Death of One of Nevada's Last Two Pearl Harbor Survivors, Leonard Nielsen, 98-- Part 1

From the August 12, 2020, Las Vegas (Nevada) Review-Journal.

November 30, 2018 Veterans Reporter News.

He died on August 9, 2020.

Mr. Nielsen joined the Navy in 1940 and trained at San Diego.  Upon completion of boot camp, he was assigned to the USS Arizona and sailed to  Pearl Harbor where he was transferred to the heavy cruiser  USS Pensacola where he was a ship-fitter (a sailor who made underwater repairs to the hull of the ship).

On November 30, 1941, the Pensacola left Pearl Harbor to transport Marines to Midway Island, but he had gotten sick and remained at Pearl and had an emergency appendectomy on the hospital ship USS Solace four days before the attack. He was still on that ship on December 7.

And, he had quite the view of the unfolding carnage.  "The wave after wave of Japanese planes never seemed to stop," he said.  "What startled me most  was seeing a Jap plane fly by so close I could clearly see the pilot's face."

--GreGen

Lauren Bruner Returns to Pearl Harbor 75 Years Afterwards-- Part 3: Horrendously Burned

Lauren Bruner described the experience of being on the Arizona, "You're like a chicken getting barbecued."

Doctors on the USS Solace, a hospital ship, wanted to amputate most of his hands, leaving just forefingers and thumbs.  Fortunately, they didn't. They peeled off the burned, dead skin and let new skin grow to replace it.  They put him in a special bed with hoops that allowed sheets to be draped above him but not touch him.

Recently discovered Navy Department records show that he had burns on his face, back of his neck, his right shoulder, right arm and forearm, fingers, hands, outer thighs and lower legs.  The burns on his right arm were particularly bad.

--GreGen

Pearl Harbor Veteran Death in 2015: Willis V. Avery, USS Solace

From the May 18, 2015, Las Vegas Review-Journal "Pearl Harbor attack survivor dies in Boulder City at 93" by Keith Rogers.

One of southern Nevada's last Pearl Harbor survivors, Willis V. Avery died May 13, at age 93.  He was a 19-year-old pharmacists mate from Vestal, New York, on the hospital ship USS Solace anchored near the USS Arizona.  As the Arizona sank, Mr. Avery scrambled along with others onto gigs and longboats to get the wounded and survivors out of the water.

--GreGen

Death of Pearl Harbor Survivor Robert Addobati-- Part 2

He boarded the USS West Virginia to extract the burned and injured.  After that he stayed on the motor launch for two days and nights bringing the dead and wounded to the Solace from other stations.  He didn't talk about these experiences for many years but eventually began speaking about it at many local schools.

"I remembered reaching out and pulling them up.  You'd grab a sailor's arm, and the skin would pull off from being burned.  The water was covered with oil from the ships, and it was burning.  I did that for ours," he recalled.

Mr. Addoboti spent the rest of the war in the South Pacific, including the Battle of Guadalcanal.  The ship he was on was torpedoed in the Admiralty Islands near New Guinea and he was injured the following day and flown back to Pearl Harbor where he had a leg amputated.  He spent a year recovering at Mare Island Naval Hospital and after that went back to sea with the Military Sea Transportation Service.  He stayed there for seven years, participating in the Korean War where he helped evacuate the 1st Marine Division at Hungnam, North Korea.

After the war, he moved to Sacramento in 1966 where he was a founding member of the Sacramento Chapter of the Pearl Harbor Survivor's Association and returned to Pearl Harbor many times.

--GreGen

Death of Pearl Harbor Survivor Robert Addobati-- Part 1

From the Jan. 31, 2016, Sacramento (Cal.) Bee  "Robert Addobati, Pearl Harbor survivor, aided fellow sailors after bombing."  A photo accompanies the article of him and two grand children at the USS Arizona Memorial on December 7, 1990.  This really brings the story home for me.

He died Jan. 15, 2016.

Joining the Navy the day after high school graduation, he was assigned to the hospital ship USS Solace.  The ship sailed from Brooklyn Navy Yard through the Panama Canal and arrived at Pearl Harbor about a month before the attack.

On the day of the attack he was nineteen and standing on quarterdeck watch.  he was quickly ordered to man one of two motor launches bringing injured back to the Solace.

Mr. Addoboti ferried injured and dead from the USS Oklahoma.

--GreGen

Death of Another Pearl Harbor Survivor: Ford Wothington Rice, 100

From the Jan. 4, 2016, Ventura County (Cal.) Star "Pearl Harbor survivor dies at age 100 at Simi Valley home."

Ford Worthington Rice served 20+ years in the Navy.  He was born in 1915 and was on the USS Solace, a hospital ship at Pearl Harbor when the attack came.  He was watching the colors being posted on the USS Arizona when he saw Japanese planes.

One flew right by him, "He turned his head and looked right at me as he went by," before dropping a torpedo at the Arizona.

Mr. Rice helped rescue and care for those Arizona survivors.

--GreGen

Pearl Harbor Memorial Bridge Dedicated in 2012-- Part 2

TOM NERKOWSKI, 92, of Branford, was on the hospital ship Solace: "I was standing right on the fan deck and that plane come down like it was going to fire on us. It looked like we were going to be hit. So, I couldn't reach the rifles, they had them all locked up, there was nothing I could grab, so I grabbed ahold of what I could and that was my hammer that I had with me, and I flung it at the plane. Lucky that it didn't hit, and then again, I kind of wish that it did." //// JERRY STOEVER was on the destroyer-tender USS Whitney and in the shower when the attack began: "I was going to meet my uncle who lived in Waikiki. I was supposed to meet him that morning. Well, needless to say, I didn't get to see him. There was liberty. I was a gunner on a 50-caliber anti-aircraft gun. That was my station for the attack. I had a chance to fire back, which I felt good about." //// --GreGen