Jack Leaming joined the US Navy in December 1938 and was assigned to the USS Enterprise [Annotator's Note: USS Enterprise (CV-6)]. He went aboard ship in May 1939 as a mess cook and was then transferred to radio. They attended school right below the flight deck. Once able to copy 15 words a minute, they were ranked Radioman 3rd Class. He was then assigned to Scouting Six [Annotator's Note: Scouting Squadron Six (VS-6)]. A Marine squadron came aboard to qualify for carrier landings, then on 28 November [Annotator's Note: 28 November 1941] the Enterprise transported that squadron to Wake [Annotator's Note: Wake Island]. Leaming and Scouting Six escorted the Marine squadron to the island, then returned to the ship and headed back to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii]. They were within 200 miles of Ford Island, Honolulu [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Hawaii] on December 7 [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. There were 18 planes in the air. Hilton [Annotator's note: US Navy Lieutenant H. Dale Hilton] and Leaming were going into Ford Island under radio silence. He heard over the radio "Don't shoot, this is an American plane." They soon saw what had happened in Pearl Harbor. By the time they arrived, the Japanese had finished their attack, but US forces were shooting at them as every aircraft was considered Japanese post-attack. They lost four or five guys that morning [Annotator's Note: to friendly fire]. Of the 18 planes that flew in that morning, only nine were able to go out on a scouting hop later that morning to look for the Japanese fleet. They searched 200 miles for four hours but found no Japanese carriers. On the night of the 7th [Annotator's Note: 7 December 1941], four fighter planes flew off the Enterprise with their lights on, two of them were shot down and killed that night. On 8 December [Annotator's Note: 8 December 1941], the Enterprise went back in for provisions and refueling. All hands worked supplying the ship. Then on 9 December [Annotator's Note: 9 December 1941], they went back out to sea, patrolling the waters to prevent another attack. They later shipped out to the Marianas [Annotator's Note: the Mariana Islands].

Jack Leaming [Annotator's Note: with Scouting Squadron Six (VS-6) aboard the USS Enterprise (CV-6)] was on scouting and patrol hops for most of December [Annotator's Note: December 1941]. On 1 February 1942, Enterprise aircraft bombed Roi Island [Annotator's Note: Roi-Namur, Marshall Islands]. Their practice dives had been from 12,000 feet to 2,000 feet. The altimeter [Annotator's Note: an instrument used to measure the altitude of an object above a fixed level] was slightly delayed, so they had to use their own visual judgement. Leaming was responsible for warning the pilot when they reached a certain point by saying "mark". The dives only took seconds. The force when pulling out was intense, with Leaming nearly blacking out at times. Before flying the SBD [Annotator's Note: Douglass SBD Dauntless naval scout plane and dive bomber], they were using SBC-3s [Annotator's Note: Curtiss SBC-3 (Model 77A) dive bombing aircraft]. The SBC-3 was a biplane, whereas the SBD was a low wing monoplane, and an excellent plane. The SBC-3 was considered ancient by 1940. On 1 February 1942 when they attacked the Marshalls [Annotator's Note: Marshall Islands], their skipper crashed into a hangar, setting it on fire. Leaming was in the second section, the sixth airplane in a single line, and by the time they got ready to dive, it was a mess. The Japanese were caught completely off guard in the Marshalls. Leaming fired a .30 caliber gun [Annotator's Note: Browning ANM2 .30 caliber machine gun] at Japanese men, which bothers him now, to kill somebody was awful, although at the time he felt that they would have killed him if he had not done so first. But killing another human being is rough.

Jack Leaming [Annotator's Note: with Scouting Squadron Six (VS-6) aboard the USS Enterprise (CV-6)] went to Honolulu [Annotator's Note: Honolulu, Hawaii] on the Enterprise and had a four-day vacation at the Royal Hawaiian [Annotator's Note: Royal Hawaiian Hotel in Waikiki, Honolulu after participating in combat in the Marshall Islands]. The men would go to cathouses [Annotator's Note: slang for brothel] for fun. Leaming had wanted to marry one of the women. When he got out of a Japanese prison camp and returned to Honolulu later, he could not find her. He still thinks about her today because he really loved her. He could forgive what she did [Annotator's Note: prostitution] because he was just as guilty as she was. The Enterprise soon shipped out to attack Marcus Island [Annotator's Note: also known as Minami-Tori-shima, Japan], which was only 642 square acres. They had an electronic device for navigation, but the air group commander in charge of the attack force that morning could not see the island due to heavy cloud cover. He finally picked up the island and turned toward it. The other pilots did not see him turn, so by the time Leaming's plane arrived they were late. The Japanese were ready for them. Their AA fire [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] was not so good initially but improved. Leaming was in the third plane to arrive that morning, his outboard wing was hit and caught fire. Hilton [Annotator's note: his pilot, US Navy Lieutenant H. Dale Hilton] was a good pilot and landed them between two waves. [Annotator's note: There is a break in the interview.]

When Jack Leaming [Annotator's Note: with Scouting Squadron Six (VS-6) aboard the USS Enterprise (CV-6)] saw the wing of his plane on fire, he prayed to God to let his death be quick , [Annotator's Note: after receiving enemy fire at Marcus Island, now Minami-Tori-shima, Japan, on 4 March 1942]. Hilton [Annotator's note: his pilot, US Navy Lieutenant H. Dale Hilton] was a good pilot and landed them between two waves. The plane began taking water in the fuselage and the tail raised. It was up to Leaming to get the rubber boat out of the airplane and inflate it. Hilton had not yet gotten out of the plane; his eye had hit the bomb sight. The plane sank, and they got into the boat. Marcus Island was isolated and far from any other land. They hoped the nearby task force would send seaplanes from the cruisers to rescue them, but that did not happen. When their plane had been struck, they were able to radio the skipper to inform him that they had been hit. They could not beat the tide and were spotted by a Japanese guard as they approached the island. A boat picked them up, putting Hilton on the stern and Leaming on the nose of the ship. A Japanese officer told Leaming that if he did not answer his questions truthfully, he would kill him. They slept on the floor of a cell for four or five days. They were then picked up by the Argentina Maru [Annotator's Note: an ocean liner purchased by the Imperial Japanese Navy and later converted into the escort carrier Kaiyō] and brought to Yokohama, Japan. There they were put into a house that had been occupied by a representative of the Standard Oil Company. Leaming and Hilton were questioned and beaten. They remained there for about a month. While there, they met other prisoners from the Yorktown [Annotator's Note: USS Yorktown (CV-5)]. At this point, the Japanese had taken Guam [Annotator's Note: Guam, Mariana Islands] and the US troops there had been moved to a Japanese prison camp in Zentsuji [Annotator's Note: Zentsuji, Japan]. The area was hilly, so the prisoners were made to smooth a pathway around the island. Around the end of May [Annotator's Note: May 1942] or June [Annotator's Note: June 1942], 60 of the prisoners were sent from Zentsuji to Osaka [Annotator's Note: Osaka, Japan] where they were kept on an athletic field. They stayed there for about three months until a proper prisoner camp was built on the waterfront. There they were used to unload ships and work in the warehouses and remained there until June [Annotator's Note: June 1945], when 800 B-29s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber] and B-17s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber] bombed Osaka. One bomb hit near the prisoner of war camp. That day, Leaming was working in camp rather than on the waterfront due to an eye injury. He looked up and watched the bombs, which contained different cylinders that spread out all over and started fires, including one at the camp. He gathered all of his belongings in a blanket, narrowly escaping the building before the roof caved in. Ace Dalzell [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling] was one of Leaming's buddies, so he saved his belongings as well. They were moved to another camp on the west coast of Japan where they remained until the end of the war.

Before the war, Jack Leaming had a Japanese friend in the second grade, whose parents sold Japanese clothing on the boardwalk in Atlantic City [Annotator's Note: Atlantic City, New Jersey]. Leaming did not think that the Japanese were an inferior race as many people did at the time. He thought they were nice people. On Marcus Island [Annotator's Note: also known as Minami-Tori-shima, Japan] they slept on pallets [Annotator's Note: after having been shot down in combat]. He and his pilot [Annotator's note: US Navy Lieutenant H. Dale Hilton] wondered what would happen to them. Leaming was a Radioman 2nd Class, and Hilton was Lieutenant Junior Grade. It was unusual to be thrown in with an officer. What one did and said as an enlisted man was not free, but as time went on, that feeling left because they did not know if they were going to be killed or shot. The hierarchy went away so they could talk more freely with each other. They were given rice and soup to eat, and what looked like weeds. At Yokohama [Annotator's Note, Yokohama, Japan] and Zentsuji [Annotator's Note: Zentsuji, Japan] they were grouped with other American prisoners of war, mostly from Guam [Annotator's Note: Guam, Mariana Islands]. One of the prisoners was Greek. They would have singsongs [Annotator's Note: an informal gathering for singing] once a week to keep up morale. Working was a good thing, they were paid ten cents an hour so they could buy cigarettes, until they were no longer available. They received Red Cross parcels from the States. One of his friends, Mick Williams [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling], traded rations for cigarettes. They were starving and did not know if they would be alive in a week. Williams did not care how much longer he had to live, he was going to enjoy life right up to the end, whatever that end may be. Ace [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling] was the only fellow prisoner Leaming kept in contact with [Annotator's Note: after the war]. Food was hard to get. Leaming worked in a steel mill [Annotator's Note: in Osaka, Japan], where the man in charge was from Korea. They used to swap items, such as tomatoes and eggs. He worked alongside Japanese men, who were friendly, but there was a limit since they were still at war and did not want to be seen as traitors. It was not a bad time. The Japanese saw the United States as heaven. Leaming never saw anyone get beaten.

Towards the end of the war, Jack Leaming's prisoner of war camp at Osaka [Annotator's Note: Osaka, Japan] had burned down. They were sent to Toyama [Annotator's Note: Toyama, Japan] and kept in a Japanese military training facility that was no longer in use. They were marched out to where the ships were tied up to unload them. While working one day, they heard a man speaking. It turned out to be the emperor saying that Japan was surrendering [Annotator's Note: Emperor of Japan Hirohito broadcast news of Japan's surrender on 15 August 1945]. The prisoners did not believe it. That night, a Japanese officer told them to prepare all of the sick prisoners to be shipped out and taken care of. Saunders [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling] told the Japanese to get them something good to eat, and they were fed steaks. They were then put on a train back to Osaka where they were given physicals on a Red Cross hospital ship. They had the option to fly or take a ship back home. [Annotator's Note: The tape ends and there is a short pause in the interview.] Since Leaming had been flying most of his Navy career, he opted to fly. They stopped in Honolulu [Annotator's Note: Honolulu, Hawaii], where he was unable to find his old girlfriend. He was then sent to a naval hospital in San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California] where he was nursed back to good health. He was then sent to North Island [Annotator's Note: Naval Air Station Orth Island in San Diego, California] where he did shore duty for two years. Leaming went to Ream Field [Annotator's Note: now Naval Outlying Landing Field Imperial Beach in San Diego, California] and studied electronic tech [Annotator's Note: electronics technician]. He taught electronics at the school. He received his backpay, giving him a lot of financial freedom. He married and bought his own house.

Jack Leaming sees the war as something they had to live with. They had to do the best they could to be happy and have a good life, or else sit around, cry, do nothing and be miserable. The only thing that stands out in his mind is sitting in the rear cockpit [Annotator's Note: of his Douglas SBD Dauntless diver bomber aircraft as part of Scouting Squadron 6 (VS-6), aboard the USS Enterprise (CV-6)] and watching the 60-gallon tank burn and pieces of the wing flying off [Annotator's Note: after being hit by Japanese anti-aircraft artillery fire during combat over Marcus Island, now Minami-Tori-shima, Japan, on 4 March 1942], and not knowing if he would be alive or dead in the next five minutes. He wondered if dying wass painful. As one gets older, you have to think about what you are going to do to be happy and free, and what you can do to get what you want. Leaming would tell future generations to do all they can to be the best they can be. Do not hate anybody and be good to yourself. Be honest, work hard, and treat people right.