get on the base and see what's happening with the big Tridents. In short, he's involved.
Like so many others at the beginning of World War Two, George persuaded his mother to sign a false statement bumping his age up a notch so he could join the Navy. He raised his right hand on January 6, 1942 and was sent to Newport , Rhode Island for boot training. From there he went to the U.S.S. Ellyson, DD-434. The ship did a lot of escort duty both in the Atlantic and Pacific including escorting the CV Hornet on its famous journey to Japanese home waters with a flight deck full of B-25s. Then from the deck of the rolling destroyer he saw a submarine breaking the surface close aboard, off the port beam. It rose from the dark water like some magical serpent and hung low like it wanted to get down below where it belonged. That sight changed George Scheer. It was the first moment of a love affair that lasted the rest of his life.
With seabag over his shoulder he walked down the broad street in front of Gilmore Hall at submarine school in New London. This is where the elite lived. A chief with dolphins greeted him. George stared at the emblem. He too would wear the silver dolphins.
He was assigned to the U.S.S. Perch (SS-313) as it was being commissioned in January of 1944. He served under Lcdr. Blish C. Hills. With stops in Key West and the Panama Canal, Perch made its way to Pearl by April, 1944. While in port George took the test, passed it and put on his dolphins. Back in New London it had seemed like the end in itself, but now he knew that submariners never stop learning. They have a divided personality - a commitment to a rate and an even greater commitment to knowing as much as possible about the submarine they are riding.
George was a second class cook at the time of his first war patrol. He took orders from a first class and they worked as a team. By now he was a Perch fixture. He had found his niche in the Navy. He was good at what he did and this demanded respect from shipmates. That's the way it is in submarines. Respect from others comes from doing a job well. When the first class petty officer left Perch, George became the leading cook. Now the galley and crew's mess was his. He ran it with a certain tolerance of those who consumed his food. He was king of the mess, but he allowed his shipmates the run of the space except when it came to set-up time. Then he cleared the decks and gave orders to subordinate cooks and mess cooks.
Perch sailed from Midway for the Marshalls in company with Peto, (SS-265) and Pintado, (SS-387). She attacked a large convoy and was depth charged for the effort. On the second patrol in company with Croaker, (SS-246) and Escolar, (SS-294) the three boats acted as a hunter-killer group. Escolar's captain commanded the group. While in the Yellow Sea and in shallow water the three boats were caught by Japanese planes. Perch received a message from Escolar saying that she was heading east. Through the periscope Perch's captain saw many aircraft concentrating their bombs on a specific target to the east. That was the last any one saw of the Escolar. She may have struck a mine or it may have been that one of the bombs split her sides. The men in Perch's after battery didn't say much. For once the crew's mess was quiet.
Perch headed south to Brisbane where George was transferred to the Kraken (SS-370). This was all in order, except that Kraken was supposed to be on the west side of the Australian continent in Fremantle. George was treated to a week long train trip across the outback. It was a sight seeing trip as far as George was concerned and he wondered at the luck of being down there on the other side of the world while his family back home in New Jersey hadn't been out of state. Added to the free trip were two weeks in Fremantle waiting for Kraken to return from patrol. Lots of liberty in a country where the people appreciated the efforts of their allies was a submariner's dream and George was up to the job. He slept little and lived the life of Riley with silver dolphins shining on his chest.
Kraken returned to Fremantle and George got to work as the boat prepared to go out again. This was her second patrol and she left on March 15, 1945. George's birthday is March 24th and this would be his fourth birthday at sea. Kraken sailed to the China coast, but there were few targets at this time of the war. The boat pulled into Subic Bay. The crew got liberty in Manila and it hadn't been all that long since the city had been liberated. George and his shipmates were amazed at the damaged city. This was the first time George had seen the war up close. They were treated like kings and took advantage of the Philippine hospitality.
On Kraken's third and last patrol the war ended with Japan's surrender. They had shot up a few shore batteries and looked for sampans, but everyone had known that the war was grinding down.
From Australia George returned to the United States in Besugo, (SS-321). During those depressing size-down years when Truman's Secretary of Defense (Johnson) reduced military funding to a skeleton, George rode the Pomfret, (SS-391), Sterlet, (SS-392) and Queenfish, (SS-393). The Korean war rebuilt the armed forces and George again rode the crest of pride as his fleet type boats were turned into Guppies. He then was assigned to Clamagore, (SS-343) and took part in exercises off Puerto Rico.
While on liberty he met a girl named Sallie. In July of 1961 he retired from the Navy and married his sweetheart. He and Sallie made their home in New Jersey where he worked for Johnson and Johnson until 1971. They moved to Brunswick, Georgia where he built a house and raised a family of a boy and girl. Their daughter is a family physician in Orange County, California and their son lives in Selma, Alabama where he works as an engineer. George pesters Sallie to let him into her kitchen and whip up some good old J-43.
He never got those submarine years out of his system. George helps out at the St. Mary's Submarine Museum and looks for excuses to visit the nearby base in Kings Bay. He has recently purchased a computer and has mastered its fundamentals. His Parkinson's disease limits his mobility, but he's determined to keep his hand in submarines by whatever means are available to him.
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