Second Naval Battle of Guadalcanal: Turning Point in the Pacific War

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But Kondo was running out of power and time. He summoned Kimura and Hashimoto to attack, but Hashimoto was far astern of the westward-moving battle, and Kimura was racing to catch up. The only ships left were Tanaka’s destroyers Oyashio and Kagero, racing down from the north. Kondo swung his own ships on Washington at 24 knots but saw the American coming back, right for him and Tanaka’s transports. Cautious and timid, worn down from the loss of his battleship, Kondo then pulled back to cover the transports and made smoke.

On Washington, Lee watched the gray smoke mass arise ahead. He figured nothing could be gained from attacking the transports now. In any case, he had delayed the Japanese so long that the transports would have to arrive by daylight, when American air power could savage them. He had one ship left. Best not to push his incredible luck any further. He ordered Washington to withdraw.

The ship turned 180 degrees to starboard at 26 knots and raced toward more Japanese destroyers–Kagero and Oyashio to starboard and Kimura’s ships to port. The Japanese had poor firing positions, but they launched torpedoes anyway. One exploded, sending up a 200-foot-high water mushroom just behind Washington.

To the north, Kondo decided he had had enough. He ordered a general disengagement to the north.

Kirishima, however, was still afloat. Like Hiei the previous day, her boilers and engines still worked, but seawater had sloshed into her steering machinery compartments. The rudder was jammed at 10 degrees starboard.

Captain Sanji Iwabuchi fought to save Kirishima, but the flooding defied control. Fire ripped through the magazines. Iwabuchi flooded them, but that only worsened things. Orders to evacuate the engine room came too late, and the firemen were stranded there. Nagara tried to tow the big ship home.

It was a familiar situation for the cruiser. The last time Nagara had been required to tow an ailing flagship had been at Midway, when she tried to tow the damaged carrier Akagi, which sank anyway. Now Kirishima limped behind Nagara, but the dreadnought kept listing to starboard. Iwabuchi summoned the crew to the bow for what was now becoming a familiar ritual in the Imperial Japanese Navy, transferring the emperor’s portrait, in this case to destroyer Asagumo. At 3:25 a.m., Kirishima sank several miles northwest of Savo Island, the second battleship Japan had lost in two days and the first enemy ship sunk by an American battleship since the Spanish-American War. Kirishima’s final explosions were watched with great interest by a horde of shipwrecked Preston and Walke sailors, still awaiting rescue.

Another Japanese victim was dying nearby, the destroyer Ayanami. Forty of the destroyer’s crew had been killed, and most of Ayanami’s remaining crew boarded Uranami, but 30 of them, including Ayanami’s captain, took a boat to Guadalcanal. Ayanami sank sometime after 2 a.m. after two explosions.

Another destroyer was ailing, too–the American Benham, which was staggering home. Benham’s hull was badly fractured. Her crew lightened the ship forward and tried to repair the damage. At 3 a.m., her skipper, Lt. Cdr. John B. Taylor, evacuated the ship’s forward half to reduce strain on the keel. Taylor radioed his situation to Lee.

Lee ordered Benham and her escort, Gwin, to Espirito Santo, but gave Taylor permission to act as to abandoning Benham. All morning Taylor nursed his ship toward home, but by midafternoon, it was too much. Gwin evacuated Benham and tried to sink her–an attempt that only served to demonstrate the weakness of the American Mark XV torpedo. One exploded prematurely, the second missed ahead, the third ran erratically. Gwin shelled Benham until a 5-inch round hit Benham’s magazines at 7:35 p.m. and sank her.

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Tags: 20th - 21st Century, Historical Conflicts, Naval Battles, World War II

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