The _Philippine Clipper_, meanwhile, had wheeled about upon receipt
of word of war and returned to the lagoon it had departed 20 minutes
earlier. Cunningham immediately requested Captain Hamilton to carry
out a scouting flight. The _Clipper_ was unloaded and refueled with
sufficient gasoline in addition to the standard reserve for both the
patrol flight and a flight to Midway. Cunningham, an experienced
aviator, laid out a plan, giving the flying boat a two-plane escort.
Hamilton then telephoned Putnam and concluded the arrangements for the
search. Take-off time was 1300.
Shortly after receiving word of hostilities, Battery B’s First
Lieutenant Woodrow W. Kessler and his men had loaded a truck with
equipment and small arms ammunition and moved out to their 5-inch
guns. At 0710, Kessler began distributing gear, and soon thereafter
established a sentry post on Toki Point at the northernmost tip of
Peale. Thirty 5-inch rounds went into the ready-use boxes near the
guns. At 0800, he reported his battery ready for action.
General quarters called Captain Bryghte D. “Dan” Godbold’s men of
Battery D to their stations down the coast from Battery B at 0700, and
they moved out to their position by truck, reporting “manned and ready”
within a half hour. The lack of men, however, prevented Godbold from
having more than three of his 3-inch guns in operation. Within another
hour and a half, each gun had 50 rounds ready for firing. At 1000,
Godbold received orders to keep one gun, the director, the heightfinder
(the only one at Wake Island for the three batteries), and the power
plant manned at all times. After making those arrangements, Godbold put
the remainder of his men to work improving the battery position.
While the atoll’s defenders prepared for war, Japanese bombers droned
toward them. At 0710 on 8 December, 34 Mitsubishi G3M2 Type 96 land
attack planes (Nells) of the _Chitose Air Group_ had lifted off from
the airstrip at Roi in the Marshalls. Shortly before noon, those 34
Nells came in on Wake at 13,000 feet. Clouds cloaked their approach
and the pounding surf drowned out the noise of their engines as they
dropped down to 1,500 feet and roared in from the sea. Lookouts sounded
the alarms as they spotted the twin-engined, twin-tailed bombers a
few hundred yards off the atoll’s south shore, emerging from a dense
bank of clouds. At Battery E, First Lieutenant Lewis telephoned Major
Devereux’s command post to inform him of the approaching planes.
Although Putnam was rushing work on the six bunkers being built along
the seaward side of the runway, he knew none of them would be ready
before 1400. He also knew that moving the eight F4F Wildcats from
their parking area would risk damage to the planes and obstruction of
the runway if the planes were in fact damaged. Since any damage might
have meant the loss of a plane--Wake possessed virtually no spare
parts--Putnam decided to delay moving the Wildcats and the materiel
until suitable places existed to protect them.
No foxholes had been dug near the field, but the rough ground nearby
offered natural cover to those who reached it. Putnam hoped that
his men would obtain good cover if an attack came. The movement of
gasoline, bombs, and ammunition; the installation of electrical lines
and generators; and the relocation of radio facilities kept all hands
busily engaged.
The attack found Second Lieutenant Robert “J” Conderman and First
Lieutenant George A. Graves in the ready tent, going over last minute
instructions concerning their escort of the _Philippine Clipper_.
When the alarm sounded, both pilots, already in flight gear, sprinted
for their Wildcats. Graves managed to reach one F4F, but a direct hit
demolished it in a ball of flame as he was climbing into the cockpit,
killing him instantly. Strafers’ bullets cut down Conderman as he tried
to reach his plane, and as he lay on the ground a bomb hit the waiting
Wildcat and blew it up, pinning him beneath the wreckage. He called
to Corporal Robert E. L. Page to help him, but stopped when he heard
another man crying for help. He directed Page to help the other man
first. Strafing attacks killed Second Lieutenant Frank J. Holden as he
raced for cover. Bullets and fragments wounded Second Lieutenant Webb.
Marine Gunner Hamas, who still had 50 cases of hand grenades in his
truck, having just delivered 25 to Kuku Point, saw the red sun insignia
on the planes as they roared low overhead. Immediately, he ordered the
vehicle stopped and instructed his men to head for cover.
Confident that his airborne planes would be able to provide sufficient
warning of an incoming raid, Commander Cunningham was working in his
office at Camp 2, when he heard the “crump” of bombs around 1155. The
explosions rattled windows elsewhere in the camp, prompting many men to
conclude that work crews were blasting coral heads in the lagoon.
Guns 1 and 2 of Battery D opened up on the attackers, collectively
firing 40 rounds during the raid. The low visibility and the altitude
at which the Mitsubishis flew, however, prevented the 3-inch guns from
firing effectively. No bombs fell near the battery, but the guns’ own
concussions caved in the sandbag emplacements, Marine antiaircraft
fire damaged eight Nells and killed a petty officer in one of them.
Returning Japanese aircrews claimed to have set fire to all of the
aircraft on the ground, and reported sighting only three airborne
American planes.
On Peacock Point, First Lieutenant Lewis’ Battery E had been
standing-to, ready to fire. Like Godbold, Lewis did not have enough men
for all four of his guns. Lewis manned two of the 3-inchers, along with
the M-4 director, while the rest of his men busily completed sandbag
emplacements. After telephoning Devereux’s command post when he saw the
falling bombs, Lewis quickly estimated the altitude and ordered his
gunners to open fire. Again, however, the height at which the attackers
came rendered the fire ineffective.
In about seven minutes, Japanese bombs and bullets totally wrecked
PanAm’s facilities. Bombing and strafing set fire to a hotel--in which
five Chamorro employees died--and also to a stock room, fuel tanks,
and many other buildings, and demolished a radio transmitter. Nine of
PanAm’s 66-man staff lay dead. Two of the _Philippine Clipper_’s crew
were wounded.
[Illustration: TABLE OF DISTANCES FROM WAKE IN NAUTICAL MILES
Manda 2676
Guam 1302
Midway 1034
Honolulu 2004
Pokaakku Atoll 304
Kwajalein Atoll 660
Roi 670
Majuro 840
Wotje 600
Jaluit 814
Marcus 760
Saipan 1260
Truk 1120
]
Almost miraculously, though, the 26-ton _Clipper_, empty of both
passengers and cargo but full of fuel, rode easily at her moorings
at the end of the dock. A bomb had splashed 100 feet ahead of her
without damaging her, and she received 23 bullet holes from the
strafing attack--none had hit her large fuel tanks. Captain Hamilton
courageously proposed evacuating the passengers and PanAm staff and
Commander Cunningham assented. Stripped of all superfluous equipment
and having embarked all of the passengers and the Caucasian PanAm
employees, save one (who had been driving the atoll’s only ambulance
and thus had not heard the call to report for the plane’s departure),
the flying boat took off for Midway at 1330.
Although he had received a bullet wound in his left shoulder, Major
Putnam immediately took over the terrible task of seeing to the
many injured people at the field. His dedication to duty seemed to
establish the precedent for many other instances of selflessness which
occurred amidst the wreckage of the VMF-211 camp. Sadly, the attack
left five pilots and 10 enlisted men of VMF-211 wounded and 18 more
dead, including most of the mechanics assigned to the squadron. On
the materiel side, the squadron’s tents were shot up and virtually no
supplies--tools, spark plugs, tires, and sparse spare parts--escaped
destruction. Both of the 25,000-gallon gasoline storage tanks had been
demolished. Additionally, 25 civilian workmen had been killed.
As the bombers departed, Gunner Hamas called his men back from the
bush, and set out to resume delivery of hand grenades. As he neared the
airfield, though, he stopped to help wounded men board a truck that
had escaped destruction. Then, he continued his journey and finally
returned to Camp 1, where he found more civilian employees arriving to
join the military effort.
Earlier, as they had returned to the vicinity of Wake at about noon,
Kinney and Hamilton had been descending through the broken clouds about
three miles from the atoll when the former spotted two formations of
planes at an elevation of about 1,500 feet. He and Hamilton attempted
unsuccessfully to catch the formations as they retired to the west
through the overcast. Kinney and Hamilton remained aloft until after
1230, when they landed to find the destruction that defied description.
Neither Elrod nor Davidson had seen the enemy.
In the wake of the terrible devastation wreaked upon his squadron,
Putnam deemed it critical to the squadron’s reorganization to keep the
remaining planes operational. Since his engineering officer, Graves,
had been killed, Putnam appointed Kinney to take his place. “We have
four planes left,” Putnam told him, “If you can keep them flying
I’ll see that you get a medal as big as a pie.” “Okay, sir,” Kinney
responded, “if it is delivered in San Francisco.”
Putnam established VMF-211’s command post near the operations area.
His men dug foxholes amidst brush and all of the physically capable
officers and men stayed at the field. Putnam ordered that pistols,
Thompson submachine guns, gas masks, and steel helmets be issued, and
also directed that machine gun posts be established near each end of
the runway and the command post. Meanwhile, the ground crews dispersed
the serviceable planes into revetments, a task not without its risks.
That afternoon, Captain Frank C. Tharin accidentally taxied 211-F-9
into an oil drum and ruined the propeller, reducing the serviceable
planes to three. Captains Elrod and Tharin (the latter wounded
superficially in the attack) later supervised efforts to construct
“protective works” and also the mining of the landing strip with
dynamite connected up to electric generators. Contractors bulldozed
portions of the land bordering the field, in hopes that the rough
ground would wreck any enemy planes that attempted to land there.
[Illustration: