thedrifter
03-28-08, 07:28 AM
Humble hero struggles with past
RYAN ORR Staff Writer
March 27, 2008 - 8:21AM
APPLE VALLEY — There is an explosion in the turret. Eighteen Marines are pulled out by a 19-year-old Navy medic. Nine are dead, the other nine, screaming in pain, die in his care. Then, Lester Lindsey Morton wakes up.
It is a recurring nightmare that Morton remembers like it was yesterday. It is the reality he witnessed some 64 years ago, while serving on the World War II Cruiser, USS Nashville CL43, as it bombed the Kula Gulf in the Solomon Islands.
“When I’m talking about it, I can still hear those kids screaming their death screams as they died on me,” said Morton, who was the young medic. “They were screaming and flailing, and the picture is still so vivid in my mind, I can almost tell you what they were screaming.”
Morton entered the turret while it was still on fire and heroically pulled out the 18 Marines.
Now 83, Morton is continually seeking new treatments to cure his post traumatic stress disorder.
It started in 1968, when he retired as the police chief of Brazil, Indiana, and has only grown worse as time goes on.
“One thing that will correct the situation, if it can be corrected is keeping busy,” Morton said.
If the disorder was present before that, Morton didn’t notice, but in those days, PTSD was something unheard of, and often shrugged off as mere shell-shock.
The term was not formally recognized until 1980.
But for Morton, as soon as retirement hit, so did the memories of that tragic day in 1943, as if it had just happened.
Not only can he still hear the screams of the Marines, he can still see, with detail, the extent of their injuries. Scorched lungs, noses and ears charred black, and their lips, said Morton.
“I loaded them up with morphine, and the doctors all say I did the right thing,” Morton says, holding back tears. “They were in the process of dying when I started taking care of them.”
Morton spent hours on his hands and knees working on the men, and sweat so much that a priest followed him around for hours trying to work out the cramps in his legs.
Nightmares of the tragic event aren’t the only thing that haunt Morton. He often breaks out crying at any given time during the day when something triggers the memory of his heroic effort.
The last time he went to a cemetery, Taps were being played. His son had to grab him and hold on to him because all he wanted to do was run to get away from it.
It is the last sound he heard before the weighted-down bodies of the Marines he had worked on for hours, slid off the stretchers into the ocean, which would be their final resting place.
“He had to mark all these men, tag them and put them on the stretcher to be buried,” said Rosemary Morton, Lester’s wife of 43 years, who wakes up to comfort him in the night when he has an episode.
Despite a Navy hearing being held at Pearl Harbor after the incident, it was never discovered how the six-inch fixed shell exploded in the turret, which killed the 18 marines and injured several others.
Morton was given a commendation for his selfless efforts.
“Despite his youth, meager experience and limited amount of training, he unhesitatingly went into the turret where he cared for the wounded in a highly efficient manner...assuming more responsibility and accomplishing more in the care of the wounded than could normally be expected of him,” wrote Rear Adm. W.L. Ainsworth.
Morton’s efforts were also mentioned in the 2007 book, “Humble Heroes,” by Steven George Bustin that chronicles how the USS Nashville fought World War II.
Morton, who now lives in Apple Valley with his wife, is not only suffering from PTSD, but was recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and has permanent hearing damage from the turret explosion.
Despite what he is going through now, there is no disputing that Morton is rare piece of living history that played an important role in making our nation what it is today, and as the commendation, book and his own story indicate, a true American hero.
Ryan Orr may be reached at 951-6277 or rorr@vvdailypress.com.
Ellie
RYAN ORR Staff Writer
March 27, 2008 - 8:21AM
APPLE VALLEY — There is an explosion in the turret. Eighteen Marines are pulled out by a 19-year-old Navy medic. Nine are dead, the other nine, screaming in pain, die in his care. Then, Lester Lindsey Morton wakes up.
It is a recurring nightmare that Morton remembers like it was yesterday. It is the reality he witnessed some 64 years ago, while serving on the World War II Cruiser, USS Nashville CL43, as it bombed the Kula Gulf in the Solomon Islands.
“When I’m talking about it, I can still hear those kids screaming their death screams as they died on me,” said Morton, who was the young medic. “They were screaming and flailing, and the picture is still so vivid in my mind, I can almost tell you what they were screaming.”
Morton entered the turret while it was still on fire and heroically pulled out the 18 Marines.
Now 83, Morton is continually seeking new treatments to cure his post traumatic stress disorder.
It started in 1968, when he retired as the police chief of Brazil, Indiana, and has only grown worse as time goes on.
“One thing that will correct the situation, if it can be corrected is keeping busy,” Morton said.
If the disorder was present before that, Morton didn’t notice, but in those days, PTSD was something unheard of, and often shrugged off as mere shell-shock.
The term was not formally recognized until 1980.
But for Morton, as soon as retirement hit, so did the memories of that tragic day in 1943, as if it had just happened.
Not only can he still hear the screams of the Marines, he can still see, with detail, the extent of their injuries. Scorched lungs, noses and ears charred black, and their lips, said Morton.
“I loaded them up with morphine, and the doctors all say I did the right thing,” Morton says, holding back tears. “They were in the process of dying when I started taking care of them.”
Morton spent hours on his hands and knees working on the men, and sweat so much that a priest followed him around for hours trying to work out the cramps in his legs.
Nightmares of the tragic event aren’t the only thing that haunt Morton. He often breaks out crying at any given time during the day when something triggers the memory of his heroic effort.
The last time he went to a cemetery, Taps were being played. His son had to grab him and hold on to him because all he wanted to do was run to get away from it.
It is the last sound he heard before the weighted-down bodies of the Marines he had worked on for hours, slid off the stretchers into the ocean, which would be their final resting place.
“He had to mark all these men, tag them and put them on the stretcher to be buried,” said Rosemary Morton, Lester’s wife of 43 years, who wakes up to comfort him in the night when he has an episode.
Despite a Navy hearing being held at Pearl Harbor after the incident, it was never discovered how the six-inch fixed shell exploded in the turret, which killed the 18 marines and injured several others.
Morton was given a commendation for his selfless efforts.
“Despite his youth, meager experience and limited amount of training, he unhesitatingly went into the turret where he cared for the wounded in a highly efficient manner...assuming more responsibility and accomplishing more in the care of the wounded than could normally be expected of him,” wrote Rear Adm. W.L. Ainsworth.
Morton’s efforts were also mentioned in the 2007 book, “Humble Heroes,” by Steven George Bustin that chronicles how the USS Nashville fought World War II.
Morton, who now lives in Apple Valley with his wife, is not only suffering from PTSD, but was recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and has permanent hearing damage from the turret explosion.
Despite what he is going through now, there is no disputing that Morton is rare piece of living history that played an important role in making our nation what it is today, and as the commendation, book and his own story indicate, a true American hero.
Ryan Orr may be reached at 951-6277 or rorr@vvdailypress.com.
Ellie