Military | Page 21 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

December 9, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Italian POWs

On July 7, 1937, Japan invaded China to initiate the war in the Pacific; while the German invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, unleashed the European war.

World War II (WWII or WW2), also known as the Second World War, was a global war that was underway by 1939 and ended in 1945.

Italy entered World War II on the Axis side on June 10, 1940, as the defeat of France became apparent. On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor and the US entered the conflict.

World War II was fought between two sets of partners: the Allies and the Axis. The three principal partners in the Allies alliance were the British Commonwealth, the Soviet Union and the United States; the three principal partners in the Axis alliance were Germany, Italy and Japan.

During World War II, American forces captured 50,000 Italian soldiers and sailors. 5,000 Italian prisoners of war were sent to Hawaiʻi and held at Schofield, Kāneʻohe, Kalihi Valley and Sand Island.

Japanese Americans were also incarcerated in at least eight locations on Hawaiʻi. On December 8, 1941, the first detention camp was set up on Sand Island.

The Sand Island Detention Center held war captives as well as civilians of Japanese, German or Italian ancestry who were under investigation.

This Italian prisoner contingent was highly skilled in construction and engineering, and as a voluntary effort they were used extensively on many construction projects around the island where skilled labor was, at that time, in short supply, particularly around Honolulu Harbor, Sand Island, etc. (Ponza – Army-mil)

“For the most part, the US Army welcomed their labor and skills in construction of needed military facilities.” (Moreo)

“At the end of each day, the Italians would salvage whatever waste materials were about as well as scouring and scooping up cement from spillage.” (Moreo)

With this salvaged material the Italian POWs built buildings and works of art (fountains and statues) at various locations on Oʻahu (these pieces are at Schofield Barracks, Fort Shafter, Sand Island and the Immigration Building.)

The Mother Cabrini Chapel, designed by POW Astori Rebate, “was huge, with an alter, and two large paintings of Mother Cabrini all done by the POWs. The chapel had a full basement for vestments and religious articles. Out in front of the chapel, the area was paved and filled by ‘well constructed benches acting as pews for a thousand or more worshippers.’” (Moreo)

The Italian POWs “decided to dedicate to the memory of Mother Cabrini, who was at that time being considered for sainthood for her earlier good works in the United States, and who was subsequently canonized as the first American saint by the Vatican around the year 1946.” (Ponza -army-mil)

Upon the chapel’s completion, Sunday mass was celebrated every week with the prisoners exiting the prison compound in order to attend the services, seating themselves in the open air pews. As word spread to the adjoining areas, Pearl City, Honolulu, Nanakuli, and even as far as Waikiki, a small group of Catholic worshipers started to drive up to the chapel on Sunday mornings to attend the services.” (Ponza – army-mil) In the way of Kamehameha Highway construction, it was torn down in 1948.

At Sand Island, “(a)t sunset, hundreds of Italians formed a male chorale and sang for an hour. It became widely known and so popular that visitors came in the evening to listen and applaud.” (Moreo)

At Fort Shafter, a fountain crowned with pineapples was designed and crafted by POW Alfredo Giusti, with winged lions and topped with pineapples. (Reportedly, Giusti inscribed his name and address on the north side of the fountain.)

Dedicated to give hope to those without hope, Giusti also crafted two statues, “The Hula Dancer” and “The Bathing Beauty,”) which now sit outside the Coast Guard administration building on Sand Island.

A hard-to-see fountain crafted by the Italians is within the secured Immigration Center on Ala Moana Boulevard (you can see it through a chain link fence on the makai/Fort Armstrong side of the facility.)

The war ended in December 1945 and the Italian POWs were repatriated in 1946, having left some lasting legacies of the war and their time in Hawaiʻi. (Unfortunately, due to increased security concerns, access is restricted at the facilities where their work is located.)

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photo taken: 18JAN2006

Sand_Island_Coast_Guard_Building-Bathing_Beauty-(Burton)

154044_1.tif. VESPUCCI SAILOR>>August 30, 2002/BRUCE APS/BRUCE ASATO PHOTOMarinaio Sergio Cadalano of the Italian Tall Ship Amerigo Vespucci touches a part of the Hula Dancer sculpture that was created by Italian Prisoner of War Alfredo Giusti in 1944 while interned at Sand Island. Cadalano is aboard the Amerigo Vespucci which sailed into Honolulu Harbor last week and will head to Tahiti and New Zealand after departing Honolulu.

Sand_Island_Coast_Guard_Building-Hula_Dancer-Bathing_Beauty-(Burton)

Fountain and landscaping, Honolulu INS building (U.S. Immigration Station)-(Burton)

Fountain INS building (U.S. Immigration Station)-(Burton)

Detail of 1942 Chamber of Commerce tourist map showing Sand-(Burton)

December 8, 2019 by Peter T Young 4 Comments

After December 7, 1941 – Submarines Continue Attack on Hawaiʻi

Most are very aware of the December 7, 1941 attacks by the Japanese on military installations on Oʻahu.

Their targets were Pearl Harbor; Hickam, Wheeler and Bellows airfields; Ewa Marine Corps Air Station; Kaneohe Bay Naval Air Station and Schofield Barracks.

However, the attacks by the Japanese on Hawaiʻi did not end on December 7th.

A group of about nine Japanese submarines were kept in the vicinity of Hawaiʻi until mid-January – they were stationed there to find out just how much damage had been done to the American military.

In addition, they tried to do what damage they could, as well as stir up concern in the civilian population about the war.

Before December was over, the Japanese submarines brought war home to the neighbor islands. Not by air attacks, but with periodic shelling from their submarines.

Over the next few weeks, on several occasions, they shelled more targets in Hawaiʻi – and, those attacks were not isolated to military targets; later in the month, civilian facilities were the intended targets.

Just before dusk on December 15th, a submarine lobbed about ten shells into the harbor area of Kahului on Maui, and three that hit a pineapple cannery caused limited damage.

Over a 2½-hour period during the night of December 30 – 31, submarines engaged in similar and nearly simultaneous shellings of Nawiliwili on Kauaʻi, again on Kahului, Maui and Hilo on the Big Island.

Damage at all three points was slight, and no one was hurt. The principal result of these shellings was to stir up the war consciousness of all the Hawaiian Islands.

A report of the Kauaʻi shelling states, “At around 1:30 a.m. on the moonlit night of December 30, 1941, an enemy Japanese submarine estimated to be about 4 miles offshore shelled Nawiliwili Harbor with least 15 three-inch shells in what was the only attack on Kauai during WWII.” (kalapakibeach-org)

“The shrapnel from one shell riddled every room in the home of CL Shannon, which was located over the Kauaʻi Marine & Machine Works, Shannon’s business, then situated along the stretch of harbor between what are today the Matson and Young Brothers terminals.”

On the bluff above the harbor, where the bulk sugar storage warehouse stands today, a shell started a small cane fire. Most of the shells were duds. One punctured a gasoline storage tank, others created water plumes in the bay.

Merchant Marine William S. Chambers, on a cargo ship docked in Kahului, noted. “We were shelled by a Japanese submarine in Kahului Harbor on December 30th, 1941, shortly before we left for San Francisco.” No damage was reported at Kahului.

Ten rounds were fired at ships docked at Kahului piers. Two shells fell harmlessly into the harbor. Four rounds hit the Maui Pineapple Company cannery, doing some damage to the roof and smokestack. One fell on the driveway of the Maui Vocational School, another in a waste lumber pile on Pier I, and one broke a few windows at the Pacific Guano and Fertilizer building. Army guns unsuccessfully returned fire.

The second attack on Kahului, on December 31, took place after General Order No. 14 established wartime censorship in Hawai’i and therefore received limited coverage.

The News did, however, mention in its first edition of 1942 that Maui police, navy and marine forces, as well as “HC & S Co. cowboys,” were patrolling on horseback to prevent looting. The death toll from the attacks: one unfortunate chicken.

None of the damage was considered major. Some frightened Kahului residents started to flee, but police and Boy Scouts persuaded them to return home.

In Hilo, residents were roused when a submarine surfaced about three miles offshore and open fired on Hilo Bay. Ten rounds, with high explosive shells hit a seaplane tender, the pier and started a small fire in the vicinity of Hilo Airport.

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December 7, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

NAS Kāneʻohe Bay

Dec. 7, 1941 will always be remembered as a “Day of Infamy,” after the devastation of Pearl Harbor. However, some may not be aware of the events that occurred that fateful morning on the other side of the Koʻolau Mountains.

Ten months after being commissioned, US Naval Air Station – Kāneʻohe Bay was one of the first locations on Oʻahu to be attacked by Japanese forces.

Minutes prior to its attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese Navy bombed NAS Kāneʻohe Bay.

The attack on Kāneʻohe was designed to disable the military’s long-range reconnaissance capabilities by knocking out the PBY Catalina seaplanes stationed there.

Navy Lieutenant Fusata Iida was the flight leader of carrier Soryu’s squadron of 12 Japanese dive-bombers who came off the seaward side of the peninsula during a 10-minute strike on the base.

Of the 36 PBY Catalina “flying boat” seaplanes, including those moored in Kāneʻohe Bay, 27 were destroyed and six others were damaged.

Only the three Catalinas that were out on patrol escaped attack. However, departing Japanese Zero aircraft attacked those three; one returned with 81 bullet holes in it.

The first Japanese aircraft destroyed in action during the December 7 attack were shot down at Kāneʻohe.

During the attack, Lt. Iida’s plane had been hit and was leaking fuel, when he apparently used it to make a suicide attack. (Before taking off, he had told his men that if his plane was badly damaged he would crash it into a “worthy enemy target.”)

He signaled that the rest of the planes should return to the ship and pointed to the ground, indicating that he would attempt to crash his plane into a suitable target.

Missing valuable targets, Iida’s plane crashed into the side of a hill on the base.

Navy Lt. John W. Finn, aviation chief ordnanceman, is credited for shooting down the Japanese Zero. During the attack, Finn left his quarters to man a .50 caliber machine gun mounted in a parking ramp. While doing so, he sustained multiple wounds. His actions earned him the Medal of Honor.

A second wave of bomber planes came approximately 20 minutes later and dropped more bombs. One of the hangars (now Hangar 102) received a direct hit during this attack and exploded.

The second attack is credited for most of the casualties (due to bomb fragments.) The Kāneʻohe raid killed 18 U.S. sailors and one civilian; 65 were injured.

Iida was buried at the Heleloa burial area, near the mass burial site of the 18 Sailors. (The remains of each were later disinterred and returned to their respective homes in the US and Japan.)

A stone and cement marker with bronze plaque, located along Reed Road, marks the approximate crash site. The Iida marker may be the only marker on a US military installation dedicated to an enemy soldier.

Representatives of several Japanese organizations regularly gather to remember Iida with a solemn ceremony and to honor the 19 who died there.

Of the artifacts surviving from pilot’s crash site, a helmet believed to be Iida’s was returned to his relatives at a ceremony at MCB Hawaiʻi in 1999.

There were a total of nine Zero pilots and aircraft lost during the attacks on December 7, 1941.

Three pilots were lost during the first wave attack, Takashi Hirano, from the carrier Akagi along with Kaga-based pilots Seinoshin Sano and Toru Haneda, did not return.

Six Zero fighter pilots were lost in the second wave attack, including Lt. Fusata Iida, Shun-Ichi Atsumi and Saburo Ishii, all members of the same element from the carrier Soryu.

In addition, Shigenori Nishikaichi, from the carrier Hiryu, crash-landed and was killed on the island of Niʻihau. Ippei Goto, along with his companion from the carrier Kaga, Tomio Inenaga, went missing in action. Information and photos summarized here are primarily from Marine and other military sources.

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John Finn defending Naval Air Station Kaneohe Bay on Dec. 7, 1941, entitled 'The Warriors of Kaneohe'

John_William_Finn-wearing_Medal_of_Honor

Cars that were strafed by Japanese aircraft pictured at Naval Air Station (NAS) Kaneohe, Hawaii

Lt Iida enroute from the factory to deliver his A6M2 model 11 to China in early 1941 flying past Mount Fuji

Sailors at Naval Air Station (NAS) Kaneohe, Hawaii, attempt to salvage a burning PBY Catalina

The Japanese officer, Lt. Iida, shot down in the attack, is buried with military honors near Kanehohe bay

Burial Ceremony for 18 Sailors Killed in Attack

Unabarakai_Association,_Japanese_Aircraft_Impact_Site-Commemoration

November 22, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Maui Airport

Puʻunēnē is a place name on Maui (pu’u means hill and nēnē is the native Hawaiian goose – “goose hill”.) It is the site of an early sugar mill built in 1901 and associated camp, as well as one of Hawaiʻi’s early airports.

On June 15, 1938, Governor’s Executive Order No. 804 set aside 300.71 acres of land at Pulehunui for the new Maui Airport to be under the control and management of the Superintendent of Public Works.

The Department of Public Works started construction on the new airport shortly after July 1, 1938. The airport was opened on June 30, 1939 (the new Maui Airport replaced a smaller airfield at Māʻalaea.)

Inter-Island Airways, Ltd (to be later known as Hawaiian Air) constructed a depot; a taxiway and turn-around were completed and graveled to serve the depot and in 1940 Inter-Island Airways funded airport station improvements.

During the time between June 30, 1939 and December 7, 1941, the civil air field was gradually enlarged and improved with some areas being paved. A small Naval Air Facility was established at the airport by the US Navy.

Maui Airport became one of the three most important airports to the Territorial Airport System.

Immediately after December 7, 1941 Pearl Harbor attack, the military took control of all air fields in the Territory and began the expansion of Maui Airport at Puʻunēnē.

Army forces eventually concentrated on Oʻahu, leaving the Navy as the primary user of the field. An expansion lengthened and widened the runways.

The northeast-southwest runway at Puʻunēnē was extended northerly to 6,000-feet and the northwest-southeast runway was extended southerly to 7,000-feet.

A taxiway, 7,000-feet long, connecting the two runways on the east side had been built. Water, sewer, electricity and telephone lines had been installed. Certain related structures had also been erected.

Under Navy control, the facility was renamed Naval Air Station Puʻunēnē, the airport served as a principal carrier plane training base.

By the end of the war, Puʻunēnē had a total complement of over 3,300-personnel and 271-aircraft. A total of 106-squadrons and carrier air groups passed through during WW II.

The demands of the war were such that the Navy found Puʻunēnē inadequate for the aircraft carrier training requirement and it was necessary to establish another large air station on Maui.

Accordingly, a site was chosen near the town of Kahului and, after the purchase of 1,341-acres of cane land, construction was started in 1942 on what was to become Naval Air Station, Kahului (NASKA.)

NASKA became operational in late 1943. Air crews were trained at both Puʻunēnē and NASKA. The NASKA facility later became known as Kahului Airport, under the jurisdiction of the Hawaii Aeronautics Commission.

Following the war, the Territory took back various airfields and converted them back into full-scale commercial operation of airports. In December 1948, the Navy declared the Puʻunēnē Airport land surplus to their needs and the airport reverted to the Territory under Quitclaim Deed from the US Government.

No major improvements were made to Puʻunēne ̄Airport, as the plan was to move commercial operations to the former Naval Air Station at Kahului, which was considered much more desirable for commercial airline operation.

In 1947, the Superintendent of the Territorial Public Works Department proposed readapting Maui Airport to the requirements of commercial aviation. Hawaiian Airlines Ltd., the only scheduled operator, had 496 schedules a month and flew a considerable number of special flights in addition. Non-scheduled operators averaged approximately 100 round trips from Honolulu per month.

However, as Joint Resolution 18, of the State legislature in 1947 notes, “As the US Navy will abandon use of its Kahului Airport on Maui, and this airport may be more economically operated and provide safer airplane operations than the territorially owned airport at Puʻunēn̄e …”

“… the Superintendent of Public Works is directed to make a survey with CAA officials and the US Navy to determine whether or not the Kahului Airport can be made available for civilian flying in lieu of Puʻunēnē Airport; and determine whether airplane operations at Kahului Airport can be carried on more safely than at Puʻunēnē; and whether or not the Kahului Airport can be operated more economically than Puʻunēnē.”

In December 1947, the Navy turned over jurisdiction of Kahului Airport to the Territory.

By June 1950, Maui Airport was still the principal airport on the Island of Maui and was served by all scheduled and non-scheduled operators.

Later in 1950, it was decided that certain parcels of land of the Puʻunēnē Airport be utilized to develop farm lots for the unemployed under lease arrangements with the Territory. Lots were laid out at the southeast end of Puʻunēnē Airport for use as piggeries.

The decision to move interisland air operations from Puʻunēnē to Kahului was made on May 25, 1951. On June 24, 1952 all airport operations and facilities were transferred from Puʻunēnē Airport to Kahului Airport.

The Maui Airport at Puʻunēnē was placed in caretaker status on June 30, 1953 and was closed to aeronautical activity on December 31, 1955.

It was decided to use an old runway for drag races and time trials in May 1956; it remains in use as Maui Raceway Park as an automobile “drag strip” and park for such activities as go-kart racing and model airplane flying.

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Puunene Airport, Maui, September 13, 1951.

Maalaea Bay Field, Maui, August 26, 1941

Maui_Airport-Puunene-USGS-UH_Manoa-(4807)-1965

NAS Pu`unēnē looking westward, Maalaea Bay-(Maui Historical Society-NOAA)

Puunee-Concrete_Bunkers-Ammunition_Magazines

CAA Region IX, 1947 National Airport Plan, Maui Airport at Puunene, Maui Master Plan, February 26, 1947-(hawaii-gov)

Maui_Raceway_Park-former_site_of_Maui_Airport_(Pu'unene)

November 14, 2019 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Fort DeRussy

The Artillery District of Honolulu was established in 1909 and consisted of Forts Ruger, DeRussy, Kamehameha and Armstrong. The District was renamed Headquarters Coast Defenses of Oahu sometime between 1911 – 1913.

Battery Randolph within Fort DeRussy was built between 1909 and 1911 and gained international, national, state and local significance at a time when British, French, Russian, German and even the Japanese had ships in the Pacific, and were expressing interest in Hawai‘i.

The Army mission in Hawai‘i was defined as “the defense of Pearl Harbor Naval Base against damage from naval or aerial bombardment or by enemy sympathizers and attack by enemy expeditionary force or forces, supported or unsupported by an enemy fleet or fleets.”

The Army fortified O‘ahu’s harbors with a system of gun emplacements employing mortars and long-range rifled guns. Although its guns are gone, the old batteries are still there.

Batteries at Fort DeRussy, including Battery Randolph and Battery Dudley, were responsible for the defense of Honolulu Harbor.

In 1906, the US War Department acquired more than 70-acres in the Kālia portion of Waikīkī for the establishment of a military reservation to be called Fort DeRussy.

Back then, nearly 85% of present Waikīkī (most of the land west of the present Lewers Street or mauka of Kalākaua) were in wetland agriculture or aquaculture.

Fort DeRussy has evolved immensely when it was sold as a 72-acre parcel of “undesirable” land, to the building of Battery Randolph at the east end of Fort DeRussy in 1911, to the significant roles that Fort DeRussy played during WWII.

The Army started filling in the fishponds which covered most of the Fort – pumping fill from the ocean continuously for nearly a year in order to build up an area on which permanent structures could be built. Thus, the Army began the transformation of Waikīkī from wetlands to solid ground.

Battery Randolph at Fort DeRussy demonstrates the shift in emphasis from fortification structures to the weapons contained therein. In contrast to the stark, vertical walls of older forts, the new works of reinforced concrete were designed to blend, so far as possible, into the surrounding landscape.

The low profile, massive emplacements all possess concrete frontal walls as much as twenty feet thick behind 30 or more additional feet of earth. The batteries were (and still are) all but invisible and invulnerable from the seaward direction. The permanency of construction is also evident by their present condition.

In its heyday, Battery Randolph had two 14-inch guns and Battery Dudley had two six-inch guns mounted on disappearing carriages. When they were installed, they were the largest guns in the entire Pacific from California to the Philippines.

The disappearing carriages allowed the guns to remain hidden from sight of approaching battleships by solid concrete walls called parapets, capable of withstanding a direct hit from a 2,000-pound artillery shell.

To get the gun into the firing position, the artillery crew tripped a lever attached to a 50-ton weight. As the weight fell, it lifted the gun tube into battery (the firing position), and the gun was then ready to fire again.

A crew of roughly 14 artillerymen would load a shell in the breech, and then load 340-pounds of gun powder behind it.

After lobbing the 1,556-pound shells up to 14 miles out to sea, the recoil automatically pushed the gun carriage back down behind its concrete parapet; the gun was then reloaded.

A well-trained crew could fire a round downrange every 30-seconds. As one round was impacting its mark, the second round was already half way in flight to hit the target again.

Protecting Soldiers inside the battery, the overhead concrete was up to 12-feet thick. On the ocean side of the battery, concrete was the equivalent of 30-feet thick.

These 1890s-era weapons were very accurate. Observation points on top of Diamond Head and Tantalus were used to triangulate the distance, direction and speed of potential adversaries via telephone to the plotting room at Battery Randolph.

The guns were capable of hitting a 20-foot target from six miles away – the equivalent of hitting a bus in Kāneʻohe (or a fly on a wall 60-feet away with a bullet the size of a pinhead, all without the aid of a computer.)

With the end of World War II came the realization that the fort was no longer capable of meeting the needs of the US military in Hawaiʻi. The giant guns were cut up and sold for scrap, having never fired a shot in anger or defense.

Battery Dudley was razed to the ground; Battery Randolph was eventually abandoned and briefly became a warehouse storage facility. In 1976, the Army designated Battery Randolph home of the US Army Museum of Hawaiʻi.

Today, Fort DeRussy Armed Forces Recreation Center is the home of the Hale Koa Hotel (House of the Warrior,) an 817-room, world–class resort hotel and continued favorite R&R destination for our country’s military personnel and the US Army Museum of Hawaiʻi.

The museum houses a gift store that sells military memorabilia, books, clothing, military unit insignia and World War era music.

The museum is funded by the Department of Defense and admission is free of charge and open to the public, Tuesday through Saturday, 9 am-5 pm, and closed on some federal holidays, but open on military holidays.

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Battery_Randolph-Fort_DeRussy-(army-mil)

Target Practice by the 10th Company, CAC, with the 14-inch guns of Battery Randolph in July 1915-(CoastDefenseJournal)

Target Practice at Battery Dudley-(CoastDefenseJournal)-1938

'South Gun' at Ft. DeRussy -originally from USS New Hampshire(CharlesBugajsky)

One of Battery Randolph’s 14-inch M1907M1 guns on its disappearing carriage-(CoastDefenseJournal)

Loading practice at Battery Randolph, ca. 1920-(CoastDefenseJournal)

From 1908 until 1917 most of the troops at Fort DeRussy lived under canvas-(CoastDefenseJournal)

BtryRandolph_14inDC_FtDeRussy-J. Bennnett Coll.

Battery A, 16th CA, conducts a target practice with a mobile 155 mm GPF gun at DeRussy Beach-(CoastDefenseJournal)-late-1930s

Fort DeRussy is nearly complete - area north (right) is still generally undeveloped-Battery Dudley in lower center-CoastDefenseJourna)-1919

14-inchDCGuncrew_BtryRandolph-J. Bennnett Coll.

'North Gun' at Ft. DeRussy-originally from USS New Hampshire (CharlesBugajsky)

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