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NEWTON FALLS -- At 23 years old in the early 1940s, Daniel Shavers said he was running wild and enjoying life.
He was working as a company clerk in a Civilian Conservation Corps camp in Portsmouth when he received a letter drafting him into the Army during World War II.
Staff Sgt. Shavers, now 96, said he looked forward to joining the military.
"A lot of my friends were going, so I wanted to go too," Shavers said. "I wasn't gonna volunteer, but I was picked out of the draft."
Joining the Army in January 1943, he completed his basic training in Fort Belvoir, Va., and later left Staten Island, New York, on a boat headed overseas.
"It just kept getting warmer and warmer," Shavers said. "We thought we were going to Europe. Ended up down in the Panama Canal."
Shavers spent 31 days on the ship before arriving at a South Pacific island.
"We ran, several times, into Japanese subs," Shavers said. "They would go back and forth, dodging them. That's the reason we were on the water so long."
Shavers said many of the men on the ships were seasick, but luckily he never was.
During his time at sea, he experienced some horrible storms with waves as tall as the ship.
"The ocean tossed that boat like it was a little toy," Shavers said.
For the majority of his time serving, Shavers worked in the Army's construction crew on 12 South Pacific islands.
"We went from island to island, jumping back and forth," he said. "So many times, I thought, 'Might as well have been in the Navy.'"
During one of his crew's transports, five ships were loaded with about 1,000 men. Shavers said a Japanese torpedo destroyed one of the neighboring boats, killing most of the men on it.
Back on land, Shavers saw devastation there as well. He and his crew were building a plane runway when one of his friends picked up a boulder with a crane. Shavers said the huge boulder was lifted too high and it rolled off the crane and onto his friend, killing him.
About six months later, Shavers said he was busy working when a friend wanted him to go to the movies. He agreed, but said he'd meet him later. About 20 minutes later, a Japanese aircraft was heard flying overhead and bombed the movie theater.
"If I'd have went with him, I'd have been dead there too," Shavers said.
Shavers said many of his friends died and there's a lot of things he doesn't want to remember, but does.
"I wouldn't wanna go through it again, but wouldn't change nothing for the experience," Shavers said.
Shavers returned home in the beginning of January 1946 as the first of his family to have gone to war and return alive and well. Only a couple weeks after he was home, he married longtime friend Katie Molden of Braceville.
As a black man, Shavers said he was unable to receive a loan to help him buy a house. So in 1947, Shavers built the home he still lives in today. It is where he and his wife raised three children, Terrance, Dwayne and Danielle.
lcummins@trib.today.com