December 6, 2008 Marshall (Tx) News Messenger.
James W. Clark joined the Navy out of high school in 1937 to see the world. He trained in San Diego and was assigned to the USS Utah which had served in the Atlantic in World War I and had been extensively modernized in 1925 before being converted into a radio-controlled target ship in 1931. It later became an anti-aircraft training ship.
In May 1940, the US Pacific fleet was transferred to Pearl Harbor. On December 7, 1941, the USS Utah was on the west side of Ford Island with the light cruisers Raleigh and Detroit. "About 8 o'clock I was looking out a porthole on the starboard side of the ship to see what the weather was like. I was on the baseball team and we were going to play that day."
"I saw a plane coming toward us. I knew it was Japanese because I saw the insignia on the wing. So I yelled to my shipmates and they all rushed over so they could see it."
"Just then an aerial bomb hit the port side of the Utah and a second or so later, we received another hit. About that time, my gunnery officer came by and got me and another sailor to go down below deck with him to check out the water tight doors.
"There was a river of water coming down the port passageway and the ship began to list 35 degrees to port. So my officer said, 'We'd better get out of here."
To Be Continued. --Cooter
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