Pearl Harbor

Around the squadron most of the day. Changed model set up to a U.S. destroyer torpedo attack on a Jap cruiser, complete with smoke and flames.

Finished a very fine book this evening — “Josephus” by Lion Feuchtwanger. A story revolving around the destruction of Jerusalem during the reign of Vespasian. The central character did not appeal to me at all during the first two-thirds of the book — he seemed too narrow-minded and fanatical — but as the story neared its end it became increasingly moving and as I turned the last page I was left with a deeply disturbed feeling that every good book brings to me.

Bought $19.00 worth of records today at the Sub Base – Smetana’s “Moldau,” Stravinskys “Petrouchka” “Le Sabre da Printemps,” Beethoven’s “Seventh Symphony” and lastly, Shostakovich’s “Sixth Symphony.”

Since returning from Midway, Ortwin has gradually “come across” with most of the dope concerning “post-battle” Midway.

Concerning Mosely — not all of his crew was lost as I previously heard, but three (of four) officers and a radioman. Their PBY was attacked by two seaplane fighters off some nearby Jap cruiser. They maneuvered to avoid them but the first burst from the Japs caught Mosely in the back of the head — I guess you never knew what hit him. The third pilot, in the navigators compartment, said he looked normal from behind except that his head was slumped forward — when he looked closer he could see blood running down his neck onto his shirt front.

Poor old Mose — well, his end was merciful and quick. The co-pilot was wounded and did his best to land the plane, but the controls were injured and he couldn’t get the left wing up. The plane hit the water at about 140 knots and at about 25°. The nose broke off to the right on impact, catching the radioman in the debris. The third pilot escaped through a break in the Nav compartment.

The plane sank almost immediately, the tail section remaining afloat just long enough to permit the launching of one rubber boat, during which time each of the Japs made a run on the boat. They were picked up three days later.

One group of wounded survivors in a rubber boat were continually bothered by sharks — attracted by the blood from their wounds seeping for the bottom of the boat. In desperation they plugged the hole in the boat bottom with a rag, only to have the shark’s pilot fish attempt to pull it out. They rigged a knife into an oar handle to make a spear, but failed in their attempts to kill a shark.

The barrel-rolling Jap strafer who was shot down over one of the Midway runways was one of the few Japs to actually crash on the island. He hit one of the runways going full tilt, and in flames bounced into the nearby brush, his engine tearing itself loose and cartwheeling off all by itself. He was actually pulled from the wreckage and his ears were cut off by a Marine who just lost a friend through the Japs shooting him while he was in his parachute.

That Zero that crashed on Midway had a Hamilton prop, a U.S. made compass, sheet aluminum stamped.

Six Army B-17Es were lost at Midway — none through enemy action — all through poor navigation. One of the PBYs picked up an Army crew whose navigator had lost two B-17s previously  — one of which he was the only survivor. There is a case on one man losing the government over a million dollars worth of sorely needed equipment. Last I heard, the Army had put this fellow into another crew as navigator — he would’ve been shot long ago in the Navy.

A boatload of Japs was picked up by destroyer three or four days after the battle — they represented the engineering brains and personnel of a Jap carrier that no one suspected had been sunk! They gave us claim to four carriers, rather than the previously announced three — pretty good.

Anyway, it seems that this boatload of Japs were on the verge of mutiny when picked up — the officer in charge, a commander, made himself comfortable in the boat, ate the remaining food, and helped himself to liberal amounts of a rapidly diminishing water supply. He “comforted” the crew with pats on the head and statements on the glory of dying for Japan, but denied them any of “his” food and water. Upon being landed at Midway he demanded a private room (he was allowed a screen to separate him from his men) and requested that Tokyo be notified immediately of his safe rescue! The Japs were looked on his curiosities by our men. They bathed in a bucket of water, rather than use the showers, and took mass calisthenics daily.

Feeling against the Army, in the Navy and Marines, has grown tremendously since Midway due to the Army’s rotten performance up there and their loud braying about what they “did.” One story that has made asses of them concerns a bombing hop in which they claimed to have sunk a Jap cruiser with direct hits in 15 seconds. They found out a few days later from an irate, newly returned sub commander, they had bombed his sub — the USS Nautilus – and it had crash dived to avoid being hit!

The story on General Tinker’s loss was another typical Army stunt. Tinker, a good enough man on the staff, wished to grab himself off a few medals, just as that old buzzard General Royce did in his Australia-Philippine raid. So, a few days after the main Midway scrap, Tinker arrives with four B-24s at Midway, to make a raid on Wake. He took the best navigators in the squadron in his plane, and left the plane’s regular pilots behind, so as to fly himself, along with some other bigwig.

They took off at night and circled Midway for short while, attempting to “join up.” Finally one plane (Tinker’s) turned off towards Kure Island, and another ship joined up on it, while the other two trailed behind.  Suddenly Tinker’s plane nosed up, did a wing-over, and shot down towards the sea — that was the last of General Tinker.

The accident was obviously the result of unfamiliar person at the controls while on instruments – possibly, and probably, the old boy himself. The Army pilots whose plane he had taken, and left them behind, were furious over this stupid sacrificing of a top-notch crew to some old duffer’s personal aspirations. Of the other three planes on the raid, two never found Wake, while the other plane found it, flew over it at dawn, but didn’t drop his bombs, for fear of rousing the Japs onto his, as yet, unarrived “buddies.”!

Of the four B-26s at Midway, only two returned. All did good work with their torpedoes. One was seen to launch so close to a Jap carrier that he hit the carrier deck with his tail as he zoomed up — it catapulted his plane end over end across the deck and over the other side. The two planes that returned were badly shot up, both tail gunners being dead, and one turret gunner. The result of Zeros, rather than anti-aircraft.