Bare-Faced Messiah (PDF) - Apologetics Index

Monterey, California, for further training, having finished about mid-way among the 300 students on
his course at the school of Military Government. In April he again reported sick and a possible ulcer
was diagnosed.
On 2 September 1945, after the horror of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Japanese signed the
surrender instrument on the quarterdeck of the USS Missouri, anchored in Tokyo Bay. Three days
later, Ron was re-admitted to Oak Knoll Naval Hospital, Oakland, not as a result of heroic war
wounds, but to be treated for 'epigastric distress'. It was in this rather inglorious situation, suffering
from a suspected duodenal ulcer, that the war ended for Lieutenant L. Ron Hubbard, US Navy
Reserve.
He, of course, saw it somewhat differently: 'Blinded with injured optic nerves, and lame with injuries
to hip and back, at the end of World War Two I faced an almost non-existent future . . . I was
abandoned by family and friends as a supposedly hopeless cripple and a probable burden upon
them for the rest of my days . . . I became used to being told it was all impossible, that there was no
way, no hope. Yet I came to see and walk again . . .'[19]
If his own account of his war experiences is to be believed, he certainly deserved the twenty-one
medals and palms he was said to have received. Unfortunately, his US Navy record indicates he
was awarded just four routine medals - the American Defense Service Medal, awarded to everyone
serving at the time of Pearl Harbor, the American Campaign Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign
Medal and the World War Two Victory Medal, this last received by everyone serving on V-J Day.
1. Memorandum from Hubbard to Magnuson, 22 July 1941
2. Memorandum for Assistant Hydrographer, 22 October 1941
3. Despatch from US Naval Attaché, Melbourne, 14 February 1942
4. Memorandum from C.O. USS YP-422, 12 September 1942
5. Moulton testimony in Church of Scientology v. Armstrong, 21 May 1984
6. USS PC-815 Action Report, 24 May 1943
7. Memorandum from Commander NW Sea Frontier, 8 June 1943
8. Record of proceedings, Board of Investigation, USS PC-815, 30 June 1943
9. Letter of admonition from Commander, Fleet Operational Training Command, Pacific, 15 July 1943
10. Report on the Fitness of Officers, 29 May - 7 July 1943
11. Letter from L. Ron Hubbard Jr., 26 January 1973
12. L. Ron Hubbard autobiographical notes, 1972