Heroism on Deck, Undiminished by the Decades

A dwindling handful of World War II vets will gather in San Francisco today at the seaside memorial to combat veterans of the Navy cruiser San Francisco.

The veterans will pay tribute to the valiant dead of their 1,050 shipmates and bestow special honor on one still living, John E. Bennett of Solana Beach--my friend, Jack.

The San Francisco was the flagship in what Fleet Adm. Ernest J. King called “the most furious sea battle fought in history”--the naval night action at Guadalcanal on Nov. 13, 1942.

On that night, a task force of five cruisers and eight destroyers defended the Marines on Guadalcanal. Bennett, a lieutenant junior grade just 21 months out of Annapolis and a veteran of Pearl Harbor, reported to the bridge as officer of the deck with his wounded arm in a sling from an earlier Japanese aerial attack. The ship’s captain was conferring with Adm. Dan Callaghan, task force commander, about an approaching Japanese force that included two battleships, the fearsome scourge of the seas.

The captain noticed fresh blood on Bennett’s sling and ordered him below to recuperate. Bennett obeyed to the letter. He went below, but then he reported for duty to the gunnery officer, sticking his head through the door while keeping his sling hidden from view. He was assigned automatic weapons control aft.

Around midnight, the San Francisco met a surprised but vastly superior Japanese force of two battleships, one cruiser and 12 destroyers. In column formation, the San Francisco charged up the middle of the fleet between the two Japanese battleships. It was a broadside free-for-all slugfest at point-blank range for 28 brawling behemoths in a sea too small.

The San Francisco’s three triple-mounted eight-inch gun turrets and assorted smaller weaponry was no match for the eight 14-inch guns of each enemy battleship. A blinding cycle of star shells burst overhead like giant flashbulbs followed by pitch-blackness while fiery red arcs of tracers crisscrossed the night sky. The ship vibrated from the thunderous blast of its own guns. Enemy shells struck nearby, spewing lethal, white-hot shards of jagged metal through the air that enveloped Bennett but left him miraculously unscathed. Turret gunners bled through their ears from the frightful cacophony and concussion of incoming and outgoing. The most powerful sensual recollection remains the odor of burning flesh.

When the shooting stopped, the San Francisco’s deck was a blazing junkyard. Eighty-six sailors, including a third of Bennett’s gun crews, were dead.

With the ship sailing in aimless circles, Bennett struggled to the bridge he had been ordered to leave. It was destroyed, and the admiral, captain and senior staff were killed. Bennett helped Lt. Cmdr. Bruce McCandless, also wounded, achieve minimal control. As they passed just offshore of Guadalcanal in the darkness, the aroma of gardenias proclaimed their deliverance.

Dawn found one cruiser and four destroyers from each side on the bottom. One Japanese battleship lay dead in the water, and the other withdrew.

Only providence explained the San Francisco’s survival. It had taken 45 major-caliber hits, including 12 14-inch shells, but they were all high-explosive incendiary projectiles, not armor piercing, because the enemy had intended to bombard Guadalcanal. The San Francisco was still afloat because it had been so close to the battleships that they could not depress their big guns enough to put holes in the ship at the waterline.

As his decimated task force limped away, Bennett spied the heart-stopping telltale wake of an enemy torpedo headed toward the San Francisco. Running erratically, it popped to the surface just off their port bow, dove again under their keel, popped up again on the starboard beam then continued on to hit the light cruiser Juneau amidships, right in the ammunition magazine, generating a massive fireball. Scrap metal rained on the San Francisco and into an empty sea where only moments before the Juneau had floated.

Later, Adm. William E. Halsey pinned the Navy Cross on Bennett’s chest.

Bennett is the epitome of what his commander in chief in a later age, Ronald Reagan, called the formidable will and moral courage of free men that is America’s exclusive weapon.

May it will always be so, and may Bennett’s heroism echo in eternity as a model for all who answer the noblest call.