Barney Ross Quotations

The gunner's mate came up and started breaking the locks on the ammunition. Everything was locked up for fear that someone might go in there with a cigarette or something.

After the atomic bombs were dropped, the war ended and we went into Tokyo Bay with the rest of the fleet, the Missouri and the rest of them, while they signed the terms of surrender that ended the war.

We managed to get underway, and I don't know to this day why we didn't get struck or take a torpedo, but we didn't. We got outside of the exit of the harbor and we started dropping depth charges.

I was standing on the deck of the USS Blue, a destroyer. We were all alone out there at this buoy, tied up.

I was 20 years old at Pearl Harbor. I was in the Navy about a year and four months before the war.

I'd get a shell, they weighed about 80 pounds I think, but when I was 19 or 20 that was nothing. I'd take a shell and a bag of powder, I'd put it in the hoist and then I would send it up to the gun.

Everything was black in the harbor, but there were still some fires burning on the ships.

Our duty was to try and find the Japanese fleet. We never did find the Japanese fleet and I am awfully glad, because they had attacked us there with six carriers, three battleships, 10 or 15 cruisers, and about 20 destroyers.

We got orders to strike the Marshall and Gilbert Islands. We had a task force with the Enterprise. We had two or three cruisers and probably eight or 10 destroyers.

Destroyers did not have chaplains because they were too small.

It was lucky for me. It wasn't lucky for the nine people that got killed and the 20 that were injured.

They got word that the Japanese planes were coming back, so we sunk her ourselves so the Japanese wouldn't get it. We didn't want the Japanese to get it intact.

All we had aboard the ship that morning was one Annapolis graduate and three reserves.

I had been out there long enough. I had not seen my family for four years.

We were very fortunate that the carriers weren't in the harbor.

When we were in Pearl, in order to get out of the sun, we always had awnings over the back end of the ship, the stern of the ship.

When we came back into Pearl it was pitch dark, and we could see the fires from the Arizona and the other ships still burning in the harbor.

The planes alone would have taken care of us, so I was grateful that we never found them. We were out there searching for 36 hours.

I did not really know what to do. The searchlight was my battle station, but there was no need to be on a searchlight at 7:55 in the morning.

Two-thirds of the crew was allowed to go to the shore because they had weekend passes. The only ones aboard were those who had the duty.

They neglected to get our oil supplies and our submarines. The battleships they did get were beginning to become obsolete anyway.

There were Japanese submarines out there, and we got credit for two of them and credited for knocking down four planes on our way out.

All destroyers at that time had about 200 men. A destroyer was rough riding, and with the rough weather, the sea can be an enemy too.