_While a Marine, foreground, looks skyward, the torpedoed battleship_
California (_BB-46_) _lists to port. In the left background flies “Old
Glory,” raised by PFCs Frank Dudovick and James D. Young, and Pvt Paul
O. Zeller, USMCR._]
“The Marines didn’t wait for colors,” Erickson recalled later, “The
flag went right up but the tune was general quarters.” As “all Hell”
broke loose around them, Dudovick, Young, and Zeller unflinchingly
hoisted the Stars and Stripes “with the same smartness and precision”
that had characterized their participation in peacetime ceremonies. At
the crew barracks on Ford Island, Corporal Clifton Webster and Private
First Class Albert E. Yale headed for the roof immediately after
general quarters sounded. In the direct line of fire from strafing
planes, they set up a machine gun. Across Oahu, as Japanese planes
swept in over NAS Kaneohe Bay, the Marine detachment there--initially
the only men who had weapons--hurried to their posts and began firing
at the attackers.
Since the American aircraft carriers were at sea, the Japanese targeted
the battleships which lay moored off Ford Island. At one end of
Battleship Row lay _Nevada_. At 0802, the battleship’s .50-caliber
machine guns opened fire on the torpedo planes bearing down on them
from the direction of the Navy Yard; her gunners believed that they had
shot one down almost immediately. An instant later, however, a torpedo
penetrated her port side and exploded.
Ahead of _Nevada_ lay _Arizona_, with the repair ship _Vestal_ (AR-4)
alongside, preparing for a tender availability. Major Alan Shapley
had been relieved the previous day as detachment commanding officer
by Captain John H. Earle, Jr., who had come over to _Arizona_ from
_Tennessee_ (BB-43). Awaiting transportation to the Naval Operating
Base, San Diego, and assignment to the 2d Marine Division, Shapley was
lingering on board to play first base on the battleship’s baseball
team in a game scheduled with the squad from the carrier _Enterprise_
(CV-6). After the morning meal, he started down to his cabin to change.
Seated at breakfast, Sergeant John M. Baker heard the air raid alarm,
followed closely by an explosion in the distance and machine gun
fire. Corporal Earl C. Nightingale, leaving the table, had paid no
heed to the alarm at the outset, since he had no antiaircraft battle
station, but ran to the door on the port side that opened out onto
the quarterdeck at the sound of the distant explosion. Looking out,
he saw what looked like a bomb splash alongside _Nevada_. Marines
from the ship’s color guard then burst breathlessly into the messing
compartment, saying that they were being attacked.
As general quarters sounded, Baker and Nightingale, among the others,
headed for their battle stations. Aft, congestion at the starboard
ladder, that led through casemate no. 9, prompted Second Lieutenant
Carleton E. Simensen, USMCR, the ship’s junior Marine officer, to force
his way through. Both Baker and Nightingale noted, in passing, that the
5-inch/51 there was already manned, and Baker heard Corporal Burnis L.
Bond, the gun captain, tell the crew to train it out. Nightingale noted
that the men seemed “extremely calm and collected.”
As Lieutenant Simensen led the Marines up the ladder on the starboard
side of the mainmast tripod, an 800-kilogram converted armor-piercing
shell dropped by a Kate from _Kaga_ ricocheted off the side of Turret
IV. Penetrating the deck, it exploded in the vicinity of the captain’s
pantry. Sergeant Baker was following Simensen up the mainmast when
the bomb exploded, shrapnel cutting down the officer as he reached
the first platform. He crumpled to the deck. Nightingale, seeing him
flat on his back, bent over him to see what he could do but Simensen,
dying, motioned for his men to continue on up the ladder. Nightingale
continued up to Secondary Aft and reported to Major Shapley that
nothing could be done for Simensen.
[Illustration: Oahu,