Day of infamy.Byline: Randi Bjornstad The Register-Guard Sixty-seven years ago this morning, as some Oregonians sat at their breakfast tables drinking coffee and reading the Sunday paper Sunday paper n → (periódico) dominical m Sunday paper n → journal m du dimanche while others readied themselves for church, 360 Japanese bombers screamed through the sky to begin a devastating dev·as·tate tr.v. dev·as·tat·ed, dev·as·tat·ing, dev·as·tates 1. To lay waste; destroy. 2. To overwhelm; confound; stun: was devastated by the rude remark. and unrelenting two-hour assault on Pearl Harbor Pearl Harbor, land-locked harbor, on the southern coast of Oahu island, Hawaii, W of Honolulu; one of the largest and best natural harbors in the E Pacific Ocean. In the vicinity are many U.S. military installations, including the chief U.S. in Hawaii. The surprise attack pinned down about 100 vessels - battleships The list of battleships includes all battleships since 1859, listed alphabetically. The list also contains battlecruisers which share most of the characteristics of a battleship or have otherwise been referred to as battleships. , cruisers, destroyers, mine layers and sweepers, submarines and auxiliary ships - that made up much of the U.S. Pacific fleet. When the air cleared just two hours later, the toll was fearsome: 21 ships sunk or severely damaged; 189 aircraft destroyed and another 159 damaged; 2,400 U.S. military and civilians dead and nearly 1,200 more wounded. The next day, after a six-minute speech by President Franklin Roosevelt, the U.S. Congress voted to declare war on Japan - the sole "no" vote was cast by Rep. Jeanette Rankin, a longtime pacifist raised in Montana. Dec. 7, 1941 - "a date which will live in infamy Notoriety; condition of being known as possessing a shameful or disgraceful reputation; loss of character or good reputation. At Common Law, infamy was an individual's legal status that resulted from having been convicted of a particularly reprehensible crime, rendering him ," the president called it - still brings chills to the spines of those who were there, those who sat glued to their radios for the latest news and those who grew up hearing about the humiliating hu·mil·i·ate tr.v. hu·mil·i·at·ed, hu·mil·i·at·ing, hu·mil·i·ates To lower the pride, dignity, or self-respect of. See Synonyms at degrade. shock of Pearl Harbor from family members in the World War II generation who remember it all too well. It's easy to find people who remember where they were and what they were doing on Dec. 7, 1941, when they heard the news of Pearl Harbor. And although their numbers are dwindling dwin·dle v. dwin·dled, dwin·dling, dwin·dles v.intr. To become gradually less until little remains. v.tr. To cause to dwindle. See Synonyms at decrease. - a person legally old enough to enlist in the military immediately after Pearl Harbor would be at least 85 years old now - it's still not difficult to find people who were on the spot during the attack and its aftermath. Two - 91-year-old James Wilson of Springfield and Fred Price Wilfred Frederick ("Fred") Frank Price (born 25 April 1902 in Westminster, London, England; died 13 January 1969 in Hendon, Middlesex, England) was a cricketer who played for Middlesex County Cricket Club from 1926 to 1947. Price also stood as an umpire from 1950 to 1967. , 85, of Coos Bay Coos Bay (k  s), city (1990 pop. 15,076), Coos co., SW Oreg., a port of entry on Coos Bay; founded 1854 as Marshfield, inc. 1874, renamed 1944. - share the unlikely good fortune of not being where they
were supposed to be when the Japanese planes began to strafe and bomb
the ships berthed in Pearl Harbor that day.
"I was on the USS Enterprise
USS Enterprise is the name of a number of ships from the United States Navy. It is also the name of a number of ships from the fictional Star Trek universe. , and we were supposed to be in Pearl Harbor - we were supposed to be tied up where the USS Arizona USS Arizona has been the name of three ships of the United States Navy. The first two ships predate both the territory and state of Arizona, but within the region of northern Mexico known as la Pimería Alta was during the attack," Wilson recalled. "But we had been ordered a few days earlier to deliver some aircraft to Guam, and on the way back one of the destroyers had trouble, and we decided to wait with it. The next morning, Pearl Harbor was attacked." Fred Price's situation was similar, except that he was actually supposed to be on the USS Arizona, which was destroyed in the attack. In fact, everyone was so sure he was on the Arizona that the military reported him as a casualty and his hometown newspaper ran his obituary. He was "deceased, but not deceased," Price said. He'd joined the Navy at 18, and in October 1941, "I was assigned to the USS Arizona," Price said. "They gave you two choices, and the USS California Six ships of the United States Navy have been named USS California in honor of the 31st state.
He arrived on Oahu on Oct. 21, 1941, "and the fleet (with the USS Arizona) was out to sea, so they assigned me to a destroyer - the USS USS abbr. 1. United States Senate 2. United States ship USS abbr (= United States Ship) → Namensteil von Schiffen der Kriegsmarine Hulbert, AVD-6 - and off to sea we go." Out in the Pacific, the Hulbert was "towing targets for aircraft to practice," he said. "But (the pilots) were having a little problem - they were dropping 150-pound water bombs, and first they dropped them five miles to our left, and then they dropped them right on top of us," damaging the ship. At that point, the men on the Hulbert cut the lines to the targets, but they didn't have sufficient time to get the boilers fired up, "so we limped into Pearl Harbor on Dec. 1," Price said, where the Hulbert was immediately sent to the submarine base A base providing logistic support for submarines. "where they have the docks to restore power and water and things like that. So consequently, on Dec. 7, the Hulbert was still at the sub base, opposite Fort Island where the rest of the battleships were." On Sunday morning Sunday Morning may refer to:
As the attack waned, "they had us go out in our motor launch to find survivors," Price said. "The Arizona was completely annihilated, and the bay was full of oil. I was just 18 years old, and there I was, picking up bodies." His grandparents grandparents npl → abuelos mpl grandparents grand npl → grands-parents mpl grandparents grand npl , who raised him after his sharecropper parents abandoned him as an infant with a Mexican family in California's Imperial Valley, didn't know he was alive until nearly a year after Pearl Harbor, Price said. "We weren't allowed to say what had happened to us - it was all taboo, censored - but when we came back to Pearl Harbor from Hilo in April 1942, they gave us all cards like regular postcards to send to relatives. On the back, it had a list - I am well, I am hurt, I am in the hospital - and we were told to make one check mark so they would know what had happened to us." Somehow, it took six months - until October 1942 - for his postcard to make it to his grandparents so they knew he was alive, Price said. "They had gotten a `lettergram' from the government saying I was missing-in-action, because everyone still thought I was on the Arizona." Both Price and Wilson continued to serve in the Navy after Pearl Harbor. Wilson served 25' years, retiring in 1966 as a master chief aviation ordnanceman Aviation Ordnanceman (abbreviated as AO) is a United States Navy occupational rating. Aviation Ordnancemen operate and handle aviation ordnance equipment. They are responsible for the maintenance of guns, bombs, torpedoes, rockets, and missiles. . Price continued "hopping from island to island to island" in the South Pacific theater Pacific Theater or Pacific Theatre may refer to
"Both my grandparents died before I got back. The day I got back, right when I drove up, a hearse went by - it was my grandmother's hearse," he said. "Her doctor told me, `She waited for you as long as she could.' I tell you, this old man has had a life most people can't dream of." Even veterans who were too young to join the military in 1941, such as Eugene resident Al Bazzi and Chuck Hitt of Springfield, have vivid impressions of the devastation of Pearl Harbor and its repercussions repercussions npl → répercussions fpl repercussions npl → Auswirkungen pl . Hitt, 81, lived in Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, and had spent the day on Dec. 7, 1941, on the beach playing football with his friends. "When I got back, someone said the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. Pretty soon, all the older fellows were gone into the service," he said. "I would look at the sailors in Long Beach with great envy - I could hardly wait to go in and get into the war." He enlisted at 17. "My parents did not want me to join the service - especially my mother," he said. "But when I turned 17, my dad gave in and signed for me." Hitt served on the USS Edgecomb, APA-164, an attack transport built in Portland in 1944 and assigned to carry troops from the West Coast to the Phillipines. "I had my 18th birthday on the ship," he said. "I was in the Philippines when the war ended." Only 77 now, Bazzi's recollections are different from the others - he served in the U.S. Army in Korea, "but I did my share like all those people in the Second World War," he said - but Pearl Harbor nonetheless had a direct effect on him and his family. "We had a little dairy ranch in Petaluma (Calif.), and after Pearl Harbor was bombed, someone came from the government and told my mother that because my parents were Italian but not citizens yet, we were all going to be put in a camp like the Japanese-Americans," Bazzi said. "I lived in fear from then on, that any time someone would come and take us, package us up and put us somewhere." He joined the Army at 21, "and my parents said if their son could go to Korea to fight, they should become citizens, so they did. Pearl Harbor was very sad for us - there are bad memories of that time - but it all worked out very good." Today is the 11th time in the 67 years since Pearl Harbor that the anniversary has fallen on the same day - Sunday - as the original event. The Japanese suffered relatively little in the way of damage and casualties during their Hawaiian campaign - 29 airplanes, one large and five "midget" submarines and fewer than 100 people. Horrendous as the U.S. losses were, things could have been much worse. Almost by chance, none of the Pacific fleet's aircraft carriers were in Pearl Harbor that day. The USS Enterprise, with James Wilson aboard, was about 215 miles west of Oahu, along with heavy cruisers Northampton, Chester and Salt Lake City, and nine destroyers. The USS Lexington had just sailed from Pearl Harbor to deliver 18 Vought SB2U-3 Vindicators Vindicators is a one or two player video game released in the United States for multiple platforms by Tengen in 1988. Gameplay The player controls a tank and must navigate through a level, avoiding obstacles and enemies. Along the way, a player may find powerups. to Midway Island; the carrier, along with heavy cruisers Chicago, Portland and Astoria and five destroyers was 500 miles southeast of Midway. The USS Saratoga had just been overhauled at the Puget Sound Navy Yard in Bremerton, Wash., and had just reached San Diego - from which it was to sail for Pearl Harbor with its own air group and a Marine fighting squadron - mid-morning on Dec. 7, 1941. |
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