Enaineer Memoirs
The Morrises were Episcopalians, so I was raised in that church. In our home, Sunday was truly
I was not allowed to play any games, certainly no movies or shopping. Weather
a day of
permitting, we drove every Sunday after church to my mother's family in Berlin, Maryland, for
Sunday dinner. My mother always did the driving.
Even though people are quite independent and self-sufficient, when help was needed everybody
helped. As a small-towner, everybody knew what was going on. So you were always responsible
for what you did. You couldn't get away with anything. Or, if you did, you had the idea you'd
pay for it sooner or later.
So, you know, that may be something you don't get in a large city where, because there are so
many people, you're not noticed so much, or most people don't pay attention to you. That wasn't
my case. I think that was the background I took to West Point. I was probably a little more mature
than most cadets-not because I was older, but because of my experiences. I didn't have any
trouble, for example, with the plebe year or "beast barracks." That was all fairly easy for me.
Were you aware of beast barracks before you went?
I had heard all the bad things, but they weren't always true. Then when you get in the middle of
it, it's a day-by-day operation, and you find you can survive rather comfortably.
You begin to analyze, become conscious of your circumstances, and you adjust to them. I think
the most successful cadets-not necessarily academically, but in terms of getting the most from
are those who see West Point for what it is and realize not to take
the West Point
life too seriously in spite of all the pressures.
You need to find some vocation as a vent to your
some athletic or extracurricular
activity. Don't get too uptight about anything because you can drive yourself nuts at that place
once you begin to worry.
Q .. Did you start in the summer of
A .. Yes. I entered the first of July. My father accompanied me to West Point with another man who
drove. Dad let me out of the car, and I went in, and that was that. I didn't get home for 18 months.
In those days, cadets didn't go home until the second Christmas, which in our case happened to
be 194 1 -Pearl Harbor.
Q .. That's right.
A .. So they cut Christmas leave in half, to seven days. Then the following summer, which was
supposed to be a
vacation, we stayed all but about two weeks, as I recall, at school. We
graduated in three years. So our class was under constant pressure, you might say.
Q ..
How about that December? Do you remember
A ..
Oh, very clearly.
Q ..
What impact did that have on you as a West Point cadet?
A ..
It made all the difference in the world. Seven December 1941, of course, was a Sunday. It was
an event which causes you to remember exactly where you were when it occurred. I had a date
that weekend, and we were standing in line outside of the cadet theater when the news of Pearl
Harbor reached us. I turned to the young lady who was with me and said, "Well, that's going to
change everything up here for a while." Within a week, our Christmas vacation had been
curtailed. After the new year
we were told that our class would graduate in June 1943, or
one year early.
Q .. I didn't realize that you knew that so soon.
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