An early photo of, then, Pilot and Staff Sergeant Bill Kennedy who winters in North Carolina, was taken by his L-5 aircraft, circa 1944. (Provided Photo)
On National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day Monday, Dec. 7, Owego and Tioga County will honor the memory of its first WWII casualty who is among the 1,117 gallant sailors and marines entombed and their shipmates who gave their lives in action on the USS Arizona.
American flags will fly at half-staff over Owego’s WWII Memorial on “A Day That Will Live in Infamy.”
The public and veterans from all wars and are welcome to attend a brief special remembrance ceremony for the Pearl Harbor heroes and survivors at 12:55 p.m., the time Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, at the Tioga County Veterans Memorial on the south lawn of the Tioga County Courthouse.
Five Tioga County servicemen were stationed at Pearl Harbor that Sunday morning. One made the supreme sacrifice and is still aboard the USS Arizona. Four became Pearl Harbor Survivors and after other South Pacific combat eventually returned home.
It was almost 8 a.m. on Dec. 7, 1941. The skies above Pearl Harbor were clear and bright blue. Eyes saw a torpedo that had just been released from a Japanese plane hit the Naval Battleship USS Arizona. A kamikaze pilot continued on to the Hickam Army Airfield about 1,200 feet way, crashing his bomber into a group of still-grounded American planes.
It’s been 74 years since the attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, which in less than two hours claimed the lives of 2,500 men and women, about half on the USS Arizona, and wounded another 1,000. About 300 American airplanes and 18 ships were damaged or destroyed in the surprise assault, promoting President Franklin D. Roosevelt to label Dec. 7, 1941, as the date “which will live in infamy.” The event single-handedly catapulted America into World War II.
Tioga County’s first WWII casualty was Seaman First Class Delmar Dale Sibley of Owego, killed in action aboard the Battleship USS Arizona at age 23 and 23 days before his 24th birthday. Delmar lived with his uncle and aunt, Owego Police Chief Earl Sibley and his wife Lucy, while working at Endicott Johnson-Owego.
Of the 84,000 who survived the brutal assault, only about 2,000, are still here today to tell their stories first hand. One of the four Tioga County survivors is still living and is a “snow bird” and three other comrades are deceased.
Army Air Corps’ Charles “Bill” Kennedy of Owego (winters in Raleigh, N.C., where on Nov. 12 he celebrated his 94th birthday) was at Hickam Field when a flight of some 50 dive-bombers and fighters struck where A-20, B-18, and B-17 were parked wingtip to wingtip. Kennedy was with an Air Force squadron of about 240 people. “We lost ten men and about 32 were wounded, lost all our airplanes and our barracks were pretty well shot up,” Kennedy said.
Lester Dunham of Owego was one of the first from Tioga County to enlist in the Marine Corps in 1939. At the time of the attack he was on guard duty patrolling the docks at Pearl Harbor. The combat Marine fought in the Guadalcanal campaign with comrades in his 1st Marine Division. There he escaped from a foxhole just before it blew up.
Army Tech Sergeant Donald Stocks of Owego was also at Hickam Field. He was a cook on the day of the attack. He left the kitchen and grabbed a rifle to fight. Back home he did not talk about that day.
Army Sergeant Richard Hopkins of Berkshire enlisted April 2, 1940, and arrived in Honolulu June 17, 1940. He was assigned to the 24th Infantry Division at Schofield Barracks at the time of the attack.
Hopkins remembers the planes coming in and bombs dropping. It’s something you do not forget. He recalls looking out of his barracks. “They were hauling wounded on cars and trucks, anything they could get them on to rush them to the hospital.”
Hopkins also spent four months on the front lines at Guadalcanal in charge of two machine gun squads against the Japanese who “would not surrender.” He vividly remembers a Japanese bullet whizzing by his head.
Hopkins is the recipient of the Bronze Star Medal – the nation’s fourth highest award – for his meritorious service in a combat zone.
Next Monday’s tribute ceremony is to keep the memory of the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese alive and to honor the heroism and sacrifice of American military at Oahu, Hawaii, that fateful day.
Veterans hope a few will take time out of their busy schedules to attend this important event. It will be a stark reminder of the hefty price of war, and of the kind of courage that has kept our country the home of the free and the land of the brave.
Were there others from Tioga County at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941? Email what you know to Glenn A. Warner Post 1371 Veterans of Foreign Wars Memorial Chairman Jim Raftis to jraftis2@stny.rr.com or call (607) 687-4229.
