| Smalls was one of the surviving Port Chicago Naval Magazine
sailors court martialed for refusing to return to work loading ammunition
for the Navy during world War II. A memorial was dedicated in 1994 to the
honor, courage & commitment of the 320 Sailors, Marines, and Merchant
Marines, and workers killed at Port Chicago NM during World War II. It
recognizes the critical role Port Chicago played in winning the war in
the Pacific. By 1944 it served as the main facility for transshipping heavily
laden cargo ships like the S.S. E.A. Bryan and S.S. Quinault
Victory with munitions bound for battles such as Guadalcanal,
Iwo Jima, Tawara, and Kwajalein.
On the evening of July 17, young African-American sailors, worked under
extremely dangerous conditions to meet the tremendous demand for munitions.
At 2218 hours,or 10:18 p.m., a mysterious explosion rocked the facility,
and the San Francisco Bay Area. The two cargo ships, were lost in the the
largest stateside disaster of the war.
Their refusal to accept the situation, their arrest and their subsequent
court martial, was one of the events that led upto President Harry Truman's
desegregation of the Armed Forces three years later in 1948. |
