December 7, 1942 - Monday - 80 years ago today

Status - John Skinner: 

John had probably begun, or was about to begin, his trip to Boston to return to the service.  He had been assigned to a Fletcher-class destroyer, the Fullam.  This destroyer was being finished at the Charlestown Navy Yard, and would be commissioned in the late winter.

Home Front

Of course the 7th marked one year since the surprise attack at Pearl Harbor and the country's entry into the war. 

In the book The Darkest Year, in the Epilogue, William Klingaman describes the situation on the 7th.  There was little in the way of commemoration of the anniversary of the attack, and most everyone was working, as the ambitious production goals set by the government were not yet being met but needed to be caught up. Despite some victories, the war front news had been mostly bad, and bloody and inconclusive fighting was still continuing in the South Pacific and North Africa.  A real turn in the tide seemed very far off.  

News had been censored heavily and in general, the public had some mistrust in the government because of this.  Rationing of goods (gas rationing having just begun) and other wartime sacrifices had begun to wear on the citizens at home.  Big business was making profits, but smaller businesses, farmers and other independent workers were suffering.  The government was undeterred in exerting control; it would now decide who went to war and who working in industry at home, and it would exert even tighter control of the flow of all goods, including foodstuffs.  

All of these things, and other issues besides, contributed to tensions on the home front.  Only war victories could in the end relieve the tensions.

See The Darkest Year, The American Home Front, 1941-1942, William K. Kligaman.  The entire book gives an interesting description of the happenings in the US during the first year of war.

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More Information:

• Official Navy Chronology, pp. 286-287.
  
• The Struggle for Guadalcanal, Samuel Eliot Morison, pp. 283-373.
• Neptune's Inferno, The U.S. Navy at Guadalcanal, James D. Hornfischer, pp. 378-429.
• The Darkest Year, The American Home Front, 1941-1942, William K. Klingaman

 

NEXT POST: DECEMBER 11TH