US Navy Photograph in hanger bay as US Soldiers and Marines are transported back home after the end of World War Two.

Brochure given to Soldiers and Marines, getting a ride back to the United States aboard the USS Yorktown October 1945.  Click on brochure to see next page...

Recollections by Robert A. McPherson, Rear Admiral (ret)

When the war was over we started "Magic Carpet."  5000 bunks, 5 layers high, were installed on the hanger deck.  My department went from 800 sailors down to 80. 

We made two magic carpet trips.  A "privy" was installed on the fantail for the thousands of additional men on the Magic Carpet trips.  But the sailors [magic carpet riders] wouldn't use it.  They preferred to go below and use the crew's crowded privies down there.

Living with the Army
Thu Jan 29 10:09:05 2004

Although soldiers had our scaled down crew outnumbered ten to one during the “Magic Carpet” trips we got along well with our mostly Army passengers. It was obvious they all respected us, maybe for no other reason than we were taking them home. Many of us were detailed to keep order in the chow and shower lines and even though a “latrine” had been set up on the fantail many preferred to use our facilities. These were often crowded in normal times and now more so with almost three times the number of people using them.
Our passengers only got two meals a day and were willing to pay for a noon meal. I can’t explain why but they all had a lot of money. Since we were short of cash some of us had no qualms about selling them our noon meal. We would take a tray of food up to the hangar deck and could almost name our price. No, we didn’t feel bad about it because we were working while they were riding and it meant we would be the ones with only two meals a day.
Shower time was chaotic in the beginning until we established some order in the waiting lines. These men were disciplined and readily cooperated recognizing an orderly way was the only way. Even though we were outranked by all levels of noncoms we had no trouble getting them to conform to naval warship custom and etiquette.

The one thing that went on 24/7 was dice games on the hangar deck. Ordinarily, there was no way we in the crew could afford to get in these games. However, after an evening of playing nickle and dime blackjack myself and another crewman (won’t mention his name) won about $20 between us. At his suggestion we decided to get in a dice game. You could gamble all night without ever touching the dice. Making side bets we soon had over a $100. He was experienced, having grown up on the streets of a big eastern city, so he took the dice and after an unbelievable run of good luck our roll grew to over $600. We split the money and hit the sack. Some time later he woke me saying he just couldn’t quit because he was “hot”. I declined and went back to sleep. In no time he was back wanting to “borrow” my $300 and to make a long story short we wound up without even our blackjack winnings. In those days $300 was big money.
A day or two out of San Francisco there was only one dice game left and when you heard “shoot five or shoot ten” they were talking about thousands.

When we were in Japan I had picked up two Jap rifles, two automatic paratrooper guns (supposedly not allowed but I managed to get them aboard) and various other souvenirs. I was talked (begged) into selling everything by our passengers. Today, what I regret selling more than anything else was a Bing Crosby record with a Japanese label. It may be worth more than all the other stuff combined.
Our passengers who were mostly Army were cooperative and we had a very good relationship with them. There were only three incidents in my personal experience where a disagreement could develop and niceties dissipate.

One of them was at a dice game where Hughie and I brought our meager nickle and dime black jack winnings to the hangar deck to get in one of the big stakes games.
We were making side bets and after I won about three straight from one soldier he wanted to double up which I agreed to and won about four more then quit. He was upset and mumbled something but I could see this will just go on until he wins it all back with one roll of the dice.
Another time when I was stationed at the 2nd division compartment door where the shower line had to single up, one soldier tried to drag on the line and when I told him to go to the end he said, "what are you going to do if I don't".
I thought he was joking so I told him, "hold on and I'll show you".
I went to our peacoat locker which was only about twenty feet away and got my prized Brevet Bergmann 9MM submachine gun sometimes called a "burp" gun. Big mistake!

Among other things I had picked up in Japan was this gun, a Jap made similar gun and two of their army rifles. Our peacoat locker had enough guns to start a war.
After his eyes popped out the soldier began begging me to sell it and the others were asking "what else you got".

They had the money and before the day was done I had sold everything I had.
The other incident was on our return trip from Manila when a mine was spotted and since we were alone we slowed down to destroy it. We were probably several hundred yards away and the mine was now you see it now you don't. We were only using one of our sixty or so 20MM's and as I recall it took two magazines before we hit it.

The soldiers were from an anti-aircraft battalion and one was overheard asking another, "how many planes did they shoot down.?"
All in good fun as was the reply, "if it wasn’t for you goddam dogfaces we’d be home already".

And so it was on Yorktown many years ago. 
Read more of the adventures of Willie onboard the USS Yorktown.  Click here