Oldest Living Survivor of the Pearl Harbor Attack Dies at 105

Warren Upton, the oldest living survivor of the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the last remaining survivor of the USS Utah, has died. He was 105.

Upton died Wednesday at a hospital in Los Gatos, California, after suffering a bout of pneumonia, said Kathleen Farley, the California state chair of the Sons and Daughters of Pearl Harbor Survivors.

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The Utah, a battleship, was moored at Pearl Harbor when Japanese planes began bombing the Hawaii naval base in the early hours of Dec. 7, 1941, in an attack that propelled the U.S. into World War II.

Upton told The Associated Press in 2020 that he had been getting ready to shave when he felt the first torpedo hit the Utah. He recalled that no one on board knew what made the ship shake. Then, the second torpedo hit and the ship began to list and capsize.

Warren Upton holds a portrait at his home in 2021.

Shae Hammond/Bay Area News Group via AP

The then-22-year-old swam ashore to Ford Island, where he jumped in a trench to avoid Japanese planes strafing the area. He stayed for about 30 minutes until a truck came and took him to safety.

Upton said he didn’t mind talking about what happened during the attack. Instead, what upset him was that he kept losing shipmates over the years. By 2020, there were only three crew members of the Utah still alive, including himself.

There were an estimated 87,000 military personnel on Oahu on the day of the attack, according to military historian J. Michael Wenger. After Upton’s death, there are only 15 still alive.