The oldest Pearl Harbor survivor of Islands, San Juan, and Skagit counties died in early February.
Jerry Wachsmuth was a 20-year-old corporal in the Marines in 1941. Wachsmuth, who died at 95 years old, wasn’t drafted into the Marines; he enlisted.
On the 75th anniversary of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, KIRO 7 News reporter Joanna Small talked to Wachsmuth.
“The whole crew —we just went up on the boat deck and started helping out on the 20 caliber anti-aircraft gun, just got in line and passing ammunition, packing it in,” Wachsmuth remembered. “I just think about all the men that I served with, not just the ship, but in the Marine Corps, on the beach battles that we had and how many never got a chance to live.”
He was on the flagship of the United States’ fleet - the USS Pennsylvania - when the bombs began exploding.
Nearly 25,000 Marines and more than 400,000 military men and women from all branches were killed in World War II.