William C. Phillips US Navy USS Honolulu |
We were in the Navy Yard at Pier 19 for repairs. I had finished my breakfast and was on my way to my locker to dress and go on liberty at 0900 with the intentions of seeing my date in Honolulu. At 0755, general quarters was sounded and officer of the deck says, "This is no drill". I locked my locker and took off as fast as I could to my general quarters station, which was above the bridge on port side, and manned a 50-caliber water-cooled machine gun. My gun boss was a 2nd Lt. in the Marine Corps. The ammo was locked in the ready service locker so he handed me a ball peen hammer to break the lock, to get to the ammo and load the gun. I saw several types of Japanese aircraft flying over and bombing ships. I fired on any enemy plane that my machine gun could reach. When the Arizona was hit with a bomb into the ship and down to the powder magazine, we felt the concussion at our battle station. We had to get fire rooms going and get steam up so we could get underway. Sometime after 0900, a dive-bomber came down at us. I was firing at him as he let his bomb go. It went through the concrete deck and down into the water where it exploded so hard it raised the ship up in the water and we buckled our knees from the force of the explosion. The magazines that were damaged were flooded by the crew as the ship settled by the bow. When the attack ended at 0950, we stayed at our gun watch all day and into the darkness. We were all jumpy and I still have nervous reactions to this date. Several days later after the USS Pennsylvania battleship was moved out of dry-dock, we moved in for repairs. The yard workers cut out the damaged sections and replaced it and all the insides were hooked up. We had unloaded all the ammunition off the ship. We got back out of dry-dock, and provisions were put back on the ship including all the ammo. It was the 16th day of January, 1942 when we left Pearl Harbor for stateside. |
Information provided by Lester Ritchie. |
