The History Channel is airing a special on the role of the Enterprise in World War II. My father served aboard this much-decorated ship, and here are some of his answers to our questions about the first episode. More to follow.
#1 I went aboard in Nov 1941 and served 34 months on board before leaving in Aug 1944.
#2. As for the plane that tried to crash aboard. That was our first combat. Radar in those days was not very good, so the 5 boggies managed to break out of cloud cover and start their attack. Due to Capt. Murray's skills maneuvering the ship we did not sustain any direct hits. They approached from the Starboard (Right) rear quarter. Our anti aircraft managed to completely disable the last of the 5. He made a wide turning approach while on fire and tried to crash on board but fell short and the right prop cut the tail off of the SBD Dive bomber (not fighter) that the guy was firing from. The plane then slid back into the sea on the port side (left) he did NOT slide across the flight deck. If he had he would have wiped out all of our planes on the flight deck. The guy firing was a Third Class Aviation Mechanic. He was firing the twin thirties that our stand armament in the dive bombers for the rear seat gunners. How much damage he did no one will ever know. It was a very proud moment when we returned to Pearl Harbor and all the personnel from Ford Island were out on the channel banks hollering, "Hip Hip Hooray" and applauding. We were flying the biggest battle flag we had on the ship. That night there was an assembly on the Hangar Deck at the dock where we were tied and Admiral Halsey gave a little speech and said "I'm so damn proud of you I could cry" and he did. Halsey was also in DC when I represented the ship's crew to receive the Unit Citatation from the Sec of Defense. Halsey shook my hand and asked, were you on the ship when I was and I said Yes Sir. He said it was a hell of a fine ship.
#3. The Doolittle raid was mainly for the morale of the country and our Navy which had been decimated at Pearl Harbor. As interest on that engagement I would like to point out that the training of the Doolittle squadron was at Eglin AFB in Florida. The aircraft carrier Hornet was on the East Coast. When the training was complete they brought the Hornet around thru the canal and loaded the planes by crane at Alameda Air Station by San Fran. We rendezvoused with the Hornet at sea and proceeded on our mission. We were not told until after we were at sea what we were going to do. We flew the patrol missions as the Hornets decks were loaded with the B25's. We refueled and left the destroyers 1000 miles out. The Hornet, Enterprise, Northampton (Heavy Cruiser) and the Nashville (Light Cruiser) proceed in. It was very heavy seas and the destroyers could not keep up. When the Fishing vessel was sighted the Nashville opened up with 6 inch guns and sunk it in minutes. The vessel had already shot down one of our patrol planes. It was feared that it had sent the warning message to Tokyo. Had the Japs been alerted and sent land based bombers out the two carriers would have been history. It was a hell of gamble, for all concerned. The Japs beheaded three of the captured airmen that crash landed in enemy territory.
That segment only covered the first 4 months of the war. The next segment will be shown this Friday and it will be the Battle of Midway which occurred in June 1942. Ah it was sweet revenge even though we did lose one carrier the Yorktown.
Thank you for sharing. Let us never forget those wonderful giant steel guardians, and the men of steel that served on them to save our liberty and freedom.
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