A legacy of valor: Only 16 Pearl Harbor survivors remain. On the 83rd anniversary, they still share stories of heroism

(CNN) — As bombs fell on Pearl Harbor during a shocking attack, transforming serene Hawaiian waters into a graveyard of twisted metal, burning wreckage and the roar of destruction, Earl “Chuck” Kohler did not hesitate to fight back.

He was 17 when Japanese bombers descended from the sky, killing 2,403 Americans and catapulting the United States into World War II. It was a brutal, unforgiving assault that left the US Pacific Fleet in ruins and the memory of that day seared into history as, in President Franklin Roosevelt’s words, “a date which will live in infamy.”

Kohler had disobeyed direct orders to shelter in a ditch and remain in place. Instead, he ran to retrieve ammunition. Armed and determined, he and his comrades fought fiercely to repel the second wave of Japanese bombers attacking Ford Island.

“Maybe (I was) a dumb farm boy, but I know this is the beginning of that war that they’d been talking about and waiting for, and I know that if I’m going to lose my life here, I don’t want to lose it in that ditch,” Kohler, a Minnesota farm boy turned sailor, said in an interview recorded by the Library in the Congress. “I’m going to want my family and my country to know I died fighting, not hiding.”

Before joining the Navy, Kohler was the son of a sharecropping dirt farmer and the fourth of 10 children. There was so much work to do that there was no time for hobbies besides hunting and helping put food on the table, he told CNN in an interview. But when he turned 17, he voluntarily enlisted into the Navy because he felt it was right for him to be there.

“I had learned early in life that you never run from a challenge or fight, you always run to it. You can’t beat them by running from them,” Kohler told CNN.

“If I am to be considered a representative of people of my generation as I’ve tried to be for all those that were lost at Pearl Harbor, I hope I have done it in a way that will have made them proud and brought to them the well-deserved honor and continued remembrance that they so rightfully deserve.”

Now 100 years old, the veteran is believed to be one of only 16 Pearl Harbor survivors who are still alive, Kathleen Farley, the California state chair of the Sons and Daughters of Pearl Harbor Survivors, confirmed to CNN. Of those killed, 1,177 served on the USS Arizona. Lou Conter, the last known survivor of the attack on the ship, died in April.

On Saturday, thousands will gather on the shores of Pearl Harbor for the 83rd anniversary of the bombing. They will honor members of the Greatest Generation, a tribute to Americans who lived through the Great Depression and then fought in WWII, “for their sacrifice, courage, and indomitable perseverance.”

In an email this week, Farley pointed to her organization’s motto: “Lest We Forget.” “We have not forgotten the 87,000 active military who were on the island of Oahu on December 7, 1941,” said Farley, daughter of John Farley, who survived the attack while aboard the USS California.

“Several events are planned to honor our beloved Pearl Harbor survivors, our fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers who were there, and we know their stories,” Farley said. “May those who have gone before us, fair winds and following seas. We, the Sons and Daughters, will carry on with your history with pride.”

Survivors attend anniversary events in Hawaii and California

At least two survivors – Ken Stevens and Ira “Ike” Schab Jr. – are expected to attend the Pearl Harbor Remembrance ceremony in Oahu, according to Pacific Historic Parks, which manages the USS Arizona Memorial.

Schab, 104, was greeted by the US Pacific Fleet Band and Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam Honor Guard upon his arrival at the Daniel K. Inouye International Airport on Tuesday, according to a post published by the Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam. His family had raised more than $5,000 to help him travel to attend the Pearl Harbor Commemorations.

Initially, Schab did not want to return to the island because of how painful the memory was, his family told CNN affiliate Hawaii News Now. But years ago, after seeing the number of remaining survivors slowly dwindle, Schab changed his mind.

“He said, ‘As long as I’m able to make the trip, I want to make the trip for the people that can’t make the trip,’” his son, Karl Schab, told Hawaii News Now.

On the morning of the attacks, Schab was a musician in the Navy band aboard the USS Dobbin and had just finished his shower and sat down for his coffee, his daughter said on their GoFundMe page. He was waiting for his younger brother Allen, who was visiting, so they could explore Honolulu together.

But they never got to meet up that morning – and when the attacks began, Schab immediately started feeding ammunition to the gunners. More than anything else that day, Schab remembers “being scared,” he told Hawaii News Now. “Wondering about my brothers. Where they were.”

The attack occurred around 8 a.m. on a Sunday morning, carried out by 353 Japanese planes, 35 submarines and two battleships. More than 160 aircraft were destroyed.

The air was thick with smoke and the acrid scent of burning oil and metal. Ships, once proud and sturdy, were ripped apart by torpedoes and bombs, sending massive plumes of fire and debris into the air. The US battleships, anchored in the harbor, were struck with such force that their hulls buckled and split open, flames engulfing the decks in a blinding inferno.

Bodies of sailors, soldiers and airmen were thrown into the water, some burned beyond recognition, others left floating in the oily sea. The air was filled with the shrieks of men in agony, the crackle of machine gun fire, and the thunderous explosions that shook the ground.

Nearby, Kohler was in an airplane hangar, right in the center of Pearl Harbor, writing a letter to his mother on a typewriter when he heard an approaching aircraft continue to get closer and closer.

“Suddenly and almost simultaneously there was this tremendous roar and bomb fragments and window glass came crashing into the back of my head, ears, neck and shoulders,” Kohler said during the interview published by the Library of Congress.

Despite being threatened to be reported for disobeying his officer’s direct orders to stay sheltered in the ditch, Kohler kept running. He grabbed a 50-caliber machine gun and ammunition and helped shoot at attacking warplanes.

“What affected me the most was seeing those ships explode, capsize, and knowing that with every one of those events there were a lot of lives being lost,” Kohler said.

Kohler is not in Hawaii. Instead, he will be speaking at the annual Beacon lighting ceremony held by conservation nonprofit Save Mount Diablo in California to pay tribute to the lives that were lost and honor surviving veterans. The Beacon on Mount Diablo was installed and illuminated in 1928 to aid in transcontinental aviation. But it was extinguished during the West Coast blackout following the Pearl Harbor attack out of fear it may lead to an attack on California.

It stayed dark until Pearl Harbor Day in 1964, when Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander in Chief of Pacific Forces during World War II, relit the Beacon in a commemorative ceremony and suggested it be illuminated every December 7th to honor those who served and sacrificed.

“In my way of thinking it gives the few survivors that are left an opportunity to reach back across the miles and the years and reconnect once again with our sunken shipmates and fallen comrades,” Kohler told CNN.

Kohler says he believes that if those who were lost there that day had a voice of their own, they would say, “Remember us.”

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