Chapter 26
December 1941
The
thirty of us from Kaneohe were taken by truck to the Pearl Harbor Naval Base
where the motor launch would take us to Landing A on Ford Island. The boat, normall spick and span in grey
paint and shined brass works, was filthy with oil and blood from picking up
bodies and debris in the oil covered, wreckage strewn waters.
We
stared in silent awe as the boat crossed to the island. The tall tripod mast of the ARIZONA leaned at
an angle above the sunken hull of the battleship. The dull red bottom of the capsized OKLAHOMA
was sprinkled with the blue-white flares of cutting torches in the on-going
attempt to cut through to men still strapped inside the battered ships, only
some of which I could identify—WEST VIRGINIA, CALIFORNIA, TENNESSEE, MARYLAND.
In
the big dry-dock in East Loch, the wreckage of the destroyers CASSIN and DOWNES
leaned against each other, trapping the battleship PENNYSLVANIA, flagship of the
Pacific Fleet, in the damaged dry-dock. Over beyond Ford Island was the battered bulk
of the NEVEDA which had been the only battleship to get under way during the
attack. Under intense dive bombing,
NEVADA had been beached on Hospital Point rather than be sunk blocking the
narrow entrance to the harbor. The
waters of the bay were covered with a thick scum of oil and pieces of wreckage. Motor whaleboats were everywhere picking up
the flotsam and still occasionally pulling aboard an old covered body.
Not
a word was spoken in our group until the boat desposited us at Landing A. As we debarked onto the wide concrete landing
we walked past a row of tarpaulin covered bodies that had been pulled from the
bay. From behind me I heard someone
mutter bitterly, “God damn the sons-a-bitches!”
No
time was wasted. We were escorted to our
living quarters that were a roped-off corner of the least badly damaged PBY
hangar on the island. Rows of folding
cots had been set up. Since the Ford
Island barracks were overflowing with survivors, the corner of that hangar was
where we would sleep while maintenance work on airplanes was done. The windows of the hanglar had been painted
black so that work could continue twenty-four hours a day.
As
soon as we had deposited our ditty bags (I had brought only a spare suit of
dungarees and one white uniform) on a chosen cot, we lined up at a desk near
the VP-22 operations office for assignment.
I was assigned to 22-P-6 and was informed that the airplane was on the
ramp and was scheduled for evening patrol.
22-P-6
had not come through the attack unscathed.
The fuselage, wing, and tail suraces were peppered with bullet
holes. Those below the waterline had
been patched properly by the metalsmiths but those on the upper surfaces simply
had fabric patches doped over the holes.
The
plane captain on 22-P-6 was a harried second class AMM named Gibson. His face was grim and there were dark circles
under his eyes. He greeted me warmly
because both the original plane captain, a first class, and the third mech had
been wounded in the attack and were in the hospital. He had been promoted to plane captain, I
would be second mech, and our third mech was a seaman striker for AMM.
When
I commented that Gibson looked bushed, he sighed and said, “Don’t rightly
remember when I had some sack time—we worked all day yesterday and last night
to get this old bird flyable.”
The
pilots came aboard while Gibson and I were finishing our pre-flight checks of
the equipment. All guns were loaded and
we were carrying two five hundred pound bombs and two depth charges on the wing
racks. When he found that I had more
than fifty hours of flight time, Gibson put me in the mechanics tower for
takeoff and the first watch. He would
try to get some sleep when we were airborne.
When
I scrambled into the tower, I saw that there were two bullet holes in the
instrument panel. I called them to
Gibson’s attention. “I know,” he said
tiredly. “I checked all the lines behind
the panel and they look okay. Slapped
some tape on the holes outside. Just get
“em started!” He fired up the putt-putt
and the instrument panel came alive.
When
we taxied out on the oily water of Pearl Harbor, motor whaleboats were still
busily clearing debris from the takeoff sea lane on the east side of Ford
Island past Battleship Row. When we were
in position, a green flag was waved from the nearest boat and we started our
takeoff run. Just as the airplane came
up onto the step I heard a loud thud from somewhere below. In response to the annunciator light on the
panel, I moved the mixture controls from Full Rich to Automatic Rich for climb
and maneuver then slid down out of the tower.
In
the galley compartment directly below the tower Gibson was standing staring
mournfully at a hole in the bottom of the airplane. We had hit a piece of debris that curled the
aluminum skin inward leaving a hole about six inches wide and over a foot long
between hull frames. Through the hole we
could see the Naval Hospital passing below as the airplane banked out to sea.
While
we were contemplating the damage, the PPC turned the airplane over to the
co-pilot and came aft. He whistled and
groaned, “What a hell of a way to start a war—shot up airplane and we knock a
hole in the bottom!!” Will it sink us
when we land, Gib?” Gibson sighed and shook his head dolefully. “Dunno, sir.
Maybe—maybe not if you can land close to the ramp and they get us out of
the water in a hurry. I’ll bend that tin
back, dope a bunch of fabric patches on it, and pile on some mattresses for
collision mats.” He sighed again and
reached for his tool box as I climbed back into the tower.
That
first war patrol was an anti-submarine sweep down between Molokai and Maui
where there had been reports of a submarine in the vicinity of Lahaina Roads,
the old Navy anchorage off Maui that was used before Pearl Harbor became
operational a few years before. We had
also been alerted that all fishing boats and sampans had been ordered to stay
in port. We were to check out any vessel
we encountered. It was rumored that such
boats were being used to re-supply enemy submarines.
Gibson
finished his makeshift patch of the bottom, caught an hour of sleep in the
forward bunk, then came to relieve me in the tower. I went aft to take position on one of the
waist machine guns. Just as I started
aft, the pilots spotted a large fishing boat underway ahead. Jus as I stepped into the waist compartment
and reached for the interphone headphones, the pilot made a low pass past the
fishing boat. Without orders to pen
fire, the third mech opened up with the port 50-cal machine gun and raked the vessel
from stem to stern.
There
had been two men visible on the boat—one on deck and one standing in the cabin
hatch. As fountains of water and
splinters from the boat sprayed into the air, the man on the deck went over the
side. The other man ducked back into the
cabin. I grabbed the gunner by the arm
and yanked him away from the gun. The
pilot was yelling, “Cease Fire! CEASE
FIRE!” on the interphone.
We
circled and came back, our co-pilot calling on the radio for a ship to come out
and investigate the fishing boat. The
boat did not seem to be badly damaged.
It had laid to and the man from the cabin pulled his deck hand from the water. They both stood up and did not appear to be
injured. When we were informed there was
a ship on the way we continued our patrol—after the pilot had some very harsh
words with the trigger-happy seaman striker.
It
was after dark when we approached Pearl Harbor to land. Gibson and I had placed three bunk mattresses
over the makeshift patch, piled on two cases of fifty caliber ammunition for
weight and I agreed to sit on top of those when we touched down to try to hold
the mattresses in place against the force of the water when the airplane
settled down.
I
do not recall that pilot’s name but he made a great feather light power landing
headed straight for the launching ramp on Ford Island. Alerted by radio, the beach crew was ready
with the big side mounts already in the water.
As the airplane slowed and settled, water poured in all around the
mattresses. Our timing was good—I heard
the tail hook clank into place, the tractor on the beach wheeled us around, and
the side mounts banged into their sockets.
Our first war patrol was safely over.