LOS ANGELES (AP) — Ray Chavez, the earliest U.S. military survivor of the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor that plunged the United States into World War II, passed away Wednesday. He was 106.

Chavez, who had actually been fighting pneumonia, passed away in his sleep in the San Diego residential area of Poway, his child, Kathleen Chavez, informed The Associated Press.

As just recently as last May he had actually taken a trip to Washington, D.C., where he was honored on Memorial Day by President Donald Trump. The White House Tweeted a declaration Wednesday stating it was distressed to become aware of his death.

“ We were honored to host him at the White House previously this year, ” the declaration stated. “ Thank you for your service to our terrific country, Ray!”

Daniel Martinez, primary historian for the National Park Service at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, validated Wednesday that Chavez was the earliest survivor of the attack that eliminated 2,335 U.S. military workers and 68 civilians.

“ I still feel a loss, ” Chavez stated throughout 2016 events marking the attack ’ s 75th anniversary. “ We were entirely. We were bros and buddies. I feel near all of them.”

Hours prior to the attack, he was aboard the minesweeper USS Condor as it patrolled the harbor’ s east entryway when he and others saw the periscope of a Japanese submarine. They informed a destroyer that sunk it quickly prior to Japanese bombers showed up to strafe the harbor.

By then Chavez, who had actually resolved the morning hours, had actually gone to his neighboring house to sleep, purchasing his other half not to wake him since he had actually been up all night.

“ It looked like I just slept about 10 minutes when she called me and stated, ‘ We ’ re being assaulted, ’ ” he remembered in 2016. “ And I stated, ‘ Who is going to assault us? ’ ”

“ She stated, ‘ The Japanese are here, and they ’ re assaulting whatever. ’ ”

He ran back to the harbor to discover it in flames.

Chavez would invest the next week there, working all the time sorting through the damage that had actually paralyzed the U.S. Navy’ s Pacific fleet.

Later he was designated to the transportation ship USS La Salle, ferrying soldiers, tanks and other devices to war-torn islands throughout the Pacific, from Guadalcanal to Okinawa.

Although never ever injured, he left the military in 1945 struggling with trauma that left him nervous and shaking.

Returning to San Diego, where he had actually matured, he took a task as a landscaper and groundskeeper, associating the outdoors, a rigorous exercise and a healthy diet plan program that he continued into his early 100s with restoring his health.

“ He enjoyed trees and he very much enjoyed plants and he understood whatever about a plant or tree that you might perhaps would like to know, ” his child stated Wednesday with a chuckle. “ And he lastly retired when he was 95.”

Still, he would not discuss Pearl Harbor for years. On a last-minute impulse, he chose to return to Hawaii in 1991 for events marking the attack’ s 50th anniversary.

“ Then we did the 55th, the 60th, the 65th and the 70th, and after that we went to each, ” his child remembered, including that till Chavez’ s health started to fail he had actually prepared to attend this year’ s collecting next month.

Born March 12, 1912, in San Bernardino, California, to Mexican immigrant moms and dads, Chavez relocated to San Diego as a kid, where his household ran a wholesale flower company. He signed up with the Navy in 1938.

In his later years, as he ended up being popular as the attack’ s earliest military survivor, he ’d be approached at funeral and other occasions and requested for his sign or to position for photos. He constantly preserved that those occasions were not about him, nevertheless, however about those who provided their lives.

“ He ’d simply shrug his shoulders and shake his head and state, ‘ I was simply doing my task, ’ ” stated his child. “ He was simply an extremely great, peaceful male. He never ever yelped about anything, and he was constantly enjoyable to everyone.”

Chavez was preceded in death by his better half, Margaret. His child is his only survivor.

Funeral services are pending.

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Associated Press Writer Audrey McAvoy in Honolulu added to his story.