Only Two USS Nevada Crew Members Remain-- Part 6: 'It Looked ike a Giant Kaleidoscope'

"It looked like a giant kaleidoscope.  The sky was all lit up," Richard Ramsey said.  "There were many, many men shot down who never got out of their planes."

Aboard the Nevada, Ramesy was on the third-deck powder magazine, passing out rounds of ammunition requested for use in the ship's guns, including armor-piercing rounds to hit German tanks and "star shells" that exploded in the air to illuminate targets at night.

Ramsey was one of more than 2,000 sailors on his ship who would remain at their battle stations for 80 straight hours, while the Nevada's four gun turrets fired hundreds of salvos of 1,000-pound projectiles that could hit and destroy a German tank up to 17 miles away, he said.

Not only was it exhausting, but the air circulation into the ship also had to be shut off, by closing air ducts every hour as a precaution to "maintain watertight integrity" and prevent water from flowing inside, Ramsey said.

"It made it very hot," he said.

--GreGen