A War Story

As the 75th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack approaches, a local historian shares the story of a Clear Lake soldier who gave his life

by H Milton Duesenberg

In one week, on Dec. 7, 2016, we will mark the 75th anniversary of the premeditated attack by Japanese forces on the American fleet in Pearl Harbor.  It was an attack that plunged the United States into a war that snuffed out the lives of many of our young.

On that Sunday morning at 7:55 a.m., 353 Japanese fighter planes, bombers and torpedo planes swept down out of the sky in a sneak attack on the U.S. Fleet, killing 2,400 and wounding 1,100 Americans.  One thousand United States sailors suffered abject horror being entombed in the bowels of the battleship Arizona when it was sculled in the surprise attack.  The trapped men tapped on the inside of the hull in a futile attempt to be released from their watery grave.  Rescuers hearing the haunting sound were helpless.

The Command Center on Ford Island, Hawaii, announced to the world the attack in an uncoded message: “Air Raid on Pearl Harbor (stop) This Is No Drill (stop).

The United States would now be engaged in a two front war: Helping the British in the East against the Nazis and in the West fighting the Japanese in the South Pacific.

Twenty-four-year-old Harper S. Joslyn, of Clear Lake, would be one of the boys to be sent to the South Pacific to join in the fight against Japan.

Harper was born here in Clear Lake on Aug. 22, 1917, the son of Dr. Albert A. and Mayme E. Joslyn.  Dr. Joslyn was a dentist and Mayme was a school teacher and principal.  In 1918, tragedy struck the Joslyn household when Mayme died in the influenza epidemic.  She left two children, a daughter, Katherine, and a son, Harper.   Harper was just 15-months-old at the time.  Dr. Joslyn later married Adelaid Wheeler, of Laurens, Iowa.  Two children were born to this marriage, a daughter, Alberta, and a son, Tom.

Harper attended Clear Lake schools and graduated from high school in 1935.  He was a member of Honor Society and ranked second in the class of 67 students.  He was a good athlete, lettering in football, basketball and track.  After graduating from high school, Harper attended the University of Iowa for a time before going to work for the Sears Construction road building company of Clear Lake as timekeeper and office man.  Harper worked several years with the company before enlisting in the U.S. Naval Reserve in January 1942 and began training  as a Naval Aviator.  After several months training, he accepted an appointment as an Aviation Cadet and reported to Naval Air Station, Corpus Christi, Texas for advanced training.

In December 1942, Harper was designated Naval Aviator and the next day appointed Ensign.  He was assigned to the Training Squadron, Pacific Fleet, at San Diego, Calif., to prepare for combat duty in the Pacific.

At this time, the war in the South Pacific was going badly for U.S. forces.  In the early stages of hostilities, President Roosevelt and the War Department had decided to devote most of the United States military resources to fighting the Nazis in Europe and to make do in the Pacific with forces already in place.

The undermanned and under supplied soldiers and nurses already stationed in the South Pacific were tasked with defending the Philippines and fighting the Japanese air and sea forces in the Coral Sea and Midway Island.

Marauding Japanese soldiers invaded the Philippine Islands in December 1942, overwhelming the American and Filipino troops and nurses on the island.  The Japanese forces eventually pinned down the Americans, including their sick and wounded, on the tip of the Bataan Peninsula.  Here, in the claustrophobic, sweltering jungle, in open-air hospital wards, 77 Army and Navy nurses tended to the sick and wounded.  The nurses, dubbed the Angels of Bataan, lived on a starvation diet, sharing with the troops bombing, strafing, sniping and sickness.

In these dire and abandoned circumstances, one United Press journalist wrote, “We’re the battling bastards of Bataan, no mama, no papa, no Uncle Sam…”

On April 9, 1942, 75,000 exhausted, starved, and injured troops on Bataan surrendered to the Japanese and were force-marched 65 miles in what became the Bataan Death March.

Other soldiers and nurses on Bataan were evacuated to the Milinta Tunnel on Corregidor Island, where they huddled like rats while 22-year-old radio operator, Corporal Irving Strobing tapped out the horror as