Richardson - USS Augusta (CA-31)

Richardson became more alarmed, wrote letters of complaint and was called to Washington for an October meeting with the president. Tired from the long trip and with no sleep, he let his feelings out in strong terms. Nothing changed. Subsequently, Richardson began to feel as if the president and Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox were hoping for a disaster, an excuse to declare war upon Japan. This has been the subject of researchers for over 60 years!

Someone thought war was inevitable. The first peacetime draft began in September of 1940 and in a month 16 million men were registered. Later that month news articles suggested that Richardson was not ready to go to war. He felt the fleet was not yet up to that level and should be training back off the west coast.

Richardson continued to warn the president and the Navy leaders about the tenuous situation at Pearl Harbor. He explained again that the battleships would have to return to the west coast Navy yards to weld up their port holes, take up the fire hazardous teakwood decks, load their wartime ammunition allowance and accomplish other war preparational duties needed to fight.[xvii] Possibly unknown to him and others, dispatches and decoded messages were in Washington being studied.[xviii] Richardson was especially disturbed when he was forced by Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Harold R. “Betty” Stark, to cease daily long-range reconnaissance patrols.[xix]

However, Richardson’s brash and to-the-point discussion with Roosevelt in October led to his release as fleet commander on Sunday, January 19, 1941. He did not expect it. Admiral Stark had told him the duty would last another year. Richardson’s flag secretary Dyer brought the message to the golf course. Richardson simply commented after reading the orders, “My God. They can’t do that to me.” [xx] They had, however.[xxi]

He kept a good face under the unusual circumstances. His wife began to pack, preparing to leave her friends and her first cousin, Mrs. General Walter C. [Isabel] Short.[xxii] On January 31 Richardson did his last diplomatic duty at Pearl Harbor. The new Japanese ambassador, Admiral Kichisaburo Nomura, stopped over in Honolulu. Richardson knew him pretty well from duties in 1928 and probably back to the time Nomura first met Roosevelt in the assistant secretary of the Navy’s office. Nomura swore to his death in 1964 that he had no knowledge of the exact plans of Japanese attack.

On February 1, on board the flagship Pennsylvania, Admiral Husband E. Kimmel replaced Richardson. With the new title of commander in [CinPAC] fleet, he had the misfortune to live through the “day of infamy.”[xxiii] Knox later told Richardson the removal was simply because “you hurt the feelings” of the President. The Paris News ran the change of command article a day later with no editorial comment.[xxiv] Work on the new junior college football stadium seemed to be of more importance. But, the city leaders were stumping the army for a training base to be placed near Paris.[xxv]

Richardson took some time moving back to Washington, coming to Paris to stay with his wife’s cousin and sister-in-law on Church Street, many blocks south of the old Richardson place and near where her cousin Isabel Short once lived. Richardson also visited and stayed with his sister Jessie Chambers in her Detroit home.

He told his story to some friends in Paris and probably discussed some things with Paris News editor A.W. Neville, a boyhood neighbor from two blocks to the west. Most wondered just when it would become public. “He was very quiet about the matter,” says a grand niece Clareda Chambers Purser. “I can remember he had a gruff manner but did not scare us.” She remembered that Jessie was prone to long blessings at meals and that the admiral would comment that the breakfast would be cold before the prayer was over.[xxvi]

Moss Richardson, another of the admiral’s sisters, was an outspoken teacher who did not have her contract renewed in Paris in the early part of the century. On January 10, 1941 she wrote her brother from her happy life teaching in Canyon, hoping to encourage him in such a desolate moment. Somehow she sensed from calls and the news that her brother’s days as fleet commander were over. She related that her father said, “Mr. Wooten [the Paris superintendent] has not done anything to you that you would not have done to him. You never have approved of him and I suppose he knows it. If you could, you would have dropped him.”[xxvii] These wise words applied to Admiral Richardson, also, she thought. Moss went on to say her dismissal from the Paris faculty changed her life for the better. “You will be used,” she wrote.[xxviii]

Maybe that was why Richardson did not retire. There was more he could do. He came back to Washington, immediately asking Knox, “ Why was I detached?” Knox put it simply, “…you hurt the President’s feelings.”[xxix]

His most important work law ahead, and affects all military participants today. While in Paris resting before reporting to Washington, Richardson most likely noticed a local newspaper article on re-organizing national defense.[xxx] On March 25, 1941, Richardson was assigned to the General Board. Among other duties, he was chosen the senior member of the Special Commission for Re-organization of the Nation Defense. During this time the proposal to unify the Army and Navy was studied. He disagreed with the idea of a joint chiefs chairman, fearful that the Navy would lose it’s air forces arm.[xxxi] It did not completely, but only after his objections were voiced and put in writing. However, this was not his only assignment during the war years. On May 25, 1942 he found that calling mentioned by his sister Moss. He became executive vice president of the Navy Relief Society. He remained in that position until May, 1945.

On December 7, 1941 Richardson ironically said to his wife while at breakfast, “”We are on the verge of war which may break out any minute. About eight years ago while a student at the War College, I wrote a thesis on Japanese policy. After breakfast I shall find that thesis and read it to see if my opinions then expressed have changed.” The paper was found, and read. Soon after lunch the telephone rang. Richardson picked it up and a voice said, “Jo, turn on your radio.”[xxxii]

Richardson waited until the next day to show up at the General Board room where he was assigned to research, write new job descriptions and re-organization projects. The admirals and officials were giving various viewpoints, but when the president of the board said, “Joe, you haven’t said a word up to now” Richardson replied simply. “…I am going to pray for two things. The first is for the success of our arms; the second is that I shall keep my mouth shut!”[xxxiii]

Knowing that he would most likely be called before a hearing panel, Richardson destroyed his personal notes. This happened too often, apparently. For example, Admiral Stark’s aide, Commander William R. Smedberg III, later destroyed historically valuable wax cylinder records of phone conversations.[xxxiv] In the meantime Kimmel was fighting public disdain and was making attempts to state his case.

No less than nine investigations would follow. First there was a secret investigation done by the Army, then two delegates dispatched to Hawaii died on the way on December 12, delaying a bit a quick look at the situation. Then Secretary of the Navy Knox held his brief investigation before the Owen J. Roberts Commission was formed. There was an Army Board of Inquiry and a Naval Court of Inquiry begun July 13, 1944. Various admirals and generals held hearings and did research, including one by Admiral T.C. Hart in early 1944. Richardson was asked to head what became the May, 1945 Admiral H. Kent Hewitt investigation, but he declined. Finally, in 1946 a huge Joint Congressional hearing was underway. Richardson only testified in the last one.[xxxv]

Kimmel was not allowed to state his case in most, and especially not at the Hewitt hearings. All research into the matter turned political, Democrats trying to protect the party and the president, and Republicans digging to bring out the evidence. Even today after a 1995 investigation and a 2000 Congressional resolution, military secretiveness and political wrangling keep Kimmel and Short’s reputation hostage. Though Richardson is listed hundreds of times in internet chatter and archives, his stand has not yet been a popular item for writers to use. The story of his command has not been detailed in depth.

One reason is that Richardson continued living the military way, not wishing the public to know of his inner feelings about his president or fellow officers. Henry Lee Somerville, a Chambers family member, relates that the admiral took very serious his oath to obey the commander in chief and not to reveal personal feelings. The Joint Congressional hearing came in November of 1945 and he was only slightly frank in his testimony. The Paris News ran articles each day that Richardson’s name was mentioned and when he was questioned.[xxxvi] “Congressional investigation of the Pearl Harbor attack may disclose the reason for a matter which has puzzled many Parisians since early 1941,” the first installment began. “Admiral Richardson’s story may illuminate Mr. Roosevelt’s relationship to the events leading up to Pearl Harbor,” the story quoted a press release.

Richardson testified with a grim smile that in 1940 a state department advisor “was exercising greater influence over the disposition of the (Pacific) fleet than I was.” Of course, at that time Richardson was desiring to move the fleet back to the west coast. He was referring to Stanley K. Hornbeck and called him “the strong man on the Far East.”

However, Richardson expressed at the end of his session that “I never bore any resentment toward President Roosevelt because of my detachment... He was the constitutional Commander of the Army and Navy. I was one of the senior subordinates; there was a difference of opinion; each of us frankly expressed his views; neither could induce the other to change his opinion.” Working off his father’s thoughts written to him by Moss, “Had I been constitutional Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, I would have taken the same action.”[xxxvii]

Finally, 49 years after leaving Paris for Annapolis he went to his Georgetown home as a civilian. He wrote the Lamar County Echo in Paris that “I can now vote for the first time,” a privilege not then given to military personnel.[xxxviii] He could catch up on golf, fishing and his favorite hobby--cooking. “When we visited him,” commented Clareda Purser, “he would pick cherries from the trees downtown as he showed us around and bring them back for the cook to use.” Most times he was the cook.

However, he did not remain “quiet” long. Shortly after the Congressional hearings Admiral Richardson was approached by Admiral Dyer and the Naval Historical Division. The plan was to reconstruct Richardson’s career and view of events. It took almost five years of work. He did not allow its publication until 1973, after the death of Admiral Stark. Richardson had roundly criticized his boss, peer and friend.

On The Treadmill To Pearl Harbor: The Memoirs Of Admiral James O. Richardson is not terribly well organized but arranges his career and publishes photos for the public to see. The “Retrospect” chapter at the end of the book is revealing, though he writes, “I am beyond rancor or any feeling of ‘sour grapes.’ And, apparently he did not become a bitter old man as was his accusation about some of his fellow officers. He closed his book by saying his stepmother told him to follow a motto through life: “The wise man seeks to outshine himself. The fool seeks to outshine others.” [xxxix]

He pulled no punches, however, and blasted Roosevelt for his treatment of Kimmel. He never mentions Short, but most likely out of respect for the kinship between the wives. Richardson was convinced that Admiral Stark and the Secretary of Navy Knox were also involved. He was confidently sure “Stark could have picked up the phone and given Kimmel a last minute alert on the morning of Pearl Harbor.” [xl]

Despite his pointed criticisms of Roosevelt, the ensuing Roberts Commission actions and Richardson’s testimony before Congress, few books about Pearl Harbor other than At Dawn We Slept, Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History, and Infamy: Pearl Harbor And Its Aftermath have pulled deeply from Richardson’s memoirs. Ladislas Farago’s The Broken Seal is a finely edited 1964 look at message interceptions.[xli] And, Robert L. Stinnett’s new work, Day of Deceit, though roughly edited, has an overly footnoted, but helpful view of the event, published after release of more documents as ordered by President Jimmy Carter.

Almost each year a new book emerges on the subject. In 1947 George Morgenstern came out with Pearl Harbor: Story Of The Secret War.[xlii] He was very anti-administration and discussed suppressed reports. Rear Admiral Robert A. Theobald wrote in 1954 in The Final Secret of Pearl Harbor: The Washington Contribution To The Japanese Attack that Roosevelt’s plan included no word be sent to Hawaii.[xliii] This line of thought was taken up by Stinnett after his discovery of Lieutenant Commander Arthur H. McCollum’s eight-point plan. Many vital intercepts, and decoding of both diplomatic and military messages, were not forwarded to Pearl Harbor, say Farago and Stinnett.

Kimmel came out with a small, un-indexed book in 1955. In it he said it was the summer of 1944 before he was allowed to review the Japanese messages. An entire eight volume set of what he saw is in print to study now. Many more documents have been released and some are on the internet. Kimmel lost his son Manning during the Naval Court of Inquiry, compounding the hell he, his wife and other two sons were living.[xliv]

In 1958 Hans Louis Trefousse wrote What Happened At Pearl Harbor and made no mention of Richardson at all! [xlv] However, it is a helpful compilation of testimony and letters. Five years later Roberta Wohlstetter came out with Pearl Harbor: Warning And Decision.[xlvi] In it she used Roosevelt papers at the library in Hyde Park but did no interview with Richardson. It must be remembered that Richardson said more than once he did not trust journalists, therefore most were probably rebuffed when they asked him for help.

Several books followed but one interesting work came out in 1977 by Marlin V. Melosi called The Shadow Of Pearl Harbor: Political Controversy Over The Surprise Attack.[xlvii] It said that in 1944 Congressman were calling for a hearing, one New Yorker saying that in it Admiral Richardson would reveal much. For years Gordon W. Prange studied the events but died before At Dawn We Slept was published. It was completed in 1981 by Donald Goldstein and Katherine Dillon and gives a closer view of Richardson’s part in the saga.[xlviii]

Also in 1981 Paul Stillwell edited a very useful book called Air Raid: Pearl Harbor. It is a compilation of personal accounts by participants.[xlix] In it Dyer writes about Richardson’s command and his thoughts. In subsequent articles included in the work, Richardson is also mentioned by other former officers.

In 1982 John Toland came out with Infamy: Pearl Harbor And Its Aftermath.[l] It went through four printings and is still easily available at small libraries across the country. He did discuss minutely the role of Captain Johan Ranneft, the Dutch naval attaché who said in Washington D.C. he saw a chart of the Japanese ship locations on December 6. Still, the subject was not through being investigated! Kimmel’s two remaining sons, Ned and Tom, continue the quest to recoup their father’s reputation and lost two stars. In 1985 Frank Paul Mintz even wrote a book about the books called Revisionism And The Origins Of Pearl Harbor.[li]

Goldstein and Dillon continued work on Prange’s notes and manuscripts, resulting in a 1986 book called Pearl Harbor: The Verdict Of History. It casually mentions Richardson on only six pages.[lii] Richardson’s own book completed in the mid-1950s and published in 1973 was little used in all these views of the Pearl Harbor disaster.

Each admiral involved has documented stories in book form, and the Naval Institute has done numerous oral histories. Sadly, today almost all interviewed by the numerous institutions and writers are dead. The 1995 Dorn Report encouraged a few more books on Pearl Harbor, one entitled Scapegoats: A Defense of Kimmel and Short. It is by a former Navy captain who professes that political expediency to enter the war was paramount to the horrible results at Pearl Horbor.[liii] Though somewhat fictional and historically inaccurate at times, the 2001 movie Pearl Harbor kept alive the subject and began a barrage of internet materials for future research. Many participants still alive now realize the necessity of permanentizing memoirs.

Admiral Richardson hid his tracks well. No collection of personal papers have been found to exist. He became disoriented at the end of his life but May took care of him at the home at 2708 35th Place NW in Washington. He quietly died in Georgetown in mid-1974 at the age of 95.

* Skipper Steely is a writer who lives in Paris, Texas. He is author of Six Months From Tennessee.

[i] This is a complicated family tree. J.J. Richardson’s first wife, Frances Foster, died in 1879. His uncle, Oliver Perry Richardson, was a teacher in Spartanburg District S.C before moving to Hunt County after the Civil War with his wife, Hester Wingo. J.J. and Oliver P. Richardson were only nine years apart. Oliver, too, lost his first wife, and was left to raise a boy, W.P., and a girl, Lula. Oliver then re-married to Susan Neilson in 1864. The couple had Opie, born in 1868. When Oliver died, J.J. and Susan married in 1883, thus J.J. was not only the children’s first cousin, but also their stepfather.

[ii] The Paris News, January 20, 1933, opinion page, “Backward Glances” column. J.J. Richardson had a school in 1879 at the corner of 17^th [now 3^rd NW] and Cherry, or at the home mentioned. “While he was the laziest man in Lamar County, he could, when not chewing tobacco, do a fine job of instructing,” said student T.H. Hadden in an interview with Neville.

[iii] It is unlikely that W.P. spent much time in Paris. There are no letters extant of any correspondence he had with the Paris kin. For more on his career, see The Association of the Graduates of the United States Military Academy, Annual Report (June 12, 1929). He was in the Class of 1884, West Point graduate #3042.

[iv] A. W. Neville, Paris News, Backward Glances column, December 23, 1955.

[v] Felix R. McKnight, Dallas Morning News {Saturday, April 11, 1942), Page 3-V. “Sailors From Texas Direct U.S. Warships In Two Oceans.”

[vi] A copy of an old news article, undated and unnamed. It says O.P., sister of Captain Richardson of Fort William H. Seward at Haines, Alaska, was visiting Dawson in the summer of 1901 en route to St. Michaels to see her brother. On a trip down the Yukon River she met William Ogilvie, the just-resigned governor of the Klondike. At Nome a small boat took them to shore, but it was capsized. They were thrown on the wreckage of a big barge, and Ogilvie held on to her until help arrived. They married in Paris, Texas on April 15, 1903.

[vii]Jessie never had children, but raised a boy with her second husband, David Ayres Chambers. Her first husband was shot and killed in a strange event.

[viii] Moss taught in Paris, Texarkana, Austin and then settled in Canyon at WTSTC. She spent a couple of summers of study at Oxford. She taught English and literature.

[ix] Dick Richardson lived out his last years in D.C. residing at the Army and Navy Club. He is buried at West Point. For the best summary of his work and life, see Claus-M. Naske, Paving Alaska’s Trails (Landham, Maryland, 1986), pages 1,2,6, 12-20, 33, 39-48. This also gives a good look at his running feud with Alaskan Delegate James Wickersham after 1909.

[x] W.P. Richardson would work on the highway system on site during the summers and spend winters in Washington D.C. on assignment and attempting to raise the construction budget from Congress.

[xi] Paris Advocate, September 20, 1911. This was after his father died in 1909 and five months after his stepmother died. See Skipper Steely [ed.], The Paris, Texas Scrapbook, pages 80, 135, 159. These clippings are obituaries and marriage notices prior to the Paris Fire of 1916, collected and placed in one book. Most clippings do not have the newspaper name, but mostly were cut from The Paris Morning News or the Paris Advocate.

[xii] Joe Fenet Richardson inherited a large amount of property from the Fenet family, and some money when his mother’s sister-in-law died in 1975. He is credited with at least 30 episodes of Lone Ranger from 1950-1955. See Joe Fenet Richardson File, Steely Collection, internet correspondence from Steve Jensen: sj12969@mail.cedarnet.org.

[xiii] [Find]. Not in Treadmill.

[xiv] Louise Horton, Samuel Bell Maxey: A Biography (Austin, 1974). Maxey left his troops, rode to Richmond to request a change, but was given another command. He eventually did become commander of the Indian Territory, just a few miles north of Paris. His home is now a Texas Park.

[xv] Stillwell, Air Raid: Pearl Harbor, page 55.

[xvi] Stillwell, Air Raid: Pearl Harbor, page –[Find]. Carney became an admiral.

[xvii] James W. Downing, Colorado Springs, Colorado, internet memoirs. E-mail at jimmorena@aol.com.

[xviii] Read Ladislas Farago, The Broken Seal and Robert L. Stinnett, Day Of Deceit for details on decoding and intercepting messages.

[xix] Stillwell, Air Raid: Pearl Harbor, page 47.

[xx] Paul Stillwell, Air Raid: Pearl Harbor: Recollections Of A Day Of Infamy (Annapolis, 1981), page 45. Admiral George C. Dyer wrote this section

[xxi] Stillwell, Air Raid: Pearl Harbor, page 45.

[xxii] Mrs. Walter Crowder Short’s father, Walter C. Dean, was the city engineer of Paris, Texas from about 1890 to 1910, and helped construct the first city lake, Lake Gibbons. Her mother was from the McBath family, who arrived in the Paris region about 1858. The Dean family moved to Oklahoma City.

[xxiii] As an additional excuse to change Admiral Richardson’s position, the president and the Navy re-organized.

[xxiv] Paris News, February 2, 1941, page one.

[xxv] Paris News, March 10, 1941, page one. Three Chamber of Commerce representatives were in San Antonio.

[xxvi] Steely Collection, Purser File, Clareda Purser phone conversation with Skipper Steely, February 18, 1999; letter from Purser March 10, 1999. She called him Uncle Otto. “He was more imposing than gruff, I guess,” said Purser. “I was always in awe of him….” She more than once mentioned his sense of humor.

[xxvii] Richardson, Treadmill, 420.

[xxviii] Richardson, Treadmill, page 420.

[xxix] Richardson, Treadmill, page 424.

[xxx] Paris News, March 9, 1941, page one.

[xxxi] Richardson, Treadmill, page 440. Richardson was chairman of this committee. Navy representative Admiral John S. McCain refused to participate, so Admiral Ernest J. King’s assistant Rear Admiral Malcolm F. Schoeffel did. This re-organization report was released in April, 1945. Richardson wrote a minority report. See Herman S. Wolk, Air Force Magazine (September, 1996, vol. 79, No. 9), “The Founding of the Force.” Also on the internet.

[xxxii] James O. Richardson, “The Relationship Between Japanese Policy and Strategy in the Chinese and Russian Wars, and its Lessons to Us,” (Dissertation, Naval War College, February 1, 1934. Or, see his comments in Treadmill, page 451-453.

[xxxiii] Richardson, Treadmill, page 441.

[xxxiv] Paul Stillwell [ed], Air Raid: Pearl Harbor: Recollections Of A Day Of Infamy (Annapolis, 1981), page 93.

[xxxv] Stillwell, Air Raid: Pearl Harbor, Ed Layton’s section, “Admiral Kimmel Deserved A Better Fate,” page 284. Layton says the legal “sharks” in both the Army and Navy chose one man investigations because the accused was not allowed to cross-examine. Navy counsel John F. Sonnett, who later prosecuted union leader John L. Lewis, used trick legal questions. This frustrated Layton and others who could not expand their answers past yes and no. Hewitt was helpless to assist.

[xxxvi] Paris News, November 21, 22, 1945, page one. Also, see Richardson’s testimony from November 11 to 21, 1945, in PEARL HARBOR ATTACK: Hearings Before The Joint Committee on the Investigation of the Pearl Harbor Attack, Congress of the United States, Seventy-Ninth Congress, First Session, Part 1, November 15-21, 1945 (United States Government Printing Office, Washington D.C., 1946), pages 253-340

[xxxvii] Pearl Harbor Congressional Hearings, 1945-46, Part 1, page 340.

[xxxviii] Lamar County Echo, May 9, 1973. Each time Admiral Richardson was in Paris he would drop by to renew his subscription. The newspaper owner was Thomas B. Steely, a World War II Navy officer who served on a subchaser in the Mediterranean. Richardson officially retired on January 15, 1947.

[xxxix] Richardson, Treadmill, 471.

[xl] Richardson, Treadmill, page 450.

[xli] Ladislas Farago, The Broken Seal (New York, 1967). Robert L. Stinnett, Day of Deceit (New York, 2000). Farago’s is an easy reading work, but lacks the information declassified after 1979 by President Jimmy Carter. Stinnett is criticized for “trashing” several careers, but none more so that what Admiral Richardson did in Treadmill.

[xlii] George Morgenstern, Pearl Harbor: Story of the Secret War (New York, 1947.

[xliii] Rear Admiral Robert A. Theobald, The Final Secret of Pearl Harbor: The Washington Connection to the Japanese Attack (New York, 1954.

[xliv] Admiral Husband E. Kimmel, Admiral Kimmel’s Story (Chicago, 1955). Kimmel and is family were the recipient of numerous calls and angry letters.

[xlv] Hans Louis Trefousse, What Happened at Pearl Harbor (New York, 1958).

[xlvi] Roberta Wahlstetter, Pearl Harbor: Warning and Decision (Stanford, 1962).

[xlvii] Marlin V. Melosi, The Shadow of Pearl Harbor: Political Controversy Over the Surprise Attack 1941-46 (College Station, 1977), page 65.

[xlviii] Donald M. Goldstein, Katherine V. Dillon [editors], Gordon w. Prange [author], At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor (New York, 1981).

[xlix] Paul Stillwell [ed.], Air Raid: Pearl Harbor: Recollections of A Day of Infamy (Annapolis, 1981).

[l] John Toland, Infamy: Pearl Harbor and its Aftermath (New York, 1982), page 317. Ranneft’s son said in 1999 by phone with Skipper Steely that he was not sure, but that his father may have seen simply a guestimate of the fleet location.

[li] Frank Paul Mintz, Revisionism and the Origins of Pearl Harbor (Lanham, Maryland, 1985)

[lii] Goldstein Dillon [editors], Prange [author], Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History, (New York, etc., 1986).

[liii] Edward L. Beach, Scapegoats: A Defense of Kimmel and Short (New York, 1995).