Hawaii - Part 2

Today the four of us split up to do separate things, Peter and I to Pearl Harbour and John and Cheryl factory outlet shopping as they had already been to Pearl Harbour the last time they were here.
Peter and I booked a tour as this was the easiest way to get to Pearl Harbour other than trying to find public transport there. We were met by our tour guide Joe at 8.30 in the morning and after making few more stops along the way we made our way to Pearl Harbour. Along the way Joe did a commentary about what we would be seeing and the history surrounding why Pearl Harbour was bombed. A stop at the Arizona visitors centre to drop off any bags visitors might have brought with them as there is a strict "no bags" policy which makes it difficult to carry anything with you. After that we are off to the Battleship Missouri

Joe drops us off at the memorial to the USS Oklahoma which was the only ship in Battleship Row in Pearl Harbour to sink. While it was salvaged it never went back into service and was stripped of guns and superstructure and sold. The memorial remembers the 429 sailors and marines lost on December 7 1941 using 429 marble poles with each of the serviceman's names on each pole.

After a quick donut supplied by our tour company we made our way to the Battleship Missouri. It is a commanding sight as it is very big and tall. It's nickname is Mighty Mo and while it wasn't part of the Pearl Harbour incident it did participate in the Pacific theatre of World War II in the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa as well as in the Korean War. She was decommissioned in 1955 and mothballed until being reactivated and modernised in 1984 providing fire support in Operation Desert Storm before finally being decommissioned in 1992. In 1988 she was donated to the USS Missouri Memorial association and became a museum ship at Pearl Harbour. While it wasn't part of the attack on Pearl Harbour it played a significant role at the end of the war as it was on the deck of Mighty Mo that the surrender documents were signed.

I decided to do a guided tour while Peter chose to wander around on his own as is usual when we visit historic places. Our tour took us to 3 specific places on the battleship, firstly it was the forward deck where the guns loomed large overhead as our tour guide Brooke gave us some background on the ship, her size, her gun power and her theatres of war.

Our next location was the surrender deck upon the Missouri which was docked in Tokyo Bay on September 2 1945, where General Macarthur and the Japanese Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu, along with a number of other allied forces personnel including General Thomas Blamey from Australia signed the Instrument of Surrender documents that officially ended World War II.
There was a display of replica documents, photos of the day and a gold disc that marked the exact position of the table upon which the documents were signed.

An interesting  story from that day was about the table the documents were signed on. The original table was a mahogany (I think) table from the Captain's cabin but when it was put on deck and the documents laid out it was not big enough so they had to scour the ship looking for a big enough table and as with most naval vessels most things are bolted to the floor to prevent movement, so the only table that was big enough was a mess table from the enlisted men's mess, a portable fold up table which was hastily covered with a cloth to hide the unceremonious look of it. A most important document signed on the lowest level of naval servicemen which I feel is quite funny.

Our next location was the main deck where the story of a kamikaze Zero crashing onto the deck of the Missouri was told. The Zero crashed on the starboard side of the ship just below her main deck level which started a fire which was quickly put out and the ship suffered only minor damage but the remains of the young Japanese pilot were recovered on board the ship not far from one of the gun tubs. The crewmen wanted to hose the remains over the deck but the captain, Captain Callaghan decided the young Japanese pilot had done his job and with honour, so he should be given a military funeral even though he was the enemy. The following day he was buried at sea with military honours with a Japanese fly sewn by the sailors during the night. On the deck are footprints showing the positions of the chaplain, the bugler and the men who were in the guard of honour committing his body to the sea.

Many years later 3 volunteers at the USS Missouri researched the attack in the hope of identifying the unnamed pilot and his family. While it can't be an absolute certainty it is firmly believed that the pilot was Setsuo Ishino and a memorial service was held for him and the other pilots that died on that day was held in April 2001. The memorial service was also attended by Captain Callaghan's son himself a retired Navy Admiral.

After the tour finished I walked around below deck before meeting Peter ready to meet our guide Joe for a ride back to lunch before our tour of the Arizona Memorial site. We received our tour guide and an audio tour as the site is quite extensive but with the temperature being quite hot we only did the most important features.


The next part of our tour was to watch a film about the day Pearl Harbour was bombed to show how and why it happened, showing actual footage from the day. After this we were transported to a navy boat for our trip across Pearl Harbour to the Arizona Memorial. The memorial is built over the sunken wreckage of the USS Arizona which is the final resting place for many of the 1,177 crewmen killed on December 7 1941 in the bombing of Pearl Harbour. The memorial has three main parts, entry, assembly room and shrine and the moment I walked into the entry I felt a wave of sadness come over me as I knew the story and that what I was standing on was essentially a gravesite for all of those fallen soldiers. It is a very moving experience especially when you walk into the Shrine and see all the names of the crewmen who were lost that day.

Oil still leaks from the sunken battleship and the oil is sometimes referred to as the tears of the Arizona or "black tears". While we were there we saw some oil rise to the surface and indeed it does look like black tears.

Black tears from the Arizona

After about 15 minutes we are back on the boat and back to land to board our bus back to Waikiki. A short drive through the Veteran's cemetery and we are back home.

We meet John and Cheryl and they have shopped up a storm at the outlet mall so everyone has had a great day.

We make our way to dinner ready for another day in paradise tomorrow.