My Dad,s youngest brother, Fred Baimbridge, had seen me off after my boot leave and nothing was said about anyone else in the family enlisting. I think it was probably in the early part of 1944, that I got a letter from home that "Uncle Fred" had joined the Seabees. About six months later, I'm working in the "Rigging Loft", splicing wire rope (not a fun job), when someone walked up behind and tapped me on my shoulder. It was him. He was in a khaki Chief's uniform and told me that he had just "hitched a ride from Bougainville". So, we had lunch together, talked about the folks back home and he was gone. I didn't see or hear from him again until the middle of 1945, just before the end of the war. The only member of my family that I 'ran into' during the war.
