Echoes of Navy Medicine’s Past
Part V: World War II, Pacific Theater
By Jan Herman and Mr. Grog
December 7, 1941 still represents the U.S. Navy’s greatest disaster. In just over two hours much of the Pacific Fleet had been destroyed or seriously damaged. Even before the last Japanese aircraft had disappeared over the horizon, what the raiders had accomplished by their surprise attack was catastrophic. The pride of the fleet—seven battleships that once projected U.S. might and prestige—either lay on the bottom or were too crippled to be of any immediate use. Bombs, torpedoes, and machine guns had taken a terrible toll, with the Navy alone losing 2,008 men.
The wounded and severely burned survivors of the attack required immediate treatment, and Navy medical personnel were on the scene to provide that care. Navy medicine was represented at Pearl Harbor by a naval hospital, a partially assembled base hospital, and USS Solace (AH-5), the Navy’s newest hospital ship. Heroic efforts to save lives by the men and women who manned these facilities began minutes after the first Japanese bomb fell and never waned until the last casualty was tended to.
Physicians, nurses, and hospital corpsmen on duty at Naval Hospital Pearl Harbor performed emergency surgery, treated burns, and comforted the dying. The same scene played out aboard USS Solace, which lay at anchor just beyond “Battleship Row.” Oil-soaked sailors plucked from the harbor were taken to the hospital ship for treatment.
If the ferocity of the Japanese onslaught that followed Pearl Harbor left American forces reeling, isolated, and with scant hope of reinforcement, as an institution Navy medicine was equally stretched. Possessing only limited resources and with a presence only in Hawaii, the Philippines, Guam, a few small installations, and aboard the few vessels of the Asiatic Fleet, Navy medical personnel were hard pressed to treat patients as the Japanese rolled through the Pacific conquering everything before them. On 8 December 1941, World War II came to the Philippines when Japanese bombers hit Clark and Nichols Fields.
Two days later enemy bombers returned, this time destroying the Cavite Navy Yard and killing and maiming scores of Americans and Filipinos. Personnel at the nearby Cañacao Naval Hospital worked frantically to treat the wounded.
Japanese soldiers who landed on Philippine beaches in late December 1941 overwhelmed the ill-equipped and outnumbered Americans and Filipinos. By the time Japanese forces entered Manila on 1 January after GEN Douglas MacArthur declared it an open city, its battered defenders had already withdrew to the Bataan Peninsula to make their last stand.
As food and medicine ran out, disease took its toll among Bataan’s defenders. The lack of quinine for the treatment of malaria was critical, and without it many men came down with the disease. Nearly everyone suffered debilitating weakness from dysentery. Overwhelmed, Bataan’s 75,000 defenders finally surrendered in April 1942.
But out in Manila Bay, the island fortress of Corregidor still remained defiant despite a lack of food and ammunition. After a month of heavy bombardment and finally landings by Japanese forces, Corregidor surrendered on May 6th. American power in the Far East had been extinguished. Yet despite the new reality, the hundreds of medical professionals captured in the Pacific were still “Doc” or “Nurse” to their fellow POWs. Without hospitals or supplies, they continued to practice their healing art, often under unimaginable circumstances.
Some 10,000 surrendered at Corregidor after thousands of captured Americans and Filipinos had already died on the infamous Bataan Death March. Those who survived Japanese brutality and neglect now faced Japanese prison camps. For the approximately 17,000 Americans and 12,000 Filipino scouts who surrendered in the Philippines, the real ordeal had barely begun. Torture, forced labor, starvation and death became the norm in Japanese POW camps throughout the Far East.
Even though physicians and corpsmen did the best they could to provide health care in these camps, they had virtually no drugs or instruments. Malaria and dengue fever were endemic. Sanitation was non-existent and almost everybody had dysentery. Many came down with deficiency diseases like scurvy, optic neuritis, and beriberi. By the summer of 1942 the Japanese held over 50,000 prisoners, 20,000 of whom were Americans.
Eleven of these were Navy nurses from the Cañacao Naval Hospital. They spent the war in internment camps at Santo Tomás in Manila and then at Los Baños in the Philippine countryside, where they were finally liberated in February 1945. Many of their male colleagues never made it home, either succumbing to disease, starvation, brutal treatment by their captives, or dying by “friendly fire” when the so-called hell ships in which they were being transported to Japan were sunk by American submarines or aircraft.
Despite the fate of these unfortunate POWs, the war against Japan was in full swing by the summer of 1942. Reconquering territory held by the enemy was the priority and it meant fighting island by island, each one a stepping stone to Tokyo. Organizing the Navy Medical Department to care for the thousands of Navy and Marine Corps casualties generated by opposed amphibious landings, make them well, and then return them to duty was the major priority. It was in the Pacific war that Navy medicine faced its greatest challenge dealing with the aftermath of intense, bloody warfare fought far from fixed hospitals. This put enormous pressure on medical personnel closest to the front and forced new approaches to primary care and evacuation.
The most dramatic and demanding duty a Navy hospital corpsman could have was with Marine Corps units in the field. Because the Marine Corps has always relied upon the Navy for medical support, corpsmen accompanied the leathernecks and suffered the brunt of combat themselves. Many of them went unarmed, reserving their carrying strength for medical supplies.
Navy corpsmen were the first critical link in the evacuation chain. From the time a Marine was hit on an invasion beach at Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Saipan, Iwo Jima, and a host of other Pacific islands, the corpsman braved enemy fire to render aid. He applied a battle dressing, administered morphine, and tagged the casualty. If he were lucky, the corpsman might commandeer a litter team to move the casualty out of harm’s way and on to a battalion aid station or a collecting and clearing company for further treatment. This care would mean stabilizing the patient with plasma, serum albumin, and, later in the war, whole blood. In some cases, the casualty was then moved to the beach for evacuation. In others, the casualty was taken to a divisional hospital, where doctors performed further stabilization, including emergency surgery if needed.
Navy hospital ships, employed mainly as ambulances, provided first aid and some surgical care for the casualties’ needs while ferrying them to base hospitals in the Pacific or back to the United States for definitive care. As the war continued, air evacuation helped carry the load. Trained Navy nurses and corpsmen staffed the evacuation aircraft.
Enabling the Navy and Marine Corps to defeat the enemy also meant recognizing that disease more often than enemy action threatened this goal. During the battle for Guadalcanal in the Solomons, malaria caused more casualties than Japanese bullets. Shortly after the landings, the number of patients hospitalized with malaria exceeded all other diseases. Some units suffered over a 100 percent casualty rate with personnel being hospitalized more than once. Only when malaria and other tropical diseases were brought to heel could the Pacific war be won.
Navy medical personnel moved quickly to reduce the impact of malaria and other tropical diseases. Personnel trained in preventive medicine oiled malaria breeding areas and sprayed DDT. Physicians and corpsmen dispensed quinine and atabrine as malaria suppressants.
The Pacific war was massive in scale, fought over vast stretches of ocean. Fleets engaged one another often many miles distant from one another. Carrier-based aircraft were the surrogates that sought out the enemy and delivered the ordnance. U.S. Navy task forces consisting of carriers, battleships, cruisers, destroyers, and destroyer escorts required their own medical support and each of these vessels had among their crews corpsmen, physicians, and, aboard the larger vessels, dentists as well. By October 1945 the fleet numbered over 7,000 vessels from landing craft and auxiliaries to the Essex class carriers and Iowa class battleships. The hundreds of vessels smaller than destroyers had their corpsmen to be sure, but the larger vessels rated physicians, corpsmen, dentists, fully equipped sick bays, battle dressing stations, and usually an operating room. The standard medical complement for a 7,250-ton escort carrier was one medical officer, a flight surgeon for the embarked air group, a dentist, and about 13 corpsmen. A much larger 27,100-ton Essex class carrier like USS Franklin (CV-13) boasted four physicians augmented by a flight surgeon, 3 dentists, and 31 corpsmen. During routine operations, physicians and corpsmen serving aboard vessels in the South Pacific encountered and treated heat and humidity related maladies exacerbated by confinement without air conditioning—heat exhaustion and stroke, fungus infections, heat rash, and breathing disorders.
The encounters between Japanese and American fleets were most often brutal affairs with many casualties generated in both brief and sustained actions. Torpedoes, bombs, and armor-piercing shells produced horrendous wounds. When the Japanese launched their kamikaze terror campaign, medical personnel were often overwhelmed. A single suicide plane plunging through the flight deck of an aircraft carrier and igniting fueled and armed aircraft produced hundreds of burn victims within seconds. As the fighting drew ever closer to the Japanese home islands in early 1945, thousands of sailors were killed and wounded by these human-guided missiles.
Navy medical personnel also served aboard submarines that prowled the Pacific destroying thousands of tons of Japanese shipping. Among its crew, each submarine carried one highly trained corpsman or pharmacist’s mate, as they were then called. (Physicians were not assigned to submarines.) Indeed, one of the most dramatic stories to come out of World War II recounted an emergency appendectomy performed by a 23-year-old corpsman as his submarine, USS Seadragon, cruised submerged in enemy waters. The corpsman, Wheeler B. Lipes, successfully removed the badly infected appendix and saved his patient. This heroic story not only highlighted the skill and resourcefulness of Navy corpsmen, but also buoyed the nation’s spirits early in the war when news from the Pacific was anything but encouraging.
When World War II finally ended with the Japanese surrender aboard USS Missouri (BB-63) on 2 September 1945, the U.S. Navy had become the largest maritime force the world had ever known. And the Medical Department which supported that Navy would itself never again have as many personnel, or staff as many hospitals, dispensaries, and hospital ships as it did on that day.
What followed victory was rapid demobilization as soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines in the Pacific theater headed home. Helping get them there were aircraft carriers, battleships, LSTs, and Navy hospital ships—all of which became troop transports in what was called “Operation Magic Carpet.”
Showing posts with label Pearl Harbor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pearl Harbor. Show all posts
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Thursday, December 15, 2011
The War's First Christmas
LCDR Grace B. LallyChief Nurse, USS Solace, 1941
BUMED Library and Archives 09-5043-039
***
The War's First Christmas
(Originally Published in The American Magazine, January 1945)
By LCDR Grace B. Lally, NC, USN
I was a chief nurse aboard USS Solace, Navy’s hospital ship attached to the Pacific Fleet, when the Japanese struck at Pearl Harbor. From that fateful morning until Christmas Eve, neither I nor the twelve nurses who served under me had much sleep or peace of mind. But in spite of weariness, all of us were aware of the Navy tradition that a tree rides the mast on Christmas, and we had managed to collect four scraggy cedars in Honolulu, together with enough tinsel, holly, decorations, toys, and knick-knacks so that every man aboard the Solace would have a gift and a celebration.
Now, on Christmas Eve, the nurses’ quarters were bustling with preparations.
Suddenly, I remembered we needed a Santa Claus.
“Get the yeoman who stands with the Commander at quarters—the plump, jolly-looking boy,” someone suggested.
“He’s perfect, “ I agreed. “Send for him, and the sailmaker.”
In our wardroom, the nurses who were off duty and I worked frantically against time.
“Trees on the mast, the quarterdeck, and in the mess hall,” we instructed the corpsmen.
“And take these trimmings to the wards. Let the up-patients help you decorate.”
“You’re Santa Claus,” we told the rotund yeoman, who grinned delightedly. “Be prepared for anything.”
“Here’s the bunting; make him a suit,” we told the ship’s sailmaker. “Get some rope and make him a beard.”
The sailmaker’s fist hit the table. “A department-store Santa Claus won’t hold no candle to him!” he swore, piloting the yeoman from the room.
Some of our presents were already wrapped; the majority were not. We had 32 pounds of candy to be divided into small, gay packets. We had one gift for each of our 327 patients and one for each member of the ship’s crew.
Fortunately, the paper held out until the last small present had swapped its cheap commercial bindings for the trappings which to every boy there would spell Christmas, and be a symbol of the gifts from which, this year, would not come through.
The nurses segregated the toys for the most critically injured, and learned that there would not be enough of the nicer gifts to go around. Over the last, a tawdry mechanical ballet dancer, they argued hotly, loyally:
“But Swenson’s blind. He’s got to have something he can feel. He could wind her up and feel her dance.”
“Look. I’ve got a machinist’s mate. He’s old and very critical. He’s got kids at home. This is the sort of silly present he’d bring home to them for Christmas. Maybe it’s his last. Maybe it would bring them closer.”
The machinist’s mate got the little dancer. There was compromise and exchange. Some of the girls still weren’t satisfied, so they went to their quarters and dug around in the bureau drawers.
***
The girls were beautiful that evening, I thought. They sort of shone, as if the lights had been turned on inside. There was a mother-thing in all of them that fought fiercely to protect its own from hurt, from neglect. It went beyond nursing, beyond self.
Before December 7 we had made tentative plans for Christmas Eve. A famous choir was to have come out from Honolulu and sung on the deck. But now our decks would be dark, only the black shadow of the tree would ride high on the mast. Maybe the stars would etch its silhouette.
Carols we must have, and luckily I remembered there was a corpsman who played a sweet accordion. Immediately we routed him out.
“Sure, I can play carols,” he said proudly. “I was weaned on ‘em. And I’ll get six of the boys who can sing.”
And so at nightfall, when the wards had been fed and the nurses had changed into their best uniforms, Santa Claus—more beautiful than a department store’s—with a bulging seabag on his back, led our small procession below. We sang Jingle Bells as we went, and out of nowhere the ship’s captain appeared. “I’m with you, Miss Lally,” he said.
The captain had second sight, I knew, when anything of harm or benefit to his ship was concerned. But I did not know that he was aware of our Christmas celebration, nor of how much his presence on such an occasion would mean to the patients.
He fell into step behind Santa Claus, and I followed him, first to the G.U. War, where, after the Japanese attack, we had placed our most serious burn cases. Behind us came the girls and the corpsmen, all singing. I could not sing right then, being too terribly aware of the eyes that looked at me from some of the burn-blackened faces.
War and Christmas seemed suddenly incongruous. Only yesterday these kids were sneaking down the stairs to watch their mothers and dads place the last glimmering icicle on the tree, tuck a walnut deep in the toe of a stocking. Pain now made the young faces seem mature. But even eyes that had been almost lifeless brightened miraculously as the nurses distributed their presents and Santa Claus his bounty.
“Shaving soup! You know, Miss Lally, I’ve worked for months to grow this beard. You wouldn’t be hinting or anything?”
“Hey, look at Wilkins. He got vilet talcum powder. Oh-h-h, Wille-e-e-e!”
***
We continued to walk, singing from ward to ward, and gradually a real procession formed behind us—a line-up of most of the ship’s officers, all the junior officers, and the crew.
Up in the nurses’ quarters we had our own party afterward. We had eggnog, and all of the girls talked at once, comparing notes on the different boys’ reactions to their gifts.
-“That big landlubber, Ogonski said, ‘Geez, the scrub me from top to toe twice a day, and then give me a cake of poifumed soap to remember them by!’”
-“We were right to give the ballet dancer to the machinist’s mate. When I went back to say good night, there he was, fast asleep, a bit of smile on his face, and the toy clutched in his hand—just like a kid.”
-“You know, it’s funny,” Tess Duggan said suddenly. “It’s the biggest Christmas Eve we’ll ever know. I mean the most important. We’ve all the ornaments, and glitter, and fine presents, and family. We’ll all have those things again, too. But it will never again be quite so big tonight.”
**A few minor edits were made to the original article
Now, on Christmas Eve, the nurses’ quarters were bustling with preparations.
Suddenly, I remembered we needed a Santa Claus.
“Get the yeoman who stands with the Commander at quarters—the plump, jolly-looking boy,” someone suggested.
“He’s perfect, “ I agreed. “Send for him, and the sailmaker.”
In our wardroom, the nurses who were off duty and I worked frantically against time.
“Trees on the mast, the quarterdeck, and in the mess hall,” we instructed the corpsmen.
“And take these trimmings to the wards. Let the up-patients help you decorate.”
“You’re Santa Claus,” we told the rotund yeoman, who grinned delightedly. “Be prepared for anything.”
“Here’s the bunting; make him a suit,” we told the ship’s sailmaker. “Get some rope and make him a beard.”
The sailmaker’s fist hit the table. “A department-store Santa Claus won’t hold no candle to him!” he swore, piloting the yeoman from the room.
Some of our presents were already wrapped; the majority were not. We had 32 pounds of candy to be divided into small, gay packets. We had one gift for each of our 327 patients and one for each member of the ship’s crew.
Fortunately, the paper held out until the last small present had swapped its cheap commercial bindings for the trappings which to every boy there would spell Christmas, and be a symbol of the gifts from which, this year, would not come through.
The nurses segregated the toys for the most critically injured, and learned that there would not be enough of the nicer gifts to go around. Over the last, a tawdry mechanical ballet dancer, they argued hotly, loyally:
“But Swenson’s blind. He’s got to have something he can feel. He could wind her up and feel her dance.”
“Look. I’ve got a machinist’s mate. He’s old and very critical. He’s got kids at home. This is the sort of silly present he’d bring home to them for Christmas. Maybe it’s his last. Maybe it would bring them closer.”
The machinist’s mate got the little dancer. There was compromise and exchange. Some of the girls still weren’t satisfied, so they went to their quarters and dug around in the bureau drawers.
***
The girls were beautiful that evening, I thought. They sort of shone, as if the lights had been turned on inside. There was a mother-thing in all of them that fought fiercely to protect its own from hurt, from neglect. It went beyond nursing, beyond self.
Before December 7 we had made tentative plans for Christmas Eve. A famous choir was to have come out from Honolulu and sung on the deck. But now our decks would be dark, only the black shadow of the tree would ride high on the mast. Maybe the stars would etch its silhouette.
Carols we must have, and luckily I remembered there was a corpsman who played a sweet accordion. Immediately we routed him out.
“Sure, I can play carols,” he said proudly. “I was weaned on ‘em. And I’ll get six of the boys who can sing.”
And so at nightfall, when the wards had been fed and the nurses had changed into their best uniforms, Santa Claus—more beautiful than a department store’s—with a bulging seabag on his back, led our small procession below. We sang Jingle Bells as we went, and out of nowhere the ship’s captain appeared. “I’m with you, Miss Lally,” he said.
The captain had second sight, I knew, when anything of harm or benefit to his ship was concerned. But I did not know that he was aware of our Christmas celebration, nor of how much his presence on such an occasion would mean to the patients.
He fell into step behind Santa Claus, and I followed him, first to the G.U. War, where, after the Japanese attack, we had placed our most serious burn cases. Behind us came the girls and the corpsmen, all singing. I could not sing right then, being too terribly aware of the eyes that looked at me from some of the burn-blackened faces.
War and Christmas seemed suddenly incongruous. Only yesterday these kids were sneaking down the stairs to watch their mothers and dads place the last glimmering icicle on the tree, tuck a walnut deep in the toe of a stocking. Pain now made the young faces seem mature. But even eyes that had been almost lifeless brightened miraculously as the nurses distributed their presents and Santa Claus his bounty.
“Shaving soup! You know, Miss Lally, I’ve worked for months to grow this beard. You wouldn’t be hinting or anything?”
“Hey, look at Wilkins. He got vilet talcum powder. Oh-h-h, Wille-e-e-e!”
***
We continued to walk, singing from ward to ward, and gradually a real procession formed behind us—a line-up of most of the ship’s officers, all the junior officers, and the crew.
Up in the nurses’ quarters we had our own party afterward. We had eggnog, and all of the girls talked at once, comparing notes on the different boys’ reactions to their gifts.
-“That big landlubber, Ogonski said, ‘Geez, the scrub me from top to toe twice a day, and then give me a cake of poifumed soap to remember them by!’”
-“We were right to give the ballet dancer to the machinist’s mate. When I went back to say good night, there he was, fast asleep, a bit of smile on his face, and the toy clutched in his hand—just like a kid.”
-“You know, it’s funny,” Tess Duggan said suddenly. “It’s the biggest Christmas Eve we’ll ever know. I mean the most important. We’ve all the ornaments, and glitter, and fine presents, and family. We’ll all have those things again, too. But it will never again be quite so big tonight.”
**A few minor edits were made to the original article
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Pearl Harbor Day: Lee B. Soucy
World War II pharmacist’s mate second class Lee B. Soucy, a medical laboratory technician assigned to the target ship USS Utah (AG-16).
What do you remember about that morning of 7 December 1941?
I had just had breakfast and was looking out a porthole in sick bay when someone said, "What the hell are all those planes doing up there on a Sunday? Someone else said, "It must be those crazy Marines. They'd be the only ones out maneuvering on a Sunday." When I looked up in the sky I saw five or six planes starting their descent. Then when the first bombs dropped on the hangers at Ford Island, I thought, "Those guys are missing us by a mile." Inasmuch as practice bombing was a daily occurrence to us, it was not too unusual for planes to drop bombs, but the time and place were quite out of line. We could not imagine bombing practice in port. It occurred to me and to most of the others that someone had really goofed this time and put live bombs on those planes by mistake.
In any event, even after I saw a huge fireball and cloud of black smoke rise from hangers on Ford Island and heard explosions, it did not occur to me that these were enemy planes. It was too incredible! Simply beyond imagination! "What a SNAFU," I moaned.
As I watched the explosions on Ford Island in amazement and disbelief, I felt the ship lurch. We didn't know it then, but we were being bombed and torpedoed by planes approaching from the opposite (port) side.
What time did this happen?
The bugler and bosun's mate were on the fantail ready to raise the colors at 8 o'clock. In a matter of seconds, the bugler sounded "General Quarters." I grabbed my first aid bag and headed for my battle station amidship.
A number of the ship's tremors are vaguely imprinted in my mind, but I remember one jolt quite vividly. As I was running down the passageway toward my battle station, another torpedo or bomb hit and shook the ship severely. I was knocked off balance and through the log room door. I got up a little dazed and immediately darted down the ladder below the armored deck. I forgot my first aid kit.
What did you do?
By then the ship was already listing. There were a few men down below who looked dumbfounded and wondered out loud, "What's going on?" I felt around my shoulder in great alarm. No first aid kit! Being out of uniform is one thing, but being at a battle station without proper equipment is more than embarrassing.
After a minute or two below the armored deck, we heard another bugle call, then the bosun's whistle followed by the boatswain's chant, "Abandon ship... Abandon ship."
We scampered up the ladder. As I raced toward the open side of the deck, an officer stood by a stack of life preservers and tossed the jackets at us as we ran by. When I reached the open deck, the ship was listing precipitously. I thought about the huge amount of ammunition we had on board and that it would surely blow up soon. I wanted to get away from the ship fast, so I discarded my life jacket. I didn't want a Mae West slowing me down.
Did you dive off the ship?
Yes and no. And that’s an interesting story. Another thing had jolted my memory. I remembered how rough the beach on Ford Island was. The day previous, I had been part of a fire and rescue party dispatched to fight a small fire on Ford Island. The fire was out by the time we got there but I remember distinctly the rugged beach, so I tied double knots in my shoes whereas just about everyone else kicked their's off.
So you did dive off the ship?
Not exactly. I was tensely poised for a running dive off the partially exposed hull when the ship lunged again and threw me off balance. I ended up with by bottom sliding across and down the barnacle encrusted bottom of the ship.
When the ship had jolted, I thought we had been hit by another bomb or torpedo, but later it was determined that the mooring lines snapped which caused the 21,000-ton ship to jerk so violently as she keeled over.
Nevertheless, after I bobbed up to the surface of the water and tried to get my bearings, I spotted a motor launch with a coxswain fishing men out of the water with his boat hook. I started to swim toward the launch. After a few strokes, a hail of bullets hit the water a few feet ahead of me in line with the launch. As the strafer banked, I noted the big red insignias on the wing tips. Until then, I really had not known who attacked us. At some point, I had heard someone shout, "Where did those Germans come from?" I quickly decided that a boat full of men would be a more likely strafing target than a loan swimmer, so I changed course and hightailed it for Ford Island.
What happened when you reached the beach?
I was exhausted. As I tried to catch my breath, another pharmacist's mate, Gordon Sumner, from the Utah, stumbled out of the water. I remember how elated I was to see him. There is no doubt in my mind that bewilderment, if not misery, loves company. I remember I felt guilty that I had not made any effort to recover my first aid kit. Sumner had his wrapped around his shoulders.
While we both tried to get our wind back, a jeep came speeding by and came to a screeching halt. One of the two officers in the vehicle had spotted our Red Cross brassards and hailed us aboard. They took us to a two- or three-story concrete BOQ (bachelor officer's quarters) facing Battleship Row to set up an emergency treatment station for several oil-covered casualties strewn across the concrete floor. Most of them were from the capsized or flaming battleships. It did not take long to exhaust the supplies in Sumner's bag.
What could you do with no supplies?
A line officer came by to inquire how we were getting along. We told him we had run out of everything and were in urgent need of bandages and some kind of solvent or alcohol to cleanse wounds. He ordered someone to strip the beds and make rolls of bandages with the sheets. Then he turned to us and said, "Alcohol? Alcohol?" he repeated. "Will whiskey do?"
Before we could mull it over, he took off and in a few minutes he returned and plunked a case of scotch at our feet. Another person who accompanied him had an armful of bottles of a variety of liquors. I am sure denatured alcohol could not have served our purpose better for washing off the sticky oil, as well as providing some antiseptic effect for a variety of wounds and burns.
Was it a bizarre situation?
Yes, it was. Despite the confusion, pain, and suffering, there was some gusty humor amidst the pathos and chaos. At one point, an exhausted swimmer, covered with a gooey film of black oil, saw me walking around with a washcloth in one hand and a bottle of booze in the other. He hollered, "Hey Doc, could I have a shot of that medicine?" I handed him the bottle of whichever liquor I had at the time. He took a hefty swig. He had no sooner swallowed the "medicine" than he spewed it out along with black mucoidal globs of oil. He lay back a minute after he stopped vomiting, then said, "Doc, I lost that medicine. How about another dose?"
It all sounds like a very incongruous way to practice medicine.
Well, it certainly wasn’t normal but then again, the circumstances were anything but routine. My internal as well as external application of booze was not accepted medical practice, but it sure made me popular with the old salts. Actually, it probably was a good medical procedure if it induced vomiting. Retaining contaminated water and oil in one's stomach was not good for one's health.
Were you still under attack while all this was going on?
Oh, sure. And I remember another incident. A low flying enemy pilot was strafing toward our concrete haven while I was on my knees trying to determine what to do for a prostrate casualty. Although the sailor, or marine, was in bad shape, he raised his head feebly when he saw the plane approach and shouted, "Open the doors and let the sonofabitch in."
Events which occurred in seconds take minutes to recount. During the lull, regular medical personnel from the Ford Island Dispensary arrived with proper supplies and equipment and released Sumner and me so we could rejoin other Utah survivors for reassignment.
When the supplies ran out at our first aid station, I suggested to Sumner that he volunteer to go to the Naval Dispensary for some more. When he returned, he mentioned that he had a close call. A bomb landed in the patio while he was at the dispensary. He didn't mention any injury, so I shrugged it off. After all, under the circumstances, what was one bomb more or less. That afternoon, while we were both walking along a lanai [screened porch] at the dispensary, he pointed to a crater in the patio. "That's where the bomb hit I told you about." "Where were you?", I asked. He pointed to a spot not far away. I said, "Come on, if you had been that close, you'd have been killed." To which he replied, "Oh, it didn't go off. I fled the area in a hurry."
What happened when the Japanese aircraft left the scene?
Sometime after dark, a squadron of scout planes from the carrier Enterprise (200 hundred or so miles out at sea), their fuel nearly depleted, came in for a landing on Ford Island. All hell broke loose and the sky lit up from tracer bullets from numerous antiaircraft guns. As the Enterprise planes approached, some understandably trigger-happy gunners opened fire; then all gunners followed suit and shot down all but one of our planes. At least, that's what I was told. Earlier that evening, many of the Utah survivors had been taken to the USS Argonne (AP-4), a transport. Gunners manning .50 caliber machine guns on the partially submerged USS California directly across from the Argonne hit the ship while shooting at the planes. A stray, armor-piercing bullet penetrated Argonne's thin bulkhead, went through a Utah survivors's arm, and spent itself in another sailor's heart. He died instantly.
The name Price has been stored in my memory bank for a long time as this fatality but, at a recent reunion of Utah survivors, another ex-shipmate, Gilbert Meyer, insisted that Price was not the one killed. I didn't argue too long because I recalled meeting two men at the Pearl Harbor Naval Hospital several weeks after the raid who walked around with their own obituaries in their wallets--clippings from hometown newspapers.
SOURCE
Interview with former World War II pharmacist’s mate second class Lee B. Soucy, a medical laboratory technician assigned to the target ship USS Utah (AG-16). Conducted by Jan K. Herman, Historian of the Navy Medical Department, 11 February 1995.
What do you remember about that morning of 7 December 1941?
I had just had breakfast and was looking out a porthole in sick bay when someone said, "What the hell are all those planes doing up there on a Sunday? Someone else said, "It must be those crazy Marines. They'd be the only ones out maneuvering on a Sunday." When I looked up in the sky I saw five or six planes starting their descent. Then when the first bombs dropped on the hangers at Ford Island, I thought, "Those guys are missing us by a mile." Inasmuch as practice bombing was a daily occurrence to us, it was not too unusual for planes to drop bombs, but the time and place were quite out of line. We could not imagine bombing practice in port. It occurred to me and to most of the others that someone had really goofed this time and put live bombs on those planes by mistake.
In any event, even after I saw a huge fireball and cloud of black smoke rise from hangers on Ford Island and heard explosions, it did not occur to me that these were enemy planes. It was too incredible! Simply beyond imagination! "What a SNAFU," I moaned.
As I watched the explosions on Ford Island in amazement and disbelief, I felt the ship lurch. We didn't know it then, but we were being bombed and torpedoed by planes approaching from the opposite (port) side.
What time did this happen?
The bugler and bosun's mate were on the fantail ready to raise the colors at 8 o'clock. In a matter of seconds, the bugler sounded "General Quarters." I grabbed my first aid bag and headed for my battle station amidship.
A number of the ship's tremors are vaguely imprinted in my mind, but I remember one jolt quite vividly. As I was running down the passageway toward my battle station, another torpedo or bomb hit and shook the ship severely. I was knocked off balance and through the log room door. I got up a little dazed and immediately darted down the ladder below the armored deck. I forgot my first aid kit.
What did you do?
By then the ship was already listing. There were a few men down below who looked dumbfounded and wondered out loud, "What's going on?" I felt around my shoulder in great alarm. No first aid kit! Being out of uniform is one thing, but being at a battle station without proper equipment is more than embarrassing.
After a minute or two below the armored deck, we heard another bugle call, then the bosun's whistle followed by the boatswain's chant, "Abandon ship... Abandon ship."
We scampered up the ladder. As I raced toward the open side of the deck, an officer stood by a stack of life preservers and tossed the jackets at us as we ran by. When I reached the open deck, the ship was listing precipitously. I thought about the huge amount of ammunition we had on board and that it would surely blow up soon. I wanted to get away from the ship fast, so I discarded my life jacket. I didn't want a Mae West slowing me down.
Did you dive off the ship?
Yes and no. And that’s an interesting story. Another thing had jolted my memory. I remembered how rough the beach on Ford Island was. The day previous, I had been part of a fire and rescue party dispatched to fight a small fire on Ford Island. The fire was out by the time we got there but I remember distinctly the rugged beach, so I tied double knots in my shoes whereas just about everyone else kicked their's off.
So you did dive off the ship?
Not exactly. I was tensely poised for a running dive off the partially exposed hull when the ship lunged again and threw me off balance. I ended up with by bottom sliding across and down the barnacle encrusted bottom of the ship.
When the ship had jolted, I thought we had been hit by another bomb or torpedo, but later it was determined that the mooring lines snapped which caused the 21,000-ton ship to jerk so violently as she keeled over.
Nevertheless, after I bobbed up to the surface of the water and tried to get my bearings, I spotted a motor launch with a coxswain fishing men out of the water with his boat hook. I started to swim toward the launch. After a few strokes, a hail of bullets hit the water a few feet ahead of me in line with the launch. As the strafer banked, I noted the big red insignias on the wing tips. Until then, I really had not known who attacked us. At some point, I had heard someone shout, "Where did those Germans come from?" I quickly decided that a boat full of men would be a more likely strafing target than a loan swimmer, so I changed course and hightailed it for Ford Island.
What happened when you reached the beach?
I was exhausted. As I tried to catch my breath, another pharmacist's mate, Gordon Sumner, from the Utah, stumbled out of the water. I remember how elated I was to see him. There is no doubt in my mind that bewilderment, if not misery, loves company. I remember I felt guilty that I had not made any effort to recover my first aid kit. Sumner had his wrapped around his shoulders.
While we both tried to get our wind back, a jeep came speeding by and came to a screeching halt. One of the two officers in the vehicle had spotted our Red Cross brassards and hailed us aboard. They took us to a two- or three-story concrete BOQ (bachelor officer's quarters) facing Battleship Row to set up an emergency treatment station for several oil-covered casualties strewn across the concrete floor. Most of them were from the capsized or flaming battleships. It did not take long to exhaust the supplies in Sumner's bag.
What could you do with no supplies?
A line officer came by to inquire how we were getting along. We told him we had run out of everything and were in urgent need of bandages and some kind of solvent or alcohol to cleanse wounds. He ordered someone to strip the beds and make rolls of bandages with the sheets. Then he turned to us and said, "Alcohol? Alcohol?" he repeated. "Will whiskey do?"
Before we could mull it over, he took off and in a few minutes he returned and plunked a case of scotch at our feet. Another person who accompanied him had an armful of bottles of a variety of liquors. I am sure denatured alcohol could not have served our purpose better for washing off the sticky oil, as well as providing some antiseptic effect for a variety of wounds and burns.
Was it a bizarre situation?
Yes, it was. Despite the confusion, pain, and suffering, there was some gusty humor amidst the pathos and chaos. At one point, an exhausted swimmer, covered with a gooey film of black oil, saw me walking around with a washcloth in one hand and a bottle of booze in the other. He hollered, "Hey Doc, could I have a shot of that medicine?" I handed him the bottle of whichever liquor I had at the time. He took a hefty swig. He had no sooner swallowed the "medicine" than he spewed it out along with black mucoidal globs of oil. He lay back a minute after he stopped vomiting, then said, "Doc, I lost that medicine. How about another dose?"
It all sounds like a very incongruous way to practice medicine.
Well, it certainly wasn’t normal but then again, the circumstances were anything but routine. My internal as well as external application of booze was not accepted medical practice, but it sure made me popular with the old salts. Actually, it probably was a good medical procedure if it induced vomiting. Retaining contaminated water and oil in one's stomach was not good for one's health.
Were you still under attack while all this was going on?
Oh, sure. And I remember another incident. A low flying enemy pilot was strafing toward our concrete haven while I was on my knees trying to determine what to do for a prostrate casualty. Although the sailor, or marine, was in bad shape, he raised his head feebly when he saw the plane approach and shouted, "Open the doors and let the sonofabitch in."
Events which occurred in seconds take minutes to recount. During the lull, regular medical personnel from the Ford Island Dispensary arrived with proper supplies and equipment and released Sumner and me so we could rejoin other Utah survivors for reassignment.
When the supplies ran out at our first aid station, I suggested to Sumner that he volunteer to go to the Naval Dispensary for some more. When he returned, he mentioned that he had a close call. A bomb landed in the patio while he was at the dispensary. He didn't mention any injury, so I shrugged it off. After all, under the circumstances, what was one bomb more or less. That afternoon, while we were both walking along a lanai [screened porch] at the dispensary, he pointed to a crater in the patio. "That's where the bomb hit I told you about." "Where were you?", I asked. He pointed to a spot not far away. I said, "Come on, if you had been that close, you'd have been killed." To which he replied, "Oh, it didn't go off. I fled the area in a hurry."
What happened when the Japanese aircraft left the scene?
Sometime after dark, a squadron of scout planes from the carrier Enterprise (200 hundred or so miles out at sea), their fuel nearly depleted, came in for a landing on Ford Island. All hell broke loose and the sky lit up from tracer bullets from numerous antiaircraft guns. As the Enterprise planes approached, some understandably trigger-happy gunners opened fire; then all gunners followed suit and shot down all but one of our planes. At least, that's what I was told. Earlier that evening, many of the Utah survivors had been taken to the USS Argonne (AP-4), a transport. Gunners manning .50 caliber machine guns on the partially submerged USS California directly across from the Argonne hit the ship while shooting at the planes. A stray, armor-piercing bullet penetrated Argonne's thin bulkhead, went through a Utah survivors's arm, and spent itself in another sailor's heart. He died instantly.
The name Price has been stored in my memory bank for a long time as this fatality but, at a recent reunion of Utah survivors, another ex-shipmate, Gilbert Meyer, insisted that Price was not the one killed. I didn't argue too long because I recalled meeting two men at the Pearl Harbor Naval Hospital several weeks after the raid who walked around with their own obituaries in their wallets--clippings from hometown newspapers.
SOURCE
Interview with former World War II pharmacist’s mate second class Lee B. Soucy, a medical laboratory technician assigned to the target ship USS Utah (AG-16). Conducted by Jan K. Herman, Historian of the Navy Medical Department, 11 February 1995.
Pearl Harbor Day: Horace Warden
Excerpt from interview with RADM Horace D. Warden, MC, USN (Ret.), Experiences during World War II, as White House physician, and involvement with space program and Pueblo crew repatriation. Telephone interview, San Diego, CA, December 14, 21, 23, 28, 1993. Interviewed by Jan K. Herman, Historian, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery.
Were you on the Breese that Sunday morning when the Japanese attacked?
Yes sir. On that Sunday morning we were moored to a buoy near Pearl City. I happened to be aboard the previous night because in those days they used to divide Pearl Harbor into three areas. There was supposed to be a doctor assigned to each area all night for medical coverage. It was my night to be aboard in Pearl City. I was due to go off duty at 8:00 on Sunday morning. I had changed into civilian clothes and was waiting on the deck for a whaleboat to take me to my car so I could go to breakfast at home on the far side of Honolulu. The Japanese hit at five minutes to eight and I never got off the ship.
Did you see them coming?
No. The first thing I remember was the sound of firing and then they called general quarters. We were not a large ship so we were not immediately threatened. After the Japanese delivered their bombs on the large ships they had to come up over us. That's when we got one of them with what I think was a 3-inch gun.
Did you see that happen?
No. I didn't see the plane get hit.
When you went to general quarters, your station was in the sick bay below decks?
Yes. But I didn't have time to get there. I remember one of our food handlers was milling around very upset and crying, a real basket case. We went to where we had the firearms stashed away and we got a rifle and gave it to him. Once he started shooting he was alright. The plane we had shot down landed right near us in the water. The pilot was still alive so they got a whaleboat to go rescue him. Apparently he made a move, put his hand under his vest or something, and so they killed him and then didn't have a live pilot to question. The sailor who shot him was told that he was going to get court martialed. But later that all was quashed and there was no court martial.
We then tried to get underway and out of the harbor. Our ship was ready because we had had the duty the night before, but we were tied to three other ships and they didn't have many people aboard on Sunday morning. So we had to wait until enough crewmembers arrived on these ships to get them out of the harbor.
Did you have any casualties to treat at this point?
None. After about an hour or an hour and a half we were out to sea and started to patrol looking for miniature subs and dropped depth charges. We stayed out about a week and then came back. I can't remember whether we ran out of food or fuel. Anyway, we came back in to Pearl Harbor. Then we could see all the damage that had been done. Going out we couldn't see it because of where we were. While we were out we kept wondering why the big ships hadn't come out.
What did you think of all that damage?
It was just terrible. It was one of those things when you think, what's the world coming to? What's going to happen to us now? Everyone was all set to try to get even if we could, but my family was on the other end of Oahu so the first thing I wanted to do was get ashore and let them know that I was okay and find out that they were okay. That was probably the worst week of the war for me.
What did you do once you got back to Pearl?
We stayed there waiting for further orders. There was nothing really to do. I then got permission to go to the Naval Hospital to help out over there.
Did you still have a lot of casualties to deal with from the attack?
Yes. We still had surgery to do. One of the Japanese planes had crashed in the Naval Hospital yard and I have a piece of it.
Did you still go patrolling with the Breese?
Yes. We would go out for a few days patrolling looking for submarines and then come back to Pearl. I remember that on Christmas day in 1941 we were tied up right at Hospital Point. Meanwhile, my family came out to the Naval Hospital to have Christmas dinner with me. That was a wonderful occasion.
Were you on the Breese that Sunday morning when the Japanese attacked?
Yes sir. On that Sunday morning we were moored to a buoy near Pearl City. I happened to be aboard the previous night because in those days they used to divide Pearl Harbor into three areas. There was supposed to be a doctor assigned to each area all night for medical coverage. It was my night to be aboard in Pearl City. I was due to go off duty at 8:00 on Sunday morning. I had changed into civilian clothes and was waiting on the deck for a whaleboat to take me to my car so I could go to breakfast at home on the far side of Honolulu. The Japanese hit at five minutes to eight and I never got off the ship.
Did you see them coming?
No. The first thing I remember was the sound of firing and then they called general quarters. We were not a large ship so we were not immediately threatened. After the Japanese delivered their bombs on the large ships they had to come up over us. That's when we got one of them with what I think was a 3-inch gun.
Did you see that happen?
No. I didn't see the plane get hit.
When you went to general quarters, your station was in the sick bay below decks?
Yes. But I didn't have time to get there. I remember one of our food handlers was milling around very upset and crying, a real basket case. We went to where we had the firearms stashed away and we got a rifle and gave it to him. Once he started shooting he was alright. The plane we had shot down landed right near us in the water. The pilot was still alive so they got a whaleboat to go rescue him. Apparently he made a move, put his hand under his vest or something, and so they killed him and then didn't have a live pilot to question. The sailor who shot him was told that he was going to get court martialed. But later that all was quashed and there was no court martial.
We then tried to get underway and out of the harbor. Our ship was ready because we had had the duty the night before, but we were tied to three other ships and they didn't have many people aboard on Sunday morning. So we had to wait until enough crewmembers arrived on these ships to get them out of the harbor.
Did you have any casualties to treat at this point?
None. After about an hour or an hour and a half we were out to sea and started to patrol looking for miniature subs and dropped depth charges. We stayed out about a week and then came back. I can't remember whether we ran out of food or fuel. Anyway, we came back in to Pearl Harbor. Then we could see all the damage that had been done. Going out we couldn't see it because of where we were. While we were out we kept wondering why the big ships hadn't come out.
What did you think of all that damage?
It was just terrible. It was one of those things when you think, what's the world coming to? What's going to happen to us now? Everyone was all set to try to get even if we could, but my family was on the other end of Oahu so the first thing I wanted to do was get ashore and let them know that I was okay and find out that they were okay. That was probably the worst week of the war for me.
What did you do once you got back to Pearl?
We stayed there waiting for further orders. There was nothing really to do. I then got permission to go to the Naval Hospital to help out over there.
Did you still have a lot of casualties to deal with from the attack?
Yes. We still had surgery to do. One of the Japanese planes had crashed in the Naval Hospital yard and I have a piece of it.
Did you still go patrolling with the Breese?
Yes. We would go out for a few days patrolling looking for submarines and then come back to Pearl. I remember that on Christmas day in 1941 we were tied up right at Hospital Point. Meanwhile, my family came out to the Naval Hospital to have Christmas dinner with me. That was a wonderful occasion.
Medical First Responders Remember Pearl Harbor
A story from the Department of Defense's Military Health System:
http://www.health.mil/News_And_Multimedia/News/detail/11-12-06/Medical_First_Responders_Remember_Pearl_Harbor.aspx
http://www.health.mil/News_And_Multimedia/News/detail/11-12-06/Medical_First_Responders_Remember_Pearl_Harbor.aspx
Pearl Harbor Day: Nurse Ruth Erickson
Excerpt from a telephone interview with CAPT Ruth A. Erickson, NC, USN, (Ret.), World War II nurse and later tenth Director of the Navy Nurse Corps, 24 March, 30 March, 6 April, 12 April 1994. Interviewed by Jan K. Herman, Historian, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery.
In late summer of 1939 we learned that spring fleet maneuvers would be in Hawaii, off the coast of Maui. Further, I would be detached to report to the Naval Hospital, Pearl Harbor, T.H. when maneuvers were completed. The orders were effective on 8 May 1940.
Tropical duty was another segment in my life's adventure! On this same date I reported to the hospital command in which CAPT Reynolds Hayden was the commanding officer. Miss Myrtle Kinsey was the chief of nursing services with a staff of eight nurses. I was also pleased to meet up with Miss Winnie Gibson once again, the operating room supervisor.
We nurses had regular ward assignments and went on duty at 8 a.m. Each had a nice room in the nurses' quarters. We were a bit spoiled; along with iced tea, fresh pineapple was always available.
We were off at noon each day while one nurse covered units until relieved at 3 p.m. In turn, the p.m. nurse was relieved at 10 p.m. The night nurse's hours were 10 p.m. to 8 a.m.
One month I'd have a medical ward and the next month rotated to a surgical ward. Again, I didn't have any operating room duties here. The fleet population was relatively young and healthy. We did have quite an outbreak of "cat [catarrhal] fever" with flu-like symptoms. This was the only pressure period we had until the war started.
What was off-duty like?
Cars were few and far between, but two nurses had them. Many aviators were attached to Ford Island. Thus, there was dating. We had the tennis courts, swimming at the beach, and picnics. The large hotel at Waikiki was the Royal Hawaiian, where we enjoyed an occasional beautiful evening and dancing under starlit skies to lovely Hawaiian melodies.
And then it all ended rather quickly.
Yes, it did. A big dry dock in the area was destined to go right through the area where the nurses' quarters stood. We had vacated the nurses' quarters about 1 week prior to the attack. We lived in temporary quarters directly across the street from the hospital, a one-story building in the shape of an E. The permanent nurses' quarters had been stripped and the shell of the building was to be razed in the next few days.
By now, the nursing staff had been increased to 30 and an appropriate number of doctors and corpsmen had been added. The Pacific fleet had moved their base of operations from San Diego to Pearl Harbor. With this massive expansion, there went our tropical hours! The hospital now operated at full capacity.
Were you and your colleagues beginning to feel that war was coming?
No. We didn't know what to think. I had worked the afternoon duty on Saturday, December 6th from 3 p.m. until 10 p.m. with Sunday to be my day off.
Two or three of us were sitting in the dining room Sunday morning having a late breakfast and talking over coffee. Suddenly we heard planes roaring overhead and we said, "The `fly boys' are really busy at Ford Island this morning." The island was directly across the channel from the hospital. We didn't think too much about it since the reserves were often there for weekend training. We no sooner got those words out when we started to hear noises that were foreign to us.
I leaped out of my chair and dashed to the nearest window in the corridor. Right then there was a plane flying directly over the top of our quarters, a one-story structure. The rising sun under the wing of the plane denoted the enemy. Had I known the pilot, one could almost see his features around his goggles. He was obviously saving his ammunition for the ships. Just down the row, all the ships were sitting there--the California, the Arizona, the Oklahoma, and others.
My heart was racing, the telephone was ringing, the chief nurse, Gertrude Arnest, was saying, "Girls, get into your uniforms at once. This is the real thing!"
I was in my room by that time changing into uniform. It was getting dusky, almost like evening. Smoke was rising from burning ships.
I dashed across the street, through a shrapnel shower, got into the lanai and just stood still for a second as were a couple of doctors. I felt like I were frozen to the ground, but it was only a split second. I ran to the orthopedic dressing room but it was locked. A corpsman ran to the OD's desk for the keys. It seemed like an eternity before he returned and the room was opened. We drew water into every container we could find and set up the instrument boiler. Fortunately, we still had electricity and water. Dr. [CDR Clyde W.] Brunson, the chief of medicine was making sick call when the bombing started. When he was finished, he was to play golf...a phrase never to be uttered again.
The first patient came into our dressing room at 8:25 a.m. with a large opening in his abdomen and bleeding profusely. They started an intravenous and transfusion. I can still see the tremor of Dr. Brunson's hand as he picked up the needle. Everyone was terrified. The patient died within the hour.
Then the burned patients streamed in. The USS Nevada had managed some steam and attempted to get out of the channel. They were unable to make it and went aground on Hospital Point right near the hospital. There was heavy oil on the water and the men dived off the ship and swam through these waters to Hospital Point, not too great a distance, but when one is burned... How they ever managed, I'll never know.
The tropical dress at that time was white t-shirts and shorts. The burns began where the pants ended. Bared arms and faces were plentiful.
Personnel retrieved a supply of new flit guns from stock. We filled these with tannic acid to spray burned bodies. Then we gave these gravely injured patients sedatives for their intense pain.
Orthopedic patients were eased out of their beds with no time for linen changes as an unending stream of burn patients continued until mid afternoon. A doctor, who several days before had renal surgery and was still convalescing, got out of his bed and began to assist the other doctors.
Do you recall the Japanese plane that was shot down and crashed into the tennis court?
Yes, the laboratory was next to the tennis court. The plane sheared off a corner of the laboratory and a number of the laboratory animals, rats and guinea pigs, were destroyed. Dr. Shaver [LTJG John S.], the chief pathologist, was very upset.
About 12 noon the galley personnel came around with sandwiches and cold drinks; we ate on the run. About 2 o'clock the chief nurse was making rounds to check on all the units and arrange relief schedules.
I was relieved around 4 p.m. and went over to the nurses' quarters where everything was intact. I freshened up, had something to eat, and went back on duty at 8 p.m. I was scheduled to report to a surgical unit. By now it was dark and we worked with flashlights. The maintenance people and anyone else who could manage a hammer and nails were putting up black drapes or black paper to seal the crevices against any light that might stream to the outside.
About 10 or 11 o'clock, there were planes overhead. I really hadn't felt frightened until this particular time. My knees were knocking together and the patients were calling, "Nurse, nurse!" The other nurse and I went to them, held their hands a few moments, and then went onto others.
The priest was a very busy man. The noise ended very quickly and the word got around that these were our own planes.
What do you remember when daylight came?
I worked until midnight on that ward and then was directed to go down to the basement level in the main hospital building. Here the dependents--the women and children--the families of the doctors and other staff officers were placed for the night. There were ample blankets and pillows. We lay body by body along the walls of the basement. The children were frightened and the adults tense. It was not a very restful night for anyone.
Everyone was relieved to see daylight. At 6 a.m. I returned to the quarters, showered, had breakfast, and reported to a medical ward. There were more burn cases and I spent a week there.
What could you see when you looked over toward Ford Island?
I really couldn't see too much from the hospital because of the heavy smoke. Perhaps at a higher level one could have had a better view.
On the evening of 17 December, the chief nurse told me I was being ordered to temporary duty and I was to go to the quarters, pack a bag, and be ready to leave at noon. When I asked where I was going, she said she had no idea. The commanding officer ordered her to obtain three nurses and they were to be in uniform. In that era we had no outdoor uniforms. Thus it would be the regular white ward uniforms.
And so in our ward uniforms, capes, blue felt hats, and blue sweaters, Lauretta Eno, Catherine Richardson, and I waited for a car and driver to pick us up at the quarters. When he arrived and inquired of our destination, we still had no idea! The OD's desk had our priority orders to go to one of the piers in Honolulu. We were to go aboard the SS President Coolidge and prepare to receive patients. We calculated supplies for a 10-day period.
We three nurses and a number of corpsmen from the hospital were assigned to the SS Coolidge. Eight volunteer nurses from the Queens Hospital in Honolulu were attached to the Army transport at the next pier, USAT Scott, a smaller ship.
The naval hospital brought our supplies the following day, the 18th, and we worked late into the evening. We received our patients from the hospital on the 19th, the Coolidge with 125 patients and the Scott with 55.
Were these the most critically injured patients?
The command decided that patients who would need more than 3 months treatment should be transferred. Some were very bad and probably should not have been moved. There were many passengers already aboard the ship, missionaries and countless others who had been picked up in the Orient. Two Navy doctors on the passenger list from the Philippines were placed on temporary duty and they were pleased to be of help.
Catherine Richardson worked 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. I had the 4 p.m. to midnight, and Lauretta Eno worked midnight to 8 a.m. Everyone was very apprehensive. The ship traveled without exterior lights but there was ample light inside.
You left at night?
Yes, we left in the late afternoon of the 19th. There were 8 or 10 ships in the convoy. It was quite chilly the next day; I later learned that we had gone fairly far north instead of directly across. The rumors were rampant that a submarine was seen out this porthole in some other direction. I never get seasick and enjoy a bit of heavy seas, but this was different! Ventilation was limited by reason of sealed ports and only added to gastric misery. I was squared about very soon.
The night before we got into port, we lost a patient, an older man, perhaps a chief. He had been badly burned. He was losing intravenous fluids faster than they could be replaced. Our destination became San Francisco with 124 patients and one deceased.
We arrived at 8 a.m. on Christmas Day! Two ferries were waiting there for us with cots aboard and ambulances from the naval hospital at Mare Island and nearby civilian hospitals. The Red Cross was a cheerful sight with donuts and coffee.
Our arrival was kept very quiet. Heretofore, all ship's movements were usually published in the daily paper but since the war had started, this had ceased. I don't recall that other ships in the convoy came in with us except for the Scott. We and the Scott were the only ships to enter the port. The convoy probably slipped away.
The patients were very happy to be home and so were we all. The ambulances went on ahead to Mare Island. By the time we had everyone settled on the two ferries, it was close to noon. We arrived at Mare Island at 4:30 p.m. and helped get that patients into the respective wards.
While at Mare Island, a doctor said to me, "For God's sake, Ruth, what's happened out there? We don't know a thing." He had been on the USS Arizona and was detached only a few months prior to the attack. We stayed in the nurses' quarters that night.
The next morning we picked up our orders in the commanding officer's office. They informed us that we were free until 0800 the following morning, which would be the 27th. That night several of us were invited out and we went to dinner in our white uniforms and capes. We really stood out in a group. Being Christmas, San Francisco was quiet and we were not feeling very Christmasy. We made some telephone calls for ourselves and our shipmates.
When did you leave San Francisco?
We left on the morning of the 28th of December to return to Pearl Harbor. We went aboard the Henderson (AP-1), an old time transport. The ship was really bulging with troops. These were the first troops to go out since war was declared. Too, this ship was talking the first mail back to Hawaii since the war began and included the Christmas mail.
We arrived back at Pearl Harbor on January 10th and we three Navy nurses were picked up and returned to the hospital. It was like coming back to family. A bonding had been created by reason of our common experience beginning on December 7th. Fifty-five years later that bond still exists whenever one meets up with another.
Pearl Harbor Day: Nurse Rosella Asbelle
Telephone interview with Rosella Asbelle, Navy nurse at Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, and later assigned to Naval Hospital Oakland's Occupational Therapy Department with amputee patients during the Korean War. Conducted by Jan K. Herman, Historian, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, 13 June 2002.
Where are you originally from?
I was born in Oklahoma but we came out to California when I was about 7 years old--a little town called Dinuba near Fresno.
Where did you go to nursing school?
I went to St. Mary's Hospital School of Nursing, San Francisco, CA.
And you were a Navy nurse.
I was very definitely a Navy nurse. I was at Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941.
What do you remember about that?
Everything. I saw Japanese planes coming over. They were so low, they were right on top of the building.
Then you knew Ruth Erickson.
We were all together. Ruth is a very knowledgeable person. I have all the addresses of the 29 Navy nurses who were at Pearl. We try to keep in touch with each other. I think there are about eight of us still living.
I remember vividly the planes flying over the buildings right next to the nurse's quarters. The nurse in the room next to me and I were looking out the window and she gasped, "Ahh, Rosella, it's war." I'll never forget that. The planes were just above the buildings. You could see the heads of the pilots.
Ruth Erickson told me that they were so close that if you had known who they were, you could have recognized them.
That's right. One came over the building so low, maybe at the height of a flagpole. You could see their heads. This grinning Japanese guy probably was thinking, "Boy, we've got you where we want you." I'll never forget that guy with the goggles and the smile on his face.
Did you have duty that morning?
It was 8 o'clock in the morning and I don't remember if I had duty that morning. But it didn't take long before the chief nurse called everybody over to the wards and casualties started coming in. And they continued coming in throughout the day. The heads or toilets were right outside the wards and there was a walkway between the ward and the head. The bodies were laid out like stacks of wood on that passageway connecting the ward and the toilet.
Did you work in the surgical area?
I was in the surgical ward and when they needed surgery they went to the operating room. Later on, I was transferred to the burn ward because there were so many people who were burned from the fires.
I read that you sprayed tannic acid on the burns.
That's right.
You must have seen some pretty horrible things that day.
It was really tragic. These kids were so young and so burned. I remember a radio blaring the song, "I Don't Want to Set the World On Fire," when some kid at the end of the ward yelled out, "Lady, you're too late. It's done been set." At that time, the wards had anywhere from 20 to 30 patients per ward. And I was on the burn ward. These kids were all lined up with tannic acid applications all over.
The saddest thing, though, was having night duty. That's when these severely burned kids would die. And you'd know when that was going to happen. Many a time, I'd sit by the bed of a young man, boy, who was burned, as he died talking about his family. It was generally about 4:30 or 5:30 in the morning when most of them went. You'd hold their hands and talk to them about their families.
That must have been terribly sad for you.
Yes. These kids were so young.
I'm sure that even if you don't remember everything that happened subsequently at Oakland, you'll probably never forget that day as long as you live.
I don't think anyone would.
We've previously posted Nurse Arbelle's entire oral history.
Remembering Pearl Harbor
Every December 7th my thoughts turn to those who witnessed that "date of infamy," an event that truly changed the course of history. As Medical Department historian, I've had the rare privilege of meeting and recording the memories of some our medical veterans--physicians, nurses, dentists, and hospital corpsmen--who not only survived the Japanese attack, but helped treat the victims. On this Pearl Harbor Day we'd like to share excerpts from some of those oral histories. Check back throughout the day to help us commemorate this World War II event. - Jan Herman
Thursday, December 1, 2011
"Navy Medicine at War" Series Now Available Online
The Navy Medicine at War series chronicles the compelling stories recalled by Navy Medical department veterans of World War II—physicians, dentists, nurses and hospital corpsmen who saw the war from their own unique perspectives. An account of Navy medical personnel practicing medicine in submarines operating in enemy waters, aboard vessels under kamikaze attack, aboard hospital ships, on beaches, in the jungle and POW camps scattered throughout Japan and the Philippines. The series was produced by the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery Office of Medical History and Archives in cooperation with the Visual Information Directorate of the Navy Medicine Support Command.
Part I: Trial By Fire: Navy Medicine at Pearl Harbor
https://archive.org/details/TrialByFireDecember71941
https://archive.org/details/NavyMedicineAtNormandyDDayJune61944WMV9640x480
https://archive.org/details/GuestsOfTheEmperorWMV9640x480
https://archive.org/details/BattleStationSickBay
Part V: Navy Medicine at War: Stepping Stones To Tokyo
The fifth installment in the six-part Navy Medicine at War film series chronicles the Navy medical experience with the Marine Corps’ island-hopping campaign during the first three years of the war.
https://archive.org/details/SteppingStonesToTokyoWMV9640x480
Part VI: Navy Medicine at War: Final Victory
“Final Victory” is the last installment of the six-part World War II film series, “Navy Medicine at War.” The film tells the story of the war’s final campaign and aftermath - the bloody fight to take Okinawa, the dress rehearsal for the invasion of the Japan ese home islands, the dropping of the two atomic bombs, Japan’s surrender, and the liberation of the prisoners of war.
https://archive.org/details/FinalVictoryWMV9640x480
Part I: Trial By Fire: Navy Medicine at Pearl Harbor
This installment recounts the “day that will live in infamy”
through the stories of Navy medical personnel who witnessed the tragic events
at Pearl Harbor.
https://archive.org/details/TrialByFireDecember71941
Part II: Navy Medicine at Normandy (Released
in 2001)
Although less well known, Navy medicine made important
contributions in the Atlantic, most notably in the Normandy campaign. The physicians and hospital corpsmen of the 6th
Naval Beach Battalion are highlighted in this installment.
https://archive.org/details/NavyMedicineAtNormandyDDayJune61944WMV9640x480
Part III: Guests of the Emperor (Released in
2005)
Pearl Harbor was just the beginning of a Japanese rampage
throughout the Pacific. With nothing to
stop their expanding empire, the enemy rolled through the Pacific conquering at
will. This installment of the film
series tells the tragic story of those who fought to defend Guam, Bataan, and
Corregidor against the Japanese invasion.
Their heroism throughout the following years in brutal captivity, under
extremely trying conditions exemplifies the enduring values of Navy Medicine.
https://archive.org/details/GuestsOfTheEmperorWMV9640x480
Part IV: Battle Station Sick Bay (Released
in 2006)
After the battle of Midway, even though the pendulum had
swung in favor of the United States, final victory was many campaigns and many,
many lives away. Throughout the next
three years, Navy medicine would accompany the carriers, battleships, cruisers,
destroyers, submarines, and thousands of other vessels on the long bloody road
to Tokyo. As crewman aboard these ships,
physicians, dentists, and hospital corpsmen would man battle stations and sick
bays during the battle—and the lulls in between. And they would do what Navy medical personnel
had always done—treating torn, burned, and bleeding bodies, and returning men
to duty.
https://archive.org/details/BattleStationSickBay
Part V: Navy Medicine at War: Stepping Stones To Tokyo
The fifth installment in the six-part Navy Medicine at War film series chronicles the Navy medical experience with the Marine Corps’ island-hopping campaign during the first three years of the war.
https://archive.org/details/SteppingStonesToTokyoWMV9640x480
Part VI: Navy Medicine at War: Final Victory
“Final Victory” is the last installment of the six-part World War II film series, “Navy Medicine at War.” The film tells the story of the war’s final campaign and aftermath - the bloody fight to take Okinawa, the dress rehearsal for the invasion of the Japan ese home islands, the dropping of the two atomic bombs, Japan’s surrender, and the liberation of the prisoners of war.
https://archive.org/details/FinalVictoryWMV9640x480
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