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Fred Eugene Bickhart

Fred Eugene Bickhart was born on May 5, 1923 in Minnesota later on he and his family moved to Washington where his younger brother was born. After a few years they moved west in to Los Angeles he went to Corona high school. He was involved in multiple sports including basketball (four years), and football (one year). With his father a minister who relocated churches which meant Bickhart was often traveling across Los Angeles. One Sunday he was hitch hiking home when he got a ride the radio was playing and it broad casted the bone chilling event known as the Pearl Harbor bombing. From then on he became interested in the Navy, but it wasn’t till after he graduated Corona high school in 1941 that his second oldest brother enlisted in the Navy. His brother came to Bickhart with the motivation to enlist and without hesitation he stated “wait, I’ll come with you”. This was the beginning of World War 2 and the steps of the US as they took apart. They were sent to a boot-camp before joining they were able to serve one year together. Fred E. Bickhart had four brothers; his oldest brother was forced to work as a radioman rather than the Navy because of his bad eyesight, the second to oldest worked beside Bickhart, and the youngest worked in the Navy within the hospital area. This is when Fred E. Bickharts involvement with the war began.

Being translations they ran lines on words, statements, and fragmented sentences through machines made to run coding formulas over them. The codes were not numeric rather they were Japanese mores code, and different styles of a new voice like instruction. Japanese was a difficult language separate as explained by Bickart there are several more Japanese characters that first need decoding them and style of translation required precision and accuracy for the correct instruction. At this time he was in Hawaii when contacted through the Navy they suggested he take a commanding officer exam, which he pasted. They then sent him to UCLA where he studied a new procedure of communication. He joined a commanding group within a marine base off of San Diego that required them to be dropped into Japanese territory after battle to set up stations. The stations were set so the military could replace them later permanently. When they went through these missions they watch gored war, the danger of being shot, and having to watch friend fall beside them as they stood there ground. Afterwards he was sent into combat war including his original radio deciphering job. He was working with the USS Knight when the ship went down, he was sending instruction at the back of the lines to the military so after the first wave took the Japanese inwards the army would show up and push in. He was with them when they were in Boston till it was sunk off San Diego California. He had to go through Pearl Harbor during on of his trips, the horrors still panic him with the views of old dead bodies and destroyed buildings however he was able to overcome this by look for the good things such as a surfing break with friends. He was involved with the decoding of information for the battle of Midway, his team was able to give enough information for the US to victoriously take ground and win, which was a major turning point for World War 2. He was involved with USS Carmick as well as landing from aircraft to place stations within enemy territory to send codes that couldn’t be reach from the safely in miles. He was in the battle of Omaha Beach as he sent information towards the US. Though he was in a safer position this still meant being underfired while understanding large strategical conversations.