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 Author  Topic: RON 9 Mark 12 20mm documents
Alex Johnson

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Alex Johnson  Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 12:48pm
The four documents below may shed some light on the discussion of Mark 12 20mm mounts in RON 12 boats. The first two from December 1942 detail initial fabrication and installation.









The next document dated 27 March 1943 states that the mounts were installed on no more than three boats. Point 12 mentions that all boats are to be fitted with the mount for service in the war zone.








The final document dated 10 June 1943 reports on the mount used by RON 9 in the Solomons.






Hope you find this informative.

ALEX


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Frank J Andruss Sr

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Frank J Andruss Sr   Send Email To Frank J Andruss Sr Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 1:00pm
Alex

Thanks so much for that wonderful look into the 20mm mounts. I never thought about them being completed at the NAVY YARD in NEW YORK, although one note spoke about the 50's being in place during boat shipment. Awesome notes to have..............


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Will Day

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Will Day   Send Email To Will Day Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 1:05pm
Terrific stuff, Alex. Thanks

Will

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Alex Johnson

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Alex Johnson  Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 1:22pm
You're welcome, Guys. It certainly does shed some light on the varied accounts of when RON 9 boats received their Mark 12 mounts. Several original RON 9 crewmembers told me they installed theirs in New York in late 1942, others in Miami, others when they arrived in New Caledonia, and Pat Rogers who recently posted that PT 154 received their mount in the Solomons in the summer of 1943.

ALEX


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Jeff D

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Jeff D   Send Email To Jeff D Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 1:27pm
Yes Alex, thank you very much for sharing! Interesting to read the glowing praise although forward turret 20mm's seem to have had a short life.



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alross2

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of alross2   Send Email To alross2 Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 1:39pm
Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. An extra ration of rum for ye, Alex.

Al


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Dick

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Dick   Send Email To Dick Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 2:33pm

Thanks Alex . . . Top notch and job well done . . . Thanks much for the fast research, to the point with no more guessing games.

Dick . . .


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TheBridge

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of TheBridge  Posted on: May 24, 2010 - 7:26pm
Blue ribbon research Alex! It certainly seals the answers to many questions we've had here. Seems the experimental development was well underway by Dec 42 and RON-9 was the first group to recieve the 20mm. As we know it was not ELCO that fabricated the guns and mounts and fortunately your documents show the chain of development (answering one of Dick's Washichek's questions)

As to Dick's other question about Where does Kelly get the MUSCLE to order specially modified boats from the factory. Well.. Bulkley and Kelly had some connection that they seem to get whatever they requested. It might have some connection that Bulkley and Kelly rescued MacArthur 9 months before:
http://home.st.net.au/~dunn/ptboat.htm
Bulkley got the medal of Honor for his actions.

Welford West (torpedo man of the 157) also said in a phone call today that they (the crew) and the PT-157 were on the ship WHITE PLAINS (it carried 6 PTs at a time). So it seems it is in the larger photo of the WHITE PLAINS but it is not apparent which one the 157 is. Welford West didn't recall where on deck the 157 was either.

Liebenow said he can't recall where or when the 20mm was installed but that it was there from day-1 in Panama training.

If we had photo enhance technology we might find one or two that had the first 20mm rings installed. But maybe I'll need special glasses to find it.

Have a good day, and good night to all!

Bridge Out



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Dick

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Dick   Send Email To Dick Posted on: May 25, 2010 - 12:56am

You know I shouldn't write this, I'm grumpy from a long day with clients, I'm tired, its late, and I'm fishing for spammers on the site. But what the heck, lets have some fun. None of this nonsense is personal.

1.) Here we go again, conjecture, supposition, embellishment of facts we do not now as of yet. It's Kennedy and the 109 again - just a different name and different boat number. I'm not putting down Kennedy nor Kelly, but come on, you or we, weren't his wife or brother or superior officer or subordinate officer or even an actual crewmember, we don’t know them or their personalities.

2.) "Dick's other question", "Kelly's MUSCLE" - it wasn't a question at all, it was clear sarcasm - The NAVY clearly didn't stop in its track when Kelly spoke - common give me a brake. He more then likely didn't have anymore pull then thousands of other Navy Lt. Commanders who accomplished jobs well done. Know, I "assume" on the other hand, Buckeley had a whole lot more pull then Kelly ever thought of.

3.) "Well underway by Dec 42" - where is that information derived from, maybe it was started Dec 12, or maybe Oct 15, or maybe even June 3, who knows by the above letters - well under way???

4.) Bulkeley or Kelly didn't rescue MacArthur, Buckeley and his remaining squadron "evacuated" the General from Corregidor Island to Mindanao Island under presidential orders. Soldiers on the island and the Army Air Corp evacuated MacArthur further on.

5.) The photo - not one of the six boats show any sign of 20mm, to this untrained eye, maybe the boats with 20mm were on the other transport with the remain six new boats of RON 9. Maybe I need new glasses. Of course I have no proof there isn’t any, just my supposition or conjecture.

Ya know, It really peeve’s me when we fixate on a couple/three boat skippers and forget the crews. Each boat's action was completed by a TEAM, and a skipper by himself could do a damn thing. Every time we hear about the great ones, oh course their generally PT officers, We don't hear much about, say the guys of Squadron 3, and how they spent the war in some rotten jungle prison camp or hell hole prison ship, starving with little hope to hold on to, oh yeah, some of them even "RESCUED” MacArthur. They don't have any impressive photos of proudly standing on the bridge of his boat. They weren't given much of a chance to fight back or even stand proudly on the deck of their boats for photo ops.

Enough said, please accept my apologies for any offense one might take.

Dick . . .




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Frank J Andruss Sr

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Post a Reply To This Topic    Reply With Quotes     Edit Message     View Profile of Frank J Andruss Sr   Send Email To Frank J Andruss Sr Posted on: May 25, 2010 - 4:35am
You said a mouthful Dick, although one must remember that during the dark days of WWII, Japanese forces were wreaking havok in the Pacific. The News back home was bleak, and Americans were starving for something good to happen. Case in point. I was very lucky to have recieved the personel collection of one Commander Alan R. Montgomery, from Squadron 3. It contains all of his medals, photo's, papers, you name it. In one of his scrap books are many Newspaer clippings. Here are some of the titles.........

1. 40 YANKS IN PT BOATS FIGHT JAP BATTLESHIP
2. PT BOATS UNDER MONTGOMERY FIGHT 6,000 JAPS
3. JAPS BLASTED BY A PT BOAT SUFFER HEAVY LOSES
4. PT BOATS IN THE SOLOMONS SINK 250,000 TONS
5. PT BOATS IN PACIFIC TAKING HEAVY TOLL ON JAPS
6. PT HORNET SINKS A FLEET OF JAP SHIPS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Montgomery went on to win the Silver Star, Bronze Star, Legion of Merit, and Presidential Citation. He was to many back home a real hero, as was Bulkey. This came at a time when Americans needed a real boost, and they got it with some of these men. As you are aware, my love affair began with PT BOATS at the ripe age of ten, and it was the book and the Movie PT-109 that got me started, as well as They Were Expendable. As I started to gain information, it was men like Bulkeley, Kennedy, Kelly, Montgomery, Cox, Gamble, Searles, and others that I was reading about. Those were the guys at the time that were making headlines, and those were the guys that were my Heroes. Later as I started to understand things, I began to look at the whole crew, the common PT BOATER that was a part of a TEAM. This TEAM made the PT BOATS successful as a fighting weapon, and they depended on each other for their very lifes.

I too sometimes get a bit tired of the constant back and forth over some of the smallest of issues here, but this is why they call it a message board. A wonderful place for anyones thirst for knowledge about PT BOATS. One must remember that not everyone that visits this message board had a deep love for the boats at a young age. Some are just finding out about the boats and those famous men I just spoke about. They are just beginning to gain knowledge about the boats. As Al Ross will attest to, one must DO THE RESEARCH TO THE FULLEST in order to fully understand the subject matter.

I do understand your comments Dick, and I fully understand where you are coming from. For me, those guys will always be my Heroes, because it was those men that AMERICA turned to in the dark days of the War for something good to happen. They were a part of History and the PRESS built them up as HEROES of the time. For the guy just learning, it is those men that he will read about, even though you and I know it goes much deeper then that.................




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