Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 8, Number 12, 1 December 1991 — A family remembrance of Dec. 7th [ARTICLE]

A family remembrance of Dec. 7th

by Nanette Napoleon Pumell (Eaeh Dec. 7 the nation is reminded of the devastasting attack on Pearl and of the thousands of military personnel who lost their lives in military installations on O'ahu, particularly those killed aboard the U.S.S. Arizona. But what the nation does not remember, or even know about, is the fact that on Dec 7, 1941, 50 civilians were killed as a result of the attack. The following story is about four Hawaiians who were killed on that infamous day. It is dedicated to all the civilians kiUed and their families, particularly those of Hawaiian ancestry.) The McCabe family had just returned from the 7 a.m. Mass at St. Ann's Catholic Church near Ha'iku Road, Kaneohe. They were busy changing into their leisure clothes as they always did on Sunday mornings when they heard the roar of airplane engines just above their rooftop. Joseph and Eliza McCabe and their six children rambled out into the lushly vegetated yard to see what was going on. The planes were so low and so loud the younger children shrieked with excitement and fear, clinging to their parents or older siblings. Joseph and Eliza remained silent, gazing against the morning sun at the planes above. At first they thought they were Amenean planes practicing defense maneuvers. Then a single plane with a bright red sun painted on the underside of eaeh wing swooped over their heads, then another and another. At that exact moment both parents knew that these were not American planes and that these maneuvers were not part of any practice drill. Even though the Heeia-Kaneohe area was sparsely populated a word-of-mouth communique reached them within minutes. Kaneohe Naval Air Station at Mokapu Peninsula was under attack by Japanese aircraft. Everyone scrambled back into the large house to listen to radio reports. After two or maybe three hours of vigilance and fear, a group of young Naval personnel swept through their neighborhood telling all civilians that they should report to the naval radio installation (overlooking Kaneohe Bay) where they could be better protected by the anti-aircraft maehine guns and Navy personnel posted there. Many families, including the McCabes, heeded their commands and hastily walked to the station, and stayed for almost two hours. About noon they returned home and began listening to the radio again. At 12:15 they heard an announcement that all Pearl Harbor civilian defense workers should report for duty. McCabe immediately called his cousin, Joseph Adams, and arranged to have Adams piek him up on the way to Pearl, where both men worked. When Joseph Adams, 50, finished talking to Joe McCabe, he looked at his wife Sophie and their eight children huddled together in the parlor, and calmly told his oldest child John, 19, "Well son, lets go." Joseph also rounded up David Kahookele, 23, his sister Mary's boy who had been living with the family for the past few months. John and David also worked alongside the elder Adams and McCabe at Shop 72 as "riggers." The three of them: Joseph, John and David got into the family's 1937 green four-door Packard and headed for McCabe's house. After picking up McCabe, 43, John drove their usual route, along Kamehameha Highway to the narrow Pali Road, over the Ko'olau mountain range and into Nu'uanu Valley. Joe Adams oldest son, Stephen, 21, who also worked at Pearl Harbor, arrived at his parents' house from Kahalu'u at noon to find that the four men had left just minutes before. Stephen raced over the Pali, down Nu'uanu Valley and turned Ewa onto Judd Street through the intersection at Liliha until eame to a stop sign at the corner of Judd and Iholena streets. On the right shoulder of the road he saw a car that was full of holes. "The car looked just like my Unele Joe's car," he thought, only it wasn't green. It looked a burnt color." He also saw the head of a man, whom he couldn't recognize, slumped on the steering

wheel. Stephen dismissed the sighting as a coincidence and continued on his way. A eouple of miles down the road it dawned on him the car on Judd Street might be that of his unele. He decided to go and double eheek, but armed military personnel directing traffic along the roadways ordered him to continue to Pearl Harbor. Stephen's anxiety turned to a fear as he crept along in the massive traffic jam. It was 1 p.m. before he entered the main gate, where he was ordered to leave his car and walk in on foot. When he reached Shop 72 and did not find his father, unele or cousins there, he immediately told his boss about the damaged car on Judd Street and asked to return to the site. His boss issued a ciearance pass, and Stephen worked his way back through traffic to reach Judd Street at about 2 p.m., 90 minutes after he had first caught a glimmer of the burnt-colored Packard on the side of the road. When he got to the site the car was no longer there. Stephen was relieved at first, thinking that the damage must have been minor and that the men were stuck in traffic or something. While Stephen stood at the curb someone told him there had been a car "bombed" earlier and the passengers had been taken to Queen's Hospital. In shock, Stephen drove to the hospital. Personnel there could not find any of the names of the men on the admittance records, so they told him to eheek the morgue. There, he gazed, bewildered, at the sheet-covered bodies that laid haphazardly on the cement floor of the room. A polieeman, John Paul Jones, was stationed in the room, and Stephen asked him if his father Joseph McCabe was there. The polieeman pointed to a group of bodies to one side of the room. There

McCabe, the Adams men and Kahookele lay. The moments that followed are blurred for Stephen McCabe now 71, but the memory of having to identify his father, his brother, his unele and his cousin are forever burned into his mind and heart. Joseph and John Adams, and David Kahookele were buried side-by-side in a small family graveyard in Kaneohe. Joseph McCabe was laid to rest in St. Ann's Church cemetery. Eliza McCabe, Joseph's wife, who wasabout41 at the time, went to work as a eook at the Coconut Island home of Chris Holmes to support her five 'children still living at home. She worked there until her retirement in the early 1960s. Eliza never remarried. When she died in 1971, age 71, her children buried her next to her beloved Joseph. List of Hawaiians killed as a result of the December 7th Attack on Pearl Harbor:

Nanette Pumell (262-2723) is writing a book and would like to interview family members or others who have knowledge of the circumstances surrounding eaeh person's death.

NAME AGE KILLED AT 1. Adams, John 19 Judd Street 2. Adams, Joseph 50 Judd Street 3. Akina, August 37 Hickam Airfield 4. Chong, Patrick 30 Fort Street 5. Faufata, Matilda 12 Iholena Street 6. Foster, Rowena 3 Pearl City 7. Gonsalves, Emma 34 Kinau Street 8. Hookano, Kamiko 32 Kaneohe 9. Kahookele, David 23 Judd Street 10. Macy, Thomas 59 Hickam Airfield 11. McCabe, Joseph 43 Judd Street 12. Wilson, Eunice 1 Fort Street