World War II Database

Admiral Chester Nimitz was Commander-in-Chief of the United States Pacific Fleet and also Commander-in-Chief of all Allied forces in the Pacific Ocean Area from the last day of 1941 until after the end of World War II. This was a position of enormous responsibility with equally enormous pressures. Nimitz at Ease opens a window onto how the Admiral spent his off-duty hours and the ways he would escape those pressures, even if only briefly. Chief among his relaxation strategies was spending time with friends from outside the Navy. In this regard, Nimitz was exceedingly fortunate because in 1920, when he had been assigned to oversee construction of Pearl Harbor's submarine base, he befriended a young Hawaiian businessman named H. A. "Sandy" Walker and his wife, Una. After the Pearl Harbor Attack, Nimitz quickly rekindled his friendship with the Walkers.

Sandy Walker was a third-generation islander who grew up speaking Hawaiian interchangeably with English. When Nimitz first met the Walkers, they were newlyweds and Sandy was just at the beginning of his meteoric rise within Hawai'i's sugar industry. By the time the Japanese attacked in 1941, Sandy had become president of Oahu's largest sugar cooperative, American Factors, one of Hawai'i's "Big Five" companies. He and Una had moved into an expansive estate in Honolulu's Nu'uanu Valley and they owned a beach retreat on Oahu's north shore.

The book's author, himself a retired Navy Captain, is also Sandy and Una Walker's grandson. This gave him unique access to family records and most notably, to Una's daily diary for 1944. Nimitz' own official diary, the Gray Book, had only become accessible a short time before Captain Michael A. Lilly, USN (Ret.) started his research so these records, along with other sources, gave him a nearly day-by-day account of the Admiral's activities. Captain Lilly's sources all told him that Nimitz spent portions of almost every day in the Walker's company. The Admiral spent most weekends at the Walker's north shore beachside retreat and dined with the Walkers almost every weeknight, either at their Nu'uanu home or at the Admiral's Makalapa quarters. In this way, Lilly proposes, Nimitz found his needed escape from the weighty pressures of his command.

As Captain Lilly introduced readers to his grandparents, readers also came to know the Walker children (the author's mother, aunt, and uncle), their grandchildren (the author's older sisters), and several of Oahu's top business leaders with whom the Walkers also socialized. Lilly succeeded in making the reader like the Walkers; which was not difficult since by all accounts, the Walkers were very friendly, generous, and likeable people. I found this book an easy read and quite enjoyable on several levels. Nimitz at Ease offered a unique glimpse into Nimitz' life away from his waging of war and also introduced several of the businessmen prominent in Hawai'i's early 20th century history. I would gladly recommend this book to anyone wishing to know more about the more private side of Chester Nimitz throughout the war and/or about Oahu in the 1940s.