The FReeper Foxhole Revisits The Battle of Savo Island - (8/9/1942)

.......

Half an hour past one in the morning, Mikawa's line began to make for 30 knots, and went into battle. In another example for the luck that shone on Mikawa, even his close range sighting of the crippled destroyer Jarvis could not unbalance the admiral, who held fire.

Not too long thereafter, however, at 0130, Chokai's lookouts sighted the Southern Force, and the Northern Force thereafter, 17,000 yards distant. A minute later, Chokai's first torpedo left its tube, and five minutes into its run, the eerie silence over the sound was broken by the rolling thunder of Chokai's first eight-inch volley, aimed at Canberra.

On the latter, the sudden shock of gunfire from the north brought the bridge watch into action and Captain Getting to the bridge, but her engagement that night would be swift and violent. Turning northeast to unmask her aft batteries, Canberra was hit some twenty plus times in a matter of five minutes, lost power for her armament and pumps, and was rendered unable to fight with not a single main gun round fired. A single torpedo, fired by the destroyer Bagley, had also hit Canberra.

On Chicago, hints at the presence of enemy ships had been seen earlier but not triggered a response. Captain Bode, in tactical command, was in his cabin, and hurried up. Even as aircraft flares blossomed over the Southern Group, and Canberra started her turn, few on Chicago figured out the facts. Chicago did not get to fire her 203mm guns either, when she began a series of maneuvers undertaken to evade torpedoes. Alas, confusion reigned on her bridge. Captain Bode, who had come up from his cabin, reports came in of torpedoes approaching from starboard. Bode turned his vessel towards that direction, leading his to comb the Japanese torpedo spread. However, moments later, the bridge lookouts spotted torpedoes to port, from on the unengaged side, possibly from the same spread of Bagley that had hit Canberra. Bode swung his ship around again, trying to comb the new thread, but by doing so, exposed the entire length of his ship to the Japanese torpedoes. One slammed in Chicago, crippling her. Slowly, she swung westward (via a southerly heading), out of the battle. Captain Bode, immersed in the plight of his ship, and fighting the damages incurred, ignored his role as task group commander and failed to issue orders to his ships or to inform his superiors of what had happened. Chicago shortly rendered fire support to the destroyer Patterson, which was dueling with Japanese light cruisers Yubari and Tenryu. From Patterson, the only contact report had been made by the Southern Group, issued by Commander Frank Walker via radio at 0146.

While Chicago and destroyer Bagley steered clear of the enemy, Mikawa having turned northeast for more prizes, Patterson remained in contact until 0210. To Captain Riefkohl of Vincennes, officer in charge of the Northern Group, the actions south of him were masked by a cloudbank hiding the ships, though the fire of Patterson at the Japanese light cruisers was seen and judged as a minor engagement with light forces. Riefkohl accordingly refused to leave his position. Vincennes had in fact received Patterson's call regarding enemy ships but Riefkohl had not been informed. Now, with a slight increase in speed to 15 knots his only reaction to the presence of the enemy, he elected to wait for orders from Admiral Crutchley. His unit had just executed another of its scheduled turns, keeping course along the edges of a large box-like figure. Vincennes led, followed by Quincy, and Astoria in the rear. Destroyers Wilson and Helm had lost their positions on the flanks and were hurrying to catch up.

Admiral Mikawa, his helm already due northeast to deal with the Northern Force, now completely lost the coherence of his force. Already, the elderly destroyer Yunagi had departed the rear of his force, and now, just as the Kinugasa had aligned herself right behind the flagship Aoba, and the Kako, the Canberra drifted into the path of following Furutaka, forcing her to turn to port at once, leading her and the two light cruisers trailing her away from the main column. Now, the two separated pincers were moving at will against the outnumbered and unsuspecting Northern Force.

Riefkohl found himself, or would soon find himself, in a little-promising situation: to his rear, Chokai, Aoba, Kako and Kinugasa threatened to cross his T from the rear, a rather unusual maneuver but efficent nevertheless, while to the forces south, Furutakaand her two lighter colleagues would have to exchange broadsides with the enemy.

Mikawa could allow himself a moment of pleasure when at 0150 the searchlights of three Japanese cruisers snapped on to light the U.S. line up. A moment later, the first salvo left Chokai's gun tubes, and soon the entire Japanese line was firing, with torpedoes added for good measure.

On the U.S. ships, disbelief was the common reaction to the sudden illumination. Captains Riefkohl and Greenman (of Astoria) were certain they faced the Southern Group, accidently assuming their Allies to be the enemy. Soon, however, shells erased all hope that a peaceful conclusion could be found with a radio call or flag hoisting (although Riefkohl tried the latter with curious success lasting several minutes). Riefkohl ordered battle stations and twenty knots, the latter being made impossible by untimely interference from a torpedo from Chokai.

In a photo taken from a Japanese cruiser, searchlights illuminate the U.S. cruiser Quincy, which was the first ship in the group to succumb. She rolled over and sank in 11 minutes.

Neither of the three heavy cruisers put up much of a fight, though two salvoes from Quincy slammed into Chokai, destroying a gun turret.

As the battle unfolded, further problems reduced Mikawa's line, now merely a loosely connected and very broad bar instead of a neat line, but it was not later than 0220 that all three U.S. cruisers were reduced to swimming wrecks. There remained little to do for Mikawa, who kept to a new northwest course he had established during the brief engagement with the Northern Force. There, U.S. picket destroyer Ralph Talbot blundered into the Japanese path and was given an unhealthly large dose of fire. Burning and lisiting, only a rain squall at the right time saved the little ship from becoming another victim of Mikawa's. The Admiral, after consulting his staff,decided at shortly before three in the morning to cancel any further attacks and retire at top speed to Rabaul. Thereby, he concluded the first naval battle fought in the Solomons. The dawning of the new morning saw the vicinity of Savo littered with wrecks -- or worse, it didn't. Vincennes had slipped under at 0300 already, with her surviving crew being rescued from the shark-infested waters. Astoria had looked as if she were salvable, and energetic efforts went into her, improving her watertight integrity and keeping fires down, but uncertainty rose with regard to her ammo lockers, which were presumed to have not been flooded - correctly. Thirty minutes past midday, Astoria accompanied Vincennes and Quincy, having already sunk at 0238, down to the ground of Ironbottom Sound.

Canberra, burning fiercely in her interior, was ordered to be scuttled should she not be able to accompany Turner's retreat at 0600. With lots of fires raging around the boilers but none in a position to power the ship's engines, rudders, or even pumps, the ship was sunk by U.S. destroyer Ellet. Admiral Fletcher did not turn around to persue Mikawa,as the Japanese Admiral had expected, but kept heading southeast. Like rats leaving the sinking ship, all ships abandoned Ironbottom Sound by the evening of August 9th. Silence fell over the sound, and no hints remained that only a day before, Allied and Japanese naval forces had fought the largest surface battle to that date in the Pacific.

HMAS Canberra underfire

Several questions need to be discussed here, even if only for the sake of completeness. The primary one to be solved is, who must be made responsible for this disaster? First on this list would be Admirals Crutchley and McCain: the first, for failing to make known his extension of his stay with Turner's force, and for going to see Turner without informing anybody but Bode of his absence in the first place. The second for failing to conduct a requested air search without any reason and not informing the commanders of failing to conduct it, leaving them in a wrong feeling of immunity.

First and foremostly culpable was Turner, whose was the plan, afterall, by which the forces operated; which did consider that the Northern Force would not need flag officer with it; which had provided for the spotty air reconnaisance plans, and for Fletcher's early withdrawal.

Somewhere on the list would be Captain Bode of Chicago, not for failing to stand up to his new post as Task Group commander but for not informing the other commanders of the presence of a strong enemy force. Certainly, also, his handling of Chicago had been somewhat spotty; granted that the situation was difficult, his decision to head west, instead of east towards the transports, whose defense was his job, and where Australia was to be found, was false. Had he encountered Mikawa again, alone, he would have stood no chance.

Battle of Savo Island: "Kako" attacks "Vincennes"

There is, however, much more blame to spread around than could possibly be laid upon the commanders on the spot. The Allied operations plan was poor. Although the distribution of the forces could not be helped, the fact that there were only two flag officers with the three screening groups necessarily led to command problems. Captain Bode of Chicago can not be considered ill-suited for a task group command, but to control damage control efforts on his ship, designated a new course and general approach to the action for his vessel, worrying about torpedoes and the like, in addition to trying to control the rest of his force proved too much. The dogged skill of the Japanese torpedo men and gunners and the coolness of the Japanese approach added to the completeness of the victory by ascertaining that the initial blows would come out of the dark and be deadly at the same time. The engagement with the Southern Force had been decided in five minutes, and not much more time was needed to deal with the Northern Force, which had a slight advantage of strength, position and alertness over its southern counterpart. This combination of near flawless execution of a well-exercised operation by the Japanese, and the problematic layout of command and control arrangements on the Allied side led to the defeat of Savo; the worst naval defeat ever suffered by the U.S. Navy.

............

"The fact must be faced that we had an adequate force placed with the very purpose of repelling surface attack and when that surface attack was made, it destroyed our force," said Admiral Crutchley. After full allowance for the element of surprise and for the fact that the attacker at night enjoys an immense advantage, there remain many questions about the action which cannot be answered.

It is unexplained how the enemy managed to pass the two destroyers stationed to give warning of just such an attack. Visibility of course was very low. The enemy might have escaped radar detection for a while by approaching close to the shore of the islands, but to reach Savo Island he had to cross open water, and at this point our radars should have picked him up easily. The nature of the radar search conducted by the two destroyers was not reported. It was suggested, without any evidence, that their search may have been intermittent, and not continuous. If this is true, the enemy could have crossed the open water at a time when the radar was not in actual operation. Admiral Crutchley suggested that our failure could be explained by the enemy's having detected our patrolling destroyers from the air and having made a wide circuit to the westward, approaching close along the shore of Guadalcanal.

Of less importance but of considerable interest is the problem of the "something" seen close aboard the Patterson at the beginning of the engagement, and the "dark objects" seen between our ships by the Chicago. They may explain the fact that both the Chicago and the Canberra were struck by torpedoes which could scarcely have been fired from the enemy cruiser line.

Because the enemy cruisers came in very close to Savo Island, their destroyers may well have been on their starboard bow, perhaps at some distance. If they failed to turn eastward quickly as did the cruisers, they might have passed through our formation. It seems probable, however, that in spite of the poor visibility, enemy destroyers would have been recognized at the close range at which they passed.

Secondly, it is possible that the "seaplane tenders or gunboats" reported in the Melbourne dispatch were in fact tenders for motor torpedo boats, and that some of these were present. The restricted waters, smooth sea, and poor visibility were well suited to their operation.

Aviation fuel that ignited during the battle on board the Australian cruiser Canberra—her survivors being rescued here by the U.S. destroyers Blue (alongside) and Patterson—diverted Japanese attention from the U.S. cruiser Chicago.

The most likely conjecture is that enemy submarines were operating on the surface in coordination with the attacking cruisers. A lookout on the Vincennes saw a submarine surface just as the action began. Capt. Riefkohl believed his ship might have been torpedoed by a submarine, and, at the close of the action, the last 5-inch gun on his ship was reported to have hit the conning tower of a submarine. The following morning several of our destroyers made sound contacts, and the Mugford believed that she sank a submarine.

The attacking ships were never seen with sufficient clarity to make identification certain. Admiral Crutchley reported, "The consensus of opinion assesses the enemy force as comprising one 8-inch cruiser (which I think might have been the Chokai) and two light cruisers of the 5.5-inch type. Probably there were three destroyers. This would correspond to the force reported in the Melbourne warning.

There is some question as to whether the enemy operated in one or two groups. The latter suggestion came from some officers of the Vincennes group who believed that they had been caught in a cross fire.

USS Chicago (CA-29) off Guadalcanal the day after the action, showing crewmen cutting away damaged plating to enable the ship to get underway. She had been torpedoed at her extreme bow during the night action of 9 August 1942.
View looks forward along her port side, with # 1 eight-inch gun turret in the upper right. Note life rafts hung on the turret side and destroyers in the distance.

This could be explained by the fact that the enemy crossed astern of this group at such speed that the leading vessels of the enemy column might have been firing on our ships from their starboard quarter while the last ships of the column were still firing from the port quarter. Admiral Crutchley remarked, "The Vincennes suggests that the other enemy force consisted of destroyers. As the enemy had two separate transport groups to attack, there seems to be good reason for dividing his force into two sections, but if this were so, the enemy destroyer force apparently destined to be the one sent against Squadron Y at Tulagi was not intercepted by any of our patrols and it becomes difficult to explain why they did not go on to attack their real objective." The fact that the enemy planes dropped flares over Tulagi considerably later than over Guadalcanal indicates that the enemy plan was probably for a single force to attack first one and then the other.

It seems certain that our ships scored several hits on the Japanese, but there was no evidence that we inflicted any considerable damage. None of the enemy ships was seen to be seriously on fire, and apparently all cleared the area at high speed.

The redeeming feature of the battle was the splendid performance of our officers and men. They had been on the alert for days and had had about 48 hours of continuous, active operations immediately before the battle. In spite of this, their conduct under the most trying circumstances was beyond praise, and they made it, in the happy phrase of one of our officers, "a night in which heroism was commonplace."

Additional Sources:

www.ww2pacific.com
www.geocities.com/Pentagon/Bunker
www.ibiblio.org
www.usni.org
www.warship.get.net.pl
www.history.navy.mil
pw1.netcom.com
The FReeper Foxhole Remembers The Battle of Savo Island - (8/9/1942) - Dec. 18th, 2003

In just 32 minutes the enemy had inflicted massive damage. Four heavy cruisers were sunk and a heavy cruiser and destroyer badly damaged. 1,270 men were killed and 708 injured. The enemy had comparative scratches on three cruisers.

What Went Wrong?

A court of inquiry determined that US ships required more training in night fighting.

There were several sighting of the IJN 8th fleet by USAAF and RAAF aircraft along with several other Japanese ship movements: each report was of different ship compositions and bearings. Weather and enemy air defenses were a factor, yet a common denominator of these sightings was delay in getting the information from MacArthur's Army zone to Nimitz's Navy zone on the scene. Japanese seaplane carriers were included in the sightings and the Allied fleet prepared for submarine or air attack, rather than surface action. Almost two thousand men paid for a chain of errors.

The 8th fleet cruiser's floatplanes were noticed and reported. Radio communication was poor that night and nobody associated aircraft reconnaissance with a surface attack. Visibility was 2 to 6 miles with rain in the area.

Both radar picket ships (radar range about 10 miles) were at the extreme ends of their patrols sailing away from the Japanese fleet. San Juan had modern search radar, but was at the other end of the Sound. Was too much or too little reliance placed on this new technology? This battle must be considered to have been fought in the pre-radar days.

RAdm Crutchley, RN, was in command of the screening force in recognition of allied unity: three of the eight cruisers were Australian. He had fought with Fletcher at Coral Sea, but was not totally integrated with the US Navy. HMAS Canberra, for instance, did not have TBS (short range radio known as Talk Between Ships) and could not hear the initial alarm issued by USS Patterson. Crutchley had left with his flagship, heavy cruiser Australia, that night to attend a conference called by RAdm Turner and did not participate in the battle. Chicago had the senior captain, but his ship was immediately torpedoed into a state of confusion that even included an exchange of friendly fire.

What went right?

Well, nothing, but luck helped a little.

Fortunately the Japanese did not steam through and attack the thinly defended transports. When the lead flagship turned towards the channel, his column, intent on sinking cruisers, failed to follow and continued north, then west to avoid shoal water, but away from the transports. The flagship then turned to chase after his squadron. To reform the Japanese fleet would have taken two hours; after attacking the transports and defenders the Japanese fleet would still be in the channel as daylight exposed them to carrier aircraft and any surviving ships of the earlier battle. The flag chartroom had been destroyed so that navigation into the channel would have been dangerous. Japanese naval tradition called for attacking warships; to expose cruisers to a second attack, with no torpedoes left, to extreme risk, for half empty transports may not have seemed worthy. They had already won a great victory over warships and that was enough for one night's work. The heavy cruiser, HMAS Australia, with screen commander Crutchley aboard, returning from his midnight meeting with Turner, was steaming to the battle site. Close support for the transports consisted of anti-aircraft light cruiser San Juan and light cruiser HMAS Hobart and destroyers Monssen and Buchanan.

Unaware of the nature of the battle, VAdm Fletcher's 3 carrier and 1 battleship force was withdrawing and not in range to attack the withdrawing enemy cruisers at first light. Fortunately the Japanese did not know this. Equally fortunate was that an enemy air attack of 40 bombers early the next morning could not find the carriers and were only able to finished off Jarvis (DD-799), torpedoed during the previous day's noon air attack.

Afterword

All agreed the Japanese had not lost their fighting spirit after their defeat at Midway and that the allies had lost a major fight from problems with reconnaissance, communication, and preparedness. Yet RAdm Crutchley calls our attention that the propose of the fleet was to protect the landing and that the enemy did not get through. The cost was 1,270 sailors killed, more than Marine loss in the entire 6 month Guadalcanal campaign, 1,207.

www.ww2pacific.com

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September 9, 2005

For Whom The Bell Tolls

Read:
1 Corinthians 15:51-56

Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your sting? —1 Corinthians 15:54-55

Bible In One Year: 2 Chronicles 30-32

cover In 17th-century England, church bells tolled out the news of what was taking place in a parish. They announced not only religious services but also weddings and funerals.

So when John Donne, author and dean of St. Paul's Cathedral, lay desperately sick with the plague that was killing people in London by the thousands, he could hear the bells announce death after death. Writing down his thoughts in the devotional diary that became a classic, Donne urged his readers, "Never send to know for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee."

How true! The book of Hebrews teaches that we will all face death one day: "It is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment" (9:27).

But if we are believers in the gospel, news of death does not need to arouse dread. We know, as Paul joyfully assured us, that by His resurrection Jesus has broken the power of death and "brought life and immortality to light through the gospel" (2 Timothy 1:10). Death has been "swallowed up in victory" by the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:54). Its sting is gone (v.55).

When the bell tolls for the Christian, it announces the good news of Jesus' victory over death. —Vernon Grounds

Ring the bells, ring the bells;
Let the whole world know
Christ the Savior lives today
As He did so long ago. —Bollback
© 1958, Singspiration, Inc.

Christ's resurrection is cause for our celebration.

FOR FURTHER STUDY
Where Do We Go From Here?
Did Christ Really Rise From The Dead?

God is just. Merciful beyond imagination.

Myself, I do not deserve the mercy I have been shown, much less the forgiveness I am confident will come.

The Savo Island story is difficult for me to read. This is, however, a very well balanced and accurate accounting.

The Navy did night training until maybe 1930. Two destroyers collided during training with some loss, can't remember how much. I don't recollect that either ship sank. Anyway, that was the end of realistic training for one heck of too long a time.

A good wake up call for the Navy, though. High price.

Goes to show how fully Japan realized the importance of the Guadalcanal landing. Those people are not dumb.

New Guinea and Guadalcanal together, right and left fist, kept Japan baffled about the American center of gravity, what the Germans call the Schwerpunct. This is deadly for the defense.

War could have been lost in 1942. Yamamoto Isoroku was correct. Stalingrad, of course, is not to be ignored.

Good morning, Snippy and everyone at the Foxhole.

Savo island is always an interesting battle to read about.

Good morning everyone!!

TGIF!!
Yee Haw!!

Good Friday morning to everyone here in the Foxhole. God bless America and thank goodness it's Friday.

On This Day In History

Birthdates which occurred on September 09:
1585 Cardinal A Jean de Plessicide de Richelieu Louis XIII chief minister
1754 William Bligh ship's captain (HMS Bounty)
1789 William Cranch Bond US, astronomer (codiscovered Hyperion)
1809 William Radford Commander (Union Navy), died in 1890
1817 Speed Smith Fry Brig General (Union volunteers), died in 1892
1819 Martin Luther Smith Major General (Confederate Army), died in 1866
1828 Leo Tolstoy Russia, novelist (War & Peace, Anna Karenina)
1850 Harishchandra India, poet/dramatist/father of modern Hindi
1877 Frank Chance baseball player/manager, Tinkers to Evers to Chance
1887 Alfred Landon (R-Ks) pres candidate (1932, 1936)
1890 Harland Sanders Kentucky Fried Chicken founder/colonel
1893 Esther Cleveland (daughter of U.S. President and Mrs. Grover Cleveland; first child of a U.S. President to be born at the White House
1898 Frank (Fordham Flash) Frisch NYC, baseball player (NL MVP 1931)
1899 Neil Hamilton Lynn Mass, actor (Commisioner Gordon-Batman)
1900 James Hilton hotel magnate (Hilton Hotels)
1907 Pinky Tomlin Eureka Springs Ark, singer/actor (Tip-Waterfront)
1908 John Haeton US, bobsled (Olympic-silver-1928, 48)
1919 Jimmy "the Greek" Snyder gambler/sportscaster (lay you 5 to 1)
1925 Cliff Robertson La Jolla Calif, actor (Charly)/spokesman for AT&T
1928 Julian E "Cannonball" Adderley US, jazz musician
1935 Chaim Topol Tel Aviv Israel, actor (Fiddler on the Roof)
1941 Otis Redding Georgia, Soul singer (Sitting on the Dock of the Bay)
1943 Roger Waters rocker (Pink Floyd-The Wall)
1946 Billy Preston singer/pianist, the 5th Beatle
1947 Lynn Fitzgerald marathoner (ran 133 miles 939 yards in 24 hrs)
1949 Joe Theismann NFL QB (Redskins)
1950 Tom Wopat Lodi Wisc, actor (Luke Duke-Dukes of Hazzard)
1951 Michael Keaton Pitts Pa, actor (Gung Ho, Batman)
1952 Angela Cartwright England (Make Room for Daddy, Lost in Space)
1952 Dave Stewart rocker (Eurythmics-Here Comes the Rain Again)
1966 Adam Sandler comedian(?) (SNL, and a whole bunch of baaad movies)

Deaths which occurred on September 09:
9CE Publius Quinctilius Varus (59), Roman governor of Germania (6-9CE), died of likely suicide following defeat at the Battle of Teutoburg Forest
1087 William I The Conqueror, King of England, & Duke of Normandy, dies
1817 Paul Cuffe entrepreneur/ civil rights activist, dies at 58
1834 James Weddell Explorer, Navigator, English, Antarctic explorer
1851 Thomas H. Gallaudet Educator, Pioneer of educating the deaf
1876 American Horse Sioux chief, dies in battle
1901 Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec Painter
1962 Pat Rooney vaudevillian, dies at 82
1971 Billy Gilbert (Great Dictator, His Gal Friday), dies at 76
1975 John McGiver actor (Patty Duke Show, Jimmy Stewart Show), dies at 61
1976 Mao Tse-Tung Chinese Social reformer/communist/ party chairman (1949-76), dies at 82
1982 Frederic Dannay, [Ellery Queen], US detective writer, died at 76.
1990 Samuel K Doe Liberian "president", killed by rebels
1993 Helen O'Connell singer (Green Eyes), dies of cancer at 73
1994 Patrick O'Neal US actor (King Rat, Night of the Iguana), dies at 66
1994 Roy Castle actor (Dr Who & the Daleks), dies of lung Cancer
1996 Bill Monroe Country Singer/Guitarist, Songwriter, Mandolin, Banjoist. Creator of Bluegrass
1997 Burgess Meredith Actor
2003 Edward Teller (95), Hungarian-born pioneer in molecular physics ("father of the H-bomb") dies.

Take A Moment To Remember
GWOT Casualties

Iraq
09-Sep-2003 1 | US: 1 | UK: 0 | Other: 0
US Specialist Ryan G. Carlock Baghdad (NE of) Hostile - hostile fire - IED attack

Afghanistan
A GOOD DAY

http://icasualties.org/oif/
Data research by Pat Kneisler
Designed and maintained by Michael White
//////////
Go here and I'll stop nagging.
http://soldiersangels.org/heroes/index.php

On this day...

0490BC Battle of Marathon Greeks led by Miltiades defeat a Persian army led by Darius the Great (Western Civilization saved)

0701 St Sergius I ends his reign as Catholic Pope
1492 Columbus' fleet sets sail west
1513 Battle of Flodden Fields; English defeat James IV of Scotland
1543 Mary, Queen of Scots is is crowned Queen of England (Mary, Mary quite contrary. How does your garden grow)
1556 Pope Paul IV refuses to crown Ferdinand of Austria emperor
1739 Slave revolt in Stono SC led by Jemmy (25 whites killed)

1776 Continental Congress renames "United Colonies," "United States"

1786 George Washington calls for the abolition of slavery.
1817 Alexander Lucius Twilight, probably 1st black to graduate from US college, receives BA degree at Middlebury College
1830 Charles Durant, 1st US aeronaut, flies a balloon from Castle Garden, NYC to Perth Amboy, NJ
1839 John Herschel takes the 1st glass plate photograph
1841 Great Lakes steamer "Erie" sinks off Silver Creek NY, kills 300
1850 California becomes 31st state
1850 Territories of New Mexico & Utah created

1861 Sally Louisa Tompkins (b.1833) commissioned as a Confederate captain of cavalry. With the onset of civil war, she labored on the behalf of the South's wounded soldiers, and for this she became the first and only woman to receive an officer's commission in the Confederate army.

1862 Lee splits his army & sends Jackson to capture Harpers Ferry
1863 Battle of Cumberland Gap, TN
1867 Luxembourg gains independence
1892 Almalthea, 5th moon of Jupiter, discovered by EE Barnard at Lick
1895 The American Bowling Congress formed (NYC)
1899 French Capt Alfred Dreyfus sentenced to Devil's Island on trumped-up grounds
1904 Boston Herald again refers to NY baseball club as Yankees, when it reports "Yankees take 2," Yankee name not official till 1913
1908 Orville Wright makes 1st 1-hr airplane flight, Fort Myer, Va
1911 1st airmail service (British Post Office)
1912 J Verdrines becomes 1st to fly over 100 mph (107 mph/172 kph)
1914 Battle of Marne (German advance stalls, Paris saved)
1919 Boston's police force goes on strike
1922 St Louis Brown Baby Doll Jacobson hits 3 triples beating Tigers 16-0
1926 National Broadcasting Co created by the Radio Corporation of America
1932 Frank Crosetti ties record, strikes out twice in 1 inning
1940 28 German aircrafts shot down above England
1942 1st bombing on continental US soil, Mount Emily Or (WW2) (Japanese float plane, launched from a submarine)
1944 Allied forces liberate Luxembourg
1944 Bulgaria liberated from Nazi control (National Day)
(Meet the new boss, same as the old boss)
1945 Japanese in S Korea, Taiwan, China, Indochina surrender to Allies
1945 1st "bug" in a computer program discovered by Grace Hopper, a moth was removed with tweasers from a relay & taped into the log
1945 Jimmie Foxx hits his 534th & final HR
1948 People's Democratic Republic of Korea proclaimed
1950 1st use of TV laugh track-Hank McCune
1956 Elvis Presley appears on national TV for 1st time (Ed Sullivan)
1957 Nashville's new Hattie Cotton Elementary School dynamited
1958 Pirate Roberto Clemente ties record of 3 triples in a game
1963 Landslide into Vaiont Dam emptys lake, kills 3-4,000 (Italy)
1965 Sandy Koufax pitches his 4th no-hitter, a perfect game vs Cubs (1-0)
1965 French President Charles de Gaulle announced that France was withdrawing from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), in protest of U.S. domination of NATO
(Oh whatever shall we do! NATO forced to go on without an army that is skilled in the fine art of surrendering)
1965 Tibet is made an autonomous region of China
1966 John Lennon meets Yoko Ono at an avante-garde art exposition
1967 1st successful test flight of a Saturn V
1969 Allegheny 853 collides with Piper Cherokee above Indiana, kills 82
1970 U.S. Marines launch Operation Dubois Square, a 10-day search for North Vietnamese troops near DaNang.
1971 1,000 convicts seize Attica, NY prison
1971 John Lennon releases the "Imagine" album
1971 NHL great Gordie Howe retires
1975 Viking 2 launched toward orbit around Mars, soft landing
1977 1st TRS-80 computer sold
1978 3rd game of the Boston Massacre; Yanks beat Red Sox 7-0
1978 Iraqi Ayatollah Khomeini calls for uprising in Iranian army
1979 John McEnroe beats Vitas Gerulaitis, for the US Open Tennis title
1981 Vernon E Jordan resigns as president of National Urban League
1982 Conestoga 1, 1st private commercial rocket, makes suborbital flight
1983 Radio Shack announces their color computer 2 (the Coco2)
1984 Walter Payton of the Chicago Bears brakes Jim Brown's combined yardage record by reaching 15,517 yards.
1986 NYC jury indicts Gennadly Zakharov (Soviet UN employee) of spying
1987 Gary Hart admits to cheating on his wife on "Nightline"
1987 Larry Bird (Celtics), begins NBA free throw streak of 59
1987 Nolan Ryan strikes out his 4,500th batter
1988 US swamps New Zealand at 27th America`s Cup: NZ set to appeal
1990 Bush & Gorbachev meet in Helsinki & urge Iraq to leave Kuwait
1991 Only 1,695 fans watch Boston Red Sox play Clevland
1996 Promising safer skies, President Clinton issued orders to tighten airport security and challenged Congress to support a $1.1 billion anti-terrorism crackdown
1999 More than 90 people died in the bombing of a Moscow apartment building. The blast was blamed on terrorists from the breakaway republic of Chechnya.
1999 The White House announced a $15 million federal gun-buyback program
2002 Egyptian military court convicts 51 men of being members of the terroist group al-Wa'ad (the Promise). Sentenced them to 2-15 years in prison.
2004 Ayman al-Zawahri said in an al Qaeda videotape that the US will be ultimately defeated in Iraq and Afghanistan.....meanwhile back in the real world
2004 Pakistani jets pound a suspected training facility for foreign terrorists in a two-hour barrage in tribal South Waziristan, killing 50 people. Pakistani troops assaulted a suspected terror hideout, killing at least six terrorists. Five of the six dead were foreigners.

Holidays
Note: Some Holidays are only applicable on a given "day of the week"

Bulgaria, Luxembourg : Liberation Day (1944)
California : Admission Day (1850)
Italy : Salerno Day-Allied landing (1943)
North Korea : National Day
Fall Hat Week (Day 3)
International Make-Up Day
Swap Ideas Day
Hand-Craft Soap Month

Religious Observances
Ang : Commemoration of Constance & her companions
Christian : St Gorgonius, martyr
RC-US : Memorial of Peter Claver, priest

Religious History
1561 The Colloquy of Poissy convened near Paris. Comprised of both French Catholic prelates and reformed Protestant theologians led by Theodore Beza, the council led to a 1562 edict offering a greater measure of freedom to French Protestants.
1598 A celebration was held for the newly completed Catholic church at San Juan de los Caballeros -- the first church erected in (what is today the state of) New Mexico. The town, founded this year by Juan de Onate, was a former Indian pueblo in the Chama River Valley.
1833 The first tracts of the Oxford Movement (which sought to purify the English Church) were released. The series was forced to close in 1841, however, when Tract 90 was published, because it interpreted Anglicanism's "Thirty-Nine Articles" in too strong of a Roman Catholic direction.
1863 Dwight Moody's future song evangelist, Ira D. Sankey, 23, married Fanny Edwards, daughter of a Pennsylvania State Senator. Their marriage of 45 years bore two sons, one of whom -- Ira H. Sankey -- became a songwriter like his father.
1952 The religious program 'This is the Life' premiered on Dumont (later ABC) television. This long-running series was produced under the auspices of the Missouri Synod Lutheran Church.

Source: William D. Blake. ALMANAC OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1987.

Chinese Eatery Sold Donkey in Tiger Urine

SHANGHAI, China (AP) - A restaurant in northeastern China that advertised illegal tiger meat dishes was found instead to be selling donkey flesh - marinated in tiger urine, a newspaper reported Thursday.
The Hufulou restaurant, located beside the Heidaohezi tiger reserve near the city of Hailin, had advertised stir-fried tiger meat with chilies for $98as well as liquor flavored with tiger bone for $74 a bottle, the China Daily reported.

Raw meat was priced at $864 per kilogram.

The sale of tiger parts is illegal in China and officers shut down the restaurant, only to be told by owner, Ma Shikun, that the meat was actually that of donkeys, flavored with tiger urine to give the dish a "special" tang, the newspaper said.

The report didn't say how the urine was obtained.
Authorities confiscated the restaurant's profits and fined Ma $296 it said. It wasn't clear what Ma was fined for. Selling donkey meat is not illegal in China and it is widely consumed in the northeast.
Ma had initially claimed that the meat came from dead tigers sold to him by the management of the Heidaohezi reserve, but later changed his story, the report said.

While Heidaohezi's director denied that claim, the reserve, with about 150 tigers, has been involved in similar controversies in the past.
Until China outlawed the trade in 1993, the reserve received most of its revenue from the sale of tiger skins, bones and other body parts, which are believed by Chinese to imbue vigor and sexual prowess.

Thought for the day :
"The word 'genius' isn't applicable in football. A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein."
Joe Thiesmann

Good morning ladies. It's Friday!

A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein."

LOL.

Are you all healed up and feelin' like yourself again?

Thank you Mayor.

Good evening texianyankee

Better late than never bump for the Friday edition of the Freeper Foxhole

This line at the end of the post caught my attention.

Yet RAdm Crutchley calls our attention that the propose of the fleet was to protect the landing and that the enemy did not get through.

I would not call having four of your heavy cruisers sunk outright with another heavy cruiser and destroyer badly damaged protecting the landing. It was only pure luck that the Japanese in the confusion of the battle turned the wrong way, away from the transports.

Had the Japanese not lost thier wits the landing at Guadalcanal could have been a major debacle. Fortunatley for the Allies the Japanese would repeat this error several times during the course of the war. Most notably at Leyete Gulf in October of 1944.

Regards

alfa6 ;>}

Canberra was hit some twenty plus times in a matter of five minutes

Durn! Some good fire control guys.

For Whom The Bell Tolls

Read:1 Corinthians 15:51-56

Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your sting? —1 Corinthians 15:54-55

Bible In One Year: 2 Chronicles 30-32

Read:
1 Corinthians 15:51-56