Oral History Interview with James M. Cocroft

[Interview Begins]

SPRAGUE: Today is September 16th, 2022. This is an interview with James M. Cocroft, known as "Groovy," who served in the United States Navy from August 17th, 1987, to September 1st, 2007. This interview is being conducted by Luke Sprague at the Jefferson Public Library in Jefferson, Wisconsin for the Wisconsin Veterans Museum Oral History Program. No one else is present in the interview room. Okay, Groovy. Could you tell me about where you grew up?

COCROFT: Yeah, I was born and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I was born at County Hospital, so. But I grew up on 25th and Atkinson in Milwaukee. My mother purchased a house there when I was born and I was the youngest of five. So I grew up in the Garden Homes, first Garden Homes neighborhood in Milwaukee.

SPRAGUE: What do you remember about that?

COCROFT: It was actually, you know, this first house I ever remember. Right. But it was a very diverse neighborhood. I think from from my understanding, we were like the first African-American family to move into a neighborhood. Back in '69, '70 timeframe. And my next door neighbor to the right of us, Mr. Zimmerman, was an old German guy. Right. Super cool guy, man. He was like he was very friendly to work towards the stories here. We had some other people in the neighborhood that wasn't to friendly, but primarily everyone in the neighborhood. The 00:02:00majority of people in the neighborhood was actually really friendly and it was just fun and we could go outside and play. The cops walked the beat out there and they gave us baseball cards. We just did a lot of different things, you know, and the family always did like cookouts. For this here again, camping, this about this year. So I just had a really fun childhood, you know.

SPRAGUE: Okay. What did your parents do?

COCROFT: My dad worked at A.O. Smith and my mother worked at home. She worked at Mt. Sinai. She was a medical records person at Mt. Si. And my dad was a welder at A.O. Smith.

SPRAGUE: Okay. And to help tie your parents in with the historical record, could you please provide your parents names maybe?

COCROFT: Yes. My mother's name is Dorothy Harwell James. She has since she has since got remarried. And then my dad name was James Kirk.

SPRAGUE: Okay, so tell me about your family's tradition of military service.

COCROFT: Oh, man, it's a whole crew of us. My brother was in the Marine Corps. My sister, my brother Douglas was a Marine Corps, my sister Purell was in the Air Force. And then I joined the military in '87, but had a cousin, several 00:03:00cousins and uncles and somebody here that was all in military and it was all branches from Army, Navy, Air Force and the Marines. No one joined the Coast Guard.

SPRAGUE: [Laughing].

COCROFT: Okay, so, You know, Department of Transportation, Homeland Security, whatever they are now. But, you know, those are unicorns. But one of my cousins, General Robert Cocroft, made it to Brigadier General. So just had some other cousins that from my cousin Andre, cousin Tony, cousin Angel. Her name is Angela. All them joined Army, Air Force, stuff like this here and then cousin Weldon Gray joined the Army. Angel retired from the Air Force. Weldon retired 00:04:00from the Army. I retired from the Navy. And my cousin, Mr. Cocroft, Robert Cocroft, Bob Cocroft. He retired from the army as well. But lots more folks out there too, because I have a huge family, right, so it's a lot more family members out there that join the military as well. My dad was in the army as well, and it just it's just a whole crew of us that decided to go ahead and serve our country as well. You know.

SPRAGUE: What was the how was the family reaction and what was that like telling them that you wanted to go into the Navy and tell us about that?

COCROFT: [Laughs].

Yeah, my mother was was very receptive to it, father, as well as a lot a other family members as well, were receptive to it. I did have one uncle named Nathaniel Harwell. He wasn't too receptive to it because he saw things that happened to people when they joined the military or they were things that when people came back, how they were treated, and then also how some people came back 00:05:00with mental health issues. So I had an uncle Michael Billy, my mom's oldest brother. He was in the Air Force as well [laughs]. And he came back and he had some issues that he had when he was stationed in New York and then overseas. So with that. So, my uncle Nathaniel was kind of scared for me, for me to go because, you know, I was very close on my uncle to Nathaniel.

SPRAGUE: Mm-hmm.

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: I've got to. I want to ask this question carefully.

COCROFT: Mm-hmm.

SPRAGUE: Were those issues revolving around race or?

COCROFT: It was because, believe it or not, this is weird because of the family dynamics that have happened. Like I said, I have a huge family. But my uncle 00:06:00Nathaniel was a he was a founding member of the Youth Council with Father Groppi. So he did a lot of this stuff with the open housing stuff for the city, so civil rights things for people in the city. My other uncle Lawrence Harwell, was in civil rights as well. He he was a CEO of an organization called Triple-O, Organizations Of Organizations. So they all were, you know, doing things to kind of help African-Americans and or people of color progress and be able to move throughout the city cause all the different things that was happening at the time and now red-lining and stuff like this here. So my one Uncle Nathaniel, it was part of the race thing as well cause he had heard stories about folks back in World War II with this here and how people were treated when it came back, how 00:07:00African-Americans couldn't come to certain towns or whatever when they came back, sometimes they were married to Caucasian ladies or whatever. So they had move out of the South up this us here. So. So he's he's kind of worried about that with me.

SPRAGUE: Just to do the tie in with the to the record here, so we get it. Father Groopie?

COCROFT: Groppi, Groppi.

SPRAGUE: How do you spell that?

COCROFT: I have to give it.

SPRAGUE: It's okay. It's all. We'll let it go.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: And Lawrence Harwell.

COCROFT: Harwell.

SPRAGUE: And Nathaniel Harwell?

COCROFT: Yes. Yes, sir.

SPRAGUE: Okay, I want to make sure we get those names down.

COCROFT: And my uncle, Lawrence Harwell, was actually a part of Polly Williams. She was a state rep. He was her staff as well. He actually helped out with with Dr. Howard Fuller to write the school choice program that Wisconsin introduced 00:08:00back in the day. So you know I have some history with family members, so, you know.

SPRAGUE: Mm-Hmm.

COCROFT: That's very cool.

SPRAGUE: That's good.

COCROFT: To have that history, you know? So I learn a lot, and that's why I'm passionate about what I do now for veterans, because some of the things that happened, like you know I am not saying the VA is bad. And cause sometimes you have certain situations that might happen and you can have that anywhere. But I want to advocate for a person because sometimes people don't know what they can actually what they're entitled to. So that's why me working at where I work at now in MAVRC, Military Veterans Resource Center at UW Milwaukee, I advocate for veterans because I know how people can be lost when they get out the military. You know.

SPRAGUE: We'll come back to that, for sure.

COCROFT: Roger that.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Milwaukee schools?

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: Where did you graduate from? Where?

COCROFT: Yeah, it's kind of funny, cause I went to Brown Street School as an 00:09:00elementary school. And Hawley Environmental School in Milwaukee as well. Went to both of those schools, went to Fritsche Middle School. And then I went to Whitefish Bay Dominican High School, went there for a couple of years. I didn't like it cause, I was a middle class, like, you know, lower middle class folk. And so a lot of kids there had money. So I didn't feel I felt like I didn't fit in. And so so in my junior year, I went to South Division in Milwaukee. Like the MPS school on South Division on Lapham Boulevard in Milwaukee on the south side 00:10:00of Milwaukee. And there I excelled in track and in my education as well. I was on the track team and won the state champion a couple of years in a row. When I was there, I was a shot putter and a discus thrower. So.

SPRAGUE: State champion.

COCROFT: Yeah. I wasn't a state champion as myself. But that whole team, we were champions that way.

SPRAGUE: Wow. Okay. So tell me about your decision to join the Navy in '87?

COCROFT: It's funny. It's actually a funny little story. When I went to South Division High School, I went to a it was a program subdivision had cause some MPS schools had like certain, how do I say it? They had certain programs that people can actually do. Like you go to tech, boys tech at one time use to be a boys tech, they open it up to tech, but there is like a lot of manufacturing, 00:11:00machining and stuff like this here at Tech High School. Some other schools had different things that you can do, and at South Division. We had a travel and tourism type of type of program, so they had like a mini hotel and a restaurant in the school itself. It's weird, but this is like back in the eighties, man so. [Both laugh]. So and so they had beds in there to teach you how to make beds and had a front desk, had everything in there and had like a kitchen. So it was just wild how we would do stuff like that. So when I got there in my junior year it was a guy named Samuel [Ewart??] Right. And Troy Washington. Right. What happened was we all came from different schools. So we all became friends and we was all that same program. And so we we talked about joining the Marine Corps together first. Right. So we wanted to do that. So my buddy, you know, we went to a recruiter so about this here and Buddy Sam got caught up in stuff and we don't know what it was, you know? And so the Marines like, we don't want you all right. So we went right next door to the Navy guy, right? The guys like, "Yeah. Come on in." So we all went in on a buddy program in '87. All three of us, 00:12:00right? [Laughing].

SPRAGUE: Wow. Tell the civilians on the phone, that are listening, What what the buddy program was?

COCROFT: Yeah. It's like when you have a friend that you want to go into the military with, they give you a contract so you both can serve together. And at some, sometimes it was where you can actually get stationed together afterwards because it's a contract where you can, that you go in with a friend, you go to bootcamp together, go to school together, you know, pick the same job or whatever. You go to a ship or wherever you want to go. However, with that whole program, it was three of us. It wasn't two. So they said our contract was null and void and we had a chance to actually get out. And.

SPRAGUE: Woah!

COCROFT: So we was in four weeks in the boot camp and they did they told us that that we had a chance to leave if we wanted to, because the contract was null and void. So we all decided just to go ahead and just stay.

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: That's rare.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: That's very rare.

COCROFT: And what's funny about that whole situation that happened after we all graduated from boot camp, Troy went to New Jersey on the USS Detroit, 00:13:00ammunition-oiler. I went to Charleston, South Carolina, to go get on the William V. Pratt, DDG, a guided missile destroyer, and Sam went to the Bronstein, FFG out of San Diego [laughs]. So we all got split up like that [laughter].

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: We all stayed in [??] South Carolina.

SPRAGUE: Okay, so interesting story [Cocroft laughs]. So tell me. Tell me about boot camp.

COCROFT: Boot camp was kind of funny. When we all got our orders to go to boot camp. Sam still had something going on. I guess he had smoked a joint or something. I don't know. So I told him, No, you can't come in just right away. So me and Troy got our orders. Caught the train from Milwaukee to Chicago. They caught that. It was the Amtrak, and then they caught the MARTA Back to Great Lakes, right [laughs]. Orders in hand, got off the MARTA in Great Lakes, walked 00:14:00up the hill in Great Lakes, went to the to the quarterdeck of the recruit station and recruit training center and said permission to come aboard [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Sounds like an experience.

COCROFT: Well, it was funny. It was funny the way I would do that. And the guys at the gate, guards, and they was like, look at these bozos, right. I was like, Yeah, whatever, man. You know, we didn't know, you know? So and that's how we came to the Navy. So.

SPRAGUE: So how does the, you know, you see a lot of the Marine Corps in the Army and their boot camp are basic. Tell me a little, give me a little bit of a picture, a vignette, of what happens to you on that first day, that first 48 hours at Navy.

COCROFT: Yeah. For us, we had to wait for Sam for the next, like the next day, he had to come down the next day because were doing a test to make sure he was clean. So we were there for a day or two. Waiting on Sam. And once, once we were 00:15:00sitting there and they had us in a separate barracks from everyone else, right. Me and Troy. So we were sitting there and everythin, waiting on Sam. So they never messed with us because of the waiting on Sam, because we wouldn't actually, you know, in a company yet. So when Sam got there, then they put us in the Company 297, right [laughs] then that, you know, we're sitting there and they got us milling about, you know, tired as hell, you know, just sitting there, super tired. And then we don't go to bed till like midnight, you know what I'm saying, 000 [laughs] and then all of a sudden at 4:00 in the morning, they throw a trash can in there and wake us up [laughs], it was like, what the hell we got ourselves into, you know? And it was just it was it was all funny after that 'cause it was things that people would do. And with with me and Sam, 00:16:00Sam was actually on the track team together. Troy, Troy worked a lot. So so he didn't do a lot of things like prior to coming into, to boot camp, in high school. But I me and Sam was athlete so so we would see people whenever we had to do stuff and would see people struggling, like, Man, that's kind of bad, he was just, you know, glad, glad that I had some some, you know, athletic athleticism to be able to do things that I was able to do. But it was just it was just pretty, pretty wild. They made us march like everyone else, right, you know, they get in formation. They taught us how to fold our clothes properly, how to make sure the catch hem is down is down on the bunk, you know, fold up your stuff, you know, make sure everything was good to go. Stencil our skivvies, you know what I'm saying? And it's pretty wild. Go use the head, as they call it, the restroom in the military in the Navy and Marine Corps. Go use the head. There was no no walls on the urinals and there was no doors or on the, as we 00:17:00call them, the shitters, right [laughs]. So it was just, it's pretty rough business, man. He was just like, this was culture shock [laughs]. And then as time goes on, because they want everyone to be able to to learn to swim or to know how to swim, at least basic survival skills in water, we had to go over to to the gym, to the aquarium, I mean, into the pool area. And what we had to do was we had to go get on top of the the platform. Step out. Cross your arms at the top. Step off. Get in the water. You go in the water. Tread water for, like, 5 minutes and then swim in order to qualify. So we had to do that. And during that time frame, the Navy SEALs are actually on the the base there. They actually did training for you.

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: It is rough dudes, too. But it was terrible [laughs]. It was funny, but it wasn't funny, you know?

SPRAGUE: Yeah. So after you got through boot, what did you do next? What training did you go to next after that?

COCROFT: I went to I went to school to learn how to be an operating specialist. And at that time in the military, too, they had some things called, there's some kind of special program they just did to be in some type of OJT [On-The-Job Training]. It was kind of weird how they did that because sometimes they send you directly to a school. My school was down at Danville, Virginia, right? But they kind of bypassed that in a sense and sent me straight to the fleet, right? So I went up there. But once I got to the ship, I went to schools, different schools to catch up on things. So they sent me to the William V. Pratt, DDG-44, out of Charleston, old [??]-class destroyer. So that was something that was kind 00:19:00of a kind of eye opener for me, too, because I got there January 2nd of 1988, and once I got there, it was raining outside. It was cold. Got there about about 2200. You know [laughter], it was sleeting. You know, they didn't call, your taps, lights out you, know what I'm saying?

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: I go up to get there and they just shoved me in his bunk somewhere on that boat, told me they'd catch me in the morning.

SPRAGUE: And it was cold in Charleston.

COCROFT: It was actually pretty chilly outside because it was raining. And so it was like it's about 45 degrees. But, you know, coming from Milwaukee around that 00:20:00time frame, it it was it was warmer than Milwaukee. But the rain and stuff like that and the wind that was blowing that day was kind of many chilly, so.

SPRAGUE: So so all you were on the Pratt and you're doing the training. What was the first, what were your, you know, your first training? What what what did they you know?

COCROFT: Well, of course, but when you first get in a boat, they have to, this check-in sheet that they that they have on. You go around and check-in like to admin, your records in, medical materials, your shots up to date. So like this here. They make sure that you check in with your division to make sure that people know who you are, get your pay started properly, put your travel claim in for all the travels that you did to get there. So like this here, but the first thing I learned was firefighting because all, aboard a ship, we don't have fire departments out on the sea. So everyone has to learn how to fight a fire. So they have you in a repair locker and teaching you how to actually dress for general quarters for any type of fires like Alpha Bravo, Charlie type fires. You 00:21:00know, they all have different categories, you know. And then that was the first thing I learned was to actually, for firefighting. And then then another thing, the second thing was a security force, because we don't have that the, we could not afford to have like base security roam around on the boat. So we had to learn how to use weapons as well. So that was like the second thing I had to do.

SPRAGUE: So is it, Charleston would have been your home port, is that correct?

COCROFT: Yes.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So when the deployed where, where did they, where did you go?

COCROFT: Okay. It's funny because in the Navy they do workups kind of like how in the Army they do the things like they training like, and stuff like this here, and Marine Corps. They do all different things. They do workups. We call 00:22:00it workups because ship goes out, do some maneuvers. We're doing a lot of general quarters, like battle stations, testing our systems, seeing to make sure our techniques are good. So, like this here. So my first winter out, my first port visit was Puerto Rico. We went down there so we can go off the coast of Vieques to do naval gunfire support. Right. And then what we did was we went down there and we were right in playing guard for for the old John F Kennedy, CVN 67. I'm sorry. CV CV CV 67, sorry about that, because it was a conventional carrier. But yeah, we went down there and did this training off of Vieques gunfire support. So this is where they do some type of bombardment, I'm sure, if it came to that for any type of conflicts, anything like this here. So that's the main thing that we did down down there and then also practice some of our skills for anti, anti-submarine warfare, anti-air warfare and on the surface warfare.

SPRAGUE: Okay. And you told me about firefighting being being trained to fight fires, the security force. So, and you have to help me because I'm from the Army here.

COCROFT: That's what's up. Alright that's what's up, no worries.

SPRAGUE: So yeah, I'm going to need your help on this. So then at this point you're an E-3 an E-4?

COCROFT: Actually E-1.

SPRAGUE: E-1. Okay.

COCROFT: No, it's E-1. Yep.

SPRAGUE: So, did they, dumb question, did they start moving you, you know, did you start doing OJT for that?

COCROFT: Yes.

SPRAGUE: As an Operational Specialist?

COCROFT: So when I first went out to sea, I was on the surface side. So I would do a lot of surface tracking. I'd be on a SPA-25, SPA-25 surface repeater that would have the the signal from the surface radar. And I would we would do track it over all the different contacts out there that has been going and report those contacts and do log-keeping of radios, making sure that the nerve center of the ship itself had eyes on, out to make sure that we don't run over anything. I worked in Combat Information Center, so it was CIC and this was what 00:24:00they call it. So, so many times, it is just like a movie where you had the old guys with the headphones on. You see the scope that's going "Eep, Eep." That's what I did [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Okay. So what I don't know, because I've never watched a radar scope is there a lot of excitement? Is it boring after a while?

COCROFT: It's boring, it's really boring, ah, because because all of the the scopes the scopes itself, they have, there's no color to it. There's like the of the old-school computers with the green screen that light up, you know, and that's that's all there was. So it was, is, is fairly boring until we went to the Mediterranean.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: But, You know. Because usually on the Atlantic itself, you didn't run into many ships out there, you know, unless you was in a battle group doing formations with other ships. But usually you see a tanker or two, you know, 00:25:00coming in to go to the different ports on the East Coast. And you will see stuff like that. But like it was always it was always just out there doing maneuvers, practicing things of that nature.

SPRAGUE: What, do you have any experiences from being on the Pratt that you remember?

COCROFT: It was always the firefighting and the security force stuff. I think also when we went to general quarters, I ended up, as time went on, I ended up in a M-60 machine operation. So I'm just letting people know how old I am with that. Right. Because it's a 240 now, right?

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: So an M- 60. You know.

SPRAGUE: I hear ya.

COCROFT: I was on the port bridge wing, an M-60 machine gunner during that timeframe. And and also, you know, how we had some called chaff. The planes 00:26:00launch it off, you see like on the flares that they launch off. We had some similar on boats, too. And I was I was also on the chaff team as well. So I will have to set that up. As we did see an [??] attempt to leave. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: It's pretty wild [laughs].

SPRAGUE: During '88, '89, did you have in that range any particular cruises that the Persian Gulf, Lebanon, Grenada, or anywhere?

COCROFT: During that time frame I went to, we went to the Mediterranean and we we left December of '89 and then came back in '90.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: You know, we went to the Mediterranean and that's where I did a lot of my a lot of my port visits. Yeah, I've been to a lot of countries because it was kind of, you know, Cold War slash peacetime at that timeframe. And so we went to a lot of different ports. Like I said, my first port was Puerto Rico when I first went out for spots, for maneuvers. But when we got to the Mediterranean, um, we, uh, well, let me backtrack a little bit. Prior to us going on the major deployments, we did kind of narcotic ops as well, on a trip to the Caribbean. So we would go around there a lot of times and get stationed in a certain area and then we would ride, we would chase down go-fast boats to kind of kind of corral them in a certain area so the helos could come get them and whatever. So they a 00:28:00lot of stuff like that. So I went down to a lot of different places down in Jamaica, Puerto Rico, the British Virgin Islands, so like this here. So we would do a lot of things in the Caribbean too, as well.

SPRAGUE: So for the interdiction itself, did the United States Navy go after these narcotics boats or did they send the Coast Guard or how did that work?

COCROFT: Well, what they used to do, because, of course, you know how the Coast Guard do their their thing. But for naval naval ships, they have a Coast Guard detachment that comes on board. So we, the Coast Guard detachment will, any time that we had a craft of interest, right, they would have the Coast Guard and some of the guys from the ship go on board and board their ships to do the interdiction that way. That's how a lot of things happen in the military, like in the Navy itself. They still do it now because, of course, the Coast Guard is 00:29:00just only so big, but a lot of times they just have a detachment on board the different ships to be able to do the interdiction. So we did that a lot too, and then we went to the Mediterranean. So.

SPRAGUE: Okay, gotcha. Question I have to ask, get on a ship. I don't know what you call that in the Navy. You're with the fleet, something like that?

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: What did, what was your sense in 1987 or '88 or '89 by now, your first entry, what were race relationships like at that time?

COCROFT: It was a, it was hit or miss depending on the person on board the ship because, you know, some cats have never seen a person of color and then some some some brothers have never seen a, you know, Caucasian person. So it was kind of weird because I didn't know it was like that, right, until I got in the military. It was weird because I'm like, we had cats from Kentucky, Louisiana, New York, you know, Montana, all kind of places. Right. So me being from 00:30:00Milwaukee, although they say Milwaukee is like one of the most segregated cities. But it was, I interacted with all kinds of people in Milwaukee. So it didn't make a difference because, you know, of course, down to Summerfest, you know, that's the grounds. I mean, we had all the different festivals to go see all the different type of people. Yeah, right. The different cultures. But when I got in the military it was kind of weird how some people never saw a person of color and and vice versa. It was weird. So, and then as far as race, race relations, some things were actually pretty good, right? But then sometimes you had a couple of people that was, you know, whether it was an African-American and being racist towards other folks or vice versa. You had that. And a lot of times our chain of command would nip that right in the bud a lot. You know, sometimes they did, but sometimes they didn't. The majority of it, they did. So.

SPRAGUE: Okay, so moving ahead, you're on the Pratt, you're over in the Mediterranean.

COCROFT: Um-hm.

SPRAGUE: And then what did you, were you still on that ship, the Pratt or what? Tell me about being in the Med.

COCROFT: Okay. On the Pratt, my job was Operations Specialist, right? So I worked on radars and we did anti-surface warfare, you know, like surface warfare. We did anti-air warfare. We did ASW, anti-submarine warfare. So my job specifically, as a OS, we have a seashore rotation is what they call it. So we have so many years you had to spend on the ship, so many years you spend on shore duty. My seashore rotation was 5/2, so i DID five years on the ship and two years on shore duty [laughs]. So they kept me, you know, kept people, certain certain jobs, we call them "rates" in the Navy. A rate. Certain, some of 00:32:00them had the 5/2 rotation. Some of them had the the 1/5, just the opposite, just depending on what, what job it was. Right. So my job alone was, was I had five years sea time and two year shore duty. So I went from. And so from from '88 until '91, till my ship decommissioned, I was still on the Pratt that whole time, you know. And I did two Mediterranean cruises in the Persian Gulf for Desert Storm on board the Pratt.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And had a host of other interdictions down in the Caribbean. [??] was in the Caribbean as well.

SPRAGUE: Okay, so let me, we're going to get to Desert Storm, but I've got to ask, were there any. I've got a couple other. Were you deployed to the Persian Gulf before the Persian Gulf War?

COCROFT: We were not. We were not. We we always did a lot of things in the Mediterranean, the Aegean. We would do things in, you know, things like that, or we would go up north. We did a lot of things like tours of the fjords, like, the Arctic Circle. So, like this here, we did things in England, a lot of different things and then a lot of times it's cribbing a lot, but never went to to the Gulf until actually '91, like '90, 1991, when Desert Shield, Desert Storm.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So would it be correct to say that, were you part of Sixth Fleet, or?

COCROFT: Once once you get into the Mediterranean Sea, it, in that area where from the shoreline of the U.S., until you get to a certain part of the Atlantic, you're in Second Fleet.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Right. And then once you get it, once you hit the Strait of Gibraltar and roll in there, that's Sixth Fleet.

SPRAGUE: Oh, so you would have been Second Fleet.

COCROFT: Second Fleet until we get, because we change, we change authorities once you get a certain threshold.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And then as we do that, leaving from Charleston and we head over, we get into the Mediterranean. You, you we assume Sixth Fleet. Assume command of our, of our unit. And then we do a turnover with the ship that's actually leaving. And so we have people that we put we will put boats in the water or have the helos fly the people over. And they would do a turnover of what was happening in the Mediterranean. So, kind of like, you know, how you stand your your duty. They they get relieved of duty, and we assume the duty.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: So it's like, that's how ships do it.

SPRAGUE: So it's likely that you didn't, you probably had nothing to do with Panama, '89-'90.

COCROFT: I did not.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: I did not.

SPRAGUE: Okay. I've got to ask. No problem.

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So let's get up to 1990 and Desert Storm.

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: Tell me a little about that a little.

COCROFT: It's weird, because the Pratt was the older ship, right? The Pratt was commissioned back in the Fifties. And so it was DLG-13 at first. And then they changed it. They [??] it up to retrofit in the upgrade to make it a missile, missile boat. So when they did that, the Pratt did Vietnam. The Pratt been around for a while, you know, and so we were, we were set to, uh, to be decommissioned in '91. Right. So although we did all the different other cruises that we did, right, although we did that, we were set to decommission and not go 00:35:00to Desert Storm because it was supposed to decommission in '91. So what happened was they want to, every every ship available for the operation. So they postponed a lot of the ships' decommissioning during that time frame. So that's when we went and left on December 30th of '90 timeframe [laughs]. Yeah. And rolled over to the and best best speed possible. Right. To get over to the to to the Suez Canal to roll in. So January 15th, we rolled in straight in, and as sooon as we got in there, got to work. And that's when I switched over from Desert Shield to Desert Storm.

SPRAGUE: Right.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: So, um, I'm good. I don't need, we don't need the classified details in any way.

COCROFT: It is all good.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. And we're not we're not qualified for that here.

COCROFT: I dig it.

SPRAGUE: But with that said, to the degree that you can, with, you know, with 00:36:00that in mind, when you got into the Persian Gulf.

COCROFT: Mm hmm.

SPRAGUE: Tell me kind of how you did what you did, and what you were doing.

COCROFT: Yeah, we were with the, uh, the Saratoga, the America, and I believe it was, uh, I don't think it was the Forrestal? I have to really look it back up. But we were with three other carriers in a carrier group, um, on several other 00:37:00ships that was out there. Some Aegis, some Aegis, got cruisers out that at that time because the Aegis cruiser at that time was like the, the newest thing out, like, you know, it was the Bunker Hill, I think the Mobile Bay, some things like that. So those were the ships that were like the newer ships. You know, there was no Arleigh Burke ships at that time. None of that stuff even existed. Right. So once we got there to the Mediterranean, I mean, to to the Suez, I mean, to the Suez Canal and went through, got in there and we started doing interdiction again, trying to figure out if there's any weapons being smuggled into into Iraq. So we were we was in the Red Sea a long time dealing with, stopping a lot of ships, finding, you know, trying to find out if there's any type of cargo or contraband or anything like this here. So that's that's what we did the whole time we were there and put it to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, to get some, some repairs 00:38:00done on board a ship because they had some a some are ships they call tenders. Right. Those are ships that that repair ships. And they had women on board those ships but on the other ships they didn't have any women on board ships, and so I was on an all male crew, but it was all male crew. My ship was all male crew. So we did a lot of interdiction stuff there, you know, boardings. And stuff like this here and stopping ships and chasing ships down. Things like that, doing plane guard for the carriers when when they was going to do their strikes or whatever. So we did a lot of stuff like that, you know.

SPRAGUE: So, forgive me, you said plane guard?

COCROFT: Plane guard. So when so when a carrier is doing their sorties, their sorties, their launch, and and the planes going on missions because at the time it was F-18s and F-14s, E A-6 Bravo, S-3 Vikings or whatever they had. Right. So when a plane goes, a carrier goes into flight ops, right, they have to have a 00:39:00ship behind them in case someone falls into the drink, they can scoop them up.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: So, because I was called plane guard.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: So every ship, we did that. And [laughs] it was fun because we get to go. It has an American in role. So and historic. You can rule, too. But we was kinda [laughs] sweating trying to catch up to them because they because they'd be doing sometimes 30 knots in trying to catch up to them--

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: And a small [bouy??]. So it a lot of fun.

SPRAGUE: And this is on the Pratt, right?

COCROFT: On the Pratt.

SPRAGUE: So while you were doing these interdictions, were you OS in the CIC, or were you manning the 60?

COCROFT: I was I was OS.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: So my job the whole time I was in the military was an OS, Operation Specialist. And so, like whenever they had like different interdictions, so like this here they would man some weapons and stuff like that. So I'd go out there 00:40:006, M60 machine gun operator.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: Or whenever we did general quarters, battle stations. That was my battle station, was the M60 machine gun on the port bridge.

SPRAGUE: What, it must have been hard doing those interdiction missions and you're there in the Red Sea. You probably didn't have, did you have time off then? When did you get to relax?

COCROFT: Me. The job as an OS, we work inside CIC. We had 40 individuals in our division, right? However, they had, what, a shift called port and starboard. So we would work actually 12 hours a day. Each section would, but it would be 6 hours on, 6 hours off. So out of that, you do 12 hours, but six on, six off. So what would happen is, let's say if I went to work at 6 a.m., I would get off at noon. So I would eat lunch, take a shower, hit the rack, the bed, right, at five up, possibly take another shower [laughs] go eat, and go back up at 6. So, so 00:41:00the port and starboard was just like that. So now the other group was 12, was noon to six and midnight to six. And then in between that time, what, what would happen is certain days they would have a GQ in the morning, General Quarters drill in the morning, right. And they would have one an afternoon the next day. So we all would get hit with that thing. So we would actually have less hours than that 12 hours of sleep or whatever. We would get, sometimes we would only get four hours of sleep out of the whole thing because sometimes a GQ would last four hours, depending on the drills that we would do. Do damage control. Like I said, if it is, they would assess battle damage and practice that. If there was any type of things like this here, different types of scenarios that we would run. And it depends on how long the GQ would run. Yes, that's funny, man.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. That's rough.

COCROFT: Yeah, I have sleep issues now because of that.

SPRAGUE: I believe it.

COCROFT: Insomnia. Definitely.

SPRAGUE: So in, in after, you know, how did Desert Storm wrap out and or were there other missions you took on during Desert Storm?

COCROFT: Yeah, it was pretty funny because of, because of the Pratt reaching decom, right. Decommission. They had something called fireside chats at night. So the admirals and the different commanders and captains from different ships. Right. You know, our captain in the Navy is the same as a colonel in it in the Army. So the COs of a ship or whatever it was, they always sit there and talk on 00:43:00the radio about who's going home first and who's staying. Right. And so, there's a lot of different things because some ships, their deployments moved up. Because of the Desert Storm, and then for us our decommissioning gap got postponed. So they sent some ships home saying, Who's gonna go home first? Right. And so they can get ready to go to the next deployment. A few months later, they come back over, right, or with the Pratt and some other ships they had. Okay, you're decommissioning. So we're gonna keep you here. Right. But the other ships go home. Prepare, pepare, prepare for their for their their deployment. So one day they say we was going home, and the next day they say, No you're not. So we would hear this all day in. Like every day, every night they had these fireside chat, you know, doing like that thing that FDR used to do. Remember the fireside chats, he used to do.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: And so that's where you used to call it like that. So that's that's what they did to us. So we didn't actually get home until June 30th of of '91.

SPRAGUE: Oh. That must have been tough hearing those conversations and--

COCROFT: It was rough. It was rough because, you know, people wanted to go home, you know, especially since things have started winding down in Desert Storm, you know, because that was a quick, you know, you know, conflict. And we was like, okay, we weren't supposed to be over here anyway, so let's go home, right? It doesn't work like that. They have to have grand scheme of things. They have to have plans. And, and sure enough, that's that's what it was. You had to stay.

SPRAGUE: So you get you get back to Charleston with the Pratt on June 30th, 1991.

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: What happens next?

COCROFT: We start decomming. They start taking things off the ship, taking 00:44:00equipment off the ship, taking the weapons off the ship, taking fuel off the ship, getting rid of some of the HVAC systems on the ship, the radars, taking out components. So, but as that's going on, people are already receiving orders because the ship itself had 300 some folks on there. Right. So as we're decomming, folks are leaving the boat. So the skeleton crew is actually there to kind of tear the boat apart in a sense. Right. Sothey put it in mothballs. But AC was was out, so they had the portable ACs on board the ship, had hoses coming into the ship. So we had to take all the supplies off the ship, all kinds of different things. And we would eat on a barge. They would give us a per diem to go eat somewhere else because it wasn't fit to be there that, you know, the galley was closed because they couldn't cook, no steam. Stuff like this here, they would put people in barracks. And so, you know, but on but on your duty 00:45:00day, you had to stay on board the ship and it was baking in there because it's a big metal ship. Right. So I was on that. So it was was pretty rough [laughs]. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Oh.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay, so what happens after the Pratt's decommissioning?

COCROFT: As a practice, decommissioning? I actually got orders about two weeks before the Pratt decom. So I got orders to the Samuel Eliot Morison (FFG-13). So that's when I went to the Morison and I was in, I was in for a rude awakening on board that ship because it was a reserve frigate, meaning that it this, um, it 00:46:00didn't have a full complement of crew. So what we did for the next two years is, well, any time reserves had to come up for the weekend, they would come on board the ship and we would train them. So we would do that all the time, plus whenever you would [want??] we would go down to the Caribbean as well with the Morison as well and do interdiction ops. Down there too alot of times we had a skeleton crew. We're not fully manned at all.

SPRAGUE: How do you deal with that on the CIC when you got a skeleton crew?

COCROFT: We we still did a the port starboard at one point, right? But then we 00:47:00had some guys that was compassionate enough, I guess you can say, right. They get us in three sections, so it'd rotate through. And although we had a skeleton crew, we were all super-qualified to do our jobs. You know, we all learned a lot, right? Because you had to, there was no choice. You know.There's usually on board like a frigate or ship, you have, usually you have 40 people in your division. We had, I think, 20. So [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Half the number.

COCROFT: Right. And then that included a E9, a mess chief. Right. So he's on board the ship. So he's not standing watch with us. He's doing other duties, right? So like 19, and 19 people. So we had it rotate it too like that. It was fun. It was challenging at times, but it was actually it made me feel good because I knew that I knew my stuff, because we learned a lot, you know?

SPRAGUE: Um-hm.So. What division? Or what was that, what was that division called?

COCROFT: OI Division.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And we are we are under the operations officer on board the ship.

SPRAGUE: So I'm going to guess operational intelligence or something.

COCROFT: It's just just how they had it. Because you had OI, OC, E Division. It just depends on, you know, so they had certain things that they had. So.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So I've got to ask, I was looking at things and this is, we're now talking about the Pratt. Or not the Pratt. I'm sorry. The Morison.

COCROFT: Mm hmm.

SPRAGUE: And you are training them. And it looks like we're in about, what, 1992.

COCROFT: '92, '93 timeframe.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And then part of '94.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So did you train on systems like the global command and control system?

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: And maybe the.

COCROFT: [??] Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: It was called the Geeks because it was just as at first the term "the geeks," right. So what, what that what that system was is it's a it's a near real time system where all ships would input that data into a, into a database, 00:49:00a cloud in a sense and it would go to crypto, the signal would be sent to kind of give you a global positioning of everyone, wherever they were at. So that was part of the big picture that they would have. But on board the ship itself we had something calledLink think 11 at the time. Um, and that was like, it's a tactical data link that they sent out. Radio is usually HF or UHF and they were seen, you know, using crypto. They were seen data that that's being seen on our radars to other ships that are going to see it and vice versa.

SPRAGUE: So I was thinking about your OS and the the picture that came to my 00:50:00head was, you guys are like the, the, the brains of the connection points to all the information goes through.

COCROFT: Yes. Exactly. Yes, sir.

SPRAGUE: Would that be fair?.

COCROFT: That's fair to say, because everything comes to our office, like our our centers at CIC. We had, any time it was time to shoot weapons, any type of intel, communications, even navigation all came through CIC. Just the nerve center, CIC is the nerve center of the ships, of any ship that was in our Navy.

SPRAGUE: So you wrap up your tour, or it wouldn't be a tour, it'd be a cruise, or how would you, what would you call that? Or your shore or your ship rotation?

COCROFT: Yeah, it's a tour.

SPRAGUE: It's a tour?

COCROFT: It's still a tour.

SPRAGUE: Make sure I get this term right.

COCROFT: Yeah. It's still a tour.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And so with that, I went to the hospital after that, naval hospital in Charleston, and I went there. When I first got there, I was working in a place called transportation. So yeah, like the motor pool, at the hospital, because 00:51:00the hospital is a huge hospital, Charleston, major hospital, you know, with everything, you know, we put a captain for Captain Martin. She was the CO of of the, she was a nurse and she's a CO of the command. But then as time went on, I got transferred over to security at the hospital, and then I went to law enforcement school in San Antonio. So I got a NEC, which is a naval enlisted code called, it was a 9545, so that was Naval law enforcement.

SPRAGUE: So I'm curious about that, that. So you went into Charleston and you were at the Naval Hospital. Um, and then you went to law enforcement school? Yeah. How does that tie together with what an OS does?

COCROFT: It doesn't.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: It doesn't, it doesn't necessarily tie in that way. There's a, there's, there's not necessarily any type of connection to what an OS did then what the 9545, which is law enforcement. What it is, is that whenever you have shore duty, right, that's when they, you can pick orders doing certain things. Sometimes you can go to base operations or you can go to a a squadron or you can go to a any type of, um, shore command working at, like working out in a field somewhere or you can go do certain things like that. So what it was, was, as an OS, at the time in, in the Navy they had master-at-arms, which is our law. It's like, you know, our police, our police. But they had people that that augmented their crew, in a sense, their personnel, because there's not enough masters-at 00:53:00arms to go around in the military. So they will have people like me. Certain, certain rates, like fire control men. We have high seamen. You have quarter masters or whatever. Now we all can go to the law enforcement school as a shore duty to act to augment the security force for the base or whatever command it was. So that's what it was. I went there to Lackland to learn about that so I can augment the security for the hospital.

SPRAGUE: Mm-hm. Looks like you also got some training about a little, couple months after that, too, for operating--

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: Equipment?

COCROFT: Yep. Some more. I went back to school again. Oh, well. Went back to school again for some more training on the global command systems systems. And what what that was was to help me learn the new updates because I was going to Italy to be on the Sixth Fleet staff after that.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: So you're in Charleston and then school, was were you at Charleston when you went to attend took this training or did you go to the training?

COCROFT: Okay, for the 9545 I was in Charleston at the hospital, but when I got orders to go to Italy, that's when I got the orders, like the school orders to go as contingent on my orders. I asked for a school to be able to go to the Sixth Fleet staff. So that's when I went to the school in Virginia again to to learn the new updates on some of the systems that I was going to go work at over in Italy. In Gaeta, Italy, on the the La Salle.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: So let's talk about, let's talk about Italy and the La Salle and tell me about that. Tell me about coming and going through this, you know, getting out through the school and then.

COCROFT: Yeah, it was it was it was pretty interesting because I didn't know what to expect. You know, I've been to Italy, I've been to Naples, I've been to Camp Darby up north in, by Pisa, stuff like this here, I've been to those 00:55:00different places, right, being deployed on board a ship. But for me to get orders to live overseas was something that I was willing to do, but I was scared, to tell you, because I didn't know, you know, I didn't you know, it's a different, it's a culture shock, you know. And so I was excited to go. But I also thought about missing my family because I deployed a lot. I was gone all the time. Right. So when I when I got those orders to Italy, it was the school was was part of the order package. And then I went to school first and then I went home on leave. Then I went to, I flew to Italy and got on board the La Salle. I was Sixth Fleet. I was in the Sixth Fleet staff. I worked in a tactical flak plot center, in a tactical flack command center. And so I worked for Admiral Abbot. He was a four-star admiral, He was the naval supreme commander at the time for the Sixth Fleet.

SPRAGUE: Abbot. A-B-B-O-T?

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Admiral. Full admiral sounds like to me.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Dumb question. Is this what you're talking about, with Sixth Fleet, is this this thing you listed? Com Sixth Fleet.

COCROFT: Yes.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Commander, Sixth Fleet. That's that's what that means. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Forgive me. I'm an army [??].

COCROFT: Oh, no worries, sir. No worries, sir. No worries, sir.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. Okay, so. So a good question. So Gaeta, Gaeta is it, or how do I say it?

COCROFT: Gaeta.

SPRAGUE: Gaeta. Gaeta, Italy [Cocroft laughs] How, you were on an unaccompanied 00:57:00tour without your family or with your family? They were able to PCS with you.

COCROFT: At that time right there, because at one point I was married in the military, but by that time I was divorced. So my son was already born. Right. But I was it was I was there as a single guy on board the ship. La Salle was the flagship itself. And the La Salle had had their own crew. Right. But Sixth Fleet was embarked on board the La Salle. So any time we went places we were booked, we were embarked on board, and the La Salle was really our vessel to get to where we need to go to the Mediterranean. And one thing that Sixth Fleet did was a lot of schmoozing of the different countries like NATO to keep the peace, you know, in a sense. So we got to go to a lot of the prime choice ports, you know, different things like that, you know. Cannes, France. You know, Crimea, you know. You know, Ukraine. We went there. We went to the [??]. Russia. Thessaloniki. We went to Bulgaria, Romania and things like that. Georgia, you 00:58:00know, country, Georgia. So we got to do all these different things that kind of work with our allies. And so any time we would go there, they had this big schmooze party and we had to put on our uniforms (laughs), right? And, you know, talk to people and, you know, and mingle and, you know, play nice with everybody, you know? And it was actually pretty good because Japanese are interesting people, they are super nice. So then we would just go do it. Morocco. Israel, you know, different things. We would go to all these different places, you know, so and they would go there and all the, the the brass from from their military would come on board and have like a dinner party, in a sense. So that's that's what we would do all the time. But, but as far as the job that the OS did for the Sixth Fleet staff and that the the radiomen, so we, we would maintain all the the picture for the whole Mediterranean. So anytime 00:59:00someone came into the Mediterranean and went to, went to the Fifth Fleet or whatnot, either way we maintain control of all those places and knew where everything was at. So we was the overall person that kept an eye on everybody there.

SPRAGUE: Do you find yourself thinking in those terms and in your life now?

COCROFT: It's funny, man. Yeah. It's weird because when you are in a position like that, right, sometimes, you know, it never went to my head, but I still had a situational awareness of looking at the big picture instead of just being focused, totally focused on something. Some things I can focus on. Right. But the overall, the overarching theme of something, I try to find it out so I can, you know, make an assessment to, you know, make the right choice. That's what I do at UW-M as well with Ms. Yolanda.

SPRAGUE: Sounds like to me, like, your military experience ties into what you're doing now.

COCROFT: It sure does. Yeah. And you know what's funny, though, is this is one thing I never said I didn't say earlier, but my family was like that. The overarching theme of things, we looked at things like that. They were strict. The family was strict. But they also want you to be able to, you know, have a good work ethic, you know, do right by people. The same thing that happens in the military. So you can decorate from from home to the military. And it's instilled in me as well. Now.

SPRAGUE: One of the other things you you mentioned, and we've got to touch on it, is that separation, too, from your family. Can you talk about that at all?

COCROFT: Yeah, it was painful because I had some uncles that are that I grew up with that oh, my dad's I particularly my dad's family was it was way older to my mom's side of the family. Right. And so a lot of my uncles, like one of my uncles, Ronald Ralph, he was a Navy guy. He was a really good guy growing up. He would he would have me come by the house and sweep the stairs. He was a longshoreman in Milwaukee, you know, there in Milwaukee. So he would he would come in the house, cleaned up some stuff, and he would give me 50 bucks to make sure I had money in my pocket. Right. And so when he passed away, I was on deployment. So he was an immediate family that can come home, you know? Yeah. So I said, you know, because I really get to say goodbye to him now, you know, that's one thing. I had a couple other aunts. Same thing happened to them. Both sides of my family were very they they were a force in my life that that I'm happy I had because some people don't have the love that they get from family members. You know, some people are struggling with that. And my my, my, my family on both sides were actually very nice to me. And my sisters and my brothers saw this here. So they just loved us to be around. And then when I left, I was sad because I figured that as they get older, I'd be gone somewhere. And I was hoping that possibly, if something were to happen, I'd be in port. Some might be important states I can go, but that in half of that time I was deployed somewhere.

SPRAGUE: And I understand. Yeah. Okay. So you're with Comm six fleet. You're on your La Salle? Yep. Any. Any of crazy experiences that you remember? There's probably more than one.

COCROFT: Yeah, we did a lot of anything that was going on in in in the Mediterranean or in the Middle East. Six We had something to do with it as well, but all those Fifth Fleet was in charge of the Gulf. But a lot of ships that would be in a mediterranean that were launch different Tomahawks or whatever it is there was under six feet jurisdiction. Right. So we as a staff planned all that. So a lot of different things that happened like that. So were Kosovo anything like that? We we actually planned a lot of that stuff. So it was it was kind of cool to be in a know because some jobs like a storekeeper they don't know they just skin you know, they're getting out the stores for the ship right they important because they do that part. We had it we had a different job. So we had we knew more things than everybody else. And so people always ask us what's going on. Right. I mean, if you gave me that bag of chips, man, I can tell you something.

COCROFT: You know.

COCROFT: I tell you covert things. You know, if they like, when we pull into port, we knew all that. We knew everything. So it was good to have a job because, you know, I had connections all over the place on a boat. I wouldn't tell them my secret stuff, you know, because I had a secret CI. Yeah, of course. Right. Yeah. But I would tell them that the, the, the, the party information like that, but I would give my just a little tidbits I can get to about your chicken wings or something, you know?

SPRAGUE: Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense.

COCROFT: It was fun. It was fun. But yeah, it was just it was interesting.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: To be able to be in the know of all that stuff, you know.

SPRAGUE: Yeah, that's really interesting. So tell me about you brought up Kosovo. Tell me about that a little bit.

COCROFT: Yeah, we do a lot of the planning for it before everything start happening. Of course, because, you know, as I was giving you leave six feet. That's when everything started happening with Kosovo. So we we did like a lot of the planning, a lot of the logistics and stories here and learning different, like trying to figure out what type of tactics can we use, what assets will we use throughout this year. So we did a lot of that stuff with that. So that's how we got into that part of it, because when you're at a staff like that, you know, at a high level, so you get to learn all the different things. That's what that's about to happen. So you know what's going to happen before happens, you know? And it was always interesting to know that. But sometimes, you know, you think about the people on the other end of it, what's going to happen to them. And it, you know, sometimes, you know, it messes with your moral compass and sometimes, you know what I'm saying? Because you don't want to know collateral damage or anything and see it. But this is bound to happen, you know? Yes, but that part of it sucked.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. Did you have any experience, personal experience with observing, you know, collateral damage or.

COCROFT: We get reports. We will get reports of things. So when the ship was sent a couple Tomahawks out and some clams or whatever it was. Right. Or they whenever they, you know, they were going to do a sorties, a bomb. So sorties is here. You find out, you know, you hear some of the things that were happening, you know, and, you know, and being being a part of that this hairnet stuff, you know, it bugs you, you know, some people. I guess it doesn't affect them like that, but it affected me because it was too far.

COCROFT: I'm sorry.

COCROFT: But. But but is this is this is this about you? Because sometimes you think about it because anything that happens to people, you know. Yeah. It's just a wonder, you know, you wonder what will happen.

SPRAGUE: Can you give me a window into your in the CIC? Mm hmm. What was the relationship between the enlisted, the chiefs and then the officers? How, what, what, what? What dynamic was that like? Tell me about that.

COCROFT: It sure does. Yep. It's funny. People talk about the the traditions that the military has, right. That well, that specifically the Navy, because we have a lot of tradition, of course. Right. So some cats was from the academy, right, and they was actually laid back, chill dudes, right? Or or as time went on, we had ladies that came in, right. So we had some chill ladies and some chill guys, right. That's from the academy. And yes, some cats they'll go to OCS [laughs], and or mustang or whatever they were. And they were just total assholes, you know, what I'm saying? Like, holy shit. Like, he was just doing a job that I was doing, I guess, a couple of years ago. I knew you an officer. Are you going to be a jackass like that [Sprague laughs]? It wasn't cool [Cocroft 01:08:00laughs]. So a lot of times I had fun dealing with some of the officers. Now, Sixth Fleet, right, a lot of the department heads for Sixth Fleet were all COs of submarines. Ex-COs of submarines, ships, fighter pilots. Seal team. Things like that. So all these all these personnel, theseguys and department heads were all super cool and they were like on a first name basis with you on staff. I was like, that's cool. So when I left Sixth Fleet and I went to it, oh, other commands, right, I had to check myself because the whole dynamic was totally different. But like on board the Pratt, or the Morison, it was like that, it was a fine line of, I'm enlisted, this person is the chief, this person is an officer and we stayed in our lanes, you know, some people were cool with, you 01:09:00know, certain things, but it was more to tradition than anything, you know. But like I said, Sixth Fleet was totally different because everyone was like post post command, commanders, whatever or captains or whatever they were, and they were super nice. We had some guys that would, that submariners um, captains so this here, they would come and sit on the mess deck with you and bring popcorn and sit down with popcorn and we would all watch movies together. That's that's how it was on certain commands but some some commands are just, that's that line.

SPRAGUE: I understand.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: You mentioned it a little a couple of times. Tell me about the transition to bringing women onto the ships and how that if you could?

COCROFT: Yeah, it's weird because on the Pratt back in the in the eighties. From the academy itself they have like the midshipmen, right. And they would have to 01:10:00go to a ship for a couple of weeks during their training. So every once in a while, we would get a couple days on a boat and some cats on the boat will lose their mind because they see a lady. Right. It was it was the weirdest thing, right. Im like, That's crazy. So it was different, as sometimes out of 300 and some odd guys, 350, 400 guys, you would see just two ladies on a boat. So everybody's just staring and gawking, whatever they trying to do, right. So it was different, right. Now I'm thinking to myself, I have a mother, sisters, aunts, cousins. I don't want anyone gawking at them like that. So I just I just used to mind my business, you know, go do my thing. However, as time went on, they start implementing more women on board, on different ships. Some guys were very upset because, you know, they didn't think women had a place in the military. It wasn't it wasn't like that for me because I grew up, my mother is a strong lady, my aunts are strong ladies, you know, my sisters, super strong 01:11:00family members. So it didn't it didn't bother me, not one. No, no, not at all. Because, I respected them, you know, and they respected me. So. But like I said, some guys were upset, you know, and I was just trying to figure out why, you know.

SPRAGUE: Did you have any involvement, the bombing of the embassy in Nairobi?

COCROFT: Did not.

SPRAGUE: Okay. I got to ask that question.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So we're up to about 1999.

COCROFT: Mm hmm.

SPRAGUE: And you said, and when did you end up leaving Sixth Fleet?

COCROFT: I ended up leaving at the end of '98.

SPRAGUE: Okay. And where did you go next?

COCROFT: I went I went to the USS The Sullivans.

SPRAGUE: Sullivans. Okay.

COCROFT: Yes.

SPRAGUE: Sullivans. Got it. Okay.

COCROFT: It was crazy about that ship because I was there for a few weeks, several weeks. I tore my ACL man, my [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Oh. So what happened then?

COCROFT: They was upset because I just, I went to another school.

SPRAGUE: Oh.

COCROFT: Right. Another school. I got there. Tore my ACL, right. And they was like, Dang it. Like, how? Like, what was you doing ? I'm like, you know, playing football [laughs]. And so tore my ACL and then I ended up, report to shore duty. I had to have a surgery and I had to go like limited duty for a little bit to be able to get, you know, healed up. By that time, The Sullivans was getting ready to go to, was getting ready to go to the Gulf, right. And so I kept in touch with some people on board ship or whatever. And they they go. They go and they come back, right. And they did a turnover with some ships on the way back. And 01:13:00one of the ships was the Cole, right. So. The Sullivans gets back and we found out later, because we were sitting inside the office and we saw where the Cole got bombed, right, and we found out through intel reports that The Sullivans was actually targeted first. You know what I'm saying? So it was a test run on The Sullivans because they want that big name. They wanted to get that name, right. And so when they went to go do that bombing, it sank. So then as they refined their stuff. The Sullivans went home. Cole came. Cole went into Yemen. That's what happened to the Cole. It was kind of ironic to me.

SPRAGUE: What did--yeah.

COCROFT: It was erie. It was very eerie because I'm like damn, you know. It would have been some other folks. And it possibly would be me, you know.

SPRAGUE: So they, might have you been on The Sullivans when they tried their 01:14:00test run?

COCROFT: Mm hmm. Yeah. That's that's that's what I think about it. It's kind of scary.

SPRAGUE: What do you think about what happened with the Cole and those guys and gals?

COCROFT: I was upset because, you know, I know those people have ideologies, stuff like this here, things like that course. And. When something happens overseas or anything like this here, they automatically blame the whole Navy, the whole military for everything that happened, right. So it's just sad that the people lost their lives like that because, me being on board The Sullivans, I knew them and I see where the bomb hit. That's right where thechow line was at. All the things I remember about the boat. I can just see it in my head, you know, like, damn. But one thing about it. All the training that we do in the 01:15:00military, the GQs, damage control, stuff like that. That's what saved the Cole. Right. So a lot of those things train the way that you fight [??] So that that instilled in me to do to make sure that I gave 110%, 150% of what I'm doing. So when I do stuff like that, so that's, that's what kind of played in my mind at the time, because it could've been a lot worse, you know, it was bad, but it could have been a lot worse, if had lost the ship itself.

SPRAGUE: Any other thoughts on the Cole?

COCROFT: I just it's just just a sad piece of history, you know. And I'm happy to see that they she was able to fix her and get him get her back to the role that she's been doing a lot of diplomacy since then. So it's just great to be able to, you know, and sometimes in Virginia, I was happy to be able to walk 01:16:00past The Sullivans, you know. I'm sorry, the Cole when I was on board the Kearsarge, the Cole will be on the same pier as us. So we just, it was just great to walk by and see it still functioning, you know.

SPRAGUE: Mm hmm. So you're on The Sullivans. What port was The Sullivans working out of?

COCROFT: Mayport.

SPRAGUE: Mayport.

COCROFT: Mayport, Florida. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay. And were you on The Sullivans when 9/11 happened or working [??] or were you on to another ship?

COCROFT: I was I was actually I was working I was on [light tour of duty??] because I had torn my ACL.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Right. And so I was working on at TPU [Transient Personnel Unit], is what it's called, in Virginia. It's like a place where they put people in limbo in a sense, like limited duty. So I was working there in a place called, it was a RILO unit, research in lieu of arrest. Right. So what I did was, anyone that 01:17:00went UA, I had to watch them. Because because of my law enforcement background, I had a security guys make sure that they didn't run out of run out of the, yeah, the barracks because because they got caught. So they came back and it was it was a unit where they was processing people out of the military. So I was waiting to get my cleared to be able to go back to a ship, you know, and and then go on to the USMS Capable.

SPRAGUE: Inescapable?

COCROFT: USMS Capable.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah. USMS Capable is where I went. And that's why I started having, it was a, it was an oceanographic ship that we did carrying narcotic ops down in the Caribbean. And it's it's only like a like 200 to 300 feet long.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Super small boat. And it was a U.S. naval ship, right. So it's under 01:18:00the military's sealift. The Military Sealift Command is what it was under. But we had a detachment of13 people on board, and the rest of them were civilians, like a civilian captain on board. So that's why I went there. And ended up going there and working in the Caribbean. And that's when I went to Key West, and stuff like that so that's when I went out to a lot of different ports down there down there in that area--Costa Rica, Ecuador, like I said, Key West. We would do all kinds of things like that. And so it was it was actually pretty cool tour of duty. Mess day in rooms was some different than being on a boat with the regular guys and girls, you know. So it was pretty cool.

SPRAGUE: How long was that tour?

COCROFT: That one was only three months because I started having migraines [laughs]. So I ended up going back to, you know, going back to light and then we them to do it they could figure out what was causing my migraines. But come to find out, it was possibly linked to Desert Storm. So.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: So I'm service-connected for that as well.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Issues like that. So so when I left there and went back to the to the [limited??] of duty, I ended up getting orders. Once they tried to give me some medicine and whatever, I got orders to the Kearsarge after that.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: They was trying to get me on to the George Washington. Right. Carrier, you know, CVN 73. But they wouldn't take me because I had a CPAP [continuous positive airway pressure] machine.

SPRAGUE: Oh.

COCROFT: So instead of them taking me, the Kearsarge said, Yes, we'll take him. So that's how I got to the Kearsarge.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So when you talked a little bit of it, so when 911 happened, you were in that limbo unit, kind of. That's what you were doing.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: And I always ask people, what do you remember about that day or 01:20:00anything particular? Sometimes people, you know, it's like.

COCROFT: Yeah. I was at my house, Chase Arbor Apartments and I was I just got done with duty the night, you know, and I came on that morning, and then all of a sudden I heard a knock on the door and it's Kenny Pedro, Pedro the maintenance man. Right. He said, Yo, bro, did you hear what happened and I'm, What happened? He said, Turn on the TV. I went, Okay, so I've got the TV on. Right, now, look, I said, Oh, shit. And that's when the second plane hit. Right. So I was like, Damn. And that's when phones are ringing. You know, we're about to close the base down. Doing stuff like this here, personnel, stay home. You know, essential personnel got to come in. So, they said, Get ready for your your night shift because you're coming back in, because you're essential or whatever. So I did that with the with the RILO stuff, you know. So when all that stuff happened, I 01:21:00went, I went to the store to go get some, some some provisions or some food because, you know, anything like that happens you got to try to make sure you get everything in the house or whatever you need to have. Went to the bank, came back home, tried to call my mother. All the cell towers, everything was jammed up, couldn't do nothin'. Right. And then I just sat there, said, okay, got, didn't go to sleep, didn't go back to sleep. Stayed up and I went into work that night. So then I had to calm the guys down because a lot of guys was like, Yo, are they going to keep us in the military? I'm like, No, they're actually going to get you out because [Sprague laughs] because you was UA and you, you know, got a urinalysis positive, positive on the urinalysis. So you're going home, right. So don't worry about that. You know. And at that time, they shut all the bases down. Right. Non-essential personnel. They sortied all the ships out.

SPRAGUE: What does that mean for the civilians online? Sortie.

COCROFT: That means that they sent all the ships out to sea to to get away from 01:22:00land to, so they can regroup and figure out what's going on. Because things were still, you know, fresh going on. So all the ships that was able to go, left. Submarines, left. If you're security on the base, you know, threat con, you know, went up, stuff like this here. So that was just one of those things where everyone was on high alert.

SPRAGUE: And this this base was Mayport?

COCROFT: That was Norfolk.

SPRAGUE: Norfolk, okay.

COCROFT: Yeah, Norfolk.

SPRAGUE: So that would probably be a lot of ships, I would imagine.

COCROFT: Yes, it was a lot of ships. Some ships couldn't go because there was there was a maintenance period. So they couldn't go nowhere because things were torn apart. But they had put extra security out on board the ships and trying to make sure everything was good for them, you know, and and sitting there, and we had got a call from some of our friends that was stationed in Italy was, right, when people can get through. And we knew that a couple of guys that we knew that 01:23:00were stationed in Italy was at the Pentagon. So I was waiting to see, but, I don't know, unfortunately, a couple of guys that were stationed with me died in the Pentagon.

SPRAGUE: Sorry to hear that.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: With respect, do you happen to remember their names?

COCROFT: Yes. Commander Dunn. Patrick Dunn.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And Ronald Hemingway. He was an ET, ET-1. Hemingway. Ronald Hemingway.

SPRAGUE: And Dunn? D-U-N-N?

COCROFT: Yes, sir.

SPRAGUE: Okay. CT-1.

COCROFT: He was an ET-1.

SPRAGUE: ET-1. Sorry.

COCROFT: ET-1, yeah. The electronics technician and commander was, he was the the executive officer of the of the the La Salle. So. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Both of those guys were on the La Salle?

COCROFT: Both. Both, yeah. Hemingway was part of the Sixth Fleet staff onboard.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And then we found that out. And, you know, everyone was like, man, that's not cool. Right. So 9/11 has has a different meaning to me than some other folks, you know. You know, a lot of people got their own thing about it. But for me to know someone personally and I know that they're not here no more because of that, it's, you know, we talk about it every year, you know, when it comes around, we [??] respects it. Ta ta, ta ta ta. You know, you're just sad.

SPRAGUE: Okay, so moving on, we've got you into the Kearsarge.

COCROFT: Kearsarge.

SPRAGUE: Kearsarge. I always get that wrong.

COCROFT: Yeah. Kearsarge. Yep

SPRAGUE: And I've heard about the ship from prior veterans, but tell me about your involvement with it.

COCROFT: Yeah, I was in CIC [Combat Information Center] on the Kearsarge. I was 01:25:00the air guy pretty much. I was the the ICO is what they called it, interface control officer on board there with the data links. So Link 16 Link 11, things like that. I ran the show with that. So train all the other guys on board. Some of the guys that aren't in training, but I train train those guys to, like, from the things, from all my past experience I was the the LPO [Leading Petty Officer] of the air side on board the Kearsarge.

SPRAGUE: And Kearsarge worked out of where?

COCROFT: Norfolk Virginia.

SPRAGUE: Okay. And where did you do your cruises or your tours?

COCROFT: Yeah, it was pretty it was pretty wild because I had two more years left on my sea time. And so I got on the Kearsarge. We did we did a lot of training, like the mine ops on board there. Also, we did some things with, um, 01:26:00we had Harriers, you know, on board, we had Cobras on board. We had CH-46s, our's is 46, 47 Army [laughs] the Chinook. We had 53s. We had all kinds of different type of aircraft on board, you know, and on board the Kearsarge itself. When I got there, we were in we were in a yards, right, they was getting retrofitted for some new equipment and some new software. So I'd seen new hardware. And then once we got out, we were doing a lot of training, going out to like we would go to Corpus Christi to work with mines and, you know, porpoises, you know, because they would use dolphins and stuff for finding mines 01:27:00and stuff. So we were we would actually go out there and test that stuff for different commands. Yeah, that's pretty cool.

SPRAGUE: So you were on the Kearsarge, to, up until when?

COCROFT: 2004.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So tell me about OIF.

COCROFT: We, once again, another ship that wasn't slated to deploy, right, till later when all happened. Right. We we were told that, it was weird. This is, this this is kind of a story that I tell people. They like, what is that really what happened? We had, we weren't slated to go on deployment. And so they weren't at first they weren't they weren't trying to get a lot of different ships to, they weren't trying to get as many ships as they had before. Like when Desert Storm happened. Right. Trying to figure out what ships can go, which ships cannot. So we had heard rumors that we were slated to go because of us 01:28:00carrying Marines. We carry, you know, 1200, there's 1200 people, 1200 personnel on board the Kearsarge. But when we had the Marine detachment, maybe 3500. So good substantial amount of people roll up on their, right. So they kept telling us, well, we don't know if we going or or not. They kept saying, Oh, we're going, some people, Oh, we're not going. So that holiday season in 2002, they did stand down, or holiday stand down. And so they had it where, you know, for holiday stand down they have half the crew go on one time of leave for holidays and then the second part stays on board and do work. And then when other come, there's a day of turnover and then the second crew leaves, second part of crew 01:29:00leaves, and in other ones come and they do the work. So lot of people went home for like Christmas and stuff like that, you know of couple of weeks before, you know, I, sometime right there. So I ended up staying on board the Kearsarge to be on a second to go for New Year's. So then as things were going along, we kept hearing more and more and more and more buzz about us getting ready to head out. Right. And it's okay, because we weren't supposed to go on deployment till, like, 2004, 2005.

SPRAGUE: Oh, wow!

COCROFT: Right. So then we got word, it was about a week and a half into the second into the first crew and their their leave period. We we got we got told, hey, we need to prep, we need to our log requests together, get out all the supplies. We need to do everything that we need to do, get the charts updated, everything, we had to update everything because we were going, right. And we 01:30:00said, Okay. Right. So we said, Okay, so we're going, but are we going to go on leave? They said, No.

SPRAGUE: Oh, no.

COCROFT: So the first halve got to go on leave. And then when they then when they all came back. Right. We were pissed, of course, because I was like, Yo, they got to see their family and we ain't going to get to see our family to go. So the ship itself told us that we couldn't go outside 50 miles radius of the ship. Right. And that, get ready to get deployed. Get your affairs in order. Get your power of attorneys. Do what you need to do. We have to do all the stuff. So I end up having a couple of buddies come over, help me move out of my apartment, put things, you know, in storage. Sew this here. Sew a bunch of different things. People were doing the same thing and they ended up saying, okay, we, you have to have four days off, right? We're on a 96 hour ether. I said, okay. I call, called my son's mother. So, hey, I need him to fly to Milwaukee or to 01:31:00Chicago, and I'm going to pick him up. She said, You're in Virginia? I said, Yeah, I am. So a lot of people that was on their second part. We all just went ahead and just said the hell with it, because was, what can they do to us. If if we're going to go on deployment, I'm going home to go see my family before I leave, you know?

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: So So I flew from Virginia to Milwaukee, So I flew into Chicago. I went to go pick him up and I went to Chicago to go pick him up, and some some guys from the ship they was walking to the [laughs] airport. Like, Hey, what's up Groovy? What's up, man? [both laugh] I didn't see. You can see me. Nope. Just [with the??][both laugh] So I came home. We had a party. I got to see my family and got back and got back within four days. Got back. And then we left to go to New Jersey to pick up, pick up, pick up our weapons, went to Morehead City to pick up our Marines. And then we went, headed over, straight over.

SPRAGUE: Now, I understand about the 96 hour thing, by the way.

COCROFT: I know.

SPRAGUE: You're saying Know with a smile.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: So when you, so when you said you went over you went over to Afghanistan or, no, to Iraq?

COCROFT: To Iraq.

SPRAGUE: Okay. If you could tell me about that a little bit.

COCROFT: That was pretty, um, I was, I was kind of content, you know, I was cool, right. It was frustrating because, you know, having to go on deployment, have to go in a situation like that, you know? You know, everything that happened to us, although I did that, the great escape of those hours, right. You know, those days, I still didn't get to spend as much time as I want to with my family. So I was, you know, a little jammed up about it, you know, in my feelings about it. But we had a mission, right? And so we had a lot of young 01:33:00Marines on board the ship. And they was happy that they about to battle. So I did see her and I sat there and I thought about it because I had already been in Desert Storm, deployed on that. But I'm like, I don't think this was going to be the same as Desert Storm. You know, we're going into Iraq, Iraq this time. We're not going to Kuwait, dipping our toe in, it was, we're going in full-bore. I said it's not it's not going to be the same. Right. And I just felt bad because some many guys have gone and I'm trying to figure out, like, why are you so giddy? Right. And so, of course, we're steaming across, doing drills. They do all kind of different things. Like this year, um, we get to Kuwait, they do a landing for Marines. So we launch all our Marines. They go in, we're sitting there, and all of a sudden the damn chemical alarm goes off. Oh, well. It was 01:34:00the creepiest shit. Right. Now we're anchored, dropping the Marines off, you know, their floating their way to shore, the chemical alarm goes off and people panicking on the boat. I was surprised at some of the people that I saw that was in panic mode, a fight or flight response. Some people just sat down in the middle of the mess decks and cried. say, Oh, my God, we're about to die, right. Get your ass up. Let's go. Right. Because I had to run down and get all my guys out of berthing and go into general quarters, get a gas mask, whatever it was. A lot of the ladies on board the ship was running and doing doing their thing, man. It was it was into it. But some of the guys, just sat there and they just totally froze. It's like, holy shit. Right. Like, wow, that's crazy. Right. And, 01:35:00you know, and I'm so proud of the other people, but some of the other people was like, man, come on. And I get it. Some people the fight or flight response is different for other people. So we did that and come to find out, there was a person that was on one of the access points on the boat that was closed, but they needed to paint it. By mistake they hit the damn chemical [both laugh].

SPRAGUE: Oh my God!

COCROFT: So, yeah, that was creepier by the hour, right? You know it's like people thought who was going to die, people thought who was going to be hit 'cause it was supposed to be, thought maybe chemical weapons, SCUDs or whatever. People were panicking, but, you know, it was funny. It was funny. At the time it wasn't funny, but now I sit back and think it's as funny as shit, right? Like, that's crazy, right? So that happened. And then we, what happened was they they 01:36:00went ahead and moved a lot of the, our assets to different ships because we had a lot of amphibious assault ships out there, Kearsarge is an amphibious assault ship. So they had the Bataan, the Tarawa, the Saipan, the Nassau, the Boxer, they had all these different ships out there. Right. And so what they did was they had set in boxes out there, a certain area. Right. And with us, they kept, kept all the [Sikorsky] CH-53s [Sea Stallion] on board, the big heavy lifters. Right. And so the Bataan, I think they had I think they all the had Cobras. One of the others had all the Harriers. Right. It was just how they did it. Right. And then sometimes they would bring couple of different assets here and there and do things. But what happened was a lot of Marines that came off our ship went to Fallujah. Yep. So that was pretty rough to find out what was going on in Fallujah.

SPRAGUE: So this would have been, what year was this then?

COCROFT: 2003.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: That's one of the--

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: --hot and heavy's going on. Yep.

SPRAGUE: But they did, did they come back to your ship or--

COCROFT: Mm-hmm. And some didn't. Some got killed, of course. Killed in action. Um, Corporal Blair's, when I said got to me because I met him, and he didn't come back, so that's the one that sits with me. And so we had, out of the whole battalion there was 23 Marines that had died at that time. And we had a memorial on board the ship, Memorial Day, because that was doing it during that time frame as well. And. So it was just those one things, man. It put a whole different light on things because I'd met a marine and then, you know, kid was a cool kid, right? And no longer here. So that kind of messed me up a little bit. Roughed me up, you know?

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: And then as time went on and we was out to sea for, like, you know, 75 days, we got a couple of beer days out there because in the Navy they have, if you do 55 days straight, like 55 days straight and keep going, you get two beers. So [laugh] and they kept all the beer in the morgue.

SPRAGUE: And I think I know why they did that.

COCROFT: Because it's cold in here, right [laughs]?

SPRAGUE: Oh. I thought maybe it was to discourage drinking the beer.

COCROFT: No, because it was cold in there.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah, 'cause onboard because onboard the amphibious assault ships they had to have operating rooms on there. Have a morgue. We have all this stuff on board those ships right there. So

SPRAGUE: What was a Corporal Blair, if you happen to know, did you ever know his first name?

COCROFT: I didn't. I can't even remember.

SPRAGUE: Okay. But he was maybe killed in action in Fallujah?

COCROFT: Yes, sir.

SPRAGUE: Do you happen to remember the Marine unit, name and regiment?

COCROFT: Oh, it was I think was a MEU. I think it was 2/2 or 2/6s. It was either 01:39:00a 2/2, 2/4 or 2/6 I think it is. I have to look it up.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Okay.

COCROFT: Marine Marine Expeditionary Unit, you know.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: And the Kearsarge was the flagship for all the amphibious assault ships out there. So we had the we had the admiral, and we had the general on board our ship.

SPRAGUE: And I assume you, of course, were in the Persian Gulf.

COCROFT: Mm hmm.

SPRAGUE: And then probably deployment of the amphibious vehicles.

COCROFT: I mean, we pulled back a little bit, about 50 to 100 miles off the coast. They gave us operating areas to sail in, three knots back and forth. Yeah. Four months.

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: For months. Yeah, it was. It was crazy. And of course, being in, being 01:40:00there, we would get, although people don't think this, but we would get hit with sandstorms out in the water. Hmm.

SPRAGUE: What was that like?

COCROFT: That was crazy, because it was messing with our radars. Yeah. Degraded our radar picture. So it was pretty crappy.

SPRAGUE: Anything else you can tell me about the Kearsarge?

COCROFT: Yeah. We ended up going to, you know, we did everything we had to do, got our Marines back, right. And we were headin' home. And by that time, there wasn't a lot of port visits because of everything that happened. Right. We did get to go into for a maintenance period in Bahrain. But that was just short-lived because we had some engine issues or whatever, you know, we had repairs. So on the way back, we ended up heading back. We, we were slated to 01:41:00have a port visit in Rota. Right. The Kearsarge was. So all the other amphibious ships, Bataan, all the other ones we were into we are off into our destinations, right, heading back from the Gulf, Straits of Hormuz around the peninsula, the peninsula, the Red Sea, Suez Canal. And as we got right before the Suez Canal for us, because we had the general and the admiral on board, we got a call for the group group eight summit with President Bush. It was in Jordan.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: So we had to go and we was the flagship so we had to do security detail for for the president. And it was a AWACS [Airborne Warning and Control System], the Kearsarge, and a couple of frigates. And then one, I remember the one frigate. It was the [USS] Vandegrift, you know, and we had to link up with the AWACS that provided coverage for President Bush. So we did that. So that delayed 01:42:00us a couple of days. Right, [laughs]. Cause everything, we went to the Gulf of Aqaba, and it was up in that area, because it's close to Jordan. So then when we got relieved from that duty, we got some SEALs and some some Rangers, special ops cats came on board which I forgot why, we went and we didn't even go to Rota. We went straight out the Med and went down round Africa, down by it's like Sierra Leone, in that area, and we had to sit out there because they had that revolution that was going on over there.

SPRAGUE: Oh, tell me about that. I read a little bit about that and I wondered if you had an involvement in that.

COCROFT: Yep [laughs].

SPRAGUE: And that would have been what year was that about?

COCROFT: 2003.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yep. And that was like in like end of May, early June. So we went off 01:43:00the coast for a show of force. And so we had a bunch of cats, Special Forces cats, Joint Task Force, Special Forces dudes with SAT phones, all kind of business, right, out there. We had P-3s flying up and down the coast, radar picture, you know what I'm saying, a clean picture. They had some we had we had a full complement of Harriers and 53s Cobras, everything, we had Cobras flying. So I was here and we were we was out there, just off the coast with a show of force and everything died down a little bit, you know. And then all the other ships were still going across the Med. You could see them on our link picture, right? A link in our geeks. We could see the guys, all the boats and across [both laugh] and we was off the coast right there. So we sat there for a few days, about a week or so, and then we ended up leaving. So we got back five days 01:44:00behind everybody else. So instead of the whole battery rolling in at the same time we got that because we had the the general and the admiral on board. So so we left and we we got back and we supposed to get back on the 25th of June. We got back on on June 30th of that year. [Laughs] Every time, almost every diplomat was on. We got in December. We get back in June. That's how it was for me. It just seemed like every I don't care what ship I was on. It seemed like that happened every time, so it was just pretty wild. So.

SPRAGUE: Do you happen to remember the name of that up for the Sierra Leone mission?

COCROFT: I do not.

SPRAGUE: Okay. No worries. I got to ask.

COCROFT: I. I can find it, though. I can get it.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Okay. So 2000, you get back. That's June, June 30th. 2003.

COCROFT: Yep. We're on stand down.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Yeah. Tell me what happened next.

COCROFT: Stand down. We got we got information to go that we needed to go to the yards again because of us being deployed like that, because of whenever you come back from a deployment, you go into a maintenance period. So they go in. We did a maintenance period and then by that time I had orders, and had had orders because we got back because I was actually left February of 2004 from from the Kearsarge.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. That was my next question. Yeah. And where were those orders to?

COCROFT: That was to NCTSI Det 2.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Naval Center for Tactical Information. Yep. NCTSI Det 2.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Tell me about NCTSI Det 2.

COCROFT: Okay. My job as an OS, I told you I was I was an ICO, interface control officer, that was working with all the data links so I can link up with any type of P-3s, at the time was P-3 now it's a P-8, patrol, maritime patrol craft now. 01:46:00But P-3s--any ship, any sub, any helicopter any any type of assets we had that had any type of link that would link stuff at four-alpha, link 11, link 16. NCTSI Det will go and they will make sure that any ship out there can see whatever other ship is transmitting. So I went to every ship on the East Coast to actually test their systems. So

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: So Mayport, we'll go down to Mayport. We'll go to Jack. We would go down to "NAS Jax" [Naval Air Station-Jacksonville, Florida] to test, the P-3s at the time. We go over to Mayport , test all the ships and even some of the shore commands, wed test their stuff too. Right. So then. Or we would do all the ships like the Reagan, right, the Truman, Eisenhower, all those carriers, all the destroyers. Every ship out there, we tested all their stuff. Then we would go to Maine. That's like where, in Brunswick, Maine, is what it is like where they 01:47:00had a lot of the P-3s stationed out of. Right. It was Brunswick, Maine, and maybe Jacksonville, in NAS Jacksonville. So we went up there to Maine to test all their stuff up there as well. So we will go up and test their stuff, too. Then we would go to Lockheed Martin up in New Jersey. Right. The Aegis training facility up there. And we would go up there and help test Aegis baselines for Korea, Japan, for Spain, all the different ages, baselines that was being created for all the other ships out there and other nations. And even our different baselines, we would test all their stuff too. So we did all that stuff with to test every platform in the military, East Coast. And I was upset, though, because after I left NCTSI, they came up to Marinette Marine up here to 01:48:00test all the LCSs [Littoral Combat Ship] up here [both laugh]. I'm like, how come I couldn't come up here? This is home!

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: After I retired, they came up here to do that [laughs]. But. But for NCTSI that, we would travel up and down the coast in a 5-ton truck, with a couple, about two or $3 million worth of equipment in it. We would go, we had a tech reps from Northrop Grumman. We worked with SPAWAR [Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command], we worked with Lockheed Martin, like I said. Any type of contractor out there, we would work with them to be able to get the stuff to test their their equipment to make sure that the symbology that was on their tactical data systems jive with the other symbology from other platforms. So.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: That was a lot of fun.

SPRAGUE: Yeah, that sounds, it sounds like it [Cocroft laughs]. Yeah, it does, actually. What, I've got you in 2004 going into this primary leadership development program to back up a little bit.

COCROFT: Yes.

SPRAGUE: Tell me about that.

COCROFT: Yeah, I had a lot of times in the military, they want you. If you wanted to advance, you have to go to different different courses. Right. You know, because whenever you try to do like advance, you know, different, different ranks or whatever, you have to have certain qualifications and so forth this year. So I went to a lot of different leadership schools. I went to a lot of different, like, link schools, like better link schools, so I was here at Fort McPherson in Georgia. I would go to different places like that to to learn more, to be able to take the test, to be able to get up to, you know, E-7or E-8, whatever I was going to go up to, go for. Right. So a lot of those schools, you would go there and they would teach you how to be a leader. Right. So you can serve correctly for your people. They don't want you to, you know, being a knucklehead or whatever and, you know, being, you know, you know, breaking 01:50:00people down when you should be trying to build people up. So a lot of the schools I went to were like, you know, leadership schools to be able to help me advance the next rank. By that time, I was ready to go. I was ready to get out of the military by that time. So. Yep.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So you're at NCTSI Det.

COCROFT: NCTSI Det 2. Yep.

SPRAGUE: Det 2. Did you have another tour after that or did you?

COCROFT: That was my last tour.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah. I was happy. I was I was like 18 years in . They kept saying, You need to take the E-7 test. I'm like, Nope, I'm good, right. And then they kept saying, We can give you this early promote eval, nope don't give to me, give it to someone else that's staying in. I said, I'm about to give it. I said, I'm I'm done pretty much I'm I'm ready to go. So as time went on, I got 19 and a half years in and they reached out to me, say, Hey, we got the orders for you. If you 01:51:00want to stay in, you can go to [laughs] you go to Djibouti, Africa, or you can go you can go to a couple other places over in the Middle East and I guarantee that you make E-7. I'm like, I'm good, man. You know, by that time I was done, you know. You know, it was. It was time for me to go, because I'd had 20, almost 20 years in by that time, you know, I was. I was ready to go, man.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: No worries. Um, let's see here. So, uh, what, uh, what were your. What were you thinking at the time when you. You were just ready to go? It was just.

COCROFT: Yeah, I was ready to go. It was it was, of course, as you know, had the military changed over a period of time. 20 years is a long time, you know, 26.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: You know, so I'm sitting there and things were just changing a lot. We 01:52:00had new, we had new people at at the Det, at the headquarters that were just to me, that wasn't geared for leadership. Right. So, I said to myself, Okay, why don't I just go ahead and just bide my time and hit the gas? Yeah. You know, and it's funny because at the time I'm getting married, take terminal leave and my AOC, [laughs] AOIC [Assistant Officer in Charge] said to me, Hey, Groovy, We're going to have this retirement ceremony for you. I'm like, Oh yeah? He said, Yeah. I said, I don't want it, man, I'm good. I said, take term to leave, I'm out of here. Right. He said, No, you're going to have this ceremony. I said, Okay, I'll have it, but I'm not going to show up [both laugh]. He said, What?! [Sprague laughs] So I didn't get in any of the certificates. Why, I didn't get 01:53:00any of that. I didn't want it though. And it wasn't that I was shunning the Navy. I was done, man, I was I don't like all this hoopla stuff. I was always behind the scene and stuff. Even now at MAVRC [Military and Veterans Resource Center], I'm behind the scenes, Ms. Yolanda's the face. Right. I know. I. She knows just as many people as I know. Right. However, I like to do things behind the scenes and just lay low. That's just me, you know? And like this, right here is something that I can do to carry on my legacy. Right. But I don't like awards or something like that. I never did. I was always a just a chill cat like that. Hence the name Groovy, you know what I'm saying[laughs]?

SPRAGUE: I understand. [Cocroft laughs]. I completely understand. Okay, so here, here, here we go. So you get out.

COCROFT: Mhm.

SPRAGUE: What was that like coming back to the civilian world.

COCROFT: It was a shit show [laughs], for a minute. I had 100 days terminal leave, 100 days of, it was linked with my regular leave, terminal, and, you know, house-hunting and [??] leave, right. So, 100 days. I came home in May. Traveled a bit, have fun, but I didn't think about a job. Didn't think about nothing. Right. That's okay. Well, as far as crunch times, I'll come in, I was about to do a, you know, retire retire. I said, Well, let me just go ahead and look at Lockheed Martin. Uh, you know, Northrop Grumman, any contracted BAE Systems, or whatever it is, right? And look at those and then say, you know what? That's going to keep me away from my family again. So I said, No, I don't want to do that. And then, at that time, my dad got sick and then some uncles got sick. So I didn't, um, sister, my sister Janelle worked at at UW-M. She 01:55:00said, why don't you come work with us there? And I was at a little lost of my, you know, so I did. So I found a new mission, but it took me a little time to equate it as a mission though. So I was I was struggling. I struggled a lot, you know.

SPRAGUE: Did you find any friends or allies or people who could help you through your transition?

COCROFT: At first I was that I was in that mode of where no one understands me because I'm back in Milwaukee. There's not enough military around here. Right. Kind of isolated myself from the family, you know, stuff like that. I was still I was still single at the time, you know, I just didn't know. I just didn't want to be bothered with a lot of people, you know. And I finally met my wife that I have now, Rosemary, 2008, because I worked at, ended up getting a job at UW-M, 01:56:00September 4th, 2007. I left UW-M in February of 2008. But then I'm taking the test again, the test, the state test and you know, coming back to UW-M. But, and I've been there pretty much ever since, but at one point I just didn't, didn't think that anybody understood what I was going through, you know, and, like I said, I isolated myself. I was grumpy, irritated, angry all the time, all kinds of like that. And, and, um, my mother told me, at the time Rosemary was my girlfriend, told me that you need to get your stuff together because you don't, you know, it's not looking good, you know, just, you're not doing right. So I ended up going to a kind of cognitive processing therapy, you know. So I started 01:57:00doing things for my mental health, you know. And so now I'm an advocate for that stuff because I tell people that you can't equate what you're doing when you get out as a mission to kind of have some self-worth, you know, a plan to do things. And then I had a therapist who told me, I said, no, no one understood what I was going through. He said, she said No. Yeah. She said, You ever thought about what they're going to. Then it clicked. I need to get my shit together, you know what I'm saying? And so that's why I've been doing therapy ever since then, so.

SPRAGUE: Do you find that helps you talk with veterans about--.

COCROFT: Yes.

SPRAGUE: Themselves?

COCROFT: Yes. I have a I have a psychiatrist. Name is Dr. Greg Burke. Right. At Aurora. He's from Wisconsin. And I knew him prior to, right, prior to me actually being one of his patients. But we sat there and talked because they 01:58:00they have a support group that they have. And one day which I'm, ah, is one support group that's just a free for all, you can talk about whatever. He talked about some of the missions that he was on in 2003. I said, Okay. And, he says, Lejeune. I'm like, Hmm. I say, You know what? I said, You all went down to Morehead City [North Carolina] and picked up some stuff. He said, Really, I said, Yeah. So, he said, Huh? I'm like, Yeah, I said, I was with the task force that picked up all, all the equipment from Lejeune in 2003. It was actually his battalion. The MEU, he was attached to that MEU [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Wow. It's a small world.

COCROFT: It's a very small world.

SPRAGUE: Mm-hm.

COCROFT: So, because me and him always clicked, right? Me being his patient, whatever. We always clicked. But it was just so crazy just to hear that. And 01:59:00then it wasn't like, What? I'm like, Yeah, I said, he said. He said, You was on a the Kearsarge? I said, Yeah, I was on the Kearsarge. He said, Oh man, he said, so, I didn't ride the ship, he said, because part of them flew and the other ones rode. But the equipment all got carried over by ships. So his equipment, for that MEU, was on our task force [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: Small world, man.

SPRAGUE: So you're working? I was trying to put the pieces together.

COCROFT: Um-hm.

SPRAGUE: It looked like you were working maybe while, you had the GI Bill. You're also working at the same time or.

COCROFT: Yep.

SPRAGUE: Tell me, tell me about your bachelor's degree and stuff.

COCROFT: Well, what happened was, so then things start happening in that 2010, 2011, time frame where everything that happened with the with the the administration of, the Scott Walker administration during that time frame, it's 02:00:00like doing things that weakens the public folks, whatever, I decided to resign my position at UW-M because I wanted to go to school and actually do something different, and then kind of come back into the private sector after that. I decided I wanted to use my my GI Bill. So that's what I did. And so 2012 is when I started school and I graduated with a degree in information sciences and technology from UW-M, and what's, the reason I took that that major is because I worked on tactical data systems, a lot of computer stuff. So I figured out, put it, put what I knew on paper, you know. So that's how I came, came to do that. So I have a degree in IST and then also a certificate in digital culture, not digital culture, you know, the digital arts and culture. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Tell me about your involvement in the Black Cultural Center.

COCROFT: Yeah, it was funny because I was doing work study. And so with work study, I was doing a VA work study and I was doing the regular work study because of, when you are recipient of a GI bill, you can actually apply for financial aid as well. But people don't know that. So I was using the GI Bill working in, where I'm the assistant director right now in MAVRC and then I worked in the Black Cultural Center, as, with the regular federal work study. So I was there and I was helping mentor a lot of kids there. And my son actually came to school in 2013, moved from Saint Louis to Milwaukee. They go to school at UW-M. And so we went to school together, right, at the same time. We actually did a photo shoot, everything like this here. But when the kids found out that my son went to school there as well, right, they was fascinated by that. And then, I sort of, I said, We're peers because we go to school. I said, But I'll 02:02:00give it to you as a peer. The information. I'm going to give it to you as a parent, too. So I had a dual hat in that thing. So I gave them the information of how college students would do. But I said, this is what your parent might be thinking. So they kind of kind of gave us some insight of how a parent would think with them going to school. So it kind of worked out a bit.

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Tell me about how you got into MAVRC.

COCROFT: During, doing some IT stuff, trying to equate the, trying to figure out the data of how many students that we actually had, because if you if you come to any school in the nation, they have military students, it's very hard to actually figure out how many students are going there. So I did a lot of that data mining myself to try to figure out inside our system to figure out who's actually a veteran by looking at who's who's who's using G.I. bills or whatever 02:03:00it is, or any type of federal assistance for for schooling at the at the DR&E program. Chapter 31. 1606. 33. 35. Whatever it is.

SPRAGUE: Yep. Yep.

COCROFT: I'm looking at all these different numbers, right, and the different things that kind of equate to that. But I also had to look at some of the people that had self-reported. Some people don't self-report. Some people are not using the GI Bill. So I had to dig deep into that stuff. So that's how I got into MAVRC as a work study student. And then when I graduated, I left for a little bit just to see what I can see out out there on the horizon. But I came back and since then I've been at MAVRC as the assistant director. I started out as the interim assistant director, you know, and then I went ahead and then applied for the regular position and then interviewed, so with this here and I'm getting hired on.

SPRAGUE: I have to ask you, as a veteran, what is it like serving those other, 02:04:00you know, veterans?

COCROFT: It's rewarding because some of the things I didn't know but I struggle with when I got out, I'm able to give those people some some insight on some things to do, some things not to do this. Just give them some some good information. I'm not sure I'd tell them what to do and just give them some things that were happening with me. I tell my story all the time that them know that I struggle and. And that let them know their struggle and let them know that they're not alone with that, you know, because a lot of times we think that we're all alone when we're struggling and we don't realize that everybody's struggling as well or other people are struggling as well. So gave him some information about of how I coped with different things and how I achieve that need, you know, the struggles I had and the obstacles that I had no mental 02:05:00health barriers so I could see her and and how I was not is not just that bad to go get the help that you need. And for some other folks, they think going to the V.A. that, you know, getting a disability as a, you know, VA disability, whatever. I tell them, I said, well, I said, look at it as compensation. Right. It's a conversation because when he was there, he was 100% he was able do all these different things and now you can't do it. So they compensating that for you. So [foreplay??] it, and get them to understand that it's not a hindrance. It's something that you can use to to kind of normalize your life again.

SPRAGUE: What's it like to be the advisor to the Student Veterans of America?

COCROFT: It's funny because you have a lot of folks that are young. They are 02:06:00they still are struggling with some of their identity, you know, of the military culture in a sense. They don't realize what they have to do when they get out, that it's time, a place where all the different things, because our dark humor that we have in the military is not for everyone. [Both laugh] You know what I'm saying. So I have to kind of coach them on that, let them know, you know, don't think in ultimates, like, you know, this is the ultimate thing or this is a final thing. Thinking possibilities or think of don't think in general terms of everything. Be to the point like we're taught to be in the military. So you have to think about things. And sometimes it's kind of hard because some of the students are upset because there are some 18 year olds in classes talking in 02:07:00class and they talk about how the kids are this way. And I said, Hey, guess what? You was an 18 year old.You was talking at one point. I said before you before you get this military culture, he says you had civilian culture first. And then they look at me [Sprague laughs]. Just show some patience and some tolerance, you know what I'm saying that's all you got to do. I'm like, wow. Like, I never thought about that. I said I had to learn it, too.

SPRAGUE: What, how do you treat Memorial Day and Veterans Day? That's coming up.

COCROFT: Honors, honor for Memorial Day I honor the sacrifice that people have, you know, the ultimate sacrifice people have given for us, for our for our way of life, you know, and for Veterans Day. I celebrate people that served, of course. So I try to educate people what Memorial Day is and what Veterans Day is 02:08:00so people can know. And, you know, of course, when we haven't--two people that I know from the Pentagon, we had a guy that was in that that was under my command, and it's he that died as well. So the ultimate sacrifice is what I try to tell people. And it is you know, I respect the families. I respect that person, things like that. Veteran's Day and was celebrate everyone's service, you know, and then even with Armed Forces Day right celebrate the people that are serving right now. You know, that's what a lot of people don't know about Armed Forces Day. Right. So so we celebrate people that are currently serving right now. Also, we do that, too, that we try to get our hands on all of that stuff and be and that the people know what the differences are.

SPRAGUE: With special respect, could you. Do you happen to remember the name of 02:09:00the person that died who was under your command at NCTSI?

COCROFT: Yes. Yeah. Erick Bittney, OS-2 Erick Bittney. He was a Navajo Indian from Albuquerque. Not Albuquerque. He's from New Mexico, though.

SPRAGUE: Eric. E-R-I-C-K?

COCROFT: Eric.

SPRAGUE: And Bittney?

COCROFT: B-I-T-T-N-E-Y.

SPRAGUE: Okay. And put you on the spot.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: But I want to get it right.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: I've been doing some therapy about Erick Bittney because I had to go identify his body, so like that, in the morgue. So that was pretty rough. You know, I searched for his car at the at the mall, the McArthur Mall in Norfolk, and I flew to Albuquerque, me and my commander, Commander Rick [Schutta??], we all flew, me and him flew to Albuquerque. And then we drove over to a little 02:10:00area by Santa Fe area for his his funeral. So yeah, that was pretty rough. And this past year I actually talked about it in my therapy, finally talked about in my therapy about the whole situation because I had to go and identify the body and I had to go in the morgue in Virginia. And there's a lot of dead bodies in there, you know, people got burned, somebody got shot. An old lady in there that passed from natural causes. Two people that got burned up in house. So people were still smoke inside in there. And he is in the corner. A lot of times people are so numb to things, right. And they had a plastic bag with a clear plastic bag over his head and they had the wire cutter on him. So he was just laid open and she snatched a bag of his hair and his head bobbled around and she said, Oh, he must have had a death wish or something is what she said. I'm like, I think to myself, like, Lady, stop, right, as he tell, sees it, tell us what he had in 02:11:00his stomach for for dinner that night. I'm like. So. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: And how did he pass? What was his?

COCROFT: They said struck a parking structure in Norfolk. Downtown Norfolk. Okay. So I worked with the police department and this detective. They go to, they investigated and I had to write a report. We had write reports for casualty report and we had to do that. It was weird, though, because he had a twin sister and somehow, somehow his sister was in town. And when we were at the command, NCTSI, writing the reports and getting everything to sent out, message driver, his mom calls us. No one called the mom to tell them, to tell them anything, but the mom calls. So we try to figure out what will happen with that. So we never got closure on that, how the mom knew. The detective didn't call her, you know.

SPRAGUE: And this this was at Norfolk?

COCROFT: This is in Norfolk, at NCTSI. And it was in 2000. And I think to ask 2004, 2005.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Yeah. [pause] I still think about them.

SPRAGUE: Mm hmm.

COCROFT: Mm hmm.

SPRAGUE: Erick. E-R-I-C-K?

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay. I want to make sure I got it right.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay. So. What do you think? What did it mean for you to serve as an African-American?

COCROFT: Just wanted to be able to contribute to this, you know, legacy to the country. You know, you know, there's always some stuff going on with race, race things. And so I would see it in the country where I worked from. And some people don't believe that other people fit in and whatever. But we had a whole 02:13:00legacy of family members doing their thing, right. So I just did my part. You know, that's how I feel. And when someone say something to me, sometimes I just look at him. I smile. I just keep walking. Because you don't know me. I don't know you. Right. And one thing my mama always say, that's their problem. [Laughs] You know what I'm saying. I just keep stuff there. I used to cuss people out. But now that I've had therapy, I just accept it as a necessary issue, and I just keep walking. But it's frustrating sometimes because some people, I had a lady, right after we got back in 2003, I went to Navy Federal, right, to go do some business, got some money, I sent to my sister Janelle, went to the post office right next to Navy Federal [Credit Union], and this older Caucasian lady in there. I go in there, I'm standing in line, she's snatching her purse up like this, scared. I got pissed, man. I was like, you know, I just 02:14:00got back from deployment [laughs]. You know what I am saying? Protecting somebody's rights to do whatever, right. And that's what I have to go through. So that pissed me off, you know? But I didn't say nothing. I just let it be, you know? It's frustrating. There's some things like that. Oh, I forgot one thing I forgot to tell you. This is crazy. During that same time frame, Carl Brashear.

SPRAGUE: That sounds familiar. Yeah.

COCROFT: The Man of Honor movie.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

COCROFT: The master chief.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: With the amputated leg?

SPRAGUE: Yeah, yeah.

COCROFT: I actually met him in Navy Federal [laughs].

SPRAGUE: What?!

COCROFT: Well, at that same time I met him in Navy Federal. Yeah, it was cool. It was a couple of years before he passed away. I sat down to talk to him right in Navy Federal I talked to him about 20, 30 minutes. It's pretty cool [laughs] He was retired in Virginia. His son plays hockey too, his son is a hockey player. But it was funny. So I asked questions about the movie [laughs]. I said, 02:15:00did that thing happen with the submarine and you being in a submarine and I mean, you've been on in a submarine, and he said, No, that's just part of the movie thing, you know. But yeah, I talked to him about about his experience in the military and it was I was so happy to be able to meet him, you know, that's cool, man. That's cool business.

SPRAGUE: I remember the movie. How do you spell his last name?

COCROFT: Oh, I don't.

SPRAGUE: Brashear.

COCROFT: Yeah.

SPRAGUE: I'll find it.

COCROFT: I think something like that. Yeah, yeah, I met him at Navy Federal 2003 after I got back [laughs]. That was crazy. Just to have seen him.

SPRAGUE: And that would have been at Norfolk.

COCROFT: Um-hm. Yep.

SPRAGUE: Okay. Wow.

COCROFT: That was cool business. I was like, Man, that's cool [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Any other interesting experiences?

COCROFT: Met Geraldine Ferraro. You remember her?

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: I met her in, I met her in France. They came to my ship, the William V. 02:16:00Pratt. I was in Marseilles. She came on board the ship, you know, doing her thing. They were, her and I think it was, who else was with her? I just came up there and I met her on the bridge. She came up there and I was on the watch, watch she come up there. So I met her as well.

SPRAGUE: Wow.

COCROFT: That's cool business. And I was like, I was happy in there too. I was like, Man, that was cool.

SPRAGUE: Huh.

COCROFT: Yeah. The Oreck man. You know, the guy that, Oreck vacuum cleaners?

SPRAGUE: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

COCROFT: I was flying on board. Flying on board the Truman. They do some some testing, some of that stuff out out, because they just came out of the overhaul and he was flying on the [COT??] with me, flying to the Truman to go see the, to go out there, because I didn't know this, the Navy actually does these things where they have celebrities and dignitaries, stuff this here, that come that that they fly them out to the ships at the carriers let them see the operations. Like the flight ops. Then they fly 'em back and I almost crushed his hand cause 02:17:00cause on the [COT??] you sit backwards, right?

SPRAGUE: Right.

COCROFT: So I was like this. And I looked at him, Oh, I'm sorry. So, yes, I saw that guy too. So I just you get to meet people here and there. So it was a cool business, man [laughs].

SPRAGUE: Probably a Mr. Oreck of Oreck vacuum cleaners?

COCROFT: Yep. Mr. Oreck. Yep.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: Isn't that funny?

SPRAGUE: Wow [Cocroft laughs]. Okay.

COCROFT: I knew a couple of people. A couple of famous people.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. No, absolutely.

COCROFT: Yes. Funny business. Yeah.

SPRAGUE: Okay. What motivated you to do this interview?

COCROFT: Um, at the tone of you, definitely. When we talked about it during the "I Am Not Invisible" campaign, that was the one at UW-M on June 9th of this year, 2022, and you said, you said, Have you ever thought about doing it. I'm like, Hmm. That'd be cool. Just to do stuff, you know, because at one point I 02:18:00was on the mural outside of the museum too.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

COCROFT: So that was cool. But yeah, that was like real cool. So I said, why not do this too? Yeah. You know, and I talk about my history and my story to people because I want people to know about me and what I've done, because sometimes people dont, they look at you differently. They're like, What did this guy do? Well, I didn't do much [laughs]. I just, you know, I just served my country and to have fun doing it, you know? You know, I had some bad times, but. No, but I had some good times too, though.

SPRAGUE: Did we miss anything that you'd like to cover?

COCROFT: Oh, I went through the Suez Canal. I went through the Panama Canal. I also did the 'Bluenose' thing where you cross the Arctic Circle. So I did stuff 02:19:00like that, too. So that was a tradition that that that they have in the Navy, so a lot of different. I'm a Shellback, I crossed the equator, did that as well. So just a lot of different things that I did when I was in the Navy because the tradition is is all Navy's full- fledged Navy, you know? And so it was just it was great to be able to serve with all my friends. So those people are more family than my family [laughs]. You know what I'm saying? Um, I still keep in touch with our people. I love all my friends. They love me. I'm happy that I did this. Regardless of what's going on in the world today and how people are acting nutty. I still I'm still happy that I made I was able to do my service for the country, you know. So just just a great thing to do. You know. Never thought I'd be going out of this country that I wanted to, you know, when I was a kid growing up in Milwaukee. I thought I do some things and I sit at home now and I 02:20:00see some some different movies, whatever. Like Malta, so like this here, I see something and my wife said, Were you there? Like I did. I've been there [laughs]. She said, Shut up [laughter]. So. [Both laugh]

SPRAGUE: Okay.

COCROFT: It's a lot of fun, though.

SPRAGUE: Well, thank you for your service.

COCROFT: Thank you too, man. Appreciate you.

SPRAGUE: Okay, then this will conclude the interview.

COCROFT: All right, sir.

[Interview Ends]