Pearl Harbor survivor who taught at Minnesota State Mankato dies at 101: 'This guy's a hero'

MANKATO – A neon green sign at VFW Post 950 silently mourns one of Minnesota's most acclaimed and well-documented wartime heroes, spelling out taps for "Charles Sehe, Pearl Harbor Vet."

Sehe died at age 101 on Nov. 3 at his Mankato home. He was the last Minnesota survivor to have served on the USS Nevada during the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.

After surviving what became known as the Day of Infamy, Dec. 7, 1941, which forced the U.S. entry into World War II, Sehe served on the Nevada throughout the conflict, including on a mission that brought him within sight of the D-Day invasion of Normandy, France. After coming home, Sehe became a researcher and academic, eventually teaching at Minnesota State Mankato for 23 years.

"This guy's a hero," said James Mason, sergeant in arms at the Mankato VFW, officially Morson-Ario-Strand VFW Post 950.

Mason, a gruff former Marine Corps gunnery sergeant, shared photos of Sehe at the post during a lunch in late November. He became friends with Sehe about a decade ago.

The Pearl Harbor attack left lasting psychological scars on Sehe, and he had a hard time talking about it with most people. But among other veterans, Sehe would open up, said Mason, 78. The two men would talk for hours over a beer or a breakfast at Hy-Vee, meeting several times a month. Sehe took an interest in the experiences of younger veterans, especially Marines, said Mason, and they in turn were fascinated by Sehe's story.

Surviving war

Sehe grew up poor in Geneva, Ill., according to a 2015 oral history with the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library. His father, a former horse trainer, lost his job during the Great Depression. Sehe recalled always being hungry, eating lunches of sugar sprinkled over lard spread on bread. As a teenager he got a job at a bakery where he'd eat cake crumbs off the bottom of the pans.

When World War II started, Sehe joined the Navy, despite not knowing how to swim. When he arrived at the USS Nevada, he was awed at the sight of the battleship, as he'd never seen a vessel larger than a canoe or clam boat.

He said he used to sit alone on the fantail of the battleship in the moments right before sunrise, when the sky was pinkish blue. He'd look down at the mighty propellers churning the water and watch as the foam of the ship's wake disappeared into the vast Pacific Ocean.

On Dec. 7, 1941, Sehe and his shipmates had just finished breakfast when they heard a boom. In shock, they ran to their battle stations. At the time, Sehe was a searchlight operator, his station a platform almost 60 feet above the deck.

Carrier-launched Japanese bombers and torpedo planes had attacked the American battleships docked close together at Pearl Harbor. The USS Oklahoma capsized, and the USS Arizona exploded, showering the crew of the nearby Nevada with flaming metallic fragments. Fifty of Sehe's crewmates died that day, their names joining the overall toll of 2,403 troops and civilians killed.

Sehe said he was left in shock by that day, with invisible wounds he carried for the rest of his life. Many of the casualties had been people he knew personally, including a hometown friend, Charles Thompson. Later, he'd say he felt guilt for his own luck. He'd almost been assigned to the doomed USS Arizona instead of the Nevada, he recalled.

After the attack, he and other sailors were given buckets and told to clean the battleship. He came across body parts, a unit of 10 Marines, burned and blackened. He couldn't pick up the remains at first, but he knew it had to be done. The gruesome job was like "picking off pieces from the clothesline," he recalled.

But he kept serving on the USS Nevada until 1946, as the battleship deployed to Alaska, France for the D-Day landings, and Iwo Jima and Okinawa. By the time he left the Navy, he had grown a foot taller.

Coming home

After the war, Sehe became a researcher and an academic. Sehe's mother, who lacked formal schooling, had always pushed him to get an education.

He completed two graduate degrees from the University of Iowa, including a doctorate. He was part of a research team that studied radioactive materials and the brain at Stanford University.

In 1967, Sehe came to Minnesota State Mankato, where he taught zoology and anatomy. Mike Drummer, 62, who said he took Sehe's human anatomy course in 1985, recalled the professor as tough but fair. "I never worked so hard in my life to get a C," Drummer said.

Bill Bessler, a longtime teacher at MSU, recalled his fellow science professor as someone driven by the desire to learn. "He really liked the academic life. … It was so different from what he had growing up, and what he had experienced in the war," said Bessler, 82.

Later on, Sehe confessed to historians that throughout those years he never knew for certain what he wanted to do, or why he was doing anything. "I know I had to keep going, but I didn't know where I was going," he said in a 2015 oral history.

It was his wife, Lillian, who kept him grounded. He met her in 1953 while working on a farm in Benton Harbor, Mich. They raised four daughters and a son.

She was his support system, recalled Isabel Sehe, their oldest daughter. Her father had a secret pain, one that he did not share with his children. What little they knew, they learned from their mother. Isabel Sehe, 70, recalled that her father had two separate periods of blackouts, and he was hospitalized for PTSD in the late 1960s.

He took up writing as a way of fighting his flashbacks. "I was trying to free my mind, troubled as it was!" Sehe told a historian.

After retiring, Sehe would continue to write as a way of processing what he had gone through. He would spend an hour or more every day at his desk, writing letters to other veterans in the area. He learned to love poetry, and found peace tending to the roses in his garden.

He became a fixture in the Mankato veterans community, and his service was recognized by organizations around the world. In 2020, France presented Sehe with the French Legion of Honor for his service on the USS Nevada in Normandy.

Mason, at the VFW, said he continued to meet with Sehe at his home as his health declined. He still keeps Sehe's handwritten letters to him.

On July 14, Lillian, Sehe's wife of 71 years, died. He died four months later and was buried with military honors Nov. 7 at Calvary Cemetery on the north edge of Mankato.

Tom McLaughlin, Sehe's neighbor and chaplain at VFW 950 in Mankato, said that Sehe's life will leave a lasting impact on him and other veterans in the area.

Every Dec. 7 for the last 20 or so years, McLaughlin, a Vietnam War veteran, made sure to call his friend on the anniversary of the attack that so deeply affected his life. During last year's call, McLaughlin said he thanked Sehe for surviving what he went through. He recalled Sehe's voice was faint, his body starting to fail. But Sehe thanked him back.

This is the first year McLaughlin won't be calling Sehe and talking about his life.

"I'm going to miss it," he said.