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

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.

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

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

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.

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