McFarland got to Guadalcanal ahead of Joe Bauer’s fliers.
A floating gasoline dump and ammunition depot, the brave little ship entered the Bay on the morning of October 16. Her crew and her skipper, Lieutenant Commander John Alderman, were understandably eager to unload, and they quickly began lowering drums over the side into waiting lighters while dropping a fuel line to a barge which had come alongside.
Commander Alderman and his crew were not quite so eager to take aboard their return cargo: 160 hospital patients, half of whom were those exhausted and battle-fatigued men who were still, in those days, ungraciously described as “war neurotics.”
At five o’clock Alderman sighted a periscope and decided to get under way. He did, with the gasoline barge still alongside taking on fuel.
Some time later Colonel Bauer’s squadron of nineteen Wildcats, plus seven Dauntlesses, came winging overhead. They came in with fuel tanks almost empty, and they began lowering quickly down for a landing. Bauer would come in last.
And then nine Japanese dive-bombers fell without warning on McFarland.
Alderman rang up full speed and ordered the barge cast off. She was, in time to be holed and sunk.
Then an enemy bomb burst among the depth charges on McFarland’s fantail. Huge explosions racked the ship. The neurotics panicked. They stampeded through the passageways and tried to tear weapons and life jackets away from sailors struggling desperately to save their ship.
Above, Joe Bauer saw McFarland plodding along at barely five knots. She was a helpless target for about five Vals which had still to make their dive. With his gas tanks nearly empty, Bauer went wolfing swiftly among the enemy.
He shot down four of them before he came down with bone-dry tanks.
McFarland was saved, as well as her precious cargo of ammunition.
Rugged Joe Bauer, Indian Joe Bauer, one of the most inspirational of flying leaders, and also the pilot whom all Marines regarded as “the greatest,” had brought off the most astonishing single feat of aerial arms in the annals of Guadalcanal. In the words of his adoring wingman:
“The Chief stitched four of the bastards end to end.”9
CHAPTER
TWENTY
“IT NOW appears that we are unable to control the sea in the Guadalcanal area,” the admiral reported. “Thus our supply of the positions will only be done at great expense to us. The situation is not hopeless, but it is certainly critical.”
It was not Ghormley the pessimist who wrote those words on October 15, 1942, but rather Nimitz the optimist.
And his grim estimate of the situation came at a time when it was next to impossible for Admiral King in Washington to divert any additional ships or supplies or men to the South Pacific. Operation Torch, the invasion of North Africa, was gathering. President Roosevelt had insisted that American troops be committed against Germany at some time in 1942. His Joint Chiefs of Staff had argued for a cross-Channel invasion of France but their British counterparts had objected; backed by Prime Minister Churchill they held out for the North African venture, and Roosevelt had agreed with them.
A vast concourse of ships, a logistics problem as yet unrivaled, was involved in transporting some 90,000 men to North Africa from bases as far away as England and the United States.
Moreover, Admiral King’s hands were also very full contending with German U-boats, which sank eighty-eight ships and 585,510 tons of cargo in the Atlantic during October, and with supplying British forces in Egypt via the long route around the Cape of Good Hope. General Marshall was solidly for Torch, now that Roosevelt had given it the green light, and General Arnold, although not equally enthusiastic, still cherished his never-to-be-realized dream of bringing Germany to her knees by strategic bombing, which meant concentrating aircraft in Europe.
Admiral King and General MacArthur might argue that disaster must not be courted in the Solomons and New Guinea just to get into action against the Germans, thus boosting morale on the home front as well as perhaps providing for the eventual invasion of Europe, but the Commander-in-Chief of American armed forces, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was not to be moved. Torch still burned with the green light.
And so Nimitz knew that the Guadalcanal situation was critical simply because the Japanese Navy was concentrating all its forces there and he had not equal forces to oppose them.
Then, on October 16, the day the Sendai marched south on Guadalcanal, Nimitz received a shattering message from Admiral Ghormley.
“This appears to be all-out enemy effort against Guadalcanal. My forces totally inadequate to meet situation. Urgently request all aviation reinforcements possible.”
The following day Ghormley came through with an estimate of what he needed to save the day: all the submarines in MacArthur’s area, all the cruisers and destroyers in Alaska, all the PT boats in the Pacific except those at Midway, a review of the entire destroyer assignment schedule in the Atlantic and the Pacific, and from the Army Air Force ninety heavy bombers, eighty medium bombers, sixty dive-bombers, and two groups of fighters, including those Lightnings which General Arnold was reluctant to release.
Nimitz, a calm and orderly man, was staggered. Obviously such recommendations did not spring from a hopeful mind. Such forces, even if they could be made available, could not be furnished instantly. And the time was one for instantaneous action with the forces that were available. Chester Nimitz sighed and came reluctantly to a decision.
Back in Washington on that same day—October 16 in Washington, the seventeenth in the South Pacific—Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox was meeting the press. Came the question: Can Guadalcanal be held?
“I certainly hope so,” the Secretary said. “I expect so. I don’t want to make any predictions, but every man out there, ashore or afloat, will give a good account of himself.”
That night on Guadalcanal the Marines heard of the Secretary’s shy little pep talk with hoots of derision.
“Didja hear about Knox? It was on the ’Frisco radio. He says he don’t know, but we’re sure gonna give a good account of ourselves.”
“Yeah, I heard—ain’t he a tiger?”1
The following day a four-engined Coronado flying boat circled above Admiral Ghormley’s flagship, Argonne, in the harbor at Nouméa.
The pilot eased back on the throttle and brought the plane down gently on the water’s surface. An admiral with a craggy face and tufted gray eyebrows clambered out just as a motor whaleboat drew alongside. The admiral jumped into the tossing whaleboat.
A young junior grade lieutenant stepped up to him, saluted, and handed him a sealed envelope marked “Secret.”
The admiral tore it open and read. He read it again, blinking, and then he handed it to his Marine adviser and friend, Colonel Julian Brown. It said:
YOU WILL TAKE COMMAND OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC AREA AND SOUTH PACIFIC FORCES IMMEDIATELY.
“Jesus Christ and General Jackson!” Bull Halsey swore. “This is the hottest potato they ever handed me.”2
On Guadalcanal, men who had never once lost hope of victory, who were entering their eleventh week of battle still confident of it, heard the news with shouts of jubilation.
A real tiger was taking over.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE
THE ARRIVAL of the 164th Infantry Regiment’s three thousand soldiers had given Archer Vandegrift 23,000 men on Guadalcanal, with another four thousand under General Rupertus on Tulagi. Guadalcanal, however, was the prize; and Vandegrift again reorganized his defenses there.
Sector One comprised seven thousand yards of beachfront held by a composite force of Marines from the Third Defense Battalion, Special Weapons, Amtracks, Engineers, and Pioneers. On its right or eastern flank it joined the 164th holding Sector Two, a 6500-yard line south along the Tenaru which curved back west short of Bloody Ridge. Here it tied in with Sector Three held by the Seventh Marines, less one battalion, for another 2500 yards west to the Lunga, Sector Four, defended by the First Marines, less one battalio
n, stretched an additional 3500 yards west until it merged with Sector Five, which, held by the Fifth Marines, curved back north to the sea.
Essentially, this was the same perimeter which the Marines had been holding since August 7, except for one new feature: a battle position on the east bank of the Matanikau.
Here two independent battalions of Marines, backed up by artillery and 75-mm half-tracks, held a line from the river mouth left to Hill 67 about a thousand yards inland. Although this position was about three thousand yards to the west of the perimeter, it could be supplied along the coastal road. It could also depend upon Marine artillery registered to fire anywhere along the entire defense.
In reserve, Vandegrift held one infantry battalion and most of the tank battalion. Regimental commanders all held a third of their strength in reserve, as did lesser commanders down through companies.
It was a neat and efficient cordon depending upon the mobility offered by interior lines, and it had, of course, that single exception on the Matanikau. But it was here, from the Japanese assembly area at Kukumbona, that Archer Vandegrift expected the main thrust.
And he was wrong.
Lieutenant General Haruyoshi Hyakutake still depended upon the Sendai Division then marching south to deliver the main blow in his three-pronged assault involving 22,000 men.
General Maruyama was to attack at a point a bit east of the area in which General Kawaguchi had met defeat. His seven thousand men were to seize the airfield, the very nerve center of the American defense.
To assist him, Hyakutake had arranged for a reinforced battalion of the 38th Division to land to the east of Koli Point. This “Koli Detachment” would be boated and ready to land on order.
On the west, Hyakutake planned a heavier distraction. Here he would use a tank-infantry-artillery unit under Major General Tadashi Sumoyoshi, commander of 17th Army artillery. Sumoyoshi’s guns had already been at work battering the enemy airfield and perimeter. Now they would support the remnants of Colonel Nakaguma’s Fourth Infantry Regiment as they charged across the Matanikau River mouth behind sixteen tanks. Farther inland, Colonel Oka’s composite force would cross the river to flank the Americans on Hill 67. Then, while Nakaguma was striking the enemy at the river mouth, Oka would turn north to come in behind the American battle position and isolate it.
In the meantime, Rabaul would mount sustained aerial attacks, covered by Zeros based on Buka and the new field at Buin on southern Bougainville. Combined Fleet’s battleships and heavy cruisers would crush the Americans with sustained bombardment. Once the airfield was captured, Yamamoto’s eagles would fly in to operate from it. His gunfire ships would cut off the American retreat.
All depended on the capture of the airfield, all depended on the peerless Sendai striking from their secret position to the south.
They would not, they could not fail. Guadalcanal airfield should again be Japanese by the morning of October 22.
October 22?
Isoroku Yamamoto was annoyed. What was wrong with the Army? First, the deadline had been moved back from October 17 to October 20. And now there was another postponement of two days. The huge Guadalcanal Supporting Forces had been at sea since October 11, at sea doing nothing; doing nothing and consuming fuel. Was the Army not aware that a fleet feeds on oil? All the Army had to do in Operation Ka was supply a few divisions of men; they had not contributed so much as a single airplane—and here they were dragging their feet again.
While they did, the Americans would surely reinforce. Isoroku Yamamoto did not subscribe to any of those wildly optimistic evaluations of the American change of command, especially not the one predicting “withdrawal of all American naval forces from the South Pacific.”1 Yamamoto could only admire the daring skill which had brought off the Doolittle raid on Tokyo. He did not think that a rude, aggressive man like Halsey—with his insulting boast that he would ride the Emperor’s white horse down Pennsylvania Avenue—could have the slightest intention of withdrawing. Halsey would attack, he would reinforce; and the Army was playing into his hands.
And there, Yamamoto was exactly right.
———
The Big E was coming back to battle. The mighty proud flattop that had been in almost every action since the Pacific War began was whole again, the damage she had suffered August 24 during the Battle of the Eastern Solomons had been repaired. On October 16 she cast off her last lines and stood out to sea from Pearl Harbor.
On her flag bridge was Rear Admiral Thomas C. Kinkaid, bareheaded and shirt-sleeved as always among his helmeted and jacketed sailors, pacing the deck with binoculars around his neck. Kinkaid was to take tactical command of South Pacific Force after his own carrier and screen had made rendezvous with Hornet and her screen. Then, for the first time since Wasp went down on September 15, the Americans would have two carriers to oppose the Japanese.
Enroute to the rendezvous area, Kinkaid received a message from his new chief, Halsey, urging him to proceed at all possible speed. Kinkaid obeyed. But he could never join Hornet before daybreak of October 24.
And that, according to Hyakutake’s timetable, was just two days too late.
Masao Maruyama was almost in tears. Kawaguchi had been right. The terrain was incredible. And that unspeakable Captain Oda, could he not have realized that if his lightly equipped trailblazers could very easily crawl up and down these terrible cliffs, heavily laden combat troops could not?
Every one of Maruyama’s men carried sixty pounds of personal equipment, besides machine guns or grenade launchers. Each man carried an artillery shell. They had no mules to pull the guns, 37-mm antitank pieces, 70- and 75-mm howitzers. All the division’s horses had been left in Rabaul. The only way to get the artillery up and down the cliffs was by hand and by ropes. It was impossible to do this in daylight because of the American aircraft. It had to be done at night; as a result, the artillery was dropping far behind.
Thirty-five miles, that was all that they had to go, and yet, after five days marching, the advance guard had gone only twenty-nine. Six miles of foul, impenetrable jungle still lay between them and the assembly area. And these were the Sendai! These were the men of Colonel Furumiya’s matchless 29th Infantry who had marched 122 miles in seventy-two hours.
But the men had been splendid. They had gone on half-rations without a murmur, and they plodded on inspired by the sight of officers who also were hungry, who also carried guns or artillery shells. Nor had the Sendai forgotten its heritage. Each morning the march was renewed with the memorable words:
“I am your Commander-in-Chief, you are my strong arms …”
Each time the men seemed to be on the verge of collapse their officers rallied them by turning them to face toward the Emperor, to sing:
“Corpses drifting swollen in the sea depths,
Corpses rotting in the mountain grass …”
They sang with tears streaking their mud-caked cheeks, uncaring if American patrols were in the vicinity. But for all their endurance, for all their sacrifice, General Maruyama knew by October 21 that he could not possibly make the deadline. He radioed General Hyakutake back in Kukumbona that he would have to postpone the attack until October 23.
It was October 22 and it was obvious that Admiral Kakuta’s flag carrier Hiyo was not going to be of use. Hiyo had developed engine trouble. Her power-plant, originally designed for a merchant ship, could not provide the speed required by a carrier. Kakuta sent Hiyo back to Truk at her top speed of six knots and took his flag, together with the Emperor’s picture, aboard his last flattop, Junyo.
On October 23, General Maruyama had reached the end of his march. He set up his headquarters on a rise called Centipede-Shaped Ridge and made his final dispositions.
The point he chose to attack was slightly to the east of the ridge at which General Kawaguchi had met defeat. Unknown to Maruyama, it was defended by the Marine battalions commanded by Chesty Puller and Herman Henry Hanneken.
Facing north toward the sea, the Japanese rig
ht consisted of the 29th Infantry, with antitank guns, mortars, mountain artillery, and engineers. It was commanded by General Kawaguchi. The left wing, composed of similar arms and similar strength, was led by Major General Yumio Nasu. In reserve was the 16th Infantry, which Maruyama intended to use once Kawaguchi and Nasu had broken through.
The attack would begin just after sunset, following the scheduled aerial bombardment of the Americans.
October 23 seemed like a dull day to the fighter pilots on Henderson Field. The big enemy push was expected hourly, and yet the skies were free of red-balled aircraft. In the morning, Captain Joe Foss and a few other Wildcat pilots escorted a Catalina south toward Nouméa. Lieutenant General Thomas Holcomb, Commandant of the Marine Corps, was aboard. Holcomb had come to visit Vandegrift, and now, he and some other generals were flying down to confer with Admiral Halsey.
Foss and his comrades dipped their wings in farewell, and flew back to Henderson.
At noon they were hanging on their noses clawing for altitude.
Sixteen Japanese bombers were coming in, escorted by a few Zeros. The Wildcats closed. In the rear of the formation, Joe Foss took a last look around. High above, like a flight of silvery flying fish, he spotted about eighteen Zeros. They were coming down in a screaming dive. They flashed beneath him.
Foss dove to overtake them. A Wildcat crossed his course firing into a Zero trying desperately to escape. Another Zero was on the Wildcat’s tail. Foss swung in behind him. Only a few feet away, he pressed the button.
Ba—loom!
The enemy plane was gone. It had blown up with the vehemence characteristic of the Zero. Foss saw the pilot pop from his cockpit like a pea pressed from a pod. The motor went spinning into space, and Foss tore through an aerial dustbin of bits and pieces of aircraft. Below him, the plane’s wing section was sailing downward like a leaf.