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The AARON WARD
(DD-483) was launched on 22 November 1941 and commissioned 4 March 1942.
She sailed for the Pacific in May 1942 and after several escort missions
joined the covering force at Guadalcanal on 17 October 1942. In Lunga
Roads at 0724, five enemy bombers dove on the WARD only to run into
heavy antiaircraft fire from both the ship and marine guns ashore. The
destroyer went ahead at flank speed and carried out evasive maneuvers to
avoid the bombs which splashed as close as one hundred yards from the
ship. Marine gunners claimed two of the five attackers and the ship
shared in the third “kill.” The WARD moved on to bombard enemy gun
emplacements and ammunition dumps, leaving burning ruins when she quit
the area. On 20 October, she was steaming with Task Group 64.1, which
included the WASHINGTON (BB-56), ATLANTA (CL-51), FLETCHER (DD-445),
LARDNER (DD-487), LANSDOWNE (DD-486), and BENHAM (DD-397), and Task
Group 64.2, consisting of the SAN FRANCISCO (CA-38), HELENA (CL-50),
CHESTER (CA-27) LAFFEY (DD-459)), BUCHANAN (DD-484), and McCALLA
(DD-488). At 2120, the CHESTER was torpedoed by a submarine. While
screening the disabled cruiser, the WARD obtained a sonar contact and
launched a full pattern of depth charges, but with no apparent results.
Ten days later, with
the BENHAM, FLETCHER, and LARDNER, she shelled Japanese positions on
Guadalcanal, expending 711 rounds of 5-inch ammunition. The WARD went on
to screen transports unloading men and materiel off Guadalcanal on 11
and 12 November and splashed one enemy plane and damaged four others in
the action. In the early morning hours of 13 November, the WARD, BARTON
(DD-599), MONSSEN (DD-436), FLETCHER, McCALLA, CUSHING (DD-376), LAFFEY,
STERETT (DD-407), and O’BANNON (DD-450) entered the Lengo Channel with
the cruisers SAN FRANCISCO, PORTLAND (CA-33), HELENA, JUNEAU (CL-52),
and ATLANTA. Steaming toward them in the dark was a Japanese battle
force of two battleships, a light cruiser, and fourteen destroyers.
The AARON WARD,
BARTON, MONSSEN, and FLETCHER were at the rear of the American column
when shortly after 0130, the first volley was fired in the Naval Battle
of Guadalcanal. The WARD had the enemy on her radar at 0145 and opened
fire soon after. Ten minutes later, two torpedoes passed beneath the
ship, and within seconds the BARTON exploded. Maneuvering to avoid
collisions, the AARON WARD hurled some twenty-five salvoes at what may
have been the Japanese destroyer AKATSUKI, which blew up and sank.
In the midst of
firing on a new target, an enemy shell put her gun director out of
action and forced the AARON WARD’s gunners to rely on local control. In
the minutes that followed she took eight more direct hits. Star shells
lit the space around her making the badly damaged destroyer an easy
target for the enemy. Hoping to clear the area, her skipper ordered
flank speed ahead but by 0225 she had lost steering control. Five
minutes later, all firing around her ceased. The battle was over, but
not for the AARON WARD. At 0235, she was dead in the water, her forward
engine room flooded. Undaunted, her crew pumped saltwater into the tanks
and lit the boilers off to get the AARON WARD underway at 0500. Half an
hour later, she was dead in the water again. All around her were
crippled ships: an enemy battleship steaming in circles, the CUSHING and
MONSSEN in flames, the charred hulk of the ATLANTA still afloat. At
0620, the tug BOBOLINK (AT-131) arrived, but before she could take the
destroyer in tow, they came under fire from the battleship HIEI.
American planes from Henderson Field arrived to divert the battleship
long enough for the BOBOLINK to rig her line and tow the AARON WARD to
where a YP could take the destroyer into Tulagi. Twelve of her crew were
killed in action, three died of their wounds, another fifty-seven were
wounded The WARD went on to Pearl Harbor for permanent repairs and on 6
February resumed her escort duties with the fleet.
At 1512 on 7 April
1943, while covering the LST-449 through Lengo Channel, the destroyer’s
lookouts spotted three enemy planes coming out of the sun. Her gunners
opened fire, but a minute later, three more dive bombers were heading
for the ship. Surging ahead at flank speed, the AARON WARD opened fire
with her 20-mm and 40-mm guns and her 5-inch battery. Bombs from the
first three planes struck on or near the ship. The mining effect of the
near-misses rocked her violently, seeming to lift the AARON WARD out of
the water. The first tore holes in her side rapidly flooding the forward
fireroom; the second struck the engine room causing a loss of all
electrical power on the 5-inch and 40-mm mounts. Shifting to local
control, the gunners kept up their fire. A third bomb splashed close
aboard, holing her port side near the after engine room. Having lost
power to her rudder, the ship circled helplessly as the second trio of
dive bombers attacked, achieving two very near misses.
Despite the
determined efforts of her crew and the assistance of the tugs ORTOLAN
(ASR-5) and VIREO (ATO-144), the destroyer developed an increasing list
to starboard, and by 2115 the battle to save the WARD clearly was being
lost. At 2135, after a failed attempt to beach her on a Florida Island
shoal, her after bulkheads gave way, and the ship began sinking
stern-first. Her bow was not quite vertical, looming over the ORTOLAN’s
fo’c’sle, when the tugs cut their tow lines and got clear. In her final
seconds, the AARON WARD straightened and then, plummeted to the bottom
forty fathoms below. Twenty-seven of her crew died that day; fifty-nine
were wounded.
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