The pacific after pearl harbor. Up next on American History tv, Navy Veterans who participated in the battle of midway recount their experiences. The American VeteransCenter Hosted this 50minute panel discussion. My name is tim hobart. Im executive director of the American Veterans center and thank you for being here. This is our 20th year of this event, so its a very special year for us, and were very happy youre here. Of course, we really want to thank the Navy Memorial for their hospitality for this weekend. Theyve been great partners for us over the years. My only word that i really had to kick things off this morning is really for all the students that are with us here this weekend. I really encourage you to take all of this in from where we start with veterans of the battle of midway 75 years ago through 75 years of American Military history. This is your own past and present, and youre our future. So, this is a great opportunity, a once in a lifetime opportunity, and really make the most of it. With that, id like to welcome admiral frank thorp, president of the Navy Memorial, just to say a few words of welcome before we get started. Admiral thorp. Thank you, sir. Good morning. Welcome to the Navy Memorial. As you all know, our mission here is to honor, recognize, and celebrate the men and women of the sea services, past, present, and future, and to educate the American Public about your all service. So its actually a tremendous honor for us to be here. And on a day like today, we use the term sea services, but in the end were all in it together. And i think these gentlemen here represent the idea of being all in it together. And i just want to say one thing about why im honored and why were honored to be here today and the opportunity you all have today. You know, when i looked at the program here and i look at words like trailblazers, legends, these are in the agenda. The last ace, leadership, saving lives, the greatest generation, the medal of honor, why we fought, valor, witness to history, and right here, the turn of the tide. It is an honor for us to be here. I hope you all really get a lot out of the next couple days, because as was just mentioned, this is literally an opportunity of a lifetime that we have over the next couple days to be able to listen to these great americans who literally gave of themselves and set an example and paved a path for us all to walk on. So, welcome to the Navy Memorial. I hope you appreciate the hospitality, and when i say that, i hope that what im really saying is that i hope we make the hospitality as great as we possibly can be to make your alls experiences the best it can be in the next two days. Thank you all very much. [ applause ] and without further ado, im going to welcome craig horn, who will be our emcee throughout the day to introduce the first panel. Thanks, everybody. Good morning. My name is craig horn. This is i think maybe my 20th year as well with the annual American Veterans conference. This morning were going to begin an adventure as we look back so that we can see further ahead. Its often been said that ignorance of the past can create irresponsibility in the present and recklessness in the future. So this morning were going to begin with the battle of midway. Its my pleasure to introduce richard b. Frank. Richard frank is an internationally recognized historian of the Asian Pacific war. He was consultant for the hbo World War Ii Special on the pacific. And in that, he wrote, and i quote, the pacific war will inspire a longoverdue reawakening of the strategic importance, sheer scale, and unsurpassed savagery of the wars unleashed by japan. The battle of the midway was the turning of the tide. Please welcome mr. Richard b. Frank. Thank you very much. Thank you for those kind remarks. Were here in the 75thyear anniversary of the battle of midway. It is on the perennial list of the most important battles of world war ii. Its often cited as the single most important naval battle in the United States naval history. Its usually listed as among the most decisive naval battles in all of history. It is an enthralling story thats been told and well told a number of times. We obviously dont have time to go into all the details of it today, but in a very sparse outline, let me point out, the battle ultimately, from our perspective, was one of a great triumph against odds. Its foundation was intelligence, particularly radio intelligence developed by american officers with british and australian support. The key figure in this is Lieutenant Commander joseph roachford, who was a radio Intelligence Officer in pearl harbor for admiral nimitz of the pacific fleet. He is now a known figure more than admirals in world war ii. He is also, those of you who are students, he is an inspiration. Those of you who are not feeling your efforts are properly appreciated, remember always when joe roachford was in the officer Training Program in 1919, when it was evaluated, this individual should not be entrusted with important responsibilities. The information that he provided enabled admiral chester nimitz to station his carriers off the island of midway. Decades after the event, we learned that there was more backstory to this than we knew at the time. President roosevelt had appointed admiral nimitz as commander in chief of the pacific fleet, but nimitzs immediate boss, earnest j. King, quite bluntly did not think nimitz was fit for the job and showed it in numerous ways. And in the weeks leading up to the battle of midway, they were in conflict of the next move. King believed the japanese were going to the South Pacific. Nimitz believed it was midway was the target, and he was in the invidious position of explaining to his doubtful boss why he was right and his boss was wrong, which he did. The battle itself was commanded by admiral Frank Jack Fletcher and another admiral, both of whom did very well, but above all, it was a battle ultimately that came down to the professionalism, the skill, and the sheer valor of the air groups and the ships complements of our task forces off midway. Most notably, our aviator suffered tremendous losses, both those who flew for midway and those who flew from the carriers. Among those were the members of torpedo squadron 8 off the hornet. They launched 15 aircraft that morning. All 15 were shot down and of 30 crewmen, 1 survived. Only 6 of 41 torpedo planes that flew that morning returned to an american deck and the dive bombers also suffered very heavily in securing that victory. But we are fortunate today to have with us three actual veterans of the battle. I talked to them beforehand, and there is sort of a natural chronology, i think, to the sequence of their recollections about that event. And so, without further ado, were going to go to that and im going to move through that. And we also had scheduled this morning captain jack crawford, who, unfortunately, is not yet here with us today, and im sorry, john crawford. Should he get here in time, maybe well have a chance to hear from him. But were going to start with jack holder, who in 1941 and 1942 was with patrol squadron 23, vp23. Jack, and as a matter of fact, you were with the squadron at the time of the attack on pearl harbor. Thats correct. I joined december 12, 1940. And then you all deployed from there to Midway Island for the battle of midway . I got to midway on may 26th, 1942, yeah. And so, your aircraft he was flying in a catalina pby, which was a highwing twinengine patrol bomber. It had great range. It also had considerable vulnerability if it ran into japanese zero fighter aircraft. Yes. And your position on the aircraft was as . Flight engineer. And what did that involve . At was. Engineer. What did that involve . Well, years ago, aircraft were built had an Engineers Panel that required a lot of instrumentation, controls, and everything, unlike airplanes today. Aircraft today mostly controlled, the pilot has all of them. Pby, the pilot couldnt even start pby without the Flight Engineer. So these controls were like engine, fuel system and things like that. You were monitoring that. Yeah. Actually i didnt know the Flight Engineer actually started a pby this aircraft was not just one that flied, it flew arguably the most Important Mission that morning. Because of the intelligence we provided pbys sent up to conduct searches on carriers where Japanese Carriers were expected, actually there was an aircraft ahead of you that saw the incoming japanese flight. The second aircraft, we left midway on deviation of 7 degrees. The pilot plane to our left spotted the fleet first when they reported the position, we flew that position, seen the same thing. You all reported the presence of two Japanese Carriers. Yes. I should point out that although there were four Japanese Carriers in the task force, this initial sighting only saw 2011 them initially. This would cause ripples in the american command decisions during the day because they knew there should be four carriers present. What was interesting when we were talking about this, theres this moment when you see the Japanese Carriers, but you continue on with your mission for hours after that. Thirteen hours that day. And in fact, as you all are flying that mission, you dont know whats going on at midway. In the afternoon we lost all contact with midway. We didnt know if we still controlled it or japanese had it. Their bombing attack that morning knocked out the radio and you guys could not pick up anythi anything. No. You didnt know who held midway. No. What did you do . We continued to search and do exactly what we were supposed to do when we went out. We reported several ships. Early in the afternoon we struck gold. We caught a submarine attempting to submerge. All hatchets were closed. No one was on deck. We dropped the first 500 pounder on the fantail, made a circle and dropped another right behind the tower, made six circles around watching it sink. We had a great day. Since you didnt know what was going on at midway, what did youall do towards the end of the mission then . Well, later on after we found out that we lost all contact, we had an option. We could take a chance on going back to midway, or we could sit out at sea. It was unanimous, we set out at sea through a sea acre, drifted all night. I took a sleeping bag, climbed on top of the wing, tied myself to an antenna and spent the night. At sun up, we finally made contact with midway. We learned that we had been successful. We also were told there was a destroyer at the french frigate loaded with aviation fuel. We took navigational sun shots, found our position, floated the sholes, refueled, went to midway. Then that day also part of the mission that pbys flew at the battle after main action were search forego downed air crew. Spent all of the day searching air crew. Late in the afternoon we found two gentlemen in a life raft. We were low on fuel at that time. We radioed a sister ship. They landed, picked up the gentlemen, took them into midway. Very good. Let me go on now to bill norberg. Bill, tell us about how long you were on the enterprise. I went aboard the enterprise in september 1941 and i stayed on it until august 45 when the bomb was dropped on nagasaki. How many Commanding Officers did you have to break in . Nine. And your actual job on the enterprise during that period, can you describe how you moved through those jobs . Started as a seaman first class or maybe yeoman second class, im not sure which. Yeoman was secretary of the navy. I worked in the captains office my entire term aboard the enterprise there. Through a bunch of successes, i was able to move rapidly. I became i was put in charge of the office when i became a first class yeoman. I kept that job when i became a chief and had that job about 23 months. You had the whole war on whats probably the most famous ship in the navys history uss enterprise. Amen, brother. I should point out for historians, someone like this is a wonderful person. Hes near the great and powerful as they talk and make decisions. You can go to people like this and find out what really happened as opposed to whats in the memoir of their recollection later in the admiral. Before we get to midway, a story we have you share with people. This is on the transit enterprise, going to deliver dual raiders. Yes, sir. And youre cruising through its dark and its foggy, and you have a little encounter with high and mighty. I did. I had delivered a message from the captain up to the admirals bridge. The admiral not being there, i left it with his orderly, a good friend of mine, by the way. I started climbing down the ladder. Instead of hitting that hard steel catwalk, i hit something kind of soft. About that time i heard a voice say to me, damn you. I recognized william f. Bull halsey. I was kind of shivering in my shoes. I took off after a shot after i said yes, sir to him and he never caught me. We have the last surviving american seaman who outran admiral halsey. I had one incident on the same cruise there where i was standing the midnight watch. It was 20 minutes of 1 00 as i recall it. I was feeling kind of sleepy. I went out on the port wing of the bridge and leaned my head against the bulkhead. Darn it i didnt lean against general porters alarm and wake up the whole ship. Boy, ill tell you, i scooted in a hurry, took off my pea coat. Somebody said, i dont know who, but he was wearing a pea coat. Thats the resourcefulness which our armed forces are known. Lets move along to the actual battle itself. Youre up with the captain on the captains bridge. Youre there all day long. Yes, sir. You hear the messages . Yes, i did. Which one do you remember any particular messages . About 9 30 in the morning. I understand from this gentleman here that his message came through. Japanese fleet spotted. Two carriers from my recollection. So you saw the takeofof the enterprise aircraft. Wasnt a very little bit before the admirals said everybody take off. So youre there on the bridge and eventually the aircraft come back. Theres not as many coming back as went out. Exactly right. We were talking about this, this relationship of the air group and the Ships Company as very close. Tell us a little about how the reaction of the crew was when the aircraft come back. Well, first of all, the ready room scene was very bad. I didnt hear of any tears being shed but it was very close to that. The torpedo squadron, first of all. We sent out four torpedo bombers and on 14 torpedo bombers and four came back. It was bad. As our planes came back, many, many, many had failed to make it. I think there were probably 20 some all together from the enterprise that were unable to come back. Every one of us could feel that we were losing something great. You mentioned among the flyers two of the most successful and famous and admired dusty and dick best. Do you remember those gentlemen . I quite remember i remember them quite well. Dick best, for instance, he was the skipper of the bombing six group. He led the attack on the carr r carrier. For some strange reason there was a mixup that occurred. Probably 28 or 29 planes attacked one and only three attacked the other. Best led the way. He made a perfect dive and landed his 1,000pound bomb in one of the most vulnerable spots on that carrier. The bomb went down through the flight deck, detonated in the hanger deck. What should they have there but a full compliment of japanese torpedo planes all gassed up, armed to the teeth. It was just a holocaust waiting to happen and thats what happened. He went out and fly a Second Mission despite the fact he had very serious problems. He did, sir. He was batting 1,000 at that point. He went out later that afternoon, his plane not having been shot up very badly and he helped attack the last surviving carrier. He scored another hit which gave him 1,000 batting average. He never flew again for the navy after that. Unfortunately he had an oxygen problem and he inhaled some caustic soda which resulted in a rapid case of tuberculosis. It took him several years to recover from it but he retired from the navy, recovered from that, and lived a very productive civilian life into the year 2001. I was fortunate enough to meet him. As bill says, the enterprise dive bomber groups, there are two squadrons. As bill said, what happened when they saw the Japanese Carriers below, there was a mixup. The lead squadron was supposed to go to the far carrier, trailing spotter was supposed to go to the trailing carrier. They all started diving on the nearest carrier. Dick best had the presence of mind to realize this would lead the other carrier, japanese flag sh ship, led three planes down and scored this hit. If he had not scored the hit on akagi, it would had the battle. He was truly one of the great heroes of the battle. Although dick best is 1,000, dusty was only three out of four in his dives at midway. Is that right . He hit akagi, hiru and acuma. His wonderful memoir called never call me a hero just came out. Now, you stayed aboard the enterprise for the whole war. The enterprise is, i guess, greatest moments. Let me stop now and you can rest your heels. Let me go now to john. He was aboard the yorktown. Tell us about when you got to the yorktown . These fellows, prior to the war, i was in high school down in georgia and had to cross the street to get on the school bus and stand in front of the post office. They had this big sign, a pilot with goggles standing on the wing of an airplane with a parachute hanging. It said, high school graduates, join the navy and learn to fly. Well, that was for me. Cut my story short, it was latter 43 before i got the Flight Training in norman, oklahoma. But anyway i graduated from boot cal 1941 down here at norfolk. Sunday the japs blew a hole pensacola, all died from the fleet that returned f