Marines in World War II Commemorative Series
 
Contents
Introduction
Suddenly Hurled into War
They Caught Us Flat-Footed
They're Kicking the Hell OUt of Pearl Harbor
Sources
Biographies
Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Russel Fox
Major Harold C. Roberts
Tai Sing Loo
Special Subjects
Browning Machine Gune Drill on Board Ship
Antiaircraft Gun Fired to a Range of 14,500 Yards
Pearl Harbor Remembered

INFAMOUS DAY: Marines at Pearl Harbor
by Robert J. Cressman and J. Michael Wenger

Sources

The authors consulted primary material in the Marine Corps Historical Center Reference Section (November/December 1941 muster rolls) and Personal Papers Section (Claude A. Larkins, Roger M. Emmons, and Wayne Jordan collections), as well as in the Naval Historical Center Operational Archives Branch (action reports and/or microfilmed deck logs for the 15 ships with embarked Marine Detachments, and those units included in the Commandant, 14th Naval District, report), in the office of the Coast Guard Historian, and in the Gordon W. Prange Papers.

The Pearl Harbor Attack: Hearings Before the Joint Committee on the Investigation of the Pearl Harbor Attack; (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1946) contains useful accounts (Lieutenant Commander Fuqua, Lieutenant Colonel Whaling, and Lieutenant Colonel Larkin), as does Paul Stillwell, ed., Air Raid: Pearl Harbor! Recollections of a Day of Infamy (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1981).

General works concerning Pearl Harbor that were consulted include Gordon W. Prange, et al., December 7, 1941: The Day The Japanese Attacked Pearl Harbor (New York: McGraw Hill, 1987), Walter Lord, Day of Infamy (Henry Holt & Co., 1957), and Japanese War History Office, Senshi Sosho [War History Series], Vol. 10, Hawaii Sakusen (Tokyo: Asagumo Shimbunsa, 1970).

Articles from the Naval Institute Proceedings include: Cornelius C. Smith Jr., "...A Hell of a Christmas," (Dec68), Thomas C. Hone, "The Destruction of the Battle Line at Pearl Harbor," (Dec77) and Paul H. Backus, "Why Them And Not Me?" (Sep81). From Marine Corps Gazette: Clifford B. Drake, "A Day at Pearl Harbor," (Nov65). From Shipmate: Samuel R. Shaw, "Marine Barracks, Navy Yard, Pearl Harbor," (Dec73). From Naval History: Albert A. Grasselli, "The Ewa Marines" (Spring 1991). From Leatherneck: Philip N. Pierce, "Twenty Years Ago ..." (Dec61)

Robert Cressman

J. Michael Wenger


About the Authors

Robert J. Cressman is currently a civilian historian in the Naval Historical Center's Ships' Histories Branch. A graduate of the University of Maryland with a bachelor of arts in history in 1972, he obtained his master of arts in history under the late Dr. Gordon W. Prange at the University of Maryland in 1978. Mr. Cressman, a former reference historian in the Marine Corps Historical Center's Reference Section (1978-1981), is author of That Gallant Ship: USS Yorktown (CV-5), and editor and principal contributor of A Glorious Page in Our History: The Battle of Midway, 4-6 June 1942. He and the co-author of this monograph, J. Michael Wenger, also co-authoried Steady Nerves and Stout Hearts: The USS Enterprise (CV-6) Air Group and Pearl Harbor, 7 December 1941.

J. Michael Wenger, currently an analyst for the Square D Company in Knightdale, North Carolina, graduated from Atlantic Christian College in 1972, and obtained a master of arts from Duke University in 1973. Mr. Wenger has taught in the Raleigh, North Carolina, school system and writes as a free-lance military historian. He is the co-author of The Way It Was: Pearl Harbor — The Original Photographs. His publication credits include the Raleigh News and Observer  and Naval Aviation News.




insignias from 50th Anniversary

THIS PAMPHLET HISTORY, one in a series devoted to U.S. Marines in the World War II era, is published for the education and training of Marines by the History and Museums Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, Washington, D.C., as a part of the U.S. Department of Defense observance of the 50th anniversary of victory in that war.

Editorial costs of preparing this pamphlet have been defrayed in part by a bequest from the estate of Emilie H. Watts, in memory of her late husband, Thomas M. Watts, who served as a Marine and was the recipient of a Purple Heart.


WORLD WAR II COMMEMORATIVE SERIES

DIRECTOR OF MARINE CORPS HISTORY AND MUSEUMS
Brigadier General Edwin H. Simmons, USMC (Ret)

GENERAL EDITOR,
WORLD WAR II COMMEMORATIVE SERIES

Benis M. Frank

CARTOGRAPHIC CONSULTANT
George C. MacGillivray

EDITING AND DESIGN SECTION, HISTORY AND MUSEUMS DIVISION
Robert E. Struder, Senior Editor; W. Stephen Hill, Visual Information Specialist;
Catherine A. Kerns, Composition Services Technician, R.D. Payne, Volunteer—Web Edition

Marine Corps Historical Center
Building 58, Washington Navy Yard
Washington, D.C. 20374-5040

1992

PCN 190 003116 00




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Commemorative Series produced by the Marine Corps History and Museums Division