Category Archives: US Navy

May 4, 2020 · 01:41

Swift and Deadly, the Japanese Fubuki Class “Special Type” Destroyers

IJNS Fubuki

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Tonight something different, once again going back to write about important classes of Navy ships. I will continue doing this whenever I need a break from mass deaths, politics, and trying to inject reason into the vacuous minds of so many Americans about COVID 19.

The Imperial Japanese Navy set the standard for new destroyer construction in the 1920. While the United States Navy and British Royal Navy were fully stocked with their First World War design destroyers the Imperial Navy’s General Staff issued a requirement for a class of large destroyers which would complement the new classes of modern cruisers being built for the navy. There was nothing wrong with their existing destroyers of the Minekaze, Wakatake, Kamikaze, and Mutsuki classes, many of which continued to serve in secondary roles in the Second World War as escorts for convoys and invasion groups. They were the equals of contemporary British and American destroyers, but the Imperial Navy’s long range plan required larger, faster, more powerful and longer range destroyers.

The Navy requirement called for a 2000 ton ship capable of 39 knots with a 4000 mile range at 14 knots, that could carry a large number of torpedoes and a heavy gun armament. The program was designed to give the numerically inferior Imperial Navy a qualitative superiority against any opponent. The ships displaced 1750 tons, but even then their displacement limited their top speed to 35 knots, not the specified 39 knots.

WWII Office of Naval Intelligence images for Fubuki Class variants

The 24 ship Fubuki Class was such a quantum leap over other contemporary destroyers that the Imperial Navy referred to them as the Special Type. Their large size, heavy armament and high speed made them equal to many light cruisers of the era.

The basic design was modified to carry more guns and torpedoes on an increased displacement and the result was a 388 foot long 1750 ton ship armed with six 5” 50 caliber guns in weather proof and splinter proof mounts. On the initial 10 ships of the class the guns could only be elevated 40 degrees which made them less than effective in an anti-aircraft role. However, in the succeeding two groups of the class, the 5” mounts were an improved type which allowed them to elevate each gun separately up to 75 degrees. The ammunition magazines were below the gun mounts and ammunition was passed to the guns by hoists. This gave them a decided edge in rate of fire over other destroyers which had open or partially shield mounts dependant on ammunition passers carrying ammunition to them from central magazines.

Close up of IJNS Sagiri

As built the light anti-aircraft armament composed of two Type 93 13mm machine guns. In the years before the war, and during the war their anti-aircraft was increased in some cases up to twenty-two 25mm anti-aircraft guns and 10 of the Type 93 machine guns. In 1944 surviving ships of the class had their X- 5” gun mount removed to facilitate more 25mm guns, radar and an additional depth charge capacity.

IJNS Ikazuchi

The nine 24” torpedo tubes in triple mounts were able to be reloaded while in battle a capability not shared by other destroyers. The ships carried a total of 18 torpedoes which initially were of the Type 8 torpedos carried on earlier destroyers. However, these were replaced by the oxygen powered Type 93 “Long Lance” torpedoes before the war. These torpedoes had a higher speed, longer range and heavier warhead than torpedoes produced by other navies. The deadly Long Lance torpedoes would become the scourge of Allied navies during the war, especially during the brutal surface engagements of 1942.

IJNS Yugiri

Due to the added weight their increased armament made to the design unstable in heavy seas, and a longitudinal hull weakness that necessitated in the class being rebuilt between 1935 and 1937. The rebuild increased their displacement to 2050 tons standard and to over 2400 tons full load. The increase in displacement resulted in a slight reduction of speed.

IJNS Hibiki

The class was built in three groups, and each is sometimes referred to as a separate class as each incorporated improvements over the preceding group. The first 10 ships of the class which are sometimes referred to as the Fubuki Class were of less complex design than subsequent ships. Their overall length was 388 feet, with a beam of 34 feet, and draft 10.5 feet. They had a smaller bridge and exposed gunfire control room than the next two groups.

The second group of 10 ships are commonly referred to as the Ayanami Class. The group had an enlarged bridge structure which enclosed previous exposed positions to include the gunfire control room, and range finders. They were also provided a range finder tower. They were the first ships to receive the improved Type B gun mounts. The final subtype of the class, the Akatsuki Class comprised just 4 ships and was distinguished by a smaller forward funnel, larger boilers and a unique splinter proof torpedo tube mount housing.

IJNS Ayanami

The ships of the class participated in every major campaign of Japan’s war in the Pacific as well as operations against China in the 1930s.One ship the Miyuki was lost in a collision with another destroyer in August 1934.

All remaining ships of the class served with distinction throughout the war, especially during the Battle of the Java Sea and operations around Guadalcanal and the Solomon Islands and the Aleutians from 1941-1943. The participated in the sinking of the heavy cruisers, USS Houston, HMS Exeter, and the light Cruiser HMAS Perth, a number of destroyers, submarines, patrol ships and auxiliaries, while providing escort to carrier task forces, surface groups, and convoys. The Ikazuchi and Inazuma were noted for their rescue and humanitarian treatment of allied sailors, including those of the USS Pope during the Battle of the Java Sea. No ship or crew of the class was ever accused of committing war crimes or mistreating prisoners of war or other survivors of Allied ships.

All of the ships of the class except the Hibiki and Ushio were lost in action during the war. Four the Fubuki, Ayanami, Yuguri and Ataksuki were sunk in surface actions. Eight ships the Usogumo, Shirakumo, Isonami, Shikinami, Sagiri, Sazanami, Inazuma, and Ikazuchi were lost to Allied submarines. Seven ships the Shirayuki, Hatsuyuki, Murakumo, Uranami, Asagiri, Oboro and Akebono were sunk by aircraft and two the Shinonome and Amagiri fell victim to mines.

The demilitarized IJNS Ushio after the war

Hibiki was given to the Soviet Union following the war and served in that Navy until either 1953 or 1963 depending on the source. She was used as a target and sunk in the 1970s near Vladivostok and her wreck is now a tourist site for divers. Ushio surrendered to the Allies was demilitarized, assisted in the evacuation of Japanese forces from conquered areas, and then scrapped in 1948.

As a sidebar, the Amagiri played a role in the life of future President John F Kennedy when she rammed and sank his PT-109 in the Blackett Strait on August 2^nd 1943. Her commanding officer at the time Lieutenant Commander Kohei Hanami attended Kennedy’s inauguration in 1961. Even before Kennedy ran for the Senate Hanami wrote to Kennedy expressing his admiration. Kennedy’s daughter Caroline met Hanami’s widow in 2015 and invited her to the christening of the USS John F. Kennedy CVN 79.

The Fubuki Class destroyers set a standard in destroyer construction that other navies around the world sought to emulate. Fast and powerful they and their crews fought gallantly in the Second World War and though in a losing cause deserve to be remembered.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

The Ships that Held the Line: The Yorktown Class Carriers, Part One, the Yorktown

USS Yorktown CV-5

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

I have been continuing to read and pay attention to the current developments in the COVID-19 pandemic. Though I have already written a fair amount about it, I still have much to lean. I am still studying models on the spread of it, current numbers of total infections, new infections, and deaths in this country and around the world, as well as reading about the 1918-1919 Great Influenza. Finally I am trying to take in the current political and social disruption, the virus is causing, as well as the ever increasing threats of revolt and harm being mounted against the politicians and scientists who are actually following sound policies to slow the spread of the virus so it does not overwhelm our hospital system until successful treatments and a vaccine can be found. Sadly, much of this is coming in response to words and Tweets of President Trump, and appears to be a coordinated, and not spontaneous protest against the social distancing, isolation, and other restrictive measures to slow the spread of the disease. This perplexes me as a civil rights advocate, historian, defender of the First Amendment, as well as a veteran who has worked as a Medical Service Corps Officer and Critical Care Chaplain in two previous pandemics.

As you can imagine that takes time to do, and I won’t shoot from the hip when I start writing new articles on the virus and its spread, the response, the casualties, and the political and social battle being waged by extremists using it as an excuse to promote their ideology. But I digress, I can write about that later. So tonight I go back to a less controversial subject, about which I know much, and have written about before.

This article is part one of a three part series about the USS Yorktown Class Aircraft Carriers. Part one serves as an introduction as well as the story of the lead ship of the Class, the USS Yorktown CV-5. I wish you the best tonight, as well as tomorrow. Please be safe.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

Seldom in the annals of war is it recorded that three ships changed the course of a war and altered history as we know it. After December 7th 1941, the three ships of the Yorktown Class Aircraft Carriers, the USS Yorktown, USS Enterprise , and USS Hornet served as the shield against the seemingly unstoppable Japanese string of victories, and then served as the spearhead of the American counteroffensive that began far earlier that the Japanese imagined in the spring and summer of 1942.

Winston Churchill once said about Fighter Command of the Royal Air Force during the Battle of Britain: “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few”. However, in addition to that remarkable event, I would place the epic war waged by the three carriers of the Yorktown class against the Japanese Combined Fleet and First Carrier Strike Group, the Kido Butai of the Imperial Japanese Navy between December 1941 and November 1942 alongside the epic fight of the Royal Air Force against Hitler’s Luftwaffe.

USS Yorktown and Enterprise under Construction, Newport News Virginia, at the dock above either the USS Boise or St.Louis

The Carriers of the Yorktown Class hold a spot in United States Naval History nearly unequaled by any other class of ships, especially since they were a class that numbered only three ships. Designed and built in the mid 1930s they were the final class of pre-war carriers commissioned by the U.S. Navy

Unlike their predecessors they were no longer experimental ships. They were built incorporating the lessons learned through operational experience with the USS Langley, USS Lexington, USS Saratoga and USS Ranger. The Class had features that would become standard in the design of all future US Aircraft Carriers. As such they were the template for future classes of ships beginning with the Essex Class until the advent of the super carriers of the Forrestal Class.

Yorktown Refueling Underway

The ships displaced 19.800 tons with a 25,000 full load displacement. They were capable of steaming at 32.5 knots, and they were the Navy’s first truly successful class of carriers built from the keel up. The ships could embark over 80 aircraft and could steam long distances without refueling. Protection was good for their era and the ships proved to be extraordinarily tough when tested in actual combat. In speed and air group capacity the only carriers of their era to equal them were the Japanese Hiryu and Soryu and the larger Shokaku and Zuikaku. British carriers of the period were about the same size but were slower, had a shorter range of operations, and carried a smaller and far less capable air group. However, their protection which included armored flight decks and hull armor that was superior to both the American and Japanese ships. That would prove particularly valuable in their survival, particularly in the Mediterranean Sea against massed attack by the German Luftwaffe.

Yorktown Operating Near the Coral Sea

The lead ship, the Yorktown CV-5 was laid down in 1934 and commissioned on 30 September 1937 at Newport News Shipbuilding. She served in the Atlantic conducting carrier qualifications and operating with her sister ship USS Enterprise CV-6 to develop the tactics and operational procedures that would be used by US carrier forces until she joined the Pacific Fleet in late 1939.

Upon joining the Pacific Fleet, Yorktown took part in various major fleet exercises and due to the deteriorating situation in the Atlantic was transferred back to the Atlantic Fleet along with other significant Pacific Fleet units to screen convoys bound for Britain against U-Boat attacks. Yorktown was at Norfolk when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and 9 days later she departed for the Pacific where she would join Rear Admiral Frank “Jack” Fletcher’s Task Force 17 (TF-17) at San Diego on December 30^th 1941.

Her first duty to escort a convoy ship transporting Marine reinforcements to Samoa. This was followed by the first American offensive action of the war, a raid on the Gilbert Islands including Makin Island in late January, and against eastern New Guinea in March. On May 4^th the Yorktown’s air group attacked Japanese installations on Tulagi and Gavutu sinking the Japanese destroyer Kikuzuki.

The actions of Yorktown and TF-17 in the Solomons were connected to the Japanese attempt to capture Port Moresby, in preparation for attacking Australia. The Japanese forces were led by a task force centered on the carriers Shokau and Zuikaku and the light carrier Shoho. The Americans parried the Japanese thrust with Task Group 11 centered on the USS Lexington and Fletcher’s Task Force 17 built around Yorktown.

Yorktown’s Nemesis The IJN Hiryu

The clash of the Japanese and American forces on the 7^th and 8^th of May 1942 is known as the Battle of the Coral Sea. This was the first Naval Battle fought by forces that did not come within visual distance of each other, and which was fought exclusively by carrier based aircraft against the ships and aircraft of the opposing forces.

On the 7^th Japanese aircraft busied themselves attacking the oiler USS Neosho and destroyer USS Sims, sinking Sims and damaging Neosho so badly that her shattered hulk would be sunk by US destroyers on the 11^th. As the Japanese aircraft worked over the unfortunate Sims which went down with all hands, Neosho, while aircraft from the Yorktown and Lexington attacked and sank the Shoho.

On the May 8th the main event began. Aircraft from Yorktown scored two bomb hits on Shokaku holing her flight deck, starting fires and knocking her out of the fight. The Japanese countered and their aircraft discovered the US ships scoring two torpedo and three bomb hits on Lexington which would result in her loss when fumes were ignited by a generator causing catastrophic explosions which forced her abandonment. Lexington was lost more to poor damage control and failure to cut off fuel from damaged lines, than it was to battle damage.

TBD Devastators from Yorktown Operating in the Solomon Islands

Meanwhile, as the Japanese attacked Lexington, Yorktown was under attack by Japanese aircraft. Expertly maneuvered by her Captain Elliott Buckmaster, she was able to avoid the deadly torpedoes launched by Nakajima Kate torpedo bombers, but suffered a bomb hit that penetrated her flight deck and exploded below decks killing 66 sailors and causing heavy damage.

Sinking of the Shoho

The battle was a tactical victory for the Japanese who sank Lexington, however it was a strategic victory for the Americans as the Japanese move on Port Moresby was blunted and the lifeline to Australia preserved. Additionally neither the damaged Shokaku nor the Zuikaku, whose air group suffered heavy losses of aircraft and experienced aircrews would be available for the attack on Midway scheduled for June.

The damage suffered by Yorktown at Coral Sea was severe, and it was estimated by naval engineers that repairs to make her ready for combat would take three months. But the due to the success of US Navy code breakers the Navy had deciphered the Japanese intention to attack Midway, and forced the Navy to ensure that repairs to Yorktown could not take three months.

Critically short of ships the Navy determined that Yorktown would have to be available for the fight, meaning that her repairs had to be accomplished in three days, not the months.

Yorktown and her escorts arrived at Pearl Harbor on May 27^th and in less than 72 hours she received the essential repairs that enabled her to speed to Midway. It was an amazing performance by the shipyard workers at Pearl Harbor who worked around the clock to put Yorktown back in fighting shape. Yorktown departed Pearl Harbor on May 30^th with her escorts and her air group, which was augmented by squadrons from USS Saratoga which was unavailable for action after being torpedoed by a Japanese submarine in January, and which was still enoute to Hawaii following repairs and modernization on the West Coast.

With her necessary repairs completed, even lacking a fresh coat of paint. she and her cobbled together air group led Task Force 17 to the waters east of Midway where they linked up with Rear Admiral Raymond Spruance’s Task Force 16 built around Yorktown’s sisters the Enterprise and Hornet. Yorktown and her escorts took station ten miles to the north of Task Force 16 as they waited for the appearance of the Japanese Fleet. They would not have long to wait as on June 3rd the Japanese invasion force was spotted by search planes operating out of Midway.

On June 4^th the Japanese Kido Butai, the crack Carrier strike group commanded by Admiral Nagumo composed of the Akagi, Kaga, Hiryu and Soryu, 2 battleships, 2 heavy cruisers, the light cruiser Niagara, and numerous escorting destroyers led Admiral Yamamoto’s Combined Fleet into battle.

Not expecting any intervention by US Navy forces, Nagumo’s aircraft hit Midway. Before the attack land based aircraft from Midway manned by inexperienced flight crews made uncoordinated, and piecemeal attacks against the veteran Japanese combat air patrol A6M Zeros, who decimated the attackers.

The American ships were given a grace period and avoided detection as a scout plane from the cruiser Tone was late in departing for its assigned search sector. Later, when the scout first spotted the Yorktown group, it did not report the presence of a carrier. The report provided Nagumo with a false sense of security, and he began to prepare for a second attack on Midway, and began removing torpedos and armor piercing bombs from his second wave, and replacing them with high explosive bombs. This created mayhem on the flight decks and hangar decks of his carriers.

Then the American carrier aircraft attacked as the Tone’s scout belatedly reported the presence of one aircraft carrier. The first to attack were slow, underpowered, under-armed, and obsolete TBD-1 Devastator torpedo planes attacked first. Their attacks were suicidal, lacking fighter cover and uncoordinated with the attacks of the Dive Bombers, they were slaughtered. Of the 41 attacking aircraft only 6 returned to Enterprise and Yorktown, while all 15 aircraft from Hornet’s Torpedo 8 were lost.

The attack of the Devastators increased the chaos aboard the the Japanese carriers. Their crews scrambled to recover their returning aircraft, and to once again rearm the second wave with torpedoes and armor piercing bombs as they prepared to launch their aircraft to attack the American Task Force.

Likewise, while the Zeroes of the Japanese Combat Air Patrol were drawn down to the deck pursuing the remaining Devastators, the SBD Dauntless Dive Bombers from Enterprise and Yorktown surprised the Japanese carriers. With their now fully fueled and armed aircraft preparing for launch, the bombs unloaded from the Kate Torpedo planes were still laying about the deck waiting to be stowed when the American dive bombers attacked.

Bombing 6 and Scouting 6 from Enterprise blasted Akagi and Kaga while Yorktown’s Bombing 3 hit Soryu causing massive damage and fires that would sink all three, leaving on Hiryu to continue the fight.

Hiryu’s first wave of dive bombers found Yorktown and suffered heavy losses to the F4F Wildcats of Yorktown’s CAP, yet three Val’s from Hiryu scored hits which started fires and disabled Yorktown, causing her to lose power and go dead in the water. Yorktown’s damage control teams miraculously got the fires under control, and patched the her damaged flight deck, while her engineers restored power. Soon Yorktown was back in action steaming at a reduced speed of 20 knots, but able to conduct air operations again.

Hiryu’s second strike composed of Kate Torpedo Bombers discovered Yorktown, and thinking she was another carrier since she appeared undamaged attacked. Yorktown’s reduced CAP was unable to stop the Kates and the Japanese scored 2 torpedo hits causing another loss of power and a severe list. Thinking that she might capsize Captain Buckmaster ordered that she be abandoned. As this was occurring a mixed attack group of dive bombers from Enterprise and now “homeless” Yorktown aircraft attacked Hiryu causing mortal damage to that brave ship.

Damage Survey Report of Torpedo Hits from I-158 on Yorktown and Hammann

With water lapping at her hangar deck it appeared that Yorktown would soon sink the ship was abandoned and left adrift. However, she floated through the night and the next morning a repair crew went aboard to try and save her. The destroyer USS Hammann came alongside to provide pumps and power for the salvage operations while 5 other destroyers provided an anti-submarine screen.

It looked like the repair crews were gaining the upper hand when the Japanese submarine I-158 reached a firing position undetected and fired 4 torpedoes one of which stuck Hammann causing her to break in half, jack-knife and sink rapidly. Two more torpedoes hit Yorktown causing mortal damage. Once again her crew evacuated the proud ship. While Captain Buckmaster planned another attempt to save her on June 7^th, but on the morning of the 7^th the gallant Yorktown rolled over and sank ringed by her escorts.

Yorktown Abandoned and Sinking

Yorktown was stricken from the Navy list on October 2^nd 1942 and her name given to the second ship of the Essex class. The second Yorktown would provide gallant service in war and peace. She is now is a museum ship in Charleston South Carolina.

On May 19th 1998, a search team led by Dr. Robert Ballard who had discover the wreck of RMS Titanic, found the wreck of Yorktown some 16,000 feet below the surface sitting upright on the ocean floor. Apart from the battle damage little deterioration was noted. The Ballard team photographed the wreck and left it alone. Since then no other explorations of Yorktown have been made. The great ship now lies over three miles below the Pacific, a memorial to her crew and the victory at Midway.

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Filed under aircraft, History, leadership, Military, Navy Ships, US Navy, World War II at Sea, world war two in the pacific

Tagged as A6M Zero, admiral chuichi nagumo, Admiral Frank Jack fletcher, admiral raymond spruance, aichi 99 val, battle of coral sea, battle of midway, bombing 3, bombing 6, Captain buckmaster, essex class, f4f wildcat, gilbert islands, ijn akagi, ijn hiryu, ijn kaga, ijn shoho, ijn shokaku, ijn zuikaku, kido butai, nakajima bn2 kate, newport news naval shipyard, Robert ballard, SBD Dauntless, scouting six, Task force 16, task Group 11, TBD Devastator, torpedo 3, torpedo 6, torpedo 8, tulagi, uss enterprise cv-6, uss hamman, uss hornet cv-8, uss langley, uss lexington, uss neosho, uss ranger, uss saratoga, uss yorktown, uss yorktown cv 10, winston churchill, yorktown wreck discovery

April 19, 2020 · 03:23

The Wickes and Clemson Class Destroyers: Flush Decks and Four Pipes

USS Ward DD-139

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

I have so much I could write about right now but instead I am going to go back to the well and dredge up an older post about some iconic warships. I guess that you can say that I am kind of taking a bit of a break from the present to remember the past, but be assured, a lot of stuff is percolating in my mind, so be expecting some new material about the COVID-19 pandemic, and some new Navy ship articles soon. However, until Monday, unless something really dramatic happens I will be continuing to re-pubish some older articles about historic Naval warships, or Warship classes that I find fascinating.

Have a great day,

Peace

Padre Steve+

USS Pope DD-225

The destroyers of the Wickes and Clemson classes defined the destroyer force of the U.S. Navy. In 1916 with the advent of the submarine as an effective weapon of war the Navy realized that its pervious classes of destroyers were insufficient to meet the new threat. Likewise the lack of endurance of earlier destroyers kept them from vital scouting missions since the U.S. Navy unlike the Royal Navy or Imperial German Navy maintained very few cruisers for such missions.

USS Paul Jones DD-230 late war note 3 stacks and radar

The Naval Appropriation Act of 1916 included the authorization of 50 Wickes Class destroyers to compliment 10 new battleships, 6 battlecruisers and 10 light cruisers with the goal of building a Navy second to none. The new destroyers were designed for high speed operations and intentionally designed for mass production setting a precedent for the following Clemson class as well as the destroyer classes built during the Second World War.

USS Boggs DMS-3

The Wickes Class had a designed speed of 35 knots in order to be able to operate with the new Omaha Class light cruisers and Lexington Class Battlecruisers in the role of scouting for the fleet. They were flush-decked which provided additional hull strength and their speed was due to the additional horsepower provided by their Parsons turbines which produced 24,610 hp. They were 314’ long and had a 30 foot beam. Displacing 1247 tons full load they were 100 tons larger than the previous Caldwell class ships. They were armed with four 4 inch 50 caliber guns, one 3” 23 caliber gun and twelve 21” torpedo tubes.

USS Crosby APD 17

Although they were very fast they proved to be very “wet” ships forward and despite carrying an additional 100 tons of fuel they still lacked range. Due to the realization the U-Boat war required more escorts the order for Wickes Class ships was increased and 111 were completed by 1919.

USS Gillis with PT Boats and PBY Catalina

The Wickes Class was followed by the Clemson Class which was an expansion of the Wickes class being more tailored to anti-submarine warfare. They had a greater displacement due to additional fuel tanks and mounted, the same armament, identical dimensions and were capable of 35 knots. However, these ships were built with a larger rudder in to give them a tighter turning radius. 156 ships of the class were completed.

Honda Point Disaster

In the inter-war years a number of each class were scrapped and 7 of the Clemson Class from DESRON 11 were lost in the Honda Point Disaster of September 8th 1923 when the lead ship of their formation turned too soon with the majority of the squadron following it at high speed into the rocks. Other ships served with the US Atlantic, Pacific, and Asiatic Fleets, remaining the mainstay of the Navy’s destroyer and scouting forces until new classes of destroyers were introduced in the 1930s. Likewise many of the ships were laid up in an inactive status and with World War II approaching many were recommissioned, with 50 being provided to the British Royal Navy as part of the Lend Lease program, where they became known as the Town Class. Most of these ships had 2-3 of their 4” guns and some of their torpedo tubes removed in order to increase their depth charge capacity and to mount the Hedgehog ASW mortar system.

HMS Leamington ex- USS Twiggs

Britain in turn loaned 9 of them to the Soviet Union in lieu of Italian destroyers claimed as reparations by the Soviets in 1944. The surviving ships were returned to Britain in 1949-51 and all were scrapped by 1952.

Many of the ships never saw combat in either war as numerous ships were scrapped due to the limitations of the London Naval Treaty. Of the 267 ships of the two classes only 165 were still in service in 1936. As new destroyers were added to the navy in the 1930s a number of ships from each class were converted to other uses. Some became High Speed Transports (APD) and carried 4 LCVP landing craft and a small number of troops, usually about a company sized element. Others were converted to High Speed Minelayers (DM) or High Speed Minesweepers (DMS). The USS Caine in Herman Wouk’s classic novel The Caine Mutiny was a DMS. A few were converted to Light Seaplane Tenders (AVD). These conversations also included the removal of boilers which reduced their speed by 10 knots in order to accommodate the equipment added during their conversions. Since they were no longer Destroyers in the true sense of the word the loss of speed and armament was not considered detrimental.

The ships converted to other uses had their armament reduced with dual purpose 3” 50 caliber guns replacing their 4” main battery, and the removal of their torpedoes. Those which remained received 6 of the 3” guns to replace their original gun armament and lost half of their torpedo tubes. During the war all the ships would have greatly increased their light anti-aircraft armament, radar, sonar, and ASW capabilities.

USS Stewart DD-224 after return from Japanese service

In 1940 19 of the Clemson Class, 27 of the Wickes Class, and 3 of the preceding Caldwell class were transferred to the British Royal Navy under the Lend Lease program. Some of these would see later service in the Soviet Navy being transferred by the Royal Navy serving after the war with those ships being scrapped between 1950 and 1952.

USS Edsall being Sunk in the Battle of the Java Sea

The ships of these classes performed admirably during the Second World War despite their age. The first U.S. Navy ship sunk by enemy forces happened before the war began. The USS Ruben James DD-245, a Clemson Class ship was escorting convoy HX-156 when she was sunk by a torpedo fired by U-552 on the night of October 31st 1941 when she inadvertently found herself between the U-Boat and her intended target. 100 of her 144 man crew died in the attack.

The USS Ward DD-139 fired the first shots of the war when it engaged and sank a Japanese midget sub outside of Pearl Harbor on December 7th 1941. After her conversion to an APD she was sunk after a Kamikaze attack which damaged her so badly that she had to be scuttled by gunfire from USS O’Brien which by coincidence was commanded by her skipper on December 7th 1941, Commander William Outerbridge.

The 13 ships of the Asiatic Fleet’s DESRON 29 took part in six engagements against far superior Japanese Navy units while operating in the Philippines and then in the Dutch East Indies as part of the ABDA Command including the Battle of Balikpapan where the USS John D Ford DD-228, USS Pope DD-225, USS Paul Jones DD-230 and USS Parrot DD-218 sank 4 Japanese transports. USS Edsall was sunk by two battleships and two heavy cruisers which fired over 1400 shells, as well as 26 Val Dive Bombers from Admiral Nagumo’s Kido Butai on March 1st 1942. The few survivors were executed later in the war. USS Pillsbury was overtaken and sunk with all hands on the night of March 2nd 1942 by the Japanese heavy cruisers Atago and Takeo.

USS Pope February 1942

Pope and HMS Encounter escorted the crippled heavy cruiser HMS Exeter from Surabaya to Australia, and safety. Unfortunately they were tracked down by a surface group of four Japanese Heavy Cruisers and four destroyers and Carrier aircraft. During the action Pope fired 140 salvos from her main guns and all of her torpedoes in a three hour running battle. During it Pope avoided destruction under the cover of a rain squall. However, that was a temporary reprieve. Once out of the squall she was rediscovered by Japanese aircraft, and was quite literally blown out of the water by the heavy cruisers Myoko and Ashigara. Though all her crew successfully abandoned ship, they waited 60 hours in the open sea for rescue, yet even so, 124 of her 151 man crew survived the war and were repatriated to the United States.

During that campaign 4 of these gallant ships were sunk in battle and a 5th the USS Stewart DD-224 was salvaged by the Japanese after being damaged and placed in a floating drydock at Surabaya following the Battle of Badung Strait. She was placed in service as a patrol ship by the Imperial Navy. A ship of her description was reported numerous times to the Navy during the war, but it wasn’t until after the war that she was discovered by U.S. Forces after the surrender and returned to the U.S. Navy. Since there was by now another USS Stewart the ex-Stewart was simply called DD-224. She was sunk as a target on May 23rd 1946 off San Francisco.

USS Gregory and USS Little off Guadalcanal

Other ships of these classes were sunk during the Guadalcanal Campaign. The Wickes Class USS Colhoun APD-2 was sunk by Japanese aircraft off Guadalcanal on August 30th 1942, followed by her sisters USS Gregory APD-3, and USS Little APD-4 which were sunk by Japanese Destroyers on September 5th 1942. USS McKean APD-5 was sunk by a torpedo launched a Mitsubishi GM4 Betty near Bougainville in November 1943 while on a troop reinforcement mission.

In the Atlantic USS Jacob Jones was sunk by the U-Boat U-578 with the loss of all but 11 of her crew.

In February 1942 the USS Gamble DM-15 was heavily damaged in a bombing attack off Iwo Jima in February 1945. She survived the attack but was determined to be a total loss and was sunk off Arpa Harbor Guam on July 16th 1945. USS Barry was sunk by a Kamikaze off Okinawa on June 21st 1945, while USS Perry DMS-17 was sunk by a Japanese mine off Palau on 13 September 1944.

HMS Cambeltown (ex USS Buchanan DD-131) at St Nazaire

Whether in the Atlantic or the Pacific the ships contributed to the Allied victory. The former USS Buchanan DD-131 which had been transferred to the Royal Navy where she was re-named the HMS Campbeltown and used in the Saint-Nazaire Raid. For the raid she was altered in appearance to look like a German Möwe class destroyer was rammed into the only drydock on the Atlantic capable of holding the Battleship Tirpitz. The mission was successful and the drydock was unusable by the Germans for the rest of the war. Following her return from service in the Soviet Navy, Leamington played the role of Campbeltown in the 1950 Trevor Howard film Gift Horse. She was scrapped in 1951.

The Clemson Class HMS Borie engaged in one of the most notable destroyer versus U-Boat battles of the war when she engaged the U-405 in the early morning hours of November 1st 1943. After being forced to the surface by Borie’s depth charges the battle was conducted at point blank range as Borie first rammed U-405 and then fought a close range small arms battle where her 4” guns were unable to be depressed far enough to hit the sub and Borie’s crew used a 20mm anti-aircraft gun, and small arms to keep the submarine’s crew from manning their significant surface armament. Finally U-405 sank with all hands. However, Borie was heavily damaged, suffered significant flooding, and lost power. With up to five Wolf Packs in the area it was determined to scuttle Borie. Her crew was removed and aircraft for the Escort Carrier USS Card sank her.

During the war these ships served in every major campaign and when no longer fit for front line service were used in escort roles in rear areas as well as in a variety of training and support roles. By the end of the war the surviving ships of both classes were worn out and a number were decommissioned and some scrapped even before the end of hostilities. Of the American ships that survived the war were all decommissioned by 1946 and most scrapped between 1945 and 1948.

During Second World War 9 of the Wickes Class were sunk in battle, and 7 were sunk or destroyed in other ways. 5 were later sunk as targets and the remaining ships were all scrapped. A total of 20 of the Clemson Class were lost either in battle or to other causes, including those lost at Honda Point.

USS Peary Memorial, Darwin, Australia

The brave Sailors that manned these ships in peace and war become fewer in number every day as the Greatest Generation passes.

USS Peary Sinking at Darwin

It is a sad testimony that none of these ships were preserved as a memorial; however the Australians have a memorial at Darwin dedicated to the USS Peary DD-226 which was sunk with 80 of her crew during the Japanese raid on that city’s port on 19 February 1942. The memorial has one of her 4” guns pointed in the direction of the wreck of the Peary. A memorial to the USS Ward which showcases her #3 4” gun which sank the Japanese midget sub is located on the Capitol Grounds in St. Paul Minnesota.

The ships of the Wickes and Clemson classes were iconic, and their crews were heroic. Though none are left we should never forget the valiant service of these ships during both World Wars.

When I think of ships like these, designed over 100 years ago which are far more heavily armed and nearly as fast as the Navy’s current Littoral Combat Ships and build in massive numbers at an adjusted cost far lower than the modern ships, one has to wonder what we are getting for our tax dollars. Personally I would rather have Wickes, Clemson, or Fletcher Class destroyers with upgraded electronics and weapons suites rather than the overpriced, under armed and terribly vulnerable LCS ships.

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Tagged as abda, battle of balikpapan, battle of java sea, caldwell class, clemson class, desron 11, desron 29, Gift Horse film, guadalcanal, herman wouk, hms campbeltown, hms encounter, hms exeter, HMS leamington, honda point disaster, ijn ashigara, ijn chikuma, ijn haguro, ijn myoko, ijn tone, ironbottom sound, kido butai, lcdr william outerbridge, lend lease, Lexington Class Battlecruisers, mowe class destroyer, Naval Appropriation Act of 1916, omaha class light cruiser, saint Nazaire, the caine mutiny, Town Class, Trevor Howard, u-405, U-552, us asiatic fleet, us Atlantic fleet, us pacific fleet, uss barry, uss boggs, Uss borie, uss buchanan, Uss caine, Uss card, uss clemson, uss colhoun, uss crosby, uss everts, uss gamble, Uss gillis, uss gregory, uss Jacob Jones, uss john d ford, Uss little, Uss mckean, uss o'brien, uss parrot, uss paul jones, uss peary, uss peary memorial darwin australia, uss perry, Uss pillsbury, uss pope, uss ruben james, uss stewart, Uss twiggs, uss ward, uss ward memorial St. Paul mn, Uss wickes, wickes class

April 18, 2020 · 12:18

The Beautiful, Iconic, Heroic, and Long Serving Fletcher Class Destroyers

The USS Fletcher DD-445

Friends. Of Padre Steve’s World,

After a full day at work and reading and reflecting on events related to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the abysmal response by President Trump and his cabinet to respond to it I needed a bit of a break. So like the warshipphile that I need to be when I think I need a break from writing about the current news , I am posting a significantly edited and illustrated post that I wrote almost a decade ago about one of the most amazing, storied, and beautiful ships ever produced, the Fletcher Class Destroyers.

If ever a class of warships can define a ship type, the destroyers of the Fletcher Class were that. They were the most numerous of all United States Navy destroyer classes the Navy commissioned. 175 of these ships were commissioned between June 1942 and February 1945. There were two groupings of ships the 58 round or “high bridge” ships and the 117 square or “low bridged” ships.

The Fletcher Class was a sound design that would be modified for use in the later Allen M. Sumner and Gearing Class destroyers. Eleven shipyards produced the ships. They were fast, heavily armed and tough. The ships of the class would serve in every theater of the war at sea during World War II, but they would find their greatest fame in the Pacific, where many of them and their gallant crews became synonymous with the courage and devotion of the United States Navy.

USS Stevens one of the 6 Fletchers equipped with an aircraft catapult

The ships were a major improvement on previous classes of destroyers and were equal or superior to the destroyers of our allies and our enemies in the war. At 2050 tons displacement and 2900 tons full load the ships were significantly larger than preceding classes and were designed to mount a superior anti-surface and aircraft armament to compliment their main battery of five 5” 38 caliber dual purpose guns and ten 21” torpedo tubes. They were 376 feet long and flush decked, their flush decks gave them a visual grace and beauty lacked by United States Navy since the four pipers of the Wickes and Clemson classes of the First World War.

They were an exceptionally tough class of ships which was demonstrated often in the brutal surface battles in the South Pacific, Leyte Gulf and in the battles with Kamikazes off the Philippines, Iwo Jima, Okinawa and the Japanese mainland. They were the first destroyers of the US Navy which were built with radar as part of their initial design.

But even more importantly, their design was adaptable to the needs of the Navy during the war and following it.

USS O’Bannon DD-450 in 196

Due to the increased threat of air attacks, their anti aircraft armament was increased throughout the war. Initially the ships as designed were equipped with 4 x 40mm Bofors in two twin-mounts and 6 to 13 x 20mm Oerlikon in single-mounts. By June of 1943 new ships of the class mounted 10 x 40mm Bofors in five twin-mounts 7 x 20mm Oerlikon in single-mounts. As the Kamikaze threat became dire ships returning to the United States for refit lost one of their torpedo tube mounts and had their AA armament increased to 14 x 40mm Bofors in three twin and two quad mounts and 12 x 20mm Oerlikon in six twin mounts.

USS Pringle DD-477 with Catapult and OSU2 Kingfisher embarked

One of the more unusual experiments was to equip six ships with a catapult for a float plane. This eliminated some of their AA guns and one torpedo tube mounting. It was not successful and the mounts were removed before the end of the war.

USS Nicholas in action at Kula Gulf

The first ships of the class saw action in the Solomons during the Guadalcanal campaign. Fletcher and O’Bannon took part in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal where O’Bannon was one of several destroyers that ganged up on the Japanese Battleship Hiei at ranges as low as 500 yards causing heavy damage to the Battleship which was sunk by naval aircraft the following day. The O’Bannon would be awarded the Presidential Unit Citation for her actions around Guadalcanal which read:

O’Bannon

“For outstanding performance in combat against enemy Japanese forces in the South Pacific from October 7, 1942, to October 7, 1943. An aggressive veteran after a year of continuous and intensive operations in this area, the U.S.S. O’BANNON has taken a tremendous toll of vital Japanese warships, surface vessels and aircraft. Launching a close range attack on hostile combatant ships off Guadalcanal on the night of November 13, 1942, the O’BANNON scored three torpedo hits on a Japanese battleship, boldly engaged two other men o’ war with gunfire and retired safely in spite of damage sustained. During three days of incessant hostilities in July 1943, she gallantly stood down Kula Gulf to bombard enemy shore positions in coverage of our assault groups, later taking a valiant part in the rescue of survivors from the torpedoed U.S.S STRONG while under fierce coastal battery fire and aerial bombing attack and adding her fire power toward the destruction of a large Japanese naval force. In company with two destroyers, the O’BANNON boldly intercepted and repulsed nine hostile warships off Vella Lavella on October 7, 1943, destroying two enemy ships and damaging others. Although severely damaged, she stood by to take aboard and care for survivors of a friendly torpedoed destroyer and retired to base under her own power. The O’BANNON’s splendid acheivements and the gallant fighting spirit of her officers and men reflect great credit upon the United States Naval Service.

DESRON 23

Fletcher’s composed DESON 23 the Little Beavers commanded by Commodore Arleigh “31 knot” Burke. The squadron covered the initial landings at Bougainville in November 1943 and fought in 22 separate engagements during the next four months. During this time the squadron was credited with destroying one Japanese cruiser, nine destroyers, one submarine, several smaller ships, and approximately 30 aircraft.

Commodore Arleigh Burke and his Commanders of DESRON 23

Under Burke the squadron was composed of USS Foot (DD-511), USS Charles Ausburne (DD-570), USS Spence (DD-512), USS Claxton (DD-571), USS Dyson (DD-572), USS Converse (DD-509) and USS Thatcher (DD-514). At the Battle of Cape St. George the squadron intercepted a Japanese force of 5 destroyers sinking 3. At the Battle of Empress Augusta Bay the ships were in action as part of Task Force 39 based around Cruiser Division 12 comprised of the Cleveland Class Light Cruisers Montpelier, Cleveland, Columbia and Denver the took part in the sinking of the Japanese Light Cruiser Sendai and a destroyer. For their efforts DESRON 23 would be awarded the Presidential Unit Citation which stated:

“For extrordinary heroism in action against enemy Japanese forces during the Solomon Islands Campaign, from November 1, 1943, to February 23, 1944. Boldly penetrating submarine-infested waters during a period when Japanese naval and air power was at its height, Destroyer Squadron TWENTY THREE operated in daring defiance of repeated attacks by hostile air groups, closing the enemy’s strongly fortified shores to carry out sustained bombardments against Japanese coastal defenses and render effective cover and fire support for the major invasion operations in this area. Commanded by forceful leaders and manned by aggressive, fearless crews the ships of Squadron TWENTY THREE coordinated as a superb fighting team; they countered the enemy’s fierce aerial bombing attacks and destroyed or routed his planes; they intercepted his surface task forces, sank or damaged his warships by torpedo fire and prevented interference with our transports. The brilliant and heroic record achieved by Destroyer Squadron TWENTY THREE is a distinctive tribute to the valiant fighting spirit of the individual units in this indomitable combat group and of each skilled and courageous ship’s company.”

USS Johnston DD-557

Fletcher Class destroyers served heroically with “Taffy-3” in the Battle of Samar at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Taffy-3 which was composed of 6 escort carriers, the Fletcher Class destroyers Hoel, Johnston and Heermann and 4 destroyer escorts was assigned the task of providing close air support for troops ashore and anti-submarine protection for transports. On the morning of October 25^th Admiral Halsey took Third Fleet north to engage a Japanese carrier force believing a Japanese surface force of battleships and cruisers to have withdrawn after being heavily hurt by submarine and air attacks. The carrier force had few aircraft and was considered a decoy by the Japanese. This left the San Bernardino Strait unguarded and the Japanese surface force which by now was comprised of 4 battleships including the Yamato as well as 6 heavy and 2 light cruisers and 11 destroyers doubled back going through the strait during the early morning hours of the 25^th. Just before dawn a patrol aircraft spotted the Japanese force and at 0659 Yamato opened fire on the task group.

USS Hoel DD-533

The three Fletcher’s and the Destroyer escort Samuel B Roberts were launched into a suicidal counter-attack against the Japanese force. Led by Johnston under the command of Ernest E. Evans the little ships engaged their vastly superior foe as the escort carriers edged away as they launched and recovered their aircraft to keep a continuous air assault on the Japanese force. Johnston scored numerous hits with her 5” guns on the Heavy Cruiser Kumano and when she reached torpedo range launched her 10 “fish” one of which blew off Kumano’s bow and another of which crippled Kumano’s sister Suzuya before she was hit in quick succession by a 14” shell from the Battleship Kongo which hit her engine room and three 6” shells from Yamato which struck her bridge. Evans kept the crippled ship in the fight drawing fire away from other attacking destroyers and fending off a Japanese destroyer squadron that was trying to flank the carriers. Johnston continued to be hit and was abandon at 0945 sinking 25 minutes later with 186 of her crew. Evans did not survive and was awarded the Medal of Honor.

USS Heermann DD-532 in action at Samar

Hoel under the command of Commander Leon S. Kintberger took on the Battleship Kongo and a column of cruisers lead by the Heavy Cruiser Haguro. Hoel’s torpedo attack on Kongo forced that ship to turn away and torpedo hits were claimed on the Haguro, although that ship remained in action and the Japanese denied any torpedo damage from the attack. The Japanese concentrated on Hoel, sinking her at 0855 taking all but 86 of her crew to a watery grave.

Heermann under Commander Amos Hathaway threw herself into the fight engaging Japanese battleships and cruisers. Heermann engaged Heavy Cruiser Chikuma with her guns while mounting a torpedo attack on Haguro. She then attacked the Japanese battleships directly engaging Haruna and forcing Yamato to head away from the action for 10 minutes as she was bracketed by two of Heermann’s torpedoes running on a parallel course. She engaged the other battleships at such close range that they could not hit her and broke off to intercept a column of cruisers. Once again she engaged Chikuma in a bloody duel with both ships taking heavy damage. Crippled by a series of 8” shell hits from the heavy cruisers Heermann was down heavily at the bow, so much so that her anchors dragged the water. Carrier aircraft joined the battle and Chikuma withdrew from the fight and sank during her withdraw. Heermann then engaged Heavy Cruiser Tone before that ship, also damaged by air attack withdrew from the fight. Though she was heavily damaged the Heermann was the only destroyer to survive the action. Despite their terrible losses the ships and aircraft of Taffy-3 sank 3 heavy cruisers and a destroyer and heavily damaged 3 battleships and 3 heavy cruisers.

Just a bit wet, USS Halsey Powell unrep with USS Wisconsin

For their heroic actions which kept the Japanese from getting to the vulnerable transports Taffy-3 including the valiant Fletcher class destroyers Johnston, Hoel, Heerman and Destroyer Escort Samuel B Roberts was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation which read:

“For extraordinary heroism in action against powerful units of the Japanese Fleet during the Battle off Samar, Philippines, October 25, 1944. Silhouetted against the dawn as the Central Japanese Force steamed through San Bernardino Strait towards Leyte Gulf, Task Unit 77.4.3 was suddenly taken under attack by hostile cruisers on its port hand, destroyers on the starboard and battleships from the rear. Quickly laying down a heavy smoke screen, the gallant ships of the Task Unit waged battle fiercely against the superior speed and fire power of the advancing enemy, swiftly launching and rearming aircraft and violently zigzagging in protection of vessels stricken by hostile armor-piercing shells, anti-personnel projectiles and suicide bombers. With one carrier of the group sunk, others badly damaged and squadron aircraft courageously coordinating in the attacks by making dry runs over the enemy Fleet as the Japanese relentlessly closed in for the kill, two of the Unit’s valiant destroyers and one destroyer escort charged the battleships point-blank and, expending their last torpedoes in desperate defense of the entire group, went down under the enemy’s heavy shells as a climax to two and one half hours of sustained and furious combat. The courageous determination and the superb teamwork of the officers and men who fought the embarked planes and who manned the ships of Task Unit 77.4.3 were instrumental in effecting the retirement of a hostile force threatening our Leyte invasion operations and were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.”

USS Isherwood (DD-520) underway in heavy weather as she comes alongside the heavy cruiser USS Tuscaloosa (CA-37) in August 1943. National Archives and Records Administration. Photo # 80-G-79429. [Navsource]

During the war 19 of the class were lost and 6 damaged so badly that they were not repaired. 44 of the ships were awarded 10 battle stars or more while 19 were awarded Naval Unit Commendations and 16 Presidential Unit Citations. Following the war all were decommissioned and placed in reserve. Many were re-commissioned during the Korean War and served through Vietnam.

USS Nicholas after her FRAM I Modernization

USS Radford in her final Configuration and Cruise in 1969

Some of these ships were modernized with newer ASW weapons and re-designated Escort Destroyers (DDE) while others had their air search radar modernized and were re-classified as Radar Picket Destroyers or (DDR). The last Fletcher in US Service decommissioned in 1971. 52 were sold or transferred under military assistance programs to other navies in the 1950s. The ships served well and the last one in active service, the Mexican Navy Destroyer Cuitlahuac the former USS John C Rodgers DD-874 was decommissioned in 2001.

Ex USS Twinning in Republic of China Navy Service, note weapon modifcations

Zerstörer Z-1 Rommel

USS Kidd as Museum and Memorial

The Mexican Navy Destroyer Cuitlahuac, the former John Rodgers at Fleet Week San Francisco, CA 1994

The Greek Destroyer Velos, now a museum ship, the former USS Charette at Athens

The Republic of China Destroyer Chaing Yang ex USS Mullany

Four are currently open as memorial ships the USS Cassin Young DD-793 at Chalrestown Naval Yard in Boston, the USS The Sullivans DD-537 at Buffalo NY, and USS Kidd DD-661 at Baton Rouge LA can be seen in the United States. The Cassin Young is berthed at the old Charlestown Naval Yard in Boston across the pier from the Frigate USS Constitution. I had the opportunity to tour her in late 2002. The former the Greek destroyer Velos the ex-USS Charette DD-581 is located in Athens. The Former John Rodgers was been purchased from Mexico by a group in the United States. However, they were unable to obtain the money to needed to return the ship the the United States for repair and restoration, and she was sold for scrap in 2010-2011.

The Fletcher Class really symbolizes more than any class of destroyer the classic look of what a destroyer should be. Their clean lines and classic design are iconic not just in this country but in the 15 other countries that they would serve in during the following years. Their amazing record and service in World War Two and in the following years in both the US Navy and the navies of our Allies is one that will probably never be surpassed.

I have visited the Cassin Young in Boston; it is well worth the time to see. I hope that I might see The Sullivans and Kidd in the coming years.

The Zerstörer Z-4 ex USS Dyson in heavy seas

I salute the ships of the class and the officers and sailors that served on them in peace and war.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Filed under historic preservation, History, Military, national security, Navy Ships, US Navy, World War II at Sea

Tagged as allen m sumner class, battle of cape st george, battle of empress augusta bay, battle of leyte gulf, cdr amos hathaway, cdr ernest evans, cdr leon kintberger, clemson class, commodore Arleigh Burke, dash helicopter program, desron 23, FRAM modernizations, gearing class, Greek Navy Destroyer Velos, ijn hiei, ijn yamato, Mexican Navy Destroyer Cuitlahuac, osu2 kingfisher, Republic of China Destroyer Chaing Yang, second naval battle of guadalcanal, taffy-3, USS, uss cassin young, uss charles ausburne, uss claxton, uss converse, uss dyson, uss fletcher, uss foote, uss heermann, uss hoel, uss john rodgers, uss johnston, uss kidd, USS Mullany, uss nicholas, uss o'bannon, Uss pringle, uss radford, USS Samuel B Roberts, uss spence, uss stevens, uss thatcher, uss the sullivans, wickes class, zerstoer z-4, zerstorer z-1 rommel

April 17, 2020 · 02:03

The Hubris of Empire: The Japanese Battleships Yamato and Musashi

Emperor Hirohito on Musashi in 1943

Friends of Padre Steve’s World

This is an old post of my series on Battleships. Previous post on different battleship classes were about the Battleships constructed under conditions of the London Naval Conference. These have dealt with the British King George V Class, French Dunkerque and Richelieu Classes, ItalianVittorio Vento Class and the American North Carolina and South Dakota Classes. I then wrote an introduction to the Post Treaty Super-Battleships. This article is the first in that series which will include articles on the German Bismarck and Tirpitz, British Vanguard and American Iowa Class. I do hope to take my mind off present events by writing about other battleship types and classes as well as other types of ships. That being said I expect to be doing a new installment of by COVID 19 articles, which I have pretty much avoided for sanity’s sake the past week.

Until tomorrow,

Peace,

Padre Steve+

They were the largest and most heavily armed battleships ever built. Shrouded in secrecy by the Imperial Japanese Navy and Government the ships were designed to offset projected American numerical superiority. Their names were symbolic of Japan’s history. Yamato was named after Yamato Province, the ancestral home of the Yamato People, the dominant native ethnic group in Japan. Musashi was named after Musashi Province in which lays Tokyo Prefecture. A third ship of the class, Shinano, was named after Shinano Province in central Japan which was the home of the prestigious Taketa Shingen family during the Senguku period.

The Conning Tower and Bridge of Musashi

The secrecy surrounding their design and construction was unprecedented. Those charged with their deign and construction were thoroughly checked out by Japan’s secret police and sworn to an oath of secrecy. The oath sworn by builders of Musashi at the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Nagasaki Shipyard were sworn to the oath shown below:

I am aware that all work work involving the construction of the No. 2 Battleship is vital to national security. I will make utmost effort to maintain the secrecy of the project, and swear that I will leak no information relating to the said battleship, even to relatives and close friends. In the event I violate this oath, I will submit to the punishment determined by the company and the Navy.

Yamato during Consrtuction

Security measures around the shipyards where Yamato and Musashi were constructed were immense. At Nagasaki where there was a large foreign business and missionary population where the shipyard was visible from most of the city at hemp screen of 75,000 square meters was constructed to shield the ship from prying eyes and spies.

Musashi under Construction

When actual preparations for construction were taken in 1937 secret police swept the areas of foreign, especially Chinese workers. Security was increased inside and outside the shipyard, all blueprints accounted for and placed under strict guard while all shipyard workers were photographed with any having knowledge of the plans or supervising the construction sworn to the secrecy oath.

When a top secret blueprint went missing in 1938 at Nagasaki an intense investigation that included the torture of numerous suspects and the jailing of a blueprinter who accidentally swept the document into the trash was sentenced to 3 years in prison.

Armor and Protection of Yamato Class

Few pictures exist of the ships and Japanese Naval Officers destroyed many of the records of the ships design and construction just prior to the end of the Second World War. Throughout their existence they were a mystery to the American Navy. During the war the U.S. Navy estimated them to carry nine 16” guns and displace between 40,000-57,000 tons. Even the highly regarded Jane’s Fighting ships listed them at just 45,000 tons.

Yamato and Musashi together in 1943

Preliminary design work began in 1934 and progressed rapidly following Japan’s withdraw from the League of Nations and renunciation of the Washington and London Naval Treaties and withdraw from the 1936 naval talks in London. The early designs varied in the caliber of guns, size and armor, propulsion systems and endurance. Gun calibers ranged from 16” to 18.1” and a combined diesel-turbine system was considered but rejected in favor of traditional steam turbines.

The final design was for a class of five ships. Each would displace 64,000 tons standard displacement and 72,000 tons at full load. They were 862 feet long with a beam of 127 feet. They were so large that the docks they were built needed to be expanded and special extra large launch platforms had to be built. At Nagasaki the dock at to be expanded by cutting into the hill adjacent to it.

They were armed with nine 18.1 inch guns in triple turrets which could fire a projectile weighing over a ton. The secondary armament consisted of 12 6.1 inch guns mounted in triple turrets formerly mounted on the Mogami Class cruisers when those ships were equipped with 8” guns. Anti-aircraft defense included twelve 5” guns and twenty-four 25mm anti-aircraft guns. During the war two of the 6.1 inch turrets were removed and replaced with twelve more 5” guns and the 25mm battery was raised to 162 guns. Fire control systems were designed in such a way that the ships could engage multiple surface targets at the same time.

The ships were protected by a massive armored belt ranging from 16 inches to 8 inches with 26 inch armor on the face plates of the main gun turrets. The armor was advanced with excellent sloping but had a flaw where the upper and lower belts connected just below the waterline which exposed them to damage from torpedoes.

Yamato and Musashi viewed beside Battleship Nagato (foreground) just before the Battle of Leyte Gulf

They were powered by 12 Kampon boilers which powered 4 steam turbines and four three bladed propellers. These developed 150,000 shp and could drive the ship at a top speed of 27 knots.

Yamato

Construction of Yamato began on November 4th 1937 at Kure Naval Shipyard. Musashi on March 28th 1938. Traditionally such events were large public ceremonies but these were limited to just a few Naval Staff and Shipyard executives. Yamato was Launched on August 8th 1940 and commissioned on December 16th 1941, just 9 days after Pearl Harbor. Musashi was launched on November 8th 1940 and commissioned on August 5th 1942 just two days before the U.S. Marines invaded Guadalcanal and two months after the disaster at the Battle of Midway.

Yamato served as Admiral Yamamoto’s flagship at Midway where she saw no action. The next two years she was and Musashi alternated as fleet flagship and conducted operations with Battleship Division One in operations between Mainland Japan and the major Japanese base at Truk. On December 25th 1943 while escorting a convoy she was torpedoed by the submarine USS Skate and suffered heavy damage which flooded a magazine. On March 29th while underway Musashi was struck near the bow by a torpedo from the USS Tunny.

Musashi Under Attack at the Battle of Sibuyan Sea

Both ships participated in the Battle of the Philippine Sea and were part of Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita’s Central Force in the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Musashi was sunk by U.S. Navy Carrier aircraft from the Third Fleet on October 24th 1944 during the Battle of the Sibuyan Sea. Hit by 17 bombs and 19 torpedoes she sank with the loss of nearly 1100 of her crew of almost 2400 men. The survivors were rescued by destroyers and disembarked at Corregidor. Some were sent by troop transport to Japan but one of the ships was torpedoed and sunk leaving her survivors adrift for 19 hours before rescue. Those who reached Japan were isolated from the population while about half of the survivors remained in the Philippines where 117 of 146 of those assigned to the defense of Manila were killed in action.

Yamato or Musashi under air Attack

Yamato saw action in the surface engagement on October 25th against the Escort Carriers and Destroyers of Taffy-3 during the Battle off Samar. Her guns helped sink the Escort Carrier USS Gambier Bay but was forced away from the action by torpedo attacks from the valiant destroyers of Taffy-3.

Yamato under Attack April 7th 1945

By April 1945 Japan’s Navy was decimated and holed up in Japanese controlled ports without fuel to conduct all but minor operations. U.S. Naval Forces were raiding Mainland Japan, inflicting heavy casualties among remaining naval, merchant marine, and air units, as well as bases and industrial facilities.

When the United States landed on Okinawa the Japanese Navy and air force launched wave after wave of Kamikaze attacks on the ships in the waters around the island. Yamato, along with Light Cruiser Yahagi and eight destroyers were designated the Surface Special Attack Force and loaded with a full load of ammunition but only enough fuel for a one way trip. They got underway on April 6th. The mission was for Yamato to reach Okinawa, beach herself and serve as an “unsinkable” gun battery until she was destroyed. The force was spotted by U.S. Navy flying boats hours after their departure and on April 7th over 400 aircraft launched from Task Groups 58.1 and 58.3 found the Yamato strike group. Devoid of fighter cover the force was doomed. The first wave of attacking aircraft began its attack at 1230. More followed, and by 1400 Yamato was mortally wounded. She had been hit by at least 8 torpedoes and 11 bombs in an hour and a half. Now she was dead in the water and began to capsize at 1405. At 1420 she turned turtle, and at 1423 she exploded when her forward blew up sending up a mushroom cloud nearly 20,000 feet. Under 300 of her crew of nearly 2400 were rescued.

The End: Yamato Explodes

The Yamato and Musashi were the largest battleships ever built. But they were designed when naval experts who planned for a war where the battleship would rule and aircraft carriers played a supporting role. But the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor made the Aircraft Carrier the new Queen of the seas. Neither ship ever faced enemy battleships in combat and both were destroyed by the weapon that the battleship admirals had discounted, carrier based aircraft.

Thus, is somewhat fitting that each ship was commissioned shortly after the triumphs of Japanese and American Naval air power at Pearl Harbor and Midway. However, they have attained an almost mythic status in naval lore. Likewise they are both are symbols to many Japanese of the sacrifice and futility of the war. Their legend lives on in Japanese science fiction. However, both of the cities where the ships were constructed were destroyed by Atomic bombs. They are tragic reminders of the cost of war in human lives, suffering, economic cost and destruction.

In a sense their poetic names and the myths ascribed to them are a tragic requiem to the Japanese Empire and the cost of war. They and their brave sailors were sacrificed when the war was already for all intents and purposes lost. They, especially the Yamato were sacrificed for no military purpose save a convoluted sense of honor, and a nation that waged unjust and criminal wars in China before before it ever dreamed of attacking Pearl Harbor. Many Japanese Navy units, including surface ships, submarines, and Special Naval Units (Marines) engaged in war crimes at sea and ashore.

Of course the vast majority of the crew members of these ships never took part in these crimes because they seldom engaged in combat action until each was destroyed. Both spent most of the war flagships as part of a fleet in readiness. Unlike the German High Seas Fleet of the First World War, or the German Battleship Bismarck, the battleships of the Italian Regina Marina, or the battleships of Vichy France, none ever faced an enemy battleship in combat.

The only Japanese battleships to engage American battleships were the elderly fast battleship Kirishima which was destroyed by the gunfire of USS Washington during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, and the even more elderly and obsolete Fuso and Yamishiro which were destroyed by the combined firepower of the survivors of Pearl Harbor, the USS West Virginia, USS California, USS Tennessee, USS Maryland, USS Pennsylvania, and the USS Mississippi which was not at Pearl Harbor, as well as many cruisers, destroyers, and PT Boats at the Battle of Surigao Strait during the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Kirishima was lost on the verge of victory to USS Washington and Rear Admiral Willis Lee who used their advantage in radar to singlehandedly destroy Kirishima and her supporting ships even as her destroyer screen was decimated, and the battleship USS South Dakota lost electric power and was heavily damaged.

Yamato and Musashi were a waste of industrial capacity, manpower, and resources for Japan. Their sister, Shinano, which had been converted to an aircraft carrier, was lost on her maiden voyage to a spread of torpedoes fired from the submarine USS Archerfish, with a huge life of life simply because she was rushed into commission without vital watertight compartments being ready. They were expensive failures in every sense of the word, showing that bigger isn’t always better, and that investment in such expensive ships must take into account the technology that could defeat them. For the moment most nations including the United States, China, Great Britain, France, Russia, and India seem to be placing their bets on the aircraft carrier retaining its dominance, but that could easily be the same mistake of the powers of the Second World War who built battleships, even when it was clear that their dominance was at an end.

Let us pray that it never happens again. I can only imagine the shock if an American Nuclear Carrier was sunk by a submarine, a saturation cruise missile attack, or one of the maneuverable Chinese nuclear ballistic missiles. Such a loss would shock the nation and send the Navy into a panic as it scrambled to find a way to recover from such a sinking without losing more carriers. Such an event would be as transformational to naval warfare as were the introduction of the Dreadnaught, and the perfection of the submarine as a tactical and strategic weapon.

Until tomorrow,

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Filed under History, imperial japan, Military, Navy Ships, Political Commentary, US Navy, war crimes, World War II at Sea, world war two in the pacific

Tagged as admiral willis lee, battle of midway, battle of okinawa, battle of surigao strait, battle of the sibuyan sea, battle off samar, battleship bismarck, emperor hirohito, ijn kirishima, ijn musashi, ijn shinano, ijn yahagi, ijn yamashiro, ijn yamato, Isoruku Yamamoto, japanese Navy war crimes, naval battle of guadalcanal, pearl harbor attack, regina marina, taffy-3, uss archerfish, uss california, uss gambier bay, uss maryland, uss mississippi, uss pennsylvania, uss skate, uss tennessee, uss tunny, uss washington, uss west virginia

April 16, 2020 · 00:28

A New Thread in the Tapestry of My Life: Serving People in the Age of COVID-19

Friends of Padre Steve’s World

It is interesting to think about life, what has transpired, and what might have been if only…

Like anyone I wonder about all of the “what ifs” and “might have been” parts of my life. Of course there are many, going back to things that I could not control, such as the choices that my parents made regarding their lives, career, family, and home. Then there are my own choices, choices that I made, some for better, and some maybe for worse. Then there were the choices of men and women in my life and career that impacted my life and the decisions that I made, again for better or worse.

Some of my dreams, and nightmares too, involve those decisions, particularly the ones that I could not control; but then there were those decisions, particularly regarding my military career choices, that come back to haunt my dreams. Those can be troubling; the things that I volunteered to do and the costs of those to Judy as a result of those decisions. Many of those decisions, particularly my decisions to volunteer for certain deployments and operations have come at a great cost to both of us, the struggle with the effects of PTSD even ten years after my return from Iraq is still very real.

But then I am reminded that none of us have a crystal ball that allows us to see what the result of our decisions will be; none of us are God, or some other omniscient being. We make our decisions based on what we know, and what we think might be the outcome of our decisions.

If only my knees hadn’t been too badly injured and slow to recover I would have been out of the Navy, probably teaching history (now online) at the college level while relegating my calling as a priest to the background. But after that I couldn’t retire, but due to a administrative error in calculating my statutory retirement date as I expected in April. I am now scheduled to retire in August, but with Coronavirus there is even uncertainty about that, and frankly I couldn’t care less, because I would rather serve and be in the thick of the fight than sitting on my ass or doing something that provides for me and Judy, but does not help in the time of crisis.

Between last spring when I first put in my voluntary retirement paperwork working in the most miserable tour of all my time in the military, and doubting my call as a Priest, something miraculous happened. The screwed up knees and administrative mistakes ended up renewing my call and ministry among people I would never have expected to be serving. But even with that I never expected that I would still be serving on active duty at the age of 60, providing needed and valued ministry to people of all faiths, including atheists, in the midst of the novel Coronavirus 19 pandemic that is infecting some of them, or infecting and killing their family members, friends, or others that they know. Of course I take all of the guidance seriously to protect those I serve as well as Judy and me, but a new thread has been woven into the tapestry of my life. I felt the renewed call not long after I arrived, but this has solidified it.

I love the television series Star Trek the Next Generation. One of my favorite episodes is called Tapestry. In the episode Captain Picard is killed. He is then met by the being known as Q, played by John De Lancie for a do-over, a second chance to reverse a choice that he made as a young officer.

On Q’s promise that his choice will not alter history Picard takes the chance and he ends up regretting it. In his second chance to avoid the incident that allowed him to be killed he alienates himself from his friends, and turns him in to a different person, unwilling to take chances and doomed to insignificance. When he returns to his new present he finds himself alive but a different person. Instead of a starship captain is a nondescript lieutenant junior grade doing a job that he hates as an assistant astrophysics officer.

Distraught Picard complains to Q:

Picard: You having a good laugh now, Q? Does it amuse you to think of me living out the rest of my life as a dreary man in a tedious job?

Q: I gave you something most mortals never experience: a second chance at life. And now all you can do is complain?

Picard: I can’t live out my days as that person. That man is bereft of passion… and imagination! That is not who I am!

Q: Au contraire. He’s the person you wanted to be: one who was less arrogant and undisciplined in his youth, one who was less like me… The Jean-Luc Picard you wanted to be, the one who did not fight the Nausicaan, had quite a different career from the one you remember. That Picard never had a brush with death, never came face to face with his own mortality, never realized how fragile life is or how important each moment must be. So his life never came into focus. He drifted through much of his career, with no plan or agenda, going from one assignment to the next, never seizing the opportunities that presented themselves. He never led the away team on Milika III to save the Ambassador; or take charge of the Stargazer’s bridge when its captain was killed. And no one ever offered him a command. He learned to play it safe – and he never, ever, got noticed by anyone.

It is a fascinating exchange and one that when I wonder about the choices that I have made that I think about; because when all is said and done, my life, like all of ours is a tapestry. On reflection Picard tells Counselor Troi, “There are many parts of my youth that I’m not proud of. There were… loose threads – untidy parts of me that I would like to remove. But when I… pulled on one of those threads – it’d unravel the tapestry of my life.”

I think that I can agree with that. All the things in my life, the good things and the bad, as well as the paths not taken have all been a part of the tapestry of my life. I would not be who I am without them; and that I cannot comprehend. I would rather be the flawed me that is me, than the perfect me that never existed. Thus, all of those threads of my tapestry are in a sense, precious and even holy.

I’ll keep all of them, but of all I will remember this thread, as well as my combat tours, and life and death in ICUs and ERs the most. Suddenly at the age of 60 life has begun again. As the late great Sid Caesar once said:

“A great NOW will be a great WAS! A bad NOW will always be a bad WAS, and all you can hope for is a Great GONNA BE!”

As old as I am and as long as I have served, my future is yet to be written, and the tapestry of my life continues, even as new threads are woven into it. Every experience in my life has helped make me the person that I am. A friend of mine from my high school years sent me an email after I explained the experiences behind my writings, and noted “maybe all of that prepared you for such a time as this.” It was an affirmation by someone who doesn’t always share my political, social, or interpretation of the Christian faith that I am doing what I need to be, in such a time as this.

Value the tapestry of your life, and always find something good to life for and work towards.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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Filed under christian life, Coronavirus, faith, life, Military, ministry, philosophy, star trek, Tour in Iraq, US Navy

Tagged as captain jean luc picard, chaplain ministry, Coronavirus 19, COVID-19, friends, PTSD, q, sid Caesar, star trek tng tapestry, tapestry of life

April 5, 2020 · 17:51

Perpetrators, Victims, and Bystanders in the Age of COVID-19

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

We are now living in an age where established norms of civilized peoples have been turned upside down and inside out. This is due to combination of events, some that I mentioned in my last post. however, the most troubling that I see is for people in positions of power where they could actually do good to mitigate our losses in the novel Coronavirus 19 Pandemic, either directly contribute to its spread, or turn their backs knowing what is happening. Holocaust Historian Yehuda Bauer wrote: “Thou shall not be a perpetrator, thou shall not be a victim, and thou shall never, but never, be a bystander.”

But here we are again with that choice. Like the Holocaust it comes down to the question of who lives and who dies. But unlike the Holocaust where those decisions were made by people who killed their carefully selected victims by bullets, gas, medical experiments, euthanasia, or who worked and starved them to death, we are brought to this point by the lack of preparation and callous indifference to the disease when it had a chance to be stopped, slowed, or brought under control until a vaccination or an effective treatment can be found. Now, doctors and nurses, themselves potential victims because they do not have adequate personal protective equipment, will have to make choices about who lives and who dies because they do not have enough ICU beds and ventilators to treat everyone. Last week I wrote about the coming combat mass casualty triage that many hospitals will have to implement in the coming days and weeks. To those who have not seen combat, been in mass casualty situations, or really their history, the decisions will seem cruel, and maybe even unjust, but that is the reality that we are soon to face here.

Honestly I don’t see the doctors and nurses who have to make such decisions as perpetrators, as they too are being infected and dying. They are also victims, as are the infected and dying. The real perpetrators are those that allowed this virus to spread, who denied it being a threat, minimized the threat, those who delayed acting, and those who have profited by it are the perpetrators.

The rest of us have a choice. We can take the side of and do everything we can to help the victims, or we can join the list of perpetrators by perpetuating their lies and crimes, or be bystanders who turn a blind eye to what is happening, neither taking a stand for or against what is happening. Sophie Scholl who lost her life at the age of 22 by writing the truth about the evils of the Nazi regime wrote:

“The real damage is done by those millions who want to ‘survive.’ The honest men who just want to be left in peace. Those who don’t want their little lives disturbed by anything bigger than themselves. Those with no sides and no causes. Those who won’t take measure of their own strength, for fear of antagonizing their own weakness. Those who don’t like to make waves—or enemies. Those for whom freedom, honour, truth, and principles are only literature. Those who live small, mate small, die small. It’s the reductionist approach to life: if you keep it small, you’ll keep it under control. If you don’t make any noise, the bogeyman won’t find you. But it’s all an illusion, because they die too, those people who roll up their spirits into tiny little balls so as to be safe. Safe?! From what? Life is always on the edge of death; narrow streets lead to the same place as wide avenues, and a little candle burns itself out just like a flaming torch does. I choose my own way to burn.”

I haven’t mentioned the numbers lately. They started to remind me of the nightly casualty counts that were shown like baseball box scores on the nightly national news broadcasts on ABC, CBS, and NBC. Sadly, every one of these numbers is a real person. The infected and dead are of all races, religions, genders, rich and poor, good and bad alike.

So I ask that when you read them to remember that, each one a real person with hopes and dreams, either ended or put on indefinitely by the virus. Then there is the ripple effects, all the family members, friends, acquaintances, and colleagues left behind. There are now holes in lives of people who have lost loved ones or friends, that cannot be filled by pious talk, blaming others, or by saying that this is God’s will or judgement.

Each of these people, the infected, the dead, and even those who recover bear the physical, emotional, and spiritual know the feeling of the God forsaken, as do those who knew them, loved them, and suffered with them. Forgive the intrusion of faith here, but for me it is the image of Jesus the Christ, hanging on a cross, forgiving a thief, comforting his mother, can crying out to his God and Father in defense of those killing him, “forgive them they know not what they do.” But then there were the bystanders who just sat back and watched, whose inaction be it from their agreement to what was occurring or fear of speaking out allowed them to do nothing. Elie Wiesel wrote “What hurts the victim most is not the cruelty of the oppressor, but the silence of the bystander.”

So here are today’s latest numbers. Worldwide the toll stands at 1,261,095 infections, 68,468 deaths, and 260,032 recoveries. A death rate that is now up to 21% based on the resolved cases, be they recovered or dead. Of the 932,595 active cases we have no idea as to how their cases will resolve. Hopefully the numbers of recoveries against deaths in these cases will begin to lower the death rate number. However, we cannot know that number until the cases are resolved, but the death rate among resolved cases has climbed from the 14%-15% rate to 20-21% in about ten days worldwide.

But in the United States, for once we are now leading the world in terms of the number of infections, despite the fact that our intelligence agencies wanted the President as early as mid January of what was coming. The President, denied, delayed, dithered, and dispersed the blame to everyone but himself until he saw the stock markets tank.

So with that being said let us talk about the United States and how many people are infected, died or recovered here. In the Good Ol’ USA, which if we remember the words of our President had become great again under his personal leadership, there are now 331,285 total cases, 9,479 deaths, and 17,091 recoveries from the virus. That is a 36% death rate. That rate among the resolved cases has remained constant between 35-40% over the last week and a half. additionally we have only tested 1,751,296 people, and thousands of they tests have not been processed because the laboratory system is overwhelmed. But the number of Americans tested is just slightly over one half of one percent of the Census Bureau’s 2019 population estimate of 329,450,000. So we cannot be sure of how many people have been exposed to, infected by, recovered, or died of the disease.

Likewise we now lead the world in total infections, our deaths only trail those of Spain and France. We’re number three, can I get a cheer for that? I doubt it because within a week at the most we will also lead the world in deaths. So let’s hear that chant of USA! USA! USA! And We’re number One!” Can I get an Amen brothers and sisters? I hate to sound flippant and sarcastic at such a time, but with so many people ignoring social distancing and doing nothing to stop the spread of the virus, including pastors who flaunt their state laws and Federal recommendations and continue to gather, or Florida’s Governor Rick DeSantis who reopened his states beaches barely two days after he closed them, how can I not be somewhat sarcastic and flippant? It’s gallows humor. These people are going to spread the virus or contract it themselves. The data shows that each infected person spreads the virus to an average of 2 to 3 other people. Do these people want others to become infected, or spread the virus to their friends and families, or do they have some kind of death wish?

I’m sorry, but those are rhetorical questions No sane person would want that to be the case, unless they are brainwashed cult members, apocalyptic Christians, or sociopaths who only want the worst for others in order to achieve their own salvation or annihilation. You cannot be too sure about religious ideologues, some of them get a kick of thinking that they will be martyrs for their cause, even if that cause were a lie. Just ask the 9-11 hijackers, but they are all dead. Ideologues, religious or otherwise who seek to kill people and then want the honor of martyrdom are simply narcissistic sociopaths who could care less about the death they inflict and the subsequent consequences, because it is really all about them.

But the President was not alone in first dismissing the virus or the impact that it would have. It appears that China’s President Xi did the same thing, as did Russia’s President Putin, and many other world leaders. No matter who they are or what country they lead, if they denied, delayed, or otherwise left their people unprotected in the face of this virus they are the perpetrators. Especially leaders that ignored the warnings of their medical and scientific advisors and urged people to go back to work as if things were still normal and the virus couldn’t kill them. Admittedly, their is a scale of culpability in this, early on many nations said that they were not like China, or then like Italy. Denial is not just a river in Egypt, but the sooner a nation and it’s leaders got over denial, the sooner they began to actually take action to protect the lives of their people.

Likewise so so called religious leaders who encourage the ignorant sheep in close proximity of each other fully realizing that some or many could be contagious, supposedly in the name of religious freedom, but more to gather their cults and collect their money as for profit prophets, promoting imaginary cures based on supposed secret “words from God” or miracle cures that can be purchased, and providing you have faith will work. They and others like them are the perpetrators.

But that leaves the rest of us. Will we speak? Or will we for whatever reasons, as logical as they may seem to be we have a choice of what we will do.

But then there are the heroes who save lives and are punished for doing so. One of them is Captain Brett Crozier, the Commanding Officer of the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt, tried to inform his chain of command of an large outbreak of COVID-19 on his ship that was threatening to overwhelm the capacities of his medical department. He did not get a satisfactory answer so he blasted out an email to many Navy officials, which was leaked by someone and published by the San Francisco Chronicle. But his email got attention, and he was allowed to take the ship to Guam, where he was able to begin transferring infected sailors off the ship and arranged to have the rest of the crew tested, and placed in safe quarters.

He was also bound by the DOD’s decision to follow CDC guidelines and not to have his crew wear Personal Protective Equipment if they were not medical personnel, or already infected and showing symptoms. That CDC guidance was finally changed Friday, and I just received a text saying we were now allowed and encouraged to wear cloth masks. Thankfully, during this period many of our workers were teleworking or on paid administrative leave due to they or their family members are in high risk groups for contracting the virus. Commanders of ships at sea didn’t get that opportunity.

The strange thing to me is that multiple Naval Commanding Officers whose negligence, lack of adherence to Naval Regulations, or concern for the welfare of their crews and safety of their ships enjoyed the benefit of a full hearing by experienced Naval Officers before they were relieved of their commands. This did not occur with Captain Crozier, who was relieved by Acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly against the advice of the Chief of Naval Operations. Modly has noted that he understood and admitted that President Trump, a man who fired Modly’s predecessor Richard Spencer who publicly stated that the President’s defense and pardoning of convicted war criminals harmed good order and discipline in the Armed Forces, wanted to fire Captain Crozier, despite the fact that he protected his ship and crew. However, against the advice of the Chief of Naval Operation and other senior Naval officers, Mr. Modly relieved Captain Crozier before such a board of inquiry could be convened, which meant that there is no chance of one occurring now, except as a means to decide if he should be prosecuted for his actions.

Of course any such board would have probably affirmed Captain Crozier’s actions, unlike the Commanding officers of other ships who covered up their ship’s training, manning, and technical or mechanical deficiencies and who by doing so sacrificed the lives of their sailors, and grave and costly damage to their ship which rendered those ships non mission capable for more than a year each. Despite the lies being presented by the President aided by his media and political apologists, Captain Crozier exhibited the finest of Naval tradition in protecting his ship and crew, and boldly risked his career for the defense of his crew and the nation. And it appears that he too has contracted COVID-19 and may be prosecuted for his actions. In this case it appears to me that the Navy’s justice system has been turned inside out and upside down.

So I must make a judgment. Captain Crozier acted in the best interests of his ship, sailors, the Naval tradition, sore values, and truth. In doing so he was afforded less justice then men whose lack of concern for their ships, crews, and the nation were given. Likewise, though his actions saved lives, and will result in the ship and crew being fully mission capable with a few weeks. Yet he was given less respect or protection for his actions, by the President has in pardoning convicted war criminals.

But as a veteran of over 38 years of military service, in peace and war, I have to admit that I am ashamed of our political, military, and moral leadership which would pardon war criminals, give full hearings to men whose actions led to deaths of their crew members and long term costly repairs to their ships, before relieving them, who then condone and defend their actions against Captain Crozier whose real offense was trying to save his crew. He is a victim of both the disease, and the Navy leadership, who have become perpetrators of injustice.

Captain Crozier was denied a fair hearing, and and condemned because the President wanted it to happen. That my friends, as an officer whose oath is to “defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic” and not the actions of any a political party or President, demands that my honor is based on defending the Constitution, and at the same time knowing that it is not my career that is sacred, but the honor and reputation of the nation in upholding our laws, Constitution, and institutions of the nation, against usurpers who only seek to expand their power and gratification at the expense of the United States, and its citizens, even using the police and military power of the state against them to do so, I have to make a stand for truth, and like General Ludwig Beck who resigned his position as Chief of Staff of the Wehrmacht in defiance of Hitler’s invasion of Czechoslovakia, and who lost his life in Operation Valkyrie in 1944, I have to state like Beck:

“Final decisions about the nation’s existence are at stake here; history will incriminate these leaders with bloodguilt if they do not act in accordance with their specialist political knowledge and conscience. Their soldierly obedience reaches its limit when their knowledge, their conscience, and their responsibility forbid carrying out an order.”

For me, my friends, that is the heart of the matter. This is about the public health and the welfare of my neighbor, not about me. If any order is issued in contradiction to the the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, the U.S.Constitution, or the Uniform Code of Military Justice, I must raise my voice against it, and as a matter of honor defend those accused of breaking them. How can a man with any sense of honor not due so?

We all have a choice. Will we be a perpetrator, victim, or bystander during this crisis? I cannot be a bystander, I cannot be silent. I have to echo and proclaim the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

So until after that tomorrow and I wish you all the best, and please be careful out there.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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Filed under Coronavirus, Diseases Epidemics and Pandemics, ethics, healthcare, History, laws and legislation, leadership, national security, natural disasters, Political Commentary, Religion, US Navy

March 18, 2020 · 23:59

“Therefore Never Send to Know for Whom the bell Tolls, it Tolls for Thee” The Victims, Costs, and Threat of COVID-19

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

On December 31st the Chinese Government reported the first death from nouveau Coronavirus 19, or COVID 19. By the end of January there were over 12,000 cases and 259 deaths. The first infected American arrived from China in the middle of January. At first, the American Government led by the Trump Administration paid little attention to it or downplayed its significance. It did that until the bottom began falling out of the stock markets, bond markets, and the oil market, the latter was not due to Coronavirus but the productions and price oil war between Saudi Arabia and Russia.

The Trump Administration finally labeled the situation a health emergency at the end of January, but did nothing to prepare. Belatedly, it began to organize a response led by Vice President Pence at the end of February, but even still the President in his speeches and tweets continued to downplay the situation as members of his political, religious, and media cult amplified his message, until a week ago.

The day I wrote my first article about Coronavirus, March 8th there had been almost 110,000 cases and nearly 3800 deaths. That was an increase of 98,000 cases and over 3500 deaths in just 38 days.

Around midnight last night, there were nearly 198,500 cases and just shy of 8,000 deaths, 7,987 to be exact. So in ten days there were around 100,000 new cases, and close to 4200 new deaths. As of this evening there are a total of 218,721 cases, of which 125,392 are currently active. 93,329 are closed, meaning either recovery or death. Of the closed cases, 8,983 or 10% have died. This means there were over 20,000 new cases and almost 1,000 deaths since last night. Italy was hit hardest in the past day, over 4,200 new cases and 475 deaths. In other European countries the numbers are spiking, and are about a week or two behind Italy in the progression of the disease.

Since last night the United States, in which testing capabilities are being expanded, there are now a total of 9,301 cases, with 2,890 of them being reported in the last day, and a total of 152 deaths, 43 since yesterday. Our numbers are about two or three weeks behind Italy, and despite the measures to quarantine, shut down, or shelter-in-place enacted by state and local governments there is no uniformity to those actions in light of the limited guidance or funding provided by Federal agencies.

In the United States, we were not prepared despite the warnings of experts that such a deadly pandemic would happen. The country was underprepared and unready for such a condition of affairs. Despite the recent flurry of action by Trump and his administration dithered and denied any real emergency or crisis for over two months, not taking precautions, not ramping up production of test kits, N-95 masks, surgical masks, other personal protective gear for first responders, hospital personnel, or nursing home workers, nor did it anticipate the need for anti-viral disinfectants, cleaners, or urge Americans to begin wearing surgical masks in order to mitigate the possible transmission of the virus. Nor did it take of whole of government approach to the developing crisis until last week. Even with that move there is much confusion and bureaucratic infighting.

Frankly, most departments are still trying to make sense of what they need to do. Today the Navy was ordered to prepare the Hospital Ships USNS Comfort and USNS Mercy for deployment. Both are converted supertankers built in 1974 and 1975 before being purchased and converted and equipped as 1000 bed hospital ships in 1987. They are approaching 50 years old. They are equipped with operating rooms ICU beds, and medical and surgical wards, Radiology suites, and a full range of labs, but it takes a lot to staff them and make them ready to deploy. In addition to normal pre-deployment activities everyone deploying on them will need to be test for Coronavirus before they set foot on the ship to ensure that they do not become “plague ships.” Comfort will deploy to New York, and Mercy to a yet to be determined West Coast metropolis. It will take at least a week, and probably more to make them ready to deploy. The crews of the ships are Merchant Marine Officers, deck, and engineering personnel, but the physicians, nurses, other providers, and technicians will leave their duty stations in Naval Hospitals and Clinics which are already at critical manning levels. They have to be augmented by activated Naval Reserve Medical personnel, Uniformed Public Health Service Officers, civilians employees of Navy Medicine and medical personnel from Humanitarian Service Organizations. There also has to be a Navy Security detachment, communications section, and an aviation detachment with its helicopters, as well as Chaplains and Mental Health Providers. These ships seldom deploy at the same time so the demands on Navy Medicine will be quite severe in Navy Medical Centers, Hospitals, and clinics.

Likewise, the administration ordered the activation of a number of mobile field hospitals. There are a number of types and sizes of such self-contained units which can be deployed by air sea, or ground. But like the Navy’s Hospital ships they draw almost all of their medical personnel from active duty hospitals, and mobilized reservists. Likewise, the reserve and National Guard field hospitals depend on the very civilian health professions working in hospitals and private practices already dealing with the pandemic.

While China has flattened its infection and death curves due to its draconian police power to enforce the will of the government over the past few weeks, COVID-19 has spread across the globe. This includes all 50 U.S. States, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. The numbers are expanding exponentially in Europe and the United States, and today, two members of the House of Representatives announced that they had tested positive for the virus. With every passing day that curve will spike in the United States and Europe, and evidence in other countries suggest that a second wave of the virus is spreading in countries that did pretty well in the first wave.

On Friday, the President attempted to contain the damage with a press conference where he again minimized the threat, denied personal responsibility for anything, and then spoke to supporting financial markets, which briefly caused a rally on Wall Street, which collapsed as he and the administration began to acknowledge the truth of the matter and he turned the answering of medical, logistic, and disaster response to experts, such as Dr. Anthony Fauci, and even Vice President Pence seemed to eclipse Trump as more presidential. Over the weekend the President looked like a man who knew that he was in way over his head, even when he blustered and tweeted. Despite the actions being planned to mitigate the economic, public health, and personal costs of the virus, the damage was done. On Monday the stock markets took their heaviest losses ever, gained a little bit back Tuesday, and crashed again today.

Scrambling to find a way out of the situation the Administration and Congress, thanks largely to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi have been attempting to work out a stimulus bill which hopefully, would directly benefit all Americans, not just the banks, oil companies, and financial industries. Congress passed a measure to provide paid sick leave for all, and the Treasury Department is arguing for direct monetary payments to Americans who are now being hit with the full reality of an uncontrolled pandemic, massive business closures, job losses, and quarantine in some cities and states. The details of that are still to be worked out, but even that may not be enough to save some people from financial disaster.

Today the President used his authority to use the 70–year–old Defense Production Act to force companies to make more respiratory ventilators, testing kits, and personal protective gear for medical personnel. But none of these measures can make up for the lack of ICU beds, General Medical beds, that are a feature of our mostly for profit medical industry. Hospitals have lost their ability to surge because maintaining an unused surge capacity is too expensive, until you really need it. Now, thirty years after the end of the Cold War, even the military medical system too has little surge capacity because like its civilian counterparts it has adopted the business models of civilian medical corporations. Fewer staff, fewer beds, and less surge capacity.

The economy is taking massive hits, large numbers of the people who can least afford it are being laid off with little chance of going back to work anytime soon.

This is especially true of the airline, cruise, hotel, entertainment, hotel, and restaurant industries. In the restaurant industry nearly 15 million jobs are at stake, by the time it abates, there could be 50 million job losses in the hotel, restaurant, and entertainment sectors as local, state and the Federal government begin shutdowns of these businesses. Sadly most of the workers are living paycheck to paycheck, work for minimum wage and tips. Many are single parents, students, and people who chose the jobs because they liked dealing with people, or who were working to support themselves to get a better paying and more stable career. We know a lot of them. Good people, hard working people who constantly get screwed regardless of whether they work for large or middle sized companies who do not value them as people, or local restaurants which do not have large financial reserves, but it will expand as commercial food suppliers lose their corporate restaurant, entertainment, hotel and resort customers who will have no need of their supplies until the situation gets better.

Hopefully the measures being worked out will not only include direct payments to Americans, support for the restaurant, hotel, entertainment, and travel industries which employ far more people than the oil companies, and financial industries, as well as a provision for paid sick leave which is standard in most countries of the world.

But my friends, every one of these victims of Coronavirus and government incompetence is a real person. Many will recover from the virus but will suffer long term effects. Many will die, leaving behind friends, families, and holes in the community. Others, not infected by the virus will lose their jobs, businesses, or people that they love and care about. These people are not just numbers no matter what country or industry they live or work in. They are real live, men and women, sons and daughters, fathers and mothers, friends, co-workers, and acquaintances.

Behind every number there is a name, and a life connected to others. John Donne put it so well in his No Man is an Island:

“No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend’s or of thine own were: any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.”

For me and Judy, these are not numbers or statistics, they are friends, neighbors, and even family.

I am old enough to have worked as a hospital chaplain during two pandemics, and seen people die. I helped write the Army personnel policies for HIV infected personnel and worked with many so they could remain in the service back in 1987 and 1988. I worked in a homeless shelter for abysmal wages caring for those with less working for a board of 30 very well off members who didn’t value me as a person. I have been a company commander in the Army at the young age of 25 with just two years of active duty service before I took command. I have also done two combat tours, seen things most Americans have never seen, been shot at by rockets, machine guns, and small arms, all while unarmed. During this current pandemic I am essential personnel. A chaplain cannot telework. Ministry involves real contact with real people, in the flesh. This involves risks, I am almost 60, but I will take them but attempt to mitigate them in order to care for those who be they military.

The sad thing is that I will have friends and family members who will despite the overwhelming evidence downplay the situation, ignore it, or claim it to be “fake news.” Unfortunately, many will become victims of it or be the typhoid Mary’s of our day, spreading the virus without even knowing they have it.

Ignorance and negligence carry a heavy human price. As stupid and senseless as it may be to some, I have to speak out. As Sophie Scholl, who died as a peaceful resistance leader at the hands of the Nazis when she was just twenty-two years old wrote:

Those are unpleasant facts, and until a vaccine is available that can treat the disease, we have to flatten the rate of infection, and the best way to do that is to practice appropriate levels of social distancing. The includes attempting to maintain a six foot separation, no hand shaking, and not going to work if you are sick. Actions taken by various, state, county, and local governments, include closing schools and universities and moving to online education, canceling large festivals, shows, and sporting events, and the voluntary shutting down of professional sports leagues, and prestigious tournaments. In response to these measures many restaurants, hotels, and entertainment centers have had to shut down, or limit services.

We were in a locally owned restaurant with a bar tonight when police entered the establishment to make sure that it was observing the state set number of no more than ten patrons inside. The manager on duty was warned and the three or four excess patrons, most who had been there a long time paid up and left. Once the people left the restaurant, the manager locked the door to ensure that no excess people would enter without a corresponding number leaving. The penalty after the warning would have been a $5,000 fine. The place will either set strict limits and hire security to enforce it, or shift to take out.

As we drove around our Town Center, all the major restaurants were closed. They cannot remain open except for take outs or delivery. Many other restaurants that depend on the volume of customers to make a profit are closed. In our area alone thousands of restaurant employees have been laid off. Likewise, movie theaters, museums, zoos, and concert venues shut down. Outside of our area both GM and Ford have shut down their American assembly plants, laying off thousands of workers, airlines have cut back the number of flights and at least one has shut down all of its overseas services. On Sunday I drove by a local mega church which had empty parking lots because they were being responsible and cancelled their services. That was a strange sight.

With people losing their jobs at such a rapid rate there is a likelihood that the rising real estate market could also suffer price devaluation, and while HUD has banned evictions or foreclosures until the end of April, the market could crash as it did in 2008.

As the disease begins to impact the military, infect service members, their families, and our Civilian Workers, it will degrade readiness. Important exercise with allies have already been cancelled, and soon deployments could be impacted, even if military action is required. Transfers are all now on hold, temporarily duty for schools, command visits, inspections, and other operations are now suspended unless they have a direct impact on combat operations. The movement of trainees to their new duty stations or technical schools is now suspended. New recruits cannot go into training and within weeks the effects will be felt throughout the military.

The President called this a wartime situation. If it really is he should declare a Stop Loss to keep as many military personnel ready in case of conflict. Worldwide economic crises often trigger insanely violent nationalistic movements, and subsequent wars. The possibility of that becomes greater as countries become unstable, and local conflicts could quickly become regional conflicts involving open, and undeclared enemies of the United States attacking our friends, allies, and vital interests in the world, which include natural resources not available in the United States, and yes, those include materials used in products that we all depend on.

I started this last night but was too tired to finish it. Hopefully this will help my readers better understand the very real impact that this virus will have on our society. It knows no class, profession, religion, ethnic, political, or racial division. A lot of people will be infected, and many will die. By the time it passes it will probably impact every one of us, if not directly, but because of it sickening and killing relatives and friends, or impacting our personal lives in terms of employment, earnings, and maybe even how we live.

I do a lot of listening, and I hear a lot of conspiracy theories spouted by people who know nothing of this virus, nothing of the powers of local, state and the Federal government in time of national emergency that it is useless to try to convince them that they are wrong. Most of the time I I listen but don’t comment because I realize that it won’t do any good.

But I am done for tonight. I could write a lot more, and probably will do weekly updates on this crisis.

So until tomorrow, be careful out there.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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Tagged as army national guard, army reserve, cdc, Coronavirus 19, coronavirus deaths, Coronavirus infections, Coronavirus Response, Coronavirus victims, COVID-19, Defense production act, economy, entertainment industry, ernest hemingway, Field hospitals, For Whom the Bell Tolls, ICU beds, John Donne, nancy pelosi, national emergency, no man is an island, personal protective equipment, ppe, president donald trump, restaurant industry, sophie scholl, stock markets, Stop loss, unemployment, us army, US Congress, US Navy, USNS Comfort, usns mercy, ventilators, vice President Mike Pence, war situation

March 9, 2020 · 23:59

The Clash of the Ironclads: The Battle of Hampton Roads at 158 Years

Friends of Padre Steve’s World

Yesterday and today mark the 157th anniversary of an event which changed naval warfare forever, the Battle of Hampton Roads. It was a watershed event which ended the reign of the great wooden ships which plied the oceans of the world under massive fields of canvas sails.

It took place about 10 miles from my current office, which is just a few hundred yards from Drydock Number One, at Naval Station Norfolk, in Portsmouth, Virginia, then called Gosport. It was here that the Confederate Navy, salvaged the wreck of the Steam Frigate USS Merrimac, razed her to the waterline, and constructed an ironclad casemate over her and recommissioned as the CSS Virginia.

On March 9th 1862, two very strange looking ships joined in battle. This is the story of the Battle of Hanpton Roads and the USS Monitor and CSS Virginia. This is their story, and the story of the men who designed and commanded them.

Peace

Padre Steve+

On the morning of March 8th 1862 the CSS Virginia steamed slowly from her base at at the former US Navy Shipyard, Gosport, in Portsmouth, Virginia into Hampton Roads at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. Her mission, break the Union blockade.

Awaiting her was a US Navy squadron of wooden warships including the steam Frigate USS Minnesota, the Sloop of War USS Cumberland and Frigate USS Congress and a number of smaller vessels. Together these ships mounted over 100 heavy guns, and were backed up by the shore batteries at Fort Monroe, on the Hampton side of Hampton Roads.

The Ships, Their Captains, and Designers

The CSS Virginia was an armored ram built from the salvaged remains of the large steam frigate USS Merrimack, which had been burned at Gosport (Now Norfolk) Naval Shipyard when the Navy abandoned the shipyard to keep her from being captured by the Confederates after Virginia had seceded from the Union on April 20th 1861. She was raised in May and the wreck was placed in what is now called Drydock Number One, at Norfolk Naval Shipyard, which is the oldest Drydock in the Western Hemisphere, a historic landmark, and still in use on May 30th 1861. Upon inspection it was determined that her hull below the waterline was intact and her engines serviceable. Since Merrimac was the largest ship, wrecked or intact, with serviceable steam engines and boilers; Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen Mallory decided that she would be converted into an ironclad.

Her design was that of Lieutenant John Mercer Brooke, a former U.S. Navy officer, and Naval Constructor John L. Porter, who had been a civilian employee of the Navy at Gosport. The design was an ironclad ram, with a massive casemate armored with four inches of Iron and 24 inches of Oak and Pine, which protected her battery of six 9” Dahlgren smoothbores, which were at the Naval Yard, and four 7” Brooke Rifled Guns, designed by LT Brooke and modeled on the design of the Parrot Rifled Gun, used by both sides during the American Civil War.

Her stem and stern nearly underwater, a V Shaped breakwater was mounted forward of the casemate, and an iron ram mounted below the waterline, a throwback in Naval design which had been abandoned since the Middle Ages when cannons became the weapon of choice. This was because the Confederates discover that the guns mounted on her might not be effective against Union ironclads which were being designed. Her design would be the prototype for almost all future Confederate Ironclads.

Iron Plates from CSS Virginia at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard

However, she was plagued with unreliable engines which had been condemned by the US Navy, even before she was burn and sunk, were scheduled to be replaced during her refit at Gosport. As such, her design limited her to a coastal defense role, and her engines limited her to a speed of 5 to 6 knots. Her turning radius was over a mile and it took her 45 minutes to make a complete circle. Though lethal to wooden ships in enclosed waters, she was hardly a threat to Union maritime supremacy. In heavy seas she would have been a death trap to her crew.

Her Captain, Flag Officer Franklin Buchanan was a former U.S. Navy Captain originally from Maryland. In expectation that Maryland would secede from the Union, he resigned his commission on April 22nd 1861. When Maryland did not secede he attempted to withdraw his resignation but was rebuffed by Abraham Lincoln’s Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles. Thus he left the Navy in May 1861 and joined the Confederate Navy in September 1861. He was appointed commander of the James River Squadron in February 1862 and selected CSS Virginia as his flagship. His Executive Officer was Lieutenant Catsby ap Jones.

The USS Monitor

However, Virginia’s plans had been leaked to the US Navy by a Union sympathizer at Gosport, and taken to Washington, DC, by a freed slave named Mary Louvestre in February 1862. She met with Welles and sped the efforts of the Navy to complete and commission a number of ironclad ships of different types, but most importantly Welles pushed the Navy and builders to speed up the completion of the USS Monitor.

Monitor was the brainchild of the Swedish Engineer John Ericsson, who had a troubled history with the US Navy. He invented the Screw Propeller for steamships, an idea rejected by the British Royal Navy, but then recruited by the ambitious American, Captain Robert F. Stockton to come to the United States. His propellers were first used on USS Princeton, for which he also designed a 12” breech loaded, rotating gun named Oregon. The gun which he designed was built in England and used hoop construction, also known as built up construction to pre-tension the breech. This method involved placing red-hot iron hoops around the breech-end of the weapon thereby allowing the gun to take a higher powder charge than previous cast iron weapons, which relied on using thicker iron to take an increased charge, making the weapon larger and heavier without increasing its strength.

However, Stockton moved to ensure that Ericsson was not acknowledged as the primary designer. Likewise, he decided that “his” ship should have two 12” guns, Ericsson’s and his own, which used the older technology and heavier iron, but without the tensile strength of Ericsson’s gun. Its huge size made it the more impressive looking weapon, but with the tendency common to such weapons, to burst.

However, Stockton’s gun was hastily built and had only a few test firings before demonstrating it before President John Tyler, his future wife Julia, former First Lady Dolly Madison and an assortment of cabinet officers, congressmen, and their families, numbering close to 400 on February 27th 1844. While coming back up the Potomac River, Stockton personally fired a shot in honor of George Washington at Mount Vernon. Stockton pulled the lanyard and the left side of the breech blew out, sending large fragments of cast iron, killing Secretary of the Navy Thomas Gilmer, Secretary of State Abel Upshur, Chief of the Navy Board of Construction and Repair, Captain Beverley Kennon. Senator Thomas Hart Benton, Captain Stockton, and another 14-18 crew members and visitors were wounded.

Stockton, who had a benefactor in President Tyler, blamed Ericsson who went on to many other accomplishments, but who refused any dealings with the Navy until Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles convinced him to design an ironclad in 1861. Ericsson responded with yet another revolutionary design which was at first ridiculed by naval experts. Ericsson based the hull of the ship on that of shallow draft Swedish lumber barges, but constructed completely of iron and not equipped with sails. He armed the ship with a heavily armored turret mounting two powerful 11” Dahlgren guns, which rotated a full 360 degrees. The turret was designed to mount two 15” Dahlgren guns, but they were not yet available. Had those guns been ready, Monitor might have sunk the Virginia.

Monitor was completed in under 100 days as Ericsson had promised. She was laid down on October 25th 1861, launched on January 30th, and commissioned on February 25th 1862. Her Captain was Lieutenant John Worden. Worden had served in the Navy since 1834, and he would go on to many great accomplishments, finishing his career as a Rear Admiral, having commanded another monitor, USS Montauk, Superintendent of the Naval Academy, Commander of the Mediterranean Squadron, and President of the Naval Institute.

However, in February 1862 the relatively old lieutenant took Monitor to sea two days later, but the deployment was cut short by a steering failure, which resulted in the ship returning to New York for repairs. She sailed for Hampton Roads again on March 6th and she would arrive on the evening of March 8th, not long after Virginia had wreaked havoc on the Union ships at Hampton Roads. His Executive Officer was Lieutenant Samuel Dana Greene, son of the future Union General and hero of Culp’s Hill at the Battle of Gettysburg, George Sears Greene.

The Battle

During the ensuing fight of March 8th Virginia rammed and sank Cumberland which though fatally wounded disabled two of Virginia’s 9” in guns. Virginia destroyed Congress by gunfire which burned and blew up and appeared to be in position to destroy Minnesota the following day as that ship had run hard aground. The losses aboard Cumberland and Congress were severe and included the Captain of the Congress and Chaplain John L. Lenhart of Cumberland, the first US Navy Chaplain to die in battle. During the battle Virginia had several men wounded including her Captain, Franklin Buchanan who during the action went atop the casemate to fire a carbine at Union shore batteries. He was wounded by a bullet in the leg and though he survived he missed the next day’s action.

Due to the coming of darkness and a falling tide the acting commander of Virginia, Lieutenant Catsby Ap Roger Jones her executive officer took her in for the night. During the night Monitor, under the command of Lieutenant John Worden arrived and took up station to defend Minnesota.

The next morning Virginia again ventured out and was intercepted by the Monitor. The ships fought for over three hours, with Monitor using her superior speed and maneuverability to great effect. During the battle Monitor suffered a hit on her small pilothouse near her bow blinding her Captain Worden. Monitor’s executive officer, Lieutenant Dana Greene, took command. Neither side suffered much damage but the smokestack of Virginia was pierced in several places affecting her already poor engine performance. Jones broke off the action and returned to Gosport for repairs while Monitor remained on station, still ready for battle.

Gideon Welles wrote after the battle: “the performance, power, and capabilities of the Monitor, must effect a radical change in naval warfare.”

It did. The battle showed the world the vulnerability of wooden warships against the new ironclads. Monitor in particular revolutionized naval warfare and warship construction. From that time on the truly modern ships were fully iron and later steel, with revolving turrets, and within twenty years without sails, even as a back up to their steam engines.

Her defining mark was the use of the armored gun turret which over the succeeding decades became the standard manner for large ships guns to be mounted. Turrets like the warships they were mounted upon grew in size and power reaching their apex during the Second World War, only to be superseded by the next revolution in Naval warfare, the Aircraft Carrier.

Both Virginia and Monitor reached less than glorious ends. Virginia had to be destroyed by her crew to prevent her capture just over two months after the battle on May 11th 1862. Monitor survived until January 31st 1862 when she sank during a heavy storm off Cape Hatteras North Carolina with the loss of 16 of her 62 man crew. The remains of two of those men, recovered during the salvage of Monitor’s engines, turret, guns and anchor were interred at Arlington National Cemetery on March 8th 2012. The relics from Monitor and some from Virginia are displayed at the Mariners Museum in Newport News (http://www.marinersmuseum.org )while one of Virginia’s anchors resides on the lawn of the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond. Two of her iron plates are on display at Norfolk Naval Shipyard.

Those early ironclads and the brave men who served aboard them revolutionized naval warfare and their work should never be forgotten.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Tagged as abraham lincoln, battle of hampton roads, Brooke Rifles, catsby ap jones, Commodore Robert F Stockton, css virginia, Dahlgren smoothbore Guns, dana greene, drydock number one, fort monroe, franklin buchanan, george sears greene, gideon welles, gosport naval shipyard, hampton roads naval museum, John L Porter, John Mercer Brooke, john worden, julia tyler, mariners museum newport news, Mary Louvestre, museum of the confederacy, naval ship design, Parrot Rifles, president John Tyler, secretary of State Abel Upshur, Secretary of the Navy Thomas Gilmer, Senator Thomas Hart Benton, stephen mallory, uss congress, uss cumberland, uss merrimack, uss minnesota, uss monitor, Uss montauk, uss princeton

February 17, 2020 · 22:31

“The Most Bold and Daring Act of the Age” Stephen Decatur, and the Defeat of the Barbary Pirates

“Our Country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but right or wrong, our country!” Stephen Decatur

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

In 1803 the United States Navy was two years into its campaign against the Barbary Pirates who sailed from Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli and Morocco. For years the United States like other nations had paid tribute to the rulers of these states for free passage of its ships and hefty ransoms to free the sailors that were enslaved following the capture of their ships. By 1800 tens of millions of dollars had been paid and in that year the amount of tribute paid was 20% of the government’s total revenue.

In 1801 the Pasha of Tripoli Yusuf Karamanli demanded the payment of $225,000 tribute from the new President of the United States President Thomas Jefferson. In years past Jefferson had advised against payment of tribute believing that such payment only encouraged the Barbary States to continue their actions. The anti-naval partisans and even his Republican allies had blocked his recommendations even though Secretary of State John Jay and President John Adams agreed with him. These partisans insisted that tribute be paid irregardless of the effect on European trade or the fate of American seamen because they believed that the Atlantic trade and involvement in the “Old World” detracted from the westward expansion by diverting money and energy away from the west. When Jefferson refused the demand and put his beliefs into practice Karmanli declared war on the United States by cutting down the flag at the US Consulate in Tripoli.

Jefferson sent a small force to defend protect American ships and sailors and asked Congress to authorize him to do more as he did not believe that he had the Constitutional power to do more. Congress did not issue a declaration of war but authorized Jefferson to “employ such of the armed vessels of the United States as may be judged requisite… for protecting effectually the commerce and seamen thereof on the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean and adjoining seas.”

Jefferson sent the best of the United States Navy to deal with the situation and US Navy ships soon began to take a toll on the pirate vessels. The squadron was composed of ships that would become legend in the history of the Navy. Commanded by Commodore Richard Dale, Edward Preble, and later Commodore John Rogers, at various times the squadron included the USS Argus, Chesapeake, Constellation, Constitution, President, Congress, Enterprise, Intrepid, Essex, Philadelphia, John Adams and Syren. The Constitution, Chesapeake, and Constellation, Congress and President were among the first six frigates authorized by Congress on March 27th 1794. Philadelphia a subscription Frigate paid for by citizens and merchants of Philadelphia, Essex a subscription Frigate pride for by the citizens of Salem and Essex County, Massachusetts, John Adams, a Subscription Frigate paid for by the citizens of Charleston, South Carolina, Argus a 20 gun Brig, Enterprise and Vixen 12 gun Schooners, Syren (later Siren) a 16 gun Brig, and Intrepid a captured Tripolitan Ketch, several smaller American built vessels, and about a dozen gunboats and mortar boats supplied by the Kingdom of Naples, which also provided the Americans with access to the ports of Messina, Palermo, and Syracuse, as well as supplies, and craftsmen to maintain the American Squadron.

Many of the officers who served in the Squadron, including William Bainbridge, Issac Hull, Charles Stewart, David Porter, would continue in service and make names for themselves in the war of 1812 and after.

One of the young officers was the 24 year old Captain of the 12 Gun Schooner USS Enterprise Lieutenant Stephen Decatur the son of a Navy Captain who had entered the Naval service as a Midshipman in 1798 and who had risen rapidly through the ranks due to his abilities and leadership. He was among the few officers selected to remain in service following the end of the Quasi-War with France. By the time that he took command of Enterprise Decatur had already served as the First Lieutenant of the Frigates USS Essex and USS New York. After an altercation with British officer while wintering in Malta he was sent home to command the new Brig of War USS Argus. He was ordered to bring her to Europe where he handed over command to Lieutenant Isaac Hull who would achieve fame in the War of 1812 as Commanding Officer of the USS Constitution. Decatur was given command of Enterprise on when he detached from the Argus.

On December 23^rd 1803 while operating with the Constitution Decatur and the Enterprise captured the small Tripolian ketch Mastico which was sailing under Turkish colors. The small ship was taken to Syracuse where Commodore Edward Preble condemned her as a prize of war, renamed her Intrepid and placed Decatur in command.

Normally such an event would be considered a demotion for an officer of Decatur’s caliber but events at Tripoli had forced Preble to make a bold strike at the heart of the enemy. On October 31^st 1803 the Frigate USS Philadelphia one of the most powerful ships in the squadron under the command of Captain William Bainbridge ran aground on an uncharted shoal and was captured. Her crew was taken prisoner and the ship floated off by the Tripolians partially repaired and moored as a battery in the harbor until her foremast could be remounted having be cut away by Bainbridge in his unsuccessful attempt to float the ship off the shoal.

Burning the Philadelphia

The threat posed by such a powerful ship in the hands of the enemy was too great to ignore. Preble order Decatur to man the Intrepid with volunteers to destroy the Philadelphia at anchor. Decatur took 80 men from the Enterprise and was joined by eight more volunteers from USS Syren including Lieutenant Thomas McDonough who had recently served aboard Philadelphia and knew the ship well.

Under the cover of night of February 16^th 1804 Decatur took the former Tripolian ship into the harbor beneath the dim light of the new moon. Posing as a Tripolian ship he was able to slip past the guns of the forts overlooking the harbor using a Sicilian sailor who spoke Arabic to request permission. This was granted and Intrepid approached Philadelphia and when close enough ordered his crew to board the Frigate. After a brief skirmish with the small contingent of sailors aboard he took control of the vessel and set it ablaze. When he was sure that the fire could not be extinguished he ordered his men back aboard Intrepid and sailed out of the harbor under the fire of the shore batteries and gunboats.

Decatur sailed Intrepid back to Syracuse where he was greeted as a hero and became one of the Navy’s legends. Pope Pius VII publicly proclaimed that “the United States, though in their infancy, had done more to humble the anti-Christian barbarians on the African coast, than all the European states had done for a long period of time.” Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson, one of the most heroic sailors that ever lived and no stranger to daring said that Decatur’s accomplishment was “the most bold and daring act of the Age.“

Decatur leading American Sailors in hand to hand combat against Barbary Pirates at Tripoli 1804 his younger brother Lieutenant James Decatur was killed aboard another gunboat in the action

Decatur would return to command the Enterprise and was given command of Constitution and was promoted to Captain bypassing the rank of Master Commander. He would prove himself again against the forces of Tripoli before departing for the United States. He distinguished himself in the years to come against the Royal Navy in the War of 1812 where when in command of USS United States defeated and captured HMS Macedonian which would serve in the U.S. Navy and later in the Second Barbary War.

During that war, which began in 1815 Decatur’s squadron decisively defeated the Algerian fleet capturing the Frigate Mashouda and killing the highly successful and chivalrous commander of the Algerian raiding squadron Rais Hamidu. The Pashas of Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli all made peace and reimbursed the Americans for the financial damage that they had done. His victory ended the terror that the Barbary States had inflicted on Europeans for centuries and helped bring peace to the Mediterranean. Following that he became a Navy Commissioner in 1816 and moved to Washington, D.C.

Stephen Decatur more than any one man ended their reign of terror against the United States and the great European powers. The actions of Decatur, Preble, their officers, crews and ships in the Barbary Wars, and the War of 1812 established the United States as a credible nation, willing use its Navy to protect its citizens and commerce overseas, without becoming an occupying power. The latter would not occur for another eighty plus years during the Spanish American War, and continues to the present day.

Of course, that did not apply to our conquest of North America which involved countless small wars which exterminated vast numbers of American Indians, opened vast lands to the expansion of slavery, and the conquest of forty percent of Mexico. I am sure that Decatur, who so boldly proclaimed, My Country Right or Wrong, would not have approved of subjugating non-hostile weaker nations. He lived in a different time, when the United States was being threatened alternately by France, Britain, and the Barbary States at sea, and Britain and its American Indian allies as it expanded west.

Likewise, Decatur did not live a long life. He was killed in duel with Commodore James Barron on March 22nd 1820. Barron had never forgiven Decatur for voting for his conviction and removal from service after being humiliated when his ship, the Frigate Chesapeake, was caught unprepared for action, fired upon, and after twenty minutes surrendered, to HMS Leopard in 1807. Following her surrender several of her men were taken off as supposed deserters from the Royal Navy. Leopard’s commander then allowed Chesapeake to return to Norfolk where Barron was relieved of command and tried by a Naval Court which included John Rogers and Decatur.

Barron was convicted removed from the Navy for at least five years. Six years later he returned from a self imposed exile and petitioned for reinstatement. Decatur remained one of his fiercest opponents, and though reinstated was embittered toward Decatur. Their seconds arranged the duel to be conducted in such a way that one or both would die. During the negotiations between their seconds, Commodore William Bainbridge, and Captain Jesse Elliott, the two came close to reconciling but the seconds pushed for the duel. Decatur was mortally wounded and refused medical treatment, dying late that night. Barron, though horribly wounded, survived, eventually becoming commander of the Norfolk Naval Yard, becoming the senior Naval officer on active duty in 1839. He died in 1851 and is buried in the cemetery of Trinity Episcopal Church, in Portsmouth, VA.

The death of Decatur, a bonafide hero, at the hands of a fellow officer stunned Washington. President James Monroe, the members of the Supreme Court, most of Congress and 10,000 citizens attended his funeral. His pallbearers included four Commodores, and two other officers, followed by many other officers and other ranks. During the funeral, one sailor burst forth and cried out “He was the friend of the flag, the sailor’s friend; the navy has lost its mainmast.”

Decatur to help form the United States Navy, and among its early leaders, who included many valiant and brilliant men, he remains the foremost. While he achieved greatness, it was that night in Tripoli harbor where he was immortalized by the words of Lord Nelson as the man who led “the most bold and daring act of the age.”

Until tomorrow,

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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Filed under Foreign Policy, History, leadership, Military, US Navy

Tagged as algiers, barbary pirates, chesapeake Leopard affair, dey of algiers, edward preble, first barbary war, hms macedonian, horatio nelson, James barron, james monroe, Jesse Elliott, john adams, john jay, john rodgers, Kingdom of naples, malta, mashouda frigate, morocco, navy birthday, pasha of tripoli, pope pius vii, quasi-war with france, rais hamidu, second barbary war, stephen decatur, thomas jefferson, thomas macdonough, Trinity Episcopal Church Portsmouth VA, tripoli, tunis, united states navy, uss argus, uss chesapeake, uss constellation, uss constitution, uss enterprise sloop, uss essex frigate, uss intrepid ketch, uss new york frigate, uss philadelphia frigate, uss syren, uss united states, war of 1812, william bainbridge, Yusuf Karamanli

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The Hubris of Empire: The Japanese Battleships Yamato and Musashi

A New Thread in the Tapestry of My Life: Serving People in the Age of COVID-19

Perpetrators, Victims, and Bystanders in the Age of COVID-19

“Therefore Never Send to Know for Whom the bell Tolls, it Tolls for Thee” The Victims, Costs, and Threat of COVID-19

The Clash of the Ironclads: The Battle of Hampton Roads at 158 Years

“The Most Bold and Daring Act of the Age” Stephen Decatur, and the Defeat of the Barbary Pirates

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Welcome!

Subscribe to Padre Steve's World

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What’s Hot

Padre Steve's Inglorius Statistics

Recent Articles

The Vault: Padre Steve’s Archives

Categories

Blogs I Follow