Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Fort Lawton Rioters Against Italian POWs Become "Victims"

The ANNOTICO Report

 

At Fort Lawton in Seattle in 1944, More than 50 Armed US Negro Soldiers Rioted and Stormed the Barracks of a group of Italian POWs, and began severely beating and stabbing the Italians along with the four American translators present. The barracks and orderly room were wrecked. Thirty-two Italians were hospitalized; a dozen sustained severe injuries including three fractured skulls, penetrating knife wounds, and shattered bones. The following morning the "lynched" body of Guglielmo Olivotto was discovered at the foot of Magnolia Bluff.

 

What was the "justification", for the Negro Non Combatants to make this unprovoked attack???

 

The Negro "soldiers" were irritated with discriminatory practices in town (How was that the responsibility of the Italians?) .

The Negroes were also resentful that the Italians had "privileges" that the Italian American community was receptive, and that the American women found the Italians "romantic and exotic".

 

For those reasons, the Negroes RIOTED, and STORMED, and ARMED, ASSAULTED the Italian Barracks.

 

From Hamman's book: Staff Sergeant FRED J. PERATA, 28th Italian Service Unit | Interpreter testified: I think they were trying to kill me. Im surprised Im alive. Broke the second or third rib. And then they stabbed me in the back.

 

Sergeant GRANT NOEL FARR, 28th Italian Service Unit | Company Clerk The faces of the men I saw in the doorways and in the room were faces that were distorted, bloodshot eyes, lips drawn back over their teeth, and a general appearance of frenzy and hate  the nostrils were dilated.

 

Private First Class HAROLD MASON GOULD, 28th Italian Service Unit | Interpreter  I was confronted with a large Negro who was standing in the middle of the road and who threw a rock at me, hitting me. I knew it wasnt on the head. I told him I was an American. I was helpless at the time with a busted arm and he said, Well, get the hell out of here.

 

Out of the more than 50 Negro Soldiers involved,  after review of the facts, 44 African American soldiers were charged with a variety of counts including riot and murder. In the end, two soldiers had charges dropped, 13 soldiers were acquitted, and 28 were convicted. One soldier was convicted of manslaughter in connection with the death of Olivotto.

 

Jack Hamann's 2005 book "On American Soil." .. that got then Congressman Jim McDermott involved, who  pushed for a review by the Army's Board for Correction of Military Records..... [The Court Martial was reversed] 

Hamman engages in an enormous litany of bizarre speculations, and thereby states that since there is a remote possibility that these speculations could have happened, that the more logical conclusions based on facts and testimony should be ignored..

Lt Col Leon Jaworski,  the youngest person ever admitted to the Texas bar (1925), and in 1931 he joined the Houston firm that became Fulbright & Jaworski. This same Jaworski, was appointed Special Prosecutor November 1, 1973 during the Watergate Scandal after the Saturday Night Massacre which led to the dismissal of prosecutor Archibald Cox. Jaworski convinced  the Supreme Court require President Nixon to hand over the incriminating "tapes"  including one (known as "the smoking gun" tape). The President resigned in early August. Now Hamman slanders this outstanding Jaworski, by accussing him of failure to share certain evidence, although he doesn't bother stating that it was trivial and of no consequence, and certainly was NOT exculpatory.

As a matter of fact, Hamman even doesn't try to claim that the Negro 'Dock workers in Uniform" didn't do what was claimed. His point was that the process was "flawed", and doesn't even argue that a non flawed system (and where do we find that in this imperfect world?), may not have reached the same result!!!!!!!! 

This was strictly overly Political  maneuver, and a "sop" to the African American Community.

When Perpetrators are excused, The Value of the Victims is  Diminished.

Of Guglielmo Olivotto, Jack Hamann writes:  "Olivotto was a quiet man, well read and devoutly religious. He was lean, five feet ten inches and just 150 pounds. His eyes were dark; his hair was black and thick, except for a bald spot on the crown of his head; he wore a dark mustache. A thin scar slid down the right side of his scalp at hairline. He was never married and had no children. He didn't drink or gamble. He had no interest in being a soldier? (p. 11).

Who weeps for Guglielmo Olivotto  ???????

But we have in Tuesday's Seattle Times, a Nicole Brodeur, who besides being young, has already adapted the bad habits of modern  journalist, to know very little about the subjects they write about, and even care less to know, and deliver "distorted" articles as the truth, obviously a Graduate of the Bush/Cheney School of Propaganda, following closely in the steps of a first time author, who seems to had in mind more on potential sales, than an even handed book. 

Brodeur spends ALL her time tearfully on the "Riotous MOB", who had NO provocation or justification, and a Callous Indifference for Guglielmo Olivotto, or the 32 Italians hospitalized, and the remainder of the Italians that were terrorized.

ADDITIONAL NOTES: Fort Lawton, in the Magnolia Bluff neighborhood of Seattle, was an Army training base and staging area for combat in the Pacific. In 1944, a group of Italian Prisoners Of War, were stationed at the fort to perform labor and maintenance duties. These particular Italian soldiers were carefully selected -- in general they had been drafted into the war and had been unenthusiastic soldiers, unlike other Prisoners Of War who were committed fascists and difficult to handle. The Army was highly concerned with treating Prisoners Of War humanely in order to conform to the Geneva convention and because any poor treatment would likely be paid for by American Prisoners Of War in Europe.These Italian prisoners volunteered to help the US war effort, and did an outstanding job, and therefore were given special privileges, that included  supervised visits to area homes,(Where the Italian community welcomed them),  taverns, and t o the movies.

The History Link.Org. The Encyclopedia of Washington State History

 

Too late, but still too little?

Seattle Times 

By Nicole Brodeur

Staff columnist

Tuesday, Decemb er 4, 2007

Better late than never, I suppose.

Still, it took a lifetime; 28 of them, to be exact. Just over a month ago, the Army admitted it was wrong when it court-martialed 28 black soldiers for a riot that ended in the lynching of an Italian prisoner at Seattle's Fort Lawton in 1944.

The case was... laid out in Jack Hamann's 2005 book "On American Soil." ..Then Congressman Jim McDermott,... pushed for the review by the Army's Board for Correction of Military Records..... [The Court Martial was reversed]  Hearts have been settled, and an entity has chastened itself....

Hamann ...[makes a point that] the Army lifted the convictions without any new testimony. The facts were enough. [But then what new testimony of actions 63 years ago ???] ....

How to make amends for an injustice that most soldiers took, literally, to their graves?...

"This isn't about the money. They want honor. They want to be made whole."

The only thing marking the incident now is a stout, whitewashed column bearing the name of the lynched soldier, Pvt. Guglielmo Olivotto, who is buried where he died......

Nicole Brodeur's column appears Tuesday and Friday. Reach her at 206-464-2334 or nbrodeur@seattletimes.com.

 

Riot involving African American soldiers occurs at Fort Lawton and an Italian POW is lynched on August 14, 1944.
HistoryLink.org Essay 7378

On August 14, 1944, several dozen African American soldiers riot at Seattle's Fort Lawton against Italian prisoners of war, and the next morning one of the Italians, Guglielmo Olivotto, is discovered hanged. Newspaper accounts in the coming days attribute the riot to the resentment of the black soldiers toward the Italian Prisoners of War due to the seemingly lenient, congenial treatment of the Italian soldiers. 

 

This is the story that receives nationwide attention, that Seattle officials and citizens react to, and that goes down in history.  It is the story related in an earlier version of this file. What actually happened was suppressed at the time: the Army classified its investigation, and contemporary newspaper accounts were based on hearsay gathered in a bar days later and on similar dubious sources. The ensuing court martial results in the conviction of 23 African American soldiers, including one for killing Olivotto.

 

Sixty years later the Army's investigation conducted by Brigadier General Elliot D. Cooke is declassified, and researcher Jack Hamann discovers that what was alleged to have happened was not what really happened. This file is largely based on his book, On American Soil. As a result of Hamann's book, four of the soldiers will petition the Army to reconsider their cases, and in October 2007 Army's Board of Corrections of Military Records will overturn the four convictions, leaving the way open for all the cases to be reopened.

Fort Lawton: 1944

Fort Lawton, in the Magnolia Bluff neighborhood of Seattle, was an Army training base and staging area for combat in the Pacific. In 1944, a group of Italian Prisoners Of War, were stationed at the fort to perform labor and maintenance duties....

Also stationed at Fort Lawton were several segregated Port Companies of the Transportation Corps, composed of African Americans trained to unload ships in combat areas. According to contemporary newspaper reports of the episode, these troops resented Fort Lawton's Italian POWs who visited local taverns, which excluded black enlisted men. Among the resentments were allegedly that local women lavished attention on the Italians. "[G]irls come out to service dances and make a big fuss over the Italians," a Seattle Times article dated August 18, 1944, reported. "They find 'em romantic. You know, speaking a foreign language and all that." 

Also present at Fort Lawton were white Military Police (MP) and some 10,000 other soldiers.

The Event

On August 14, 1944, the black troops were notified that the next day they would be shipped overseas. That night there was a big party in their mess hall. Late in the evening, three Italians returning from town encountered three African Americans. All had been drinking. The groups clashed, supposedly leaving one black American unconscious. A particular MP, a private, came by and took the unconscious man away to the hospital. This MP claimed that one of the soldiers blew a whistle and trouble then started. Supposedly angry at the injury of one of their group, a number of black soldiers entered the Italian bunkhouse and orderly room and began severely beating and stabbing the Italians along with the four American translators present.

Italians ran out of bed, hid under furniture, and ran out to hide in nearby woods. The barracks and orderly room were wrecked. Thirty-two men were later hospitalized; a dozen sustained severe injuries including three fractured skulls, penetrating knife wounds, and shattered bones (p. 142). The following morning the same MP who had transported the supposedly unconscious black soldier to the hospital, along with another MP, discovered the body of Guglielmo Olivotto at the foot of Magnolia Bluff, hanging on wires that were part of the obstacle course.

Questions and Odd Occurrences

  • After the attack started, several panicked phone calls were made from the Italian quarters, but there was a remarkable lapse of 30 to 45 minutes before Military Police arrived on the scene.
  • Either through remarkable incompetence or a cover-up, all evidence of the identity of particular black rioters was destroyed. The Italian barracks were repaired and repainted with dazzling speed -- within 24 hours. Not a single fingerprint was taken, though they were everywhere. None of the white MPs could recall exactly who the black rioting troops were, claiming "you can't tell one from another."  (Sounds like an attempted "coverup" in favor of the Negroes) 
  • All the black troops of both companies, whether or not they were involved in the riot, were herded into a stockade but allowed to keep their weapons. When their weapons were finally confiscated they were not tagged or in any way treated as evidence. They were thrown in a heap. (And the mportance is?) 
  • There were no signs of struggle on Olivotto's body. (However, there were superficial abrasions on his legs.) An important fact is that Olivotto was extremely fearful of black people.  He was last seen leaping in terror out of a window next to his bunk. A possibility is that he was driven away from the riot by someone he felt safe with, i.e., a white MP (p. 146-147). Most evidence at the scene of the hanging crime, including clear footprints and the rope, was destroyed. Dominic Moreo, in his Riot at Fort Lawton, 1944, points out that shoes, apparently belonging to Olivotto, were found in the nettles some distance away. This might suggest that he was dragged through the nettles, face down, probably by two people. But the evidence is too sketchy to draw a firm conclusion.
  • Whatever happened, the Army's investigator, Brigadier General Cooke, was scandalized at the large amount of obvious lying under oath by many MPs and officers at Fort Lawton.

Aftermath

The death of an Italian prisoner of war became an important issue to American military and diplomatic officials. U.S. Forces were then battling German forces in France and Italy and any perception that the U.S. mistreated prisoners had important repercussions with world opinion and with the treatment of U.S. prisoners in German and Japanese hands. There was immediate and intense pressure to solve the crime "apparently"  perpetrated by African Americans. (Is there ANY Question that the Events happened???)

After a hasty review of the facts, 44 African American soldiers were charged with a variety of counts including riot and murder. Four of the defendants faced the death penalty.

The charges were prepared by Lieutenant Colonel Leon Jaworski, a Texas prosecutor in civilian life and later Watergate Special Prosecutor. The defense was handled by Major William Beeks, a Seattle maritime law specialist and later U.S. District Court Judge. Beeks was given two weeks to prepare a defense for 44 clients, including four accused of capital murder. In the end, two soldiers had charges dropped, 13 soldiers were acquitted, and 28 were convicted. One soldier was convicted of manslaughter in connection with the death of Olivotto despite no facts linking him to the hanging. It was the largest Army court martial during World War II.

After the war, the longer prison sentences were reduced by a clemency board, although some soldiers served as long as 25 years. Guglielmo Olivotto was buried at the cemetery at Fort Lawton in an area away from the American graves.

A Death Far from Home

Of Guglielmo Olivotto, Jack Hamann writes:

"Olivotto was a quiet man, well read and devoutly religious. He was lean, five feet ten inches and just 150 pounds. His eyes were dark; his hair was black and thick, except for a bald spot on the crown of his head; he wore a dark mustache. A thin scar slid down the right side of his scalp at hairline. He was never married and had no children. He didn't drink or gamble. He had no interest in being a soldier? (p. 11).

Sixty-three Years Later

In late October 2007, the Army's Board of Corrections of Military Records, after a year of deliberation, ruled that the black soldiers court-martialed in the death of Olivotto were unfairly denied access to their attorneys and to investigative records and should have their convictions overturned. This ruling applies to four soldiers who petitioned military investigators (three of them, represented by their families, are no longer living).

The soldiers petitioned after the publication of Jack Hamann's book, with the aid of Congressman Jim McDermott, Democrat from Washington state, and Representative Duncan Hunter, Republican from California. Ultimately the ruling could cover another two-dozen soldiers convicted at the time.

The four soldiers who petitioned were Booker W. Townsell, of Milwaukee, Luther L. Larkin, of Searcy, Arkansas, William G. Jones, of Decatur, Illinois, and Samuel Snow, of Leesburg, Florida. Of these four, Snow alone is still alive. After serving a year in prison and being dishonorably discharged, Snow returned to his home in Leesburg, Florida, to raise two children and to work as a church janitor. He lived for decades with the dishonorable discharge and was denied benefits of the GI Bill and veterans' health care.

He is one of only two of the black soldiers believed to be still alive. Snow was convinced that the conviction was a racial injustice but nevertheless burned his Army paperwork in order to hide it from his children.

Restitution will include honorable discharges and back pay for the soldiers who petitioned.

Snow told a reporter, "I'm rejoicing today. I'm not mad at nobody. I'm just as satisfied as can be"  (Martin). 

 

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