The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights

After several days, the fifty sailors are given their sentences: fifteen years of hard labor to be served at the Naval prison on Terminal Island. The men are paired off in cells, where they are given transcripts of the trial. Looking over the manuscripts only cements the sailors’ belief that the trial had been prejudiced against them. On Terminal Island, the Port Chicago 50 mostly keep to themselves, as they had earned a reputation for toughness from news stories of the trial. The sailors spend their days performing hard labor, from breaking rocks with hammers to creating Naval supplies. 

Thurgood Marshall, convinced that the trial was fraudulent, sets to work trying to appeal the trial’s convictions. News of the trial spreads through black newspapers and a pamphlet published by the NAACP, leading to growing public outrage and petitions demanding the Navy look into the trial. Further stories of racial tensions at US Navy and Army bases around the globe only bolster the military’s image as being racially prejudiced. Marshall writes a letter to Secretary Forrestal, asking for an explanation for the Navy’s policy of segregation. Though Forrestal responds with a defense of the Navy, the controversy surrounding Port Chicago cements Forrestal’s private belief that segregation is a failed policy. Forrestal receives reports that the Navy’s experiments with integrating the crews of several of its ships are successful, and he decides to continue with a policy of integration, even allowing African-Americans to serve as Naval officers. In February 1945, it becomes official policy that “the Navy accepts no theories of racial differences in inborn ability” (148). 

Though Forrestal moves to integrate the Navy, he declines to reduce the sentences of the Port Chicago 50. In April 1945, however, Marshall is allowed to make an appeal of the case to a group of naval officers in Washington, DC. Marshall argues that much of the prosecution’s case is built on inadmissible evidence. In particular, Marshall points to Delucchi’s claims of hearing the sailors use slurs against their officers. Marshall claims that Delucchi’s statements are hearsay, a form of evidence not typically admissible in courts. The officers agree with Marshall and instruct the judges to review the trial but exclude the inadmissible evidence. The admirals, however, decide to convict the Port Chicago 50 a second time. Marshall petitions Forrestal for an in-person meeting, but Forrestal declines, saying that he has looked over the trial transcripts and does not believe anything untoward has occurred.

While the Navy makes progress in moving towards desegregation, the Port Chicago 50 remain in prison as mutineers. Lester Granger, a civil rights activist, is tasked by Forrestal with advising the Navy on its attempts to desegregate. Granger strongly urges Forrestal to free the Port Chicago 50, in order to make clear the Navy’s seriousness about tackling racism. Eleanor Roosevelt likewise places pressure on Forrestal to free the Port Chicago 50, sending him a pamphlet about the case created by the NAACP. Still undeterred, Forrestal will not publicly acknowledge that the Port Chicago 50 were unfairly convicted. Instead, he makes plans to secretly commute their sentences and send them to sea, allowing them to serve as sailors.

The convicted sailors are given no warning of Forrestal’s plans. Instead, they awake one morning to be told they are “shippin’ out” (153). The sailors are driven to a port and divided into small groups, each boarding a different ship. The next morning, Joe Small finds that the ship has sailed out to sea and finally understands that he is being allowed to serve. Several days after the convicted sailors return to sea, Forrestal makes an official announcement about the decision. Though the sailors are allowed to serve again, they maintain their status as convicted mutineers. While the sailors are joyous to be out of prison and back at sea, they have difficulty adjusting to their new lives. For many of the white sailors on the ship, it is the first time they have ever seen a black person. One day, Small sits to eat next to a white sailor named Alex, hailing from Alabama. Alex makes a racist joke about how he has never eaten with a black person before, referring to Small with the “n-word” in the process. Small and Alex immediately begin to fight, which lasts until an officer orders them to stop and shake hands. Despite their initial fight, Small and Alex soon become good friends, often going for beers together on their days off.

In the Epilogue, Sheinkin traces the lives of the convicted sailors in the decades after the events at Port Chicago. Though other figures such as Rosa Parks have been canonized as civil rights heroes, the Port Chicago 50 return to their daily lives after the service, and their story is largely forgotten by Americans. Some of the sailors, such as Freddie Meeks, are ashamed to discuss the trial with anyone—even their family members. Each of the convicted sailors receives a discharge “under honorable conditions”, marking them as members of the military who had received a “disciplinary action” (163). Though the sailors receive some veteran benefits with this discharge, they are unable to receive funding from the GI Bill, which would pay for college tuition. 

Many of the sailors and their families attempt to petition the Navy to overturn their convictions as mutineers. In 1989, a professor named Robert Allen publishes a book about the Port Chicago 50, which draws new attention to the case. Some Congress members learn about the case and ask the Navy to consider re-opening it, but the Navy feels too much time has passed since the original trial. Instead, the Navy suggests the sailors ask President Bush for pardons of their crimes. However, many of the sailors do not wish to ask for a pardon, as a pardon does not acknowledge that a person has been unjustly convicted. The sailors and some Congress members continue to ask the Navy to re-open the case, and the Navy ultimately agrees to do so. In its report, the Navy acknowledges the racism of only assigning black sailors the duty of loading explosives. However, the Navy refuses to acknowledge that racial discrimination played a part in the trial and does not overturn the sailors’ convictions. To this day, the sailors remain convicted mutineers.