It promised to be a good day.....

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Ray
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It promised to be a good day.....

Post by Ray »

Holiday schedule.....Reveille played on the base p.a. but the volume was muted by half. Reveille on the ship sounded over the 1-MC but the duty petty officer of the watch neglected the bosun whistle and merely whispered the rote commands. Material Condition Yoke was set as a matter of course and the duty fire party mustered on the fantail but there was no fire drill scheduled.

The young man.....really still just a boy of 15, rolled over in his rack. Usually he was up and in the breakfast chow line even before they opened the mess deck's gates but this was Sunday and the breakfast was extended into a brunch of sorts. No hurry. He had just drifted back to sleep with dreams of the big skies of his native nebraska when those dreams were interrupted with sirens and bells and klaxons.

Then it seemed like the rack itself was turned upside down as the deafening blast and pressure wave filled the berthing space. Though his ears were ringing and he was disoriented, he rolled out of his rack only to find the deck oddly listing. Acrid smoke from burning paint and lagging and rack matresses choked him. It was booger dark and there were overturned racks and lockers blocking his way but, by the flickering meagre light of a battle lantern across the space and with the aid of his zippo, he thought he could make it to and up the ladder through to just aft of the mess deck's scullery. He paused at the base of the ladder to help untangle a ship mate from his overturned rack.

Then the sacks of propellant powder for the big guns up forward ignited and that was the last thing he remembered in the earthly realm.....

NEVER FORGET !
m.A.g.a. !
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Grizz
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Re: It promised to be a good day.....

Post by Grizz »

we remember. thanks for honoring them.
Bill in Oregon
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Re: It promised to be a good day.....

Post by Bill in Oregon »

Ray, a late friend, Frank Cordeiro, was a high school senior in Honolulu with an interest in photography. A teacher who had taken a shine to him loaned him his Leica and told him to wander around the harbor over the weekend and see if he could take some interesting photos of planned Naval maneuvers. That was Friday, Dec. 5, 1941. Frank was up early on Sunday morning and walking along the shoreline of Pearl Harbor with his camera when the attack began to unfold. His photo of the USS Shaw exploding ran above the fold, Page One of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin and was retransmitted around the world -- one of the most iconic images of that tragic day. When I was a small-town newspaper editor in southern Oregon, I got to know Frank and Lucille Cordeiro, who had retired to the tiny Rogue River community of Trail. Frank died of heart disease just a few months before my Mom did; as a military spouse she was buried in Eagle Point National Cemetery just a few spaces to the east of Frank in the same row.
Frank told me that he hunkered down in vegetation as the attack proceeded, taking photos when he could. He told me that at one point, a Zero flew past him so low that he made eye contact with the pilot, who waved. He joined the Army and after being wounded in combat he was redesignated a combat photographer. Assigned to McArthur, he was there to photograph the Japanese surrender.
It was a great privilege to know Frank.
This is the photo he took of the Shaw:
https://www.ncpedia.org/media/explosion-uss-shaw
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Grizz
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Re: It promised to be a good day.....

Post by Grizz »

Screenshot 2022-12-02 062818-Dec7 1941.png
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Walt
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Re: It promised to be a good day.....

Post by Walt »

Thanks, Ray! It wasn't even mentioned by many in the "news" media.
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Blaine
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Re: It promised to be a good day.....

Post by Blaine »

My Mother always noted that she had two cousins on the Arizona. Perhaps twins.
Arizona survivors can ask for their remains to be interred within the sunken ship. It's hallowed ground.
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