Butler resident Haley aboard ship for WWII peace treaty signing
When World War II officially ended, Butler resident Bernie Haley was there.
Haley, who died at age 58 in 1973, was aboard the USS Missouri when it arrived in Tokyo Bay late in the summer of 1944. Japanese officials boarded the ship, and the peace treaty was signed on Sept. 2 of that year.
“My dad was a radar technician on the ship,” said Butler resident Terry Haley, the youngest of Bernie Haley’s seven children. “The family sent me a lot of documentation from that time.”
Haley was 18 years old when his father died of a heart condition.
Haley possesses a diary written by his father during his 15 months aboard the USS Missouri, along with one of five letters Bernie Haley was permitted to send from the ship when the treaty was signed.
Haley’s father did not get a good look at the peace treaty signing itself.
He wrote that there “were so many dignitaries there, flags from the United Nations, cameras, commentators ... We were all shined up, standing at quarters, far from the scene of the surrender.”
But Bernie Haley was part of a USS Missouri crew that played a hand in that surrender. The ship waged battle on Iwo Jima and Okinawa during the war.
The diary indicated 731 Japanese planes, seven airfields and 15 Japanese ships were damaged as part of the USS Missouri’s raid on Okinawa.
Haley said his father rarely spoke of his time in the Navy aboard the ship. He was discharged Nov. 28, 1945, and returned home to Butler.
“He told me two stories,” Haley said. “One was that only two people were killed aboard the USS Missouri during the war. One shipman was killed when he was accidentally struck by one of the large guns as it was being turned. The other was a Japanese kamikaze pilot who flew his plane directly into the side of the ship.”
The other story told to Haley was the burial-at-sea ceremony the USS Missouri gave to the pilot.
“That pilot was only 17 years old,” said Debbie Haley, Terry’s wife.
“My father said they had a ceremony on board for him,” Haley said. “The crewmen stitched together a Japanese flag made from material they had on the ship as part of that ceremony. When the event was concluded, they buried him at sea.”
About six years after the war ended, that pilot’s family came to Pearl Harbor, where the USS Missouri is docked to this day, to thank the United States Navy for its dignified treatment of their son.
Bernie Haley was inducted into the Navy on Dec. 27, 1943. After attending boot camp for six weeks and getting assigned to radar school, he was assigned to the USS Missouri.
The diary indicated that the USS Missouri traveled 101,616 miles during Bernie Haley’s time on board — from June 10, 1944 until the signing of the peace treaty.
The USS Missouri serves as a museum now. Haley and his family visited the museum a year ago and stayed in the Royal Hawaiian hotel. Haley’s father stayed in that same hotel before setting sail from Hawaii.
“I guess we came full circle that way,” Haley said.
Haley was gifted a piece of burned wood from the ship during World War II. He also has a USS Missouri ball cap he proudly displays.
“This is a family legacy for us,” his wife said.
