Pearl Harbor Survivor Makes a 5,000-Mile Trek
Robert Coles, a 92-year-old from Maine, is making his first visit since 1941
Robert Coles, 92 years old, at his home in Machias, Maine, on Thursday as he prepared to travel to Hawaii. PHOTO: JASON PAIGE SMITH FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
HONOLULU—Few of the remaining survivors gathering here this week to mark the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harborhave journeyed farther than Robert Coles.
The retired U.S. Navy seaman traveled more than 5,000 miles from his home in Machias, Maine, a small town in the eastern part of the state that was the site of an early naval battle in the U.S. Revolutionary War.
At 92, Mr. Coles decided it was time to revisit Pearl Harbor—for the first time since he was stationed there 75 years ago. It would be a final chance to see some of the men who survived the attack with him.
“I won’t know them, and they won’t know me, but I’ll be with friends,” Mr. Coles said days before he departed for Honolulu. “They were covering my back just like I was covering their back.”
Mr. Coles is one of the youngest survivors, having enlisted in the Navy in 1940 while still a high-school senior in the Bronx.
When he deployed to Pearl Harbor a few weeks before the attack, he was given the choice of three ships for his assignment, including the USS Arizona.
“I said no to the Arizona because on those large ships, they blew bugles through the P.A. system,” Mr. Coles said.
Instead, he chose the destroyer USS Bagley, which escaped heavy damage. Almost the entire crew of the Arizona—1,177 sailors—were killed after a bomb sunk the vessel.
Trained as a radioman, Mr. Coles said he was assigned seaman duty on the Bagley because he scored poorly on a Morse code test.
Shortly before 8 a.m. on Dec. 7, 1941, he had just left the mess hall and was walking on the deck of the destroyer, tied alongside a dock, when he saw about two dozen planes with red circles on them streaking through the middle of the harbor.
Mr. Coles is one of a dwindling number of Pearl Harbor survivors attending the commemoration of the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack that propelled the U.S. into World War II. PHOTO: JASON PAIGE SMITH FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
“I thought, ‘What the hey? Is this maneuvers?’,” he said. “Then I realized this couldn’t be maneuvers. I turned around and ran to the .50-caliber machine gun.”
Although Mr. Coles wasn’t assigned gunner duties, he used a wrench to break open a box of ammunition, loaded the big gun and started firing at the Japanese planes.
“I swear by almighty God I shot at and hit the first two torpedo planes that flew by the Bagley, 50 feet off the water,” he said. The regular gunner took over, and Mr. Coles went to work spotting more planes for him. “Suddenly, I saw a huge black explosion,” he said. “That was the USS Arizona going up.”
Mr. Coles went on to serve 17 naval battles during the war, escaping any harm. “I was looked over by the good God above,” he said.
He went on to serve in the Navy until 1970, raise four children and run a lawn-mowing business in Maine until retiring a few years ago.
Last spring, while playing cribbage with friend Laura Knight, he mentioned that another veteran had told him about the big 75th commemoration and asked if he wanted to go, she said.
Mr. Coles wanted to attend but didn’t think it was possible because of medical issues. By September, he was feeling better but had used money planned for the Hawaii trip to help pay his medical expenses. Ms. Knight, 49, a member of the local American Legion, helped, through an online giving site, raise the approximately $12,000 needed for him and a caretaker. Days before his Saturday departure, Mr. Coles took care of arrangements, including getting his blue Navy uniform ready.
“I’m kind of looking forward to it,” he said, “although I have trepidations.”
Write to Jim Carlton at jim.carlton@wsj.com
