At war’s end, sailor welcomed back vets

Arthur Gregoire was 17 when he joined the Navy and put in for sea duty.

He was wrapping up boot camp and readying his sea legs in 1945, when World War II ended. Gregoire’s ship never left Brooklyn Navy Yard.

But Gregoire still took on an important job: welcoming the troops home and helping them get back to their lives stateside.

Gregoire was assigned a post at a “separation center,” where soldiers were discharged from duty on Lido Beach in Long Island, N.Y.

The Navy took over a big, “ritzy” hotel on the beach and also set up a barracks. Gregoire was put in charge of the surplus store, which provided civilian clothes and supplies to replenish the soldiers before they headed home.

The soldiers, mostly New York natives, arrived in droves on “troop trains,” Gregoire recalled – some as far away as California.

“They were all glad to be back,” Gregoire said. “Some of them had been there quite awhile, so they were pretty happy to be back home.”

While some soldiers were discharged immediately, others had time left to serve. Gregoire found himself training those troops in the store.

“We’d put them to work in different areas until their time was up,” Gregoire said. “For me, it was like a regular job. We all had our duties to do, and that was my duty.”

One of his most vivid memories of the time is the gold eagle pin soldiers received to indicate their honorable discharge. (Many in the Navy, including Gregoire, call it the “duck pin.”)

“I got one when I was released,” he said, adding that it’s still in a drawer at his Manchester home.

Gregoire hoped there might be a sea duty assignment for him, but it wasn’t to be. Gregoire served a year and half, and then left to finish high school.

He later worked as a bread delivery man, and then in the computer field for various companies.

During his October visit to the World War II Memorial, Gregoire was impressed by the first-class treatment: official escorts wherever they went and groups of people waving flags and clapping for them.

In Washington D.C., Gregoire said the old memories hit him hard.

“You think about all the veterans, all the people that died and never came back,” he said. “It’s an honor for us to see how lucky we are that they went out there, actually dying for us.”

Karen Lovett can be reached at 594-6402 or klovett@nashuatelegraph.com.