Franklin (CV 13) - Naval Cruise Book

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CHAP I i: K FIVE ... you wont he hearing from me for a Ions, time now. so dont worry . . . But I iiottd go . . . tJiere ' s a fella named fourrou.x on Number Five Mount wants his eo Jee, and I ' ve had mine ... FIRST ACTION An LNDEKCLKRENT of excitement could be felt as Big Ben slipped out of Pearl Harbor on June 15tli. Somewhere, thousands of miles to the westward, the mighty Fifth and Seventh Fleets were gathered for another historic assault on the Empire ' s defense lines. Hundreds of transports, jammed with hardened, sunburned shock troops of the .Marine Corps and Army slipjied into Pearl Harbor for refueling. Silently they left, over the sea and into the setting sun. circled liy squadrons of lean, grey destroyers. America was on the road back! Would the next strike be against mysterious, impregnable Truk? The Philippines ' ? The mainland of China? Somewhere a still powerful Ini- .S I c Fedeuu and (tM C Osborne cleaning one oj ' ' Bic; Ben ' s five inch guns.

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The Toughest Sailor, Little Ben. tells the SP (Shore Patrol) where to head in. W illy wanted to go to war on Big Ben . .

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perial Navy rode the high seas: it numbered battleships, carriers, cruisers, dozens of destroyers and submarines in its fleets. Millions of fanatical yellow troops garrisoned an un- defeated Empire. The air force that had sent the Prince of Wales, the Repulse, the Arizona, the Oklahoma, the Lexington, the 1 orkloun. and scores of other varshi])s to the bottom, still patrolled the skies above Japan and its island fortresses. Hawaii dropped quickly into the sea. Astern a thousand yards, the new cruiser Denver glided along in Big Ben ' s wake. Old friends, the Twiggs and Leary, with two other destroyers, tossed and plunged ahead. Shortly after clear- ing the harbor Comdr. Day spoke to the Franklin s officers and the fliers of Air Group Thirteen: ■ ' Gentlemen, on June 15th, (that ' s today), the Amphibious Forces will land the Second Marine Division and the 27th Army Division on the Japanese island of Saipan. in the Mariannas group. The landings will be supported by the Seventh United States Fleet, Vice Admiral Kinkaid. com- posed of the battleships Tennessee, West Virginia, New Mex- ico . . . the list sounded like a roll call of all the fighting ships of the Navy. The Fifth Fleet, Vice Admiral Spruance, consisting of carriers and battleships, in Task Force Fifty-eight, will operate between Saipan and the Philippines, the direction from which the Japs are expected to counter-attack. The Fast Carrier Task Force — of which the Franklin will be a unit — will cover the landings and destroy the Imperial Jap- anese Fleet if the ojiportunity presents itself. One group of fast carriers will neutralize by bombing the Bonin Is- lands, of Iwo Jima and Chichi Jinia. from which the Japs might send air strength into the Mariannas. At last reports, an enemy concentration of six battleships, five carriers, twelve cruisers, and thirty destroyers was as- sembling in the Philippines and has been sighted by our submarines moving into the Philippine Sea. .Make no mis- take. e think the Japs are going to come out and fight this time. e are going to be ready for them. The Franklin, ith her escorts, will remain in reserve in the Eniwetok area, as reinforcements, until called upon. This is il. To the crew of officers and men. to helmsman and lookout. |)ilot and engineer, this w-as it; the first certain indication of where Big Ben might expect her entry into battle. Of course, the pattern might change, as so often it did change, but here was something more definite than mere scuttlebutt. On June 17th. the Franklin crossed the International Date Line, longitude loO degrees east. The calendar moved back one day; there were tuo Sundays in a row. Now the combat air patrol took to the ky: six Hellcat fighters to protect the little task group from a sur]jrise attack. Big Ben entered tlie circular lagoon of Eniwetok on June 21st. It was a dreary spot, but one of America ' s farthest out- posts, and had been in Japanese hands only three months before. Torn hulks of Japanese shi))s, rijiped to tatters by American steel and American courage, lay in the anchorage — mute but eloquent tribute to the American boys from all sections of the nation, who had splashed ashore to cut down the fanatical Imperial .Marines to the last man. There were also rusted helmets of American type; rows of lonely white crosses. Meanwhile, meager and delayed reports of the action on Saipan came in. Marines were hanging on; an Army divi- sion was ashore; Jap jdanes were coming in from Guam to attack the transports as they lay along the beachhead. Then word came that the Japanese Navy was steaming toward the scene. It was the job of Task Force Fifty-eight to see that it never got there. Four hundred miles from Saipan. the Japanese launched a cloud of dive-bombers and torpedo jdanes which — the Japs believed — would seal the issue. How Admiral Mitsch- er ' s fighters took care of this Oriental dream is a part of history, but Big Ben never got into this First Battle of the Philippine Sea, since the Japanese Navy did one of its famous vanishing acts after Mitscher ' s men had blasted down its air cover. Big Ben, like a substitute at a football game, was still sitting on the sidelines when orders came on June 29th to break the inaction. The Franklin was to join Hear Admiral Ralph E. Davison ' s Task Group 58.2, bound for Iwo Jima to maintain the enemy airfields and installa- tions in the Bonin Islands inoperative. She was to be in company with the carrier !T asp, the light carriers Monterey and Cabot, all escorted by the cruisers Boston, Canberra, and Scin Juan, with nine destroyers in the screen. The Bonins, only 600 miles south of Tokyo, were heavily patrolled and guarded. Their airfields were stepping-stones for the squadrons which might be flung into the desperate liattle that still raged on Saipan. By July 1st the task group was steaming through waters constantly patrolled by Jap search planes — snoopers, as ihey are called in Navy language. The American combat air patrols were doubled in strength and the radarmen never took their eyes from the screens that might disclose the ap- proach of a bogey. Since surprise is the essence of a carrier-borne attack, enemy search planes must be spotted and shot down before they could locate the task group and flash a warning to home bases. It was that afternoon when Big Ben ' s first casualty in combat zones saddened all hands. Lt. Clarence F. Kelly Blair, lanky, hard-flying leader of a division of the Thirteenth .Air Group, suddenly side-slipped and plunged into the sea as he attempted to land after a patrol. Neither plane nor pilot were seen again. The task group was only 400 miles from Iwo Jima on July 3rd when a long range Japanese search plane sneaked in low over the formation, dropped two bombs, which nar- rowly missed a destroyer, and fled. The plane was identi- fied as an Emily. a name well known to men who fought the Japs. Tyjjes of enemy aircraft were designated by girls ' or boys names — thus the Betty, Jack. Jill, Zeke, Frances and dozens of others. In the afternoon Admiral Davison decided the Japs might lie aware of his ajiproaching force and decided to do some- thing about it. Twenty Hellcats from the Wasp were flung across the remaining 300 miles to surprise the enemy on the ground and shoot up his planes. The fighters returned at sunset, reporting that they had knocked down a dozen Japs as they were taking ofl and had damaged many others on the ground. Through that night the group sped on toward the morn-