Chapter 3: (p. 058) (2)

During its first months of existence the Special Programs Unit tried to quiet racial unrest by a rigorous application of the separate but equal principle. It began attacking the concentration of Negroes in large segregated groups in the naval districts by creating more overseas billets. Toward the end of 1943, Negroes were being assigned in (p. 077) greater numbers to duty in the Pacific at shore establishments and aboard small defense, district, and yard craft. The Bureau of Naval Personnel also created new specialties for Negroes in the general service. One important addition was the creation of black shore patrol units for which a school was started at Great Lakes. The Special Programs Unit established a remedial training center for illiterate draftees at Camp Robert Smalls, drawing the faculty from black servicemen who had been educators in civilian life. The twelve-week course gave the students the equivalent of a fifth grade education in addition to regular recruit training. Approximately 15,000 Negroes took this training before the school was consolidated with a similar organization for whites at Bainbridge, Maryland, in the last months of the war.[3-60]

[Footnote 3-60: For further discussion, see Nelson,
"Integration of the Negro," pp. 124-46.]

At the other end of the spectrum, the Special Programs Unit worked for the efficient use of black Class A school graduates by renewing the attack on improper assignments. The bureau had long held that the proper assignment of black specialists was of fundamental importance to morale and efficiency, and in July 1943 it had ordered that all men must be used in the ratings and for the types of work for which they had been trained.[3-61] But the unit discovered considerable deviation from this policy in some districts, especially in the south, where there was a tendency to regard Negroes as an extra labor source above the regular military complement. In December 1943 the Special Programs Unit got the bureau to rule in the name of manpower efficiency that, with the exception of special units in the supply departments at South Boston and Norfolk, no black sailor could be assigned to such civilian jobs as maintenance work and stevedoring in the continental United States.[3-62]

[Footnote 3-61: BuPers Ltr, Pers 106-MBR, 12 Jul 43.]

[Footnote 3-62: "BuPers Hist," p. 53.]

These reforms were welcome, but they ignored the basic dilemma: the only way to abolish concentrations of shore-based Negroes was to open up positions for them in the fleet. Though many black sailors were best suited for unskilled or semiskilled billets, a significant number had technical skills that could be properly used only if these men were assigned to the fleet. To relieve the racial tension and to end the waste of skilled manpower engendered by the misuse of these men, the Special Programs Unit pressed for a chance to test black seamanship. Admiral King agreed, and in early 1944 the Bureau of Naval Personnel assigned 196 black enlisted men and 44 white officers and petty officers to the USS _Mason_, a newly commissioned destroyer escort, with the understanding that all enlisted billets would be filled by Negroes as soon as those qualified to fill them had been trained. It also assigned 53 black rated seamen and 14 white officers and noncommissioned officers to a patrol craft, the PC 1264.[3-63] Both ships eventually replaced their white petty officers and some of their officers with Negroes. Among the latter was Ens. Samuel Gravely, who was to become the Navy's first black admiral.

[Footnote 3-63: Memo, Chief, BuPers, for CINCUSFLEET,
1 Dec 43, sub: Negro Personnel, P16/MM, BuPersRecs.
The latter experiment has been chronicled by its
commanding officer, Eric Purdon, in _Black Company:
The Story of Subchaser 1264_ (Washington: Luce,
1972).]

Although both ships continued to operate with black crews well (p. 078) into 1945, the _Mason_ on escort duty in the Atlantic, only four other segregated patrol craft were added to the fleet during the war.[3-64] The _Mason_ passed its shakedown cruise test, but the Bureau of Naval Personnel was not satisfied with the crew. The black petty officers had proved competent in their ratings and interested in their work, but bureau observers agreed that the rated men in general were unable to maintain discipline. The nonrated men tended to lack respect for the petty officers, who showed some disinclination to put their men on report. The Special Programs Unit admitted the truth of these charges but argued that the experiment only proved what the Navy already knew: black sailors did not respond well when assigned to all-black organizations under white officers.[3-65] On the other hand, the experiment demonstrated that the Navy possessed a reservoir of able seamen who were not being efficiently employed, and--an unexpected dividend from the presence of white noncommissioned officers--that integration worked on board ship. The white petty officers messed, worked, and slept with their men in the close contact inevitable aboard small ships, with no sign of racial friction.

[Footnote 3-64: Memo, CNO for Cmdt, First and Fifth
Naval Districts, 10 May 44, sub: Assignment of
Negro Personnel, P-16-3/MM, BuPersRecs.]

[Footnote 3-65: For an assessment of the performance
of the _Mason's_ crew. see "BuPers Hist," pp. 42-43
and 92.]

Opportunity for advancement was as important to morale as (p. 079) assignment according to training and skill, and the Special Programs Unit encouraged the promotion of Negroes according to their ability and in proportion to their number. Although in July 1943 the Bureau of Naval Personnel had warned commanders that it would continue to order white enlisted men to sea with the expectation that they would be replaced in shore jobs by Negroes,[3-66] the Special Programs Unit discovered that rating and promotion of Negroes was still slow. At the unit's urging, the bureau advised all naval districts that it expected Negroes to be rated upward "as rapidly as practicable" and asked them to report on their rating of Negroes.[3-67] It also authorized stations to retain white petty officers for up to two weeks to break in their black replacements, but warned that this privilege must not be abused. The bureau further directed that all qualified general service candidates be advanced to ratings for which they were eligible regardless of whether their units were authorized enough spaces to take care of them. This last directive did little for black promotions at first because many local commanders ruled that no Negroes could be "qualified" since none were allowed to perform sea duties. In January 1944 the bureau had to clarify the order to make sure that Negroes were given the opportunity to advance.[3-68]

[Footnote 3-66: BuPers Ltr, P16-3, 12 Jul 43, sub:
The Expanded Use of Negroes, BuPersRecs.]

[Footnote 3-67: Ltr, Chief, NavPers, to Cmdts, All
Naval Districts, 19 Aug 43, sub: Advancement in
Rating re: Negro Personnel, P17-2/MM, BuPersRecs.]

[Footnote 3-68: BuPers Cir Ltr 6-44, 12 Jan 44.]

Despite these evidences of command concern, black promotions continued to lag in the Navy. Again at the Special Programs Unit's urging, the Bureau of Naval Personnel began to limit the number of rated men turned out by the black training schools so that more nonrated men already on the job might have a better chance to win ratings. The bureau instituted a specialist leadership course for rated Negroes at Great Lakes and recommended in January 1944 that two Negroes so trained be included in each base company sent out of the country. It also selected twelve Negroes with backgrounds in education and public relations and assigned them to recruiting duty around the country. The bureau expanded the black petty officer program because it was convinced by the end of 1943 that the presence of more black leaders, particularly in the large base companies, would improve discipline and raise morale. It was but a short step from this conviction to a realization that black commissioned officers were needed.

Despite its 100,000 enlisted Negroes, the absence of black commissioned officers in the fall of 1943 forced the Navy to answer an increasing number of queries from civil rights organizations and Congress.[3-69] Several times during 1942 suggestions were made within the Bureau of Naval Personnel that the instructors at the Hampton specialist school and seventy-five other Negroes be commissioned (p. 080) for service with the large black units, but nothing happened. Secretary Knox himself thought that the Navy would have to develop a considerable body of black sailors before it could even think about commissioning black officers.[3-70] But the secretary failed to appreciate the effect of the sheer number of black draftees that overwhelmed the service in the spring of 1943, and he reckoned without the persuasive arguments of his special assistant, Adlai Stevenson.[3-71]

[Footnote 3-69: News that the Navy had inadvertently
commissioned a black student at Harvard University
in the spring of 1942 produced the following
reaction in one personnel office: "LtCmdr B ...
[Special Activities Branch, BuPers] says this is
true due to a slip by the officer who signed up
medical students at Harvard. Cmdr. B. says this boy
has a year to go in medical school and hopes they
can get rid of him some how by then. He earnestly
asks us to be judicious in handling this matter and
prefers that nothing be said about it." Quoted in a
Note, H. M. Harvey to M Mc (ca. 20 Jun 42), copy on
file in the Dennis D. Nelson Collection, San Diego,
California.]

[Footnote 3-70: Ltr, SecNav to Sen. David I. Walsh
(Massachusetts), 21 May 42, 51-1-26; see also idem
to Sen. William H. Smathers (Florida), 7 Feb 42,
Nav-32-C. Both in GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-71: Interv, Lee Nichols with Lester
Granger, 1953, in Nichols Collection, CMH.]

Secretary Knox often referred to Adlai Stevenson as "my New Dealer," and, as the expression suggested, the Illinois lawyer was in an excellent position to influence the secretary's thinking.[3-72] Although not so forceful an advocate as Christopher Sargent, Stevenson lent his considerable intelligence and charm to the support of those in the department who sought equal opportunity for the Negro. He was an invaluable and influential ally for the Special Programs Unit. Stevenson knew Knox well and understood how to approach him. He was particularly effective in getting Negroes commissioned. In September 1943 he pointed out that, with the induction of 12,000 Negroes a month, the demand for black officers would be mounting in the black community and in the government as well. The Navy could not and should not, he warned, postpone much longer the creation of some black officers. Suspicion of discrimination was one reason the Navy was failing to get the best qualified Negroes, and Stevenson believed it wise to act quickly. He recommended that the Navy commission ten or twelve Negroes from among "top notch civilians just as we procure white officers" and a few from the ranks. The commissioning should be treated as a matter of course without any special publicity. The news, he added wryly, would get out soon enough.[3-73]

[Footnote 3-72: Kenneth S. Davis, _The Politics of
Honor: A Biography of Adlai E. Stevenson_ (New
York: Putnam, 1957), p. 146; Ltr, A. E. Stevenson
to Dennis D. Nelson, 10 Feb 48, Nelson Collection,
San Diego, California.]

[Footnote 3-73: Memo, Stevenson for the Secretary
[Knox], 29 Sep 43, 54-1-50, GenRecsNav.]

There were in fact three avenues to a Navy commission: the Naval Academy, the V-12 program, and direct commission from civilian life or the enlisted ranks. But Annapolis had no Negroes enrolled at the time Stevenson spoke, and only a dozen Negroes were enrolled in V-12 programs at integrated civilian colleges throughout the country.[3-74] The lack of black students in the V-12 program could be attributed in part to the belief of many black trainees that the program barred Negroes. Actually, it never had, and in December 1943 the bureau publicized this fact. It issued a circular letter emphasizing to all commanders that enlisted men were entitled to consideration for transfer to the V-12 program regardless of race.[3-75] Despite this effort (p. 081) it was soon apparent that the program would produce only a few black officers, and the Bureau of Naval Personnel, at the urging of its Special Programs Unit, agreed to follow Stevenson's suggestion and concentrate on the direct commissioning of Negroes. Unlike Stevenson the bureau preferred to obtain most of the men from the enlisted ranks, and only in the case of certain specially trained men did the Navy commission civilians.

[Footnote 3-74: The V-12 program was designed to
prepare large numbers of educated men for the
Navy's Reserve Midshipmen schools and to increase
the war-depleted student bodies of many colleges.
The Navy signed on eligible students as apprentice
seamen and paid their academic expenses. Eventually
the V-12 program produced some 80,000 officers for
the wartime Navy. For an account of the experiences
of a black recruit in the V-12 program, see Carl T.
Rowan, "Those Navy Boys Changed My Life," _Reader's
Digest_ 72 (January 1958):55-58. Rowan, the
celebrated columnist and onetime Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State for Public Affairs, was one of
the first Negroes to complete the V-12 program.
Another was Samuel Gravely.]

[Footnote 3-75: BuPers Cir Ltr 269-43, 15 Dec 43.]

The Bureau of Naval Personnel concluded that, since many units were substantially or wholly manned by Negroes, black officers could be used without undue difficulty, and when Secretary Knox, prodded by Stevenson, turned to the bureau, it recommended that the Navy (p. 082) commission twelve line and ten staff officers from a selected list of enlisted men.[3-76] Admiral King endorsed the bureau's recommendation and on 15 December 1943 Knox approved it, although he conditioned his approval by saying: "After you have commissioned the twenty-two officers you suggest, I think this matter should again be reviewed before any additional colored officers are commissioned."[3-77]

[Footnote 3-76: Memo, SecNav for Chief, NavPers, 20
Nov 43, 54-1-50; Memo, Chief, NavPers, for SecNav,
2 Dec 43, sub: Negro Officers. Both in GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-77: Memo, SecNav for Rear Adm Jacobs, 15
Dec 43, quoted in "BuPers Hist," p. 33.]

On 1 January 1944 the first sixteen black officer candidates, selected from among qualified enlisted applicants, entered Great Lakes for segregated training. All sixteen survived the course, but only twelve were commissioned. In the last week of the course, three candidates were returned to the ranks, not because they had failed but because the Bureau of Naval Personnel had suddenly decided to limit the number of black officers in this first group to twelve. The twelve entered the U.S. Naval Reserve as line officers on 17 March. A thirteenth man, the only candidate who lacked a college degree, was made a warrant officer because of his outstanding work in the course.

Two of the twelve new ensigns were assigned to the faculty at Hampton training school, four others to yard and harbor craft duty, and the rest to training duty at Great Lakes. All carried the label "Deck Officers Limited--only," a designation usually reserved for officers whose physical or educational deficiencies kept them from performing all the duties of a line officer. The Bureau of Naval Personnel never explained why the men were placed in this category, but it was clear that none of them lacked the physical requirements of a line officer and all had had business or professional careers in civil life.

Operating duplicate training facilities for officer candidates was costly, and the bureau decided shortly after the first group of black candidates was trained that future candidates of both races would be trained together. By early summer ten more Negroes, this time civilians with special professional qualifications, had been trained with whites and were commissioned as staff officers in the Medical, Dental, Chaplain, Civil Engineer, and Supply Corps. These twenty-two men were the first of some sixty Negroes to be commissioned during the war.

Since only a handful of the Negroes in the Navy were officers, the preponderance of the race problems concerned relations between black enlisted men and their white officers. The problem of selecting the proper officers to command black sailors was a formidable one never satisfactorily solved during the war. As in the Army, most of the white officers routinely selected for such assignments were southerners, chosen by the Bureau of Naval Personnel for their assumed "understanding" of Negroes rather than for their general competency. The Special Programs Unit tried to work with these officers, assembling them for conferences to discuss the best techniques and procedures for dealing with groups of black subordinates. Members of the unit sought to disabuse the officers of preconceived biases, constantly reminding them that "our prejudices must be subordinated to our traditional (p. 083) unfailing obedience to orders."[3-78] Although there was ample proof that many Negroes actively resented the paternalism exhibited by many of even the best of these officers, this fact was slow to filter through the naval establishment. It was not until January 1944 that an officer who had compiled an enviable record in training Seabee units described how his organization had come to see the light:

We in the Seabees no longer follow the precept that southern
officers exclusively should be selected for colored battalions. A
man may be from the north, south, east or west. If his attitude
is to do the best possible job he knows how, regardless of what
the color of his personnel is, that is the man we want as an
officer for our colored Seabees. We have learned to steer clear
of the "I'm from the South--I know how to handle 'em variety." It
follows with reference to white personnel, that deeply accented
southern whites are not generally suited for Negro
battalions.[3-79]

[Footnote 3-78: Quoted in Record of "Conference With
Regard to Negro Personnel," held at Hq, Fifth Naval
District, 26 Oct 43, Incl to Ltr, Chief, NavPers,
to All Sea Frontier Cmds et al., 5 Jan 44, sub:
Negro Personnel--Confidential Report of Conference
With Regard to the Handling of, Pers 1013, BuPers
Recs. The grotesque racial attitudes of some
commanders, as well as the thoughtful questions and
difficult experiences of others, were fully aired
at this conference.]

[Footnote 3-79: Ibid.]

Further complicating the task of selecting suitable officers for black units was the fact that when the Bureau of Naval Personnel asked unit commanders to recommend men for such duty many commanders used the occasion to rid themselves of their least desirable officers. The Special Programs Unit then tried to develop its own source of officers for black units. It discovered a fine reservoir of talent among the white noncommissioned officers who ran the physical training and drill courses at Great Lakes. These were excellent instructors, mature and experienced in dealing with people. In January 1944 arrangements were made to commission them and to assign them to black units.

Improvement in the quality of officers in black units was especially important because the attitude of local commanders was directly related to the degree of segregation in living quarters and recreational facilities, and such segregation was the most common source of racial tension. Although the Navy's practice of segregating units clearly invited separate living and recreational facilities, the rules were unwritten, and local commanders had been left to decide the extent to which segregation was necessary. Thus practices varied greatly and policy depended ultimately on the local commanders. Rather than attack racial practices at particular bases, the unit decided to concentrate on the officers. It explained to these leaders the Navy's policy of equal treatment and opportunity, a concept basically incompatible with many of their practices.

This conclusion was embodied in a pamphlet entitled _Guide to the Command of Negro Naval Personnel_ and published by the Bureau of Naval Personnel in February 1944.[3-80] The Special Programs Unit had to overcome much opposition within the bureau to get the pamphlet published. Some thought the subject of racial tension was best ignored; others objected to the "sociological" content of the work, considering this approach outside the Navy's province. The unit (p. 084) argued that racial tension in the Navy was a serious problem that could not be ignored, and since human relations affected the Navy's mission the Navy should deal with social matters objectively and frankly.[3-81]

[Footnote 3-80: NavPers 15092, 12 Feb 44.]

[Footnote 3-81: "BuPers Hist," pt. II, pp. 2-3.]

Scholarly and objective, the pamphlet was an important document in the history of race relations in the Navy. In language similar to that used in the War Department's pamphlet on race, the Bureau of Naval Personnel stated officially for the first time that discrimination flowed of necessity out of the doctrine of segregation:

The idea of compulsory racial segregation is disliked by almost
all Negroes, and literally hated by many. This antagonism is in
part a result of the fact that as a principle it embodies a
doctrine of racial inferiority. It is also a result of the lesson
taught the Negro by experience that in spite of the legal formula
of "separate but equal" facilities, the facilities open to him
under segregation are in fact usually inferior as to location or
quality to those available to others.[3-82]

[Footnote 3-82: NavPers 15092, 12 Feb 44, p. 10.]

The guide also foreshadowed the end of the old order of things: "The Navy accepts no theories of racial differences in inborn ability, but expects that every man wearing its uniform be trained and used in accordance with his maximum individual capacity determined on the basis of individual performance."[3-83]

[Footnote 3-83: Ibid., p. 1.]

_Forrestal Takes the Helm_

The Navy got a leader sympathetic to the proposition of equal treatment and opportunity for Negroes, and possessed of the bureaucratic skills to achieve reforms, when President Roosevelt appointed Under Secretary James Forrestal to replace Frank Knox, who died suddenly on 28 April 1944. During the next five years Forrestal, a brilliant, complex product of Wall Street, would assume more and more responsibility for directing the integration effort in the defense establishment. Although no racial crusader, Forrestal had been for many years a member of the National Urban League, itself a pillar of the civil rights establishment. He saw the problem of employing Negroes as one of efficiency and simple fair play, and as the months went by he assumed an active role in experimenting with changes in the Navy's policy.[3-84]

[Footnote 3-84: See Columbia University Oral Hist
Interv with Granger; USAF Oral History Program,
Interview with James C. Evans, 24 Apr 73.]

His first experiment was with sea duty for Negroes. After the experience of the _Mason_ and the other segregated ships which actually proved very little, sentiment for a partial integration of the fleet continued to grow in the Bureau of Naval Personnel. As early as April 1943, officers in the Planning and Control Activity recommended that Negroes be included in small numbers in the crews of the larger combat ships. Admiral Jacobs, however, was convinced that "you couldn't dump 200 colored boys on a crew in battle,"[3-85] so this and similar proposals later in the year never survived passage through the bureau.

[Footnote 3-85: Interv, Lee Nichols with Vice Adm
Randall Jacobs, 29 Mar 53, in Nichols Collection,
CMH.]

Forrestal accepted Jacob's argument that as long as the war (p. 085) continued any move toward integrating the fighting ships was impractical. At the same time, he agreed with the Special Programs Unit that large concentrations of Negroes in shore duties lowered efficiency and morale. Forrestal compromised by ordering the bureau to prepare as an experiment a plan for the integration of some fleet auxiliary ships. On 20 May 1944 he outlined the problem for the President:

"From a morale standpoint, the Negroes resent the fact that they are not assigned to general service billets at sea, and white personnel resent the fact that Negroes have been given less hazardous assignments." He explained that at first Negroes would be used only on the large auxiliaries, and their number would be limited to not more than 10 percent of the ship's complement. If this step proved workable, he planned to use Negroes in small numbers on other types of ships "as necessity indicates." The White House answered: "OK, FDR."[3-86]

[Footnote 3-86: Memo, SecNav for President, 20 May
44, Forrestal file, GenRecsNav.]

Secretary Forrestal also won the support of the Chief of Naval Operations for the move, but Admiral King still considered integration in the fleet experimental and was determined to keep strict control until the results were known. On 9 August 1944 King informed the commanding officers of twenty-five large fleet auxiliaries that Negroes would be assigned to them in the near future. As Forrestal had suggested, King set the maximum number of Negroes at 10 percent of the ship's general service. Of this number, 15 percent would be third-class petty officers from shore activities, selected as far as possible from volunteers and, in any case, from those who had served the longest periods of shore duty. Of the remainder, 43 percent would be from Class A schools and 42 percent from recruit training. The basic 10 percent figure proved to be a theoretical maximum; no ship received that many Negroes.

Admiral King insisted that equal treatment in matters of training, promotion, and duty assignments must be accorded all hands, but he left the matter of berthing to the commanding officers, noting that experience had proved that in the shore establishment, when the percentage of blacks to whites was small, the two groups could be successfully mingled in the same compartments. He also pointed out that a thorough indoctrination of white sailors before the arrival of the Negroes had been useful in preventing racial friction ashore.[3-87]

[Footnote 3-87: Ltr, CNO to CO, USS _Antaeus_ et al.,
9 Aug 44, sub: Negro Enlisted Personnel--Assignment
of to Ships of the Fleet, P16-3/MM, OpNavArchives.]

King asked all commanders concerned in the experiment to report their experiences.[3-88] Their judgment: integration in the auxiliary fleet worked. As one typical report related after several months of integrated duty:

The crew was carefully indoctrinated in the fact that Negro
personnel should not be subjected to discrimination of any sort
and should be treated in the same manner as other members of the
crew.

The Negro personnel when they came aboard were berthed
indiscriminately throughout the crew's compartments in the same
manner as if they had been white. It is felt that the
assimilation of the general service Negro personnel aboard this
ship has been remarkably successful. To the present date (p. 086)
there has been no report of any difficulty which could be
laid to their color. It is felt that this is due in part, at
least, to the high calibre of Negroes assigned to this ship.[3-89]

[Footnote 3-88: Idem to Cmdr, _Antaeus_ et al., 9 Jan
45, P16-3, OpNavArchives.]

[Footnote 3-89: Ltr, CO, USS _Antaeus_, to Chief,
NavPers, 16 Jan 45, sub: Negro Enlisted
Personnel--Assignment of to Ships of the Fleet,
Ag67/P16-3/MM; see also Memo, Cmdr D. Armstrong for
ComSerForPac, 29 Dec 44, sub: Negro Enlisted
Personnel (General Service Ratings) Assignment of
to Ships of the Fleet; Ltr, ComSerForPac to Chief,
NavPers, 2 Jan 45, with CINCPac&POA end thereto,
same sub; Ltrs to Chief, NavPers, from CO, USS
_Laramie_, 17 Jan 45, USS _Mattole_, 19 Jan 45,
with ComSerForLant end, and USS _Ariel_, 1 Feb 45.
All Incl to Memo, Chief, NavPers, for CINCUSFLEET,
6 Mar 45, sub: Negro Personnel--Expanded Use of,
Pers 2119 FB. All in OpNavArchives.]

The comments of his commanders convinced King that the auxiliary vessels in the fleet could be integrated without incident. He approved a plan submitted by the Chief of Naval Personnel on 6 March 1945 for the gradual assignment of Negroes to all auxiliary vessels, again in numbers not to exceed 10 percent of the general service billets in any ship's complement.[3-90] A month later Negroes were being so assigned in an administratively routine manner.[3-91] The Bureau of Naval Personnel then began assigning black officers to sea duty on the integrated vessels. The first one went to the _Mason_ in March, and in succeeding months others were sent in a routine manner to auxiliary vessels throughout the fleet.[3-92] These assignments were not always carried out according to the bureau's formula. The commander of the USS _Chemung_, for example, told a young black ensign:

I'm a Navy Man, and we're in a war. To me, it's that stripe that
counts--and the training and leadership that it is supposed to
symbolize. That's why I never called a meeting of the crew to
prepare them, to explain their obligation to respect you, or
anything like that. I didn't want anyone to think you were
different from any other officer coming aboard.[3-93]

[Footnote 3-90: Memo, Chief, NavPers, for
CINCUSFLEET, 6 Mar 45, sub: Negro
Personnel--Expanded Use of, with 1st Ind, from
Fleet Adm, USN, for Vice CNO, 28 Mar 45, same sub,
FFI/P16-3/MM, OpNavArchives.]

[Footnote 3-91: BuPers Cir Ltr 105-45, 13 Apr 45,
sub: Negro General-Service Personnel, Assignment of
to Auxiliary Vessels of the Fleet.]

[Footnote 3-92: Ltr, Chief, NavPers, to CO, USS
_Mason_, 16 Mar 45, sub: Negro Officer--Assignment
of, Pers 2119-FB; see also idem to CO, USS
_Kaweah_, 16 Jul 45, sub: Negro Officer--Assignment
of to Auxiliary Vessel of the Fleet, AO 15/P16-1;
idem to CO, USS _Laramie_, 21 Aug 45, same sub, AO
16/P16-1. All in OpNavArchives.]

[Footnote 3-93: Quoted in Rowan, "Those Navy Boys
Changed My Life." pp 57-58.]

Admitting Negroes to the WAVES was another matter considered by the new secretary in his first days in office. In fact, the subject had been under discussion in the Navy Department for some two years. Soon after the organization of the women's auxiliary, its director, Capt. Mildred H. McAfee, had recommended that Negroes be accepted, arguing that their recruitment would help to temper the widespread criticism of the Navy's restrictive racial policy. But the traditionalists in the Bureau of Naval Personnel had opposed the move on the grounds that WAVES were organized to replace men, and since there were more than enough black sailors to fill all billets open to Negroes there was no need to recruit black women.

Actually, both arguments served to mask other motives, as did Knox's rejection of recruitment on the grounds that integrating women into the Navy was difficult enough without taking on the race (p. 087) problem.[3-94] In April 1943 Knox "tentatively" approved the "tentative" outline of a bureau plan for the induction of up to 5,000 black WAVES, but nothing came of it.[3-95] Given the secretary's frequent protestation that the subject was under constant review,[3-96] and his statement to Captain McAfee that black WAVES would be enlisted "over his dead body,"[3-97] the tentative outline and approval seems to have been an attempt to defer the decision indefinitely.

[Footnote 3-94: Ltr, Mildred M. Horton to author, 14
Mar 75, CMH files.]

[Footnote 3-95: Memo, Chief, NavPers, for SecNav, 27
Apr 43, Pers 17MD, BuPersRecs, Memo, SecNav for Adm
Jacobs, 29 Apr 43, 54-1-43, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-96: See, for example, Ltr, SecNav to
Algernon D. Black, City-Wide Citizen's Cmte on
Harlem, 23 Apr 43, 54-1-43, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-97: Quoted in Ltr, Horton to author, 14
Mar 75.]

Secretary Knox's delay merely attracted more attention to the problem and enabled the protestors to enlist powerful allies. At the time of his death, Knox was under siege by a delegation from the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) demanding a reassessment of the Navy's policy on the women's reserve.[3-98] His successor turned for advice to Captain McAfee and to the Bureau of Naval Personnel where, despite Knox's "positive and direct orders" against recruiting black WAVES, the Special Programs Unit had continued to study the problem.[3-99] Convinced that the step was just and inevitable, the unit also agreed that the WAVES should be integrated. Forrestal approved, and on 28 July 1944 he recommended to the President that Negroes be trained in the WAVES on an integrated basis and assigned "wherever needed within the continental limits of the United States, preferably to stations where there are already Negro men." He concluded by reiterating a Special Programs Unit warning: "I consider it advisable to start obtaining Negro WAVES before we are forced to take them."[3-100]

[Footnote 3-98: Memo, Ralph Bard for Forrestal, 4 May
44, sub: Navy Policy on Recruitment of Negro
Females as WAVES; Ltr, Nathan Cowan, CIO, to
Forrestal, 20 May 44, 54-1-1. Both in GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-99: Memo, J. V. F. (Forrestal) for Adm
Denfeld (ca. 7 Jun 44); Memo, Capt Mildred McAfee
for Adm Denfeld, 7 Jun 44; both in 54-1-4,
GenRecsNav. See also Memo, Chief, NavPers, for
SecNav, 11 May 44, sub: Navy Policy on Recruitment
of Negro Females as WAVES, Pers 17, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-100: Memo, Forrestal for President, 28
Jul 44, 54-1-4, GenRecsNav.]

To avoid the shoals of racial controversy in the midst of an election year, Secretary Forrestal did trim his recommendations to the extent that he retained the doctrine of separate but equal living quarters and mess facilities for the black WAVES. Despite this offer of compromise, President Roosevelt directed Forrestal to withhold action on the proposal.[3-101] Here the matter would probably have stood until after the election but for Thomas E. Dewey's charge in a Chicago speech during the presidential campaign that the White House was discriminating against black women. The President quickly instructed the Navy to admit Negroes into the WAVES.[3-102]

[Footnote 3-101: Memo, Lt Cmdr John Tyree (White
House aide) for Forrestal, 9 Aug 44, 54-1-4,
GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-102: Navy Dept Press Release, 19 Oct 44.]

The first two black WAVE officers graduated from training at Smith College on 21 December, and the enlistment of black women began a week later. The program turned out to be more racially progressive than initially outlined by Forrestal. He had explained to the President that the women would be quartered separately, a provision (p. 088) interpreted in the Bureau of Naval Personnel to mean that black recruits would be organized into separate companies. Since a recruit company numbered 250 women, and since it quickly became apparent that such a large group of black volunteers would not soon be forthcoming, some of the bureau staff decided that the Navy would continue to bar black women. In this they reckoned without Captain McAfee who insisted on a personal ruling by Forrestal. She warned the secretary that his order was necessary because the concept "was so strange to Navy practice."[3-103] He agreed with her that the Negroes would be integrated along with the rest of the incoming recruits, and the Bureau of Naval Personnel subsequently ordered that the WAVES be assimilated without making either special or separate arrangements.[3-104]

[Footnote 3-103: Oral History Interview, Mildred
McAfee Horton, 25 Aug 69, Center of Naval History.]

[Footnote 3-104: Ltr, Asst Chief, NavPers, to CO,
NavTraScol (WR), Bronx, N.Y., 8 Dec 44, sub:
Colored WAVE Recruits, Pers-107, BuPersRecs.]

By July 1945 the Navy had trained seventy-two black WAVES at Hunter College Naval Training School in a fully integrated and routine manner. Although black WAVES were restricted somewhat in specialty assignments and a certain amount of separate quartering within integrated barracks prevailed at some duty stations, the Special Programs Unit came to consider the WAVE program, which established a forceful precedent for the integration of male recruit training, its most important wartime breakthrough, crediting Captain McAfee and her unbending insistence on equal treatment for the achievement.

Forrestal won the day in these early experiments, but he was a skillful administrator and knew that there was little hope for any fundamental social change in the naval service without the active cooperation of the Navy's high-ranking officers. His meeting with Admiral King on the subject of integration in the summer of 1944 has been reported by several people. Lester Granger, who later became Forrestal's special representative on racial matters, recalled:

He [Forrestal] said he spoke to Admiral King, who was then chief
of staff, and said, "Admiral King, I'm not satisfied with the
situation here--I don't think that our Navy Negro personnel are
getting a square break. I want to do something about it, but I
can't do anything about it unless the officers are behind me. I
want your help. What do you say?"

He said that Admiral King sat for a moment, and looked out (p. 089)
the window and then said reflectively, "You know, we say that
we are a democracy and a democracy ought to have a democratic
Navy. I don't think you can do it, but if you want to try, I'm
behind you all the way." And he told me, "And Admiral King was
behind me, all the way, not only he but all of the Bureau of
Personnel, BuPers. They've been bricks."[3-105]

[Footnote 3-105: Quoted in the Columbia University
Oral History Interview with Granger. Granger's
incorrect reference to Admiral King as "chief of
staff" is interesting because it illustrates the
continuing evolution of that office during World
War II.]

Admiral Jacobs, the Chief of Naval Personnel, also pledged his support.[3-106]

[Footnote 3-106: James V. Forrestal, "Remarks for
Dinner Meeting at National Urban League," 12 Feb
58, Box 31, Misc file, Forrestal Papers, Princeton
Library. Forrestal's truncated version of the King
meeting agreed substantially with Granger's
lengthier remembrance.]

As news of the King-Forrestal conversation filtered through the department, many of the programs long suggested by the Special Programs Unit and heretofore treated with indifference or disapproval suddenly received respectful attention.[3-107] With the high-ranking officers cooperating, the Navy under Forrestal began to attack some of the more obvious forms of discrimination and causes of racial tension. Admiral King led the attack, personally directing in August 1944 that all elements give close attention to the proper selection of officers to command black sailors. As he put it: "Certain officers will be temperamentally better suited for such commands than others."[3-108] The qualifications of these officers were to be kept under constant (p. 090) review. In December he singled out the commands in the Pacific area, which had a heavy concentration of all-black base companies, calling for a reform in their employment and advancement of Negroes.[3-109]

[Footnote 3-107: Intervs, Lee Nichols with Adm Louis
E. Denfeld (Deputy Chief of Naval Personnel, later
CNO) and with Cmdr Charles Dillon (formerly of
BuPers Special Unit), 1953; both in Nichols
Collection, CMH.]

[Footnote 3-108: ALNAV, 7 Aug 44, quoted in Nelson,
"Integration of the Negro," p. 46.]

[Footnote 3-109: Dir, CNO, to Forward Areas, Dec 44,
quoted in Nelson's "Integration of the Negro," p.
51.]

The Bureau of Naval Personnel also stepped up the tempo of its reforms. In March 1944 it had already made black cooks and bakers eligible for duty in all commissary branches of the Navy.[3-110] In June it got Forrestal's approval for putting all rated cooks and stewards in chief petty officer uniforms.[3-111] (While providing finally for the proper uniforming of the chief cooks and stewards, this reform set their subordinates, the rated cooks and stewards, even further apart from their counterparts in the general service who of course continued to wear the familiar bell bottoms.) The bureau also began to attack the concentration of Negroes in ammunition depots and base companies. On 21 February 1945 it ordered that all naval magazines and ammunition depots in the United States and, wherever practical, overseas limit their black seamen to 30 percent of the total employed.[3-112] It (p. 091) also organized twenty logistic support companies to replace the formless base companies sent to the Pacific in the early months of the recruitment program. Organized to perform supply functions, each company consisted of 250 enlisted men and five officers, with a flexible range of petty officer billets.

[Footnote 3-110: BuPers Cir Ltr 72-44, 13 Mar 44,
sub: Negro Personnel of the Commissary Branch,
Assignment to Duty of.]

[Footnote 3-111: Idem, 182-44, 29 Jun 44, "Uniform
for Chief Cooks and Chief Stewards and Cooks and
Stewards."]

[Footnote 3-112: Idem, 45-18, 21 Feb 45, and 45-46,
31 May 45, sub: Negro Enlisted
Personnel--Limitation on Assignment of to Naval
Ammunition Depots and Naval Magazines.]

In the reform atmosphere slowly permeating the Bureau of Naval Personnel, the Special Programs Unit found it relatively easy to end segregation in the specialist training program.[3-113] From the first, the number of Negroes eligible for specialist training had been too small to make costly duplication of equipment and services practical. In 1943, for example, the black aviation metalsmith school at Great Lakes had an average enrollment of eight students. The school was quietly closed and its students integrated with white students. Thus, when the _Mason's_ complement was assembled in early 1944, Negroes were put into the destroyer school at Norfolk side by side with whites, and the black and white petty officers were quartered together. As a natural consequence of the decision to place Negroes in the auxiliary fleet, the Bureau of Naval Personnel opened training in seagoing rates to Negroes on an integrated basis. Citing the practicality of the move, the bureau closed the last of the black schools in June 1945.[3-114]

[Footnote 3-113: There is some indication that
integration was already going on unofficially in
some specialist schools; see Ltr, Dr. M. A. F.
Ritchie to James C. Evans, 13 Aug 65, CMH files.]

[Footnote 3-114: BuPers Cir Ltr 194-44, sub: Advanced
Schools, Nondiscrimination in Selection of
Personnel for Training in; Ltr, Chief, NavPers, to
CO, AdComd, NavTraCen, 12 Jun 45, sub: Selection of
Negro Personnel for Instruction in Class "A"
Schools, 54-1-21, GenRecsNav.]

Despite these reforms, the months following Forrestal's talk with King saw many important recommendations of the Special Programs Unit wandering uncertainly through the bureaucratic desert. For example, a proposal to make the logistic support companies interracial, or at least to create comparable white companies to remove the stigma of segregated manual labor, failed to survive the objections of the enlisted personnel section. The Bureau of Naval Personnel rejected a suggestion that Negroes be assigned to repair units on board ships and to LST's, LCI's, and LCT's during the expansion of the amphibious program. On 30 August 1944 Admiral King rejected a bureau recommendation that the crews of net tenders and mine ships be integrated. He reasoned that these vessels were being kept in readiness for overseas assignment and required "the highest degree of experienced seamanship and precision work" by the crews. He also cited the crowded living quarters and less experienced officers as further reasons for banning Negroes.[3-115]

[Footnote 3-115: Memo, CNO for Chief, NavPers, 30 Aug
44, sub: Negro Personnel--Assignment to ANs and
YMs, P13-/MM, BuPersRecs.]

There were other examples of backsliding in the Navy's racial practices. Use of Negroes in general service had created a shortage of messmen, and in August 1944 the Bureau of Naval Personnel authorized commanders to recruit among black seamen for men to transfer to the Steward's Branch. The bureau suggested as a talking point the fact (p. 092) that stewards enjoyed more rapid advancement, shorter hours, and easier work than men in the general service.[3-116] And, illustrating that a move toward integration was sometimes followed by a step backward, a bureau representative reported in July 1945 that whereas a few black trainees at the Bainbridge Naval Training Center had been integrated in the past, many now arriving were segregated in all-black companies.[3-117]

[Footnote 3-116: BuPers Cir Ltr 227-44, 12 Aug 44,
sub: Steward's Branch, Procurement of From
General-Service Negroes.]

[Footnote 3-117: Memo, Lt William H. Robertson, Jr.,
for Rear Adm William M. Fechteler, Asst Chief,
NavPers, 20 Jul 45, sub: Conditions Existing at
NTC, Bainbridge, Md., Regarding Negro Personnel,
Reported on by Lt Wm. H. Robertson, Jr.,
Pers-2119-FB, BuPersRecs.]

There were reasons for the inconsistent stance in Washington. The Special Programs Unit had for some time been convinced that only full integration would eliminate discrimination and dissolve racial tensions in the Navy, and it had understood Forrestal's desire "to do something" for the Negro to mean just that. Some senior commanders and their colleagues in the Bureau of Naval Personnel, on the other hand, while accepting the need for reform and willing to accept some racial mixing, nevertheless rejected any substantial change in the policy of restricted employment of Negroes on the grounds that it might disrupt the wartime fleet. Both sides could argue with assurance since Forrestal and King had not made their positions completely clear. Whatever the secretary's ultimate intention, the reforms carried out in 1944 were too little and too late. Perhaps nothing would have been sufficient, for the racial incidents visited upon the Navy during the last year of the war were symptomatic of the overwhelming dissatisfaction Negroes felt with their lot in the armed forces. There had been incidents during the Knox period, but investigation had failed to isolate any "single, simple cause," and troubles continued to occur during 1944.[3-118]

[Footnote 3-118: "BuPers Hist," p. 75.]

Three of these incidents gained national prominence.[3-119] The first was a mutiny at Mare Island, California, after an explosion destroyed two ammunition ships loading at nearby Port Chicago on 17 July 1944. The explosion killed over 300 persons, including 250 black seamen who had toiled in large, segregated labor battalions. The survivors refused to return to work, and fifty of them were convicted of mutiny and sentenced to prison. The incident became a _cause celebre_. Finally, through the intervention of the black press and black organizations and the efforts of Thurgood Marshall and Lester Granger, the convictions were set aside and the men restored to active duty.

[Footnote 3-119: Nelson, "Integration of the Negro,"
ch. VIII.]

A riot on Guam in December 1944 was the climax of months of friction between black seamen and white marines. A series of shootings in and around the town of Agana on Christmas Eve left a black and a white marine dead. Believing one of the killed a member of their group, black sailors from the Naval Supply Depot drove into town to confront the outnumbered military police. No violence ensued, but the next day two truckloads of armed Negroes went to the white Marine camp. A riot followed and forty-three Negroes were arrested, charged with rioting and theft of the trucks, and sentenced to up to four years in prison. The authorities also recommended that several of the white marines (p. 093) involved be court-martialed. These men too were convicted of various offenses and sentenced.[3-120] Walter White went to Guam to investigate the matter and appeared as a principal witness before the Marine Court of Inquiry. There he pieced together for officials the long history of discrimination suffered by men of the base company. This situation, combined with poor leadership in the unit, he believed, caused the trouble. His efforts and those of other civil rights advocates led to the release of the black sailors in early 1946.[3-121]

[Footnote 3-120: Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Ralph W.
Donnelly, _Blacks in the Marine Corps_ (Washington:
Government Printing Office, 1975), pp. 44-45.]

[Footnote 3-121: White's testimony before the Court
of Inquiry was attached to a report by Maj Gen
Henry L. Larsen to CMC (ca. 22 Jan 45), Ser. No.
04275, copy in CMH.]

A hunger strike developed as a protest against discrimination in a Seabee battalion at Port Hueneme, California, in March 1945. There was no violence. The thousand strikers continued to work but refused to eat for two days. The resulting publicity forced the Navy to investigate the charges; as a result, the commanding officer, the focus of the grievance, was replaced and the outfit sent overseas.

The riots, mutinies, and other incidents increased the pressure for further modifications of policy. Some senior officers became convinced that the only way to avoid mass rebellion was to avert the (p. 094) possibility of collective action, and collective action was less likely if Negroes were dispersed among whites. As Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, commander of the Pacific Fleet and an eloquent proponent of the theory that integration was a practical means of avoiding trouble, explained to the captain of an attack cargo ship who had just received a group of black crewmen and was segregating their sleeping quarters: "If you put all the Negroes together they'll have a chance to share grievances and to plot among themselves, and this will damage discipline and morale. If they are distributed among other members of the crew, there will be less chance of trouble. And when we say we want integration, we mean _integration_."[3-122] Thus integration grew out of both idealism and realism.

[Footnote 3-122: As quoted in White, _A Man Called
White_, p. 273. For a variation on this theme, see
Interv, Nichols with Hillenkoetter.]

If racial incidents convinced the admirals that further reforms were necessary, they also seem to have strengthened Forrestal's resolve to introduce a still greater change in his department's policy. For months he had listened to the arguments of senior officials and naval experts that integration of the fleet, though desirable, was impossible during the war. Yet Forrestal had seen integration work on the small patrol craft, on fleet auxiliaries, and in the WAVES. In fact, integration was working smoothly wherever it had been tried. Although hard to substantiate, the evidence suggests that it was in the weeks after the Guam incident that the secretary and Admiral King agreed on a policy of total integration in the general service. The change would be gradual, but the progress would be evident and the end assured--Negroes were going to be assigned as individuals to all branches and billets in the general service.[3-123]

[Footnote 3-123: Ltr, Rear Adm Hillenkoetter to
Nichols, 22 May 53; see also Intervs, Nichols with
Granger, Hillenkoetter, Jacobs, Thomas Darden,
Dillon, and other BuPers officials. In contrast to
the Knox period, where the files are replete with
Secretary of the Navy memos, BuPers letters, and
General Board reports on the development of the
Navy's racial policy, there is scant documentation
on the same subject during the early months of the
Forrestal administration. This is understandable
because the subject of integration was extremely
delicate and not readily susceptible to the usual
staffing needed for most policy decisions.
Furthermore, Forrestal's laconic manner of
expressing himself, famous in bureaucratic
Washington, inhibited the usual flow of letters and
memos.]

Forrestal and King received no end of advice. In December 1944 a group of black publicists called upon the secretary to appoint a civilian aide to consider the problems of the Negro in the Navy. The group also added its voice to those within the Navy who were suggesting the appointment of a black public relations officer to disseminate news of particular interest to the black press and to improve the Navy's relations with the black community.[3-124] One of Forrestal's assistants proposed that an intradepartmental committee be organized to standardize the disparate approaches to racial problems throughout the naval establishment; another recommended the appointment of a black civilian to advise the Bureau of Naval Personnel; and still another recommended a white assistant on racial affairs in the office of the under secretary.[3-125]

[Footnote 3-124: Ltr, John H. Sengstacke to
Forrestal, 19 Dec 44, 54-1-9, GenRecsNav; Interv,
Nichols with Granger.]

[Footnote 3-125: Memo, Under Sec Bard for SecNav, 1
Jan 45; Memo, H Struve Hensel (Off of Gen Counsel)
for Forrestal, 5 Jan 45; both in 54-1-9, Forrestal
file, GenRecsNav.]

These ideas had merit. The Special Programs Unit had for some time been urging a public relations effort, pointing to the existence of an influential black press as well as to the desirability of (p. 095) fostering among whites a greater knowledge of the role of Negroes in the war. Forrestal brought two black officers to Washington for possible assignment to public relations work, and he asked the director of public relations to arrange for black newsmen to visit vessels manned by black crewmen. Finally, in June 1945, a black officer was added to the staff of the Navy's Office of Public Relations.[3-126]

[Footnote 3-126: Memo, SecNav for Eugene Duffield
(Asst to Under Sec), 16 Jan 45, 54-1-9; idem for
Rear Adm A. Stanton Merrill (Dir of Pub Relations),
24 Mar and 4 May 45, 54-1-16. All in Forrestal
file, GenRecsNav.]

Appointment of a civilian aide on racial affairs was under consideration for some time, but when no agreement could be reached on where best to assign the official, Forrestal, who wanted someone he could "casually talk to about race relations,"[3-127] invited the Executive Secretary of the National Urban League to "give us some of your time for a period."[3-128] Thus in March 1945 Lester B. Granger began his long association with the Department of Defense, an association that would span the military's integration effort.[3-129] Granger's assignment was straightforward. From time to time he would make extensive trips representing the secretary and his special interest in racial problems at various naval stations.

[Footnote 3-127: Quoted in Forrestal, "Remarks for
Dinner of Urban League."]

[Footnote 3-128: Ltr, SecNav to Lester Granger, 1 Feb
45, Forrestal file, GenRecsNav.]

[Footnote 3-129: Ltrs, Granger to Forrestal, 19 Mar
and 3 Apr 45, 54-1-13, Forrestal file, GenRecsNav.
Granger and Forrestal had attended Dartmouth
College, but not together as Forrestal thought. For
a detailed and affectionate account of their
relationship, see Columbia University Oral History
Interview with Granger.]