After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, some sailors were trapped on the USS West Virginia and the USS Oklahoma

After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, some sailors were trapped on the USS West Virginia and the USS Oklahoma. One group survived 16 days, which they tallied on the wall of the storeroom where they were trapped. No one wanted guard duty because of the incessant banging and screaming


16 days to die at Pearl Harbor: Families weren’t told about sailors trapped inside sunken battleship

When salvage crews raised the battleship West Virginia six months after the Pearl Harbor attacks, they found the bodies of three sailors huddled in an airtight storeroom — and a calendar on which 16 days had been crossed off in red pencil.

By Eric Gregory

At first, everyone thought it was a piece of loose rigging slapping against the wrecked hull of the USS West Virginia.

Bang. Bang.

To the survivors on land, it was just another noise amid the carnage of Pearl Harbor a day after the Dec. 7, 1941, attack. Like the sound of fireboats squirting water on the USS Arizona. Or the hammers chipping into the overturned hull of the Oklahoma

But they realized the grim truth the next morning, in the quiet dawn. Someone was still alive, trapped deep in the forward hull of the sunken battleship

Bang. Bang.

The Marines standing guard covered their ears. There was nothing anyone could do.

When salvage crews raised the West Virginia six months later, they found the bodies of three men huddled in an airtight storeroom: Ronald Endicott, 18; Clifford Olds, 20; and Louis “Buddy” Costin, 21.

But the most haunting discovery was the calendar.

Sixteen days had been crossed off in red pencil. The young sailors had marked their time, not knowing what had happened to their ship or that their country was at war.

For 54 years, their story has been told in hushed tones among the West Virginia’s survivors. It has become a symbol of courage and perseverance for these aging men.

Few people knew the whole truth. The Navy never told the families how long their loved ones had survived. And for those brothers and sisters who eventually found out, the truth was so devastating they kept it a secret. Even from their own parents.

“His days are numbered”

In the days after the attack, Jack Frank Miller often found himself praying on the dock near the sunken West Virginia.

He had met Clifford Olds at boot camp. Both were from small prairie towns in North Dakota. They liked fishing and motorcycles, ships and open seas. Now they were serving together on the same battleship.

They had been drinking beer at a Pearl City tavern, the Monkey Bar, the night before the attack. A woman snapped their picture, with a third sailor. Olds was smiling, toasting his friends, a Camel cigarette dangling from his Miller just knew Olds was still alive down there, probably trapped in the airtight fresh-water pump room, waiting to be rescued.

But the ship had taken at least six torpedoes and two bombs, burned for 30 hours, and settled in the mud of the harbor bottom, its main deck covered in oily water

Cut a hole to get someone out and you’d flood the whole thing. Use a torch and risk an explosion.

Miller knew what that meant for his friend. “His days are numbered,” he thought. “I’m afraid it’s going to be a lingering death.”

He returned to the Monkey Bar and found the woman who took the picture. She gave Miller the negative.

Miller is now 75 and living in Seattle. He still has the photo, a memento of a friend he’ll never see again


Trapped sailor from Aberdeen

The Aberdeen Daily World, Ronald Endicott’s hometown newspaper in Grays Harbor County, declared him dead on Dec. 17, 1941.


“Died for U.S.” his obituary read. “Ronald Endicott, young Aberdeen Navy man, was killed in the war in the Pacific. Endicott was the son of Mr. and Mrs. R.B. Endicott of Aberdeen.”

A photo showed a dimpled, baby-faced boy in his sailor suit.

Nothing was said of Pearl Harbor, the West Virginia or the noise that still rang from its hull that same day, thousands of miles away.

Bang. Bang

No one wanted guard duty that put him within earshot of the West Virginia, especially on quiet nights. They would do anything to trade posts so they wouldn’t have to hear the desperate — almost tireless — cry for help.

“God, I can’t go by that ship anymore,” a buddy told Marine Dick Fiske

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