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Lee Braswell (SBTS Writer)-Historian
to remember
Blackburn, John Thomas, F1c.
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Casualty Info
Home Town Columbus
Last Address Columbus, OH
Casualty Date Dec 07, 1941
Cause KIA-Body Not Recovered
Reason Torpedoed
Location Hawaii
Conflict World War II
Location of Interment Courts of the Missing at the Honolulu Memorial - Honolulu, Hawaii
Fireman/1c John T. Blackburn was Killed in Action on December 7, 1941, during the attack on Pearl Harbor. He was stationed aboard the USS Utah AG-16.
Comments/Citation:
John Thomas “Jack” Blackburn was born 7 January 1920 in Columbus, Ohio to Thomas Clyde and Jessie Eylor (Rose) Blackburn. He had one brother and one sister; he was the youngest child. His father was a railroad brakeman. Jack enlisted in the Navy on 6 October 1939 and was aboard the USS Utah by December of that year as a Fireman First Class.
Shortly after 8 am on 7 December 1941, a torpedo struck the port side of the USS Utah (AG-16) while moored at Berth FOX-11 in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The Utah, a former battleship, had been converted to a target ship to train gunners on various anti-aircraft guns.
Just before the first torpedo hit, the crew on board the USS Utah had sighted incoming aircraft and presumed them to be the American planes expected for training exercises. When the crew realized they were enemy aircraft, orders were given for all personnel to move to bombing quarters. The first torpedo strike caused serious flooding and the ship began to list to port. When a second torpedo hit in the same area, the list grew more severe. Then the ship’s officers ordered all personnel to the starboard side, awaiting imminent capsize. Those who made it to the upper decks abandoned ship under orders and had to deal with aerial bombardment from aircraft. At 8:12 am, the USS Utah had completely capsized as personnel swam to Ford Island. When it was all over, 58 of the USS Utah’s crew lost their lives and 461 survived.
F1c John Thomas Blackburn (Service Number 3812894) is listed as Missing as Action and remains unaccounted for. He is memorialized by a cenotaph on his parent’s grave marker at the Otterbein Cemetery in Westerville, Franklin County, Ohio. F1c Blackburn is also memorialized at the USS Utah Memorial in Pearl Harbor and his name is inscribed on a wall within the Courts of the Missing in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, located in Honolulu, Hawaii. He received a Purple Heart, the Combat Action Ribbon, the American Defense Service Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, and the WW II Victory Medal for his service.
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This story is part of the Stories Behind the Stars project (see https://www.storiesbehindthestars.org/). This is a national effort of volunteers to write the stories of all 400,000+ of the US WWII fallen here on Together We Served and on Fold3. Can you help write these stories? Related to this, there will be a smartphone app that will allow people to visit any war memorial or cemetery, scan the fallen person’s name and read his/her story.
Lee Braswell - Contributing Author, Stories Behind the Stars
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World War II/Asiatic-Pacific Theater/Attack on Pearl Harbor
From Month/Year
December / 1941
To Month/Year
December / 1941
Description The attack on Pearl Harbor, also known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor, the Hawaii Operation or Operation AI by the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters, and Operation Z during planning, was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii Territory, on the morning of December 7, 1941. The attack led to the United States' entry into World War II.
Japan intended the attack as a preventive action to keep the U.S. Pacific Fleet from interfering with military actions the Empire of Japan planned in Southeast Asia against overseas territories of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and the United States. Over the next seven hours there were coordinated Japanese attacks on the U.S.-held Philippines, Guam and Wake Island and on the British Empire in Malaya, Singapore, and Hong Kong.
The attack commenced at 7:48 a.m. Hawaiian Time. The base was attacked by 353 Imperial Japanese fighter planes, bombers, and torpedo planes in two waves, launched from six aircraft carriers. All eight U.S. Navy battleships were damaged, with four sunk. All but Arizona were later raised, and six were returned to service and went on to fight in the war. The Japanese also sank or damaged three cruisers, three destroyers, an anti-aircraft training ship, and one minelayer. 188 U.S. aircraft were destroyed; 2,403 Americans were killed and 1,178 others were wounded. Important base installations such as the power station, shipyard, maintenance, and fuel and torpedo storage facilities, as well as the submarine piers and headquarters building (also home of the intelligence section) were not attacked. Japanese losses were light: 29 aircraft and five midget submarines lost, and 64 servicemen killed. One Japanese sailor, Kazuo Sakamaki, was captured.
The attack came as a profound shock to the American people and led directly to the American entry into World War II in both the Pacific and European theaters. The following day, December 8, the United States declared war on Japan. Domestic support for non-interventionism, which had been fading since the Fall of France in 1940,[19] disappeared. Clandestine support of the United Kingdom (e.g., the Neutrality Patrol) was replaced by active alliance. Subsequent operations by the U.S. prompted Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy to declare war on the U.S. on December 11, which was reciprocated by the U.S. the same day.
From the 1950s, several writers alleged that parties high in the U.S. and British governments knew of the attack in advance and may have let it happen (or even encouraged it) with the aim of bringing the U.S. into war. However, this advance-knowledge conspiracy theory is rejected by mainstream historians.
There were numerous historical precedents for unannounced military action by Japan. However, the lack of any formal warning, particularly while negotiations were still apparently ongoing, led President Franklin D. Roosevelt to proclaim December 7, 1941, "a date which will live in infamy". Because the attack happened without a declaration of war and without explicit warning, the attack on Pearl Harbor was judged by the Tokyo Trials to be a war crime.
Lee Braswell (SBTS Writer)-Historian
to remember
Blackburn, John Thomas, F1c.
