WWII Snapshots by Shawna Castillo - 2008

Fred Atchison, Navy, and Rita Atchison, Home Front

Fred Atchison enlisted in the Navy when he was just 17 years old.

"I’d like to say it was purely because I was patriotic," he said. "But I didn't know much about patriotism back then," he said.

Atchison lived with his grandfather and was raised in the country in central Georgia. "The Navy was sort of romantic to me; I had never been around the sea," he said. "And I never was sorry that I joined the Navy."

On March 27, 1942, Atchison enlisted in Macon, Ga., and was sent to the Norfolk Navy Training Station in Norfolk, Va.

"I don't remember the amount of weeks we trained, but it seemed like a lot of them," he recalled.

From there, he traveled to Scotland via the USS Thomas Stone.

According to the Naval Historical Center Web site, www.history.navy.mil/index.html, the USS Thomas Stone was a passenger liner owned by the American President Lines and commissioned as the President Van Buren Aug. 12, 1941. The U.S. Navy acquired the ship on Jan. 14, 1942 and converted it into a troop transport.

In Scotland, Atchison trained with English soldiers in an inlet until it was time for the North African invasion. Although Atchison has many memories of his time spent in Scotland, one in particular sticks out.

"We were in clear sight of the Duke's castle. He and his wife were out in the sailboat and got too close to that rendezvous circle," he said. "We were throwing up quite a wake and it capsized their sail boat -- so one of our boats rescued them from the water and they invited us over to their castle."

Unfortunately, Atchison wasn’t able to visit the Duke. Half of the ship's crew went over the first day, and Atchison was to be in the second half. "The first group came back from the Duke's castle with a considerable amount of artifacts that he had hanging on the wall and the Duke was upset. So he called the Skipper, or the Commanding Officer, and his possessions were returned with their apologies."

As a result of the incident, subsequent visits to the castle were cancelled.

"After that little incident, we really trained hard," Atchison said.

On Nov. 8, 1942, after they had received sufficient training, Atchison and his fellow crew sailed into the Mediterranean Sea to enter North Africa. He was in an invasion task force of 100 different ships, some loaded with men to go onto the beaches, and others loaded with supplies and aircraft.

At daybreak, there was an aerial torpedo attack by German aircraft.

"The only ship hit in that huge convoy was the Thomas Stone," Atchison said.

The torpedo hit the ship's fantail, the aft-most weather deck on a ship that controls the after-steering mechanism and the propeller that propels the ship.

The convoy continued on to Oran, Algeria, accompanied by a small lightly armed warship known as a corvette.

On the eve of Thanksgiving 1942, a series of five bombs fell on the Thomas Stone.

"We counted four," Atchison said. "And the next one went right through the fantail of the ship, just in front of the big hole the torpedo had made."

After eight months, the crew was forced to abandon the Thomas Stone. They traveled to Oran via railroad, set up a camp outside of the city, and opened the North African Naval Supply Depot. Atchison started driving a truck hauling military arms, food, ammunition and clothing from Oran to Algiers.

Atchison returned to the United States for reassignment in 1945. He went to Providence, R.I., to meet with recruits who had just completed boot camp. From there, he and the recruits went on a shakedown cruise to test the performance of their ship down the Gulf Coast and stayed for a few nights in Galveston, Texas.

"We were sitting there in the Galvez hotel coffee shop when one of the newer guys nudged me and said, 'Look, Atch!,'" he said. "And there were two beautiful women coming down the stairway."

Atchison immediately hit it off with one of the women – Loreta (Rita) Sheppard. Sheppard had never seen the ocean and was on vacation with a friend. She was from Wyandotte County, Kan. They spent the day together and agreed that he would continue writing her while he was at sea. About a year passed before Atchison saw Sheppard again.

He returned to the Norfolk Navy Training Center, where they collected more troops, and traveled through the Panama Canal on their way to begin the invasion of Japan. On the way over, the crew was informed that Japan had surrendered. The crew continued to Sasebo, Japan, where they unloaded soldiers and picked up Marines and sailors to be transported to the United States. When Atchison returned to the States, he was discharged in Jacksonville, Fla.

He worked at a grocery store and a gas station, and did occasional farm work.

After the death of his father, Atchison re-enlisted in the Navy.

In 1946, after being sworn in, Atchison went to the Naval Training Center in Bainbridge, Md. He called Sheppard twice to re-establish their communication and she agreed to visit him after he was stationed at the Norfolk Naval Ship Yard in Portsmouth.

"It was heaven on earth," he said. "And I told her, 'I just can't let you go.'"

Three weeks later, on Oct. 4, 1946, they were married in the Navy chapel.

They began their lives together in a small duplex located on the shipyard. Atchison took her to meet his family in Georgia. He was then discharged from the Navy. The two of them then traveled to Kansas, where they settled with Sheppard's parents for a few months and eventually moved into their own home.

"Rita had a very long trip because going through all of those mountains, I learned I was going to be a father," Atchison said.

Atchison worked at a few menial jobs before he decided he was going to further his education. Sheppard agreed to stay with her parents with their first-born, Fred Jr., and Atchison went back to Milledgeville, Ga., where he moved in with his mother and worked for the rest of the year. Since he had not completed high school, Atchison took the GED exam and then enrolled at the University of Georgia in Athens.

In 1950, Rita and Fred Jr. joined Atchison in Athens. While he received his education, Rita worked in public health, and the couple had their daughter, Phoebe. In 1954, Atchison received his bachelor's degree in forestry.

He began working for the Georgia Forestry Commission, where he was responsible for three nurseries. At that time, the commission was producing 300 million trees per year, and Atchison was responsible for distributing the seeds to various nurseries. The couple stayed in Georgia for six years, where they had their second son, Mark, and twins, Bob and Dave.

In 1960, Atchison and his family moved to Maine where he accepted a job with a nursery program. They stayed for three years and then decided to move back to Kansas.

"Our kids were reaching the age that we were beginning to worry they'd make ties up there and not want to come back with the family," he said.

Atchison accepted a job in Leavenworth, Kan., working at a private nursery, and then worked at Kansas State University in the Department of Horticulture.

In 1964, opportunities arose in Hays, Kan., at the Fort Hays Experiment Station where he became the area extension forester. While in Hays, Atchison completed a master's degree in botany at Fort Hays State University. He and Rita also had their youngest son, Brad. They stayed in Hays for 14 years.

"It was a great time in our lives," Atchison said. "All of our children were in school at once out there."

In 1978, Atchison and his family moved to Manhattan, Kan. Atchison worked with forest management and was responsible for the northeast part of Kansas. He retired in 1987.

Fred and Rita were married more than 60 years. She passed away in May 2007. They enjoyed many hobbies together, including gardening, spending time outside and visiting with their children and 12 grandchildren.

"We had a good life together," said Atchison. "I miss her terribly."

Atchison now lives in a retirement community in Manhattan, where he continues his love of gardening. He has converted a spare bedroom into a mini-nursery, where he is growing asters, marigolds, statice and even some vegetables under some grow lights. His apartment is filled with family photos, paintings done by a daughter-in-law and woodcarvings and musical instruments he made.

Although Atchison served a considerable amount of time in the Navy, his views of war are not that of a typical veteran.

"I believe in protecting our own," he said. "But I don't like war. I'm more of a lover than a fighter."