World War II
At the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, Pennsylvania was in drydock in the Pearl Harbor Navy Yard. She was one of the first ships in the harbor to open fire as enemy dive and torpedo bombers roared out of the high overcast. They did not succeed in repeated attempts to torpedo the caisson of the drydock, but Pennsylvania and the surrounding dock areas were severely strafed. The crew of one 5 inch (130 mm) gun mount was wiped out when a bomb struck the starboard side of her boat deck and exploded inside Casemate 9. Destroyers Cassin and Downes, just forward of Pennsylvania in the drydock, were seriously damaged by bomb hits. Pennsylvania was pockmarked by flying fragments. A part of a torpedo tube from Downes, about 1,000 lb (450 kg) in weight, was blown onto the forecastle of Pennsylvania. She had 15 men killed (including her executive officer), 14 missing in action, and 38 wounded.
On 20 December, Pennsylvania sailed for San Francisco, arriving on 29 December. She underwent repairs until 30 March 1942.
Read more about this topic: USS Pennsylvania (BB-38)
Famous quotes containing the words world and/or war:
“Crows are black the world over.”
—Chinese proverb.
“It is the women of Europe who pay the price while war rages, and it will be the women who will pay again when war has run its bloody course and Europe sinks down into the slough of poverty like a harried beast too spent to wage the fight. It will be the sonless mothers who will bend their shoulders to the plough and wield in age-palsied hands the reaphook.”
—Kate Richards O’Hare (1877–1948)