After basic training, I was assigned to the Detachment Medical Department at Fort McDowell, California. I served four years with regular promotions from Private to Tech 3. From January to March 1944, I was assigned to the S.S. Cape Newenham, a ship taking fresh troops to New Guinea. Under the ship's surgeon, I was the sergeant in charge of the ship's hospital facility, where I assigned beds and supervised keeping the facility clean; the beds cleaned and patients fed. Capt. Peterson brought along a fifth of Canadian Club whiskey and we enjoyed that bottle on the voyage. We spent a month in New Guinea, moving from port to port as the ship's captain, T.M. Lewis, received orders. In the Port of Finchhaven, as we were about to leave, I was startled to see my brother, Johnny. I knew he was stationed somewhere in New Guinea, but didn't know where or how to contact him. We ended up at Dutch Harbor on the north end of the island, where we received orders to return to San Francisco empty; carrying no troops back. Other than the merchant Marine Crew and the Army Hospital Detachment, the ship was empty. We were allowed to sleep in and had little structure on the trip home. Some of the returnees were assigned to paint the bulk heads and decks of the ship. One guy came to the ship's hospital and asked me for a bed sheet to use as a drop cloth, and I provided it for him. The next day, he came to ask for another one. I asked what happened to the one I'd given him a day earlier, and he replied that he threw it overboard at the end of the day. I told him that my family back home would have been delighted to have that one sheet and that I wasn't going to supply him with a new sheet everyday. I gave him one more, and he used it for the rest of the trip. On March 18, 1944, the S.S. Cape Newenham crossed the International Date Line. We returned home to San Francisco, where I resumed my duties at Fort McDowell until I was discharged in January of 1946.