Navy Personal Stories: Fire on the USS Lake Champlain

Fire on the USS Lake Champlain-July 3, 1957

George Essey HM2
Prelude to the Fire at Marseilles Capt. George Luker came aboard the CHAMP after a round of golf with a very sore back. We got a phone call in sick bay about the captain's sore back and he wanted some kind of relief, but no one wanted to go and treat him. I finally and reluctantly volunteered and took my gear and went up to Capt. Luker's quarters. I massaged his back with Oil of Wintergreen and as I had him under the heat lamp, we got to talking about our personal lives. He was from Ambridge PA, which is about 40 miles north of Monessen PA, my hometown. He was the gunnery officer (WW-II) on the USS ARKANSAS BB-33, of which my brother, Sam Essey, was a BM1 and work with the 12" guns, and these were Capt. Luker's assignments. Small world and Capt. Luker and I became good friends from this meeting and relieving the pain in his back.

..FIRE.. I was the assigned corpsman on duty on the day of the fire in Marseilles when the "Fire on the starboard side, aft" call came over the squawk box. I grabbed the emergency first aid bag and ran 2 flights up to the hangar bay. Upon seeing the bright orange flames, I ran back down to sick bay and yelled, "This is no drill! Fire! Fire!" I returned to the hangar bay and started running towards the fire site when I was stopped and lifted off of my feet by this big, tall Warrant Officer (name unknown). He calmly set me down and said, "Doc, there's nothing you can do there now, so just wait for the call for a medic!" Just then a call came over the squawk box for medic's to go to the officer's gang plank (OGP) to tend to injured personnel. I started running to the forward part of the hangar bay and was joined by HM1 Clyde Null. Clyde said, “If you hear one bang, double your speed. If you hear two bangs, run like a bat out of hell. If you hear three bangs, pretend that there is another carrier attached to our carrier and keep running on it." What a fearful moment that was as we ran to the OGP.

As we arrived at the OGP, Clyde ran down and I started to follow him, when the OD, Ensign Par-----, hollered out, "Hey sailor, come back here!". I returned as requested and he said that he is placing me on report for NOT REQUESTING PERMISSION TO LEAVE THE SHIP!!! I couldn't believe him, so I grabbed the clip board off of him and wrote down my name, etc., handed the board back to him, ran down the OGB, and still did not request permission to leave the ship.

We brought up these burnt sailor and civilians, all with 2nd and 3rd degree burns and some that were charred. One of the burnt people had the skin on his legs so swelled up with fluids that when we lifted him up to be placed on a stretcher, this excess skin busted and fluid went everywhere. We were lucky to find other sailors handy to take the stretcher to sick bay as we continued to receive and check out other injured personnel. Upon returning to sick bay, we all were busy in treating the injured and burnt sailors and civilians and this was an all day job. As a result of this fire, we lost 3 Frenchmen and 5 American sailors, for which we had burial at sea ceremonies later on in the cruise.

At the end of the day, Cdr Krasno, Senior Medical Officer, got us all together and reviewed the situation and the quick action taken by everyone during the fire and he personally thanked everyone for a job well done. During the Captain's inspection after the fire, the "H" Division was commended for their work during and after the fire.

The next day, HM3 "Moon" Mullens and I were detailed to the room where the dead sailors were stored, awaiting the arrival of the Fleet Mortician, CPO "Digger" O'Dell. The bodies were laid out in a made up type of a freezer room and we had to keep them doused with formaldehyde, a job that nobody should ever want to do. Once that CPO O’Dell came aboard, we were officially relieved from this detail. The reason that Moon and I were picked for this detail is that we both worked at funeral homes prior to joining the Navy. A point of interest in this event is that I was already approved for the Cincinnati School of Mortuary and was to start immediately upon being discharge, however, I called my former boss and sponsor for the school, Denver Rhome, and told him to remove my name from the school roster as I wanted no part of it. He told me that burn cases are the worst scenario of death and if you can stomach that, you got it made.

Follow-up on the Prelude to the Fire at Marseilles I reported to Cdr Krasno about being placed on report. He said not to worry about it and let's just wait for the hearing. Finally, the day came and I had to report to the hearing at the Captain's mast. When I walked into Capt. Luker's office, Capt. Luker greeted me with, "George! What the hell are you doing here?" The Ensign just looked like a bomb hit him when Capt. Luker said "George....", instead of "Sailor, ....". As I explained the details to him, he looked at the Ensign and said, "You stopped him because he didn't request permission to leave the ship. What were you thinking of. There was a fire!". He then told me to leave and tore up the report sheets. Later, when Cdr Krasno came back to sick bay, he said he never seen anybody get reamed out as the Ensign was and then told the Ensign to steer clear of the Captain's office and just enjoy the rest of the trip.



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