HomeMy WebLinkAboutMINUTES - 03121991 - 2.3 'moi l lr),�-003
TO: BOARD OF SUPERVISORS Contra
r
Phil Batchelor
Costa
FROM: i
CountMarch 12 1991 ��o:_ -= -�P''� y
DATE: sTa c6U
suelEcr: Port Chicago Ammunition Explosion Investigation
SPECIFIC REQUEST(S)OR RECOMMENDATION(S)&BACKGROUND AND JUSTIFICATION
RECONIlYIENDATION
Accept report from the Human Relations Commission in response to
the Board' s referral regarding request to the County' s
Congressional representatives to reopen the U.S. Navy' s
investigation of the Port Chicago ammunition explosion.
BACKGROUND-
On October 2, 1990 the Board of Supervisors requested the Human
Relations Commission to review and recommend actions the Board
may take to request the County' s representatives in Congress to
reopen the U.S. Navy' s investigation of the Port Chicago
ammunition explosion.
The report of the Human Relations Commission is attached.
CONTINUED ON ATTACHMENT: X YES SIGNATURE:
RECOMMENDATION OF COUNTY ADMINISTRATOR RECOMMENDATION OF BOARD COMMITTEE
APPROVE OTHER
SIGNATURE(S):
ACTION OF BOARD ON March 12, 1 991 APPROVED AS RECOMMENDED X OTHER
VOTE OF SUPERVISORS
I HEREBY CERTIFY THAT THIS IS A TRUE
X UNANIMOUS(ABSENT III ) AND CORRECT COPY OF AN ACTION TAKEN
AYES:_ NOES: AND ENTERED ON THE MINUTES OF THE BOARD
ABSENT: ABSTAIN: OF SUPERVISORS ON`THE DATE SHOWN.
Cc: Human Relations Commission ATTESTEDW
County Administrator � PHIL BATCHELOR,CLERK OF THE BOARD OF
congressman ;Miller SUPERVISORS AND COUNTY ADMINISTRATOR
M382 (10/88) BY DEPUTY
h" Contra Costa County
Contra .. 11--- :o
RECEIVED HUMAN RELATIONS COMMISSION
Room 103,Adm. Bldg.
Costa MQR 011991 651 Pine Street
CoUnty ':. `
Office of Martinez, California 94553
Pa .gyp (415) 646-2013
rq CounW Adminiztrtat&
DATE: Feb. 28, 1991
TO: Dean Lucas,
Deputy County Administrator
FROM: Ami Mezahav,
Coordinator
SUBJECT: HRC Response to Board of Supervisor's request regarding the 1944
Port Chicago Ammunition Explosion Court Martial
Increasing attention has been focused on the treatment given the black sailors
involved in the refusal to load ammunition on Navy ships immediately following the
Port Chicago explosion which killed 320 men. The US Navy has concluded that
the statute of limitations for review of this case has expired. The Board of
Supervisors has "requested that the HRC recommend to the Board what, if any,
action should be requested by the Board from the County's representatives in
Congress regarding this case.
Summary
In the summer of 1944, thousands of tons of ammunition were loaded onto
US Navy ships at the small harbor of Port Chicago. All the seamen who handled
the ammunition were black, all the officers were white. While the seamen had
been given technical training to serve at sea, none were instructed in the
handling of ammunition. After numerous complaints of unsafe conditions were
made to Navy higher-ups,- the men were assured that the bombs simply could not
explode because they were all defused.
On the night of July 17, 1944 two ships, the E.A. Bryan and the Quinalt
Victory, were being loaded of cargo including 650 pound incendiary bombs with
the fuses already installed. Shortly after 10 P.M. the ships and their cargo
exploded, destroying the barracks holding seamen not on duty and nearly vaporizing
the small town of Port Chicago, which was a over a mile and a half from the
docks. The dead totaled 320, 202 of them black men. This single incident
accounted for more than 15% of black casualties during World War Two. .(Cited in
A. Russell Buchanan, Black Americans in World War II. Santa Barbara, CA 1972)
A few weeks later, after denying the surviving black seamen the thirty day
leave granted to the white survivors, the Navy ordered them to return to work at,
a nearby port under the same unsafe conditions they faced in Port Chicago.
Over two hundred black men refused the order, fifty eight of whom were singled
out for court martial on a .charge of mutiny. US Supreme Court Justice Thurgood
Marshall, who was then a young lawyer working for the NAACP, handled the
black seamen's case, calling it "one of the worst frame-ups we have come across
in a long time. It was deliberately planned and staged by certain officers to
discredit Negro seamen" (Quoted in Robert L. Allen The Port Chicago Mutiny:
The Story of the Largest .Mass Mutiny Trial in US Naval History New York:
Warner Books, 1989 p.130) . After a lengthy trial replete with racially tinged
incidents the men were found guilty and court-martialed. For forty six years
these men have carried with them the stigma of a less than honorable discharge,
and many have called for an official review of the case.
Port Chicago .page 2
Not surprisingly, the Navy has refused to do so, arguing that the statute
of limitations for review of this episode has passed. This being the case, the
Contra Costa County Human Relations Commission feels that the County Board of
Supervisors should 'strongly support the efforts-of Representative George Miller
and 24 other Members of Congress who have joined the sailors in asking the Navy
to reopen the case. As The Contra Costa Times has pointed out in a September
24, 1990 editorial, "If the Navy won't investigate its own questionable conduct,
then Miller and other members of California's congressional delegation should do it
for them. Even 46 years after the fact, the public has a right to know if the
Navy engaged in unconscionable racism. . ."