rapidly closing Japanese destroyers. The Pennsylvania was alone now, and had to keep the enemy destroyers as far away as possible.
The Pennsylvania’s gunners were both lucky and good. One fourteen-inch shell hit a Japanese destroyer, which exploded and disappeared. This caused the remaining three to pull farther out of range, although they continued to shadow the American ship.
Two hours later a floatplane was sighted on the horizon, and everyone on the Pennsylvania knew that the Jap battle fleet had sighted her. There would be no escape to California. Jamie was further disconcerted to realize that the Japanese were approaching from the north and not from the west. He realized there had to have been two Japanese task forces, and they had blundered into range of the second one.
Shortly after they were sighted, shells began to rain down on the Pennsylvania. At extreme range, none hit, but the splashes were greater than anything they’d seen before.
“Sixteen-inchers,” Fiorini said. “Maybe larger. Probably eighteens.”
Jamie laughed. “Ain’t nothing bigger than sixteen-inchers, and I don’t think the Japs have any of those. Besides, who made you an authority on big guns?”
Others in the party laughed nervously. Fiorini had been in the paymaster’s office and helped run the battleship’s newspaper. Fiorini was not deterred. “Sixteens at least,” he said, and the others hooted. It was good to be distracted, if only for a moment.
The Pennsylvania was struck by a pair of shells, and she shook like she was in an earthquake. Jamie was again knocked to his knees and, when he got up, saw flames and dark smoke pouring from the gaping ruin that had been her bridge. He wondered if Captain Cooke was still commanding the battleship. Then he wondered if anyone was.
The Pennsylvania was well within range of the Japanese guns that were still below the horizon, and she began to absorb additional punishment. At first Jamie and his crew tried to make emergency repairs, but it quickly became apparent that the Pennsylvania was doomed and that life above decks was a red-hot hell of raining shell fragments and flying debris.
Bloodily dismembered bodies were piled about, and wounded, many horribly mangled, lay screaming where they fell. Some of the unhurt ran around in confusion and blind terror, interfering with those who were trying to do their duty and fight the ship. Walking was difficult because of the blood that ran down the decks, and several of Jamie’s group were hit by debris and body parts. One sailor was swept overboard by a metal fragment, while another was killed when a human arm was driven through his chest like a spear.
Jamie took the survivors belowdecks, where they were shielded from the deadly rain. Anyone not in a turret or protected by the ship’s armor was going to die and very quickly. The battleship was fighting back, as the sound of her guns attested, but it seemed that the rate of fire was diminishing as the Japanese shells found their targets.
In the midst of the horror, Fiorini grabbed his arm. “Come with me, Lieutenant. You gotta see this.”
Jamie followed Fiorini down another couple of decks. The electricity was flickering, and Jamie was afraid he would be trapped in the dark bowels of a sinking ship, like the men in the Oklahoma, and the fear almost paralyzed him.
Fiorini read his thoughts. “Just through here, sir. Remember the hit that didn’t explode?”
“Yeah,” Jamie said nervously. It had happened a few moments earlier, when a shell slammed into the ship only a few dozen feet from them and they all thought they were dead. While they’d gasped in relief, Fiorini had disappeared for a moment.
Finally, Fiorini paused. “Look at her, but don’t touch. She’s still hot and may go off.”
“Jesus Christ.”
Embedded in the decking was a monstrous shell. Its head was buried and out of sight, but the base was fully visible. Jamie was a gunnery officer, and it was larger than anything he had ever seen.
“Hold this,” Fiorini said, handing him a tape measure. Jamie complied and measured the shell’s diameter. Eighteen inches! It was incredible; no, impossible. The Japs were firing eighteen-inch shells against them. He’d been told that nobody had eighteen-inchers, but he was staring at one.
Fiorini pulled a small camera from his work bag and took several flash pictures while Jamie held the tape. Jamie was about to comment on the camera when he recalled Fiorini’s work on the ship’s paper.
“These could be important,” Fiorini said, and Jamie agreed.
“But first we got to get them out of here.”
Somebody hollered that the ship was sinking, and they returned to the fury of the outside world as another Japanese salvo pounded them. By this time, the deck was only a few feet above the water, and the ship was tilted several degrees to starboard. Sailors were leaving the stricken vessel and were able to do so almost by stepping into the water.
“Who gave the order to abandon ship?” Jamie asked.
“No one,” came the reply. There was no one left to give the command. The venerable old Pennsylvania was defenseless, out of control, and sinking. The remaining turrets had been smashed, and the flame-charred guns were pointed in odd directions. Worse, it appeared that the ship was turning slowly in the direction of the Japanese, the tops of whose ships were now clearly visible as they emerged on the horizon. Jamie counted two battleships and then a third, and the third was a monster. He knew where the eighteen-inch shells had come from.
Jamie, Fiorini, and scores of others stepped from the deck into the water. They swam toward floating debris while the doomed battleship moved slowly past them with stately dignity as shells continued to rain down, killing many of the men in the water. Jamie thanked the facts that he had his life jacket on and that he was an excellent swimmer.
When he reached the debris, he gathered several dozen survivors and lashed debris together to form a raft. While they worked, the Pennsylvania continued to absorb punishment as she turned slowly away from the men floating in the water. Either someone was making a heroic charge at the enemy or the ship’s rudder was stuck. Jamie thought it was the rudder. He didn’t think anyone was in control of the battleship. Looking at the now burning hulk, he doubted that anyone was even alive, much less guiding the vessel.
Jamie watched as the uneven struggle ended. Fiorini continued to take pictures, and Jamie wondered how he’d kept his camera dry.
“Rubber pouch” was the answer. Fiorini then unloaded the film and put it in the pouch. The camera he tossed into the ocean. “No more film.”
Moments later the Pennsylvania sank by the bow with the giant Japanese battleship virtually alongside her. When it was over, the Japanese ships began to pick up American survivors. Jamie’s party was a couple of miles away by this time, but they had no hopes of going undetected.
“We’re gonna be prisoners?” Fiorini asked. “I think I’d rather stay in the water and take my chances with the sharks.”
Jamie had heard how the Japs treated their prisoners and prayed he’d survive the ordeal.
“They’re leaving,” someone yelled. It was true. The Jap ships were all turning away at high speed and leaving them in the water. When they were several miles away, the giant battleship must have spotted their group and opened fire with its smaller-caliber secondary batteries. That their target was tiny kept the survivors from being directly hit, but the splashes and concussion knocked them all off their improvised rafts and into the water.
Jamie pulled himself back onto some debris. Fiorini bobbed up beside him and handed him the camera pouch. Jamie took it and was about to pull Fiorini out of the water when another shell landed nearby, covering him with spray and nearly knocking him back into the ocean. Fiorini’s face registered surprise and went slack. Then his eyes rolled back in his head and he disappeared into the ocean. The concussion from the shell had created a surge of water pressure that had squashed the life out of him and somehow spared Jamie.
The firing ceased. The Japanese were almost out of sight and over the horizon. Jamie counted about twenty survivors, many of whom were badly hurt. A second tally told him that he was the only officer, and that there was no food or water.
He laughed bitterly. He was the commander of the crew of the Pennsylvania. At least the killing had stopped. Now all they had to do was survive.
Admiral Chester Nimitz established his command at San Diego, which disappointed some of his officers,
