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By Root 993 0

Rear-Admiral Frank Fletcher and forewarned by Ultra intelligence of Japanese intentions, steamed to intercept Inoue’s main force. At dawn on 7 May in the Coral Sea, Fletcher dispatched his cruisers, led by British Rear-Admiral John Crace, to attack the enemy’s transports. Fletcher was misinformed about enemy locations. US air squadrons, instead of finding the Japanese carriers, chanced upon Inoue’s amphibious force. Its transports promptly turned away, to await the outcome of the fleet encounter. Crace withdrew, on learning that he was advancing into empty ocean. Planes from Lexington scored an early success, sinking the small carrier Shoho. Meanwhile Fletcher’s carrier group had an extraordinarily lucky escape. The Japanese fleet was 175 miles astern of him; his own planes were absent when enemy aircraft sank and destroyed an American tanker and escorting destroyer which were trailing his task groups. If Inoue’s bombers had flown further and found the US carriers, these would have been exposed to disaster. As it was, on that first day both rival admirals groped ineffectually.

Next morning, 8 May, as sunrise came at 0655, sailors in foetid confinement below took turns to snatch breaths of clean air from vents or scuttles, as waves of American and Japanese aircraft lifted off from their respective flight decks. Lt. Cmdr. Bob Dixon, who had led the previous day’s air attack on Shoho, again distinguished himself by locating the Japanese fleet. He lingered overhead to maintain surveillance, nursing his engine to save fuel – a constant preoccupation of naval fliers.

The first wave of US aircraft located and attacked the carrier Shokaku, inflicting significant but not fatal damage. Most of the torpedo-carriers and dive-bombers missed. The strikes were poorly coordinated. Dive-bomber crews suffered severe problems when their sighting telescopes and windshields misted up during the steep descent from ‘pushover’ at 17,000 feet to ‘pull-up’ at 1,500. Pilots fumed at their own lack of speed and defensive firepower against Japanese fighters. Commander Bill Ault got lost on his way home, a frequent and fatal error in that vast ocean. He sent a laconic farewell message before ditching and vanishing forever: ‘Okay, so long people. Remember we got a thousand-pound hit on the flat top.’ But Shokaku survived. Lt. Cmdr. Paul Stroop, a staff officer aboard Lexington, acknowledged ruefully, ‘We should have been more effective.’

And even as the Americans were diving on Inoue’s fleet, the Japanese struck Fletcher’s ships much harder. When radar reported enemy aircraft closing, the US carrier captains called for twenty-five-knot flank speed and began evasive action before meeting shoals of incoming torpedoes, a rain of bombs. Yorktown suffered a single hit which killed more than forty men, and a near-miss which momentarily blasted the ship’s racing screws clear of the water. Her captain asked the engine room if he should reduce speed, to receive the defiant answer: ‘Hell no, we’ll make it.’ But Lexington’s full helm turn as torpedoes approached failed to save her: the 40,000-ton carrier was struck with devastating effect. ‘It was pretty discouraging to see these Japanese launch their torpedoes then fly very close to the ship to get a look at us,’ said Paul Stroop. ‘They were curious and sort of thumbed their noses at us. We were shooting at them with our new 20mms and not hitting them at all.’ Blazes broke out which found plentiful tinder – inflammable bulkhead paint, wooden furniture such as no US warship would carry again. Half-naked sailors suffered terrible burns – ‘the skin was literally dripping from their bodies’. This was the last time American crews willingly exposed flesh in action. After just thirteen minutes the Japanese planes turned away, leaving a shambles which greeted Fletcher’s airmen returning from their own strike.

Heroic efforts were made to control Lexington’s fires: Lt. Milton Ricketts, sole survivor of a damage-control team wiped out by a bomb, was himself mortally wounded, but ran out a hose and began playing water