On Dec. 7, 1941, Paul P. Joyce Sr., was pretty upbeat. A young sailor, just six days earlier he had made 2nd class petty officer in the U. S. Navy. His ship, the USS Utah, was docked on the west side of Ford Island at Pearl Island, Hawaii.The USS Utah was a training ship used for bombing targets. Since explosives couldn’t be used, the Navy used water bombs to train.
Early that Sunday morning, when the bombing started, the men knew they were in trouble. The bombing all round them was loud and constant and happened so quickly they had no time to react. The USS Utah was hit by two torpedoes.
Soon she began rolling over.
“I got to a ladder,” said Joyce. “Most of our hatches topside were secured with wood since we were used as a bombing target. But there were a few that were open and that’s how we got out. We lost 50 something people.”
Once the men were off the ship, they took cover in a drainage ditch where they could see the faces of the Japanese pilots as they dove in to bomb the island.
Joyce said he was scared and assumed that his fellow sailors were just as frightened. Their instinct and their Naval training took over and, according to Joyce, hidden from the enemy in a drainage ditch, they were intent on surviving.
After World War II, Joyce went on to serve on a transport ship carrying troops to Korea during the Korean War.
He retired from the Navy after 30 years, two months and seven days.
Joyce was a carpenter in the Navy. After retiring, he then got another job as a carpenter at Virginia Tank and Supply company in Norfolk, Va., where he worked for 16 years.
He and his wife, the former Thelma Mills, moved to Piedmont in 1984.
For the next 23 years Joyce restored furniture.
In August a heart blockage called for doctors to put a stent in his chest. Then a neurosurgeon informed him that he had suffered a stroke on his right side which affected his walking.
Now, the 89-year-old veteran who was born in Elizabethtown, Ill., “in southern Illinois down on the Ohio River” has had to curtail his activities. He waters his plants and helps his wife put the garbage in the trunk of their car to take it to the bottom of the hill.
When he and his wife can, they continue to go to the church to which they belong, Union Grove United Methodist in Rock Run.
His five children are Trudy Loy of Piedmont, Paul Joyce Jr., of San Bruno, Calif., Karen Ann Joyce of San Francisco, Sammy Joyce of Chesapeake Beach, Va., and John Joyce of Anniston.
