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  For all who have served our country

  List of Maps

  Pacific Theater, World War II

  Round-the-Horn Voyage of the Oregon, 1898

  Battle of Tsushima, 1905

  The Great White Fleet Circles the Globe, December 16, 1907–February 22, 1909

  North Atlantic Convoy Routes, 1917–1918

  Battle of the Coral Sea, May 1942

  King’s Pacific Strategy and Division of Commands, 1942

  Guadalcanal and the Solomons, 1942

  Pacific Campaigns, 1943–1944

  Battle of Leyte Gulf, October 1944

  The Great Typhoon, December 1944

  PROLOGUE

  The Banks of the Severn

  It is graduation day at Annapolis—the United States Naval Academy. The year is not important. The date might be in the past, today, or one of many to come. The speaker’s words reverberate across the field, but something more resonates here.

  Nearby, the broad estuary of the Severn River meets the waters of Chesapeake Bay. The warm breeze carries with it the scent of tidewater and the squawks of gulls, but there is more here, too, than salty smells and aerial cacophony.

  The academy’s motto is simple and direct: Ex Scientia Tridens—“From Knowledge, Sea Power.” From this place has come that and much more.

  The tree-lined pathways, the grassy parade grounds, and even the small boats tugging gently at their moorings are heavy with it. The names of the buildings that rise above the banks of the Severn shout it: history and tradition, duty and honor, vision and courage, abound here.

  The granite walls of Leahy Hall are the first stop for aspiring midshipmen. King Hall serves thousands of meals daily with a proficiency its no-nonsense namesake would demand. Nimitz Library overlooks College Creek, beyond which the academy cemetery holds the bones of many whose history fills its books. Halsey Field House is a testing ground, the focal point of hard-fought athletic competition.

  An office building, a mess hall, a library, and a field house—as varied as the men whose names they bear. Consummate diplomat, opinionated strategist, calculating master of detail, pugnacious fighter—all began their naval careers here within a period of eight years near the opening of the twentieth century.

  They are the only four men in American history to hold the five-star rank of fleet admiral. None of them envisioned as they walked these grounds the extent to which their diverse personalities and methods would transform Theodore Roosevelt’s Great White Fleet of their youth into his cousin Franklin’s ultimate weapon of global supremacy.

  With a combination of nimble counsel, exasperating ego, studied patience, and street-fighter tactics, William D. Leahy, Ernest J. King, Chester W. Nimitz, and William F. Halsey, Jr., built the modern United States Navy and won World War II on the seas. Each is forever a part of the United States Naval Academy; Annapolis was forever a part of them.

  On the graduation field this day, the brigade stands at attention. Another class is about to follow these men, to march into history.

  Saturday, December 6, 1941

  Vichy, France

  Europe has been at war for more than two years. Amid the mineral spas of Vichy, the American embassy occupies what was previously a doctor’s office. While its accoutrements are sufficient, the tone and fabric of the entire town mirror the sad conditions that have befallen France. Quick to oppose Hitler’s invasion of Poland, France was forced by the German blitzkrieg to accept a humiliating surrender.

  The surrender terms—the armistice, the Vichy French prefer to call them—left a provisional government to administer the unoccupied southern third of the country, as well as France’s colonies around the world. The wild card remains what will become of the French fleet, arguably still among the most powerful in the world.

  The U.S. ambassador, retired admiral William D. Leahy, appreciates this more than most. He is first and foremost a sailor, but over a forty-year naval career, he has also witnessed the diplomatic side of international power. Admiral Leahy wouldn’t be here if President Franklin D. Roosevelt did not trust his ability to wring every last drop of pro-American support from Vichy’s shadow government.

  But Leahy is discouraged. He is used to serving his chief with fidelity, but the last few months have been frustrating. Vichy France is a nation subservient to the Third Reich in all but name. Leahy goes to bed hoping for a recall to Washington—either to impress the French with the seriousness of Roosevelt’s displeasure or simply to allow for his own retirement. Because of the time difference, dawn the next morning will fall upon Vichy twelve hours before it reaches the Central Pacific.

  Narragansett Bay

  The heavy cruiser USS Augusta is already a storied ship. Four months before, the flagship of the Atlantic Fleet carried President Roosevelt to a secret rendezvous with British prime minister Winston Churchill off the southeast toe of Newfoundland. After a conference that included a Sunday church service featuring the hymn “Onward, Christian Soldiers,” America was not yet at war, but Roosevelt and Churchill were newfound friends.

  This particular morning, Augusta steams into the sheltered waters of Narragansett Bay and moors at its buoy off Newport, Rhode Island, the fleet headquarters. From its mast flies the four-star flag of Admiral Ernest J. King, commander in chief of the Atlantic Fleet. There is neither war nor peace. American ships are being lost in the North Atlantic, but King’s response is limited by political considerations.

  As Augusta rides gently at its buoy, King spends the morning writing a batch of letters. Some are official navy business. Others go to friends in his hometown and Annapolis classmates. His family is another story.

  That afternoon, the admiral’s barge ferries him into Newport, where he walks up Church Street past the spire of Trinity Church. As is his custom when in port, he drops by the Newport Reading Room, the town’s most venerable private club, for a glass of sherry. He is still in a pensive mood when he returns to the Augusta and hears its bugler signal the lowering of the colors at sunset. King has always appreciated a sense of history, and in his cabin aboard the darkened ship, he selects a title from his collection of biographies and histories and reads himself to sleep.

  Washington, D.C.

  The barren limbs on numerous maple, elm, and oak trees along the avenues bespeak the obvious: it is late fall in the nation’s capital. The cherry trees—a 1912 gift from the people of Japan—surrounding the Tidal Basin and the nearly completed Jefferson Memorial are also stark and black in the low-angled December sun. Washington itself is in a state of denial as to its increasing role at the center of a rapidly expanding federal government.

  As is usual on a Saturday, Rear Admiral Chester W. Nimitz is in his office at the Navy Department Building, a massive structure that sprawls almost four blocks along the north side of the Mall. It is the admiral’s turn for a tour of shore duty, and since 1939 he has been chief of the Bureau of Navigation.

  Evening brings a respite that Nimitz always embraces—dinner at home with his family. He lives with his wife, Catherine; youngest daughter, Mary; daughter-in-law, Joan; and an eighteen-month-old granddaughter. They occupy an apartme
nt at 2222 Q Street, a block from Rock Creek Park in one direction and the embassies of Massachusetts Avenue in the other. Part of the admiral’s daily ritual is to take Freckles, the family’s cocker spaniel, for his evening walk along a route that takes them past the Japanese embassy.

  The two older Nimitz girls, Kate and Nancy, live across the hall. The only member of the family not present is the admiral’s son. A 1936 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, young Chet is halfway around the world, assigned to the submarine Sturgeon operating out of the Philippines.

  At Sea, Two Hundred Miles West of Pearl Harbor

  The weather is not cooperating. Task Force 8, comprising the aircraft carrier Enterprise, three heavy cruisers, and nine destroyers, pounds eastward into heavy seas. On the bridge of the carrier, Vice Admiral William F. Halsey, Jr., is surprised that the weather is the only thing he is fighting. Halsey has issued orders that Enterprise and its escorts operate under war conditions.

  Nine days earlier, his ships left Pearl Harbor for a destination known only to the admiral and his closest aides. Once at sea, Enterprise welcomed its own air squadrons but also took aboard twelve Grumman F4F Wildcat fighters belonging to Marine Fighting Squadron 211. Its commander told his pilots to expect two days of maneuvers, and no one threw more than a shaving kit and a change of Skivvies into his cockpit.

  The marine pilots took off from Enterprise for their secret destination in the early dawn of December 4 without incident. Delivery accomplished, Task Force 8 headed back toward Pearl Harbor, not knowing that hundreds of miles to the north a huge Japanese carrier force was roughly paralleling its eastward course.

  Halsey planned to dock in Pearl Harbor today, but buffeting winds and waves crack a seam in one of his destroyers and slow refueling operations. The admiral takes it in stride, but his crews are less understanding. A Saturday arrival in Hawaii would salvage a portion of their weekend ashore. Now those off-duty on Enterprise will have to be content to gather on the hangar deck and watch Gary Cooper in Sergeant York. Task Force 8 is rescheduled to enter Pearl Harbor about noon on Sunday, December 7.

  PART I

  SAILORS

  1897–1918

  In time of war, would we be content like the turtle to withdraw into our own shell and see an enemy supersede us in every outlying part, usurp our commerce, and destroy our influence as a nation throughout the world?

  —FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 1913

  Proud of the navy “N” on his sweater—even if he missed a button putting it on—William F. Halsey, Jr., commanded the destroyer Shaw (DD-68) off Ireland in the summer of 1918. (F. E. Sellman photo, courtesy of Gary Fabian).

  CHAPTER ONE

  Leahy

  “The Judge”

  —Annapolis, Class of 1897

  The glistening white bow of the American battleship Oregon drove through wave after towering wave as the big ship clawed its way south through heavy seas. Its jack staff at the bow routinely disappeared as fully fifteen feet of blue water broke on the forward turret and threw white spray nearly the length of the ship. It was April 1898, and as the Oregon thundered toward the fabled Strait of Magellan, the air hung thick with rumors of war with Spain. In fact, in this era before radio communications, there was no way for the captain to know if war had already begun.

  By the standards of any contemporary navy, the Oregon was a major strategic weapon. The Union Iron Works of San Francisco had laid down its keel late in 1891 as the third in a line of Indiana-class battleships. At 348 feet in length, with a beam of 69 feet and a displacement of 10,288 tons, the ship was a beefy platform for a dazzling array of firepower, including two 13-inch guns each in the main fore and after turrets.

  Oregon and its older sisters, Indiana and Massachusetts, owed their existence to a belated post–Civil War awakening that the United States, having largely completed its expansion from sea to sea, should now be prepared not only to defend its interests but also to seek other territory well beyond its borders. Not everyone, however, supported this creeping American imperialism. Many avowed isolationists in Congress wanted only coastal defenses and opposed offensive, long-range battleships. The futurists in the U.S. Navy managed to paper over such disputes by calling this new generation of vessels “seagoing coastline battleships.”

  In addition to its armaments, the Oregon relied on a belt of eighteen-inch-thick armor plating around its sides and thinner armor for its gun turrets and decking. The ship also had two other distinct advantages: it was fast for the time—twin screws delivered better than fifteen knots—and its spacious coal bunkers provided a range of more than six thousand miles. Heavily armed, well protected, speedy, and long-range, Oregon and its class were clearly the advent of a new generation of naval warfare. They could boast of being the first modern-era battleships of the U.S. Navy.

  Among Oregon’s complement of 32 officers and 441 enlisted men were 6 green naval cadets. They were 1897 graduates of the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, but not yet full-fledged ensigns because the navy required two years of sea duty before awarding commissions. Service aboard a first-class ship such as the Oregon was a plum assignment, even if some of the old hands tended to view the flocking cadets more as nuisance gnats than budding officers.

  The pulses of old salts and young greenhorns alike had quickened on March 19, 1898, as the battleship departed San Francisco and passed through the Golden Gate, its destination known only to its captain. After 4,700 miles and the traditional “crossing the equator” ceremony, Oregon steamed into Callao, Peru. But ship and crew paused there only long enough to fill the coal bunkers to the brim and secure an extra two hundred tons of coal in sacks on the decks.

  Rumors were rife that they might be headed for Honolulu or even the Philippines, but as Oregon cleared the harbor, it turned south toward the stormy seas around Cape Horn at the tip of South America. By the time another three thousand miles had fallen astern, the Strait of Magellan beckoned, and an icy southerly gale whipped the battering waves ever higher. “Under the onslaught of these gigantic seas,” recalled naval cadet William D. Leahy, “the ship dove, trembled, shook them off, and dove again.” According to Leahy, “We said she smelled the Spanish Fleet.”1

  Cadet Leahy’s Irish grandparents, Daniel and Mary Egan Leahy, immigrated to the United States in 1836 and settled in Massachusetts. A son, Michael Arthur, was born two years later, shortly before the family moved to New Hampshire. There a second son, John Egan, joined the family. But it was in a tiny village in Dodge County, Wisconsin, just west of Milwaukee, that the Leahys put down roots.

  Like so many of their generation, brothers Michael and John Leahy saw military service during the Civil War—not necessarily by choice, but out of a sense of duty. When the Thirty-fifth Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment was mustered at Milwaukee early in 1864, twenty-five-year-old Michael Leahy became captain of Company D and brother John a first lieutenant in Company C.

  Wisconsin certainly had no shortage of famous units. Perhaps best known were those Wisconsin regiments that made up part of the Army of the Potomac’s stalwart Iron Brigade. No less storied was the Twenty-fourth Wisconsin. On a raw November day in 1863, the Twenty-fourth Wisconsin formed beneath Missionary Ridge outside Chattanooga, Tennessee. Union troops were trying to lift the siege of the town, but Confederate defenders were proving stubborn. Quite suddenly, without orders, Union regiments in the center of the line began to move forward up the ridge. When their wild advance was over, among the battle flags atop the crest was the standard of the Twenty-fourth Wisconsin, carried there by its eighteen-year-old “boy colonel,” Arthur MacArthur, whose son, Douglas, would spend most of his own military career trying to emulate his father’s charge.

  The Thirty-fifth Wisconsin was not destined for such glory. Its service was mostly garrison duty around New Orleans and Mobile, Alabama, far from the major campaigns of the war. But such duty was not without risk. The regiment suffered only two casualties from battle, but lost 3 officers a
nd 271 enlisted men to disease. The Leahy brothers returned from the war proud of their service, and for the rest of his life, Michael regularly attended meetings of veterans’ groups and marched in Fourth of July parades.

  After his discharge, Michael studied law at the University of Michigan and earned his degree in 1868. Briefly forsaking Wisconsin, he began to practice law in the small town of Hampton, Iowa, where a Wisconsin girl thirteen years his junior, Rose Mary Hamilton, caught his eye. They married and were still living in Hampton when William Daniel Leahy, the first of their eight children, was born on May 6, 1875.

  Michael and Rose were eager to return to Wisconsin, and they soon joined Michael’s brother, John, upstate in Wausau. By the time young William—he was “Bill” to just about everyone—was ready for high school, the family moved even farther north to Ashland, on the southern shore of Lake Superior.

  As Bill approached his high school graduation in 1892, Michael Leahy encouraged his son to pursue a law degree at the University of Wisconsin and join him in his legal practice. Bill certainly appeared to have an aptitude for law, including an almost stoic, deliberative thought process and attention to detail, but there was something about his father’s military service—brief and unsung though it was—that intrigued him. Bill decided instead to seek an appointment to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

  Congressman Thomas Lynch was impressed with the young man, but Lynch had no West Point appointments that year. He did, however, have an opening the following year at the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis. Was Leahy interested in the navy? Despite living near the wind-tossed waters of Lake Superior, Leahy, like most of the country at the time, had not given the navy much thought. During his years growing up, he and the country had focused on the U.S. Army’s exploits in the West, such as chasing the Apache leader Geronimo. But at least the Naval Academy was the military and, after all, a free education. Leahy accepted and spent the next year preparing for the entrance exams, particularly a newly added algebra requirement.2