A Magnificent Fight. The Battle for Wake Island

"A MAGNIFICENT FIGHT"
6§ A The Battle
im for Wake Island
mu;miki;m
FIGHT"
ROBERT J. CRESSMAN
NAVAL INSTITUTE PRESS ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND
© 1995
by the United States Naval Institute
Annapolis, Maryland
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced
without written permission from the publisher.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Cressman, Robert J.
A magnificent fight : the battle for Wake Island / Robert J.
Cressman.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 1-55750-140-8
1. Wake Island, Battle of, 1941. I. Title.
D767.99.W3C74 1994
940.54'26—dc20 94-32013
CIP
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper©
98765432
First printing
To the Defenders of Wake Island
CONTENTS
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xi
Special Notes xiii
CHAPTER ONE
"A Land Reserved to Those Who Fly" i
CHAPTER TWO
"An Uninviting Low-Lying Atoll" 26
CHAPTER THREE
"Like the Fatted Calf " 5 4
CHAPTER FOUR
"I'll See That You Get a Medal as Big as a Pie" 80
CHAPTER FIVE
"Humbled by Sizeable Casualties" in
CHAPTER SIX
"Still No Help" 135
CHAPTER SEVEN
"Very Secret to Everyone Except the Japs" 170
CHAPTER EIGHT
"This Is as Far as We Go" 192
CHAPTER NINE
"A Difficult Thing to Do" 225
APPENDIX ONE
The Cunningham-Devereux Controversy 261
APPENDIX TWO
Decorations for Valor Awarded to Wake Defenders 268
Vlll CONTENTS
APPENDIX THREE
Wake Island's Wildcats 270
APPENDIX FOUR
Wake Island, the Movie 275
Notes 277
Bibliography 305
Index 313
PREFACE
The first battle for Wake Island occurred not on the triangular atoll
itself but in the United States Congress, which at times appeared to be
very reluctant to provide money for that advanced base in the mid-
Pacific. Fiscal austerity, however, ultimately gave way to a desperate
race against time to fortify the atoll while diplomatic relations between
the United States and Japan deteriorated.
The second, more famous battle—the one around which this work
centers—occurred between 8 and 23 December 1941, in the aftermath
of one of the most devastating defeats in American military history, the
Japanese air raid on Pearl Harbor. Soon after Vice Admiral Nagumo
Chuichi's carrier-based planes attacked the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl,
on the other side of the International Date Line, Japanese land-based
bombers pounded Wake Island. Over the next two weeks, Wake was
bombed almost daily either by land-based medium bombers or flying
boats.
Wake's determined defenders held out and in so doing provided a
badly needed lift to American morale, a ray of hope in the midst of dark
clouds of despair. Wake proved such a tough nut to crack (its seacoast
batteries and aggressively handled Wildcat fighters drove off one landing
attempt) that Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku, commander in chief of the
Combined Fleet, had to order the First Air Fleet, whose planes had
ravaged Admiral Husband E. Kimmel's battle line, to detach forces to
soften it up for a second try.
In 1994, when the concept of "jointness" seems to dominate the
thinking of the modern American military in the aftermath of Desert
Shield/Desert Storm, it is an interesting parallel to note that Wake's
defense force in 1 941 reflected a true multiservice effort born of desperate
improvisation: an understrength marine defense battalion detachment
and a composite aviation unit equipped with a dwindling number of
fighter planes, augmented by sailors and volunteer civilians. An army
signal corps radio unit was the garrison's only contact with the outside
world. The defense was commanded and coordinated by a naval aviator.
X PREFACE
Much that has been written suggests that the defense of Wake was
a magnificent improvisation born on 8 December 1941 (west longitude
date), in the tradition of Americans spontaneously uniting to face a
common adversary. War planners, however, contemplated such an im-
provisation—and planned for it—as early as the summer of 1941, long
before the first bombs fell.
"A Magnificent Fight" is the first Western study of Wake's defense
to rely on extensive Japanese materials—many never before used by or
unavailable to historians—to document the oft-neglected enemy per-
spective, identifying the enemy order of battle and the roles each unit
played. This book also details the activities of those brave American
civilians who volunteered to serve alongside the marines—and thus
share the same privations—and those who carried out vital support
duties.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Many people assisted in the preparation of this book. Unfortunately, a
mere recitation of names reflects neither the contribution of each person
nor the indebtedness I feel.
I thank my friends and colleagues at the Naval Historical Center,
including John C. Reilly, Jr., Raymond A. Mann, and James L. Mooney
of the Ships' Histories Branch; John E. Vajda and Tonya T. Montgomery
of the Navy Department Library; Edward J. Marolda, Gary E. Weir (who
had to listen to Wake Island tales in the carpool), Robert J. Schneller,
Richard A. Russell, and Curtis A. Utz of the Contemporary History
Branch; Edwin C. Finney, Jr., of the Curator Branch; Roy Grossnick and
Steven D. Hill of the Aviation History Branch; and especially Bernard
F. Cavalcante's magnificent research staff in the Operational Archives:
Kathleen M. Lloyd, Richard M. Walker, John L. Hodges, Ariana A. Jacob,
and Regina T. Akers.
At the Marine Corps Historical Center, I thank Brigadier General
Edwin H. Simmons, USMC (Ret.), Richard A. Long, Robert E. Struder,
Catherine A. Kerns, Steve Hill, Danny J. Crawford, Robert V. Aquilina,
Anne Ferrante, Benis M. Frank, Evelyn A. Englander, and Amy Cantin,
as well as those formerly associated with the Center, Joyce E. Bonnett,
Lance Corporal Tom Clarkston, Gunnery Sergeant Bill Judge, J. Michael
Miller, and the late Regina Strother.
Former Wake Islanders who proved most helpful include Brigadier
Generals Woodrow M. Kessler and John F. Kinney, Colonel Arthur A.
Poindexter and Major Robert O. Arthur, Sergeant Major Robert E. Wins-
low, Master Sergeant Walter A. Bowsher, Gunnery Sergeant Walter T.
Kennedy, Lieutenant Commander George H. Henshaw, Clifford E.
Hotchkiss, and Charles R. Loveland. Brigadier General Robert E. Galer
and Colonel Milo G. Haines provided recollections of life in VMF-211
in 1 94 1. I extend special thanks to family members of Wake Islanders,
especially Henry Elrod Ramsey, nephew of the late Captain Henry T.
Elrod; Mrs. Virginia Putnam (who allowed me use of her husband's
papers); Mrs. Hilda Hesson;
Mrs. Marylee Fish; and George Halstead,
xii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
whose late brother's letters from Wake, arriving when I was recovering
at home from a heart attack, inspired me to press on and tell the Wake
Island story as it had not been told before.
Also of great assistance were Major John Elliott, USMC (Ret.) ;
Tech-
nical Sergeant Barry Spink, USAF, of the Air Force Historical Research
Agency, Maxwell Field, Alabama; R. E. G. Davies of the Aeronautics
Branch of the National Air and Space Museum, Washington, D.C.; Ann
Whyte of Pan American Airways,- Barry Zerby and Richard von Doenhoff
at the National Archives in Washington, D.C.; Kathleen O'Connor at the
National Archives Pacific-Sierra region facility in San Bruno, California;
Margaret Goostray of the Boston University Library; David W. Luca-
baugh, a tireless researcher in the subject of naval aviation and the one
who first provided me with material on the Wake Island Wildcats,- Stan
Cohen, who shared the information he had gathered on the civilian
contractors; the late Captain Roger Pineau, USNR (Ret.), who proved
very helpful concerning the Imperial Japanese Navy;
and John DeVir-
gilio, who provided me with anecdotes concerning Japanese carrier oper-
ations against Wake. Invaluable for helping me to acquire material in
Japan were Captain Chiyaha Masataka and Kageyama Koichiro. D. Y.
Louie provided superb assistance in translating some of the Japanese
documents.
Special friends, who are owed much gratitude for their contributions,
which ranged from translations of Japanese documents to detailed cri-
tiques of the narrative at various stages in its life, include J. Michael
Wenger, James C. Sawruk, John B. Lundstrom, Charles R. Haberlein,
Jr., and Jeffrey G. Barlow.
I also owe a large debt of gratitude to my parents, Lieutenant Com-
mander and Mrs. Wilmer H. Cressman, who not only provided a loving
and nurturing home but who supported my academic pursuits for so
long, giving me the pleasure and privilege of working under the late
Gordon W. Prange at the University of Maryland, who instilled within
me a love of researching and writing U.S. naval history.
And last, but certainly not least, I thank my family: my long-suffering
wife, Linda, daughter, Christine, and son, Bobby, for their unusual pa-
tience with me when mine ran thin and for putting up with me during
the lengthy process of research, writing, and rewriting.
SPECIAL NOTES
All times and dates in this book, unless otherwise specified (such as for
Pearl Harbor and Washington, D.C.), are for the zone in which Wake
and the Marshall Islands lie.
Japanese names are rendered with the surname first, the given name
second.
Allied code names for Japanese aircraft were not adopted until No-
vember 1942, and because they are anachronistic, they have been
omitted from the text.
SPECIAL JAPANESE TERMS USED IN TEXT
Buntaicho Division officer (command echelon)
Chutai Unit of six to nine planes
Chutaicho Chutai commander
Hikotaicho Air group officer (command echelon)
Kanbaku Abbreviation for Kanjo bakugekiki (carrier [dive]
bomber)
Kanko Abbreviation for Kanjo kogekiki (carrier [torpedo]
attack plane)
Kansen Abbreviation for Kanjo sentoki (carrier fighter)
Kido Butai Carrier striking force (literally, mobile force)
Kokutai Land-based naval air group
Rikko Abbreviation for Rikujo kogekiki (land attack plane;
medium bomber)
Shotai Unit of two to four planes
Shotaicho Shotai commander
JAPANESE NAVAL AIRCRAFT REFERRED TO IN TEXT
(Post-November 1942 Code Names in Brackets)
Aichi D3A1 Type 99 carrier bomber [val]
Aichi E13A1 Type 00 reconnaissance seaplane [jake]
xiv SPECIAL NOTES
Kawanishi E7K2 Type 94 reconnaissance seaplane [alf ]
Kawanishi H6K4 Type 97 flying boat [mavis]
Mitsubishi A5M4 Type 96 carrier fighter [claude]
Mitsubishi A6M2 Type 00 carrier fighter [zero or zeke]
Mitsubishi F1M2 Type 00 observation seaplane [pete]
Mitsubishi G3M2 Type 96 land attack plane [nell]
Mitsubishi G4M1 Type 1 land attack plane [betty]
Nakajima B5N2 Type 97 carrier attack plane [kate]
Nakajima E8N1 Type 95 reconnaissance seaplane [dave]
"A MAGNIFICENT FIGHT"
CHAPTER ONE
- \ LAND RESERVED
TO THOSE WHO FLY"
"A horseshoe of bright turquoise, framed in flashing white, stands
sharply out against the indigo blue of encircling ocean. Wake Island!
. . . Barely a mile long, less than half a mile wide, Peale Islet ... is
an exciting spot. From the cool veranda of your hotel you look across
the beautiful lagoon whose lovely colors change constantly before your
eyes. Beyond, the fascinating crest of the surf beats high as it dashes
itself on the barrier reefs . . . Wake Island, so newly added to the world's
travel map, is already becoming a favorite vacation spot for travel-wise
voyageurs. A beautiful, unspoiled land a world away from the hustle
and bustle of modern life. ... A land reserved to those who fly, where
every comfort and convenience, excellent food and expert attention
are as much a part of your stay as the breath-taking sunsets, the soft
thundering of the sea and its magnificent thirty-foot surf. Not soon can
one forget these rainbow waters, soft deep sands, the friendly sun, the
cool sweet trade winds blown from across the broadest sea."
1
An affluent world traveler of 1940 might have eagerly anticipated
the adventure of a transpacific aerial voyage in a well-appointed Pan
American Airways Clipper and a stay at the modern and comfortable
hotel there, but Wake Island had not always been regarded so romanti-
cally. Lacking potable water and inhabited only by hump-backed Polyne-
sian brown rats, hermit crabs, and seabirds, Wake before the transpacific
aviation era offered practically nothing more exotic to a prospective
visitor except perhaps a scenic sunset.
Westerners most probably first saw the island that would become
known as Wake when Alvaro de Mendana, the twenty-five-year-old
nephew of the governor of Peru, Lope Garcia de Castro, happened across
the ''low and uninhabited island" on 2 October 1568 while en route
back to Peru from the Solomon Islands. Desperately low on water and
provisions, Mendana overruled his pilots, who saw the reefs and feared
that they were too near land, and ordered his ship, the Capitana, taken
close inshore. Seeing no signs of human habitation, however, only
"sandy places covered with bushes," Mendana wrote off San Francisco
2 "A MAGNIFICENT FIGHT"
(the name he gave it because he discovered it on the eve of the feast of
St. Francis) as "useless" and grimly sailed on.
A little over two centuries later, a Briton, Captain Samuel Wake of
the schooner Prince William Henry, modestly named the place for him-
self when he came across it in 1796, but he essentially agreed with
Mendana's assessment and apparently made no effort to claim it for his
sovereign. Indicative of the state of map-making and navigation of the
those times, characterized by "long voyages and the habit of exchanging
even hearsay data," the island not only bore other names—Wake's Is-
land, Wakers, Weeks, Wreck, Halcyon, Helsion, and Wilson, among
others—but also was placed on maps in locations at various spots in
the general vicinity.
One American whaling ship reported sighting "Wake's Island" when
the Almira spoke three other whalers off the atoll on 24 April 1826. The
U.S. Navy's first visit occurred fourteen years later, when Lieutenant
Charles Wilkes, in the sloop of war Vincennes, reached the atoll on 20
December 1840 and conducted a brief survey of the low, triangular
coral formation. Over the next half-century, "Wake's Island" served
only as the backdrop for dramatic shipwrecks such as that of the bark
Libelle on 4 March 1866 and the tea clipper Dashing Wave on 31 August
1871.
Ironically, though it had been Spaniards who had been the first West-
erners to see Wake Island, it took a war with Spain to interest the United
States in annexing it. Following Commodore George Dewey's victory
over a Spanish naval squadron in Manila Bay in May 1898, American
expansionists pressed for the country to acquire bases to support pro-
jected operations in the Philippines. Consequently, on Independence
Day 1898, the U.S. Army transport Thomas hove to off Wake en route
to the Philippines, and General Francis V. Greene raised a fourteen-inch
flag "tied to a dead limb." By such unpretentious beginnings, however,
Greene did what neither Mendana nor Wake had done for their respective
rulers—he claimed the place for his country. Acquiring Wake, along
with the Hawaiian Islands and the Spanish possessions of Guam and
the Philippines, meant that America no longer could isolate itself geo-
graphically, protected by an oceanic barrier. Subsequently, in keeping
with growing interest in an American transpacific cable route, Secre-
tary of the Navy John D. Long sent the Bennington (Gunboat No. 4)
to the atoll, where on 17 January 1899, Commander Edward D. Taus-
sig, the warship's captain, took possession of Wake for the United
States.
Although Midway was ultimately chosen as the point through which
the cable would pass, when the United States became concerned with
Japanese aims in the Pacific, American naval strategists conceived plans
CHAPTER ONE 3
Wake Island, 30 March 1939. The small Pan American Airways
settlement on Peale (top, center) is barely visible in this picture. Wilkes
lies at upper left, separated from Wake (foreground) by a narrow channel.
Note extensive vegetation on all three islets, that on Wake being deemed
"very thick, almost impenetrable." (USMC)
to cover contingencies. Those who formulated strategy were aware that
Wake occupied a place on the map, yet they dismissed its usefulness.
In 191 1, for example, war planners noted only that the Japanese (who
had been assigned the color code orange )
might establish an outpost
there. Three years later, they recorded Wake's proximity to the American
fleet's hypothetical line of advance to the Philippines.
In 1 92 1, however, the celebrated naval writer Hector C. Bywater
rescued the place from obscurity—at least in the public eye (the navy,
of course, knew Wake existed)—and accorded it great importance when
he discussed a hypothetical Pacific campaign in his book Sea-Power in
the Pacific: A Study of the American-Japanese Naval Problem. "The
conversion of Wake Island into a well-defended fuelling station," he
declared, would help the United States consolidate a "vital line of com-
munication" between Hawaii, Guam, and Manila. An advanced base at
Wake could allow the U.S. Fleet to operate off the Japanese homeland
or reach as far as Guam, but the island had limited anchorage facilities
and lay only a hundred miles north of a possible submarine rendezvous
in the Japanese mandates.2
Fortifying or developing Wake, however, had to remain in the realm
of speculation, for Article XIX of the Washington Treaty of 6 February
CHAPTER ONE 5
1922 prohibited the United States from fortifying its possessions west
of the 180th meridian (encompassing Guam and Wake). Despite that
prohibition, Bywater's description of Wake's potential (as well as the
navy's interest in Pacific war planning over the years) had prompted
not only intellectual curiosity on the U.S. Navy's part but practical
investigation.
Typical of the short visits to Wake by U.S. Navy ships in the 1920s
and 1930s was that of the submarine tender Beaver (as- 5 ), which reached
the atoll on 19 June 1922 during an eastward voyage from the Asiatic
station. "Wake is of interest by reason of its extreme isolation; over
300 miles from the nearest land, and that only another atoll," Lieutenant
Commander Sherwood Picking, the tender's captain, observed later,
"but especially because of its location on the route between Hawaii and
our Asiatic Stations." Although Wake lay "almost directly on the course
between Honolulu and Guam," ships rarely visited let alone sighted it.
Lying so low and close to that course, Wake would present a navigational
hazard "were it not for the almost constantly prevailing fair weather."
The Beaver's landing party found several shacks long since abandoned
by Japanese poachers, as well as some sake jugs and a broken-down
still. They also noted the sand and coral boulders, the dense scrub, the
"innumerable" birds (who "showed no fear and . . . were so tame that
they could be handled"), the large rats, and a few lizards. Having read
in the sailing directions that the lagoon was "well stocked with fish,"
the tender's men found this to be so, and with "a few rifle shots and some
lively grabbing" managed to net "a considerable number" of "excellent"
specimens. The party then collected samples of coral, sponges, and shells
before returning to the ship.
3
Picking subsequently reported that use of Wake "as a base for surface
vessels" was "out of the question." Destroyers or submarines could
heave to to enable members of the crew to go ashore for recreation, he
speculated, but the place would be useful as a fueling base only "for the
sake of the slight lee it affords." "It is as a base for aircraft that Wake
. . . would be of use," Picking posited. "A large area of the lagoon is
clear of dangers to a depth of five feet and over, and its smooth water
offers excellent opportunities for refueling, repairing and resting the
crew." He went on to note that although natural obstacles would make
landing supplies difficult, "twenty men equipped with tools and dyna-
mite could in a week open the channel to the lagoon" and permit
launches to enter. "Such a party could subsist itself indefinitely," he
declared expansive...