QUIET HEROES: We began yesterday telling the story of the U.S.S.
Samuel B. Roberts and its heroic part in World War II.
Donn Edmonds penned a column in the Buffalo News after
interviewing a few of the remaining sailors, including Vince
Goodrich of Bradford, at an annual reunion held in Buffalo.
He writes: “The old guys are alike in some ways, different in
others, but forever joined. Some were 18 years old when they went
in the water, bobbing like bottles in the South Pacific. Some were
burned, others were torn by shrapnel, all thought it was all over.
For days they drifted, their minds slipping from lack of food and
water.”
“Dick Rohde remembers thinking that he would just swim to
India.
“‘One guy said he was going below deck to get some chow,’
recalled Mel Harden. ‘We were on a raft.’
“Bud Comet looks like a gray-haired Marlboro Man, lean and
handsome at 80. He remembers being in the water, tied to a raft so
he wouldn’t drift away when asleep. A shark swam up next to him. He
cupped his hands and clapped, the sound driving the shark away.
Comet relaxed. A minute later, it was back.
“‘It was three feet from me,’ he said. ‘It looked me in the
eye.’
“Then it swam away. Comet and others were saved by the fuel oil
that leaked from the damaged ship and coated their bodies. It
screened the blasting sun, repelled salt water and covered their
scent from sharks.
“It didn’t always work.
“‘The sharks did some damage,’ said Dick Rohde, his voice
breaking. ‘Let’s just let it go at that. …’
“They watched the ship they called home go down, the
star-spangled flag swallowed by murky water. They floated lost and
helpless for three days. They endured the circling sharks and the
moans of the wounded. Bud Comet watched over his badly burned buddy
for three days, a guy named Osbourne. When the rescue ship finally
came, Comet lifted him aboard. Osbourne turned, looked Bud Comet in
the eye, slowly shook his head ‘no’ and died in his arms.
“A bunch of old guys came to town last week. They didn’t cause
much of a stir. Real heroes never do.”
