After graduating Harvard Kennedy and his older brother joined the Navy. Joseph Kennedy became a flyer and was immediately sent to Europe. On the other hand, Kennedy had difficulties getting accepted into the Navy due to his health and back problems. With the help of Mr. Kennedy, John Kennedy was eventually accepted and admitted into the Navy as a Lieutenant and was assigned to the South Pacific as a commander of a patrol torpedo (PT) boat, PT-109. Kennedy and his crew of twelve men were on a mission to stop Japanese ships from delivering supplies to their soldiers. On August 1943, fifteen Patrol Torpedo boats set out to damage the Japanese Navy supply convoy, also known as the “Tokyo Express.” Thirty torpedoes were fired, but no damage was …show more content…
done to the Tokyo Express. The United States’ boats that used up their torpedoes were ordered back home, the rest remained behind for another round. There were three boats left PT-109, PT-162 and PT-169, spread out to establish a boundary. Around 2:30 a.m. another boat approaches, Kennedy believed it was another PT boat. As it got closer it became evident that the boat was a Japanese destroyer, Kennedy attempted to bear his torpedoes but there was not enough time. The Japanese boat struck PT-109, tossing Kennedy around the deck. As the majority of the crew got knocked into the water, the engineer, Patrick McMahon, who was under the deck, managed to escape the flames from the exploding fuel with severe burns. Kennedy ordered the men to abandon ship, in fear of it going up in flames. As the flames diminished, Kennedy sent his men to what was left of the boat. Meanwhile, Kennedy swam to McMahon and grabbed him by his life-vest strap, pulling him toward the boat. Harold Marney and Andrew Jackson were nowhere to be found, likely to have been killed at impact. No ships or boats were in sight, and the men were afraid to fire the flare gun in fear of attracting another attacker. After careful and thought out discussions, the men decided to abandoned the remains of the boat and headed out for an island three and a half miles away. Due to the salt in the water, McMahon could not swim very well as it irritated his wounds, Kennedy decided to wrap a piece of tow rope around him and pulled him with his teeth. Back in Harvard Kennedy was on the swim team, which helped him become a great swimmer. On the other hand, two of the crew members could not swim at all. The crew decided it was best to laid them upon a plank while they took turns pushing or pulling as they could. The first to arrive at the island was Kennedy and McMahon. After the three and a half mile swim Kennedy did not have the strength to get up on his feet, McMahon had to help him out of the water. Kennedy collapsed and waited for the rest of his crew. Just as Kennedy was resting, a Japanese boat passed by closely. Once everything was clear, he decided to swim down to the Ferguson Passage where the PT boats passed when operating in Blackett Strait. By clinging to reefs and island hopping Kennedy made it in the passage, there he stayed put until he realized the PT boats were somewhere else that night. As he returned to the island with his crew, there were many difficulties. The strong currents would spin him into the Blackett Strait and back into the Ferguson Passage nearly killing him, as he would have to swim back all over again. Kennedy eventually stopped on an island named Leo Rava, where he slept enough to regain his strength. On August 4th Kennedy and his men headed back into the ocean in hopes of finding food and fresh water on nearby islands. Once again Kennedy had to help McMahon and drag him by his life-vest strap, while the rest of the crew continued to take turns pushing the plank for the men who could not swim. Upon arriving at Olasana Island coconuts were plentiful, but to some of the men it made them feel a little sick. As the search for freshwater continued the crew were too anxious to explore the whole island due to the Japanese Patrols. That night Kennedy and his crew decided to go on to the next island, the Naru Island looked over the Ferguson Passage. According to the Presidential Library and Museum of John F. Kennedy (jfk.org/JFK-in-History), Kennedy and Ross climbed onto it’s beach on August 5th. The two men carefully made their way through, only to find a wreck of a small vessel. As they cautiously got closer, they found a small box with Japanese labels. Upon opening it they found Japanese candy inside. As they made their way up the island they found a tin of freshwater and a one-man canoe hidden. Upon taking a drink Kennedy and Ross saw two men at the Japanese wreckage. Making their way towards them they realized they were islanders. As soon as the men saw Kennedy and Ross the islanders got frightened and took off in a canoe. Later that night, Kennedy took the canoe they found and headed to the Ferguson Passage, only to be disappointed as there were no U.S. vessels. Kennedy headed back to Olasana only stopping long enough to get the candy and water from the Naru Island for the rest of the crew, leaving Ross to rest. Once Kennedy arrived at Olasana, he realized the two islanders at Naru made contact with the rest of the crew. The islanders, later identified as Biuku Gasa and Eroni Kumana, were scouts for the Allies. The two men were tired and thirsty and stopped for coconuts at the Olasana Island. The next day Kennedy returned to Naru with the two men Gasa and Kumana, to meet Ross along the way. The islanders showed Kennedy and Ross where a boat was hidden on the Naru Island. Kennedy could not figure out a way to leave a message to the owners of the hidden boat. The islanders showed them how to carve a message into a husk of a green coconut. Till this day the husk of coconut Kennedy used to leave a message is in the Presidential Museum. It reads, NARU ISL COMMANDER...NATIVE KNOWS POS’IT...HE CAN PILOT...11 ALIVE NEED SMALL BOAT...KENNEDY As they waited for any type of signal or rescue, Kennedy insisted on going to the Ferguson Passage with Ross in the two-man canoe.
Due to the heavy seas, the canoe got flooded and they barely made it back to Naru. The next morning, on August 7th, eight islanders came to Naru. Bringing food and instructions from local Allied coast watcher, Lt. A. Reginald Evans, Australian Navy, telling Kennedy to come to Evan’s post. The islanders hid Kennedy in the canoe under a pile of palm branches and traveled to Gomu Island in the Blackett Strait waterway. By this time Evans had already sent a rescue mission for Kennedy and his crew. On the night of August 7th the rescue boats PT-157 and PT-171 picked up Kennedy first so he could guide them to the rest of the crew. On August 8th the PT rescue boats arrived at Olasana Island. Kennedy had to yell out for his crew as they were all asleep from exhaustion. The rescue continued to go on without any mishaps or accidents, the men of PT-109 arrived at the U.S. base in Rendova Island on August 8th. Upon rescuing, Kennedy received the Navy and Marine Corps Medal for his leadership and courage, and a Purple Heart for the injuries he acquired during the incident. Kennedy later found out his older brother Joseph was killed during action while piloting a British Mosquito night fighter during a top secret operation (nps.gov). Years later the press asked Kennedy how he became a hero, his response, “It was involuntary, they sank my
boat.”
Prior to the dispatch of September 24, the information which the Japanese sought and obtained about Pearl Harbor followed the general pattern of their interest in American Fleet movements in other localities. One might suspect this type of conventional espionage. With the dispatch of September 24, 1941, and those which followed, there was a significant and ominous change in the character of the information which the Japanese Government sought and obtained. The espionage then directed was of an unusual character outside the realm of reasonable suspicion. It was no longer merely directed to ascertaining the general whereabouts of ships of the fleet. It was directed to the presence of particular ships in particular areas; to such minute detail as what ships were double-docked at the same wharf….These Japanese instructions and reports pointed to an attack by Japan upon the ships in Pearl Harbor. The information sought and obtained, with such painstaking detail had no other conceivable usefulness from a military
To begin, the attack on Pearl Harbour was devastating to U.S. naval capabilities in the Pacific at the onset of their entry into the war. Japanese officials had grown tired of the U.S. oil embargo, which was meant to limit their territorial expansion and aggression in South-East Asia as well as China, and as negotiations weren’t reaching any conclusions they decided that the only course of action was a first strike on the aircraft carriers at Pearl Harbour to cripple U.S. naval capability in the Pacific (Rosenberg 1). The attack, which lasted about two hours, had resulted in the sinking of four battleships, among ...
America was not the only one who suffered casualties during the attack on Pearl Harbor. Japan lost five midget submarines and nine of the men who piloted the small, war submersibles. The tenth man, Ensign Sakamaki, became our first Japanese WWII prisoner of war. Jap...
Japanese stood their ground and on December 7,1941.The surprise attack on the Americans that destroyed or damage nearly 20 American naval vessels, including eight battleships, and over 300 airplanes. More than 2,400 Americans died in the attack, including civilians, and another 1,000 people were wounded at Pearl Harbor(document
In the early morning of 19 February 1945, United States Marines assigned to the 3rd, 4th and 5th Marine Division led the initial assault on the Japanese controlled island of Iwo Jima, with the objective of capturing and securing the island. This was the beginning of one of the fiercest and bloodiest; and more decisively, the most strategically important battles fought during World War II. After the dust had settled, and the smoke had cleared, the causalities and losses were astounding. 6,821 U.S. Marines along with 18,844 members of the Imperial Japanese Army had paid the ultimate sacrifice. A decisive US victory on the island of Iwo Jima later played a pivotal role in the overarching defeat of the Japanese Empire and its Armed Forces (Morison, 1945).
Blair Jr., Clay, (1975). Silent Victory: The U.S. Submarine War Against Japan. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, p. 78. p. 1072. Buell, Thomas B. -. (1987)
On December 7th 1941, Japanese Planes and submarines attacked the United States Naval base at Pearl Harbor. This event singlehandedly brought the U.S from its then neutral stance in World War Two to a fighting member of the “Allied Powers.” Pearl Harbor was the first of a long series of confrontations between the U.S and the Japanese in an effort to gain control of the Pacific. Unlike the “War in Europe” the Pacific strategy was dominated by naval and aerial battles, with the occasional land-based “Island Hopping” Campaign. As such, one of the most important factors in the war in the pacific was Fleet Size, the more ships a country could send to war, the better. Pearl Harbor was the Japanese’s way of trying to deal with the massive U.S Pacific fleet. However, Pearl Harbor was not the turning point of the war. After December 7th the United States began work on numerous technological developments which would ultimately help them in one of the most important battles of WWII, the largest naval confrontation of the war, The Battle of Midway. The battle, which took place from June 4th to June 7th , 1942 is widely considered the turning point of the Pacific Theater (James & Wells). Through the Post-Pearl Harbor desire for “Revenge” and various technological advantages including code breaking and radar, the U.S were able to outsmart the Japanese at Midway and ultimately win the battle, eventually leading to a victory in the Pacific.
Winning a Pulitzer was not the only thing he did that made him great before presidency. Kennedy was also a WWII war hero. As a PT boat skipper he saved his men in an attack from the Japanese. One of the men who knew Kennedy, saved after his PT-109 was hit by a Japanese destroyer in the Blackett Strait, was Patrick McMahon. After McMahon passed away in 1990 his step-son was asked about the event and what McMahon said about Kennedy:
American history is accompanied by a long list of explorers who first discovered and who explored the massive continent. All of the explorers had an impact on the development of America. The Lewis and Clark expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery, stands prominently at the top part of this list. The Lewis and Clark Expedition has had a significant political, social, and economic effect on America. They were the first to map out the west and set off westward expansion. Without the success of the expedition growth of America would have taken five times as long, as predicted by Thomas Jefferson.
John F. Kennedy was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, on May 29, 1917. he graduated from Harvard in 1940. then shortly after he signed up for the navy, and 3 years into his navy service, August 2nd at 2:30 in the morning Kennedys pt boat (Patrol Torpedo boats) was hit and sunken by a Japanese destroyer boat. Kennedy swam out to save Patrick Henry McMahon and Charles Harris. Kennedy pulled McMahon by a life-vest strap, and he talked Harris into doing the difficult swim back to the wreckage. After he came back from the war, he became a House of Representative Democratic Congressman, and then senate in 1953. He later then married Jacqueline Bouvieron September 12, 1953. They had two children Caroline and John Jr, and a third child Patric...
On December 7th, 1941, approximately 26 months after the war begun; the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked a fleet of U.S Navy ships in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Material damages included 21 ships, 8 of which were well equipped battleships, and 350 ...
It’s a beautiful sunny morning, on a tropical island that everyone would love to take a vacation at. It’s approximately 6:00 am, December 7, 1941, when a first group of 181 kamikaze planes attacked; targeting key naval bases stationed at Hawaii; a sustained crippling of U.S. naval forces for about 6 months. The death toll was 2,500. Out of the 9 battleships, 8 were heavily damaged by the assault on Pearl Harbor and out of the 8, three were unrepairable, USS Arizona, USS Oklahoma, and the USS Utah. 160 aircrafts were put out of commission, and nearly 130 were heavily damaged. This was the first incident in which there was an act of war, committed on U.S. soil, outside of the American Revolution and the Civil War. The world was at war, and the U.S. remained neutral until now. Before the attack, the U.S. was in great debate whether to enter the war or to stay out of it. The act of war forced the U.S. into the War and triggered a controversial debate in whether to retaliate against Japan with the use of nuclear arms.
Introduction – Pearl Harbor was vulnerable to attack because of the obstruction of defense and warning.
Kennedy was traveling and doing speeches in nine different states in only a week, in preparation for his next presidential campaign which had not been announced but was obvious. The first state Kennedy traveled to Texas, along with his wife Jackie Kennedy. This was the first appearance Ms. Kennedy had made since she lost her son Patrick to Hyaline Membrane Disease also known as Infant Respiratory Distress Syndrome, he was only two days old(The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum). The day began just as any other day but soon ended in tragedy and sorrow. As the motorcade traveled down a crowed street in Dallas a gun shot rang out. The president had been stuck in the back of the head and neck by the bullet and he fell toward Ms. Kennedy. The governor of Texas, John Connelly was also struck by a bullet. The president and the governor were both taken to Pa...
Lieutenant Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. was born on July 25, 1915 and the oldest child of Joseph Sr. and Rose Kennedy. He attended the Choate School in Connecticut and the London School of Economics before finally entering Harvard, graduating cum laude in 1938. In 1942, he dropped out of law school to join the Navy, hoping to become a pilot. In 1943 and 1944, he flew many missions in a PB4Y-1 Liberator (the Navy's version of the B-24 Liberator) and completing two full tours of duty. Finally eligible for duty in the States at this point, he volunteered for a secret mission: operating some of the very first mil...