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Topic: PT BOATS AT PEARL HARBOR |
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Frank J Andruss Sr
TOP BOSS
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Posted on: Jan 2, 2007 - 4:25am
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I have heard many times how PT Boats assisted in looking for and bringing in survivors of the attack on Pearl Harbor. As the boats, along with the Submarines were not touched by the bombing, they cruised in the Harbor bringing aboard many of the injured sailors. History tends to downplay the role of the PT Boats and this type action is no different. PT Boats probably downed the first Japanese planes of this action, but again never really recieved credit due. I have never seen any photo's of the boats in action at Pearl Harbor and was wondering if any exsisted. I would love to include them as part of my Exhibit, but have found no evidence of photo's available. Anyone have information, please contact me here or off site at mosquitofleet@comcast.net
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TGarth Connelly
New Member
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Posted on: Jan 2, 2007 - 6:34am
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Frank -
Frank D. Johnson's book had a few of those photos. Also, I've been told that the boats at PH were a blue ...
Garth
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C Marin Faure
Full Member
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Posted on: Jan 3, 2007 - 11:17pm
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From what I have read the PT boats in Pearl on December 7 were deck loaded on one or more fleet oilers at the time. Some of the PT crews got their guns into action during the attack but I don't recall reading in any of the many books I've read about the attack that PT boats were ever in action on the water.
C. Marin Faure
Sammamish, Washington |
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TGarth Connelly
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Posted on: Jan 4, 2007 - 4:01am
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Marin,
Not all of the boats were on the tanker being shipped to the PI. Some were indeed in the water and were helping to pick up survivors.
Garth
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C Marin Faure
Full Member
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Posted on: Jan 5, 2007 - 12:35am
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Garth--
Thanks. I looked at the Dec. 7 vessel disposition chart in Victor Chun's PT book and saw where the boats in the water were located. Interesting that none of the books I've read on the attack ever mentioned their role during or after the attack other than the guns of some of the ones on the oiler being brought into action. I have Frank Johnson's book "PT Boats of WWII" but did not see any photos in it of PT boats during or after the attack.
C. Marin Faure
Sammamish, Washington |
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TGarth Connelly
New Member
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Posted on: Jan 5, 2007 - 4:18am
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There's one of two 77 footers racing along in front of a CV in Johnson's book.
Why would the Navy report on the movements inside a harbor of minor combatants. They were more concerned with raising the fleet and finding survivors and recovering bodies rather than the movements of a few minor units ... and how would you record something as fluid as that on a day of utter chaos. It'd next to impossible I should think.
Garth
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C Marin Faure
Full Member
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Posted on: Jan 5, 2007 - 2:25pm
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I'm familiar with that photo and many others of PTs on patrol in the waters around Oahu after the war started. I thought someone had said there were photos in the book of the PTs being used in the harbor during or right after the Dec. 7 attack to pick up survivors.
I grew up in Hawaii and when I was a kid a family friend who was a submarine commander in the Navy gave me a big box full of PT and submarine photos. The 100 or so PT shots were all of boats in Hawaiian waters early in the war but none of them had been taken during or right after the attack.
The Navy might not have said much about the actions of small boats during or after the attack, but the people crewing them might have. Some of the books I've read about the attack related the experiences of people involved in fairly "insignificant" actions, like cruising around in a motor lifeboat pulling people off the bottom of the Okalahoma. I don't doubt that some of the PT boats were used in this way, I'm just a bit surprised that I've not seen it mentioned in any of the books I've read about the attack and its aftermath.
C. Marin Faure
Sammamish, Washington |
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Will Day
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Posted on: Jan 5, 2007 - 9:01pm
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Cdr. Bulkeley's book AT CLOSE QUARTERS has a short description of the Ron 1 boats during the Pearl Harbor attack.
Will |
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C Marin Faure
Full Member
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Posted on: Jan 5, 2007 - 10:38pm
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Will-- Thanks for that reminder. I bought an early copy of At Close Quarters twenty years ago in a used bookstore when I first started researcing my current project and while I've read it I either missed or have forgotten Bulkley's desciption of the Pearl Harbor action. I'll review it again.
C. Marin Faure
Sammamish, Washington |
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Joe Brannan
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Posted on: Jan 6, 2007 - 8:57am
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I saw two 77 ft Pt Boats dropping depth charges on a Jap sub that had gotten thru the net at PH. A destroyer was doing the spotting with it's sonar for the PT as it could not manuver in the entrance channel. The sub was between the net and the beached BS Nevada. This was a month after PH. The day I arrived in Ph.I was on my way in a motor launch to my new duty station US Niagara. We pulled over and tied up to the old coal docks until the action was over.
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