Pearl Harbor Day

Already the 7th over here, (would have been my Dad's birthday too).
I have a mate who's not really into WW2 at all but went to Pearl Harbor when on holiday few years ago , he met several Veterans & was very impressed by the memorials.
He wears a Pearl Harbor pin on his work uniform still.

 

I was in Japan a bare couple of days after Pearl Harbor Day two years ago. (Which, you might note, was a fairly round anniversary.) While I very much enjoyed my first brief visit to Japan it was a thought provoking experience.

 

Today's Pearl Harbor article from the local paper's website, two brief interviews with survivors and some "where were you when" accounts.
http://readingeagle.com/article/20131207/NEWS/312079979#.UqPkyOIfj90

 

One of my customers (since deceased) had been aboard the California during the attack. When she was abandoned he swam to Ford Island and never left. He spent the entire war there. He always thought that it was a little ironic that the survivors are now considered heroes because whenever he met new arrivals on Ford Island during the war he never mentioned that he had been there on the 7th. He had learned early on that the new guys on the block often felt that the Hawaiian forces had been "asleep at the switch" and had failed to do their job and they didn't hesitate to voice their opinion as to that fact.
Since we just recognized the 50th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination I thought that the story of Pearl Harbor survivor Jim Leavelle might be of interest to the members. He had been aboard the tender Whitney during the attack and 22 years later would become a footnote in the assassination's aftermath. In the photo of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald, Leavelle is the officer dressed in white with the white hat who is at Oswald's side. He said he saw the gun in Ruby's hand and had tried to pull Oswald out of the way. He always wondered what would have happened if he had pushed instead of pulled.

 

^Takao,

Thank you. Those were indeed interesting reading.

^Sanwichery,

That's WAY too close for comfort. Twice.

 

A remarkably little talked about event outside of a history class in today's day in age.........Never forget.....

 

Correction Lou: to my knowledge there are 5 veterans from the USS Arizona left, not Pearl Harbour veterans as a whole

 

Yes, a sad fact. Truth be told I was surprised to hear that there were 5 Arizona vets still with us. I had expected less.

 

I just finished researching a sailor who died on the USS Houston (CL81) in Oct 1944. In doing so, I discovered that he had previously served on the USS Marblehead. The following is an excerpt from the War Diary of the USS Marblehead dated 8 Dec 1941:

At 0315, the following message was received from the Commander in Charge of the Asiatic Fleet: “JAPAN STARTED HOSTILITIES, GOVERN YOURSELVES ACCORDINGLY.” At 0348 on 08 Dec, the following message was received from the Secretary of the Navy: “EXECUTE WPL FORTY-SIX AGAINST JAPAN.”​

At the time, the USS Marblehead was at Tarakan, Borneo. In my research I also came across a blog post from Hampton Roads Naval Museum which contained the following image:




I presume that the USS Marblehead had received a similar message as indicated in the above War Diary entry.