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| Grady Gaston shortly after his rescue. |
For those of you unfamiliar with Gaston, a native of Frisco City, Ala. who died in 1998, he endured an epic struggle for survival after a military plane crash in the Australian wilderness during WWII. In the early days of the war, Gaston served as the radio operator aboard the “Little Eva,” a B-24 Liberator bomber that was based out of a remote airbase in Queensland, Australia. On Dec. 2, 1942, while on their way back from their first mission, their plane was disabled during a severe thunderstorm.
As the plane began to run out of fuel, Gaston and other members of the crew parachuted from the plane moments before it crashed in a remote area of the Australian wilderness. Up to that point, Gaston had never parachuted out of anything, much less a moving plane hundreds of feet off the ground, but miraculously he survived the jump. Others weren’t so lucky.
Once on the ground, Gaston found himself in a group of four, who began making their way west toward the coast. Over time, the men slowly began to starve to death and eventually only Gaston was left alive. An extensive search was launched for the plane and the crew, but Gaston wasn’t found until April 23, 1943 when an Aborigine found him walking on the beach. Barely alive, Gaston had survived 141 days in a wilderness that would have killed experienced bushmen and Aborigines in similar circumstances.
Gaston’s ability to survive was mostly due to the fact that he was willing to eat things that his companions would not. With no way to start a fire, he ate whatever he could catch with his bare hands, including raw snakes, frogs, fish and sand crabs. He also fought off wild dogs, drank impure water and lost 70 pounds. He would later describe his experience, which led to him being featured in “Ripley’s Believe It or Not!,” as “141 days of hell.”
Not long after his rescue, in May 1943, Gaston provided the military with an official statement of what happened to him and his colleagues in the Australian jungle, and today I provide you with the second portion of that official statement. This portion of this statement picks up after the death of Lt. Grimes in the first portion of Gaston’s statement, which can be read here: http://leepeacock2010.blogspot.com/2013/03/part-i-of-gastons-official-statement.html.
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After this we went on about 25 to 30 miles at which point the beach ran out entirely. There was nothing in sight for miles but long stretches of “flats” and upon trying to walk through we went up to our waists in mud and marsh which meant sure death if we tried to go further. After sitting down for a while we decided to go back to the shack where we had left Lt. Speltz and all die together.
On the way back we found Lt. Grimes’ body where it had washed ashore. Lt. Grimes had been drowned on Dec. 27, and we arrived back at the shack on Dec. 29. While returning we had come across some little cockerels and carried all we could to Lt. Speltz. While eating them he stated that they tasted better than the steak we had eaten two weeks before.
Lt. Dyer and I kept up our search for food in the vicinity of the shack and soon Lt. Speltz picked up and got to feeling pretty good. We had located a water hole about four miles from the shack but by this time what little food we could find was running very low so we decided to go back and cross the Robinson River and see what we could find on the other side. On crossing the river we all got caught in the current and were rapidly being carried out to sea when suddenly our feet touched a sandbar which we were able to cling to and fight our way back to shore.
That was about the worst fright we had and from then on decided that we would stay near the shack and just wait until the final day or until someone might come along. We made regular daily trips through the jungle bringing back anything we could find from dead fish to any snakes we saw and could kill. One day while going to the water hole we found a dead wallaby which we brought back to camp and cooked with our last match. At the time, we thought that was just about the best meal we had ever eaten. From then on, it was just a series of raw foods and what few berries we could find.
Early in January we sighted a flight of B-25s going over and tried to signal them but with no success. From then on our lives remained just about the same. We had taken care of the little melon patch we had found and by now there were quite a few melons which were small but we shared one between us each evening while they lasted and while we were sitting around talking about the delicious meals and desserts we had enjoyed during our lives.
Talking about most anything that would help pass the time because at night the mosquitoes and bugs were almost unbearable; many times we had to bury ourselves in the sand to try to keep them off.
Each day we became weaker and weaker and on Feb. 10, as we were preparing to go to the water hole, Lt. Dyer collapsed completely. Lt. Speltz and myself went on to the waterhole, and found what few cockerels we could find (they were getting scarce by now) and on our return Lt. Dyer was dead. We had all made notes as we went along and we had scratched on a small piece of paper “I lasted until Feb. 10.”
Many times, we had discussed what we wanted done if anything happened to us separately, so we immediately put him on the sand with his face down. We had decided not to bury any bodies because some day someone might come along and find them if they were above ground.
This incident just left Lt. Speltz and myself.
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To read the rest of Gaston’s statement, please visit this site next Saturday, when I will post the third portion of Gaston’s official statement about the “Little Eva” incident. If you don’t want to wait that long, you can read his entire statement at the following address, www.dropbears.com/a/aviation/docs/SgtGradyGaston-LittleEva.pdf. If you’re interested in more details about Gaston’s ordeal, I’d also encourage you to read “The Crash of Little Eva: The Ultimate World War II Survivor Story” by Barry Ralph, which was originally published in November 2004 by the University of Queensland Press in Australia.
In the end, how many of you remember Grady Gaston? Do you have any memories of Gaston that you’d like to share? Let us know in the comments section below.
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