Richard L. Stewart Interview (<I> USS Downes</I> ), 26 April 2001

Richard L. Stewart Interview ( USS Downes ), 26 April 2001

Text from Interview Excerpt(s)
We knew the war was coming. Just not when it would happen.

[Tell me a little bit about the equipment that you had to deal with on the destroyer ( USS Downes ). What type of engines did you have?]

They were steam turbine. We had a fairly new destroyer; it was built in 1937 [1936]. A Mahan-class, and they started building newer ones at that time in forty-one. This was one of the latest ones in the fleet.

[And what was its particular role to play in a battle? What was it designed to do?]

Well, they were screening carriers and things like that. And we were equipped with five-inch thirty-eight guns and torpedoes. And a few machine guns. We were actually in dry dock when the war started. Have you ever heard of shooting fish in a rain barrel?

[Yes, I have.]

Well, that was it. They could have sent us a post card on Thursday, and it wouldn’t have made any difference. Because our propellers were sitting on the side of the dock, the boilers were open.

[Was the Downes attacked at Pearl Harbor?]

Well we were in dry dock, two destroyers and the battleship Pennsylvania . They did not come for us in the first wave, cause they knew we weren’t going anywhere. They came over to attack the Pennsylvania and bombing [was] so ineffective that they missed and overshot the Pennsylvania and destroyed the two destroyers. And they both burned in dry dock. Of course that was God-awful, not everyone was aboard. People were ashore for the weekend. I should have been, but I had car trouble the day before, and I decided, "Oh, the heck with it," and stayed aboard.

[So how did you first know there was an attack going on?]

The noise, the bombs.

[What did you do? What was your role?]

Well, there was obviously no point in my going to the engine room. We weren’t going anywhere. I took over at the machine gun and we did get some shots off. Hopefully, shot at a plane or so, until the ship burned and I had to leave. And that’s why I got the medal.

[What medal is that?]

Oh, it’s the Navy Commendation Medal. In jumping off the burning platform I had broken some bones in my foot. So, I got over on the side. I did get off the gang rail before it burned, fortunately. There was no water under us, of course.

[How far down did you have to jump?]

Well, just one deck.

[So you must have had some time to look around you.]

Not very damn much. When a ship burns, it burns like mad.

[After you got ashore, to look around the harbor and see what was happening. . . .]

Actually, I did watch the Shaw in the neighboring floating dry dock get blown apart. And it was pretty horrendous. A Japanese plane came over strafing.

[How many times did they come over? I mean, about how many times?]

A couple of times. Actually, one interesting thing that a lot of people down home like to make a point of . . . of course, I couldn’t move very fast then, but they were putting this culvert in place, and the chief petty officer that outweighed me by quite a bit--I was about 160 pounds then, wish I were now--we both made a dive for this culvert. There was only room for one of us, but damned if we both didn’t get in there! That lasted about a minute until the plane had left and I went back, crawled out. And for the first time in my life, I stole a car. Saw a car that had the keys left in it. So I spent the rest of the morning taking people to the hospital. Then around noon. . . .

[Even with your foot broken?]

Yeah, it was my left foot. And I could shift the clutch with my left heel. It wasn’t much fun, but I mean, it worked, I could do it.

[So at the end of the attack on Pearl Harbor, you were left without a ship. What happened then?]

Well, I was in the hospital for a while, which is not a very happy place to be. In fact that night, lying in the hospital, we had some planes coming over and some of the ships in the harbor opened up on the planes. And me on the third deck in the hospital with a foot, by that time with a cast, hardly maneuverable. That was not a happy place to be. So I stayed in the hospital for a while.

Oh, I wanted to tell you, and this I did not put in my written accounts. Everybody on the ship did very well, we did lose 12 men out of a total crew of around 130 at that time, but not everyone was aboard. But we had one . . . do you know we were segregated then? The steward’s department was either Filipino or black. And we had one black mess attendant, did his job fine until the ship burned. He managed to get off the ship safely. And nobody saw him until the next day. Of course, I wasn’t there, but the others tell me, they said, "Scales, where’ve you been?" And he said, "Well, sir, when the ship burned I got off and I took out to run and I ran until I ran out of land." He said, "If this hadn’t been an island I’d be running yet." And that was the most sensible approach to the situation of anyone I know. He just ran until he ran out of land.

Citation :	Richard L. Stewart Interview, Oral History Collection , April 26, 2001.
Location :	Special Collections, Joyner Library, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC 27858 USA
Call Number :	Oral History No. 182.

Looking Back

Day of Infamy Exhibit

Browse

Special Collections | Joyner Library | East Carolina University

Page Updated