Just 2 hours steaming north of Leyte Gulf.

October 25th, 1944 0716: The Order comes: Small Boys Launch Torpedo Attack - Rear Admiral C. A. F. Sprague

American Forces:

Destroyers Heermann, Hoel, and Johnson
Destroyer Escort Samuel B. Roberts, Raymond, Butler, and Dennis

Japanese Forces:
4 Battleships
8 Cruisers
11 Destroyers

Johnson opens the ball at 0710 anticipating Sprague's orders.

Weaving to avoid shells, and steering towards splashes, the Johnston approached the Japanese heavy cruiser Kumano for a torpedo run. When Johnston was 10 miles from Kumano, her 5-inch guns rained shells on Kumano's bridge and deck (where they could do some damage - the shells would simply bounce off the enemy ship's armored hull). Johnston closed to within torpedo range and fired a salvo, which blew the bow off the cruiser squadron flagship Kumano and also took the cruiser Suzuya out of the fight as she stopped to assist.

From seven miles away, the battleship Kongo sent a 14 inch shell through the Johnston's deck and engine room. Johnston's speed was cut in half to only 14 knots, while the aft gun turrets lost all electrical power. Then three 6-inch shells, possibly from Yamato's secondary batteries, struck Johnston's bridge, killing many and wounding Comdr. Evans. The bridge was abandoned and Evans steered the ship from the aft steering column. Evans nursed his ship back towards the fleet, when he saw the other destroyers attacking as well. Emboldened by the Johnston's attack, Sprague sent the rest of Taffy 3's destroyers on the assault. Even in her heavily damaged state, damage-control teams restored power to 2 of the 3 aft turrets, and Evans turned the Johnston around and reentered the fight.

The other destroyers attacked the Japanese line with suicidal determination, drawing fire and scattering the Japanese formations as ships turned to avoid torpedoes. The powerful Yamato found herself between two torpedoes fired from the destroyer Heermann which were on parallel courses, and for ten minutes, she headed away from the action, unable to turn back for fear of being hit. Heermann, meanwhile, closed with the other Japanese battleships, advancing so close to her huge targets that they could not fire for either inability to depress their main guns enough or fear of hitting their own men and ships.

The Hoel loses her port engine; she is steered manually; her decks are a holocause of blood and wreckage; fire control and power are out; No. 3 gun is wreathed in hot steam from broken pipes; No. 5 gun frozen from a near miss; the barrel of No. 4 gun blown off.  No's 1 and 2 guns continue to fire.  She sinks at 08:40 holed by scores of major caliber shells.

The Heermann, hit numerous times, makes a wild escape; carrying 6 dead and many wounded back to the fleet.  The escort destroyers Raymond and Butler expend all of their ammo and torpedoes but survive intact.  Dennis has all of her guns knocked out but survives to rescue 435 survivors from the bombed St. Lo.

At 07:35, the even smaller destroyer escort Samuel B. Roberts turned and headed toward the battle. On the way, the Roberts passed by the mangled Johnston and saw an inspirational sight in the person of Comdr. Evans standing on the Johnston's stern, his left hand wrapped in a bandage, saluting the captain of the Roberts. With only 2 5-inch guns, one fore and aft, and just 3 Mark-15 torpedoes, her crew lacked the weapons and training in tactics to take on the much larger attackers. Still, she charged in to attack the heavy cruiser Chokai. With smoke as cover, the Roberts steamed to within two and a half miles of Chokai, coming under fire of her two forward 8-inch turrets. But Roberts was so close that the shells passed overhead. Once in torpedo range, Roberts' 3 torpedo salvo struck the cruiser. Following this Roberts dueled with the Japanese ships for an hour, firing over 600 5-inch shells, and raking the upper works with 40 mm Bofors and 20 mm anti-aircraft guns while maneuvering at close range. At 08:51, the Japanese finally landed two hits, the second which destroyed the aft gun turret. With her remaining 5-inch gun, she set the bridge of the cruiser Chikuma afire and destroyed the number 3 gun turret, before being pierced again by three 14 inch shells from the Kongo.

But the crew of No. 2 gun continue to load, ram, aim and fire by hand.  Without compressed air to clear the bore of the bits of burning fragments from the previous charge, the powder bags might cook off.  They fire six rounds by hand.  Six rounds that destroy the bridge of a Japanese cruiser so close it can be hit by men forced to manually aim the cannon.  The seventh cooks off and instantly kills most of the gun crew.  The gun captain, his body ripped nearly in half, holding a 54lb shell in his arms; his dying words plead for help to load the gun.  With a 40-foot hole in her side, the Roberts took on water, and at 09:35, the order was given to abandon ship, sinking 30 minutes later with 89 of her crew.  The gun captain had a fast frigate named in his honor, as did the Captain who survived 50 hours in the water with his crew.  The latest in the line of the Roberts guards the fleet today.

Now two hours into the attack, Comdr. Evans aboard the damaged Johnston spotted a line of four destroyers led by the light cruiser Yahagi making a torpedo attack on the fleeing carriers and moved to intercept. Johnston poured fire on the attacking group, forcing them to prematurely fire their torpedoes, missing the carriers. Their gunfire then turned to the weaving Johnston. At 09:10 the Japanese scored a direct hit on one of the forward turrets, knocking it out and setting off many 5-inch shells that were stored in the turret, and her damaged engines stopped, leaving her dead in the water. The Japanese destroyers closed in on the sitting target, and the Johnston was hit so many times that one survivor recalled "they couldn't patch holes fast enough to keep her afloat." At 09:45 (2 hours and 45 minutes into the battle), Comdr. Evans finally gave the order to abandon ship. The Johnston sank 25 minutes later with 186 of her crew. Commander Evans abandoned ship with his crew, but was never seen again. He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.

Meanwhile, Sprague had ordered all three Taffy groups to launch their planes with whatever they had, even if they were machine guns or depth charges. Even after many aircraft expended their ammunition they made dry runs to threaten and distract Japanese warships and their gunners. Instead of the Japanese rolling over the tiny carriers of Taffy 3 and it's handful of destroyers, the Americans had turned the battle into a bloody all-out brawl with their attackers.

The carriers of Taffy 3 turned south and fled through shellfire. The armor-piercing shells intended for Halsey's battleships flew right through the thin-skinned escort carriers without triggering their fuses. A switch to High Explosive shells holed, slowed, and sunk the Gambier Bay at the rear, while most of the others were also damaged. Their single stern-mounted five-inch anti-aircraft guns returned fire, even though they were ineffective against surface ships. Yet, the St. Lo scored a devastating hit on the deck mounted torpedo magazine of a cruiser, the only known hit inflicted directly by a gun on an aircraft carrier against an opposing surface vessel.

The Kitkun Bay readys it's planes for an attack on Japanese battleship forces so close that you can see the 14inch gun fire straddling the White Plains in the background.  The planes have been supporting Army forces ashore. There's been no time to arm the planes with anti-shipping bombs...they only have their machine guns and gasoline drop tanks with which to fight.  Other planes dropped anti-sub depth charges ahead of the bows of Japanese ships in the hopes that the sinking charges would do some damage when they exploded.



Just as it seemed the end was near for the Taffy 3 and the other two Taffy groups, at 09:20 Kurita suddenly broke off the fight and, giving the order "all ships, my course north, speed 20", retreated north. Though many of his ships were not even damaged, the air and destroyer attacks had broken up his formations, and he had lost tactical control. The heavy cruisers (Chokai, Kumano, Chikuma) had been sunk, and the ferocity of the determined concentrated sea and air attack had led him to calculate that continuing was not worth further losses.  He was two hours from the soft transports at Leyte.

Kutita couldn't have done much at this stage of the war.  The transports had off-loaded supplies and the troops were secure ashore.  The planes of Taffy 2 and 3 were rearming for a sea-strike out of his reach.  The 6 battleships that were pulled from the mud of Pearl Harbor were waiting for him off Leyte...depleted in ammo from shore bombardment, but with 20 AP rounds remaining for each gun.  It would have been an expensive hit and run raid.

My daughter asked me this weekend why I joined the Navy instead of the Army or Marines.  I was a boy when young men who fought in this battle were still in their late twenties.  The TV show Victory at Sea thrilled me.  I always knew I would join the Navy and fight the big guns.  As it turned out, I joined the Navy and blew things to fuck all.  It was still the Navy.