HONOLULU (AP) _ On the
morning of Dec. 7, 1941,
Lewis P. Robinson stood on a
dock at Pearl Harbor waiting
for a boat to return him to the
USS Arizona after an overnight
shore leave. The clear blue
skies suddenly darkened as a
wave of Japanese planes descended, raining
bombs on the harbor. Within minutes,
bombs ripped open the 608-foot Arizona,
killing 1,177 crew members and sinking the
ship. On Thursday _ the 59th anniversary of
the attack _ Robinson will be reunited with
his shipmates when his ashes are interred by
divers in the sunken hull of the Arizona. "He
always said that he wanted to go back," said
Robinson"s niece Susan Anderson. "He said
make sure when he died, he would be
placed on the Arizona." Robinson, who died
in 1997 at 78, will be the 16th Arizona
survivor to be laid to rest in the battleship
with the 945 servicemen entombed there. Of
the 337 Arizona servicemen who survived,
only 50 are believed to be still living, said
Daniel Martinez, a historian for the National
Park Service at the USS Arizona Memorial.
Dozens of other Pearl Harbor veterans
haave also had their ashes scattered in the
harbor"s waters, fulfilling a wish that
survivors say expresses a mix of
camaraderie, honor, gratitude and guilt. "It"s
a sense of wanting to belong with their
shipmates," said Robert Kinzler, president
of the local Pearl Harbor Survivors
Association. "It could be a feeling of guilt
that they survived while their shipmates
passed away." The surprise attack on Pearl
Harbor and other Oahu military bases sank
or heavily damaged 21 ships, destroyed or
damaged 323 aircraft, killed 2,388 military
personnel and civilians and wounded 1,178.
Only those assigned to the Arizona at the
time of the attack are eligible for interment
in the hull of the ship.
