The Battle of Midway

On Christmas Day 1941 Admiral Chester Nimitz arrived by Catalina flying boat to take command. He did not bring any staff with him. When the door opened, he was assailed by a poisonous atmosphere from black oil, charred wood, burned paint, and rotting flesh. The boat ride to shore engulfed the party in the panorama of sunken hulls and floating wreckage, punctuated by the bodies of dead sailors still surfacing from the blasted ships.

He spent the first days learning everything he could about his new assignment and confirmed the public’s perception was wrong. The dry-docks, repair shops, and fuel tank farm were intact. The carriers with their escorts, and the submarines stood ready to take the offensive. He immediately sent submarines into Japanese waters, and conducted carrier operations disrupting Japanese Initiatives. Admiral Raymond Spruance said of Nimitz, “The one big thing about him was that he was always ready to fight….And he wanted officers who would push the fight to the Japanese”.

Nimitz decided some very good men had taken a terrible beating and were now suffering terrible reminders and apprehensions. When he officially took command December 31, he told the assembled staffs he had complete and unlimited confidence in every one of them. He related that as head of officer personnel in Washington, he knew they had been selected for their competence. But if any wanted to leave, he would individually discuss their futures and do all he could to get them the assignments they wanted.

However, there were a few key staff members he wanted to stay with him. They included Commander Joe Rochefort, Jr. and Captain Edwin T. Layton. There intelligence unit had not unscrambled the new Japanese call signs or broken into the revised naval code to warn of the Pearl Harbor attack. However, these men later provided the key intelligence convincing Nimitz to hazard all his carriers at Midway.

For the Japanese the battle for Midway was part of their strategy for establishing the next line of their Pacific Ocean defensive parameter. They intended to conquer Port Moresby in New Guinea, Samoa, Fiji, New Caledonia, and the Western Aleutians. Thereby, Australia would be severed as a base for an American counter-offensive and the northern flank of the Home Islands would be protected. Specifically, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto considered this initiative would provide the opportunity to draw out Nimitz for the decisive naval battle contemplated by American naval strategist Alfred Thayer Mahan.

This sea fight began with Chester Nimitz determined to meet the enemy in a major battle, but he faced long odds. Solid intelligence had discerned a complex plan disbursing Japanese forces, but Nimitz still had to consider the information could be a ruse, because the basic principle of U.S. intelligence that an enemy will act according to the best use of their capabilities. For Nimitz that meant giving weight to concentration as the best option. He was also troubled by the uncertainty of locating enemy dispositions expected because of storms west and northwest of Midway. In fact, weather was to play an important part in hiding Japanese carriers from detection. Both sides experienced Horatio Nelson’s admonition that “something must be left to chance; nothing is certain in a sea fight”.

His final instructions to admirals Raymond Spruance and Frank Fletcher were, “In carrying out the task assigned in Op Plan 29-42, you will be governed by the principle of calculated risk, which you will interpret to mean the avoidance of exposure of your force to attack by superior enemy forces without the prospect of inflicting, as a result of such exposure, greater damage to the enemy”. To understand Nimitz’s and the flyers tenuous position consider that gathering every available U.S. Navy ship achieved an order of battle for Midway, where they might be outnumbered more than three to one.

Author Gordon W. Prange compiled the order of battle for the navies. The Japanese had 4 heavy carriers, 2 light carriers, 11 battleships, 10 heavy cruisers, 6 light cruisers, and 53 destroyers for a total of 86 ships. The United States had 3 carriers no light carriers or battleships, 6 heavy cruisers, one light cruiser, and seventeen destroyers or a total of 27 ships.

To balance the odds somewhat Nimitz had decided to make Midway Island his fourth aircraft carrier. He crowded the island with 115 aircraft, including the untried (B-17 & B-26) and obsolete (Vindicator & Brewster Buffalo).

This abbreviated narrative now excludes the contribution of thousands, whose combined efforts provided the vital margin needed for victory. Preparing Midway for invasion and assembling the carrier task forces at point “Luck” to attack the Japanese required prodigious achievements in logistics, ship repair, and inspired assessments of naval intelligence. This narrative also does not describe how paying the more bitter price for mistakes in strategic planning, tactical execution, and operational doctrines contributed heavily to the Japanese defeat. Instead the narrative relates the fearful sacrifice of a few brave men, who in close combat attacked the four heavy carriers of the First Carrier Striking Force on June 4, 1942.

The Japanese transport group was discovered on June 3, but the next morning the curtain rose for the carrier battle. At 5:30AM the PBY patrol by Lieutenant Howard Ady radioed discovery of the Japanese carriers. Fifteen minutes later the PBY patrol by Lieutenant William Chase radioed in the clear, “Many planes headed Midway. Bearing 320 degrees distance 150 miles. These warnings enabled the remaining 66 aircraft crammed onto Midway to get into the air. The updates provided by Ady enabled Admirals Raymond Spruance and Frank Fletcher to launch carrier attacks. All Midway aircraft made attacks against the Japanese carriers except for 21 Marine Brewster Buffalos and 7 Wildcat fighters dedicated to repelling the attackers.

In the ensuing Japanese attack on Midway beginning at 6:16AM, 14 of the 21 Brewster fighter pilots died prompting Captain Philip R. White to say, “It is my belief that any commander that orders pilots out for combat in F2A-3’s (Brewster Buffalo) should consider them lost before leaving the ground”. Captain Francis McCarthy, flying one of the Wildcats, was also killed after shooting down one of eight Zeros attacking him and wingman Lt. Roy Corry Jr. Overall only 10 fighters survived the fight and only two were in shape to fly again.

The attacks by land-based planes on the Japanese carriers began at 7:48AM. First six TBF Avenger torpedo bombers lead by Navy Lieutenant Langdon K. Fieberling of Torpedo 8 made their attack. These were some of the new torpedo bombers that should have replaced the hopelessly outdated Devastators Lt. Cdr. John Waldron had onboard Hornet, but the Avengers were 24 hours late reaching Hawaii. The planes obtained no hits, but five of six aircraft were destroyed including Fieberling’s and only two of 18 men survived to return to Midway. Ens. Bert Earnest and Radioman Harry Ferrier thereby became with Ens. George Gay the other two “lone survivors” of Torpedo 8.

Next the Army Air Corps made its first appearance. Captain James Collins lead four Army B-26 medium bombers rigged to carry torpedoes in the first ever attempt to attack enemy ships. They had to launch at less than 1,000 yards to hit 30 knot aircraft carriers with 33 knot torpedoes. Also, most torpedoes failed when released at over 50 feet and at speeds exceeding 126 mph; a speed at which this aircraft often stalled and crashed when attempting to land. Two of four planes with their 7-man crews perished, and no hits were obtained.

Marine dive bombers closely followed the B-26’s. At 7:55AM Major Lofton Henderson (for whom Henderson Field at Guadalcanal was named) attacked with 16 Dauntless bombers of which 8 were lost with their two-man crews. Henderson’s crews were untrained in dive bombing tactics and again no hits were obtained.

Lieutenant Colonel Walter C. Sweeney at 8:39AM lead 13 long range Army B-17’s over Nagumo’s position in a level bombing attack from 20,000 feet and obtained no hits on the carriers or escorts. One aircraft was damaged by a Zero and one man was injured. The Japanese were reluctant to attack the heavily armed bombers, but had no trouble evading the bombs dropped nearly four miles above them.

At 8:30AM Marine Major Benjamin Norris led eleven Vindicator dive bombers to the Japanese fleet. The aircraft were considered so ancient pilots called them “wind indicators”. These planes displayed such fragility their fabric fuselage was reinforced with 4” hospital masking tape. They never reached the carriers and unsuccessfully attacked a battleship. Amazingly only two fell to enemy attacks, but two more were lost at sea with their two-man crews because of low fuel. By June 6 only three were flyable. The Battle of Midway was this aircraft’s only combat use. The plane was pulled from service in 1943.

Next into the battle from 9:18AM to10:15AM came Torpedo 3, Torpedo 6, and Torpedo 8 from the USS Yorktown, USS Enterprise, and USS Hornet respectively. In all Lt. Commander Lance E. Massey, Lt. Commander Gene Lindsey, and Lt. Commander John Waldron lead 42 Devastator torpedo bombers. The squadrons had become separated from their dive bombers and fighters that were intended to accompany them for coordinated attacks. Waldron left the other Hornet aircraft deliberately replying to Lt. Commander Stanhope C. Ring’s order to follow him, “I know where the damn Jap fleet is. The hell with you”. Now alone these 100 mph torpedo bombers had to evade 300 mph Zero fighters, and withstand concentrated task force anti-aircraft fire before launching at less than 1,000 yards.

In pressing home their attacks, 35 aircraft with their two-man crews were lost. Ens. George H. Gay, Jr., who crashed in the midst of the Japanese carriers, was the lone survivor of this Torpedo 8 attack and was rescued by a PBY the next day. The only fighters about were six from Fighting 3 lead by Lt. Commander “Jimmy” Thach that tangled with a horde of Zero fighters and lost one aircraft. Those from Fighting 6 lead by Lieutenant Jim Gray lost track of their torpedo bombers and kept circling at 20,000 feet to protect the dive bombers they never found. Eventually these fighters returned to the Enterprise in total frustration.

The USS Hornet fighters and dive bombers spent a fruitless morning. Lt. Commander Ring led Bombing 8, Scouting 8, and Fighting 8 exactly as ordered by Captain Marc Mitscher and then searched to the south until fuel was critical and each squadron proceeded independently. Lt. Commander Robert R. Johnson leading Bombing 8 was unable to find the Hornet and landed on Midway, but 3 of the 14 aircraft had to ditch on the way for lack of fuel. Lieutenant Stan Ruehlow leading Fighting 8 remained determined to find the Hornet, but all ten aircraft had to ditch, and Ens. Mark Kelly and Ens. George R. Hill were never found. That morning there were 29 empty seats in the Hornet ready room. Fifteen seats belonged to Torpedo 8 pilots slaughtered that morning by the Japanese. The 11 were for Bombing 8 that refueled at Midway and later returned to the Hornet.

The Japanese carrier task force had withstood eight separate attacks over nearly three hours without a single hit. Not counting the B-17’s that stayed at 20,000 feet, Navy, Marine, and Army flyers pressed home attacks with 79 aircraft. Of those 58 were destroyed, 126 of 174 men perished, and no hits were obtained. While the Japanese found satisfaction in thwarting the attacks, they faced complete frustration in efforts to re-arm and spot aircraft from the hanger decks to strike the American carriers.

Now at 10:20AM Bombing 3, Scouting 6 and Bombing 6 from the USS Yorktown and USS Enterprise respectively found the carriers. They arrived over the carriers while most Zero fighters were still at low altitude finishing off the last American torpedo bombers. The 18 planes of Commander Max Leslie’s Bombing 3 delivered three fatal hits to one carrier, probably the Soryu. For Bombing 6 and Scouting 6, Lieutenant Wade McClusky as group commander, and Lieutenants Earl Gallaher and Richard Best as section leaders attacked the Akagi and Kaga. Most of Best’s section incorrectly followed McClusky and Gallaher in attacks that inflicted five hits and five near misses on the Kaga. Best and his two wingmen attacked the Akagi. The two wingmen obtained near misses, but Best’s 1,000 lb bomb exploded amongst aircraft on the hanger deck to start an uncontrollable fire.

The Japanese task forces that had been impervious to harm from 7:48AM to 10:23AM saw three of their heavy carriers turned into burning wreckage in six minutes. However, a price had to be paid. Max Leslie’s planes returned safely, but Scouting 6 and Bombing6 lost 16 aircraft and 11 of 38 two man crews.

The Japanese turn came at 11:52AM when Yorktown radar plot reported, “Bogeys 32 miles and closing”. In spite of fearful losses, the Japanese scored hits with three bombs at noon and at 2:42PM their torpedo plane attacks scored two hits and forced the Yorktown to abandon ship. The defending Combat Air Patrol lost one Wildcat compared to 22 of 30 Japanese aircraft lost to fighters and anti-aircraft fire.

There was still one heavy carrier unaccounted for, and at 2:45PM Lieutenant Sam Adams of Scouting 6 radioed Admiral Spruance its location. The Admiral had no fighters or torpedo bombers, but ordered Lieutenant William E. Gallaher aloft at 3:30PM to lead 24 planes from three dive bombers squadrons. A half hour later the Hornet launched 16 dive bombers lead by reserve Lieutenant Edgar Stebbins. These 40 aircraft encountered anti-aircraft fire, lighting attacks from Zeros, and superb evasive ship handling. However, there were just too many planes and bombs. At least four hits and many near misses transformed the Hiryu into the fourth blazing funeral pyre of the day. All three dive bombing squadrons got hits and three aircraft with crews were lost.

There were attacks before and after June 4 during the Battle of Midway costing the Japanese Combined Fleet other ships. However, the loss of these four heavy carriers and the many superbly trained aircrews and technicians proved fatal to Japanese plans.

This splendid victory by Navy, Marine and Army Air Corps flyers over the First Carrier Striking Force permanently seized the initiative from the Japanese. One could easily paraphrase Winston Churchill to say never have so many who fought in the Pacific owed so much to so few. Not counting the B-17’s that stayed aloft, about 550 flyers closely engaged the Japanese and suffered nearly 300 deaths. Walter Lord and Gordon W. Prange considered this accomplishment incredible and miraculous. For Mitsuo Fuchida and Masatake Okumiya, it was the battle that doomed Japan.

The Battle History of the Imperial Japanese Navy by Paul S. Dull U.S. NAVAL BASE, PEARL HARBOR, DRY DOCK NO. 2 lcweb2.loc.gov/master/pnp/habshaer/hi/hi0700/hi0748/data/hi0748data.pd

Action Report: USS Hornet (CV-8) Midway http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/logs/CV/cv8-Midway.html

Battle of Midway, Commanding Officer, USS Yorktown, report of 18 June 1942 http://www.patriotfiles.com/index.php?name=Sections&req=viewarticle&artid=1096&page=1 http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ships/logs/CV/cv5-Midway.html

Battle of Midway: 4-7 June 1942, Online Action Reports: Commanding Officer, USS Enterprise, Serial 0133 of 8 June 1942 http://www.history.navy.mil/docs/wwii/mid6.htm

MK XIII Aerial Torpedo http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=1035 http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WTUS_WWII.htm

Vindicator SB2U Dive Bomber http://www.militaryfactory.com/aircraft/detail.asp?aircraft_id=731

Douglas TBD Devastator http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TBD_Devastator I find no evidence the planes flew with bombardiers on June 4 or had Norden bombsights.

Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_B-17_Flying_Fortress

B-17 Crew Requirements and Standard Operating Procedures http://www.303rdbg.com/crewmen-missions.html

Midway Film by John ford http://video.staged.com/localshops/ww_iirare_film__midway__directed_by_john_ford

Valor: Marauders at Midway http://www.airforce-magazine.com/MagazineArchive/Pages/1986/April%201986/0486valor.aspx

The Nimitz Graybook http://usnwc.edu/Academics/Library/Naval-Historical-Collection.aspx#items/show/849

Japanese aircraft carrier Hiryū http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_Hiry%C5%AB Japanese aircraft carrier Kaga http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_Kaga Japanese aircraft carrier Sōryū http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_S%C5%8Dry%C5%AB Japanese aircraft carrier Akagi http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_Akagi (Therefore average top speed 30.6 knots) Japanese aircraft carrier Shōkaku https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_aircraft_carrier_Sh%C5%8Dkaku“8 May 1942 by dive bombers from USS Yorktown and Lexington which scored three bomb hits: one on the carrier’s port bow, one to starboard at the forward end of the flight deck and one just abaft the island. Fires broke out but were eventually contained and extinguished. The resulting damage required ShÅkaku to return to Japan for major repairs. On the journey back, the carrier shipped so much water through her damaged bow she nearly capsized in heavy seas, maintaining a high rate of speed in order to avoid a cordon of American submarines out hunting for her.

She arrived at Kure on 17 May 1942 and entered dry dock on 16 June 1942. Repairs were completed within ten days and, a little over two weeks later on 14 July, she was formally reassigned to Striking Force, 3rd Fleet, Carrier Division 1”.

At the Battle of the Coral Sea on May 8 dive bombers from USS Yorktown and Lexington scored three bomb hits on the Shokaku. The resulting damage required her to return to Japan for major repairs. She arrived at Kure on 17 May 1942 and did not enter dry dock until a month later on 16 June 1942.

In comparison the damage the Yorktown sustained after Coral Sea led to the Navy Yard inspectors estimating that she would need at least two weeks of repairs. However, Admiral Nimitz ordered that she be made ready to sail alongside TF 16. Yard workers at Pearl Harbor, laboring around the clock, made enough repairs to enable the ship to put to sea again in 48 hours.

Thanks for posting. I’d like to recommend a book which I think is out of print. I stumbled across a copy at a church rummage sale a few years ago and couldn't’t pass it up. “The United States Navy in World War II” by SE Smith.
https://www.amazon.com/United-States-Navy-World-War/dp/B00DE0LHCI
It a compilation of first hand accounts including a couple accounts by the dive bombers at Midway. My favorite from ‘‘this section is by Lt. Clarence E Dickinson titled “The Target Was Utterly Satisfying”. He tells about how his squadron found the carriers without any fighters at altitude and dove on them. He used the big red disk as his target and saw dozens of fighters on deck and taking off. Great read.

I need to get out and see the new movie. My dad was a torpedo man on the Yorktown, his job was to arm and mount the torpedo to the plane. He spent the rest of the war on a highly decorated Destroyer which was sent to Guadalcanal several months after Midway.

It took away from the real tactics and skill (and luck) of the American forces in battle

The proper word is not "luck." Giving credit where credit is due, the correct attribution is "Providence," overwhelmingly so.

Chance is blind, God is not, especially when His Will is carried out by determined Christians. I think we can say that of the plurality of American men of that time.

"Dieu et mon droit!" (Motto of British royalty)

"The Sword of the Lord and Gideon!" (Battle of King's Mounrain, uttered by Rev. Samuel Doak (click here to the 900 righteous American defenders)

Now being bred out of the American youth by our misdirected schools, universities, and religious denominations. Farewell, Columbia!

I went to see it...twice. I was very skeptical of Hollywood putting out anything military related, but...many Freepers told me there was no PC horsecrap in it, and that it was generally pretty accurate.

You should go see it on the big screen. I have been waiting years for someone to do a WWII Pacific movie with CGI that really showed the ships and planes in a realistic light, and they finally did it.

There were a few things I nitpicked about (they showed Doolittle taxiing his plane for launch, and I don’t believe he moved it at all...he needed every inch, and I thought the conversation between Nimitz and Layton (Nimitz’s Intelligence Officer) about the identification of “AF” by Rochefort was Hollywoodized, but...I have to read Layton’s book he wrote in 1985 before he died. Maybe that is where they got it from.

Go see it in the theater. You won’t be disappointed.

In regard to the Japs and Japanese PC nonsense, when referring to the war in the Pacific we fought the Japs of Imperial Japan and it would be most appropriate to refer to them in that way. The men who fought them should always be able to refer to them as Japs in relating their experiences. If you go to the official site for the 41th Infantry, which was part of McArthur’s army you will note they took pride in being the division that took the fewest Japanese prisoners. In New Guinea a unit of the division overran a Japanese position and discovered they had slaughtered and eaten American soldiers and the Japs were not that hungry. When McArthur’s army got back to the Philippines they killed about every Jap they could find.

There is a light year of difference between them and the Japanese of later generations and even those of that generation who rebuilt Japan. I remember how thankful we were to return to Yokosuka and have the Japanese yard workers swarm over our ship. Many of those who helped build the Imperial Japanese Navy that attacked Pearl Harbor were in charge of the shops that did exquisite work repairing our ship before we headed to Vietnam again. The piers, cranes, drydocks, and shops were never bombed, because the U.S. Navy had determined to homeport the 7th Fleet there.

Actually, all of the Japanese carriers had reasonable firefighting systems or at least were designed that way. The Achilles heel of Japanese damage control was that they didn’t design their ships *around* damage control like the Americans did and their naval doctrine dictated that damage control was supposed to be handled by a core of highly trained damage control specialists, which turned out to be a problem when the specialists were killed or disabled and the rest of the crew didn’t know what to do. The American practice was to train all crew members in at least the bare rudiments of damage control (”This is a fire hose, this is where you find them, this is how you use it” and “This is a hatch, you keep it closed at all times when you are not transiting it.” if nothing else) and had noticed the surprising survivability of the technically inferior German WW1 fleet units at the battles of Dogger Bank and Jutland, which were attributed to superior damage control and ships designed around it. US naval architects and policy makers took this idea and ran with it to an extent that the Germans couldn’t and didn’t recognize it in WW2. American damage control and damage control oriented design were partially why the destroyers and destroyer escort of Taffy-3 were able to keep floating and fighting for so long with such horrific amounts of damage.

The fact that the Japanese damage control issues weren’t hardware centric was demonstrated by the carrier Shokaku at the Battle of the Coral Sea. Shokaku was hit in and through the deck by three American bombs dropped by dive bombers, equivalent hits to what sank some of the IJN carriers at Midway, but was easily able to put out the fires and sail away. It turns out the captain of the Shokaku had taken a look at what doctrine said he should do to configure his crew for damage control, said f**k that and had his DC specialists start training his entire crew in the rudiments of damage control. Shokaku would be hit hard at the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands (six deck and through deck hits from Hornet’s dive bombers this time) and again sailed away due to the atypical-for-the-IJN DC training.

Correct - if you were at low altitude, you often couldn’t climb back to altitude in time to do anything significant, let alone intercept incoming enemy aircraft.

To give you some idea, the Zero’s time to altitude was a bit over seven minutes to go from near sea level to 19,685 feet. Their initial climb rate was about 3,340 feet per minute. Keep in mind that their climb rate slowed greatly as they gained altitude, like all prop planes. The Zero climbs like some early jets, but even that was not enough to get it from splashing torpedo bombers on the deck to intercepting a Dauntless at altitude before the latter could begin its dive in any amount of time to be useful. This was a fact of life of air combat until the second generation jets like the F-86 started showing up with their 7000+ fpm climb rates.

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