“Radio the boys, that’s their primary target,” Sherman announced. “They should know what the hell they look like. I want the Akagi.”
“Kaga looks almost identical,” Newton said softly.
‘Then tell them to sink the first bastard and then the other,” Sherman replied coldly, and Newton smiled.
Akagi 06:45 hrs
“Enemy planes sighted!”
Helmets were being passed around, and Admiral Yamamoto and Genda, by his side, took theirs and put them on. Binoculars raised, they could see the incoming wave, ten miles out, already with smoking trails as the defending fighters swarmed in on them.
He tried to count their numbers. Several score at least, coordinated this time, in tight formations.
In line of battle Kaga and Akagi were in the center. Three miles to the north were Zuikaku and Shokaku. Three miles farther to the south were Hiryu, Soryu, and Kirishima, their ring of eleven destroyers broken into three groups, five to the central group, three each to the other two.
Antiaircraft guns from the northernmost group began to open up, dark splotches staining the morning sky. The enemy planes pressed on, their torpedo bombers beginning to drop altitude, all aimed straight at Akagi.
“They’re coming for us,” Genda announced, “ignoring Zuikaku and Shokaku.”
“It’s what I would have ordered them to do,” Yamamoto replied. Another two minutes. The heavy guns on both Kaga and Akagi opened up, though Akagi’s rate of fire was vastly slower due to damage below and the ditching of ammunition overboard while fighting the fires.
The attack was coming on fast. A dozen or more planes were tumbling from the sky, trailing smoke, a few parachutes blossoming. Several Zeroes focused in on the torpedo planes, slashing into them, while high overhead the dive bombers continued on, now well past Zuikaku and her sister ship.
Akagi started to heel over to port, the helmsman, as ordered, going into evasive maneuvers. A destroyer nearby nearly rammed into her bow, just barely avoiding collision as it turned aside.
“There are more of them than last time,” Genda announced heatedly. “A lot more. This might be two carriers hitting us at once.”
He focused on the lead dive bomber. Different design, looked almost like one of their Devastators.
“That’s a Vindicator,” Genda announced, as if reading Yamamoto’s mind. “They’re usually land based.”
As the first two dive bombers began their wing over, they exploded, one after the other, a Zero diving past them. Two more began their dives. One of the Zeroes cartwheeled, wing sheared off.
Akagi was heeling hard over in a violent full turn to port.
He saw the Dauntlesses moving into position up high, puffs of smoke from antiaircraft shells, a mad confusion of aircraft.
Three of the Vindicators were shrieking down, their aim good. The three released fairly low before pulling out. One had its wing shearing off, either from a direct hit or overstress. But the bombs winged in, the first bursting a hundred yards off the bow, the second fifty yards from the port-side bow, but the third clipped the front of the landing deck, punched through into the depths of the ship, and blew.
We might survive this, we might survive this, Yamamoto silently chanted. This bomb burst did not feel that bad, some splintering of the deck forward. Fortunately the hangar deck was empty of planes.
But now the Dauntlesses were coming in, and he sensed this would be the moment.
There were at least fifteen of them, six winging over, the others appearing to hold back. It must be a good commander up there, ready to divert the others if the first wave hits us hard.
They were still turning hard to port, the bombers winging down, guiding straight in. Two more were hit, the bomb of one exploding right underneath the plane, taking out the plane behind it. But still they pressed in, two more bombs visible through the smoke.
There was no need to be told to duck. He crouched down low and felt the two sharp impacts, the explosions erupting somewhere down deep within.
“More!”
He gazed up. The rest of the attack group was coming in and he knew that his beloved comrade, the first fleet carrier of His Majesty’s Navy, was now in mortal peril.
The Americans came on relentlessly, more bombs dropping. Another impact, and this one astern, close enough that he felt the heat of the blast washing over the bridge. A loud screaming: a Dauntless, out of control, tumbled, barely cleared the bridge, and then disappeared astern, crashing in their wake.
He stood up. Fires were burning the length of the deck, soaring up out of impact points, and he could feel their speed slacking off.
“American torpedo planes!”
Genda pointed to port but the smoke was so thick he could not see them.
Heavy gunfire. An American plane appeared through the smoke, skimming the deck forward of the bridge, a Zero on its tail tearing into it, an American Wildcat behind the Zero, both Devastator and Zero bursting into flames, the Wildcat breaking away but it too now going down as antiaircraft fire tore off the aft fuselage of the plane.
The intense bravery of all three pilots struck him, held his awed attention. A second torpedo plane came out of the smoke, crossed over the deck, and dropped back down as it cleared and skimmed off over the ocean. Hardly a gunner on the starboard side fired at it, their concentration still focused aloft.
He caught a glimpse of four more bombers, dropping down, heading toward Kaga, then they were lost in the smoke.
And then the double impact as two torpedoes struck nearly side by side astern, the force of the explosion throwing him back down, helmet cutting open his brow as he fell to the deck.
Genda was by his side, helping to pull him back up, shouting for a corpsman. He waved him off.
“I’m fine. My ship. Find out about our ship!”
Akagi was still turning to port, but already slowing even more. From the starboard side exhaust stack a deafening burst of steam exploded out, indicating boilers were being flooded. A moment later he could sense the list beginning.
And then there was a momentary silence, except for the hungry crackle of the fires sweeping the deck, an alarm sounding somewhere, men shouting--but the thunder of the guns, the shrieking roar of the planes was gone.
They circled through one hundred eighty degrees, turning, helmsman shouting that the engine room was not answering. As they turned across the wind, he caught a momentary glimpse to the northeast. The surviving American planes were forming up in the distance, streaking away, bursts of antiaircraft fire from the escorting destroyers following them, a few Zeroes still in pursuit.
But the damage had been done. He could feel the list increasing, speed dropping away.
His damage control officer, cradling what looked like a compound fracture to his arm, bone sticking out just above the elbow, stood before him, pale faced.
“Sir, nothing is answering below. I have verbal reports of the hangar deck swept by fire, port-side engine rooms flooding, uncontrollable flooding below. The forward hit ruptured plates on the bow, and water is flooding in there as well. I’ve ordered counterflooding, sir, but. . .”
He lowered his head, barely suppressing a sob.
“Go on.”
“Sir, I think you should transfer your flag.”
A huge explosion erupted forward, fireball white hot. Obviously an aviation gas tank exploding, the explosion consuming fire crews that had been trying to train fire hoses into the hole punched by the bomb. That hole was now buckling back the entire forward deck of the ship.
The list was continuing to increase; it was past ten degrees.
He could see Kaga now. She had not been hit and was still steaming at full speed, coming around to run alongside her sister ship.
He swept the bridge with his gaze. Another explosion, this one astern: vents of steam pluming up, an indication of boilers flooding or major steam lines letting go.
Electrical lighting on the bridge flickered down, winked off. Emergency battery-pow
ered lamps turned on their faint beams, piercing the gloom of smoke.
Akagi was dying.
“Order the crew to abandon ship,” he said quietly. “Signal destroyers to stand by to pick up survivors.”
Genda, openly crying, saluted and started to turn away.
“Sir, your flag. You are transferring, of course.”
He forced a smile.
“I’m not some suicidal fool, my friend. Of course I am transferring, but first let us get our valiant men up from below. Only then will I leave.”
He paused.
“And, Genda, make sure you retrieve the Z flag. Admiral Togo’s spirit would never forgive us for leaving it behind.”
Over the Lexington 07:12 hrs
Tears of rage clouded Fuchida’s eyes. The battle report from Akagi was evident as he tuned in to one of the American frequencies, the pilots exulting. “Scratch a Jap flattop!” one of them shouting. “It’s Akagi, I tell you. Look at that son of a bitch burn. Good work, McMullen! Danny, you put it right down the bastard’s throat!”
The enemy target was visible ahead. Definitely one Saratoga-class carrier. But only one? Surely both had to be here, for the battles of yesterday indicated they had engaged only Yorktown-class carriers.
Regardless, the target was his, and this time he would make sure it was taken.
“All planes!” he announced, switching on his mike. “Attack the carrier and the carrier only! Attack!”
He wanted to add, avenge the Akagi, but did not want that thought to cloud any of the pilots from his ship, nor reveal more if the enemy was listening.
The torpedo planes were already down low, dropping in fast. The bulk of the American fighters and his own escorting Zeroes were already entangled with them.
The twenty-seven Vals of the strike force, though broken up into four attack groups from the various carriers, began to wing over, one after the other. How he wished he could go in with them, but his admiral had given him clear orders and he felt compelled to obey.
Lexington
“For that which we are about to receive . . .” Sherman whispered, watching as the long, apparently endless stream of dive bombers began their runs.
Within only a few minutes, five bombs had smashed into the deck of the old Lady Lex. Three minutes later three torpedoes were into her port side, all of them near the bow, one of the explosions bursting a main aviation gas tank. Several thousand gallons spilled out before it suddenly flashed and exploded in a huge secondary that lifted off the first forty feet of decking, and blew out more of the bow below the waterline.
However hard they had been hit, they had also hit back. At least thirty of the attacking planes had reportedly been dropped by excited Wildcat pilots and gunnery crews. It was damn small compensation.
Damage control reported that the forward hundred feet of the ship was torn wide open, while a bomb hit aft had punched clean down to the port side turbine, blowing it apart. That had shut down one of their props completely. Secondary blasts were cutting through both port and starboard engine rooms.
She was already going down at the bow, flooding so rapidly that it made him think of the stories about the Titanic, which had been torn open forward, stern lifting out of the air until the ship rose nearly vertical before sliding beneath the waves. At the same time the Lex was taking on a sharp list to port, so rapidly that panicked sailors were already abandoning positions below, afraid they would be caught below decks if the carrier rolled over and turtled.
He was responsible for the lives of over two thousand men on board, though only the good Lord knew how many were still here and how many were already dead.
With half this damage, if just below the water line from the torpedoes, or just the bomb hits, he could have put their backs to the wall and ordered a fight to the finish to save this ship. He had never been on a sinking ship before, but all his knowledge and instincts told him that Lexington was dying, and would either go down bow first or roll over.
He sighed, looking over at Admiral Newton, who without comment just nodded in agreement.
“Prepare to abandon ship,” he said softly. “Order destroyers to come alongside to take on survivors. Make sure all wounded are properly evacuated. I want no one left behind.”
The intercom system was entirely knocked out, but the order was passed by mouth, shouted down from the bridge, to fire crews battling the blazes, and then down below, where already men were sensing the inevitable and beginning to stream up to the deck.
Honolulu
The mood in the hangar was electric. Radio operators were monitoring both Japanese and American frequencies, shouting out reports, everyone cheering with them when the cry went up, “Definitely scratch a flattop. Akagi is burning bow to stern!”
There were backslappings, cheers, a delicious taste of vengeance at last after the heartbreaking confusion of yesterday’s battle of inconclusive reports, and the gut-wrenching sight of the few battered planes returning, pilots numbed with shock.
The voices on the radio sounded exuberant even though squadron leaders were now beginning to report in the heavy toll exacted for their kill: nearly all the Vindicators and Devastators gone, but still, they had made a kill, and once the survivors were refitted and refueled, they would go out and take another of the four carriers reportedly sighted, of which one was definitely finished.
And then the reports from Lexington came in, and then suddenly just went off the air, until one of the ham radio operators announced he had communication with a Wildcat flying combat air patrol. The man’s voice was breaking.
“She’s going down. God damn, they got her, she is going down.”
The gathering in the hangar instantly sobered. There had been hope against hope that Enterprise and the attackers from Oahu had perhaps sunk two of them and that maybe there were only two or three left and Lexington would finish the lot. But the retiring strike wave reported confirmation of at least three carriers still out there, one pilot chiming in that he had seen two more, farther to the south.
“We don’t have a single carrier left in the entire central Pacific,” Collingwood whispered, awake because of all the confusion and now sitting by James’s side.
“What about the orphans?” someone asked, a pilot standing to one side, eyes hollow, hands in pocket. James looked over at him, didn’t recognize him, and saw a squadron insignia on his sleeve indicating Enterprise, the name Dellacroce stenciled on his shirt.
“Order them back here,” General Scales, who had taken command of communication, announced.
There was a moment of silence. Nearly everyone in what was now called the “radio shack” was Army.
“Who knows ranges here?” Scales asked.
The lone Enterprise pilot stepped forward.
“I flew Wildcats,” he announced.
“Your name, son?”
“Lieutenant Dellacroce.”
Scales looked at him appraisingly and then actually went over and shook his hand.
“Heard about you. You’re the pilot who nailed five Japs yesterday. Proud to shake your hand, son. You are America’s first ace in this war. Word’s already out that you’re being put in for the Medal of Honor.”
Dave took his hand, but there was no warmth, only a distant gaze, and James, like so many others, saw and understood that gaze. He was in shock.
James stood up and went over to Dave’s side.
“Tell us what your planes can do. Can they make it back to here?”
“The dive bombers, if fully fueled out, have a range of fifteen hundred miles, but that’s a bunch of civilian-time baloney. Cut that in half for wartime flying, and that is with no damaged fuel tanks. They just might make it. Wildcats, twelve hundred miles, but again, cut that in half, two-thirds if they’ve been dogfighting for fifteen or twenty minutes. A few might make it in.”
“Get the pilot from Lexington on the radio,” Scale said. “All birds from Lexington to head for Oahu or splash down near that civilian freighter off Kaua
i.”
Lieutenant Dellacroce turned and walked out of the hangar, gaze fixed on the western horizon, where he knew yet more of his comrades were dying, or nursing in damaged planes. He felt nothing other than infinite weariness.
Akagi 08:10 hrs
“Sir, you must leave the ship now!”
Yamamoto barely heard him, absorbed in other thoughts. Memories of the first time he had walked her deck, even before launch, dreams of what she would be, the backbone of a new modern navy for Japan, his own times aboard her in various command positions, and now this last time as admiral.
He knew her as intimately as he knew his own children. He had seen her grow and change. He had seen the early rickety biplanes taking off from her deck, and then this morning, in her final strike, sleek Zeroes, Vals, and Kates.
Another explosion rumbled up from below, and he could see the look of concern in Genda’s eyes. Tucked below the air officer’s arm was a folded canvas bag.
“The Z flag?” Yamamoto asked, and Genda nodded.
“Any still on board?”
“Just those waiting for you, sir.”
“Have all wounded been properly evacuated?”
Genda hesitated.
“Well?”
“Sir, I regret to say that there are still some men trapped far below decks, fires and flooding above giving them no escape. Men too critically injured to be moved,” he sighed. “Sir, they can’t be evacuated. Moving them will kill them anyhow. They beg to go down with their ship.”
He sighed and for the first time in a very long time, others saw tears openly coursing down his weathered cheeks.
“If I leave them behind, what will others say?”
“You have done all that you can possibly do, sir,” Genda replied heatedly. “Remember you yourself said that you would not tolerate the utter foolishness of commanders insisting they go down with their ships. You must now set that example!”
Genda reached out as if to grab his arm but an icy stare caused him to hesitate.
Pearl Harbour and Days of Infamy Page 67
