Ship of Ghosts - James D. Hornfischer [43]
CHAPTER 12
Night fell. The wind went away with the sun, and the torn seas were permitted to slumber, smooth and glassy and glinting with the light of a rising full moon. The Japanese ships were gone. What wounds they might be tending were, and might ever remain, unknown. The wounds suffered by the Combined Striking Force were many and manifest. And for all their sacrifices, the danger to the Dutch East Indies loomed as great as ever. Thousands of Japanese troops were out there still, no doubt growing restless as soldiers out of their element will. They would bide their time at sea.
As Admiral Doorman led his ships southward toward Java’s northern coast, he received from the Dutch commander of the Surabaya naval district a three-hour-old report from a U.S. bomber that forty-five enemy transports, three cruisers, and twelve destroyers were just twenty miles from Bawean Island. Given the unfortunate vintage of the sighting report and the swift setting of the sun, his chances of intercepting them seemed about as good as the prospects for his home island in general.
The persistence of daylight had been his last hope to find and destroy an enemy who was all too lethally well trained to fight after dark. Ahead a lighthouse stood near Toeban, warning Doorman of his proximity to land. Nearly as dangerous as the newly planted minefields off that coastal town were the shoal waters that threatened the keels of his deepest-draft ships.
During the lull on the Houston, hastily prepared sandwiches and coffee were distributed. Crews in the engineering compartments, gun mounts, and magazines, worn from the nonstop action, paused to eat and rest. Their hardware had withstood similar strain. Turret One had fired 261 salvos since installation, 97 just that afternoon. Turret Two had fired 264, 100 that afternoon. The life of an eight-inch gun was about 300 salvos. From the long barrels of the rifles, the liners were creeping out as much as an inch or more from the muzzle. The gun casings were so hot they could not be touched for hours. The ventilation systems in the shell decks, handling rooms, and magazines were utterly inadequate. Fighting 140-degree heat, men who didn’t lose consciousness altogether during the battle stood in three inches of melted gun grease, sweat, and urine. The violent sheering of the ship sloshed that fetid brew everywhere, into the breech trays and onto the powder cases. The mixture of human and industrial stenches crept into every compartment without a watertight seal.
Doorman changed course to the west, paralleling the north coast of Java. Shortly after nine p.m., the four U.S. destroyers that had so doggedly brought up the Striking Force’s rear had become too low on fuel to continue. The destroyers weren’t the only Allied ships low on critical consumables. The Houston had passed word to the Perth’s Captain Waller via voice circuit that her two forward mounts were nearly out of eight-inch ammunition. The shortage was the unavoidable result of an unprecedented four-hour gunnery marathon. At one point Otto Schwarz of the Houston, stationed on the shell deck below Turret One, had been assured by a chief that naval battles were always over in a hurry. He told Schwarz there had never been a naval battle that lasted longer than twenty or twenty-five minutes. The limited stock of ready ammunition in the turret would be all the gunners would need. Some eight hours later, the men in Schwarz’s compartment were still hauling greasy shells out of the storage racks. When they were gone, the crew began the backbreaking job of hand-carrying 260-pound projectiles, swaddled in slings made from cloth