American hero John Finn passes away
Just before 8:00 a.m. on December 7, 1941, Chief Petty Officer John Finn awoke to the sound of airplanes flying overhead and gunfire. He quickly threw on some clothes, jumped in his car and headed for the base, keeping his speedometer below the base’s 20-mph speed limit.
“I got around, and I heard a plane come roaring in from astern of me. As I glanced up, the guy made a wing-over and I saw that big old red meatball, the rising sun insignia, on the underside of the wing,” Finn recalled in a 2003 interview. “Well, I threw it into second, and it was a wonder I didn’t run over every sailor in the air station.”
Although Japan had not yet declared war on the United States, Japanese aircraft carriers had launched the first wave of 183 aircraft in a “sneak attack” on the anchored U.S. fleet. Another wave of 170 planes would strike just after 8:30 a.m., in all killing 2345 military personnel, 57 civilians, damaging or destroying hundreds of aircraft, sinking four battleships, two destroyers, and damaging numerous other ships.
The 32 year-old Finn arrived at Kaneohe Bay Naval Air Station where the PBY Catalina seaplanes were based. All but six of the base’s 33 Catalinas were destroyed by the Japanese, and the only seaplanes that could still function were those that had been out on an anti-submarine patrol. Some of his men were inside aircraft that were on fire, shooting the planes’ machine guns at Japanese aircraft overhead. As men scrambled to improvise firing platforms for the machine guns, Finn commandeered a .50 caliber and mounted it on an instruction stand normally used for teaching gunnery.
In: Articles, Military History · Tagged with: John W. Finn, Medal of Honor, Pearl Harbor, World War II
Generations of Valor
Pearl Harbor survivor Houston James of Dallas is overcome with emotion as he embraces Marine Staff Sgt. Mark Graunke Jr. during the Dallas Veterans Day Commemoration at Dallas City Hall on Thursday. Sgt Graunke, who was a member of a Marine ordnance-disposal team, lost a hand, leg and eye while defusing a bomb in Iraq in July of last year. (Jim Mahoney/Dallas Morning News)
In: Images, Military · Tagged with: Pearl Harbor, Staff Sergeant Mark Graunke, US Marine Corps
