Navy Corpsman

We slept in bunk beds, and a muscular guy we called Horse slept on the bottom and I on the top bunk. We kept our clothing and stuff in lockers, and we didn't have tables for radios or stuff like that. Once, when I overslept, Horse pulled me and my mattress off and I fell five feet to the floor. Horse had played football at a big college in Washington. He was tough, and he liked to go out on liberty and get in fights with marines and other tough guys. He decided to try to make me tough, too. Whenever he thought of it, he socked me hard on my upper arm or wrestled me around a bit.

He was my friend, and I took him home to visit with my mom on weekends. She introduced him to a nurse, and they dated for several months.

Our Hospital Corps School formed a six man flag football team. Horse and I played in games against the Navy Recruit Depot, North Island Airmen, and the United States Marine Recruit Depot. Horse played on the line and said he was out to get some hemoglobin using a medical term for blood. I was second string quarterback. The first string quarterback was a fine athlete, fast, smart, and played well. I was allowed to play part time in all the games, and once I threw a fifty yard pass for a touchdown. That year several players from the other teams stayed at Balboa Park Naval Hospital being treated for broken arms, clavicles and some with fractured jaws. We wore no padding and usually wore only shorts.

As navy sailors we were paid in cash every two weeks. Once, a group of four students had an evening game of poker. I was listening to them bet from my bunk bed. Two fellows kept raising the bet higher and higher finally betting many dollars. One of them called the bet and showed four kings. His opponent smiled and laid down four aces. The game broke up after that hand! The guy who lost was the Master at Arms, and he slept off the base with his wife. After that game he framed the four kings and aces, and he stopped gambling for a while.

My first job as a Navy Hospital Corpsman was working on a medical ward at Balboa Park Naval Hospital in San Diego. The ward had a wing with thirty beds for infectious hepatitis patients and a second wing for thirty rheumatic fever and cardiac patients. There were also three private rooms for critical patients, a small doctors office, and a small room for medicines and supplies.

Fresh out of school, I worked two days on the medical ward for indoctrination. The Registered Nurse was a female lieutenant about forty five and she was slender and stern. I don't picture her smiling except when she was causing someone pain. She put me on night duty twelve hours a night for thirty nights in a row. I was expected to work alone nursing the sixty patients, give medications, keep records, and keep patients supplied with water, clean linen, etc. The three terminal patients were incontinent of bowel and bladder. It was necessary for me to clean their bodies and change their linen several times each night. The work kept me running all night long. I did not know how to type but was expected to type each patient's name and diagnosis on a muster sheet every morning. I failed to type but used a pen to chart a note on each patient in separate charts. The day nurse was angry if I failed to graph temperature, pulse and respiration figures that had been noted during the day shift.

Two private rooms had patients who were dying. I recall one man who signed his cartoon strip VIP. Virgil I. Parch drew characters with big fat noses. I had seen many of his humorous cartoons in magazines and national newspapers. I was with him when he died.

Frequently several patients needed their blood drawn for testing before breakfast. We were not taught in school but one of the heart patients was a Chief Pharmacist Mate, and he volunteered to teach me and to have his blood drawn first. I learned as he gave me verbal instructions using his arm vein for practice. He was about forty and for me he was a real hero.

While I was learning to draw blood a strong looking muscular sailor refused to sit in a chair. He stood and held out his arm while using his other hand to make traction. I stuck his vein and while withdrawing blood from him, he fainted and fell. The needle came out and I squirted his blood all over the floor. I was the only one working , so I cleaned up the mess made him sit while I drew more blood.

One morning a well muscled black sailor in his early twenties asked me if I was planning to draw his blood for testing. I did not know him because he had been in town on liberty since before I started working. I knew he had heart disease. He looked healthy and in super physical condition like a football halfback. He was well groomed, had good teeth, a nice face with clear skin. He stood six feet tall weighing about two hundred pounds. I sensed the boy was uneasy, so I ordered him to lie supine on the bed as I prepared to pierce his arm vein with the large needle attached to the twenty c.c. syringe. Experience had already taught me that the big guys were most likely to pass out at the sight of their own blood. As the needle pierced his vein, his eyes rolled back, and he stopped breathing for thirty seconds. Then he sat up gasping for breath and asked me to open the window. I made him lie flat thinking he wouldn't faint again. I stood on his bed, and opened the high window. He panted for air, hyperventilated, and passed out again. It was almost seven A.M. and a young doctor arrived. I ran through the ward fifty yards to his office and asked for his help. "Look" he said, "It sounds like he just hyperventilated from fear. As soon as he runs out of oxygen and builds up a little carbon dioxide he will wake up and be fine. Go on back and stick him. He's probably awake by now and if not, stick him anyway."

I begged the young doctor to see the boy. I said I was new on the job, and he consented to look at the patient. Just as we arrived the young man woke and sat up. I pushed him down flat again and the doctor laughed at my concern. "If he faints again just stick him anyway and get the blood test done."

He was about to leave when the young man lost consciousness again. The doctor flicked him on the face and chest with his finger but the man didn't breath. A stethoscope placed over the heart brought a look of attention to the doctor's face. He pounded his fist on the sailor's chest and listened with the stethoscope again. The doctor worked for two minutes trying to get the heart going. Then he spoke to me in a quiet tone. "I want you to act like nothing has happened so the other patients won't be alarmed. Walk slowly to the nurses station. I think she just arrived. Tell her to come here, I want to talk to her. This man is dead."

An autopsy showed the sailor had suffered a massive heart attack. The doctor told me there was no chance we could have saved him.

Toward the end of my month of night duty I had become upset after loosing several patients. Since I couldn't seem to sleep at night, the roving night nurse gave me some red capsules to make me sleep. I slept well that day but at night I felt sleepy. The roving nurse was pretty, young and nice. She gave me more drugs. I felt I was ready to go crazy. One morning I didn't wake up at six P.M. to go to work. I slept for more than twenty four hours. I was put on report and sent to a Captains Mast. I told the Captain my story, and he saw to it that I was transferred to the acute psychiatric ward. As punishment I was refused liberty for a month. I enjoyed working in the psychiatric ward, made friends with the psycho patients, and the nurse had me transferred to an open psychiatric ward.

I worked nights and was responsible for fifty patients. Most of them were adventurous and alert. I had an easy job. Then I got a job as a brig guard. Several months later, the war with Korea was over and I was given an honorable discharge.