The Disaster
The Mutiny
The Trial
The Charges
Q&A with Sandra Evers-Manly

The Disaster

On the evening of July 17th, 1944, at the Port Chicago Naval Munitions base located on San Francisco Bay, the largest state-side military disaster of WWII occurred, killing 320 men and injuring another 390 men on the base. Two transport ships, the E.A. Bryan and the Quinault Victory were completely destroyed. The small town of Port Chicago, only 30 miles from San Francisco, also suffered tremendous damage. Chunks of smoldering metal weighing hundreds of pounds and even un-detonated bombs rained down upon the community, damaging over 300 structures and injuring over 100 people. Miraculously, none of the bombs exploded, and no residents of the town of Port Chicago were killed. By sheer size of the blast, the Port Chicago explosion was as large as a 5-kiloton bomb.

Of the 320 men who lost their lives on the base, 202 of them were black. And of the additional 390 men injured, 233 were black. Many of these black naval seamen volunteered in the United States Navy expecting, and some even hoping, to see action on the front lines of the war. They went through segregated boot camp, applied to training schools, and graduated as full seamen in the United States Navy. When recruits were sent to the Port Chicago base, they were sure they were about to get their ship duty.

But the realities of Navy policy were a slap in the face to these ideals. Despite many recruiting officers' claims to the contrary, the Navy didn't actually allow blacks in combat at this time. Instead, the Port Chicago black seamen were relegated to a different but still very important duty. They were assigned to load the ammunition and explosives on the transport ships at port.

Unfortunately, the black seamen received no training for this task. They were not even issued gloves. The equipment they were given was often in poor working condition. On top of this, many black divisions were being bet upon by the whites commanding them. White officers were wagering whose divisions could load the most ammunition in the least amount of time. This atmosphere of speed-above-safety put the loaders in further peril.

Most of the enlisted men were very afraid of the possibility of an explosion when they first learned of their new job descriptions. On the job, the men could never escape the constant worry and physical nervous conditions that accompanied their regimen. As some men just became accustomed to their own fears, others found it easier to just ignore the risks and accept their officers' promises that none of the bombs were fused and therefore could not explode. But, working shifts around the clock, handling everything from bags of gunpowder to concussion depth charges, there was no escaping the fact that the black seamen's daily regimen was basically an accident just waiting to happen.

In the summer of 1944, the United States was engaged in the historically brutal battle in the Phillipines. Munitions loading facilities all over the country's coasts were furious with activity. The E.A. Bryan docked at Port Chicago on July 13th, 1944. At 8:00 a.m. the next day, Naval personnel began their job of loading the ship's hold with ammunition. By July 17th at 10:00 p.m., the ship had been loaded with well over 4000 tons of munitions, almost 2000 tons of which were high explosives.

The Quinault Victory only arrived at Port Chicago on July 17th. Over 100 men, a majority of whom were new to the base and their responsibilities, immediately set to work rigging the ship in preparation for the loading of ammunition scheduled to begin by midnight. But long before that hour, disaster would strike.

Minutes before 10:30 p.m., the entire pier area erupted. Actually, two explosions, seconds apart, ignited the summer night sky with a column of fire and smoke rising over 2 miles high. The first blast was fairly small and localized. But it triggered a second catastrophic blast that incinerated the entire E.A. Bryan, and lifted the Quinalult Victory completely out of the water, turned it around, and ripped it to pieces. Every man working on the pier and on the two ships was killed instantly. There was literally nothing left of the E.A. Bryan and most of the dead, both the ship and men instantaneously burnt to ashes.

Part of the dock barely remained, sagging precariously into the bay. A section of the Quinault Victory's keel, its only recognizable piece left, protruded ominously from the water about 1000 feet away from its original mooring.

On the base itself, adjacent to the site of the actual blast, chaos ensued. The locomotives used to move munitions to the pier were totally obliterated. Barracks were blown off their foundations and shredded. Men were knocked down by the concussion of the blast and were pelted with debris from wood to hot metal to broken shards of glass. Severe burns, broken bones and even blindness was the fate of many.

As the base's personnel recovered from the shock of the actual explosion, fire-fighting and rescue efforts went into immediate effect, with other nearby military bases and towns providing added assistance. Between that night and the next morning, the injured were taken to local hospitals and most of the black enlisted seamen were evacuated to nearby bases. Others were ordered or volunteered to stay behind at Port Chicago to clear debris and set about the grim task of searching for and removing what was left of the bodies of their fallen mates.

The Mutiny

In the days after the disaster, the Naval Court of Inquiry convened to try and determine its cause. The Court heard the testimony of ordnance experts, eyewitnesses of the explosion, survivors of the accident and other base personnel and investigated the possibility of sabotage, defects in the bombs, rough handling of the munitions, winch and other equipment problems, the fueling system of the vessels, and associated organizational problems within the divisions.

Of everyone interviewed, only five were black. The wagering the white officers were doing on their black divisions was explained away as healthy competition, and the officers-in-charge were acquitted of any responsibility. As far as any human cause was determined, blame fell on the black enlisted men who lost their lives in the explosion. But officially, the Court never established the exact cause of this terrible tragedy.

In these same days after the explosion, and during the Naval Court's inquiry, the black seamen returned to work on their new bases, assigned barracks and other associated base duties, but not ship-loading. They did their work still in a lingering state of shock, the disturbing memory of the blast and their many dead friends still fresh in their minds. Even though they weren't handling explosives, their fears and nerves remained on edge, exacerbated by the blame they were receiving from the Navy.

The men were offered no psychiatric counseling to cope with their stress, nor were they given any survivors' leave to visit with family and friends like many of their white counterparts ­ and certainly the officers. Even those hospitalized with injuries were not granted any medical leave.

Hoping to be transferred to other stations, ships or even combat, the black enlisted men of Port Chicago were stunned when they were ordered to return to loading ammunition and explosives only weeks later. On August 9th, over 300 men were ordered out onto the loading pier of the Mare Island Naval facility. Most of the men refused the order, citing their enduring lack of training, similarly poor equipment as was used at Port Chicago, and therefore the clear possibility of another explosion.

After the confrontation, over 250 men were arrested. They were incarcerated for 3 days in a barge moored to the pier, and were threatened by their white officers with mutiny charges punishable by death during wartime. The men were given the opportunity to put the so-called uprising behind them and return to work. About 200 reluctantly agreed, but were thrown in the brig instead. The 50 remaining black enlisted men who still refused to load munitions under unsafe conditions were indeed finally brought up on charges of mutiny and a date of court martial was set.

The Trial

The trial occurred during the month of September, 1944. The 50 men found themselves facing 7 senior Navy officers, 6 as jury, the seventh as judge. The accused prosecutor was Lt. Commander James F. Coakley. He vehemently argued that the seamen were cowards, guilty of treason. 25 years after this case, he would gain national distinction as the hard line district attorney who prosecuted anti-war activists Huey Newton and Eldridge Cleaver of the Black Panthers.

Coakley's case in this court martial was fueled by the defense counsel's comparatively weak arguments based on a gray distinction between individual insubordination and organized mutiny and the outright fear of the men to handle explosives.

The black press helped create nationwide media coverage which caught the attention of the NAACP. The Secretary of the Navy at the time, James Forrestal, was pressured to allow Future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, then a young general counsel for the civil rights organization, to observe the trial. Disappointed by what to him was obvious racist railroading by the Navy and the seemingly toothless defense, Marshall went on the attack, putting the Navy itself on trial in the media.

On October 24th, 1944, after less than 2 minutes of deliberation for each black seaman accused, the specially convened military court found all 50 men guilty of mutiny as charged. 1/5th were sentenced to 15 years in prison. Almost half were sentenced to 12 years. Another 5th were sentenced to 10 years, and the remaining 5 men to eight years. All the men were to be dishonorably discharged from the Navy.

The Changes

In the year after the trial, Thurgood Marshall took on the case on behalf of the NAACP, appealing the men's cause to the highest government officials. During this time, Eleanor Roosevelt learned about the case and joined growing public sentiment in refuting similar racial injustice. Partly as a result of her efforts, black United States Army Air Corps pilots stationed in Tuskegee, Alabama were the first black pilots to see combat during World War II. With the combination of the war, the international fight for freedom and an election year, there was immense pressure on President Franklin Roosevelt.

But despite all of this, Marshall's public and legal campaign failed to overturn the convictions of the black naval enlisted men. However, when the war ended a year later, and the spirit of peace prevailed, the President finally agreed to release the men under a general amnesty and time served. Upon their release, though, the men were never granted any Navy veterans' benefits, and their felony convictions remained upheld.

At the time of the Port Chicago disaster, every man handling ammunition on the base was black and every officer was white. This segregation of personnel and responsibility on bases, and the refusal to allow black enlistees in combat was standard practice by the Navy. The tragic explosion at Port Chicago accounted for 15% of deaths suffered by blacks in all of the war. It was recognized as an even larger national disaster than Pearl Harbor. It caused millions of dollars in damage, over 300 deaths and 500 injuries.

And the subsequent investigation into the causes and the facts it brought to light, resulted in no policy alteration at that time. Still, these events and the trial for mutiny of those 50 men were ultimately a catalyst for change. Soon after, the Navy did desegregate training and shore facilities and ships. The Navy also instituted new training and safety procedures for the handling of ammunition and explosives. And for the first time, white sailors were also assigned munitions loading duties.

Unfortunately, even to this day, the 50 black enlisted men -- sailors who were unflinching patriots and brave men willing to fight and die for their country -- have not been exonerated. Their convictions for mutiny in time of war have never been overturned. The price of their duty, unrealized. Their essential contributions and the heroism of their service, never truly recognized.

Q&A with Sandra Evers-Manly

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