Hornfischer rocks. I read his naval pacific trilogy, incl. Tin Can Sailors. I have communicated with Hornfischer several times, and he is always good to write back. I’m a big fan of Ernest Evans, native American skipper of the Johnston, who, despite having his arm shot off with a five-inch projectile, remained in command and ran his “Johnston” straight to the jap cruiser Kumano w/o the benefit of the ability to steer.
Evans’ tin can landed a couple of torpedoes which blew off the bow, and fired more than 200 5-inchers against its hull. All the while, the Johnston and 3 other tin cans were laying down smoke screen and drawing fire from the jap flotilla, all in an effort to preserve intact the US contingent of small carriers.
The Kumano was thus sunk by a little destroyer escort. Evans didn’t make it, but he was posthumously awarded the CMH. Evans is my hero.
Hornfisher tells me that he is presently working on a massive project to chronicle aspects of the Cold War. He also put me onto a brand new book by Dan Pederson, “Topgun”, a personal account of the guy who, with others, revolutionized the dogfight in the era when air/air missiles had supposedly rendered the practice obsolete. Great reading.
“Neptune’s Inferno” was one of the best naval books I have ever read, and I have read quite a few.
Most people today have no idea of the absolute seaborne savagery that took place in the Solomon Islands in 1942.
For every marine or solider who died on land, three sailors died at sea. That was when, as lowbuck said, we were still learning to fight.
And the things that took place in the sea...heartbreaking to read. Back in the nineties, I got to spend several hours with one of the surviving officers of the Indianapolis sinking, and his reactions as he tried to describe some things to me, fifty years after the fact, have left a deep mark on me.
One of the things he said was, fifty years later, he could not say The Lord’s Prayer.
And just even telling me he couldn’t say The Lord’s Prayer turned his face crimson and caused him to choke up.
If there was anything that ever reflected to me in a meaningful way the horror of that experience, it was that. Fifty years later.
Johnston badly damaged Kumano but didn’t sink her. The ship managed to hang on for another month. Halsey supposedly said that if he could have felt sorry for a Japanese ship it would be the Kumano.