Robert Lowe was born in Hutton, Louisiana in July 1922. He worked his way through high school during the Great Depression. He had a rough necking job on a drilling rig when he was 16 years old. He got a job as an oil field parts delivery salesperson. He decided to join the military at 18. He joined the Marine Corps in April 1941. He went for his training in San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California] at Camp Pendleton. He was then sent to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii] in the first week of September. He explored the island before it got shot up in December [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on 7 December 1941]. Basic training was very intense. He received amphibious training in San Diego. He went into communications in the 2nd Marine Division. In Pearl Harbor, he was chosen for training on a big secret, the first big radar set that they were taking to Wake Island. He was in the 1st Defense Battalion of the Fleet Marine Force. His battalion had gone to Wake Island about month before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Lowe was not on Wake because the radar set had problems. The radar was so secret that his commanding officer was not allowed on the grounds where they were training.

[Annotator's Note: Robert Lowe was with the 1st Defense Battalion at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.] They were on a guard duty rotation for the islands of Midway, Wake, Palmyra, and Johnston. They wanted to install their radar unit on Wake Island and wanted some front line defense there. Lowe was on the crew for the radar unit. The radar could not go and he stayed back with the unit so he missed being on Wake Island [Annotator's Note: Battle of Wake Island; simultaneous attack with Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, 8 to 23 December 1941]. He had attended basic training in San Diego and Camp Pendleton [Annotator's Note: California]. He then went to Hawaii in September 1941. He worked on radar training during the week and had leave on weekends. They should have been operating the radar set on that Sunday morning [Annotator's Note: 7 December 1941, the day that Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor]. Honolulu was a serviceman's paradise. The streets were lined with bars. The temperature was good, and it rained every afternoon. Nanakuli Beach was a favorite with high waves. On this Sunday morning, he had chosen to make a tour of the island of Oahu. On the morning of 7 December, he was walking across the parade ground when the colors [Annotator's Note: United States flag] went up. From behind the flag, a group of airplanes were coming straight at him, low to the ground. He could see the Japanese insignia. He thought the Navy was up to some war game. They were torpedo planes and in two or three seconds he heard the torpedoes dropping. Lowe headed to the barracks. As he got there, he saw the explosion of the USS Arizona (BB-39). It could be heard all over Oahu. The war was on. Lowe's group was looking out the window at the barracks. They were only about 14 city blocks from battleship row. They thought they should get out there. They had their '03 Springfield rifles [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber Model 1903, or M1903, Springfield bolt action rifle] but no ammunition. They ran to the quartermaster and found out they needed an order to get ammo. They broke the door down, sat on the quartermaster sergeant, and took the ammunition. They set up an operation point to be able to shoot at the Japanese as they came across the parade ground. There were at least three planes that crashed after crossing their area. His group likes to claim they shot down the first planes. There was a Private named O.H. Poe [Annotator's Note: US Marine Corps Technical Sergeant William Howard Poe], who was a big Arkansas guy. Lowe was readying his rifle on a Japanese plane that was so close he could see the guy's face. Poe grabbed him and said this one was his to get. Poe shot at it twice. That plane crashed. Poe said, "You see, that is the way you do it."

[Annotator's Note: Robert Lowe was on the parade grounds at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii when the Japanese attacked on 7 December 1941. He and men from his outfit, a detachment of the US Marine Corps' 1st Defense Battalion, were shooting at the incoming Japanese planes with their rifles.] They were aiming for the pilot. Those aircraft were made of canvas and no metal. The rifle might have knocked out an engine, but if they hit the pilot it was better. It was like a duck hunt. They were having a ball. It was a great opportunity for the US Marine Corps to shoot at the enemy. They were strafed a couple of times. The Marines eventually set up some machine guns. They shot at whatever moved. They [Annotator's Note: Japanese aircraft] came through in stages. The first torpedo run lasted about a half an hour. There was a 20 minute lull before the high level bombers came over. They finished off Ford Island and Hickam Field [Annotator's Note: both in Pearl Harbor]. Lowe stayed there until around 11 o'clock. They decided to walk along the waterfront to see what happened. They went down to the dry dock and saw the USS Pennsylvania (BB-38) there. There was just a solid row of sunk or sinking battleships. The Navy had skiffs going through the water and picking up people. Lowe and his men came to a small 200 by 200 foot area with 200 to 300 dead sailors. One of the things he remembers is there was a Japanese plane that had crashed. The tail section was sticking out with the Japanese insignia on it. Something of a cemetery there with that. Something to remember.

[Annotator's Note: Robert Lowe and men from his outfit, a detachment of the US Marine Corps' 1st Defense Battlion, were looking over the aftermath of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941.] They received orders to clean up the road along the ship channel that was blocked with debris from the bombs. They needed to get ambulances in and out. They found a lot of pitiful things there. There were canned goods all over the place. They pulled back two sheets of tin. There was a foot there in a shoe. They could not find the body. They worked until almost dark. Rumors were flying about the Japanese invading. They did not sleep that night. The Japanese had just wanted to knock out the fleet so it would take two or three years to get replacements. The next day was a day of reconnoitering. That night they were put in the hills on guard duty where the ammunition had been moved. It rained for two days and nights. They returned to the base and loaded ammunition into a remaining ship. They had no equipment left so everything had to be hand carried. A five inch shell weighs about 110 pounds. They stacked it as high as they could reach. This was the USS Tangier (AV-8). They got a day and a night's rest. The seventh day after the attack, they were told they were heading out to sea.

Robert Lowe boarded the USS Tangier (AV-8) in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii [Annotator's Note: on 15 December 1941]. He wondered how he was going to sleep knowing that he had just loaded ten tons of ammunition in it. They went out in a convoy with a slow tanker which held them back. They spent a week traveling. On the second day, they told them they were going to Wake Island. Lowe had seen his radar unit on the ship, so he knew they were going there to set it up for 1st Defense Battalion and Major Devereux [Annotator's Note: later US Marine Corps Brigadier General James Patrick Sinnott Devereux, commander 1st Defense Battalion on Wake Island]. They got to Wake Island and were ready to go ashore when the island fell on 14 or 15 December. They then left and went to Midway Island. They unloaded the radar and spent ten days there. They turned the radar over the Marines there and returned to Pearl Harbor on New Year's Eve. They crossed the International Date Line going to Wake Island. The Navy has a rule that no matter where you are on Christmas Day you get a Christmas dinner. They had their dinner and then got to Wake Island. When they crossed the Date Line again, it was Christmas Day again and they got their second dinner.

Robert Lowe was at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii and was sent to Palmyra Atoll for two years of guard duty. They took a radar set and a three inch gun. It got tiresome after a year or so, and he applied for flight training. He was accepted and went to San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California] and was discharged from the US Marine Corps. The next day he signed up for the Navy's V5 training program [Annotator's Note: US Navy V-5 Aviation Cadet Training Program]. He spent a year in various colleges getting his flight training. He liked the idea of being in a war. He wanted to get to it. The training was backed up, so he applied for a discharge from the Navy to go back into the Marine Corps. He rejoined the Marine Corps and was assigned to the 5th Marine Division. He wanted active duty and action. He was sent to California in July 1945. Then the war was over. He never went back overseas. He had soloed in flight training, but never got past the preliminaries. He broke up four airplanes in one bad landing. He was flying a Piper Cub [Annotator's Note: Piper J-3 Cub light observation aircraft]. They had to wait for the temperature to be five about zero to take off. Just as he took off, the windshield came out of the plane. The cold air hit him, and he put his arm up. He banked around and just put the plane down. He ricocheted off two planes. He was trying to catch his breath. The commanding officer ran out and asked what had happened. The windshield was on the ground near where he was, so they never did believe that it had come out in the air and caused him to crash land.

Robert Lowe says war has its sadness. So many lost. It is always good to find some humor in a situation. That is what Marines do. Anybody who says they never were scared is a liar. There are no atheists in a foxhole. You have to find some lightness to keep you going. Marines were taught to fight. He does not know one man that did not want to get into the next battle. He did his flight training in Piper Cubs [Annotator's Note: Piper J-3 Cub light observation aircraft]. He stayed in Oklahoma for over a month and still did not have his secondary training. That is when he wanted to get back into the Marine Corps and go fight again. He also felt that flying was just a job and he did not want to do that anymore. He worked his way up to technical sergeant. He was reduced in rank one degree to staff sergeant when discharged. He had been on the way to Wake Island and was about five to ten miles away when ordered to turn around. They were landing on the south side of the island. The Japanese came in from the north. He did not see any Japanese ships or planes. It was still dark. Major Devereux [Annotator's Note: later US Marine Corps Brigadier General James Patrick Sinnott Devereux, commander 1st Defense Battalion, Wake Island] was being overwhelmed. He was just on a cargo vessel with not many people. There were not more than 60 Marines on board. He was there just to get the radar set on the island. It had been a two week trip to get there. There was not room on the ship for any training. He spent the first two or three days throwing up. Then he settled down and cleaned his rifle. He looks back that he was a kid that grew up in the Great Depression. You worked for what you got. He was looking for a way of life. He joined the Marine Corps at 18. It taught him to follow orders, be punctual. It gave him a sense of responsibility. If any young person today could get four years in the Marine Corps it would be of great benefit, or any branch of service.