History of Hawaii
Pearl Harbor was surprisingly attacked on December 7, 1941 by the Imperial Japanese Navy, killing 2,403 people and sinking the main American battleship fleet. Fortuitously, the four Pacific aircraft carriers were not in port and escaped damage. Hawaii was put under martial law until 1945. Unlike the West Coast of the United States in which 100,000 ethnic Japanese citizens were interned, the Japanese American population in Hawaii completely avoided such similar fate, though hundreds of pro-Japan leaders were arrested. Pearl Harbor was the U.S.' main forward base for the Pacific War. The Japanese tried to invade in summer 1942 but were defeated at the Battle of Midway. Hundreds of thousands of American soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen passed through on their way to the fighting.
List of Medal of Honor recipients during peacetime
Prior to World War II, the Medal of Honor could be awarded for actions not involving direct combat with the enemy; 193 men earned the medal in this way. Most of the peacetime medals were awarded to members of the United States Navy for their actions during boiler explosions, man-overboard incidents, and other hazards of naval service. The last award for valor not in combat and was to Francis P. Hammerberg a United States Navy diver who received the Medal of Honor posthumously for rescuing two fellow divers at Pearl Harbour in the then Territory of Hawaii. He lost his life during rescue operations on February 17, 1945.