The Hiei was reportedly the favorite ship of Emperor Showa (Hirohito until his passing when he assumed his Imperial identity for posterity), probably because he had made state visits to Europe on the Hiei during his younger days.
Originally a battle cruiser that was re-built and up-rated to a battleship between the World Wars, the Hiei was shot up heavily by the American anti-aircraft cruiser Atlanta, heavy cruisers San Francisco and Portland, and several destroyers in the bloodbath known as the First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal.
But the smaller American ships lacked the firepower to finish her, except for the 8-inch guns on the Frisco and Portland firing at essentially point blank range, and they had both taken a lot of punishment during the battle, with the Frisco in particularly bad shape - including the deaths of both the American Admiral in charge of the task group and the Frisco's Captain. However, both of these cruisers survived the battle, but the Atlanta wasn't so lucky. Hit accidentally by two full salvos from the San Francisco, she went to the bottom along with several of the American destroyers in the battle.
Unable to steer, the Hiei was unble to clear the area and was still afloat steaming slowly in circles at dawn. She was finished off by American planes from Henderson Field, becoming the first of several Japanese battleships sunk by American sea and air power during the war.
Bob Ballard's expedition had previously located the wreck of the Hiei but was not able to positively indentify the ship because her sister ship, the Kirishima, was sunk in the same general area a couple days later after being pounded to pieces by the USS Washington in the Second Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, and again finished off by aircraft from Henderson Field.
As war graves, all these ships are off limits for anything but external observation.
Was on the USS Hornet when the Japanese torpedoes hit it.
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
Was on the USS Hornet when the Japanese torpedoes hit it.
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
Was on the USS Hornet when the Japanese torpedoes hit it.
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
BBI!!!!!
Kinda want to hear more. A lot more. If you have any ... and don't mind.
Some of those ships are tombs for the crew that.... Â
went down with them. I’d think they’d be left undisturbed. I imagine it’s simply a matter of knowing their final resting place in a historical context.
That's how long the first Hornet was in commission with the US Navy.
And during that time, she lived up to her name by repeatedly stinging Imperial Japan.
The Hornet launched the Dolittle Raid in April, 1942. That clearly demonstrated that the USA was not going to roll over and quit as the Japanese government expected. Although the damage from this raid was very light, it altered the course of the war by turning Japanese internal propaganda to lies and by pushing the Japanese government and military to a more aggressive stance.
This more aggressive stance led to the Battle of Midway, Japan's attempt occupy Midway Island and part of the Aleutian Islands and thereby create the decisive battle that would end the Pacific War on their terms. They got the battle they wanted, but it didn't go the way they thought it would, turning into the worst defeat the Japanese Empire had experienced in over 500 years.
The Hornet played a major role at Midway. Her Torpedo Squadron 8 was almost wiped out, with only one man returning. But the terrible and near total sacrifice of the Torpedo planes from all three US carriers was not in vain. They pulled the Japanese combat air patrols down to the wave tops, so the enemy fighters completely missed the arrival of American dive bombers who promptly sent the big carriers Akagi, Kaga, and Soryu to Davey Jones' Locker. The Hiryu was sunk soon after, eliminating the fourth of the big six carriers that launched the December 7th attack on Pearl Harbor. The effect of this battle was to severely blunt Japanese offensive momentum and begin the near-complete destruction of the Imperial Japanese Navy by tearing the heart out of their world's best carrier strike force.
The Hornet missed the Battle of the Eastern Solomans, the next big carrier fight, but participated in the Battle of Santa Cruz. She was sunk there, but not before American pilots heavily damaged both the light carrier Zuiho and the fleet carrier Shokaku. And although the battle was a tactical victory for the Japanese, it was another strategic loss for them because they were unable to effectively counter the American conquest of their airfield on Guadalcanal, now called Henderson Field after the fallen leader of the US Marine Midway-based dive bombers in the big battle.
It would be over a year before the American and Japanese carrier forces met again, but the next time would be the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot, the death blow for Japanese naval aviation. And a new Hornet, a new Lexington, and a new Yorktown would carry the war to the Japanese home islands. Japanese surrender on the Missouri was coming.
were sister ships, with the Yorktown and Big E built first and the Hornet added later when it became clear to FDR and other American military leaders that war was inevitable.
The Yorktown class were the first real fleet carriers built from scratch by the United States, and as such were a stepping stone to the superb Essex class that carried the US to victory in the Pacific. The new Hornet, new Yorktown, and new Lexington were all Essex class ships, members of the largest class of fleet carriers ever constructed.
The Yorktown class incorporated lessons learned from the old Langley (CV-1) and the massive for the time Lexington (CV-2) and Saratoga (CV-3), all conversions of hulls originally intended for something else, and especially from the Ranger (CV-4) a smaller, slower carrier that was actually the first US carrier built from the keel up. But the Ranger had a whole lot of design mistakes that were rectified in the Yorktown class, making the Yorktowns far better - and more powerful - ships. Those design mistakes consigned the Ranger to use in the Atlantic Ocean for almost the entire war, and kept her out of combat when she did finally make it to the Pacific war.
As Bill2 indicates, the Big E carried the flag from beginning to end, along with Big Sara, the only other pre-war American carrier to survive combat in the Pacific. The Big E and the Hornet fought side by side at the Battle of Santa Cruz where the Hornet was lost, and the Enterprise emerged from the war with the most battle stars of any American ship.
My father was on the U.S.S. Princeton, a light aircraft carrier, Â
when she was sunk in the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October of '44. So this news and discussion were especially interesting to me. Like the Hornet, the Princeton refused to go down, so we eventually had to torpedo it.
So thanks, guys, for the interesting news and discussion.
After the battle of Santa Cruz the Americans one fleet carrier Â
Was on the USS Hornet when the Japanese torpedoes hit it.
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
BBI!!!!!
Kinda want to hear more. A lot more. If you have any ... and don't mind.
I wish I could remember more, unfortunately gramps pass away in the 80's. But he did die a very happy and proud man knowing that he was part of the greatest generation and that he had played a part in defeating the most evil force the world had ever seen.
The Big E was the first carrier and flight crews to fight at night and to fight long stretches continuously sending off and taking on planes. The operational details and intensity of every crew member was required to fight non stop for days and nights with hundreds of sorties of their own and taking on other planes that could not land on damaged carriers.
E was the source of the dive bombers that took out the first two Japanese carriers at Midway, later took out the third and the next day took out a heavy cruiser.
Fought at the battles of Leyte Gulf, Philippine Sea, Formosa, Saipan, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, The Marianas, Truk, the Solomons, Guadalcanal, the Caroline Islands, the night bombings of the Japanese Inland Sea and some others.
Most interesting, which RedDog indicated, despite being active in the battle of Pearl Harbor and at one time being the only carrier we had ( with a banner which said: Enterprise vs Japan) but the end of the war we had built 2 dozen larger and more sophisticated carriers.
Our position in the world for the last 75 years was earned in the monster total national effort to win those 4 years.
During WW II, the US completed 22 Essex class carriers, with all but one commissioned prior to the end of the war, plus another one, the Reprisal, that was never completed but was launched and used as a test vessel. A few more were delivered after the war.
And we also built 9 of the Independence class light carriers, including the Princeton referenced above, which were built on Cleveland class light cruiser hulls in an effort to get more carrier decks into the war quickly.
Plus we also built 3 of the even bigger Midway class carriers but none were commissioned in time to see action. And there were literally dozens of escort carriers in addition to these bigger guys.
But this is actually only the tip of the iceberg.
At the end of the war, the US Navy was bigger than ALL the other navies of the entire world COMBINED. (The Royal Navy was next, followed by the Canadian Navy who grew from almost nothing to do an absolutely superb job of running the Atlantic convoy system during the war.)
The US Navy was the only navy in the world with sufficient auxiliaries (oilers, stores ships, ammunition ships, repair ships, floating dry docks, etc.) to support major combat fleet operations for an extended period of time far from home ports. And it was also the only navy in the world with sufficient landing ships and landing craft with supporting fire power to conduct large scale amphibious assaults.
But what has always astounded me is the sheer number of ships that we did NOT complete, or outright cancelled. This roster of ships never completed is larger and would have been far more powerful than the entire pre-war Japanese navy, then the third largest and arguably the most powerful in the world. Our cancelled carriers included several more Essex and Midway class ships plus many Commencement Bay class escort carriers.
Most people aren't aware of it, but there were two more uncompleted sisters to the four Missouri class battleships, another uncompleted Alaska class large cruiser (with three more never laid down) that was almost the size and power of a pre-war battleship, plus dozens of heavy and light cruisers, and that's just the start.
The five monster Montana class battleships (think a Missouri with another 20,000 tons displacement and a fourth triple 16-inch 50-caliber gun turret) that would have outgunned the Japanese Yamatos were never laid down because the carriers had become the capital ships of the war. And dozens more destroyers and dozens more submarines were cancelled along with more Terror class large minelayers and many other small or semi-combat ships. And the US was prepared to build 1,000 Destroyer Escorts (!!!) but we only actually built about 400 of the convoy guards.
was on a PT boat in the South Pacific (the Solomon Islands specifically) during the war and I know a decent amount about that aspect of the war but I need to learn more about some of the other great naval battles. Thanks for this thread an the info, definitely inspired some upcoming reading/
Our cargo ships to Europe were called Liberty Ships. Starting in 1941, we made 2700 of them in shipyards all over our area..Brooklyn, Kearny, Philly, Bayone, Jersey City.
Although by the end of the war we standardized on a larger Victory ship, we got so good at building Liberty ships we could turn out the 10000 ton holding cargo area, 450 foot ships every 11 hours.
We made the Elco PT Boats every 60 hours.
We made 88000 tanks in four years. We made 32000 military trucks and 2.7M machine guns and 11 million rifles. We made an enormous number of combat boots for all of the Allies. We fed the Allies. Our coal and oil and gas and steel and aluminum production was larger than the next five countries combined.
Our cargo ships to Europe were called Liberty Ships. Starting in 1941, we made 2700 of them in shipyards all over our area..Brooklyn, Kearny, Philly, Bayone, Jersey City.
Although by the end of the war we standardized on a larger Victory ship, we got so good at building Liberty ships we could turn out the 10000 ton holding cargo area, 450 foot ships every 11 hours.
We made the Elco PT Boats every 60 hours.
We made 88000 tanks in four years. We made 32000 military trucks and 2.7M machine guns and 11 million rifles. We made an enormous number of combat boots for all of the Allies. We fed the Allies. Our coal and oil and gas and steel and aluminum production was larger than the next five countries combined.
We kicked ass in WW2
]
Liberty ships were actually built expecting only one trans-atlantic crossing - the German subs were so deadly thru 1943 that the planners never expected those ships to survive the crossing and return. I believe they were the first mass class of merchant ship to use welded hulls. These hulls would sometimes fracture and crack the ship in half in seconds. Welding allowed cracks to transfer across the plates that riveted hulls would not permit. The builders had to add additional strapping midship to prevent these hull fractures/failures. Great learning platform for a new construction process.
My old man was a Seabee on Okinawa and said he watched the fleet sail past on the way home and it took 3 days to pass. I'm sure this was a bit of an exaggeration by a 19 year old but I can imagine how big the fleet actually was as described by Red Dog and Bill2.
Red Dog, the two uncompleted Iowa Class battleships were Kentucky and Illinois. I believe the bow of the Kentucky was used to repair the Missouri after it had a collision.
Also, the reason the US battleships used 16 inch vs a larger caliber (say 18" like Yamato class) was because the ships were limited to a 108 ft beam to pass through the Panama Canal - the locks are 110 ft wide. The engineers calculated that the 108 ft beam would only allow up to 16 inch rounds to be fired if all 9 guns fired a broadside simultaneously. Anything over might cause the ship to capsize. (Can you imagine the power generated to capsize a 57,000 ton ship?)
In my mind, the Iowa Class battleships are the most beautiful ships ever built (Iowa, New Jersey, Missouri and Wisconsin). Just classic sweeping lines and proportions.
Only ship I can think of that was perhaps more visually balanced and crafted was the Bismarck
Not a bad choice. Beautiful profile, but don't like the portholes in the hull.
Funny enough, the Prinz Eugen looks so similar in design to the Bismark that Hood and Prince of Wales actually opened fire on the Eugen first thinking it was Bismark. Ooops....
but the Italians had some different and interesting looking battleships in the mid century time frame.
also...the Iowa class had some firesystems and radar advances at the time that made them quite deadly if they had been called upon more often ( or they were introduced earlier in the War).
I was running this story by a couple History guys at my school - they loved it (the historical side of things) especially the details you had to add about the US Navy. There are some crazy stories about some ships that were lost, not just during WW2, but afterwards as well.
They all had the same question though - what does Paul Allen do with these ships once he discovers/reclaims them. Technically, they belong to him since they were discovered in international waters - at least that's what they all thought.
I was curious if you knew, because we couldn't find any information on it.
except that IIRC, the Kentucky's bow was used to repair the Wisconsin. (I am too lazy to look it up.)
And Bill2 continues to nail it with his economic and production information. The incredible production of cargo ships, many from Kaiser Shipbuilding, was another key to victory.
On the 16-inch 50-caliber guns on the Iowas, what most people do not know is that most of the larger guns in the US Navy in WW II, starting with the 8-inchers on the heavy cruisers, fired "Super heavy" shells that were anywhere from 10 to 40% heavier than same size shells used in any other navy. Even our 6-inch shells on the light cruisers were heavier than those used by other navies, but they were not part of this program.
These heavier shells were fired at a lower muzzle velocity than other navies used, and that did hurt their range a little bit (which turned out to be a good trade-off) but that did improve barrel life. (These big guns wear out in a few hundred shots so any improvement is helpful.) Some say it also improved accuracy, but I think that is questionable. More likely the accuracy came from superior American gun mounts and superior American rader-directed gunnery. The REAL advantage of these super heavy shells was that they had superior hitting power. Under many circumstances they hit like the next size gun up.
This was one of the factors that made the Japanese very leery of our New Orleans class heavy cruisers with their 9 8-inch guns, the last major class we built before hostilities began. This is part of why the San Francisco was able to duke it out with a Japanese battleship mounting 14-inch guns. Besides, we didn't have any other choice on that awful night anyway.
Our 12-inch gun on the Alaska class large cruisers could hit like a 14-inch battleship gun in other navies. These large (27,000 ton standard displacement - TWICE the size of other cruisers) ships with their new design 12-inch guns were intended to easily kill ANY heavy cruiser afloat. But they never fired in battle against a significant surface opponent.
The American 16-inch 50-caliber (the length of the barrel in multiples of the bore diameter) gun on the ten fast battleships (and two uncompleted Iowas) had comparable hitting power to the Japanese 18.1-inch gun under most circumstances. For some strange reason, the Japanese 18.1-inch shell was maximized to do damage when it hit BELOW the water line, a difficult feat to accomplish, and our gun didn't match them in that situation. But other than that, our 16-incher hit as hard as their 18.1-inch gun.
-SS John W. Brown - Docked in Baltimore Harbor, not too far from where I live. I pass it by on the way to the I-95 on-ramp.
It's still operational and hosts tours and cruises periodically.
-SS Jeremiah O'Brien - Docked in San Francisco, also operational and used as a museum ship.
-SS Arthur M. Huddell - Given to Greece, who renamed it and use it as a museum ship.
-SS Albert M. Boe - The last Liberty Ship built had perhaps the most interesting fate. It was sold to a fishing company and is currently used as a stationary floating cannery in Alaska.
We should not fail to remember the war in the Atlantic was also going on. In general, the older WW1 commissions and the dreadnought/limited size fleets of the post Treaty of Versailles between the wars carried out these operations.
Besides the fascinating escapades of the Royal Navy in the North Sea and clearing out or neutralzing the superior "Pocket Battleships" ( Like the Lutzow, the Admiral Hipper, the Graf Spee)of the Germans, they also took the hit ( on The Hood)from the Bismarck and went batshit to run that marvel of engineering ( But badly led by a near panic once the Brits started chasing)- our own WW1 battleships did some great work as well.
If you ever get to Houston, go see the USS Texas. It is not the oldest battleship still in existence ( the Mikasa is a beautiful ship commissioned in the 1880-1890 period and as the Japanese flag ship fought with distinction in the Russo Japanese War). The Texas was built in 1912 and commissioned in 1914 so was completely outclassed by the WW2 era Iowa class and for that matter by the WW2 heavy crusiers like the San Francisco which Red Dog cited above.
It was often stationed and repaired in the Brooklyn and NY Navy Yards. In fact he entrance into WW1 was delayed as she went to the North Seas by heading north up the East River and through LI Sound when she ran aground off Block Island and had to be towed back for extensive hull repairs and a new Captain
Uss Texas was a sister ship class to the USS Arizona and the USS New York. It fought at Scapa Flow in WW1 and then became the flagship of the US Navy in the Atlantic between the wars.
She saw the growing advances in warfare as the first ship to have anti-aircraft guns, the first US ship to control gunfire with directors and range-keepers (analog forerunners of today's computers), the first US battleship to launch an aircraft and was one of the first to receive radar. She was also the first ship to show movies to the crew during voyages and in an attempt to keep more sailors on the ship when in port.
We dont think of the Navy contributions to the North Africa operations, the Sicily and Italian landings and D Day.
The USS Texas was a monster contributor for the Normandy Landings ( My memory of the details may be wrong on this section). She was the actual beginning of the bombardment on June 6th at 3am of off Omaha Beach. Getting closer and closer as the tide allowed she fired point blank at Point de Neuf and several other key points on Omaha Beach and the fist 15 miles in land. She flooded her Channel side torpedo tubes to lie deeper and at an angle in the water and get elevation into the machine gun nests overlooking Omaha. Starting at 3am on the 6th she fired non stop at a rate unmatched up to that time and during WW2 until she was totally out of ammunition including shooting down several German planes trying to straf our troops stuck on the beach.
The Texas had to go back to England for fuel and ammunition by the night of the 7th and returned the morning of the 8th bombarding blockages and clearing out the German sites behind the beach inland until the troops were beyond the range of her big guns on June 12-15.
She supported the Battle to take Cherbourg and fought non stop despite being straddled and bracketed with German shore battery fire many times and taking 3 direct hits and one shell into her magazines which fortunately did not explode.
Then she sailed directly for the Pacific in time to do the same at Iwo Jima. She was support for a few more landings and then at Okinawa her role was one of the prime bombardment ships and anti aircraft cover taking out 3 kamakzee planes and shooting down several others. She fought at Okinawa for 60 straight days and nights without leaving ( by then our logistical might could re-supply the forward ships on a constant basis).
She then went to Leyte Gulf. When the war ended she took troops back to California.
Its not even a story or record we are conscious of anymore.
We would not remember except she was taken in ( and not always well maintained) and sits at the San Jacinto Memorial in the Houston Ship Channel surrounded by Chemical Plants as far as the eye can see.
Now just a footnote in our history. But her sailors were monsters when the moment came.
After the war they interviewed the head of the Japanese War Council and he said:
" Many of our children and grandchildren went to school in California and your Ivy League Schools. All they saw was soft lives of leisure. We were positive that once we hit you to show our determination you would leave and desire peace and to play tennis. We forgot that your war would be fought by savage people from places we did not know of like Brooklyn and Alabama"
Please remember that we are not the worlds reserve currency because we were smart and people liked us
They do...stuff.
The Hiei was reportedly the favorite ship of Emperor Showa (Hirohito until his passing when he assumed his Imperial identity for posterity), probably because he had made state visits to Europe on the Hiei during his younger days.
Originally a battle cruiser that was re-built and up-rated to a battleship between the World Wars, the Hiei was shot up heavily by the American anti-aircraft cruiser Atlanta, heavy cruisers San Francisco and Portland, and several destroyers in the bloodbath known as the First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal.
But the smaller American ships lacked the firepower to finish her, except for the 8-inch guns on the Frisco and Portland firing at essentially point blank range, and they had both taken a lot of punishment during the battle, with the Frisco in particularly bad shape - including the deaths of both the American Admiral in charge of the task group and the Frisco's Captain. However, both of these cruisers survived the battle, but the Atlanta wasn't so lucky. Hit accidentally by two full salvos from the San Francisco, she went to the bottom along with several of the American destroyers in the battle.
Unable to steer, the Hiei was unble to clear the area and was still afloat steaming slowly in circles at dawn. She was finished off by American planes from Henderson Field, becoming the first of several Japanese battleships sunk by American sea and air power during the war.
Bob Ballard's expedition had previously located the wreck of the Hiei but was not able to positively indentify the ship because her sister ship, the Kirishima, was sunk in the same general area a couple days later after being pounded to pieces by the USS Washington in the Second Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, and again finished off by aircraft from Henderson Field.
As war graves, all these ships are off limits for anything but external observation.
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
Thanks for sharing. God bless your grandfather.
So now what?
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
BBI!!!!!
Kinda want to hear more. A lot more. If you have any ... and don't mind.
And during that time, she lived up to her name by repeatedly stinging Imperial Japan.
The Hornet launched the Dolittle Raid in April, 1942. That clearly demonstrated that the USA was not going to roll over and quit as the Japanese government expected. Although the damage from this raid was very light, it altered the course of the war by turning Japanese internal propaganda to lies and by pushing the Japanese government and military to a more aggressive stance.
This more aggressive stance led to the Battle of Midway, Japan's attempt occupy Midway Island and part of the Aleutian Islands and thereby create the decisive battle that would end the Pacific War on their terms. They got the battle they wanted, but it didn't go the way they thought it would, turning into the worst defeat the Japanese Empire had experienced in over 500 years.
The Hornet played a major role at Midway. Her Torpedo Squadron 8 was almost wiped out, with only one man returning. But the terrible and near total sacrifice of the Torpedo planes from all three US carriers was not in vain. They pulled the Japanese combat air patrols down to the wave tops, so the enemy fighters completely missed the arrival of American dive bombers who promptly sent the big carriers Akagi, Kaga, and Soryu to Davey Jones' Locker. The Hiryu was sunk soon after, eliminating the fourth of the big six carriers that launched the December 7th attack on Pearl Harbor. The effect of this battle was to severely blunt Japanese offensive momentum and begin the near-complete destruction of the Imperial Japanese Navy by tearing the heart out of their world's best carrier strike force.
The Hornet missed the Battle of the Eastern Solomans, the next big carrier fight, but participated in the Battle of Santa Cruz. She was sunk there, but not before American pilots heavily damaged both the light carrier Zuiho and the fleet carrier Shokaku. And although the battle was a tactical victory for the Japanese, it was another strategic loss for them because they were unable to effectively counter the American conquest of their airfield on Guadalcanal, now called Henderson Field after the fallen leader of the US Marine Midway-based dive bombers in the big battle.
It would be over a year before the American and Japanese carrier forces met again, but the next time would be the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot, the death blow for Japanese naval aviation. And a new Hornet, a new Lexington, and a new Yorktown would carry the war to the Japanese home islands. Japanese surrender on the Missouri was coming.
Thanks
Was there from Pearl Harbor to the end...20 battles and often central to those battles.
The Yorktown class were the first real fleet carriers built from scratch by the United States, and as such were a stepping stone to the superb Essex class that carried the US to victory in the Pacific. The new Hornet, new Yorktown, and new Lexington were all Essex class ships, members of the largest class of fleet carriers ever constructed.
The Yorktown class incorporated lessons learned from the old Langley (CV-1) and the massive for the time Lexington (CV-2) and Saratoga (CV-3), all conversions of hulls originally intended for something else, and especially from the Ranger (CV-4) a smaller, slower carrier that was actually the first US carrier built from the keel up. But the Ranger had a whole lot of design mistakes that were rectified in the Yorktown class, making the Yorktowns far better - and more powerful - ships. Those design mistakes consigned the Ranger to use in the Atlantic Ocean for almost the entire war, and kept her out of combat when she did finally make it to the Pacific war.
As Bill2 indicates, the Big E carried the flag from beginning to end, along with Big Sara, the only other pre-war American carrier to survive combat in the Pacific. The Big E and the Hornet fought side by side at the Battle of Santa Cruz where the Hornet was lost, and the Enterprise emerged from the war with the most battle stars of any American ship.
So thanks, guys, for the interesting news and discussion.
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Quote:
Was on the USS Hornet when the Japanese torpedoes hit it.
He said the fire was so bad they had to abandon ship where they floated 3 days in the Pacific waiting to be rescued. He says the US Navy had to sink it because the Japes were trying to tow it away
BBI!!!!!
Kinda want to hear more. A lot more. If you have any ... and don't mind.
E was the source of the dive bombers that took out the first two Japanese carriers at Midway, later took out the third and the next day took out a heavy cruiser.
Fought at the battles of Leyte Gulf, Philippine Sea, Formosa, Saipan, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, The Marianas, Truk, the Solomons, Guadalcanal, the Caroline Islands, the night bombings of the Japanese Inland Sea and some others.
Most interesting, which RedDog indicated, despite being active in the battle of Pearl Harbor and at one time being the only carrier we had ( with a banner which said: Enterprise vs Japan) but the end of the war we had built 2 dozen larger and more sophisticated carriers.
Our position in the world for the last 75 years was earned in the monster total national effort to win those 4 years.
Incredible national performance
1941: 3600
1942: 18,000
1943: 47,000
1944: 85,000
1945: 96,000
And we also built 9 of the Independence class light carriers, including the Princeton referenced above, which were built on Cleveland class light cruiser hulls in an effort to get more carrier decks into the war quickly.
Plus we also built 3 of the even bigger Midway class carriers but none were commissioned in time to see action. And there were literally dozens of escort carriers in addition to these bigger guys.
But this is actually only the tip of the iceberg.
At the end of the war, the US Navy was bigger than ALL the other navies of the entire world COMBINED. (The Royal Navy was next, followed by the Canadian Navy who grew from almost nothing to do an absolutely superb job of running the Atlantic convoy system during the war.)
The US Navy was the only navy in the world with sufficient auxiliaries (oilers, stores ships, ammunition ships, repair ships, floating dry docks, etc.) to support major combat fleet operations for an extended period of time far from home ports. And it was also the only navy in the world with sufficient landing ships and landing craft with supporting fire power to conduct large scale amphibious assaults.
But what has always astounded me is the sheer number of ships that we did NOT complete, or outright cancelled. This roster of ships never completed is larger and would have been far more powerful than the entire pre-war Japanese navy, then the third largest and arguably the most powerful in the world. Our cancelled carriers included several more Essex and Midway class ships plus many Commencement Bay class escort carriers.
Most people aren't aware of it, but there were two more uncompleted sisters to the four Missouri class battleships, another uncompleted Alaska class large cruiser (with three more never laid down) that was almost the size and power of a pre-war battleship, plus dozens of heavy and light cruisers, and that's just the start.
The five monster Montana class battleships (think a Missouri with another 20,000 tons displacement and a fourth triple 16-inch 50-caliber gun turret) that would have outgunned the Japanese Yamatos were never laid down because the carriers had become the capital ships of the war. And dozens more destroyers and dozens more submarines were cancelled along with more Terror class large minelayers and many other small or semi-combat ships. And the US was prepared to build 1,000 Destroyer Escorts (!!!) but we only actually built about 400 of the convoy guards.
Although by the end of the war we standardized on a larger Victory ship, we got so good at building Liberty ships we could turn out the 10000 ton holding cargo area, 450 foot ships every 11 hours.
We made the Elco PT Boats every 60 hours.
We made 88000 tanks in four years. We made 32000 military trucks and 2.7M machine guns and 11 million rifles. We made an enormous number of combat boots for all of the Allies. We fed the Allies. Our coal and oil and gas and steel and aluminum production was larger than the next five countries combined.
We kicked ass in WW2
Although by the end of the war we standardized on a larger Victory ship, we got so good at building Liberty ships we could turn out the 10000 ton holding cargo area, 450 foot ships every 11 hours.
We made the Elco PT Boats every 60 hours.
We made 88000 tanks in four years. We made 32000 military trucks and 2.7M machine guns and 11 million rifles. We made an enormous number of combat boots for all of the Allies. We fed the Allies. Our coal and oil and gas and steel and aluminum production was larger than the next five countries combined.
We kicked ass in WW2
Liberty ships were actually built expecting only one trans-atlantic crossing - the German subs were so deadly thru 1943 that the planners never expected those ships to survive the crossing and return. I believe they were the first mass class of merchant ship to use welded hulls. These hulls would sometimes fracture and crack the ship in half in seconds. Welding allowed cracks to transfer across the plates that riveted hulls would not permit. The builders had to add additional strapping midship to prevent these hull fractures/failures. Great learning platform for a new construction process.
My old man was a Seabee on Okinawa and said he watched the fleet sail past on the way home and it took 3 days to pass. I'm sure this was a bit of an exaggeration by a 19 year old but I can imagine how big the fleet actually was as described by Red Dog and Bill2.
Red Dog, the two uncompleted Iowa Class battleships were Kentucky and Illinois. I believe the bow of the Kentucky was used to repair the Missouri after it had a collision.
Also, the reason the US battleships used 16 inch vs a larger caliber (say 18" like Yamato class) was because the ships were limited to a 108 ft beam to pass through the Panama Canal - the locks are 110 ft wide. The engineers calculated that the 108 ft beam would only allow up to 16 inch rounds to be fired if all 9 guns fired a broadside simultaneously. Anything over might cause the ship to capsize. (Can you imagine the power generated to capsize a 57,000 ton ship?)
In my mind, the Iowa Class battleships are the most beautiful ships ever built (Iowa, New Jersey, Missouri and Wisconsin). Just classic sweeping lines and proportions.
Only ship I can think of that was perhaps more visually balanced and crafted was the Bismarck
Only ship I can think of that was perhaps more visually balanced and crafted was the Bismarck
Not a bad choice. Beautiful profile, but don't like the portholes in the hull.
Funny enough, the Prinz Eugen looks so similar in design to the Bismark that Hood and Prince of Wales actually opened fire on the Eugen first thinking it was Bismark. Ooops....
also...the Iowa class had some firesystems and radar advances at the time that made them quite deadly if they had been called upon more often ( or they were introduced earlier in the War).
They all had the same question though - what does Paul Allen do with these ships once he discovers/reclaims them. Technically, they belong to him since they were discovered in international waters - at least that's what they all thought.
I was curious if you knew, because we couldn't find any information on it.
Thanks guys!
Good stuff!
And Bill2 continues to nail it with his economic and production information. The incredible production of cargo ships, many from Kaiser Shipbuilding, was another key to victory.
On the 16-inch 50-caliber guns on the Iowas, what most people do not know is that most of the larger guns in the US Navy in WW II, starting with the 8-inchers on the heavy cruisers, fired "Super heavy" shells that were anywhere from 10 to 40% heavier than same size shells used in any other navy. Even our 6-inch shells on the light cruisers were heavier than those used by other navies, but they were not part of this program.
These heavier shells were fired at a lower muzzle velocity than other navies used, and that did hurt their range a little bit (which turned out to be a good trade-off) but that did improve barrel life. (These big guns wear out in a few hundred shots so any improvement is helpful.) Some say it also improved accuracy, but I think that is questionable. More likely the accuracy came from superior American gun mounts and superior American rader-directed gunnery. The REAL advantage of these super heavy shells was that they had superior hitting power. Under many circumstances they hit like the next size gun up.
This was one of the factors that made the Japanese very leery of our New Orleans class heavy cruisers with their 9 8-inch guns, the last major class we built before hostilities began. This is part of why the San Francisco was able to duke it out with a Japanese battleship mounting 14-inch guns. Besides, we didn't have any other choice on that awful night anyway.
Our 12-inch gun on the Alaska class large cruisers could hit like a 14-inch battleship gun in other navies. These large (27,000 ton standard displacement - TWICE the size of other cruisers) ships with their new design 12-inch guns were intended to easily kill ANY heavy cruiser afloat. But they never fired in battle against a significant surface opponent.
The American 16-inch 50-caliber (the length of the barrel in multiples of the bore diameter) gun on the ten fast battleships (and two uncompleted Iowas) had comparable hitting power to the Japanese 18.1-inch gun under most circumstances. For some strange reason, the Japanese 18.1-inch shell was maximized to do damage when it hit BELOW the water line, a difficult feat to accomplish, and our gun didn't match them in that situation. But other than that, our 16-incher hit as hard as their 18.1-inch gun.
-SS John W. Brown - Docked in Baltimore Harbor, not too far from where I live. I pass it by on the way to the I-95 on-ramp.
It's still operational and hosts tours and cruises periodically.
-SS Jeremiah O'Brien - Docked in San Francisco, also operational and used as a museum ship.
-SS Arthur M. Huddell - Given to Greece, who renamed it and use it as a museum ship.
-SS Albert M. Boe - The last Liberty Ship built had perhaps the most interesting fate. It was sold to a fishing company and is currently used as a stationary floating cannery in Alaska.
Besides the fascinating escapades of the Royal Navy in the North Sea and clearing out or neutralzing the superior "Pocket Battleships" ( Like the Lutzow, the Admiral Hipper, the Graf Spee)of the Germans, they also took the hit ( on The Hood)from the Bismarck and went batshit to run that marvel of engineering ( But badly led by a near panic once the Brits started chasing)- our own WW1 battleships did some great work as well.
If you ever get to Houston, go see the USS Texas. It is not the oldest battleship still in existence ( the Mikasa is a beautiful ship commissioned in the 1880-1890 period and as the Japanese flag ship fought with distinction in the Russo Japanese War). The Texas was built in 1912 and commissioned in 1914 so was completely outclassed by the WW2 era Iowa class and for that matter by the WW2 heavy crusiers like the San Francisco which Red Dog cited above.
It was often stationed and repaired in the Brooklyn and NY Navy Yards. In fact he entrance into WW1 was delayed as she went to the North Seas by heading north up the East River and through LI Sound when she ran aground off Block Island and had to be towed back for extensive hull repairs and a new Captain
Uss Texas was a sister ship class to the USS Arizona and the USS New York. It fought at Scapa Flow in WW1 and then became the flagship of the US Navy in the Atlantic between the wars.
She saw the growing advances in warfare as the first ship to have anti-aircraft guns, the first US ship to control gunfire with directors and range-keepers (analog forerunners of today's computers), the first US battleship to launch an aircraft and was one of the first to receive radar. She was also the first ship to show movies to the crew during voyages and in an attempt to keep more sailors on the ship when in port.
We dont think of the Navy contributions to the North Africa operations, the Sicily and Italian landings and D Day.
The USS Texas was a monster contributor for the Normandy Landings ( My memory of the details may be wrong on this section). She was the actual beginning of the bombardment on June 6th at 3am of off Omaha Beach. Getting closer and closer as the tide allowed she fired point blank at Point de Neuf and several other key points on Omaha Beach and the fist 15 miles in land. She flooded her Channel side torpedo tubes to lie deeper and at an angle in the water and get elevation into the machine gun nests overlooking Omaha. Starting at 3am on the 6th she fired non stop at a rate unmatched up to that time and during WW2 until she was totally out of ammunition including shooting down several German planes trying to straf our troops stuck on the beach.
The Texas had to go back to England for fuel and ammunition by the night of the 7th and returned the morning of the 8th bombarding blockages and clearing out the German sites behind the beach inland until the troops were beyond the range of her big guns on June 12-15.
She supported the Battle to take Cherbourg and fought non stop despite being straddled and bracketed with German shore battery fire many times and taking 3 direct hits and one shell into her magazines which fortunately did not explode.
Then she sailed directly for the Pacific in time to do the same at Iwo Jima. She was support for a few more landings and then at Okinawa her role was one of the prime bombardment ships and anti aircraft cover taking out 3 kamakzee planes and shooting down several others. She fought at Okinawa for 60 straight days and nights without leaving ( by then our logistical might could re-supply the forward ships on a constant basis).
She then went to Leyte Gulf. When the war ended she took troops back to California.
Its not even a story or record we are conscious of anymore.
We would not remember except she was taken in ( and not always well maintained) and sits at the San Jacinto Memorial in the Houston Ship Channel surrounded by Chemical Plants as far as the eye can see.
Now just a footnote in our history. But her sailors were monsters when the moment came.
After the war they interviewed the head of the Japanese War Council and he said:
" Many of our children and grandchildren went to school in California and your Ivy League Schools. All they saw was soft lives of leisure. We were positive that once we hit you to show our determination you would leave and desire peace and to play tennis. We forgot that your war would be fought by savage people from places we did not know of like Brooklyn and Alabama"
Please remember that we are not the worlds reserve currency because we were smart and people liked us