Stuck between sinking ships

While the USS Tennessee survived the bombs and torpedoes of Dec. 7, 1941, its location posed the greatest threat.

Surrounded by the burning, sinking wrecks of the USS Oklahoma, West Virginia and Arizona, the Tennessee could not escape its mooring position on Battleship Row.

Flames from oil fires and burning debris caused numerous blazes aboard the battleship, which also suffered two direct bomb hits. Fragments from the second bomb, which struck a Tennessee turret, hit and mortally wounded the captain of the nearby West Virginia.

Commander Colin Campbell, executive officer of the Tennessee, described rushing from his home in Waikiki that Sunday morning, reaching Pearl Harbor over an hour after the attack began to find his ship on fire and surrounded by burning oil.

“The stern of the Tennessee was on fire, and fires were raging on the Arizona and West Virginia, threatening destruction of this ship,” Campbell wrote. “The officers on the bridge of the West Virginia informed me that her after magazines had been flooded but that efforts had been made to flood the forward magazines, but as the second deck was underwater, they were not sure that they had succeeded. I told them that their magazines must be flooded at all costs, as this ship (Tennessee) was relatively undamaged and must be saved.”

He reported that the fires on his ship were under control by 10:30 a.m., but the Tennessee was “constantly in danger” for the next few days because of oil fires from the Arizona.

Five Tennessee crew members were killed in the attack, but the Navy reported that the ship was “relatively unscathed.”

Sources include Naval History and Heritage Command.