Joe and Peg Donegan

Joe Donegan, MP at Sandy Hook

Joe Donegan, used with permission

Sandy Hook, Gateway NRA, NPS
An Oral History Interview with Joe and Peg Donegan
Military Police Officer and Wife
1957-1958
Interviewed by Billy Yirce, Monmouth University student intern October 26, 2003
Transcribed by Danny Gutch, volunteer 2010

Editor’s notes in parenthesis ( )

Billy Yirce: Where and when were you born?

Joe Donegan: I was born in the Bronx, New York. October 1933.

Billy Yirce: Okay. And how did you end up becoming in the Army? How did you end up joining the Army?

Joe Donegan: R.O.T.C. (Reserve Officers’ Training Corps)

Billy Yirce: Where did you go to school?

Joe Donegan: Seton Hall (University)

Billy Yirce: Okay. And what did you know about Fort Hancock before you were sent here?

Joe Donegan: Nothing.

Billy Yirce: Nothing.

Joe Donegan: Funny thing was we were in Officers’ Basic (Training) down in Georgia and there was a thing on the bulletin board saying on day, "Looking for volunteers to go to Fort Hancock." (I said,) “Where's that?” Looked it up, New Jersey. “That's close to home. I'll go.” And two of us from our class came up here. But they were only looking for six month people at that time. Then when you got commissioned you stayed on active duty for six months then you went to the Reserves. And in the meantime, I had put in for an extended active duty, which meant I would stay on longer. So I got here and they said, "Eh, well we really didn't want you." (laughs) "We wanted six month people to be here to do nothing and then move out." But they were stuck with me.

Billy Yirce: What was your rank and title when you were here?

Joe Donegan: I was a second Lieutenant. I was a military police officer and eventually provost marshal.

Billy Yirce: So as military police, what did your average day? What would your average day consist of?

Joe Donegan: Sitting around the office doing nothing.

Billy Yirce: Did you guys ever have problems where they needed you? Really rarely?

Joe Donegan: The problems were all local. I mean there was nothing big. It was always the MPs (military police) would arrest someone for being on the Post who wasn't supposed to be here. You know, this was a closed Post back then. 2

Billy Yirce: Yeah. No one was allowed in.

Joe Donegan: No one was allowed in. And there was a Coast Guard commander who liked to fish, and his buddies liked to fish. And he was always bringing them in.

Billy Yirce: And you'd have to arrest them?

Joe Donegan: And we'd pick him up. The MPs would pick him up. They'd call the Post Commander. The Post Commander would get all over me because, "Why are your MPs doing that? Why you guys doing that?" And I'd say, "Rules say no one on the Post.” So if they're there, we'd pick them up. So you know we'd be between a rock and a hard place. That was the biggest kind of problems. You know you had drunks and stuff like that.

Billy Yirce: You always have that. Were there any ever alerts of potential enemy attacks when you were here?

Joe Donegan: No.

Billy Yirce: Nothing. What building did you live in?

Joe Donegan: Quarters 1.

Billy Yirce: Quarters 1 on Officers’ Row?

Joe Donegan: Right.

Billy Yirce: And it was just you and your wife?

Joe Donegan: That's it.

Billy Yirce: That's a big house for just two people right? So that was nice. How old were you? You were young, right?

Joe Donegan: Probably about 21, 22 (years old).

Billy Yirce: Living in, that's not bad then. So, you were probably happy about that.

Joe Donegan: You know, it was a good life when you weigh all the different things, you know.

Billy Yirce: Now what about social activities? What went on here? Theaters, dances, anything?

Joe Donegan: Not much. The Officers’ Club was only open, I think on weekends. You gotta realize at that time, there were probably no more than six officers assigned to the Post Headquarters. You had the Navy Detachment. You had a Coast Guard Detachment. And you had the Nike people.

Billy Yirce: Okay.

Joe Donegan: All separate units. So at the Headquarters that I belonged to, probably only six or seven officers. So were wasn’t a lot.

Billy Yirce: There wasn’t a lot of officers.

Joe Donegan: You didn't have any young officers my age. These were all World War II vets.

Billy Yirce: So you were the young guy.

Joe Donegan: Oh yeah. Just young kids really compared to the rest of them.

Billy Yirce: Did you get along wit the enlisted men? How was your relationship with them?

Joe Donegan: I liked them. Again, the way it was here we didn’t have a lot of…

Billy Yirce: No social time.

Joe Donegan: The sergeants took care of the enlisted men. You know, they didn't trouble me or anything. I survived. It was, the time it was so different from what someone might think it was like here in the Army. We were at the time, it was after the Korean War, no other wars were going on. Most of the people here were old World War II veterans.

Billy Yirce: Just riding out their time.

Joe Donegan: Just riding out their time. That’s it.

Billy Yirce: What about religious services? Did you attend any?

Joe Donegan: Yes, now, we were Catholic. Chaplin used to come in I think from Fort Monmouth. I asked my Wife, "Where was the Chapel? Where did we go?" And I don't remember. We didn't go to the main Chapel, the white building. (St. Mary’s Catholic Chapel was located in Building 123 which is inside the fence of the Coast Guard Station.)

Billy Yirce: Okay yeah.

Joe Donegan: We didn't go there. It was some place where they had Mass when the Chaplain came. And it was custom that someone would invite the Chaplain to their home for breakfast. So like that was part of the social. And I think we had bowling.

Billy Yirce: Yeah someone said that there was bowling right here in the PX right here. Four lanes I think they said.

Joe Donegan: Yeah there was a bowling alley here. And I think there was a bowling team. Again for those seven or eight and their wives.

Billy Yirce: So, nothing too big.

Joe Donegan: No. And I remember we did have a big dance once because Captain Burkheimer, who was my boss, he was an infantry officer, but he was provost marshal at the time. He was in charge of the dance. I remember working with him on setting up this dance. When it was, what it was for….

Billy Yirce: No idea. What about the beach? Did you use the beach a lot?

Joe Donegan: There was a separate beach for the officers.

Billy Yirce: So you had your own beach.

Joe Donegan: The Officers’ Beach. Now you didn’t have beaches…

Billy Yirce: Not like they are today. So you had your own section. What beach did they give the officers? Do you remember what part? JD: No idea. BY: What about New York City? Did you guys ever go to the (New York) city?

Joe Donegan: No.

Billy Yirce: No.

Joe Donegan: Second lieutenant didn’t make much money. You didn’t have money to go. And of course, we came from the area. We came from Northern Jersey.

Billy Yirce: So it was nothing new?

Joe Donegan: No.

Billy Yirce: What was the most interesting thing you remember about Fort Hancock? If you had to think of one thing?

Joe Donegan: It’s hard to you know, try to pick out one thing. I remember the pack of wild dogs that was here. And I can remember at Christmas time getting holly.

Billy Yirce: The man I just interviewed told me about the holly. He said this is one of the largest holly…

Joe Donegan: We used to go out and pick holly to decorate the house. The movies, I think, that was only weekends. There wasn’t a lot of social life like you’d think of. It was a small group.

Billy Yirce: What was this pack of dogs you were talking about? This wild pack of dogs.

Joe Donegan: We, you asked what we did all day. I said very little. We’d be riding along in the jeep. Didn’t have all these roads. A lot of dirt roads through the back. And I was going out with one of the sergeants and as we got to where two dirt roads came together, all of a sudden there was a howl of dogs. There must have been fifteen to twenty of them come running past us. We came back, the sergeant got a carbine and said, “Let’s go out and see if we can get some of these dogs.” We were afraid that the dogs were going to come onto the Post.

Billy Yirce: Going to attack someone.

Joe Donegan: Yeah. That might of hurt or killed someone. We went out and we never saw them again.

Billy Yirce: Only one time?

Joe Donegan: Only that one time. And I said, “Where did they come from?” and the sergeant said “People that were here left the dogs and the dogs went off and lived in off the land and went into the woods and maybe some from the Highlands.” We really don’t know where they came, and we don’t know where they went.

Billy Yirce: Do you keep in touch with anyone you served with still?

Joe Donegan: No.

Billy Yirce: No. Not at all. What did you end up doing after you go out of the military?

Joe Donegan: I was a teacher.

Billy Yirce: Oh yeah? Where did you teach?

Joe Donegan: Montclair Public Schools.

Billy Yirce: Do you have anything else to add? Well, overall was it a fun or boring place to work?

Joe Donegan: Well, again, if I was a single bachelor, I would have said it was boring. But my Wife was here. We went home at night, watched television, did things you did. We had a nice house, mostly military furnishings. We had some of our own stuff. It wasn’t a good assignment in that I was a young, military police officer and all of the others were old.

Billy Yirce: So you had no one to really socialize with.

Joe Donegan: I remember the Coast Guard, or the Navy guy, Commander Reddick. He was a nice guy. He had a big family and he had a dog. And the dog used to go to the MP Station and drink out of the toilet bowl when he was thirsty. It’s the little things like that I remember. I remember one time we went out on his boat. He had a minesweeper I think. And he had some of the officers and their wives, what, who, where, church people or what (I don’t remember) and we went out for a little cruise at night on a Navy ship.

Billy Yirce: That’s nice.

Joe Donegan: But little things like that.

Billy Yirce: Well, thank you for doing the interview with me. I appreciate it. Enjoy your day. (Tape stops to change interviewee from Mr. Donegan to Mrs. Peg Donegan.)

Peg Donegan: Well, just the living quarters themselves were so exciting. We were newly married.

Billy Yirce: You guys were young and had a huge house.

Peg Donegan: I mean this huge, huge house that I mean many years later we could have raised a family in there very easily. But it was just like it was kind of a dream to be there, you know in a big home.

Billy Yirce: And how did you guys meet? Were you high school sweethearts? Or did you meet in college?

Joe Donegan: College years.

Billy Yirce: College at Seton Hall?

Peg Donegan: Well, he was in college I was in high school. I was dating a college guy. (inaudible conversation between Mr. and Mrs. Donegan) I was saying I was trying to remember the people. And I was saying how did I get to know the people? And I think it was through the church, through the Chapel, you know. But it would be after Mass that people would gather like in front. Because the military is like another family, you know and you would get to, that’s really where we got to know most of the people that we….

Joe Donegan: Well, the ones that went to church.

Peg Donegan: Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Donegan: I closed my mind, with something like, I can’t remember what it was now.

Peg Donegan: You could come back to that.

Billy Yirce: Now did you have a job?

Peg Donegan: No.

Billy Yirce: You stayed at home.

Peg Donegan: Mmmhmm.

Joe Donegan: I can’t remember what it was.

Joe Donegan: But as a Garrison, I don’t think there were more than fifty enlisted men.

Billy Yirce: It was a small. When you were here it was a very…

Joe Donegan: Half were MPs and half were clerks and the people who worked in Post Headquarters and Post Engineers.

Billy Yirce: Now was the Nike site open when you were here?

Joe Donegan: Yep.

Billy Yirce: Do you know anything about that or?

Joe Donegan: They didn’t bother with us and we didn’t bother with them.

Billy Yirce: Just kept separate.

Joe Donegan: They were just like borders here if you wanted to put it. The Post would have provide them with whatever they needed. But they had their own command structure.

Billy Yirce: So it was like a totally different section.

Joe Donegan: They didn’t come under our command.

Billy Yirce: Oh okay.

Joe Donegan: I mean if there was a soldier in trouble the MPs picked him up and we took him over to the unit, but that was it. We had a front gate. You know the house at the very beginning. That was the gate house. We had an office down there where we took care of checking people in and out with a gate there with soldiers. I knew we had to go to Monmouth for stuff.

Peg Donegan: The commissary too.

Joe Donegan: I had to go to Monmouth for pay to pay the soldiers.

Billy Yirce: Oh did you?

Joe Donegan: I had to go over there to Post Finance and I had to draw the money and come back here.

Billy Yirce: What about food shopping? Where did you guys?

Joe Donegan: The commissary.

Billy Yirce: Yeah. Oh, you had to go all the way to Fort Monmouth.

Joe Donegan: We didn’t do much in the town here. We’d go to Bahr’s (Landing). That’s still here I think.

Billy Yirce: What?

Joe Donegan: The restaurant. Bahr’s in Highlands.

Billy Yirce: Oh, I’m not familiar. I’m sure it is.

Joe Donegan: Yeah that was a restaurant we used to go to and that was about it. We were here less than a year.

Peg Donegan: It was less than a year.

Billy Yirce: Where did you go after here?

Joe Donegan: Fort Dix.

Billy Yirce: Fort Dix and how long were you there?

Joe Donegan: It was a real empty place. (laughter) and we were there for a year and then I went to Germany.

Billy Yirce: Oh okay.

Joe Donegan: I was with the MPs in Germany.

END OF INTERVIEW