Florida Catholic | Veterans Day

Veterans Day

A date which will live in infamy

AMY M. FERRARA | FLORIDA CATHOLIC STAFF

Published: 11.09.07

Joe and Angie Engel during a visit at the Pearl Harbor Memorial at Naval Air Station Pensacola.
AMY M. FERRARA | FC

PENSACOLA | Joe Engel sat on the couch and motioned for his wife, Angie.

“Come over here and pretend that you love me.” His mouth fell into a boyish grin.

Angie leaned toward her husband and wrapped both of her arms around his right one, which he had rested on her leg. Interlocked in that grip were 70 years of marriage and numerous shared memories of Dec. 7, 1941.

Not long after they wed, Joseph C. Engel Sr. and Angelina Bellanova moved to Pearl Harbor, where Joe was stationed as a pilot with the Navy. Angie smiled. “We loved Hawaii,” she said.

Joe’s blue eyes widened. “We rented a plane on our own,” he said, maneuvering the conversation into a story. “Angie asked, ‘Where’s my parachute?’” he continued. He told his wife, “Angie, you don’t know how to use it anyway.”

More than six decades later, Angie still huffed.

“It cost only $10,” Joe continued. “When we married, I was only making $72 a month.” The boyish grin returned. “She married me for my money.” He then commented on her raisin-filled Neapolitan meatballs.

“The meatballs came later,” Angie added.

In Hawaii, Joe put in for a three-year extension of duty. But their plans soon changed.

On the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, the Engels walked out of their house with their 14-month-old son and went to 7 a.m. Mass in the nearby city of Kula, the location of the civilian church.

“That’s why we weren’t at Kaneohe Bay for the attacks,” explained Angie.

But a friend was. As they left their house, they spoke to a neighbor, “Chubby,” who was on his way to the hangar to repair his son’s bicycle for Christmas. In the attacks, the Japanese destroyed the hangar. Chubby lost his leg.

At the church in Kula, the Engels heard sirens during the service, but the priest continued to celebrate Mass. When their baby grew restless, Joe walked him to the car. There he turned on the radio and received the news that the island was under attack.

He took his wife and son back to the base, where they saw hangars and planes exploding. Joe grabbed a 30-caliber rifle and started shooting at the Japanese planes that were flying overhead. As his bullets went up, he could see the enemy’s fire hit the ground 10 feet in front of him.

Still talking about their experiences, Angie flipped through a paperback book she had picked up from the coffee table. On the front and back covers were pictures of the 24 aircraft her husband, who retired as a commander with three Distinguished Flying Cross medals and six air medals, flew during his 30 years of Navy service. In January, Joe self-published this book, “Flight of the Silver Eagle,” with the help of one of his sons.

“Good and bad memories,” he said, nodding toward the book.

But one thing is for sure: Many of his memories as an aircraft commander during WWII include Angie. In the book’s dedication, Joe wrote, “Angie, I dedicated this book to you. You are an angel on earth. Raising four boys while living the Navy life for 30 years is no easy task. It is your love and commitment to our family and our faith that has enabled us to share these last 70 years together. The tomato sauce, garlic, olive oil and wine kept us alive.”

Three months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Angie and her son left Hawaii. Joe volunteered for VD-1, a photographic squadron, in the South Pacific. He knew the assignment would grant him a short leave to San Diego for training, where he could see his family. He was home just long enough for the second of his four sons to be conceived. Then he went back to war.

“Whenever I was in real difficulty,” he said, “I’d say a prayer.”

And sometimes prayer would find him. One day, while camped in the jungle around Guadalcanal Island, a chaplain drove by in a jeep.

“Got any Catholics in the area?” Joe remembers the chaplain called.

He raised his hand.

“‘Round ’em up,” the chaplain said. He then designated Joe to be the altar server. On the jeep’s hood, the chaplain spread the altar cloth and celebrated Mass.

Flipping through another bound compilation of Joe’s recorded memories, Angie read aloud from a letter that Win Ross, one of Joe’s buddies, wrote after the war. Ross thanked Joe for telling him that “the same God was looking after you and me regardless of what faith those were who were praying for me and that you and I would be through this war because HE was looking over us.” Ross was Methodist.

“I’m still in touch with my buddies through e-mail,” Joe said. The 95-year-old Holy Spirit Parish parishioner walked slowly down the hall and into his office. He slid onto his desk chair and clicked open his e-mail. As he watched a comedic video on You Tube.com about Osama bin Laden that someone had sent him, Angie pointed to pictures nailed to the wall above her husband’s computer: Joe in his commander uniform; Joe with his crew in front of his plane, the Liberator; Joe with white hair standing next to a plane at the Pensacola Naval Air Station.

At his wife’s persistent requests, Joe finally closed his e-mail. He then stood and walked a few steps to his file cabinet. Resting on top was a copy of a picture that showed him as a young man in uniform sitting on his camp bed at Guadalcanal. He pointed to a small detail on top of the dresser in the image. “That’s Angie’s picture right there.”

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