USO Canteen FReeper Style..Battle of Midway Tribute....June 4,2002

FRiends of the USO Canteen FReeper Style and Snow Bunny

[Snow Bunny]

Sixty years after the Battle of Midway, ceremonies across the nation and on the tiny atoll itself will commemorate the day U.S. forces sunk four Japanese aircraft carriers and turned the tide of World War II. the battle on June 4-6, 1942.

For three days, American dive bombers and fighter pilots fended off the Japanese naval fleet's attempt to gain Midway as an outpost.

After Midway, the crippled Japanese fleet withdrew, never again to gain the offensive.

The battle of Midway was the most important in the fight for the pacific in the WW2, finishing the Japanese rule over on the last six months since the Pearl Harbour attack the 7th. of December of 1941.

Having achieved its initial military goals by early 1942, the Japanese decided to take more Pacific outposts--including Midway Island in the central Pacific and islands off Alaska--in order to establish an outer defense line. The Japanese fleet, under Adm. Yamamoto Isoroku, also hoped to draw the remaining U. S. aircraft carriers into battle.

Yamamoto erred in dividing his force of more than 160 vessels. The U.S. commander, Adm. Chester Nimitz, with 76 ships available, including the carriers Hornet, Enterprise, and Yorktown, was stronger than the Japanese thought. Searches by U.S. aircraft established the position of the Japanese fleet.

Early on June 4, Vice Admiral Nagumo, in command of the Japanese carriers, launched 108 planes for an attack on Midway, 240 miles (386 km) to the southeast. American fighters sent to intercept them were outmaneuvered by Japanese fighters. Bombs damaged Midway, but the runways were not put out of action.

Rear Adm. Raymond Spruance, in command of the Hornet and the Enterprise, counterattacked. Fighters and bombers from all three carriers and from Midway were sent toward the enemy carriers. Only then did Nagumo learn that the U.S. carriers were to the northeast. He also learned that another air attack on Midway would be required and ordered his reserve aircraft to be rearmed with fragmentation and incendiary bombs. His logistics grew increasingly complex as his striking force returned from Midway. At 9:05 am he altered course to proceed toward the U.S. carriers. By 9:17 all his bombers were on his decks, refueling or rearming. Because of Nagumo's change in course, dive bombers from the Hornet missed him. Two other waves of more than 40 bombers did find the Japanese, but they scored no hits, and all but a few were shot down.

But the maneuvers of the Japanese carriers had kept their bombers from taking off, and their fighter planes were out of position because of their fight with the attackers. At 10:26, 37 U.S. bombers struck with devastating effect. The Agaki took direct hits, was abandoned, and sank, and the Kaga and Soryu were also destroyed. The Hiryu escaped, launched bombers that damaged the Yorktown, but was itself destroyed from the air at 5 pm The Yorktown was later destroyed by a Japanese submarine. The Americans lost 150 planes and 307 lives; the Japanese, 253 planes and 3,500 lives.

After Midway the Japanese fleet withdrew, never again to regain the offensive.

Going back to June 4, 1942.......

On the Island of Midway at 0230 pilots and air crews were awakened and just fifteen minutes later the units of the First Air Fleet, in preparations for the air attacks that morning against Midway began at 0245 when pilots and air crews aboard the flagship, Akagi, were awakened, At 0400 PBY Catalinas and F4F Wildcats from Midway had already taken off, patrolling the area and the island. By 0430, the first airplanes started lifting off for their first air strike of the day, 108 planes from all four carriers this time. Half an hour earlier, Scouts were launched from the Japanese carriers prior to the attack, but too few: one Kate each from Akagi and Kaga, supplemented only by two catapult planes from Tone and two from Chikuma, and a smaller scout from Haruna. Tone's No.4 catapult plane would not launch in time due to a malfunction and Admiral Nagumo did not send out a replacement as he could have should done.

The strike force, closed on Midway, and appeared shortly before 0600 on the radar at t Midway. Midway's base commander launched all available planes, including the twenty-seven fighters led by Marine Major Floyd B. "Red" Parks, which would jump the enemy bombers on their run in. Six Avenger torpedo-bombers, four Army Marauder medium bombers, eleven Marine Vindicator dive-bombers and sixteen Douglas Dauntlesses, and a total of nineteen B-17 bombers, augmented the rest of the 32 total Catalina’s.

Major Park's pilots and their planes in both numbers and quality were not ready to engage this enemy. They were to early and failed to get into the bombers quickly, owing to the escorting Zero fighters. Of the intercepting fighters, 15 were shot down, and the fighters were unable to protect Midway from air attack, which task was now left to the air defense units. Total Japanese losses over Midway and before were around fifteen planes shot down and thirty-two damaged. In exchange, the Japanese, without any planes to bomb, hit the facilities on Sand and Easter Island, and left both islands on fire, having destroyed fuel tanks, the hospital, storehouses, and seaplane facilities.

Even before the Japanese planes attacked Midway, Nagumo's carrier lost their most important defense when Lt. Howard Ady, piloting a PBY Catalina spotted them. Ady immediately broadcast the sighting report, which was received at 0553 by USS Enterprise, Yorktown, and Intelligence back at Pearl Harbor.

US flattops waited on. But Nagumo's carriers would see their very first action. On Midway Lt. Langdon K. Fieberling led six VT-8 Avengers, re-routed to Midway when they had been unable to catch up with their mother ship, the Hornet, Midway's planes took off with orders to attack the enemy carriers along with four B-26 Marauder bombers They flew into the fray of AA and Japanese Fighters as the first US attack group. And above them, old Vindicator dive-bombers, SDB Dauntlesses, and B-17 level bombers approached for their attacks.

Fieberling's planes attacked first at 0700, but there was no way around the Zero fighters, much less away through them. Four Avengers fell even before they were able to release their torpedoes. The other planes continued, but three more fell to AA, and the rest, an Avenger and two Marauders, scoring no hits, retired damaged to Midway.

Nagumo, watching the attack from his flagship's bridge, was not impressed with the ability of the of the US pilots, but he felt that they might indeed prove what Lt. Tomonaga Joichi of the Midway strike force had stated: a second attack was necessary.

Unknown to Nagumo, his fate was being sealed. Admiral Spruance, his flagship Enterprise having intercepted the report from Ady, had been steaming toward the enemy to reduce the range. When the Japanese planes left the air space over Midway at around 7 o'clock, quick calculations made it clear that if the US carriers launched immediately, they would probably hit the Japanese carriers with planes loaded on the deck, a most vulnerable condition. Accordingly, both carriers launched their planes between 0700 and 0755, full deckloads of bombers with a fighter escort. Twenty minutes past seven, Spruance ordered the new Rear-Admiral Mitscher to take Hornet and an escort and maneuver independently.

Nagumo's ships underwent more attacks in rapid succession, first Major Loften Henderson's Marine Dauntlesses, then B-17s from the Army, and finally the Vindicators. None scored a single hit, but the more planes attacked, the more convinced was Nagumo that a second strike was needed against Midway. Already at 0715, Nagumo had ordered to arm his ready planes with bombs instead of torpedoes. But by 0730, Tone's No. 4 scout had radioed Nagumo that there were "ten enemy surface ships" in the vicinity. Though worried about the unplanned presence of this force, Nagumo regarded the Midway forces as the main threat and continued the re-arming.

Nagumo was greatly hampered by the incapable crew of Tone No.4, which took an hour to find out what it had really sighted, the Yorktown group. Only by 0820 did the plane inform Nagumo that the force included "what appears to be a carrier". Nagumo now had to worry but didn't for too long, and soon ordered armament changed back to torpedoes. Only half of the Japanese planes were affected, for only half of them had been loaded with bombs after the first of Nagumo's rearm orders had been given. Due to the time pressure, however, bombs were not being properly stored. The Japanese carriers slowly became floating, unprotected arsenals.

By 0830, the final Midway-based attack against Nagumo's forces had been made, and a mere nine minutes later, Lt. Tomonaga's Midway group arrived overhead and commenced landing. Though interrupted once by a false report of US torpedo planes, Nagumo successfully landed Tomonaga's group, and turned his forces toward the enemy by 0917. Only a minute later, however, Nagumo saw himself faced once again with enemy torpedo planes .

It was VT-8 from Hornet, under the command of Lt.Cmdr. John C. Waldron. His planes were old, slow, and sluggish TBD Devastators, once the finest plane in the fleet ,but after seven years it had become a deathtrap., Waldron had trained his pilots to the last - and, before the battle, suggested to them that they should write a letter to their families. This brave but hopelessly outnumbered force approached Admiral Nagumo's carriers. Zeros were soon between them, and no single plane survived the massacre, as the Devastators approached in the "low and slow" manner necessary for them to conduct a successful attack, an approach forced upon the men by their torpedo load, the Mk13. Only one of the pilots, Ensign George Gay, survived, and was picked up alive by a PBY the next day.

The Yorktown wounded and sinking at the Battle of Midway

USS YORKTOWN CA 5 AT

THE BATTLE OF MIDWAY

During the great air battle of 4 June, Hammann screened Yorktown, helping to shoot down many of the attacking aircraft. But the carrier took two torpedo hits and, listing heavily, was abandoned that afternoon. Hammann again picked up survivors in the water, including Yorktowns skipper, Captain Buckmaster, and transferred them to the larger ships. Next morning, however, efforts were mounted to save the stricken carrier, a skeleton crew returned on board, and attempts were made to tow her to safety. Hammann came alongside 6 June to transfer a damage control party. The destroyer then lay alongside, providing hose and water for fire fighting, power, and other services while tied up next to Yorktown.

The salvage party was making excellent progress when the protective screen was penetrated by a Japanese submarine after noon on 6 June. Four torpedoes were loosed two missed, one passed under Hammann and hit Yorktown, and the fourth hit the destroyer amidships, breaking her back.

Sailors on Yorktown watch the USS Hammann break into and sink into the ocean with many crewmen trapped below.

ENS George H. Gay, with his gunner, Robert K. Huntington, ARM3c, climbing into the rear cockpit, spotted first for takeoff from Torpedo Eight on U.S.S. Hornet on the morning of June 4, 1942, is visited during a delay by ENS Ulvert M. "Whitey" Moore who was spotted behind him. They joked about never having launched with a torpedo slung under their aircraft, and had never even seen it done. Moore said "You test the weight and I'll test the wind," to which Gay responded, "I'll do my best, buddy, if I go into the drink she's too heavy so you ask for more speed to get more wind over the deck." With a grin and a thumbs up, Moore returned to his TBD, and soon they were launched.

America owes a great debt to those brave men in the Battle of Midway.Thank you seems so small, but it is said with all our hearts.

[Billie]

I will representing the Coast Guard on the radio, the phone and at the front desk of the base. Know that I assume this duty with the same passion and love that I have for our country.

You make us proud, Brian. Good job, and thank you so much for your dedication, loyalty, and service to your country and your friends.

Go, Tonk! :)

[Iowa Granny]

Beautiful Flowers, Tonk! Thanx so much,,,, tomorrow it will be time for me to stop and smell them!

Thanx, too, for your good wishes for the "Good Guy". I've worked my butt off for him. He was 4 points behind in the last poll. I'll be working the phones really hard today.

"Granny Hugs" to you on your first day out 'Solo'.

[WVNan]

Unusual for me, but dropped by to say, "Good morning love", then I'm off to work.

Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.Isaiah 53:4

[Billie]

Beautiful flowers - think I'll set them on the desk beside me so I can smell them while I type. :)

[SAMWolf]

Lieutenant George H. Gay, Jr., USNR, (1917-1994)

George H. Gay, Jr. was born in Waco, Texas, on 8 March 1917. He entered the Navy in 1941. After completing flight training and receiving his commission in September 1941, Ensign Gay was assigned to Torpedo Squadron Eight (VT-8). On 4 June 1942, while operating from USS Hornet (CV-8) during the Battle of Midway, his squadron was wiped out while making an unsupported torpedo attack on the Japanese carrier force. Gay was the only survivor of the thirty pilots and radiomen in that attack. While swimming after his plane went down, he observed the dive bombing attack that destroyed three of the four Japanese carriers present.

Ensign Gay was rescued by a seaplane the following day. After recovering from his injuries, he served in Torpedo Squadron Eleven (VT-11) during the Guadalcanal Campaign, and was later a flight instructor. He was also active making public appearances in support of the war effort. Following the end of World War II, he remained in the Naval Reserve into the 1950s and was a pilot with Trans-World Airlines for thirty years. George Gay died on 21 October 1994.

For an Oral History of Ensign Gay's and Torpedo 8's role in the Battle of Miday,

click on this link ==>Battle of Midway - Oral History

[SAMWolf]

Morning WVNan.

Didn't know you were a morning person, did you. Canteen does that to people, makes em change old habits.

[Jen]

Good morning Sam! So you won the bet! hehehehe Why does that not surprise me, you Bad Boy?!? Have a good day, Jen

[SassyMom]

Congrats on winning the bet......I think that is a good thing. :) Just hang in there!

[Diver Dave]

Congratulations Tonk. Give 'em hell.

[SAMWolf]

Arnie says, I hurt your feelings last night. If I did and you want to use your 2x4 to get even,

My Mother-In-Law made me do it,

I'll kindly provide an address where you can reach her if you'd like.

[WVNan]

Yeah, and you know how late I was up last night.

[kayak]

Congratulations, Tonk!

And thank you!!!!!!!!

[SAMWolf]

Thanks. I could use to $20 too

I didn't know whether to go back and read all of yesterdays thread or try and get some posts in this morning. Finally figured I'd post today.

Looks like the IL's have settled into the routine, 10pm bed time. So that's probably going to be my time limit, give or take 30 minutes.

I'll being doing hit and post for 3 weeks, I still have other things I want to do so I'm forced to split my Canteen time even thinner.

At least the first hour or 2 at work I can get some time in.It's gonna be a loooooooooong 3 weeks.

[SassyMom]

Hey Sam, I heard a rumor that your ils were planning on moving in with you. Is there any truth to that rumor?????? LOL

I'M JUST KIDDING, PUT DOWN THE 2X4!!!!!!!!!

[SAMWolf]

With it's dive flaps open, an SBD Dauntless dives toward the Japanese carrier Akagi, which is already burning from other hits during the Battle of Midway

Viewed from overhead, an SBD Dauntless dive bomber attacks the Japanese carrier Soryu, while another SBD pulls out of it's dive after scoring a hit with its bomb

[Diver Dave]

Cool Theme today Bunny.

Salute and prayers to our Armed Forces at home and abroad, past and present.

[Billie]

God Bless America

[Diver Dave]

Mornin' Billie. I think I can relate to Arnold. :^)

[COB1]

"Thank you seems so small, but it is said with all our hearts."

I've been a WW II history buff for a long time, Snow Bunny.
Thank you for an excellent article!
The Battle of Midway was a turning point in our whole war effort.
Like you said, those two words seems so small when measured against the sacrifice of the men who fought that battle, but they come straight from the heart.

Tonk, you give us a measuring stick to judge our patriotism.
God bless you, brother, for your continuing service.

Good morning to all, and may God bless you this day.