Hermosa Beach vet recalls Pearl Harbor horrors
Hermosan Leonard Brugnola gave a firsthand account of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Photo by James Whitely
Brugnola was a young U.S. Navy seaman who had fought only seasickness up until the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, when he found himself frantically searching through the smoky mayhem of a bombed out ship for survivors.
Brugnola and the rest of a small makeshift rescue crew followed screams for help to grasp an outstretched hand, only to come away with a disembodied arm. They ripped up their shirts and pants to staunch blood that flowed from gaping wounds. They struggled topside with maimed men, only to be told by medics that the men were goners, and then they went back down for more.
Seventy years later, Brugnola’s clear eyes misted and his strong voice faltered as he told his tale to an audience gathered at the city’s granite memorial on the east lawn of the Community Center, for a candlelight ceremony marking Veterans Day.
Brugnola, a member of the too-fast vanishing generation that served, often as teenagers, in the war against the Axis, used a walker to reach the speaker’s podium for his keynote address, and expressed his gratitude to fellow veterans for their service.
“I’m going to salute each and every one of you,” he said.
Brugnola recalled with good humor his enlistment in the Navy at age 19, in New York state, and his gut-wrenching trips to the rail of his ship, the USS Shaw, to heave the scant contents of his stomach overboard, during a goodwill tour to Hawaii.
“I was sick for days,” he said. “That’s when I would say to myself, ‘Why did I join the Navy?’”
He told how the humble soda cracker eventually saved the day, presenting itself as the one food that would stay down.
Once the seasickness abated, “it was paradise,” he said.
Navy veteran Leonard Brugnola, Army veteran Steve Crecy, Marine corps veteran Jim Gierlich, Army veteran Julian Katz and police chaplain Gila Katz react at Hermosa’s candlelight ceremony for Veterans Day. Photo by James Whitely
The tour wound its way to Hawaii, and on the morning of Dec. 7, Brugnola was on dry land, attending Catholic mass at “a little church on the hill,” when the priest told Navy personnel “there was something wrong” down at the water.
“Lo and behold, we looked down the hillside at Pearl Harbor and it was unbelievable. It was unbelievable,” Brugnola said. “But it was real.”
Along with a knot of men, he hopped into a truck and was driven swiftly past mounds of shrapnel to the shore.
“Everything was blown up,” Brugnola said. “There were bodies lying everywhere.”
He was sent to a dry dock where the USS Pennsylvania lay disabled after returning Japanese fire.
“A medic said ‘Fellows, you’re going to work in teams of two. Go below and bring them topside. If they’re dead, don’t worry about them. We’ll take care of them later,’” Brugnola recalled.
The men descended a steep metal staircase.
“It was impossible to see through the smoke,” Brugnola said.
“I can’t see, I can’t see,” a man cried. Half his face was destroyed and an eyeball dangled from his head. Another man yelled for help from beneath a press of steel that had collapsed upon the lower half of his body. Brugnola and his workmate got the man topside.
“We took him up there and they said ‘He’s gone, try again,’” Brugnola said.
As the effort wound on, the rescuers used up their clothing making slings, staunching wounds and shielding their hands from the heat of metal they had to move out of the way.
When the smoke cleared, 24 crewmembers were killed aboard the Pennsylvania, 38 were wounded and 14 were missing in action.
“This was my first experience of war, and it wasn’t easy. And there were a lot who had it a lot harder,” Brugnola said, looking out over a gathering flecked with military signs and insignia. “I salute you once again. I’m glad we’re all here.”
Local veterans Mat Stuber from the Coast Guard, Don Dinubilo from the Air Force, Kirk Gillette from the Navy, John Cruz from the Marines and Julian Katz from the Army lit special candles for each of the services.
Under a full moon and a cloudy sky shedding scattered drops of rain, trumpeter Paul Verner, a Vietnamveteran, played taps.