Leaving Guantánamo With the World on the Nuclear Brink

“YOU MAY NOT TAKE PETS WITH YOU. Leave house keys on table in the living room. DO NOT PROCEED BY CAR.  Do not ask questions or request exemptions. The evacuation will be by ship. PUT THIS IN YOUR PURSE. DO NOT LEAVE IT LYING AROUND THE HOUSE OR YARD.”

- Guantánamo Bay Evacuation Order, Oct. 22, 1962

Fifty years ago this week, nearly 3,000 American civilians found themselves caught in the middle of history's most dire nuclear standoff.  Aerial images from United States intelligence showed Russian nuclear missiles on Cuban soil.  The defense secretary briefed President John F. Kennedy on the mechanics of pre-emptive airstrikes. Reinforcements streamed in. Defensive readiness drills were conducted at Naval Base Guantánamo Bay. 

Courtesy of Neil O'Donnell Adm. Jerry O'Donnell commanded U.S. Naval Base, Guantánamo Bay, during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Rear Adm. E. J. (Jerry) O'Donnell, who survived the sinking of the aircraft carrier Lexington during World War II, had command of the base. In addition to preparing for war, he had to evacuate the thousands of family members and other noncombatants within the base's fence line.

Admiral O'Donnell, who faced an enormous challenge under the threat of nuclear attack, was my grandfather.  My grandmother married Jerry after they were both widowed decades after what came to be known as the Cuban missile crisis.  And the evacuation - an important, mostly untold, plot line in a story of a world on the nuclear brink - came to me as oral history. My uncle, Neil O'Donnell, passed it down from hi s father, who lived it.

Admiral O'Donnell was informed of the impending evacuation the evening of Oct. 21.  He told only his chief of staff and a handful of others.  The challenge was how to evacuate nearly 3,000 civilians in mere hours, leaving no American noncombatants on the island and clearing the way for the president to ratchet up pressure on the Kremlin.

So he and a few fellow officers drafted an order that was to be delivered by hand to each household on the base.  Announcing the evacuation by television or radio was out of the question - the Cubans and the Russians were surely listening. Admiral O'Donnell had to come up with a way to get thousands of people off the island without tipping them off.  Speed and stealth were necessary.

The order was starkly worded.  Evacuees were told to pack one bag apiece. Told that car keys should be left in the ignition or tied to the steering wheel, and pets left tied up in the yard.  Told that husbands mig ht not be able to say goodbye.  And told to help those with small children, if at all possible. It closed by informing the evacuees:

“Get your suitcase and children and wait quietly in your front yard when ready.  God Bless you. We will all miss you.”

The menace of war was unmistakable.  This was an order written by men who did not know if they would ever see their loved ones again.

A week before the evacuation, the admiral's wife knew something was up.  Raised in a Navy family, Ruth Hall O'Donnell served in World War II herself as one of the first WAVE officers and understood the importance of operational security.  So as she and her husband watched a stream of planes pour into Leeward Point Field from the patio at their quarters, she knew a major operation was under way.  But she did not ask her husband about it, and he did not volunteer an explanation.

Courtesy of Neil O'Donnell Official U.S. Naval Base, Guantánamo Bay, visitors map, circa 1960. (See enlarged view of map.)

The speed and secrecy of the evacuation surprised even Admiral O'Donnell's family.  Their two sons, James and Neil, boarded at Georgetown Preparatory School in North Bethesda, Md.  Aside from sending letters, their main contact with their parents was by ham radio relay.  Once a week, Ruth and Jerry telephoned a transmitter station on the base that connected to a ham radio operator in Washington, who then connected them to a phone line. That line rang at Georgetown Prep, where Neil and James were allowed special permission to speak with their parents, given their remote post.  Nei ther parent gave any indication of the rising tensions on the island in the run-up to the evacuation.

So the boys found out about the evacuation the same way the rest of the nation did: by watching Kennedy on television.

Back at Guantánamo, the sense of urgency from the base commander worked.  The last ship carrying evacuees got under way by 4:30 p.m. In less than five hours, 2,700 civilians were pulled from their daily routine, informed of their departure and sent toward the American mainland.

Americans watched the crisis unfold on their televisions. Kennedy talked about “offensive missile sites” that could provide a “nuclear strike capability against the Western Hemisphere.” They saw the nation on the edge of nuclear war.  What they did not see were the ships full of refugees from the place that could deliver Armageddon.

On one of these ships, the USNS Upshur, the ship's chaplain, Lt. Robert G. Brown, provided a history of the events.  One thousand seven hundred three evacuees boarded ships at Guantánamo, only 25 of whom were adult men. Nine hundred forty were children under age 13, and 200 of these were under age 2.  (Pregnant women and the infirm traveled in Marine transport aircraft.) Mothers worked with crew members and other embarked passengers to keep the children occupied during their transit.  For the teenagers, a record player was provided for entertainment.  Rumors of war shivered through the ships.

One high school senior named Dale Ward wrote a poem to express her anguish, pride and love for her boyfriend, a young sailor assigned to a naval construction battalion on the island.  She titled her poem “A Sweetheart's Prayer.”  Fearing that he would soon be in combat, she wrote:

If they say he has to fight,
Watc h him please, from dawn till night.
Keep him through the dark night long,
Give him hope and keep him strong.
Father in Heaven, guard my SeaBee,
And send him safely home to me.

And after the last ship departed, Kennedy delivered an address announcing the quarantine of Cuba and the evacuation of all dependents from the island.  It caught the Soviets by surprise and changed the calculus of the Cuban missile crisis.  Without notice, the United States had removed the last obstacle precluding offensive action against Cuban and Russian targets on the island.  By the time the news reached the Kremlin, the evacuation was a fait accompli, and the Americans could attack much sooner than expected.

Before the 13 days of the Cuban missile crisis, Guantánamo's position as a flash point of American-Soviet relations meant that a seemingly limitless stream of official visitors called upon the admiral at his quarters.  Some came to stand ju st inside the perimeter minefields and see Communist land with their own eyes.  Others came simply to entertain the troops on behalf of the U.S.O.

U.S. Navy/Courtesy of Neil O'Donnell Adm. O'Donnell, left, with Zsa Zsa Gabor, Jerry Colonna and Delores Gay at the naval base in Cuba.

In the admiral's official guest book are the signatures of Hollywood luminaries intermingled with those from naval officers, Marines and loads of politicians.  Zsa Zsa Gabor, Bob Hope and Andy Williams put on a show there for Christmas 1960.  Hubert H. Humphrey logged repeated visits to the base.

These entries trail off after a visitor fro m the joint chiefs of staff called upon the couple on Sept. 10, 1962.  By then, it was obvious to the government that the Soviet Union had placed significant numbers of personnel and advanced air defense systems in Cuba.

On Nov. 14, just three weeks after the evacuation, the log had a new signature. Gen. David M. Shoup, the commandant of the Marine Corps and a Medal of Honor recipient, wrote, “U.S.A. so fortunate to have Adm. O'Donnell in command here!” It was more than a hint of relief at the new nuclear détente.

Civilians began to return to Guantánamo Bay on Dec. 7, 1962, Pearl Harbor Day.

Co urtesy of Neil O'Donnell Ruth O'Donnell's guest book, showing Gen. David M. Shoup, Frederick H. Korth, Perry Como, and Señor Wences signing in. (See an enlarged view.)

The U.S.O. tours resumed.  Along with the first returning families, the singer Perry Como arrived, paraphrasing the lyrics of his recent hits in the admiral's log by signing “When you want me; just call.”  The same day, the ventriloquist Señor Wences probably conveyed the sentiments of many Americans when he wrote, tongue in cheek: “Berry happy ¿Ok?”

For all their trouble, the spouses of service members received one small memento very much of its time: a ceramic ashtray. Personalized for each spouse, it read, “As a remembrance of your evacuation from the Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, on 22 October 1962.”  On it was a miniaturized copy of the evacuation order.

John Ismay A personalized memento ashtray provided to individual families upon their post-evacuation return to U.S. Naval Base, Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. (See an enlarged view of ashtray, which contains the text of the evacuation order.)

Looking back on the operation in 1969, Admiral O'Donnell noted “the wonderful emotional strength of the women and the children” evacuated, and credited it as “a consequence of a general spirit that we had tried to instill at the base that had resulted in pride in their position in a frontier of the free world, and our insistence on the very hi ghest standards of conduct and sobriety.”

Sober, yes.  But evidently needing a cigarette.

John Ismay is a former Navy explosive ordnance disposal officer and an independent researcher. You can follow John on Twitter (@johnismay) and at johnismay.tumblr.com/.