When I saw several
B-l7d’s fly over Honolulu,
accompanied by guardian P-40s, and saw that these magnificent
bombers were followed by anti aircraft puffs, I experienced
that itchy excitement in the pit of by chest. I felt
a rising sense of excitement and apprehension. I looked
toward Pearl Harbor and saw a heavy pall of black smoke
rising and fading toward the sea. And I swear I thought
I saw silver specks of aircraft diving in and out of
the rising smoke. It must have been around 8 a.m. I
could hear the fire engine, police and ambulance sirens
blaring away. They appeared to be converging on Pearl
Harbor.
I finally finished my appointed rounds, and met Hide
on Kapiolani Boulevard behind McKinley High School.
I don’t remember us being afraid but rather excited.
Staid, peaceful and paradisiacal Hawaii disappeared
and the visions of Hawaii becoming the power center
and staging point in the Pacific became obvious.
Honolulu was stirring rapidly. Hide and I wanted
to “investigate”, but had no concept of
what to do except “defend” Hawaii with
our “extensive“ ROTC training of three
months. Of course like many teen age boys in Hawaii,
we had some experience with BB guns. At this point,
the shells were still occasionally falling in various
parts of Honolulu. We decided return to our homes and
meet later.
I hurried home to face a distraught and furious mom
who imagined me being hurt. Our one and only Philco
was blaring away with news of “enemy attack by
a foreign power”, and urgent requests for all
armed forces, police, and emergency personnel to return
to their bases. My step brother Rich was just back
on a short furlough and was quite undecided on when
and how to get back to Schofield Barracks. Rich and
his father disagreed on whether he should report to
duty immediately.
It was clear to me how strongly the older generation
Japanese felt generally ambivalent toward this situation.
Rich’s wife and father were fearful of retaliation
and of becoming a casualty of the Japanese attack.
Rich of course was one of the first group of Japanese
Americans to be drafted into the 100th Battalion. All
Nisei’s and most of the older generation were
sure of defending Hawaii, but some of the older people
who were active in Japan friendship societies, cultural
groups, churches, and businesses were ambivalent and
perhaps angry at this turn of events.
Home to me in Kakaako was a Japanese ghetto in the
best sense of the word. These Japanese communities
abounded all over Hawaii, as did the Chinese, Filipino,
Hawaiian, Portuguese, and other ethnic communities.
All the young children and teens were excited and
dashed about, home to home, asking about schools and
whizzing shells. My brother Joe and I climbed up the
mango tree and onto the neighbors corrugated roof,
along with other teens and tried spot the Japanese
planes. A huge cloud of black smoke rose over the Pearl
Harbor-Hickam Field area and drifted to the sea. It’s
hard to know if we saw specks of light flashing down
and up over the rising smoke. Our parents were screaming
at us to come down because the shells were still occasionally
scraping the sky over Honolulu.
The sequence of the day’s events is blurred,
but I remember making a few rounds to the grocers to
stock up. And all available buckets and pots were filled
with water. Schools were declared closed, all coastal
areas, especially harbors and bays were taboo, blackouts
were declared and travel restricted. There were fearful
talks of imminent invasions and what we should do,
especially since Kakaako was a central fishing area,
with Kewalo basin and its docked sampans not a quarter
mile away.
Night came, a quick supper and the checking of all
doors and windows for light leakage. Later, a fearful
knocking on the door. “Who is it?” some
one answered.
“This is the Defense Patrol ... light coming
from the window”. We thanked them and quickly
adjusted the window shade. The fire engines and ambulances
were still rushing about.
There were rumors galore: spies caught, mysterious
blinking lights in the hills, invading boats; another
air attack imminent, water supply poisoned all Japanese
to be rounded up and deported or sent to the mainland.
To most of the fishermen in boats who had been out
to sea since early morning, it was a nightmare. Since
we lived close to Kewalo Basin and Alamoana Park, we
heard the rat-tat-tat of machines going off all night
long. The late boats came in after the waterfront was
secured by the Army and met a hail of machine gun fire
as they attempted to enter the harbor. Some larger
sampans had radio but hardly any had any communication
radios. Many of them had no knowledge of the attack.
I don’t have any record of deaths, casualties,
or sunken boats but that night and a few succeeding
nights heard many bursts of gunfire.
There were some casualties among the Japanese Americans
in succeeding days when irate citizens attacked them.
The horror of the Japanese attack was kept quiet for
a while, but the tremendous death and damage became
known soon after and horrified us.
Despite my mother’s warning, I snuck out the
following day and visited Hide and together we visited
our closed high school for damage. There was a gaping
hole in the pavement near our school, and if the shell
had landed ten feet closer, the statue of President
McKinley would have been demolished.
That day, I realized that my world had changed forever. |
