William Roy was on the USS Yorktown [Annotator's Note: CV-5] when Pearl Harbor was attacked. The Yorktown was at Pier 7 in Norfolk, Virginia. He had been chasing the ship from Portland, Oregon and back as the Yorktown had been assigned to the North Atlantic Patrol. When he arrived he went to the photo lab and fell asleep there because he had no bunk. When the news of Pearl Harbor came over the radio, there was chaos. They were trying to get the ship ready to get underway. They did not want to be torpedoed so they went up the river to be anchored. Then they were afraid u-boats would attack them so they went back to Pier 7. Trains came down with equipment for them. They had to supply the ship at the pier. The airplanes were at North Field. They gathered the airplanes and then headed south. Roy did not know where Pearl Harbor was as he had never served in the Pacific. He had served on a battleship in the Atlantic. The other sailors also did not know where Pearl Harbor was so they were also trying to find out. While in the Atlantic they launched some aerial patrols to look for German submarines. They went to the Panama Canal. That night they passed through the canal and ended up on the Panama City side. Overnight they painted the mighty Y on the stack [Annotator's Note: for identification purposes a large letter Y was painted on Yorktown's stack]. The next morning they were approaching the Pacific and Roy was heading down for breakfast when all of sudden all hell broke loose. The ship started dropping depth charges and PBYs were flying around and destroyers were also getting into attack formation as a Japanese submarine was caught waiting for the Yorktown to reach the Pacific. The got away from the fight and then sailed for San Diego. From there they picked up a unit of Marines who they dropped off on Samoa. From Samoa they went to Pearl Harbor. It was a sobering sight. Roy had served on one of the battleships that had been at Pearl Harbor. He took a few pictures but stopped shortly thereafter as he could not bear it. There were no tugs in the harbor so Captain Buckmaster [Annotator's Note: US Navy Vice Admiral Elliott Buckmaster] pulled the carrier into port on the starboard side. Roy was in the photo room on the starboard side when this happened. Buckmaster eased the ship into port and cracked six pilings on the way in. Many aboard the Yorktown believed that Captain Buckmaster possessed unparalleled seamanship. It was a wonder he got the Yorktown in port at all without tugboat support. Roy's first feeling was that it was unbelievable that it could happen at all. All of the layers of protection that were in place still did not save the ships. They were still trying to rescue bodies from some of the battleships when they arrived.

[Annotator's Note: William G. Roy served in the Navy as a Photographer's Mate 2nd Class aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown (CV-5).] They only stayed in Pearl Harbor for a few days before taking on supplies and heading south. Admiral Nimitz's [Annotator's Note: Admiral Chester Nimitz] plan at the time was to harass, but not engage, the Japanese navy. The headed for the Marshall and Gilbert Islands where the Japanese had airfields, fuel storage and communication stations. These were all targeted by the aircrews of the Yorktown. Roy flew in the rear seat of a TBD Devastator torpedo bomber. He carried a large camera taking pictures of the installations then the fighters and dive bombers attacked them. There was some defense in the Marshalls and Gilberts but the Japanese were surprised to see an aircraft carrier in the area. These raids boosted morale for the sailors in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor. On the way to the Coral Sea, two fighter pilots were sent to take on a Japanese Mavis seaplane [Annotator's Note: Mavis is the American code name of the Kawanishi H6K seaplane]. The Mavis was sighting the taskforce and making radio reports of its progress when the fighters were sent to intercept the seaplane. The Mavis ducked into a cloud and the fighters entered behind it and shot the Mavis down. When the fighter pilots landed someone gave them makeshift medals. Roy often rode in the middle seat of the Devastator. When they were carrying a torpedo, however, the second seat was kept empty. Roy was bombardier, observer, and photographer. The middle seat had sights for depth charges and the pilot would give instructions on which charge he wanted to drop. The bombardier held onto a pickle switch. Once, Roy nearly dropped the bombs on accident. It was early in the morning and it was dark on the ground but at altitude Roy could see the sun coming up. The pilot called to the gunner telling him that he saw a plane heading low towards the Yorktown. The pilot dove to attack the seaplane with his nose mounted machine gun. Roy thought he heard the pilot tell him to arm the charges so he grabbed the pickle switch and got the camera out of the way. The pilot pulled off when he realized the plane was the USS Astoria's [Annotator's Note: USS Astoria (CA-34)] observation plane that stayed low when it was catapulted and was heading away from his ship but straight toward the Yorktown. Roy was now scared about the three primed depth charges so he returned them to safe mode and hoped that the plane's bouncing would not jar the depth charges loose.

[Annotator's Note: William G. Roy served in the Navy as a Photographer’s Mate 2nd Class aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown (CV-5).] On the way to the Coral Sea they joined up with the USS Lexington (CV-2) as part of Task Force 16 under Captain Sherman [Annotator's Note: US Navy Vice Admiral Frederick C. Sherman]. The Yorktown then went off on its own mission and the headed for Tulagi. The fleet on New Guinea was based on Tulagi. An air officer came to the photo lab with a geography book and asked Roy to copy the old map for the pilots. Roy made about a hundred maps and pilots used those to bomb with. Early in the war they did not have good maps of the South Pacific. After arriving, they bombed Tulagi. There was also a force heading for Tulagi in supply ships and by the time the planes from the Yorktown were able to bomb the harbor the supply fleet had already landed. They set up a torpedo run on the empty ships. The Mark 13 torpedoes were already obsolete before the war began. The torpedo planes dropped their torpedoes but the supply ships were empty and sitting high in the water so the torpedoes passed underneath them and the few that did explode detonated against the mud bank. The dive bombers caused some damage to the enemy ships and the fighters strafed the smaller craft. There were 115,000 Japanese soldiers on New Guinea waiting to get orders to invade Port Moresby. It had a naval base and an air base. The Japanese were bombing it day and night and half the city had fled the area. The navy yard and airport were destroyed. The Japanese tactics were to invade Port Moresby in order to block attempts to resupply General MacArthur [Annotator's Note: General Douglas MacArthur] in Australia. The Japanese had been using midget subs to sink ships in Sydney Harbor. One was caught in a submarine net and the two sailors aboard suffocated. From Tulagi they started maneuvering and rejoined the Lexington. They maneuvered through heavy storm clouds so the enemy could not spot them. The Japanese flew over the task force but did not see the ships below. The flew patrol aircraft out to try and find the Japanese ships. Roy did not fly on any of these patrol missions as he was not a regular member of a flight crew even though he was qualified. The pilots wanted their normal crew for the mission. When the pilots returned from sinking the light carrier it was the first time that the ships did not make contact with each other. It demonstrated the feasibility of small planes sinking massive ships with bombs. When the planes landed back on the carrier everyone was jubilant that they were making a difference. Roy took some pictures of the celebrations. Three Japanese planes tried to land on the Yorktown around dusk. They came down the starboard side which tipped off the carrier as American pilots were told to fly down the port side. Suddenly someone realized that they were Japanese aircraft and opened fire on them with the ships .50 caliber machine guns. It did not do much to the Japanese. Everyone was surprised by this turn of events. The Japanese probably would have landed on the carrier if they had not flown down the wrong side. The Yorktown worked closely with the Lexington until the Lexington was sunk during the battle [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Coral Sea]. The Japanese had three carriers in their task force. The United States had two. The Lexington was originally laid down as a battlecruiser and was reclassified a carrier later. Because it was originally a battlecruiser it could not maneuver as well as the Yorktown and this allowed the Japanese to get a lot more hits on the Lexington with torpedoes and bombs. The Lexington could not purge its gas system and this led to fires. They had ready torpedoes on the flight deck. Captain Sherman thought he could keep the fires under control and continue to fight but he eventually realized that the fires were out of hand and that the ship could not be controlled. Ships came alongside and took people off, which was unusual. As the Yorktown was maneuvering around, Roy used a couple of movie cameras and shot some pictures of the Lexington. A crewman from the Astoria [Annotator's Note: USS Astoria (CA-34)] also took pictures. The did not get too close and they did not send any help in because the destroyers and cruisers were already doing that. As soon as the ship was unloaded, it exploded. Later that night a destroyer torpedoed the Lexington and sank it.

William Roy had decided to do a documentary if there was a battle. He got permission to film the captain and the admiral and shot a lot of stock footage of various other people. Everyone on board wore khakis and hardhats except for Captain Buckmaster [Annotator's Note: US Navy Vice Admiral Elliott Buckmaster], who always wore a flame retardant suit. Roy just wore plain old dungarees. The executive officer, Dixie Kiefer, allowed Roy to stay on the bridge. Buckmaster told him to stay out of the way but allowed him to stay there. During the battle [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Coral Sea], the USS Yorktown (CV-5)'s planes intercepted a flight of dive bombers and torpedo planes. They caught the planes about 35 miles away from the ship. The ship's guns opened fire on them in sequence. A five inch gun can hit an area of about fifty yards with its shrapnel. They did not get many hits on the Japanese planes with the five inch guns. A torpedo plane made a run at the Yorktown's port side but they maneuvered away from it. Roy filmed a torpedo plane burning passing by the port side of the ship. Roy could see the pilot shake his fist before the plane exploded. Bombs from the dive bombers fell slowly and the captain would go out on the wing of the bridge to direct the ship's evasive maneuvers. Once a bomb hit the ship and went through four decks and killed 44 people. Roy took pictures of the damage. Roy reaffirms his respect for Buckmaster's seamanship and describes how Buckmaster managed to avoid eight torpedoes. Torpedoes have a very distinctive wake and can travel faster than most ships. The Yorktown had structural damage from bombs that exploded nearby. As Roy was running along the starboard side he saw a Zero [Annotator's Note: Mitsubishi A6M Zero fighter aircraft] make a strafing run from the bow. He ducked just before the guns fired on the bridge. Only one bomb was a direct hit. They had to return to Pearl Harbor for repairs. On the way back, the refrigeration system stopped working. For the rest of the trip everyone ate rice three meals a day. Despite being hit, the morale was very high aboard the Yorktown. The Japanese carriers and could carry more planes. Planes from the Yorktown managed to damage the flight decks of the Japanese carriers which gave the Japanese planes in the air nowhere to land. Many pilots had to bail out and many of them were never retrieved. The Shokaku and Zuikaku had to return to Japan for repairs and the Shoho was sunk. The Battle of Midway began a month later and, without the events of Coral Sea, the Japanese could have had seven carriers to the Americans' three. By this point, the Yorktown had been underway for 101 days. They had a fleet tanker [Annotator's Note: the USS Neosho (AO-23)] with the fleet. It refueled the ships before Coral Sea but Japanese search planes found the tanker and mistook it for a carrier. A heavy attack ensued but the empty fuel tanks kept the tanker afloat for awhile. The escort ship was sunk immediately. The next day the fleet found the tanker and recovered the crew. This attack diverted the Japanese and alerted the Americans that the Japanese were nearby.

William Roy remembers the fighter planes beginning to malfunction after being at sea for so long. A lot of planes' engines would go out right as they cleared the flight deck and someone told Roy to go out and film the planes taking off to figure out what the problem was. Roy assumed every pilot hated him. He hung out in a cargo net on the end of the deck. The planes taking off covered Roy in grease. All of the planes got airborne. From there they took a tank [Annotator's Note: a fuel tank] to the lab and cut it open and found a bunch of gunk in it. Roy filmed this and the tank was sent back to the Bureau of Aeronautics. After Coral Sea they limped back to Pearl Harbor. The navy yard chief said that they would need three months to repair the ship [Annotator's Note: the USS Yorktown (CV-5)] but Admiral Nimitz [Annotator's Note: Admiral Chester Nimitz] told them they had three days. The crewmen expected that they would be there for six months and the analysis done by the Yorktown's engineers concluded that the ship was not seaworthy. A destroyer met the Yorkton off Pearl Harbor with experts aboard to analyze the ship. Once they arrived in port, Nimitz came aboard and told them they had 72 hours to reload the ship with provisions. The planes had flown to Pearl Harbor and the ship was assigned some F4F Wildcat fighters. The ship was repaired but it was mostly propping up timbers and welding plates. When they exited Pearl Harbor they were alerted to the presence of Japanese submarines at the mouth of the harbor. Once destroyers dropped charges and neutralized the threat, the planes flew back out to land on the carrier. Roy was the flight deck cameraman. They recovered the bombers without incident. They also picked up 27 F4F-4s [Annotator's Note: Grumman F4F Wildcat fighter aircraft]. Jimmy Thach [Annotator's Note: later US Navy Admiral John S. Thach] was the squadron commander. His XO [Annotator's Note: Executive Officer] was Don Lovelace, who passed up a chance to be a squadron commander to serve under Thach. The planes had more guns, less ammunition, more armor, and a slower speed even with a bigger engine, than the standard F4F. Roy spoke with the ordnance director and discovered that the guns were brand new. The guns had not been put in the trunnions and still had Cosmoline on the barrels. They had to bore sight the guns while underway. It took 24 hours to get the guns ready to go. The XO lands last in the squadron. The second to last plane in the formation came in too high and too fast and was waved off. Then Lovelace came in to land and landed perfectly and taxied through to the safe zone. The other pilot came around again and Roy filmed him as he made his approach. The pilot ignored a wave off and tried to set the plane down. The plane climbed over the barrier. His right wing collided with the aircastle and the plane came down on top of Lovelace's airplane. The propeller was sent back into the cockpit and killed the pilot instantly. Lovelace's plane was still running and they jumped to cut the power before it exploded. Lovelace was also killed in the crash. Roy came back later and saw a shroud placed over Lovelace's plane and thought that they were going to bury him in his plane. Roy witnessed the plane being pushed off the side of the carrier but later learned that they had previously put Lovelace in the morgue. Roy believes Lovelace was still in the morgue when the Yorktown was sunk.

After leaving Pearl Harbor, William Roy and the rest of the crew of the Yorktown [Annotator's Note: USS Yorktown (CV-5)] rendezvoused with the carriers Enterprise [Annotator's Note: USS Enterprise (CV-6)] and Hornet [Annotator's Note: USS Hornet (CV-8)] at Point Luck. They left Pearl Harbor on 30 May [Annotator's Note: 30 May 1942]. On 3 June, a seaplane sighted two of the Japanese carriers. The seaplanes made torpedo runs and the Army made bombing runs with B-17s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber]. All of the Army's bombs missed the target but the photos of the ships covered in water were sent back to Pearl Harbor and the Army got a lot of publicity for sinking a carrier. There was a lot of activity aboard the Yorktown. The other two carriers were 25 miles away and were never seen or attacked by the Japanese. Japanese aircraft were very destructive and the Yorktown bore the brunt of the attacks. They received an alert saying that Japanese aircraft were 55 miles out. Everyone got into battle stations and during this attack Roy had free run of the ship. Roy went up to the signal bridge and it gave him better visibility but he was more exposed. Dive bombers came first and were attacked by fighters and antiaircraft fire. Some made it through the barrage and Roy filmed them. The Japanese used different tactics with their bombs. While American bombs were designed to penetrate deep into the hull of a vessel and take out machinery, Japanese bombs were designed to detonate immediately in order to clear out gun crews. The first bomb that hit was on the flight deck and it blew a ten foot by ten foot hole in the flight deck. It took out an entire gun crew and set planes on the hangar deck on fire. They had to flood part of the hangar deck in order to put the fires out. The pharmacist's mate was also killed. Two more bombs struck the ship. The first went through several decks and knocked out the boilers as well as the photo lab and the XO's [Annotator's Note: executive officer] office. The other bomb went down the bow and hit a rag locker and set a bunch of oily rags aflame. The rags were still burning days later when they went to salvage the ship. Dixie Kiefer was the XO. Roy has pictures of the repairs of the hangar deck. It made the runway bumpy but the repair was done within 20 minutes. Roy took a picture of a galvanized bucket and didn't know what it was for. He walked over and found someone's head in the bucket. Roy took a picture of a dive bomber that came very close to his position before it was shot down. Roy was well trained and tried not to think too hard about odds when facing down an airplane's machine guns with a camera. He was the only man on the flight deck who was not armed. Only people with combat jobs could get weapons out of the armory. If a sailor was unarmed he had no business being on the flight deck. A few volunteers got rifles. Some got rear seat machines guns and fired those at the approaching airplanes. Roy took some photographs of the knocked out 1.1 inch gun mount. Later he received news that the fleet photo officer tried to block it because he wanted happy photos he could publish. It was later used to help train medical crews on what to do when there are wounded and dead and the crews are shorthanded. Roy was not thinking about what he was seeing when he was taking the pictures but today it is very hard for him to look at his own pictures.

[Annotator's Note: William G. Roy served in the Navy as a Photographer's Mate 2nd Class aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown (CV-5) and was aboard during the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Battle of Santa Cruz, and when the ship was sunk during the Battle of Midway.] Dixie Kiefer [Annotator's Note: executive officer of the USS Yorktown (CV-5)] sent men down to the ship's stores to grab chocolate bars and candy to pass around to the men. Everyone went to their positions and started doing whatever they could do. Roy did not have anywhere to go because the photo lab had been destroyed. The ship got underway and was going about 18 knots. When the torpedo plane alert came they launched some fighters. The Japanese planes changed their tactics at Midway and attacked from the stern. While trying to turn, two torpedoes struck the port side of the ship. Roy took a picture of the men in the 20mm gun nest that was right above the impact point. This footage was later put on video by the National Archives. After the ship was hit chaos ensued. Roy was knocked off his feet. The gunner Roy was standing next to was killed in a strafing run. The ship started listing to port and that was when Roy started taking pictures of the gun mounts. Even after the torpedoes hit they still thought they could save the Yorktown. The generator kicked in but the panel that controlled the power conversion was knocked out. The wounded had to be lowered by a line down the side and put in rafts. There was no communication. The captain passed the word to abandon ship. Roy took his movie camera with him so he could film while in the raft. He was wearing unauthorized boots because he thought they would be easier to get off in the water than shoes with laces. After climbing in the raft, Roy saw a mess attendant tangled in the lines. The mess attendant said that he could not swim. Roy got him untangled. The ship was listing to port 28 degrees and they feared the ship would capsize. The captain went to the stern. The captain was supposed to be the last man off but two men were inadvertently left in the sick bay. Roy went to the starboard side. He had three rolls of film under his jacket. The water was slick with oil and swimming through it was difficult. Roy brought the mess attendant over to a nearby life raft. He tried to hold on to it because the raft was overloaded. Roy remembers seeing an ensign in the life raft with a .45 caliber pistol. A young sailor was in the raft with his eyes rolling. The ensign told the sailor to get out of the raft but the sailor did not respond. The ensign threatened to shoot the sailor. Roy examined the sailor and discovered he had been wounded in the gut. From there they helped other wounded people into the raft. Waves and wind pushed to people in the sea back into the ship. Roy tried to work his way towards the stern. There were destroyers several hundred yards away. They thought that the destroyers were coming for them but then they did not. Little boats came and picked some of them up. When Roy got to the stern he found Buckmaster [Annotator's Note: then Captain Elliott Buckmaster, commanding officer of the USS Yorktonw (CV-5)] holding on to a sailor who could not swim. Eventually Roy reached a boat and was brought aboard the USS Hammann (DD-412). The ship was packed with survivors from the Yorktown so Roy went up to the forecastle. Later he went below and found the mess hall converted into an operating room. From there he climbed into the spud locker and slept there for the night. The next morning they got Roy cleaned up and gave him new clothes. He forgot to ask what happened to his camera. When he returned for the salvage trip his camera was gone. The Hammann was packed because they had also picked up many of the survivors from the Lexington [Annotator's Note: USS Lexington (CV-2)] the month before. Captain Buckmaster and Admiral Fletcher [Annotator's Note: Admiral Frank J. Fletcher] were aboard the USS Astoria (CA-34). Fletcher turned over command of Task Force 17 to Admiral Sprague [Annotator's Note: Admiral Clifton Sprague] aboard the Hornet [Annotator's Note: USS Hornet (CV-8)]. According to Roy, this allowed Sprague to get all the glory for the victory. Admiral Frank Fletcher was a black shoe sailor, not an aviation guy. Roy had a lot respect for Fletcher. After Buckmaster joined Fletcher on the Astoria, Roy passed his film up to someone he knew and never saw it again.

[Annotator's Note: William G. Roy served in the Navy as a Photographer's Mate 2nd Class aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown (CV-5) and was aboard during the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Battle of Santa Cruz, and when the ship was sunk during the Battle of Midway.] Shortly thereafter, Buckmaster [Annotator's Note: the Captain Elliott Buckmaster, commanding officer of the USS Yorktown (CV-5)] returned and told his crew that Fletcher [Annotator's Note: US Navy Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher] had signed off on a mission to save the Yorktown. About 160 men volunteered to go including Roy. The paymaster went and got about 100,000 dollars off the ship. Roy got his camera out and sent it to the Hammann [Annotator's Note: USS Hammann (DD-412)]. Their primary mission was to put the fire out in the rag locker. They ran a line along the side of the bulkhead that held 35 pound fire bottles. The Hammann pulled alongside and gave them fire hoses. They flooded the entire damaged area and that doused the fire. The next order of business was to get the guns over the side. They got one of them overboard then Buckmaster called to say he needed help on the hangar deck so Roy went there next. He took a picture of the silhouette of a torpedo plane. He did not have a flash on his camera. They were lowering the torpedo plane spares and pushing them out of the hangar deck opening to get the weight off the ship. Right before they pushed the third plane overboard Roy asked for the plane and the captain gave it to him. Now Roy has his own torpedo plane 17,000 feet under water. The pharmacist mate had returned with tags and boxes and needed help getting rid of the bodies on the flight deck. He took the personal effects and put them in envelopes. They looked around and saw an auxiliary radio on the catwalk and discovered the body of a man who had crawled into a cubby hole. Roy said a prayer for each man before sending the bodies overboard. The Hammann was tied up on the starboard side bow providing power while they worked on the boilers to get the ship under way. They still thought they had a chance to save the Yorktown. The fires were out, the list had been reduced two degrees, and the engineers thought that they could get steam up in two or three of the boilers. Nimitz [Annotator's Note: Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz] had sent out the fleet tug USS Vireo (AT-144) but she was not powerful enough to tow the ship quickly. They even considered using a cruiser to tow the carrier.

[Annotator's Note: William G. Roy served in the Navy as a Photographer's Mate 2nd Class aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown (CV-5) and was aboard during the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Battle of Santa Cruz, and when this ship was sunk during the Battle of Midway.] Four destroyers were circling the Yorktown. A PBY [Annotator's Note: Consolidated PBY Catalina flying boat] had spent the morning flying around but then it left the area. For two days the Japanese submarine I-168 had been trailing the Yorktown. The captain of the submarine, Tanabe [Annotator's Note: Japanese Navy Lieutenant Commander Yahachi Tanabe] got into firing position and launched his torpedoes. The destroyers never noticed I-168 because the sonar waves get bent by hot and cold layers of water. The destroyer crews discounted the readings as false. Tanabe launched four torpedoes. A spotter fired the guns to alert everyone. Roy left the second gun on the port bow and ran to the starboard side and saw a boatswain's mate cut the ties with a fire axe. Roy went to take a picture and as he was doing so the Hammann [Annotator's Note: USS Hammann (DD-412)] exploded. The boatswain's mate was sent flying into the air. The Hammann snapped in two. Of the 16 officers aboard, 12 were killed. The CO [Annotator's Note: commanding officer] and XO [Annotator's Note: executive officer] were both wounded. The bow went straight down. The stern started drifting back and Roy took three pictures. The first was of the people clinging to the stern and the second showed the ship sinking. When the ship sank, the 18 depth charges aboard all exploded when they reached the proper depth. The explosion picked the Yorktown up out of the water and threw many people overboard. The Yorktown also took two torpedoes on the starboard side. The third photograph Roy took was after he got up off the ground following the explosions. The ship began to settle. Roy had run out of film but he managed to find an aerial camera that still had film in it. Roy took that camera and left the ship with two cameras and went aboard the Vireo [Annotator's Note: USS Vireo (AT-144)]. Buckmaster [Annotator's Note: then Captain Elliott Buckmaster, commanding officer of the USS Yorktown (CV-5)] was aboard the ship as well. They picked up some of the dead bodies and had a sea funeral for them. From there, they joined the USS Balch (DD-363). The Balch spent the night circling the Yorktown. The ship was on an even keel. They thought that they still might be able to save it. The next morning there was an announcement telling Roy to go to the bridge. When he got there he looked at the Yorktown and saw her begin to roll to port. Roy started taking pictures immediately. He got about three pictures off before the ship sank stern first, with all battle flags still flying. Roy turned the pictures in at Pearl Harbor but kept the camera. He was not allowed in the photo lab. The Yorktown sank at 7:01 in the morning on 7 June [Annotator's Note: 7 June 1942]. Buckmaster asked the captain of the Balch to take him through the wreckage. The ship went right through the debris and then circled around it. It repeated this maneuver once but the captain refused Buckmaster's request to go through a third time.

[Annotator's Note: William G. Roy served in the Navy as a Photographer's Mate 2nd Class aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown (CV-5) and was aboard during the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Battle of Santa Cruz, and when the ship was sunk during the Battle of Midway.] When they arrived at Pearl Harbor, they learned something interesting. The USS Fulton (AS-11) had arrived the day before with many survivors. It had picked them up off of several ships before sailing for Hawaii. Nimitz [Annotator's Note: US Navy Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz] greeted the ship when it arrived at Pearl Harbor. When the Balchh [Annotator's Note: USS Balch (DD-363)] arrived, there was not much of a greeting. Captain Buckmaster [Annotator's Note: then Captain Elliott Buckmaster had been the commanding officer of the USS Yorktown (CV-5)] wrote his after action report on 18 June 1942. They had few clothes and no money during the time they spent in an old Marine Raider training camp. When they returned to Pearl Harbor they could not get checked out by doctors because there were too many people in critical condition. Roy worked on the docks and in the burial parties. A pilot came into the harbor and hit a crane. They took him from the mortuary and buried him. Roy received a suit of whites and got on the USS Henderson (AP-1) for an 11 day voyage to San Francisco. Upon arriving, Roy was ordered to report to Treasure Island for further orders. From there he was ordered to join a dive bomber squadron in Carrier Aircraft Service Unit 5 (CASU-5) in San Diego. While in San Diego, Ensign George Gay was also there. Gay was the sole survivor of Torpedo Squadron 8 (VT-8) from the Battle of Midway. Roy was not paid for three months so his family sent him some money. CASU-5 would send replacement pilots to where they were needed. Roy worked out of the photo lab and flew some training missions with them. They flew practice horizontal bombing runs out in the Pacific. Roy would watch the bombs fall to see who got the closest. From there Roy was transferred to photo school where he was promoted to chief. While walking down Market Street in San Francisco he saw the marquee of a theater. Theaters bought war footage. The marquee advertised the sinking of the USS Yorktown (CV-5). Roy asked the girl at the counter if he had to pay to see his own footage. The girl called the owner, Mr. Robinson, who told Roy to come on up. He shook Roy's hand and told him that he has not met any of the people who shot the films he has been showing. During the movie Robinson asked Roy to describe various things and later he invited Roy to dinner. They went to Palo Alto and around the area. Robinson's wife decided to cook Roy a southern dinner. Roy arrived in his whites and Robinson showed him his train collection.

William G. Roy is proud of his role in the Battle of the Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway. He thinks that the successful defense of the Coral Sea eventually allowed MacArthur [Annotator's Note: General Douglas MacArthur] to return to the Philippines. The Australian Prime Minister wrote an article in the Chicago Tribune begging Americans for aid. Unknown to him, Churchill [Annotator's Note: British Prime Minister Winston Churchill] and Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: President Franklin D. Roosevelt] had decided that Australia was indefensible. Submarines had been sinking ships in Sydney Harbor. Roy believes that Midway stopped the eastern and southern march of the Japanese. Had they succeeded in capturing it, Midway would have allowed the Japanese to bomb Hawaii. California had already been shelled by Japanese submarines, albeit ineffectually. Roy believes that if the Japanese had won at Midway it would have given them free run of the Pacific. He thinks that if Midway and Hawaii were lost, D-Day probably would not have happened when it did. He thinks that if Hawaii had been taken the war with Japan would have essentially been over because the United States would have no bases from which to attack. He also claims that victory at Midway allowed the United States to send reinforcements into North Africa in November 1942 to help Montgomery defeat Rommel. Every so often they have reunions but every year fewer men show up. Roy closes by thanking The National WWII Museum for all that it is doing for veterans.