"It was 1938, and the nation was still in the depths of a great depression when I grasped an opportunity to expand my horizons and enlist in the U.S. Navy. On October 16, I swore to uphold The Constitution and to fight, if necessary, to defend my country in time of war. This vow to fight became reality sooner than I expected.
I was assigned to the U.S.S. Blue and by November 1941 had attained the rank of Machinists Mate 2nd Class. We were detached from our home base in San Diego and reassigned to Pearl Harbor. Life was fairly routine with frequent sorties at sea. In port, we were able to enjoy th etropical paradise of Hawaii as we were the evening of Saturday, December 6, 1941. We had spent the day restockni gfood, refueling, and cleaning ship. Enlisted men enjoyed a topside movie with liberty until midnight while senior officers and Cheif and First Class Petty Officers were allowed overnight liberty ashore.
Shortly before 8:00 a.m. the next morning, word was passed to man our fire and rescue stations. Having no such responsibility, I remained in my bunk. Within seconds, a second word was passed to man battle stations as we were under attack.
After moving to my damage control station and securing hatches and valves, our ammunition handler came to me and said that he couldn't find the keys to the ammo storage rooms. With a big set of bolt cutters, I solved an even bigger problem. We had begun firing our anti-aircraft guns and making the engines ready to get underway.
Normally, this process is a three hour job, but we did it in an hour. We finally got underway about the same time as the second wave of the attack, leaving port shooting. Various accounts credit us with shooting down from one to four planes and a probable sub sinking as we departed teh harbor. Ater falling in with the U.S.S. Enterprise and her task force, we returned Monday, December 8, and got a first-hand view of the devastation of the attack."
(Edward E. Hannah, Sr. was honorably discharged in 1946. He graduated from the University of Arizona in 1948, and settled in Columbus, Ohio in 1949, where he and his wife, Peggy, enjoyed their five children and twelve grandchildren. Ed Hannah passed away on July 3, 2008.)
