Sunday in Hell, page 38
When the death blow fell on Arizona thirteen minutes into the attack, Vestal’s skipper, Commander Cassin Young, miraculously survived, though he and approximately 100 of Vestal’s crew were literally blown off their ship’s decks, over the starboard side, into the harbor. While the great majority of the repair ship’s sailors swept overboard survived the powerful shock wave radiating outward across Vestal, West Virginia, and Tennessee, there were casualties and more stories of lives saved, and men fighting back in the face of the deadly assault.
In the early moments of the attack, men on West Virginia’s deck looked up to see a flight of Kate high-level bombers flying over them from the southwest tracking on a path offset slightly, paralleling the centerline of the pairs of battleships. The high-level bombers had come almost immediately behind the Kate torpedomen’s low altitude attacks from the southeast and south, releasing their bombs at an altitude of approximately 10,000 feet. The lead bomber did excellent work in accounting for wind offset and range at bomb release.
Two bombs struck Vestal about 0805, approximately the same time the 3-inch AA and two machine guns opened fire. The first bomb was on the starboard side, away from Arizona, at frame 44. It penetrated three decks, passed through the upper crew space and stores compartments, exploded in a lower stores hold, cut fire main and crew electrical cables, buckled a watertight hatch, wrecked the lower hold and started a fire. Heat from the fire necessitated flooding the forward magazine, which contained 100 rounds of target and approximately 580 rounds of service 5-inch ammunition. The bomb didn’t puncture the ship’s hull.
The second bomb hit on Vestal’s opposite side, to port, at frame 110, further aft, close to Arizona, and did near-fatal damage to her hull. It passed through the carpenter shop, shipfitter shop, shipfitters’ locker room, fuel oil tanks, and left an irregular hole in the hull approximately five feet in diameter, just inboard of the bilge keel. Flooding with fuel and water began immediately and eventually progressed up to the level of the carpenter shop. Commander Young’s recollections of the first moments of the attack implied that at least two other bombs from the same bombing run struck Arizona - one the fatal blow resulting in the disastrous secondary explosion that swept Vestal’s 3-inch AA gun crew overboard, killing one of its members.
The huge explosion and its accompanying fireball savaged Vestal’s port side aft, bent stanchions, port lenses, broke windows, rained debris, bodies, and body parts on the decks and ignited oil-fed fires on the water’s surface between the two ships. The fireball also instantaneously ignited fires aft and amidships on three of Vestal’s life rafts, six mooring lines, a gangway; and burned paint work. On the afterdeck lay the bodies of two men. Cassin Young concluded in his 11 December statement, “These men may have been either Arizona personnel blown over by magazine blast or members of Vestal after gun crews: they were burned beyond recognition.”
The explosion and fireball which first swept men off Vestal’s topside decks, then showered debris, destruction and death on her, had a shattering effect on some of her crew. Immediately after two bombs had torn into her came the explosion, fires within and topside on Vestal, and in the water between the two ships - and indications their ship was taking water and beginning to list. To compound the fear of an imminent, perhaps far worse disaster, she was still tied close to Arizona, a much larger, more powerful ship, which was rapidly settling, her forward half a roaring inferno. Amid the shock, disbelief, and confusion were a few moments of a commander nowhere in sight, which caused some of her crew to decide to abandon ship.33
Some of the crew members headed for the gangway on the starboard side, intending to leave the ship down the side shielded from the fire. They met their captain coming back on board.
The encounter was unforgettable, a story that would be proudly told by one of Vestal’s wounded crew members to passengers on the SS President Coolidge, and to a newspaper reporter in San Francisco on Christmas Day. The account was also described to men who later recommended Commander Young receive the Medal of Honor for his courage and leadership that terrible morning.
Commander Young swam to the gangway and emerged from the water just as some of his crew had started to clamber down. Covered with oil from the slick, he blocked their path and shouted, “Where in the hell do you think you’re going?” When they said that they were abandoning ship, Young ordered them back to their stations, bellowing, “You don’t abandon ship on me!”34
There was more fighting by Vestal’s crew as the Japanese raid continued, and more ship and life saving decisions made by their feisty commander. When he wrote of Vestal’s actions on 11 December, it was his sad duty to tell of six identified dead; three unidentified dead, including two possibly from Arizona; seven missing; and nineteen hospitalized. He said, “About twenty percent of those hospitalized are seriously injured, suffering primarily from burns and fractures.”35
The Death of USS Utah (AG-16) and Saving of Light Cruiser Raleigh (CL-7)
At 0812, at berth F-11, bow pointed northeast on the west side of Ford Island, the mooring lines restraining the Utah snapped and she rolled to port on her beams, ending her long career as first a battleship, and finally, a radio-controlled target ship. When she was lost, 58 members of her crew who were on board that morning were lost with her, all but a few entombed in a ship never refloated.
Moored where aircraft carriers normally berthed in Pearl Harbor, she took two torpedoes port side, when 16 Kates from the carriers Soryu and Hiryu fanned in two groups of eight low across the harbor from the west and northwest. Like the torpedo bombers coming toward the battleships from the opposite direction, the Kates came in flights of twos and threes against selected targets - but not without some frustrating mistakes by eager young Japanese pilots.
Lieutenants Heita Matsumura and Tsuyoshi Nagai, both squadron leaders, led the two groups of Kates, with Matsumura having specifically instructed the crews to avoid Utah - which would be a waste of precious torpedoes. But the two leaders brought the 16 in so low it was probably difficult for inexperienced crews flying formation off their lead aircraft to divide their attention and identify desired targets visually early enough to make necessary course adjustments - if they had tentatively selected their targets. Nagai and Matsumura early recognized the Utah and passed her by. Other torpedomen passed up targets on the west side of Ford Island, and circled round to launch their weapons at the battleships. Matsumura was angered at his young pilots’ waste of torpedoes.36
Nagai changed course and flew over the southern end of Ford Island, aiming for 1010 dock on the east side of the harbor, expecting to see a more lucrative target, the battleship Pennsylvania (BB-38). She too was absent from her normal berth, and Nagai would have to settle for smaller targets - the minelayer Oglala and light cruiser, Helena.
About 0755, two Kates flown by Nagai, and an eager, young, inexperienced Lieutenant Tamotsu Nakajima were flying at altitudes as low as 50 feet toward Utah, from the west. Nakajima thought he saw a torpedo hit Utah and followed suit. On board the ship, members of her crew were directing their attention to three airplanes in formation, coming from the south toward Ford Island, diving low over the south end of the island and dropping bombs. They were undoubtedly the same Val dive bombers and bombs seen by Admiral Furlong from the quarterdeck of Oglala, officers on the decks of Oklahoma, West Virginia and Arizona, and in Naval Air Wing TWO on Ford Island when the attack on the Fleet began.
Aboard the light cruiser Raleigh (CL-7), moored at berth F-12 directly ahead of Utah, bow also pointed northeast, men were about to hoist the colors at the stern, when the Officer of the Deck, who evidently saw the approaching aircraft, concluded this was “part of a routine air raid drill,” and called the antiaircraft gunners to their stations. But just then, about the same time two torpedoes slammed into Utah in quick succession, near Frame 84, a torpedo struck the Raleigh midships at Frame 58, flooding the forward engine room and Nos. 1 and 2 firerooms. Another passed forward of her bow, about ten yards astern of the light cruiser, Detroit (CL-8), moored further ahead of Raleigh, at F-13. The torpedo sank in shoal water near Ford Island.
On Raleigh, Seaman First Class Frank M. Berry ran for the ship’s alarm, but it didn’t go off because electrical power promptly failed after the torpedo exploded. While Raleigh’s crew rushed to battle stations, manned their guns to battle the attackers, and began the fight to avoid capsizing, Utah began listing hard to port, her crew struggling desperately to save themselves and one another. With two gaping holes torn in her aging hull, she was taking water at a far more rapid rate than Raleigh. Within moments after the second torpedo hit, she was listing approximately 15 degrees. About four minutes later the list was approximately 40 degrees and increasing.
Commissioned as Battleship No. 31 on 31 August 1911, after her keel was laid down in 1909, she served on numerous wartime and diplomatic missions, until under the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty she was selected in 1931 for conversion to a target ship. On 1 April 1932 Utah was recommissioned in Norfolk, Virginia, as a radio controlled target ship, and during the following eleven and a half years served in many training and test roles, including a machine gun school, bombing target, target tow, combatant target ship, and embarked and transported marines as a troop ship. She came to Hawaiian waters in April 1941, and after a modernizing overhaul at Puget Sound beginning in May, to make her a more effective target ship, sailed for Hawaiian waters again on 14 September. She completed an advanced antiaircraft gunnery cruise in Hawaiian waters shortly before returning to Pearl Harbor the first week in December.
When the Japanese struck the morning of 7 December, the captain and executive officer were both on shore leave, and the senior surviving officer on board was the Engineering Officer, Lieutenant Commander Solomon S. Isquith. When the attack came, and continued for nearly two hours, Isquith and every man on board were eventually, painfully reminded circumstances made it impossible for the ship’s guns to fire a single round against her attackers - and they had no weapons with which to defend themselves. In the most recent training cruise, she had been engaged in operations as a bombing target and all her 5-inch and 1.1-inch guns were covered with steel houses. All .50 and .30-caliber machine guns were dismounted and stowed below decks in storerooms, all ammunition was in magazines and secured, and two layers of 6-inch by 12-inch timbers covered the decks for protection against practice bombs.
A defenseless ship and crew were only the beginnings of mounting frustration, anger, and tragic loss - among men who acted with great courage and heroism, with more than one risking or giving up his own life to save others. On Utah in Pearl Harbor that morning, were magnificent, inspirational men, exhibiting extraordinary acts of self-sacrifice that would be repeated time and again in a mounting catastrophe.
When Lieutenant Commander Isquith saw the abrupt list begin after the first torpedo hit Utah, he concluded the ship was going to capsize. What’s more, he must have known the crew couldn’t defend the ship, and even if guns were serviceable in minutes, there wouldn’t be time to open fire.
He immediately passed “All hands on deck and all engine room and fireroom, radio and dynamo watch lay up on deck and release all prisoners.” (On board ships, sailors punished as a result of a “captain’s mast,” a disciplinary proceeding under the Articles of War, are locked in “the brig” - or jail, which was usually well below the main deck.) Isquith, seeing the rapid increase of the list after the second torpedo hit, ordered all hands to the starboard side, the high side, to escape the danger of loose, tumbling timbers fatally pinning or injuring men attempting to scramble topside to save themselves.
He then passed the word for crew members to equip themselves with life jackets, direction that proved impossible for many. Life jackets were in canvas bags stored with miscellaneous gear in rooms above the main deck, which required men to go up ladders - where they would encounter storerooms with shifting, spilling and mixing contents - then, if they could find a life jacket, have time to escape. Worse, in the midst of scrambling for life jackets those first few moments, a bomb apparently released by a Val dive bomber, struck the port “aircastle” - superstructure - of Utah.
Fast on the heels of prior orders to the crew, and the frantic first few moments after the torpedo hits, came a report from the engine room. Steam had dropped, they couldn’t cut in the drain pumps, the port engine room was flooded, and the starboard engine room was taking water rapidly, the water at that time being above the high pressure turbine and reduction gear - though the lights were still on in the engine room.
The starboard engine room watch cleared the starboard engine room. The No. 2 fireroom, with No. 4 boiler steaming, reported steam dropping rapidly and additional burners cut in to hold steam. The second torpedo hit put out all fires. The fireroom watch then abandoned the fireroom, closed the quick closing fuel oil valve, leaving the auxiliary feed pumps operating but slowing down due to lack of steam.
Isquith wrote in the USS Utah’s action report, dated 15 December,
By about 0805, the ship listed to about 40 degrees to port. Lights were on. No report had been received from the dynamo [generator] room; word was again passed, ‘All hands on deck and abandon ship, over the starboard side.’ The crew commenced getting over the side, the ship continuing to list but somewhat slower. The planes were now returning from a northerly direction flying low and strafing the crew as they abandoned ship.
Observing the strafing and the moving of the timbers and loose gear in the aircastles, I directed the crew divide into three groups, one group going up the ladder leading from the starboard aircastle to the captain’s cabin stateroom, and one going up the ladder leading from the starboard wardroom country near the wardroom pantry to the forecastle. A large number of these men escaped through the ports in the captain’s cabin.
Lieutenant (jg) Philip F. Hauck, Machinist Stanley A. Szymanski, and myself were the last to leave the ship going through ports in the captain’s cabin. At this time, about 0810, the ship was listing about 80 degrees to port and the planes were still strafing the ship, mooring lines were parting, and two motor launches and the motor whale boat were picking up men in the water. Many were observed swimming to the north and south of Pier FOX-11, and as planes were still strafing the men were ordered to the sides of the keys for some protection.
At about 0812, the last mooring lines had parted and the ship capsized, the keel plainly showing. All men picked up by the ship’s boats were taken ashore to Ford Island and ordered to return and pick up any men still swimming about.
On reaching shore on Ford Island, all hands were ordered into trenches that had been dug there for some Public Works Project, in order to protect themselves from strafing planes. Noting that many men were wounded, Commander Gray H. Larson, (MC), U.S. Navy, with KERNS, Jean W., HA1c., U.S. Naval Reserve, who had brought a first aid kit ashore with him, set up a first aid station in the quarters of Lieutenant Church (CEC), Building No. 118 Ford Island. Commander Larson, GRAY, CPHM., and two other pharmacist’s mates proceeded with the first aid treatment of all men who had been injured and necessary cases were sent to the Naval Air Station Dispensary in Naval Air Station trucks supplied for this purpose.
While in the trenches, a short time later, knocking was heard on the ship’s hull. At this time planes were still strafing and dropping bombs. I called for a volunteer crew to return to Utah to investigate the knocking heard. Machinist Szymanski and a volunteer crew consisting of Chief Assistant Medic MacSelwiney and two seaman, names unknown, returned to the ship and located the tapping coming from the void space V-98, under the dynamo room. They answered the knocking with knocks on the outside which in turn were answered by knocking within the ship.
Etched indelibly in the memory of Lieutenant Commander Isquith that terrible morning, were several brave men, who on 15 December he singled out for exceptional conduct under fire. In numerous ships that same morning, there would be many unforgettable men like those commended by the Utah’s engineering officer: (jg) P.F. Hauck, U.S. Navy, for assisting in getting men safely out of the ship without thought of his own safety; Machinist S.A. Szymanski, U.S. Navy, for rescuing Fireman Second Class John B. Vaessen by cutting a hole in the bottom of the ship while planes were still strafing; Fireman Second Class John B. Vaessen, US Naval Reserve, for remaining at his post in the forward distribution room without thought of his own safety, to keep lights on the ship as long as possible while realizing full well the ship was going to capsize; Chief Assistant Medic (Pharmacist Assistant) Terrance MacSelwiney, U.S. Naval Reserve, for operating a motor whale boat making trips to and from the ship during cutting operations without regard to his own safety from strafing planes, and for inspecting the engine room, clearing out the watch and securing the engineering plant prior to abandoning ship while aware the ship was going to capsize; and Chief Watertender Peter Tomich for ensuring that all fireroom personnel had left the ship and the boilers were secured prior to his attempting to abandon the ship.
USS Utah (AG-16) torpedoed by Japanese aircraft, listing heavily to port, about to part her mooring lines and capsize off the west side of Ford Island, during the attack on Pearl Harbor, 7 December 1941. Photographed from seaplane tender Tangier (AV-8), which was moored astern of Utah. Note colors half-raised over fantail, boats nearby, and sheds covering Utah’s after guns. NA
The modest engineering officer played down another memory and important detail he left out of his 15 December report. While acting as the ship’s commander looking after the safety and survival of Utah’s crew, then leaving the ship at the last possible moment, he nearly waited too late, thus risking his own life. He climbed on a table anchored to the deck in the captain’s cabin, preparing to exit through the same port through which he’d observed many men escape. About to lose his footing and balance, only an extra reach and grasp through the port by the men who had just preceded him saved him from possibly losing his own life. But it was Chief Watertender Peter Tomich whom Isquith and others remembered most of all.37
