Richard Stoiber US Navy USS California |
I had just turned 20 years old on August 31, 1941. I had been in the US Navy almost one full year by then and I was really proud of our Navy. The first of June 1941, I was assigned to serve on the Battleship USS California. After participating in fleet maneuvers and war games prior to December 7th in Pearl Harbor, I never thought at that time that any country would be foolish enough to challenge us to a State of War. On Friday, December 5, 1941, we arrived in Pearl Harbor from Long Beach, California and two weeks of extensive training at sea. I was due to go on Liberty to Honolulu that following Sunday morning, December 7, and was pressing my white uniform in the Shipfitter Shop prior to going to Divine Services. Services were held on the Foc'sle of the ship under a large white tarpaulin. I never made it to Divine Services that morning. One of our apprentice seaman had just returned from taking some trash to an incinerator on the top side (our shipfitter shop was located on the third deck below) and exclaimed that "real bombs" were being dropped on the Naval Air Station located on Ford Island which was adjacent to where our ship was tied up. Just then, General Quarters was sounded throughout the ship and all hands dashed to their battle stations. My battle station was located on the starboard side of the third deck aft. The time was about 8:00 a.m. Shortly after securing all doors and hatches, we were hit on the port side forward of the ship by an aircraft launched torpedo. Then some time later we received another torpedo hit almost directly opposite our battle station on the port side aft. The ship began listing to port about 25 degrees. We were given orders to counter flood voids on the starboard side to offset flooding on the port side. This was done by opening hydraulic valves to let seawater into large empty voids or tanks. While in the process of doing this, we were informed that the Battleship Oklahoma, which was tied up behind us, had capsized. We were getting concerned the, wondering if the same thing would happen to us. It turned out that we had started our counter flooding at the correct time, which prevented our ship from capsizing. At this time, the power went out aboard ship, so we had to rely on battery-powered lanterns to find our way below decks. The air below was getting heavy with fuel oil fumes from ruptured oil tanks so we donned gas masks to breathe a little better. I had to get the masks from a locker located forward from our battle station. Upon returning with an armful of masks, a 500 pound bomb, dropped from a Jap plane, exploded on the deck above not far from where I had been. The deck above was an armored deck, three inches thick, to protect the bowels of the ship. The force of the bomb's explosion put a blister about eight to ten feet in diameter in this armored deck. The concussion was so great in the area where I was that it exploded light bulbs in their sockets. After securing everything we could in our battle station we were ordered to carry cases of three-inch shells to an anti-aircraft gun just above us on the topside. It was quite scary up there. Black smoke was billowing all around Battleship Row from oil fires on the surface of Pearl Harbor. Bullets from aircraft machine guns were ricocheting off steel bulkheads all around. It didn't pay to duck because they were coming from all directions. We didn't dally around. We delivered our case of three-inch shells and ducked below for more. Luckily none of those bullets had our names on them. After we delivered all the three-inch ammunition we could locate, we settled down in our Damage Control Station (battle station) for further orders. After receiving no further instruction for some time, it seemed awfully quiet so I went topside to investigate. Unknown to us, word had been passed to abandon ship. Not hearing the order, we remained at our battle station. It was approximately 11:00 a.m. when I appeared on the Quarter Deck. As I was surveying the terrible sight around me, ships burning, some sunk, others capsized, burning oil floating on the water in many places, a friend of mine in a motor launch below yelled to me to jump off the ship and they would take me ashore. Coming to the surface after jumping off the ship I was covered with oil. Needless to say they could not pull me into the motor launch. I was like a greased pig. I could not hold on to anything and they could not pull me into the boat, so I had to swim about 100 yards to shore with burning oil all around me. After reaching shore, I took a shower and got into some clean clothes at the Ford Island Naval Air Station. Later, I volunteered to help man a machine gun nest on the airfield. Two days later I reported back to my ship and found out that they had mustered the crew and put me down as missing in action. The Navy Department notified my parents on December 16 that I was missing in action and memorial services were held in my hometown of Marshfield, Wisconsin. The local paper, in large headlines, had me listed as the "first local casualty of World War II". About two weeks later, I was finally able to acquire some stationery and wrote home. The folks said "what a great Christmas present". The Navy Department sent my parents a telegram on December 31 notifying them that I had survived. I was assigned as a member of a skeleton crew to remain with the USS California, which was crippled and settled in the mud in Pearl Harbor with her foc'sle awash. With grim determination, she was raised and rebuilt into a mighty, modern warship. On the 5th of May 1944, the 40,000 tons of messed-up steel from the bottom of Pearl Harbor had finally gotten underway with a newly trained crew on our way to carry the war to the enemy. Our first operation after Pearl Harbor was Saipan, then Tinian, Guam. Then we made an assault on the Philippines which included neutralizing the beach on the island Leyte so General MacArthur could make his return to the Philippines. We had a revenge encounter with the Jap fleet in the Battle of Surigao Strait. They were never the same after that battle as we erased the major part of that fleet. Then it was on to the Lingayen Gulf Operation during which we were damaged by a kamikaze suicide plane. Then back to the good old USA for a much needed rest and repair. I was a Shipfitter Third Class on December 7, 1941. On January 12, 1942, I was commended by my commanding officer for performance of duty in a highly meritorious manner during the attack and was advanced one pay grade to Shipfitter Second Class. On July 12, 1942, the Board of Awards Pacific Fleet awarded me a citation for exceptional courage and judgment and performance of duty on the USS California during the attack on the fleet in Pearl Harbor. I requested a change of duty in 1945. I was a Shipfitter First Class by then and wanted to see some other duty. I was assigned to the USS Ard (#16), a floating repair dock in the Philippines. I made Chief Shipfitter the Spring of 1946 and that Fall I decided to leave the Navy. I was discharged at the Mare Island Naval Yard in Vallejo, California in December 1946. The USS California was built and commissioned at the Mare Island Shipyard and joined the US Fleet in August 1921. On December 7, 1941, the USS California had a crew of 120 officers and 1,546 men aboard. Of that crew, 6 officers and 92 men were killed or missing and another 3 officers and 58 men were wounded. On December 10, 1941, the Battleship came to rest in about sixteen feet of soft mud. With a list to port of some five and one-half degrees and a draft of forty-three forward and the waves. The sea had closed over the port side forward and over Turret No. 4 on the Quarter Deck aft. After two happy decades of "smooth sailing", Pearl Harbor marked a sudden and bitter end for the Golden State Battlewagon. After World War II, the USS California was put in the inactive reserve fleet for about twelve years. Technology passed her by and on March 1, 1959, her name was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register. She was finally sold for scrap to a Boston metals company for $860,000. The total delivery cost to build her which was started in 1915, was $12.75 million. A lot of money back in those days. When completed, the USS California was called the most "Powerful Battleship in the World". |
Information provided by Virginia Stoiber and Nancy Jones |
