By Thomas W. Butler

Dick Schrey was about 20 years old when he re­ported in at Fleet Radio Unit FRUPAC-Iwo Jima in June of 1945. He was a short, husky guy with an easy smile and a good sense of humor. 44 of us served to­gether for several months at FRUPAC on that tiny (nine square miles) backwater island which none of us would ever have heard of it it were not for WWII and the bitter battle which was fought there that year.

Like the rest of us, Dick enjoyed a drink occasion­ally…and he liked music. Specifically, he liked Myer’s Jamaica Rum, the dark, heavy stuff that looks like molasses…and he liked Bunny Berrigan’s 1930’s horn classic, “I Can’t Get Started With You”. He liked that number so much he bought the recording and carried it with him from station to station. Indeed, he played it almost non-stop during the fall of 1945. I can still hear the words..

             I’ve flown around the world in a plane
             I’ve settled revolutions in Spain
             The whole world I have charted
             And still I can’t get started with you.

That may not be exact, but its pretty close. The log shows that Dick came aboard at FRUPAC-Iwo Jima on 26 June 1945 along with four other radiomen: Eu­gene Coyne, Paul Miettunen, Norbert Trudeau and Robert Voyles.

You know I can’t remember what any of those guys looked like. Of course, it is almost 50 years…but Dick, I remember. A good radioman and a good guy.

We both wound up back on Oahu, several months after the war ended, sometime in December or January of 1945/46. We were held up in Hawaii, bored and waiting for transportation back to the USA and dis­charge. Bored and impatient to get back to civilian pursuits…and civilian clothes…and USA women. I re­member I was quite unhappy that the Navy decided to hold me until the last day of my “minority cruise” which was to expire on 26 February 1946. This, despite the fact I had service “points” far above the number re­quired for discharge.

One morning a few of the fellows decided to go to Sun­rise Beach to catch some rays and throw the football around. Dick tried to get me to go. I said no … I had some letters to write. Dick went off with the bunch.

They arrived at the beach, got settled and began to throw the football. Surf was up. The ball went in. Dick waded in to retrieve it. Too far. Bingo. A breaking comber caught him. Dick couldn’t swim. In a fearful instant, he was gone. They tried to get to him. Then they tried to find his body. It seemed impossible, but he had drowned. They came back without him.

Bunny Berrigan’s record of “I Can’t Get Started With You” is a genuine classic. You don’t hear it very often…but it pops up every once in a while on a “Golden Oldies of the 30s” program. Even after almost 50 years I never, ever, hear it without remembering Dick Schrey and the awful waste. I always wonder whether things might have been different if I had gone to the beach with them.

Not many people involved in our work died on ac­tive duty. Dick Schrey did. And at the worst time. On the way home. Perhaps this article will assure him, wherever he is, that old shipmates still remember.