Pearl Harbor Through the Eyes of Wes Ruth and the JRS-1

December 7, 1941, marked a climactic day in U.S. history. You most likely remember it as one of those dates that you were forced to memorize in your high school history class. The surprise Japanese attack on airfields, facilities, and naval ships in and around the U.S. military installations at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, resulted in the death of 2,300 Americans and thrust the United States into the second World War. The day, however, is not just a footnote in a history book. It is a day marked by thousands of individual experiences that occurred and impacted the lives of all those involved. Soldiers, sailors, and airmen suddenly found themselves fighting in the first U.S. battle of the war and had to make rapid and difficult decisions under great stress. One such Navy pilot was Wesley Hoyt “Wes” Ruth, who found himself on one of the first flights to fight back against the attack.

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Ruth was a 28-year-old native of South Dakota who had joined the U.S. Navy in September 1938. On December 7, 1941, Ruth was an ensign serving with Utility Squadron One (VJ-1) located on Pearl Harbor’s Ford Island. In an interview with the Charlotte Observer in December 2013, Ruth recounted some of his experiences that day. He recalled eating breakfast when he saw the first wave of Japanese aircraft make the initial attack on naval and air facilities at Pearl Harbor. He ran to his car and was driving towards the airfield when he saw the USS Arizona, a battleship of the U.S. fleet, explode in the harbor after being struck with a bomb dropped from one of the attacking aircraft. He remembered debris from the exploding battleship falling onto his car. He arrived at the aircraft hangar as the attack continued, explosions and death surrounding him.

It would have been easy for him to stay at the airfield and work to recover from the devastating attack. But Ruth did not sit idly by on the ground. Buildings and ships still burned as he, along with four other pilots of the squadron, worked quickly to get airborne in an effort to find where the attacking aircraft were coming from.

Ruth gathered his copilot Emery C. Geise, radio operator Oscar W. Benenfiel Jr. and three sailors and  set out in his Sikorsky JRS-1, numbered 1-J-1 to locate the Japanese fleet. “Just before I left the [flight] line, the senior officer brought out three Springfield rifles [standard issue, single shot rifles] for us to use to shoot at the Japanese, which was a hopeless cause,” Ruth recalled in the interview. He and his crew were ordered to search north and east of Pearl Harbor before returning to their base. He chose to fly at an altitude of approximately 1,000 feet, right below the clouds, in case he needed to fly into the clouds to conceal his large, unarmed aircraft.

He flew about 250 miles from Pearl Harbor before he was forced to turn back due to dwindling fuel supplies. Near the end of their patrol, Ruth and his crew did spot one Japanese fighter returning from the attack, but successfully evaded it without incident. They returned safely to Pearl Harbor and Ruth reported what he had seen, noting that he was most likely getting close to the fleet since he encountered the Japanese fighter.

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Ruth and the other four pilots from Utility Squadron 1 received the Navy Cross, the second highest medal awarded by the US Navy, for their brave actions that day. Ruth’s citation states:

“The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Navy Cross to Lieutenant, Junior Grade (then Ensign) Wesley Hoyt Ruth, United States Navy, for extraordinary heroism in operations against the enemy while serving as Pilot of an airplane, and for extraordinary courage and disregard of his own safety during the attack on the Fleet in Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii, by Japanese forces on 7 December 1941. Although contact with the enemy meant almost certain destruction and despite lack of armament in this type of plane, Lieutenant Junior Grade Ruth voluntarily piloted a JRS-1 amphibian plane, with only Springfield rifles, in search of and to obtain information of the enemy forces. At a point two hundred miles north of Oahu, Lieutenant Ruth did contact an enemy aircraft and only through prompt and extremely skillful handling of his plane did he succeed in escaping and returning to Pearl Harbor. Lieutenant Junior Grade Ruth’s outstanding courage, daring airmanship and determined skill were at all times inspiring and in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.”

Ruth survived that fateful day, and the rest of the war, passing away on May 23, 2015, at the age of 101. He currently rests in Arlington National Cemetery along with many heroes who witnessed or perished during the attack on Pearl Harbor. Although he is no longer with us, we can still remember the actions he and his crew took that day.

The aircraft Wes Ruth flew on the mission to locate the Japanese fleet is still preserved at the National Air and Space Museum. 1-J-1 saw continued service throughout the early years of the war, before being retired to the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), where it was used for testing. After this service, it was officially  donated to the National Air and Space Museum as a result of its connection to the attack at Pearl Harbor.

The aircraft was recently moved from the display floor and now sits in the Mary Baker Engen Restoration Hangar at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. It is being prepared for a multi-year restoration effort to return the outward appearance of the aircraft to what it looked like the morning Ruth flew it. Next time you are at the Udvar-Hazy Center, make sure to visit the Restoration Hangar Overlook to see the progress being made on the JRS-1. Take a moment to remember what Ruth, along with so many other Americans, experienced on that day and how they reacted when war came early that Sunday morning.