The Battle of Savo Island, August 9th, 1942

[2RHPZ]

Opening Salvos: The Battle of Savo Island, August 9th, 1942
Prologue, Battle, Epilogue

The news of the landing on Tulagi and on Guadalcanal threw Rabaul into a frenzy
of activity. Japanese 8th Fleet Headquarters, responsible for the defense of the
Solomons, the Coral Sea, and the Rabaul area, prepared for operations against
the American invaders. Vice-Admiral Mikawa Gunichi, Commander, 8th Fleet,
however, had a rather difficult operation before him. When the Admiral ordered
his forces to assemble, he had no clear knowledge of his opposition, but a very
clear view of his own strength. The main unit, and flagship, of his force was
the heavy cruiser Chokai, a 13,000-ton behemoth with ten 203mm guns and 24
torpedo tubes plus reloads. Chokai was the ray of light in a force of old ships,
and the only heavy cruiser available to Mikawa at this point, though four more
heavy cruisers were under his command.

These four ships were part of the most capable of Mikawa's forces, Cruiser
Division 6 under Rear-Admiral Goto Aritomo, consisting of heavy cruisers Aoba,
Kinugasa, Furutaka, and Kako. All of these cruisers carried six 203mm guns, and
eight torpedo tubes. They were anchored at Kavieng, on the north coast of New
Ireland, out of range of the U.S. bombers flying from Port Moresby, New Guinea
and Townsville, Australia. These were the primary forcesAdmiral Mikawa would
take to Savo Island, but they would need several hours to arrive - for the
moment, all that was on hand was Cruiser Division 18, light cruisers Tenryu and
Yubari under Rear-Admiral Matsuyama Mitsuhara. In addition, there were two
divisions of old destroyers deployed to Rabaul, but operations withheld all but
Yunagi from Admiral Mikawa's strike force.

On the Allied side, numerical strength and the naturally favorable position of
forces was impressive enough. Off to the east of Guadalcanal, Vice-Admiral Frank
Jack Fletcher commanded the three available U.S. carriers -- Saratoga, which
flew his flag; Enterprise, and Wasp, a recent arrival and veteran of the
Atlantic Ocean, including a sortie in the Mediterranean Sea. Her captain,
Forrest Sherman, was widely regarded as a brilliant officer, and soon he was to
be Admiral Nimitz' Chief of Staff. In attendance of these carriers was the
battleship North Carolina, with Enterprise's Task Force, six cruisers, and
sixteen destroyers. A fueling group of five oilers gave the Task Forces the
ability to remain on sea for the duration of the landings.

Screening the landing forces, TF 62, under Rear-Admiral Richmond Kelly Turner,
was the Australian Rear-Admiral Victor A.C. Crutchley's combined support/escort
force, eight cruisers and eight destroyers. Another seven destroyers were
attached directly to Turner, but Crutchley's units were further split.
Destroyers Ralph Talbot and Blue covered the western approaches to the bay soon
to be called Ironbottom Sound. Savo Island split The Slot, the body of water
between the eastern and the western Solomons, in two lanes of approach. To cover
both, and the eastern approach from Indispensable Strait, Crutchley divided his
unit into three parts. To the east, there were the light cruisers San Juan and
HMAS Hobart, plus destroyers Monssen and Buchanan, under the command of Rear-Admiral
Norman C. Scott, COMTG62.4. Covering the northern approach from the west,
between Florida Island and Savo Island, was Captain Frederick L. Riefkohl's Task
Group 62.3, with heavy cruisers Vincennes, Astoria, and Quincy, and destroyers
Wilson and Helm. To their south, Crutchley commanded his own force, TG 62.2,
with the Australian heavy cruisers Australia and Canberra, and U.S. heavy
cruiser Chicago. Escort and support was provided by destroyers Patterson and
Bagley. Crutchley's command arrangements within his thin-spread escort force was
easy, his force dispositions out of necessity and in hindsight good. His own
Southern Group was well-trained. Australia and Canberra had formed a team in the
Royal Australian Navy, and Chicago had been with them ever since early 1942. The
Northern Group was born out of necessity: as it made no sense to split the
Southern Group's experienced team up, the three remaining heavy cruisers
naturally went together, while the lighter forces of Admiral Scott remained in
the east to safeguard the sound from enemy light forces.

In the light of such opposition, naturally, there had to be at least one
advantage playing in the Japanese Navy's favor, and indeed there was more than
just one. First, there was the fact that Admiral Mikawa could hope to sortie
with a complete division of heavy cruisers which had operated together often
enough to be a working, powerful team. Second, his ships carried the 24",
oxygen-driven, one-ton-warheaded Type 93 (called "Long Lance" in Morison?s
History of United States Naval Operations in World War II) torpedo, the most
devastating of all Japanese weapons. This torpedo, designed to give the Japanese
ships a long-range punch, reached out to almost 40,000 yards, and could go as
fast as 49 knots (though not both at the same time). Third, his units all had
received the exceptional night training of all IJN forces (save, obviously,
carriers), while US ships owing to the risks of night training and to the
Neutrality Patrol's demands had little to no experience in this kind of
fighting. These were just the advantages known to Mikawa, and there was a fourth
one which he didn't know of.

U.S. command arrangements had been put into effect shortly after MacArthur's
return from the Philippines. In its pre-Guadalcanal form, Admiral Nimitz
commanded North Pacific, Central Pacific and South Pacific forces. The latter's
boundary with MacArthur's South-West Pacific Command ran right through the
Solomons and placed Guadalcanal barely within Nimitz' command authority.
Realizing this error, the U.S. high command soon edited the placement of this
boundary, and moved it several degrees to the west, thereby cutting the Coral
Sea, and putting Guadalcanal under Nimitz' authority. This was still an
unsatisfying arrangement, though there would be no more changes.

Overall coverage of the Coral Sea, and the approaches to Guadalcanal and Rabaul,
was only possible with cooperation between the commands. Or to give a more
telling example: if Admiral Turner desired an air search of Rabaul, he would
first have to ask Fletcher to forward this request to Admiral McCain, Commander,
Aircraft, South Pacific, who in turn would have to ask MacArthur's air commander
to conduct the search. Such arrangements could have but did not totally prevent
the search of Mikawa's route. But as we shall see, other problems did.

For Mikawa, August 7th was busy enough even without him sortieing against the
enemy. Submarines were detached to attack the shipping off Lunga Point,
Guadalcanal. Two transports were loaded with a few hundred men to conduct a
landing to reinforce Guadalcanal, and sent off the same day. At 1430, Mikawa's
assembled forces set off with him aboard Chokai. His route would take him out of
Rabaul's Simpson Harbor; around Cape St. George, the southern tip of New
Ireland; through the Buka Strait, between the islands of Buka and Bougainville,
down the eastern coast of Bougainville, and finally through the Bougainville
Strait into the New Georgia Sound, aptly named "The Slot" by U.S. naval forces.
If nothing unexpected was to happen, Mikawa's units would be off Savo Island by
midnight, 8th August.

By daybreak on August 8th, Mikawa's forces were in a position off the
northeastern tip of Bougainville. Mikawa worried about the presence of the enemy
carriers known to be somewhere in the area, but Rabaul could not give him any
positive hints of enemy carriers in range of his formation. Mikawa was told that
there were no enemy carriers in range - a grave mistake, which now threatened to
place Mikawa within range of some 140 attack planes on three US carriers.

Here one of the ironies and inconsistencies of history writing reveals itself .
No account condemns Mikawa's decision to attack - this one here makes no
difference - but it must not be forgotten that the number one factor in Mikawa's
success, indeed his mere survival, was extraordinary luck on his part. If truly
seen from Mikawa's perspective, indeed one can not help but to question the
logic of his decisions and rate them as impulsive more than thoughtful.

But in either way, Mikawa's seven cruisers and the sole destroyer were steaming
through The Slot already when night stopped Allied reconnaisance. And as luck
would have it, Mikawa remained an unknown factor for the defenders of the U.S.
transports.

In support of the landings, a complex air search plan had been developed,
involving many small elements from various bases in the area. One of the areas
spared from air reconnaissance, however, was The Slot. Admiral Turner, noticing
this gap in his all-important early warning system, demanded a search to be
conducted on 8th August over The Slot and the waters to its immediate north.
Additionally, MacArthur's SOWESPACCOM would dutifully conduct the appropriate
searches over its own territory. However, despite the urgency of Turner's
request, COMAIRSOPAC McCain failed to comply -- no air search would be conducted
over The Slot other than some more or less coincidental patrols.

Some of these came from carrier Enterprise, having drawn search duty for August
8, and launching several SBD Dauntless dive bombers. They would barely miss
Mikawa. Two planes did not miss Mikawa, however. It was a Hudson bomber from the
Royal Australian Air Force,that, its patrol originating from Milne Bay, New
Guinea, sighted Mikawa at 1025 on August 8th east of Bougainville. Immediately,
the pilot reported the enemy ships to his base. However, no radio contact could
be made with Milne Bay. The pilot decided not to follow Mikawa, and return to
his base to report on the sighting as soon as possible. The Hudson's report,
paraphrased, reached the invasion forces, and indicated to the Allied forces
that three cruisers, two gunboats, and two seaplane tenders were proceeding
south. Turner believed this force would establish a base in one of the islands
to the north, from where to employ planes against the Allies. Neither he nor his
captains appeared to consider the force a threat.

Turner's decision was partially justified. Seeing that the ships reported were
as a force too weak to hurt his screen, and that given the large variety of
vessels, especially the presence of seaplane carriers, it seemed unlikely that
this was a strike force, Turner decided not to go to a higher alert. Nor did he
specifically inform his subordinates of the presence of the enemy force, or of
what he intended to do about them. Certainly Turner had his hands full with the
events ashore and his own problems with unloading. Certainly, Turner could not
be asked to see through the haze of the message, that in fact five heavy
cruisers, two light cruisers, and a destroyer were part of this force. However,
he could well have presumed that the reported cruisers would attack him, and
that the gunboats might easily be something different; and alerted his
commanders accordingly, while asking Fletcher to intercept the force. He did not
do all of that; it would cost the Navy dearly.

Whilst Mikawa was moving south, the Allies were compounding the failure of their
intelligence by dropping their plans into the dustbin. Admiral Turner, realizing
that his transports were not yet unloaded and would require another day, and
that his Marines ashore would require the supplies which he could still land.
However, there was a problem there: no-one had anticipated that beforehand,
expecting only that five cargo ships, and not the entire 19-transport force,
would remain off Guadalcanal. However, Admiral Fletcher, owing to poor radio
communications, had no idea that Turner would retain his entire force (including
himself) off Guadalcanal, and radioed Admiral Ghormley on the evening of the
eight about his intention to withdraw. Ghormley, with no knowledge of Turner's
intention either, gave his okay. Fletcher thus duly informed Turner and set
about to retire, placing his refueling on the ninth within the radius of action
of his fighters to Guadalcanal. He intended to cover the expected five cargo
ships, and Crutchley's cover force, before withdrawing for good.

It was an unfortunate turn of events, and one for which only the Allies'
inexperience in loading and unloading combat transports could be called
responsible. Turner's miscalculation, and that of his subordinates, in presuming
the correctness of the sighting report, and in attempting to analyze what the
Japanese force would do, and not what it could do, added to the problem. As
eighth turned into ninth August, all that stood between Mikawa and his prey was
the thin and inexperienced screen of Task Group 62.6, under Crutchley. Or so it
would have been, but for the unfortunate results of the misunderstanding between
Turner and Fletcher.

It had dawned upon Turner that there were problems with his unloading when
Major-General Alexander Vandegrift of the 1st Marine Division acknowledged that
he needed additional supplies, and a clear view of the situation on Tulagi.
Turner acceeded, gave Vandegrift a destroyer-minesweeper, Southard to head to
Tulagi, and summoned him and Crutchley to a conference aboard his flagship for
midnight, August 8th. Darkness prevented Crutchley from taking a floatplane, or
small boat (which was inadvisable given the 30nm stretch of open water between
the Southern Group and the transports), and he took his flagship Australia to
the rendezvous, thus depriving the Southern Force of a heavy cruiser.

Upon leaving, Crutchley placed the senior officer, Captain Howard D. Bode of USS
Chicago, in charge of the Southern Group. With Crutchley's departure, the entire
western line of defenses had no flag officer with it. Furthermore, Crutchley did
not inform either Admiral Scott of the Eastern Group nor Captain Riefkohl of the
Northern Group of his absence. Bode meanwhile decided against placing Chicago in
front of Canberra, unwilling to risk night maneuvering. Bode decided that
instead of making the change immediately, he might do so if Crutchley did not
return before the next turn in the pattern, when placing Chicago before Canberra
would be less risky. Furthermore, Bode believed Australia to be back soon, and
the conference to be short.

Bode was right in assuming the latter - Crutchley's conference with Turner was
short lived, and by midnight, Crutchley was back aboard his flagship. However,
he did not regard night-time maneuvers as a good idea, and stayed in with
Turner's force, some twenty miles from his group, again without informing the
hapless Bode, who went to well-deserved and needed sleep, or Admiral Turner. Two
days of continous Condition One - the entire watch on duty - had not improved
the combat readiness of the U.S. force either. By the evening, Condition Two had
been declared, with only half the watch on duty. Everywhere about the force,
tired Captains and men went to their bunks, to gain strength for the next day's
hard work.

Admiral Mikawa's approach was made even easier when Rabaul signalled him that
air strikes had already accounted for a good deal of the enemy forces in the
sound, including eight transports (which may have been important in his later
decision to leave the transports alone instead of going after them). At midnight
on August 8th, Mikawa's forces went to battle stations. One of the most
spectacular naval battles ever was commencing. Mikawa's units sighted the island
of Savo at 0047, and three minutes later, lookouts spotted the destroyer Blue,
on its southerly patrol leg, at a mere 10,000 yards. The destroyer had his radar
operating, but failed to sight the Japanese force, coolly steaming at 22 knots,
guns trained out on Blue, into the northern passage. Another false destroyer
contact was made to the north, however, and Mikawa again eased his forces south,
into the southern passage.

Half an hour past one in the morning, Mikawa's line began to make for 30 knots,
and went into battle. In another example for the luck that shone on Mikawa, even
his close range sighting of the crippled destroyer Jarvis could not unbalance
the admiral, who held fire.

Not too long thereafter, however, at 0130, Chokai's lookouts sighted the
Southern Force, and the Northern Force thereafter, 17,000 yards distant. A
minute later, Chokai's first torpedo left its tube, and five minutes into its
run, the eerie silence over the sound was broken by the rolling thunder of
Chokai's first eight-inch volley, aimed at Canberra.

On the latter, the sudden shock of gunfire from the north brought the bridge
watch into action and Captain Getting to the bridge, but her engagement that
night would be swift and violent. Turning northeast to unmask her aft batteries,
Canberra was hit some twenty plus times in a matter of five minutes, lost power
for her armament and pumps, and was rendered unable to fight with not a single
main gun round fired. A single torpedo, fired by the destroyer Bagley, had also
hit Canberra.

On Chicago, hints at the presence of enemy ships had been seen earlier but not
triggered a response. Captain Bode, in tactical command, was in his cabin, and
hurried up. Even as aircraft flares blossomed over the Southern Group, and
Canberra started her turn, few on Chicago figured out the facts. Chicago did not
get to fire her 203mm guns either, when she began a series of maneuvers
undertaken to evade torpedoes. Alas, confusion reigned on her bridge. Captain
Bode, who had come up from his cabin, reports came in of torpedoes approaching
from starboard. Bode turned his vessel towards that direction, leading his to
comb the Japanese torpedo spread. However, moments later, the bridge lookouts
spotted torpedoes to port, from on the unengaged side, possibly from the same
spread of Bagley that had hit Canberra. Bode swung his ship around again, trying
to comb the new thread, but by doing so, exposed the entire length of his ship
to the Japanese torpedoes. One slammed in Chicago, crippling her. Slowly, she
swung westward (via a southerly heading), out of the battle. Captain Bode,
immersed in the plight of his ship, and fighting the damages incurred, ignored
his role as task group commander and failed to issue orders to his ships or to
inform his superiors of what had happened. Chicago shortly rendered fire support
to the destroyer Patterson, which was dueling with Japanese light cruisers
Yubari and Tenryu. From Patterson, the only contact report had been made by the
Southern Group, issued by Commander Frank Walker via radio at 0146.

While Chicago and destroyer Bagley steered clear of the enemy, Mikawa having
turned northeast for more prizes, Patterson remained in contact until 0210. To
Captain Riefkohl of Vincennes, officer in charge of the Northern Group, the
actions south of him were masked by a cloudbank hiding the ships, though the
fire of Patterson at the Japanese light cruisers was seen and judged as a minor
engagement with light forces. Riefkohl accordingly refused to leave his
position. Vincennes had in fact received Patterson's call regarding enemy ships
but Riefkohl had not been informed. Now, with a slight increase in speed to 15
knots his only reaction to the presence of the enemy, he elected to wait for
orders from Admiral Crutchley. His unit had just executed another of its
scheduled turns, keeping course along the edges of a large box-like figure.
Vincennes led, followed by Quincy, and Astoria in the rear. Destroyers Wilson
and Helm had lost their positions on the flanks and were hurrying to catch up.

Admiral Mikawa, his helm already due northeast to deal with the Northern Force,
now completely lost the coherence of his force. Already, the elderly destroyer
Yunagi had departed the rear of his force, and now, just as the Kinugasa had
aligned herself right behind the flagship Aoba, and the Kako, the Canberra
drifted into the path of following Furutaka, forcing her to turn to port at
once, leading her and the two light cruisers trailing her away from the main
column. Now, the two separated pincers were moving at will against the
outnumbered and unsuspecting Northern Force.

Riefkohl found himself, or would soon find himself, in a little-promising
situation: to his rear, Chokai, Aoba, Kako and Kinugasa threatened to cross his
T from the rear, a rather unusual maneuver but efficent nevertheless, while to
the forces south, Furutakaand her two lighter colleagues would have to exchange
broadsides with the enemy.

Mikawa could allow himself a moment of pleasure when at 0150 the searchlights of
three Japanese cruisers snapped on to light the U.S. line up. A moment later,
the first salvo left Chokai's gun tubes, and soon the entire Japanese line was
firing, with torpedoes added for good measure.

On the U.S. ships, disbelief was the common reaction to the sudden illumination.
Captains Riefkohl and Greenman (of Astoria) were certain they faced the Southern
Group, accidently assuming their Allies to be the enemy. Soon, however, shells
erased all hope that a peaceful conclusion could be found with a radio call or
flag hoisting (although Riefkohl tried the latter with curious success lasting
several minutes). Riefkohl ordered battle stations and twenty knots, the latter
being made impossible by untimely interference from a torpedo from Chokai.
Neither of the three heavy cruisers put up much of a fight, though two salvoes
from Quincy slammed into Chokai, destroying a gun turret.

As the battle unfolded, further problems reduced Mikawa's line, now merely a
loosely connected and very broad bar instead of a neat line, but it was not
later than 0220 that all three U.S. cruisers were reduced to swimming wrecks.
There remained little to do for Mikawa, who kept to a new northwest course he
had established during the brief engagement with the Northern Force. There, U.S.
picket destroyer Ralph Talbot blundered into the Japanese path and was given an
unhealthly large dose of fire. Burning and lisiting, only a rain squall at the
right time saved the little ship from becoming another victim of Mikawa's. The
Admiral, after consulting his staff,decided at shortly before three in the
morning to cancel any further attacks and retire at top speed to Rabaul.
Thereby, he concluded the first naval battle fought in the Solomons. The dawning
of the new morning saw the vicinity of Savo littered with wrecks -- or worse, it
didn't. Vincennes had slipped under at 0300 already, with her surviving crew
being rescued from the shark-infested waters. Astoria had looked as if she were
salvable, and energetic efforts went into her, improving her watertight
integrity and keeping fires down, but uncertainty rose with regard to her ammo
lockers, which were presumed to have not been flooded - correctly. Thirty
minutes past midday, Astoria accompanied Vincennes and Quincy, having already
sunk at 0238, down to the ground of Ironbottom Sound.

Canberra, burning fiercely in her interior, was ordered to be scuttled should
she not be able to accompany Turner's retreat at 0600. With lots of fires raging
around the boilers but none in a position to power the ship's engines, rudders,
or even pumps, the ship was sunk by U.S. destroyer Ellet. Admiral Fletcher did
not turn around to persue Mikawa,as the Japanese Admiral had expected, but kept
heading southeast. Like rats leaving the sinking ship, all ships abandoned
Ironbottom Sound by the evening of August 9th. Silence fell over the sound, and
no hints remained that only a day before, Allied and Japanese naval forces had
fought the largest surface battle to that date in the Pacific.

Several questions need to be discussed here, even if only for the sake of
completeness. The primary one to be solved is, who must be made responsible for
this disaster? First on this list would be Admirals Crutchley and McCain: the
first, for failing to make known his extension of his stay with Turner's force,
and for going to see Turner without informing anybody but Bode of his absence in
the first place. The second for failing to conduct a requested air search
without any reason and not informing the commanders of failing to conduct it,
leaving them in a wrong feeling of immunity.

First and foremostly culpable was Turner, whose was the plan, afterall, by which
the forces operated; which did consider that the Northern Force would not need
flag officer with it; which had provided for the spotty air reconnaisance plans,
and for Fletcher's early withdrawal.

Somewhere on the list would be Captain Bode of Chicago, not for failing to stand
up to his new post as Task Group commander but for not informing the other
commanders of the presence of a strong enemy force. Certainly, also, his
handling of Chicago had been somewhat spotty; granted that the situation was
difficult, his decision to head west, instead of east towards the transports,
whose defense was his job, and where Australia was to be found, was false. Had
he encountered Mikawa again, alone, he would have stood no chance.

There is, however, much more blame to spread around than could possibly be laid
upon the commanders on the spot. The Allied operations plan was poor. Although
the distribution of the forces could not be helped, the fact that there were
only two flag officers with the three screening groups necessarily led to
command problems. Captain Bode of Chicago can not be considered ill-suited for a
task group command, but to control damage control efforts on his ship,
designated a new course and general approach to the action for his vessel,
worrying about torpedoes and the like, in addition to trying to control the rest
of his force proved too much. The dogged skill of the Japanese torpedo men and
gunners and the coolness of the Japanese approach added to the completeness of
the victory by ascertaining that the initial blows would come out of the dark
and be deadly at the same time. The engagement with the Southern Force had been
decided in five minutes, and not much more time was needed to deal with the
Northern Force, which had a slight advantage of strength, position and alertness
over its southern counterpart. This combination of near flawless execution of a
well-exercised operation by the Japanese, and the problematic layout of command
and control arrangements on the Allied side led to the defeat of Savo; the worst
naval defeat ever suffered by the U.S. Navy.

[2RHPZ]

Savo Island: The Worst Defeat

By Captain George William Kittredge, U.S. Navy (Retired)

An officer in Turret Two of the heavy cruiser Chicago (CA-29) looks back 60 years to August 1942, when Japanese cruisers and destroyers blew off 40 feet of his ship's bow and killed or wounded 26 of his shipmates.

We sighted the masts on the horizon, then the ships—cargo ships, transports, destroyers, cruisers, and the aircraft carrier Enterprise (CV-6)—more than I had ever seen. The Anzac (Australia-New Zealand Army Corps) Squadron took its place in the screen. It was good to be part of a U.S. Navy task force and operate with U.S. flag hoists again.

Four days later, we went to battle stations about midnight. This was good, because it gave us something to do. All through the ship you could feel the tension and excitement. We couldn't have slept anyway, and the waiting alone in our bunks might have made us afraid.

That afternoon, our radar had picked up a Japanese patrol plane 25 miles east of the task force. Rear Admiral Norman Scott, the screen commander, made the decision not to shoot it down. No fighters were launched from the Enterprise. The sky was three-quarters overcast, and the ceiling was about 1,500 feet. Chances were good the patrol plane had not sighted us. In the morning, we would know.

By 0400 we could make out Savo Island off the starboard bow. We were up to 27 knots with the bow wave curling back from the clipper bow of the Chicago (CA-29). Every so often, the bow would dip into the swell and send salt spray flying aft as far as Turret Two. You got the feeling that a Japanese lookout stationed on Savo couldn't help but see it, and that when we rounded the island, half of the Imperial Fleet would be there with guns trained and ready. Shortly after 0500 we rounded Savo and headed for Iron Bottom Bay.

Behind us stretched the task force, and in the van, loaded on troop ships and attack transports (APAs) were the Marines, some 20,000 of them, bound for Guadalcanal. Ahead of us was the new light cruiser San Juan (CL-54), flying the flag of Admiral Scott. And ahead of the flagship, the first rays of the morning sun were lighting the shores of Florida Island, Tulagi, and Guadalcanal. The bay was empty. Not a Japanese ship was in sight.

The vast armada astern split into two groups, with the larger heading for Guadalcanal and the smaller heading for Tulagi with the San Juan still leading the way. Astern of us were the Australian cruisers Canberra and Australia. The New Zealand cruiser Leander brought up the rear.

Suddenly, the order came to stand by. The San Juan had sighted eight Mavis flying boats anchored in the bay south of Tulagi. I heard the gunnery officer's voice in the earphones of my headset. "All turrets match in train!" The trainer, Benny Benson, had seen the "bug" move on his dial and Turret Two, my turret, lurched like a freight train as he automatically matched in train. I reached out and pulled the door shut to the officer's booth, closing out the light from the early morning sun. Through the port to the gun room, I could see the three gun captains, naked to the waist and gleaming with sweat even though the morning air was chilly. Each of them was glued to the breech of his 8-inch gun, motionless, waiting for the order to load. The order came over the phones and I relayed it through the voice tube: "Load!"

Three right arms moved in unison, swinging open the three breech plugs and cutting in the ejection air that whistled through the long gun barrels. It came on automatically, and the noise was deafening. There was a rumbling as the rammermen sent the pointed black projectiles home into the open mouths of the guns. A whistle blew, a real one this time, and powder bags shot into the gun room from powder boxes on either side. The powdermen tossed in two bags to a gun. The gun captains kneeled and primed. The breech plugs flew closed, and three men snapped back like rubber bands to the ready lights mounted beneath the powder trays. The lights flashed on simultaneously. Turret Two was ready. The men became very tense.

Suddenly, the engine of an F4F Grumman Wildcat roared overhead. Then came another roar, as his section mate joined him. I glanced at my wristwatch. The time was 0550. That was when it started, the first major offensive action of the war in the Pacific, on 7 August 1942.

I watched through the periscope in the officer's booth of my turret as those two fighters closed the anchored flying boats. It was utterly peaceful in the lagoon where the seaplanes were moored. Tulagi rose in the background like a dark green apple dumpling. There wasn't a light on the shore or movement of any kind.

We had taken the Japanese completely by surprise. When the leading fighter was within 500 yards of the first flying boat, he opened up. Fire flew from his guns and seemed to curve slightly downward and hit the water and bounce lazily upward again. The two planes made pass after pass and soon all eight seaplanes were aflame. We commenced the bombardment shortly afterward at 0600, according to our plan.

All morning we steamed back and forth about 2,000 yards from the beach—point-blank range for 8-inch guns—and fired salvo after salvo into the two islands. All morning we remained at battle stations. Rumors were rife that the Marines on Guadalcanal hadn't found any opposition; that all the Japanese had withdrawn inland; that the fighting was almost over on Tulagi.

But the fighting wasn't over on Tanambogo. I could see it plainly, because we were giving the Marines the close supporting fire they needed so badly. Two Marine tanks had landed. One stalled at the water's edge, and the other went up the hill alone. Halfway up the hill, 50 Japanese Special Naval Infantry came out of nowhere and swarmed over the tank. Looking through my turret's periscope was like looking into a bad dream. They poured gasoline over the tank, and black greasy smoke belched skyward. The hatch flopped open, and one man jumped out. A rifle butt knocked him down. One of the enemy infantrymen tossed in a grenade, and a brilliant shaft of light flashed from the opening. No one jumped out. The Japanese then squatted around the fallen Marine and beat him to death with their rifle butts. I turned away from the turret periscope. The gun boss was saying something over the sound powered phones again.

"All turrets load and report when ready. Salvo fire. Single salvo."

The turrets reported ready in order.

"Stand by."

"Fire!"

The ship shook, as nine 8-inch guns recoiled in unison. I looked through the eyepiece of the periscope again. There was no charred tank. No Japanese infantry were grouped around the fallen Marine. There was just a pall of white smoke and a very large hole in the ground.

At 1130, chow was piped down. Men in the handling rooms sent runners to bring sandwiches from the ship's galley for the gun crews in the turrets. We remained at General Quarters.

On the dot of 1200, we received the first air attack. It was senseless, without meaning, like so many attacks the Japanese made throughout the war. Tactically, it was well planned. At the higher levels, the Japanese had moved fast. They had assembled a strike force of about 40 Mitsubishi twin-engine torpedo planes. A coast watcher on Bougainville had seen some of them taking off and sent a warning. They came in over the western tip of Florida Island. The squadron leader used his head. Florida Island lies north of Tulagi and Tanambogo and encircles them like a flattened crescent. The squadron leader kept his planes low and close to the water on the flight down from Bougainville so the hills of Florida Island would screen his planes from Allied radar. When the attack started, the planes came over the hill at the western edge of the island and followed the gentle slope of the periphery down to the water again. I counted 43 of them. There was no mistaking the Mitsubishis; we had met them before in the Coral Sea. They were big, with two engines, painted green and looking something like a dragonfly the way the tail was rounded instead of coming to a point. They also had a nasty stinger in each of their tails—a machine gunner in a little green house all his own.

On they came, 50 feet above the water in three unbroken lines, and we waited. Iron Bottom Bay provided little room to maneuver, and there must have been more than 100 ships milling around as the Japanese planes closed to drop their torpedoes. Two ships collided before the first wave arrived.

The amazing thing about that attack was that the Japanese never dropped a torpedo. They just fled through the whole armada with every ship in the outfit blazing away at them. But they did do damage. One crashed into a destroyer, and the other hit a freighter, the George F. Elliot, setting her on fire. And they got hit, too. Some fell on one wing and did cartwheels as their wing tips dug into the water. Others burst into orange flame and made perfect landings in the water. All in all, the Japanese lost 12 planes. We were lucky we hadn't lost more ships.

Dive-bombing and horizontal-bombing attacks continued the rest of the day. We remained at general quarters and continued to wear out our guns, shooting at targets on the beach whenever the Marines needed supporting fire. Toward the middle of the afternoon, so many of the men were asking permission to go to the head that the efficiency of the gun crews was impaired. Paper containers were passed throughout the turrets. There was no ventilation. It was hot and it stunk. Men passed out and were brought topside to be revived, then went below, only to pass out again. That was 7 August.

With sunset came relief from air attacks. We secured from general quarters, and Condition Two was set with only half the guns manned. Men hurried topside to breathe the cool night air. Vomit and debris were cleaned from the turrets. But nobody slept, and nobody got very far from his general quarters station. Through the night, gunfire continued on the beach. There would be a flash and a series of flashes like lightning, or a dull, red glow followed by a distant rumbling. It was impossible to sleep. An hour before dawn, we went to general quarters again. And at dawn, the air attacks resumed.

Until 1200 on the 8th, we had air support from our carriers, which were lying off Guadalcanal about 70 miles to the southwest. But by then the carriers were down to their minimum of fighters and had to withdraw. Before they left, one of the most macabre incidents of the whole affair occurred.

The Chicago had dropped out of the bombardment group to launch one of our Curtiss-built scout observation seaplanes for inner air patrol against the threat of submarine attack. It was launched from the cruiser by catapult. Naval Reserve Lieutenant Anthony Kolonie was the pilot. When Kolonie came back, he brought another passenger besides his radioman. The passenger was a fighter pilot off the Enterprise. Kolonie told it something like this:

I was flying about 100 feet above the water between Florida Island and Guadalcanal. Out of the corner of my eye, I kept watching the bomber flights going overhead—Japanese flights from the north and our own coming from the south. Sometimes those bomber squadrons passed so close they almost got in each other's formation. But they always kept on going. It was the fighters that worried me. I knew I would be duck soup for a Zero fighter. All of a sudden, I saw a column of smoke directly overhead and an F4F following a Japanese bomber down in his last dive. Right behind the Grumman was a Zero. You know how you try to yell when you see something like that. You know all the time the guy can't hear you but you yell anyway. Well, I kept yelling and halfway down black smoke began to come out of the F4F. Then I saw the F4F level off and roll over. The pilot dropped clear, and his parachute blossomed out. He never knew the Zero was behind him until he got hit and his plane started to burn. The Zero beat it as soon as the F4F was on fire. I watched the parachute coming down and landed alongside where the pilot went in. My radioman went out on the float and pulled the pilot aboard. He was horribly burned. We got him into the rear seat and I took off again and started to fly back to the ship. Halfway back, my radioman said, 'Sir, the pilot wants to talk to you on the intercom.'

'Put him on,' I said. About a second later, I heard the pilot mumble, 'Are those Zeros up there?' You could tell he was badly hurt from the way he talked. I looked up. A flight of Japanese dive bombers was going over at about 12,000 feet escorted by Zeros. I turned around and nodded. He held up a forefinger and motioned towards the earth and tried to laugh but his lips were charred and they split. 'Put me back in the water,' I heard him say over the intercom but there was no laughter in his voice.

That afternoon Lieutenant Kolonie flew the fighter pilot back to the Enterprise, because the "Big E" was withdrawing to the south. We got ready to face the afternoon air attacks without fighter support. Again, sunset brought relief, but this time it didn't matter much. Nobody wanted to leave the guns, and we slept where we were. The stench had subsided somewhat, and nobody was sick any more. We went to Condition Two again. The explosions on the beach kept up.

The general alarm shook us out about 0200 on the 9th. The gun boss put out the dope over the phones that the coast watcher up at Bougainville had sighted a Japanese cruiser and destroyer force coming down through the straits just before sunset. He said they should be here shortly.

Someone asked what the battle plan was.

The Australian cruiser Canberra and ourselves were going to guard the south pass between Guadalcanal and Savo Island, the gun boss said, and the Astoria (CA-34), Vincennes (CA-44), and Quincy (CA-39) would guard the north pass between Florida Island and Savo. The Blue (DD-387) and the Ralph Talbot (DD-390) were to act as radar pickets to the southwest and northwest, respectively.

What about the Australia?

Royal Navy Rear Admiral V. A. C. Crutchley had gone back in the Australia to confer with Admiral Scott in the transport area. Two destroyer flotillas would be back there to guard the transports in case the Japanese broke through us.

We didn't have long to wait. For a while, we steamed on in the wake of the Canberra, making a seemingly endless oval in the waters of the south pass. A rumor raced through the ship that the Blue had been hit and was barely keeping afloat. The rumor put everyone on edge. We were alert, and it didn't matter that we had had no sleep for two nights. It also didn't matter that we had had no hot food for two days. A surge of excitement was in the air.

Contact! On the port quarter!

We were in for it now. We were heading northwest and coming up from the south. Our forward turrets couldn't bear. The Japanese force must have gone around the underside of Guadalcanal. Were they faster than we thought?

Crack!

The 5-inch guns were firing star shells. Pretty soon we would be able to see what the score was. But they weren't going off. I could hear the gun boss over the phones, asking the secondary battery officer if his guns were firing antiaircraft shells instead of star shells; if his loaders were putting the star shells in the fusepots correctly; if. . . . No matter. Up ahead, the Canberra was coming about and heading toward the enemy. We soon followed her, and our forward turrets would bear, and our brand-new fire control radar would take the place of our eyes. What if the star shells didn't go off? Director One on top of the foremast would be able to bear, and Director One had the fire control radar on top of it. Radar could see in the dark. The Chicago began to heel as the rudder went over. I shouted to Benny Benson: "Match in train, goddamn it. Bear a hand!"

The turret lurched as Benson slewed it, all the faster because the ship was turning. I looked in the gun room. The turret captain's eyes met mine, and he grinned. Nervously, I grinned back.

The Japanese had opened fire. I heard the gun boss's voice in my earphones sounding cool and calm as he told us to stand by. Then there was a shudder, and the pointer in Director One was saying the mast had been hit. The first salvo was over, but one of the shells glanced off a leg of the mast and exploded. The director was jammed in train.

There were a few muffled oaths from the gun boss, and suddenly he exclaimed in awe: "My God, the Canberra's on fire. She's blazing from stem to stern."

The Chicago was heeling again. We were turning sharply this time. Torpedoes? I knew George Holly had the conn. George would miss them if anybody could.

Then the deck beneath me came up under my feet, and the turret door to the officer's booth flew open. Salt spray soaked me, and the pungent smell of mudflats, which denotes exploded TNT, met my nostrils. For a minute I didn't know whether the Chicago was sinking or whether the turret had been hit on the faceplate and knocked off its roller path. Through the open turret door I could see two broad pencil streaks of phosphorescence in the water, parallel to the hull of the ship. They were the wakes of two torpedoes that had missed. Suddenly, the 20-mm guns opened up. I grabbed at the handle of the turret door. It wasn't jammed. It swung shut, and I dogged it. The 5-inch guns were firing again—not star shells but rapid fire. The 40-caliber machine guns joined in with their steady, rapid fire. Something was awfully close. I yelled to the pointer and trainer, "Open your ports! Local control. Fire at anything you can see!"

[2RHPZ]

They acknowledged, and I breathed a sigh of relief as the turret started to move, and I knew it wasn't jammed in train. I looked through my periscope, thankful I was encased in armor and not exposed to the uproar outside. To the right of where the turret was pointed, a Japanese tin can was silhouetted between the burning Canberra and ourselves and moving fast. The trainer saw it, too, for the turret was slewing as he tried to catch up. But the range was very close, and we went into the stops before we could bear. The 5-inch did get some hits. You could see the red spots glow in the destroyer's hull whenever the shells hit; then they would go out. There were splashes on the other side of the destroyer, as the 5-inch shells tore through her hull without arming and exploding. The range was too short for the shells to arm.

I was blinded momentarily, as the first of the Japanese cruisers turned on searchlights and bathed the Chicago in artificial light. But I had a glimpse of a four-turret Chokai-class heavy cruiser, with three turrets trained on the Canberra and one on us. The Canberra had made the fatal mistake of not draining the gas tanks of its airplane prior to the action. Early in the engagement, the plane was torn to shreds, and the gasoline ran down on deck, lighting up the ship like a Christmas tree. That fact alone was the reason the Japanese ships concentrated on the Canberra and not on us. They swept by us and headed for the north pass, where the Quincy, Vincennes, and Astoria were waiting.

Then, a curious thing happened. Even before the Japanese ships were in range of the northern group, flares started dropping from the sky, illuminating the U.S. warships. It was an almost flawless example of air-sea coordination. The Japanese had a perfect setup, as they closed and used their searchlights indiscriminately. Our ships fought valiantly, but they fought in vain. The previous two days had caught up with them.

The Quincy went first and rolled over in 11 minutes with few survivors. The forward high turret on both the Astoria and Vincennes blew up, sending a column of flames 1,000 feet into the air. The Vincennes sank next. The Astoria lasted until morning and finally turned over and sank shortly before noon. The Canberra also lasted until morning with about a 20° list and deck ready boxes of ammunition exploding from the heat of the fires that were still burning. Two destroyers were alongside, trying to take off what remained of her crew. The survivors had formed two lines on deck, holding onto the lifelines to stand, waiting their turn to be rescued. There was no panic. Each man waited his turn in line before jumping over to the deck of the destroyer.

The Chicago was lying to less than 100 yards from the starboard side of the Canberra. This was the high side, and the list was to port. I counted 119 small-caliber hits in her hull and 23 large-caliber hits that I judged to be from 6-inch or greater guns. When all the survivors of the crew of the Canberra had been removed, the destroyer Patterson (DD-392) was ordered to sink her with torpedoes. We backed clear, and the Patterson moved into a position about 800 yards on the Canberra's beam and fired one torpedo. It was a cold shot. The Patterson fired another, which was worse than the first one. It was a circular run and almost hit the Chicago. We had to back emergency to avoid it. We couldn't go ahead, because 40 feet of our bow was missing where the Japanese torpedo had hit us. And to go ahead emergency would have put additional strain on the forward bulkhead that was keeping us from sinking. But there was no saving the Canberra, and the order came to sink her with gunfire.

Now was the time to lick our wounds and assess our losses. Four heavy cruisers were lost the night of 9 August, three of them U.S. ships. In addition, a fourth U.S. cruiser, our Chicago, had suffered major damage, and a destroyer had been damaged as well. The Japanese force had not lost a ship. How could it have happened? First and foremost was the one factor that historians never seem to talk about—the luck factor.


It Could Have Been Worse

George William Kittredge

Sure, our star shells didn’t work. Sure, the Japanese were great at night action and had practiced it for years. But think what might have happened if one shell from their first 6-inch salvo had not hit one of the legs of the tripod mast on the Chicago and jammed the ship’s fire control director and radar in train. The probability of such a thing happening was incredible, and if it hadn’t happened, the results might have been much different. If the Chicago had been able to open fire at that range, with her fire control radar giving accurate ranges, her 8-inch-gun salvo, coming from nine guns, would not have been over but right on.

The second cause for the defeat was lack of command and control in the northern group composed of the Quincy, Vincennes, and Astoria, all 8-inch-gun cruisers and more modern ships than either the Canberra or Chicago. No flag officer was in overall command. All of the ship’s captains in the northern group were four-stripers of relatively the same signal number. This meant that there really was no one to take command.

Why, then, didn’t the Japanese task force commander, Vice Admiral Gunichi Mikawa, after destroying four Allied heavy cruisers and badly damaging a fifth, carry out his original orders to attack and destroy enemy transports in the Tulagi-Guadalcanal area? The reinforced U.S. First Marine Division, comprising 20,000 men, had been landed in the Tulagi-Guadalcanal area. The most certain way of bringing about their defeat and surrender would have been to destroy the ships that were carrying the Marines’ food, ammunition, and supplies. Nothing much in the Allied arsenal—only one heavy cruiser, one antiaircraft cruiser, and some destroyers—could stand in Mikawa’s way if he chose to stay and fight. Against this force, Admiral Mikawa had five heavy cruisers, a light cruiser, and a destroyer. In addition, the Allies could expect no air cover the next day, because the U.S. carriers had been forced to withdraw, although Mikawa would not have known this. He did know, however, that he could call on his own air power, which at that time was almost unlimited. And his own force had come through the Battle of Savo Island virtually unscathed. Some 30 men had been killed on the heavy cruiser Chokai by one of the few salvos the northern group of heavy U.S. cruisers had fired. The salvo had hit the Chokai just aft of the Japanese cruiser’s navigating bridge and destroyed her chart room. But other than that, his ships were in full fighting trim. Why, then, didn’t Admiral Mikawa carry out his orders?

One theory seems plausible. When the Chicago was bathed in light from the Japanese searchlights, Admiral Mikawa would have seen the tripod mast of the foremast of the Chicago. He also would have seen the three stacks of the burning Canberra, which he would have recognized at once as a Royal Navy heavy cruiser. But to him, a tripod mast would have meant a battleship. And the fact that she had taken one or two torpedoes (the Chicago also was hit in the engine room by a second torpedo that didn’t go off), and still was turning to fight, may have convinced him he was about to be engaged by a battleship. And that would have been too much for his force. So, fearing a trap, Admiral Mikawa turned his force northwest, where his scout planes already were illuminating the three Allied heavy cruisers with flares, instead of heading east and destroying the freighters and transports. Interestingly enough, the only loss suffered by Admiral Mikawa’s force was on the return to his base at Rabaul, when the heavy cruiser Kako was sunk by a U.S. submarine, the S-44 (SS-155). Had he cleaned up the Marines’ supply ships, he might not have lost the Kako.

What happened to the Chicago, with 40 feet of her bow blown off and 26 men killed or wounded? We left Iron Bottom Bay in the company of a destroyer and a damaged freighter and eventually arrived in Cockatoo drydock at Sydney Harbor, where the Australians built a temporary bow, which would take the Chicago back to Mare Island on the West Coast. I volunteered for submarines, because if I had to serve at sea for the duration of the war, I wanted to be on a ship that could return to the surface after she sank, and submarines were the only answer. An old submarine, an “S boat” based at Brisbane, put out the word that she needed an officer for a patrol off Rabaul. The only qualification was a warm body and the ability to swim. I was ready to go, but the Chicago’s skipper, Captain Howard D. Bode, said no. If I were going to submarines, I had to do it the right way and go back to sub school at New London. Captain Bode was right. The S boat never made it back from patrol. She was declared overdue and presumed missing about the same time my orders came through, sending me to submarine school. And what became of Captain Bode? He found himself facing a general court-martial—why, I never knew—but commited suicide rather than stand trial.


Captain Kittredge is retired and living in Maine after serving in that state's legislature and founding Kittredge Industries, Inc., designers and builders of personal submersibles. A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, he went on to command three submarines and a fast-attack submarine division. From 1946-47, he served as Admiral Richard Byrd's navigator in the Antarctic. He later served as assistant naval attache at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi, India, two years in the Office of Secretary of Defense Charles Wilson, and as senior military attache at the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv, Israel.