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Casualty Info
Home Town Monroe, AR
Casualty Date Dec 07, 1941
Cause KIA-Killed in Action
Reason Torpedoed
Location Hawaii
Conflict World War II/Asiatic-Pacific Theater/Attack on Pearl Harbor
Location of Interment Arkansas State Veterans Cemetery - North Little Rock, Arkansas
Wall/Plot Coordinates Section: N, Site: 285
Official Badges
Unofficial Badges
Additional Information
Last Known Activity:
On December 7, 1941, SK1 John Craig was assigned to the USS Oklahoma, which was moored at Ford Island, Pearl Harbor, when the ship was attacked by Japanese aircraft. The USS Oklahoma sustained multiple torpedo hits, which caused it to quickly capsize. The attack on the ship resulted in the deaths of 429 crewmen, including SK1 Craig.
SK1 John William Craigs remains were accounted for on December 8, 2017 as confirmed by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.
Comments/Citation:
Storekeeper First Class (SK1c) John William Craig, United States Navy. Service Number: 3466549
Early Life
John William Craig was born on 15 November 1915 in Monroe, Monroe County, Arkansas. His father, John David Craig, born 7 November 1885 in Tennessee, died 5 September 1959 in Little Rock, Pulaski County, Arkansas, was a Laborer in a wood clearing lot. His mother, Lutie A. Sawyer was born on 17 September 1884 in Tennessee and died on 24 January 1964 in Arkansas. John’s parents were married in about 1905. John was the eldest of three children in the family; he had two younger sisters.
Military
John William Craig enlisted in the United States Navy. Following boot camp and additional follow-on training, he was assigned to the Battleship USS Oklahoma (BB-37) which was stationed in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii when the Japanese attack occurred.
On the morning of 7 December 1941, a fleet of Japanese carriers launched an air strike against the U.S. Pacific Fleet at anchor in Pearl Harbor, on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. The attack decimated the ships and personnel of the fleet and thrust the United States into World War II. At the onset of the 7 December 1941 attack, the battleship USS Oklahoma (BB-37), being moored at berth Fox 5 on “Battleship Row.” Just before 8 am, the Oklahoma was among the first of the ships struck in the attack. A torpedo struck on her port side and she capsized quickly. After the Arizona, she was the largest loss of life, at 429 sailors and marines. The Oklahoma was salvaged in 1942, but it was determined she could not be repaired. In May of 1947, she was sold for scrap and while under tow to California, she sank in a storm. Her exact location remains unknown to this day.
Death and Burial
John William Craig was Declared Dead while Missing in Action or Lost at Sea on 7 December 1941 aboard the USS Oklahoma during the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. He was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart Medal. He was memorialized at the Honolulu Memorial, Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, located inside Punchbowl Crater in Honolulu, Hawaii. He is also memorialized at the USS Oklahoma Memorial in Pearl Harbor. After his remains were identified, he was buried at the Arkansas State Veterans Cemetery in North Little Rock, Pulaski County, Arkansas, Section: N, Site: 285
On December 8, 2017, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) identified the remains of Storekeeper First Class John William Craig, missing from World War II.
Storekeeper First Class Craig, who joined the U.S. Navy from Arkansas, was aboard the USS Oklahoma (BB-37) at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, when it came under attack by Japanese aircraft. SK1 Craig was killed in the attack, and while his remains were recovered from the ship following the incident, they could not be individually identified at the time and were interred as unknowns at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. In 2015, advances in forensic techniques prompted the reexamination of unknown remains from the Oklahoma, and SK1 Craig was eventually identified from among them.
Storekeeper First Class Craig is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.
SK1 John W. Craig, USN, was killed during the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. He was a crewmember of the USS Oklahoma. His remains were interred as unknown at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Hawaii until 2019 when DNA analysis allowed him to be identified and returned to Arkansas for a proper burial. Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson declared December 6, 2019 as John W. Craig Memorial Day and ordered that the state flag be flown at half-staff in remembrance of the fallen Sailor. Sources
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 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.
If you have any details, photos, or corrections for this story, please email me by clicking on my name. CDR Robert "Red" Mulvanny-Contributing Author, Stories Behind the Stars
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.
