yed.[3-112] It (p. 091)
also organized twenty logistic support companies to replace the
formless base companies sent to the Pacific in the early months of the
recruitment program. Organized to perform supply functions, each
company consisted of 250 enlisted men and five officers, with a
flexible range of petty officer billets.

[Footnote 3-110: BuPers Cir Ltr 72-44, 13 Mar 44,
sub: Negro Personnel of the Commissary Branch,
Assignment to Duty of.]

[Footnote 3-111: Idem, 182-44, 29 Jun 44, "Uniform
for Chief Cooks and Chief Stewards and Cooks and
Stewards."]

[Footnote 3-112: Idem, 45-18, 21 Feb 45, and 45-46,
31 May 45, sub: Negro Enlisted
Personnel--Limitation on Assignment of to Naval
Ammunition Depots and Naval Magazines.]

In the reform atmosphere slowly permeating the Bureau of Naval
Personnel, the Special Programs Unit found it relatively easy to end
segregation in the specialist training program.[3-113] From the first,
the number of Negroes eligible for specialist training had been too
small to make costly duplication of equipment and services practical.
In 1943, for example, the black aviation metalsmith school at Great
Lakes had an average enrollment of eight students. The school was
quietly closed and its students integrated with white students. Thus,
when the _Mason's_ complement was assembled in early 1944, Negroes
were put into the destroyer school at Norfolk side by side with
whites, and the black and white petty officers were quartered
together. As a natural consequence of the decision to place Negroes in
the auxiliary fleet, the Bureau of Naval Personnel opened training in
seagoing rates to Negroes on an integrated basis. Citing the
practicality of the move, the bureau closed the last of the black
schools in June 1945.[3-114]

[Footnote 3-113: There is some indication that
integration was already going on unofficially in
some specialist schools; see Ltr, Dr. M. A. F.
Ritchie to James C. Evans, 13 Aug 65, CMH files.]

[Footnote 3-114: BuPers Cir Ltr 194-44, sub: Advanced
Schools, Nondiscrimination in Selection of
Personnel for Training in; Ltr, Chief, NavPers, to