The Ghost Mountain Boys - James E. Campbell [13]
In winter 1941, Captain Alfred Medendorp had just arrived home from Camp Livingston on leave to Grand Rapids, Michigan. He had not seen his wife and three sons in nearly a year. On Sunday morning, December 7, he and his boys were traipsing around the hills near the house with bows and arrows, creeping through fields and ducking in and out of woodlots, shooting trees and launching arrows high into the air.
Alfred Jr. crept along with his dad, picking his way over dry leaves and sticks. There was no snow but the ground was frozen. The leaves crumbled like wax paper under their feet.
Dot Medendorp was in the kitchen, tidying up. On the radio The Glenn Miller Band was playing “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree with Anybody Else But Me,” when a newsman’s urgent voice interrupted. Dot rushed to the radio to turn up the volume. The Japanese, the newsman reported, had just bombed Pearl Harbor.
Dot hurried to the back door and called out, “Al, Come quick! Something’s happened.”
Alfred Medendorp rushed toward the house, followed by his sons. Dot was standing at the back door, holding it half-open.
“Japan just bombed,” she said, choking on the words.
Medendorp brushed past his wife and sat down at the kitchen table. The voice on the radio repeated: “The Japanese have bombed Pearl Harbor.” Medendorp tried to absorb the impact of the news. Then he looked up to see Al Junior standing at the door, holding his little bow.
Later that day Medendorp received a telegram ordering him back to Camp Livingston; the following day he left, but not before Dot took a family photograph. In the photo, Medendorp is standing behind his three sons. The low dun-colored hills that they had wandered the previous morning form the photo’s backdrop. His arms encircle the boys. He is in full dress uniform and smiles slightly. The boys, too, are dressed up—hats, Sunday coats. Al Junior wears stockings and tucks his hands into the pockets of his checkered black and red peacoat.
When Corporal Carl Stenberg heard about Pearl Harbor, he and a bunch of buddies had just come back from Alexandria, Louisiana. It was a weekend ritual for Stenberg. While other soldiers went to Alexandria for the women, the recently married Stenberg made the trip to go to the theater.
When Stenberg and his friends returned on Sunday afternoon, the camp was buzzing with activity.
Trucks waited, their engines idling, and men rushed from building to building. Even before hearing the news, Stenberg knew that something big was up. It was in the mess hall that he learned what had happened.
“The Nips just bombed Pearl Harbor!” exclaimed a cook.
The following day, fearing the Japanese might follow up Pearl Harbor with attacks on other strategic sites, the entire camp mobilized. The division sent soldiers to guard dry docks, factories, shipyards, bridges, chemical refineries, utilities, and sulfur mines across the south, from Mississippi to Louisiana to east Texas. Some officers, including Major Herbert Smith, went to the Infantry School at Fort Benning to learn combat tactics.
Pearl Harbor abruptly ended Stenberg’s dream of “putting in a year” and returning home to resume his life. On December 31, 1941, the army informed all one-year soldiers that they were now obligated to serve for the duration of the conflict plus six months. Few soldiers were pleased, but now instead of griping, they spoke of “exacting revenge” on the “yellow bastards” and making “quick work” of the war. “Remember Pearl Harbor” became their battle cry.
Japan’s December 7 assault on Pearl Harbor decimated the Pacific Fleet, killed or wounded over 3,500 men, and sent shock waves through America. In Japan,