Surviving Shipmates Make Contact after 41 Years: Unsinkable Sailors and the USS Frank E. Evans (DD 754)

Fresno, CA, May 13, 2010 – More than four decades have passed since Marcus Rodriguez Jr. saw his shipmates.  This fall, when the USS Frank E. Evans (DD-754) Association holds its annual reunion in San Diego, Rodriguez will be there.

He and his shipmate, Steve Kraus, were the signalmen on duty the morning of 3 June 1969 when the Australian aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne struck Evans’ port side.  The collision cut Evans in two and sent the forward section to the bottom of the South China Sea.  Seventy-four lives were lost.

Over the years, survivors including Kraus have located each other through the Association.  In early April, Kraus said, “I started calling every phone number I could find in the City of Fresno and County area.  In the afternoon I received a call back from Marcus.  It has been almost 41 years since we have spoken.”

Rodriguez was born in 1948 and lived and worked on a farm and vineyard while growing up.  He signed up for the Navy in December of 1966 through a delayed-entry program, finishing high school in 1967 and actually entering the Navy in January 1968.  Between signing up for the Navy and actually showing up for duty, he learned that he had been drafted by the Philadelphia Phillies baseball team.  He headed off to Navy boot camp instead.

After boot camp, he reported to the Evans, which was then in dry dock.

“At first, I started off as a ‘deck ape,’ ” Rodriguez remembers, using a common term for boatswain’s mates.  “Then I put in for signalman and got that.”

As he progressed in his training, Rodriguez at first became proficient in sending flashing light signals, but reading flashing light took more time.

“What I mostly did was send,” he recalled.  “It takes a while to get used to reading lights.”

Because all ships in the formation were operating under total darken ship conditions on the day of the collision, Kraus told Rodriguez that there was no need for both of them to be awake, and Kraus remembers that Rodriguez lay down on the deck above the signal shack.  When the two ships collided, the force catapulted Rodriguez through the air and onto the flight deck of the Melbourne.

“I just remember going on duty that morning,” he said.  “That was it.  I woke up a couple of days later in Cam Ranh Bay.”

Among other injuries, Rodriguez suffered several broken bones and cuts.  He spent three or four weeks in the hospital there, then was transported to the Navy’s Oak Knoll Hospital in Oakland, California.  He was there from the end of June 1969 to January 1970 then spent about a month in a VA hospital in Fresno before being discharged from the Navy in 1972.

Rodriguez has fond memories of his shipmates and also remembers the officers involved in the collision.

Commander Albert S. McLemore “was a great guy,” Rodriguez said.  “A great officer.  He had everybody’s respect.”

Rodriguez had a lot of contact with Lieutenant (junior grade) Ronald C. Ramsey, who was the ship’s Communications Officer and was in charge of the signalmen.  “He was just a good guy.  He’d joke around with you.  He was an OK guy.”

He did not have much contact with Lieutenant (junior grade) James A. Hopson but remembers that “he was well liked.”

Rodriguez is looking forward to seeing his old shipmates at the reunion.  It is scheduled for September 16-18, 2010.  More information can be found at the Association’s website, www.ussfee.org.