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

The disobeying sailors are “packed in like sardines” on the prison barge, where they spend days awaiting judgment (87). Tensions on the barge grow as men debate whether or not they should return to work. Small advises one particular sailor that he should not resume work, as he would be viewed as a traitor by the others on the barge. Each day, the sailors are marched from the barge to the mess hall for food, where some sailors steal utensils and carve them into knives for use as weapons. Small grows fearful that the simmering tensions on the barge will lead to a fight with the military guards on the shore, and he delivers a speech to the sailors to try to calm them down. In the speech, Small argues that any fighting or misbehavior will provide the guards with leverage over the sailors, giving them justification to shoot at the barge. Small’s words prove persuasive; the men lose their anger and obey all orders given to them by their guards.

On day three on the prison barge, the sailors are ordered to line up by Division and march to a field. Once at the field, Admiral Carleton Wright approaches them in a jeep.