Gregory G. Fletcher - Intrepid Aviators: The American Flyers Who Sank Japans Greatest Battleship

THE TRUE STORY OF USS INTREPIDS

TORPEDO SQUADRON 18 AND ITS EPIC CLASH WITH

THE SUPERBATTLESHIP MUSASHI

GREGORY G. FLETCHER

NAL CALIBER

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First published by NAL Caliber, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

First Printing, July 2012

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Copyright Gregory G. Fletcher, 2012

Maps and line drawing by Lum Pennington

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA :

Fletcher, Gregory G.

Intrepid aviators: the true story of USS Intrepids Torpedo Squadron 18 and its epic clash with the superbattleship Musashi/Gregory G. Fletcher.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-101-58696-9

1. United States. Navy. Torpedo Squadron Eighteen. 2. Intrepid Aircraft (carrier)History. 3. Musashi (Battleship)History. 4. World War, 19391945CampaignsPhilippines. 5. Leyte Gulf, Battle of, Philippines, 1944. 6. World War, 19391945Aerial operations, American. 7. World War, 19391945Naval operations, American. I. Title. II. Title: True story of USS Intrepids Torpedo Squadron 18 and its epic clash with the superbattleship Musashi.

D790.37818th .F54 2012

940.5425995dc23 2012001025

Set in Adobe Garamond ProDesigned by Elke Sigal

Printed in the United States of America

PUBLISHERS NOTE

While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers, Internet addresses and other contact information at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

ALWAYS LEARNING

PEARSON

To my father, who lived it, and his shipmates

*

C HAPTER O NE

IN THE PHILIPPINE SEA

T he staccato notes of reveille, played on a bugle, blared from a loudspeaker in the passageway outside the junior officers bunkroom. Inside, behind a flameproof curtain that served as a door, Ensign Willard M. Fletcher, United States Naval Reserve, rolled up on one elbow and squinted groggily at the luminescent dial of his wristwatch. It was four a.m. He had been keeping a running count of the days since leaving Pearl Harbor in August 1944; today was October 24, 1944, his seventy-fifth consecutive day at sea.

Ensign Fletcherhis family called him Will and his buddies called him Fletchwas a naval aviator assigned to Torpedo 18, an attack squadron stationed aboard the aircraft carrier Intrepid. Though not scheduled to fly today, he was required to report at five a.m. to his squadron ready room for flight quarters, a mandatory muster of all pilots and aircrew.

Intrepid was steaming through the middle Pacific latitudes, roughly fifteen degrees above the equator, when reveille sounded. The junior officers bunkroom, a shipboard dormitory known as Boys Town, was warm from the tropical heat, the air heavy with humidity and the musky odor of many men sleeping in close quarters. An electric fan bolted to the bulkhead droned back and forth in desultory time but did little to cool the room. Will had drifted off to sleep listening to the purr of the fan, but he had slept only fitfully. He could not get comfortable in the heat. His skin was clammy and his bedsheet damp with perspiration. He kicked aside his cover sheet and swung his legs over the bunk rail. He consoled himself with the notion that he might be able to nap for a few minutes in his ready room chair before attending to his collateral duty as assistant squadron maintenance officer.

Will had joined the United States Navy in August 1942 as an aviation cadet. Like all new enlistees, he had been introduced to the navys peculiar vocabulary and learned new words for everyday objects. He had learned, for example, that his bed was called a rack in navy lingo. In civilian life, he had associated the word rack with a medieval instrument of torture and, as a new cadet, he had wondered naively why anyone would use such a gruesome term to describe a bed. Two years later, on his maiden voyage aboard a navy ship, he discovered the answer. Ordered to the Naval Air Station Barbers Point, Hawaii, in May 1944, he had embarked as a passenger aboard an escort carrier making the five-day run from San Fransico to Pearl Harbor. On his first night at sea, he had slept (or tried to) on a standard enlisted mans rack, which was essentially a metal frame with a canvas bottom, suspended from the overhead by chains and covered with a thin, flameproof mattress. The rack had swung like a pendulum, exaggerating the movement of the ship as it pitched and rolled through steep Pacifc swells. For the better part of two days, Will had lain awake in his rack, seasick beyond cure or caring. Although his officers rack aboard Intrepid did not sway as much as an enlisted mans rackit was a narrow bunk bed affixed solidly to the wall (which is called a bulkhead in navy jargon)it wasnt any more slumber-inducing. A navy rack, he was fond of saying afterward, looked and slept like one.

Will had learned to smoke after he joined the navynearly everyone smokedand now he craved a morning cigarette. His flight suit, which was a cotton khaki coverall similar to those worn by garage mechanics, hung from a hook by his rack. He fished a pack of Lucky Strikes and a Zippo lighter from the breast pocket of the flight suit, grabbed his shaving kit, and shuffled off in his skivvies to the officers washroom (called the head) to grab a smoke and prepare himself for the day. He hoped the smoking lamp (the official signal that smoking was permitted aboard ship) was lit.