When I first tell that story, the usual reaction is: Was that a fair thing to do?

Well, they said, “Why, Mr. Goddard, you couldn’t get out of this island until the month of October at the earliest.”

I sat in my hotel room in Barbados and got comfortable, and then I assumed that I was in a little boat . . a little tender, taking me off to the waiting ship in the bay.

“Mr. Goddard, we’ve Just received a cable from New York canceling a passage sailing on the next ship

Right after the war was over, I took the first trip out with my wife and little girl to the Island of Barbados in the West Indies.

When I went to the steamship company, they showed me a list which was as long as from here to there of people waiting to get on the boat.

I wanted to get out. I found myself locked in . . locked in until October at the earliest

“we have one lady here . . an American lady who has been bothering us week after week to get her out of Barbados back to New York, so we called her first

strangely enough, my brother Victor went up with my little girl in his arms . . the very first one to step off

So I assumed I stepped off onto the gangplank, and then step after step right up the entire gangplank

The next morning, Friday at 10:35, the Alcoa Steamship Company called me and offered me passage on the next sailing

I was leaving a very wonderful and large family behind that I had not seen in six years

So, the first ship out of New York City to sail for the Indies after the war was over, I sailed with my little family to Barbados.

then your little ship is latched alongside of the big ship and a gangplank is lowered and you walk up the gangplank

and then I went sound asleep in the act of walking up the gangplank

I felt that if I walked up the gangplank and it seemed to me real, and then on the top of that ship holding the rail I could look back at the little town of Bridgetown

In Barbados, it took me less than one day to have passage on a ship, although the ship was not sailing for another twenty-one days.

At the very end of March, I saw the ship that sailed for New York leaving the bay.

If you put your name down with your family of three, you are at the bottom of the list—it will take two years to get out of here.”

On arrival, my brother asked me when I intended returning to America. Well, this was the 30th of January.

I could look back at the little town of Bridgetown, and have that feeling of sadness and yet joy