7 decades later, Pearl Harbor anniversary still powerful: HeraldTimesOnline.

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12/7/11 11:57 AM

7 decades later, Pearl Harbor anniversary still powerful: HeraldTimesOnline.com

A hat for Pearl Harbor survivor George Cotton sits in a display case at American Legion Post 18 in Bloomington. Cotton was serving aboard the USS Detroit when Pearl Harbor was attacked. He died in 2002. Jeremy Hogan | Herald-Times James Madison, an Indiana University professor emeritus of history. Photo courtesy Indiana University

Seventy years later, do Americans remember Dec. 7 as a day of infamy? The United States official entry into World War II came the day after the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, when Congress authorized President Franklin Roosevelt to declare war. Yesterday, Dec. 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan, the president said in his historic address. Just after dawn, 360 Japanese planes loaded with torpedoes and bombs flew low into the U.S. naval hub located on the southern coast of Oahu and destroyed most of the 92 ships in the harbor. The attack surprised everyone. More
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7 decades later, Pearl Harbor anniversary still powerful: HeraldTimesOnline.com

12/7/11 11:57 AM

than 2,400 died 1,177 were on the USS Arizona. The battleships hull remains submerged in the shallow harbor. The devastating surprise attack resulted in a surge in enlistment as young men altered their life paths by joining the fight for democracy and freedom. James Madison, an Indiana University professor emeritus of history, said shock and disbelief at the brazen Pearl Harbor bombing, one of the most brilliant military strikes in all of human history, stirred a vengeful nation. By Dec. 8, a desire for revenge set in. People said, They cant do this to America. Most Americans then could not imagine that the Japanese were capable of anything like this, Madison said. When they saw those first images, the revenge factor moved to the forefront and never really went away. The propaganda was filled with revenge. Remember Pearl Harbor. People did, and still do, remember that date. On Dec. 8, 70 years ago, Jim Lilly, then a student at the University of Tennessee, withdrew from college and joined the U.S. Army Air Corps. He flew a P-38 fighter plane, and was captured by German soldiers in 1944, when he parachuted from his plane over Italy in heavy cloud cover. He spent nearly a year in the Stalag 17 prisoner-of-war camp in Germany before being liberated by General Pattons army on April 29, 1945. His son and daughter, Bruce and Janice Lilly of Bloomington, said their dad never talked much about his decision to join the Army the day after the Pearl Harbor attack. Madison said Jim Lilly was one of many Americans prompted to actively engage in the war after the attack on home ground. There was a flow who signed up after that. There were a lot, the IU history professor said.

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7 decades later, Pearl Harbor anniversary still powerful: HeraldTimesOnline.com

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Even though seven decades have passed, Madison does not see the Dec. 7 anniversary fading into history any time soon, even as the number of World War II veterans dwindles. A soldier who was 20 at the time of the attack would be 90 years old now. Jim Lilly was 87 when he died the day after Christmas in 2008. The generation that fought in World War II is going away, but their children and grandchildren are still here, Madison said. Theres certainly been a decline in interest in history, but World War II is different. And much more significant historically, he said, than the terrorist bombings of Sept. 11, 2001, just one decade ago. Both were surprise attacks, but beyond that there are far more differences than similarities, Madison said. The consequences were stark and different. I suspect that Sept. 11 will fade in memory ... will look like a picnic in the park, compared with the events that followed the Dec. 7, 1941, attack. It was no Pearl Harbor.

George Cottons memory of the Pearl Harbor attack

This account on the Bloomington American Legion Burton Woolery Post 18 website is attributed to George Cotton, who was serving aboard the USS Detroit when Pearl Harbor was attacked. Cotton died in 2002. I had set my breakfast tray on the table and (was) on my way to get a glass of water when general quarters was sounded. I first thought maybe the China Clipper had run into trouble as she took off and landed from her berth on our port side. I soon learned: the Japanese were attacking us!!! I then manned my forward damage control station, which was below decks. I
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7 decades later, Pearl Harbor anniversary still powerful: HeraldTimesOnline.com

12/7/11 11:57 AM

never before seen the kind of damage that the (Japanese) were doing to us. All I could do was wait and wonder whether or not a bomb would come through the deck above me or if a torpedo would come through the side of our ship. We got underway, and my damage control station was secured. I was told to go down to central station and man the switchboard and phones, which were in the keel of the ship. As we went out of the harbor, our destroyers were dropping depth charges, trying to get a (Japanese) two-man submarine. Being in the keel was a very scary place to be when getting underway. The (Japanese) fired two torpedoes at us. One crossed our bow and another crossed our stern. Neither hit us. The (Japanese) dropped a bomb on our sister ship, the USS Raleigh, berthed next to us, and behind her the (Japanese) sank the USS Utah. The Utah is still lying where she sank.

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