Black sailor’s Pearl Harbor heroics were blow against racism

A THINLY DETAILED tale of heroism tantalized the nation in the months after the Pearl Harbor attack.

An “unnamed Negro messman” was said to have shot down multiple Japanese bombers while aboard a sinking battleship. A Pennsylvania newspaper reporter eventually tracked down the extraordinary story of the Navy cook-turned-gunner named Doris (Dorie) Miller.

Amid a storm of bombs and bullets, the 22-year-old son of Texas sharecroppers manned a deserted machine gun and helped shoot out of the sky up to six enemy fighter planes.

Miller became the first AfricanAmerican sailor to receive the Navy Cross, the service’s second-highest honor.

As Wednesday marks the 75th anniversary of the attack, Miller’s supporters — including Texas Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson — are still pushing for the military to award him the Medal of Honor.

“I’ve done everything I can think of to get it done, and it’s not done yet, and I’m not sure I’m getting any closer,” Johnson told the Daily News.

A former high school football star from Waco, Miller enlisted in the Navy in 1939. He was assigned to the USS West Virginia at a time when black servicemen were barred from combat roles.

Standing 6-foot-3, with a powerful build, Miller cleaned out his division in the ship’s heavyweight boxing tournament. Yet his duties aboard the segregated warship included serving food, collecting dirty clothes and shining the duty officers’ shoes.

Miller was rounding up the laundry on the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, when a series of torpedoes struck the West Virginia.

He rushed to his combat station only to find that it had already been decimated.

The ship’s officers, well aware of Miller’s strength, assigned him to carry injured sailors to safety.

The hulking mess attendant hauled out several of his comrades, including the ship’s mortally wounded captain.

“(Miller) was instrumental in hauling people along through oil and water to the quarterdeck, thereby unquestionably saving the lives of a number of people who might otherwise have been lost,” a senior officer later wrote.

Miller’s heroism that morning was in fact just beginning.

As other sailors rushed to leap off the sinking ship, he spotted a .50-caliber Browning machine gun and unloaded on the enemy bombers swarming overhead.

Miller had never been trained to fire the gun — doing so at all would have been violated a law that prohibited black servicemen from shooting weapons. But nothing was going to stop Miller from taking the fight to the Japanese. “I just pulled the trigger and she worked fine,” he later said. “I had watched the others with these guns. I guess I fired her for about 15 minutes. I think I got one of those (Japanese) planes. They were diving pretty close to us.” Miller’s act of bravery led lawmakers and civil rights activists to call on the military to provide greater opportunities and better treatment for African Americans. “When Dorie Miller took gun in hand,” the poet Langston Hughes wrote, “Jim Crow started his last stand.” Miller reenlisted in May 1943 following a nationwide tour to sell war bonds.

That November, he was aboard the Liscome Bay when it was struck by a Japanese torpedo in the Battle of Makin Island.

The blast detonated the escort carrier’s bomb magazine, sinking the ship in minutes. Two-thirds of the crew perished, including Miller.

Several schools and buildings around the country have been named in honor of Miller, including a co-op in Corona, Queens. He was also one of four Naval heroes featured on U.S. postage stamps in 2010. For decades, Texas lawmakers have lobbied for the government to upgrade Miller’s award to the Medal of Honor.

The calls have gone

A Navy spokesman declined to comment on a potential upgrade but praised Miller’s service. “The Navy’s proud of Miller’s service and his dedication to the country,” a spokesman told The News.

Miller’s supporters believe his race was a major factor in the initial decision to deprive him of the nation’s highest military honor.

His niece, Henrietta MillerBledsoe, 64, said she’s bothered by lingering skepticism over how many planes Miller had a hand in shooting down.

“It doesn’t matter if it was zero planes,” she said. “At least he took the intiative to remove his captain and man the machine gun. That in and of itself is heroic.” unanswered.