Eugene F. Montieth was born in Caribou in January of 1926. He attended school in Caribou for 10 years until he was 16 and, in June of 1942, tried to enlist in the Marine Corps with his friend Joey Charlifour. They passed one physical in Presque Isle and were sent to Portland where, after a second exam, Montieth was turned down because of two missing teeth and two others that needed to be removed.
“I tried to talk Joey out of going but it was no use; he insisted,” Eugene recalled. “He went to Paris Island for training and I went back to Caribou.”
After training, Joey was sent to the Pacific and was in on the invasion of Peteliu where he was wounded quite badly and sent to a hospital to recuperate. After being “patched up,” as Eugene put it, Joey participated in the invasion of Okinawa where he was again badly wounded and sent back to the States to a hospital in New River, N.C. where he was eventually medically discharged.
On January 29, Eugene enlisted in the Navy in Portland and was sent to the Fargo building in Boston.
“We received a little training in Boston; we learned how to pack our sea bag and our mattress and a hammock,” Eugene said. “We received our uniforms and all of our personal items and got our shots — and I got rid of those pesky teeth!”
On February 8 Eugene saw a notice on a bulletin board that the Navy wanted 50 volunteers to go aboard the U.S.S South Dakota B.B. 57 in the Brooklyn navy yard. Eugene recalled that these men were to be replacements for 50 men who’d been killed at the Battle of Savo Island on November 13 and 14 of 1942. Eugene volunteered.
In April of 1943, Eugene and 49 others left New York and headed to Norfolk, Va. then on to Portland, Newfoundland, Iceland and finally Orkney Islands in Scotland.
“From there we made two trips to Norway on our way to take ships to Murmansk, Russia,” he said. “We tried to entice the German fleet out of Norway; they had two battleships in there — the German ship Tirpitz and another battleship were in Norway but would not come out to engage us.”
Eugene’s ship the South Dakota returned to Norfolk in July for 10 days before venturing on to the Pacific.
“We were to support the sweep through the Pacific as we advanced on toward the Japanese Homeland,” Eugene said.
“We started with the Gilbert Islands where we bombarded Nauru Island on December 8, 1943. Next we went on the Marshall Islands where we bombarded Rio and Namur islands on January 30, 1944,” he added. “We made strikes on the heavily fortified island of Truk on February 16 and 17, 1944. We then struck Guam, Saipan and the Tinian Islands on February 22.”
Eugene said that the South Dakota then took a few days off before striking the Palau, Yap and Woleai Islands on March 30.
“On April 21, we made strikes on Hollandia, New Guinea and on April 22 we invaded Holandia. We struck Truk Island once again on April 29,” he said.
On May 1, the South Dakota bombarded Ponape Island.
“It was one of the most beautiful islands that I had ever seen — green grass and trees and a nice looking horse running around on the shore,” Eugene recalled.
The South Dakota struck Guam, Saipan and Tinian again on June 11 and bombarded the islands the next day.
“June 19 was the day of the first battle of the Philippines Sea, which was one of the biggest air battles of WW II,” he said. “The fleet shot down 409 Japanese planes, but one got through to us and hit us with a 500 pound bomb, killing 27 men. Five of these men were machine gunners from my division.”
After the battle the South Dakota had to return to the U.S. for repairs.
“We pulled into Bremerton, Washington for 40 days and we all finally got a chance to be home for 20 days; of course we had to ride on the train for five days each way to get to Maine … what a trip” Eugene remembered. “It was nice to be able to visit with my family as it had been almost 18 months since I had seen my mother, father and younger sister.”
When the South Dakota and her crew returned to the Pacific, they took part in all of the operations from Okinawa to Tokyo.
“We took part in the invasions of Leyte, Luzon, Iwo Jima and finally we were the first ship to fire a six-gun salvo on the Japanese Homeland during WW II,” Eugene said. “We bombarded Okinawa, Kamaishi on Honshu, Hamamatsu and Kamaishi — these last three bombardments were on the homeland of Japan. It looked like they were about finished. We received word on August 15 to cease offensive operations that Japan had capitulated and proceeded to enter the harbor in Sagami Wan on August 27, 1945.
During the war, Eugene and the South Dakota were in on 65 operations. The crew were awarded a total of 10 medals and two more ribbons. “We were authorized to wear 10 battle stars on the Pacific Campaign Ribbon and two on the Philippine Liberation ribbon.”
They had traveled 250,000 miles, had 95 men killed in action and about 250 wounded.
Eugene married Wilda (Hanscom) of Fort Fairfield and they have four children together. Since retiring from the Navy, he attended and graduated the University of South Florida and taught junior high school.
