Writing home: life in the Navy’s ‘black’ boot camp

The small manila envelope sat on top of a tray of old documents. Curious to know what was inside, I picked it up and slid out its contents. Several postcards appeared, apart of a series, which depict life for African-American Navy recruits undergoing boot camp training. The find was a reward for braving a Spring chill early one morning at the flea market.

A change in Navy policy

The United States Armed Forces was segregated when the nation entered the Second World War. When it came to the Navy, the enlistment of African-American sailors was restricted to menial work found within the Messman Branch. Serving as mess attendants, cooks, and stewards, these sailors received little training and had few responsibilities.

In addition the branch was organized outside the Navy’s general service. This meant that its members, even if they held the rank of Chief, could not exercise authority over junior enlisted men in the general service.¹ Then on 7 April, 1942, there came a change to the status quo.

On this day Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox announced that all ratings, jobs, in the general service of the Navy, and the reserve components of the Marine Corps, and Coast Guard, were now open to African-American volunteers. The announcement was made after lengthy deliberation between the White House and Navy leaders.² As a result, the establishment of a segregated training facility was needed.

Camp Robert Smalls

Selected to serve as the new boot camp for African-American sailors was Camp Robert Smalls, initially named Camp Barry, located at Great Lakes Training Center. Through its gates the first batch of recruits arrived in June 1942. At first the training program was twelve months long but when the Navy began taking draftees in February 1943, it was shortened to eight weeks.

Camp Robert Smalls offered recruits much more than just a basic military education. Since many of the draftees it received were illiterate, a special remedial training center was set up at the camp which ultimately provided some 15,000 men with an elementary education.³ Another type of education offered was musical instruction.

Throughout the course of the Second World War, over 5,000 African-American musicians were trained at Great Lakes Training Center. Not all of these men came from Camp Robert Smalls; however, two other segregated boot camps were also built at Great Lakes, they being Camp Moffett and Camp Lawrence.⁴ From these three training facilities successful recruits would go on to continue their advanced military training, called ‘A’ Schools, unless they were slated for service in a menial position.

One sailor’s experience

Azeriah H Morton was born on 15 January, 1926. Originally from Newport News, Virginia, he was a resident of Orange, New Jersey, at the time of his enlistment in Spring 1943. He entered boot camp at Camp Robert Smalls just a few months after his seventeenth birthday.⁵

Undergoing military training was an exciting experience for Morton. So much so that he felt the need to share with his family visuals of camp life, in the form of several real photo postcards (RPPCs) sent back home. These postcards were sold at the camp’s post exchange.

One postcard shows dozens of recruits resting in their hammocks inside a barracks. Many don wide smiles as they look towards the photographer. The caption on the back, provided by Morton, reads: ‘this is where and what we stay in. Its fun. In the front is what we put our clothes in’.

The exact nature of Morton’s wartime service is unknown. Further research is needed by contacting the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis, which houses the personnel records of military veterans. What is known for certain, however, is that he was a proud veteran. Written upon his headstone at Rosedale Cemetery in Orange, he passed away in 2002, is ‘S1 Navy World War II’.⁶ The S1 is the acronym for Seaman 1st Class.

1. Morris J. MacGregor, Integration of the Armed Forces: 1940-1965 (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History [United States Army], 2001), p.58.
2. A detailed history of the development of the Navy’s wartime policy towards black sailors is provided in MacGregor, Integration of the Armed Forces, pp.59-67.
3. Details on the training regime and development of the segregated boot camp program for African-American recruits can be found in ]MacGregor, Integration of the Armed Forces, p.67-75.
4. Gregory Drane, ‘The Role of African-American Musicians in the Integration of the United States Navy’, in Music Educators Journal, vol. 101, no. 3 (March 2015), pp.63-67.
5. Morton’s biographical information was found by consulting his draft registration card. Ancestry.com. U.S. WWII Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
6. National Cemetery Administration. U.S. Veterans’ Gravesites, ca.1775-2019 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006.