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Rob Roberson -> 13 December 1942 (6/4/2002 10:43:55 AM)
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The destroyer cut across the harbor slowly, the water smooth as glass, unusual for this area of the world. At the wheel of the small ship, Seaman Alan Anderson loved it. He had been in rough seas during the transit of Monaghan from Pearl Harbor and the 20-year-old sailor had been at the wheel of the destroyer during one too many squalls. Turning the ship's wheel right then left, he guided the destroyer on a lazy figure eight helping her keep station with the the transports his ship was shepherding.
Looking left on this sunny Lae morning he saw his captain taking in the latest reports of enemy activity. He liked the man, believed he was a fair man to work for, not too unlike his father back in the States. He smiled at that thought, "enemy activity." The skies of New Guinea had been clear for weeks now. Not an enemy plane had so much as made an appearance. Anderson thought that a large part of that was because of the Army-Air. Their route to Huon Harbor had taken them almost adjacent to the New Guinea coastline--an area completly dominated by the allied air force. Making the transit to Lae completely safe.
Monaghan was part of a destroyer "picket" on the edge of the task force, protecting transports bearing fresh troops and supplies for the fighting land forces at Lae. Scuttlebutt was that battle was going quite well and with the Japanese all but pulling out of the area most of the sailors felt very safe in the waters of Lae.
What Anderson did not know was Army intelligence had reached the conclusion that the Japanese air power had been broken in this area. They had whittled their CAP over routine supply ship convoys in the area down quite a bit. The beat-up fighters of the New Guinea air force needed maintanence and this was the day more than 50 percent of the force was on the runways receiving it.
"Bridge port bow, aircraft off the port quarter on the horizon."
The captain turned and immediately called for General Quarters. The destroyer begin to buckle-up for combat her crew rushing to their battle stations.
Anderson began to turn the wheel hard at his captain's commands. The destroyer surged forward with all the speed she could muster. It was obvious to him that the skipper was trying to make sure his ship stayed between the aircraft and the transports. Anti-aircraft guns began barking and between Monaghan and Stockton the sky began to fill up with that deadly metal rapidly.
"Bridge Jap bombers coming in low off the starboard side."
Anderson continued to respond to his captain's navigational commands automatically, but inside he worried. A second set of bombers was bearing down on the ship he was on from the opposite side, that was bad.
The bombers began to peel off, after each deposited a silver torpedo in the water. The port lookout picked up the torpedo wakes immediately, the starboard lookouts could not find them...
The Monaghan turned hard to port, Anderson spinning the wheel on his Captain's commands the destroyer screws clawing for water, as she desperately tried to avoid the incomming torpedos...
As fast as the small boy was she couldn't avoid the entire spread of torpedos coming at her both port and starboard. One struck her just under her number on the port side, the impact sending most of the bridge crew flying forward into the bulkhead. The destroyer suddenly was moving straight as Anderson was thrown over the wheel. A second torpedo, one of the invisible starboard ones, struck her in the stern of the small ship, shearing off 30 feet of it. Water began to pour inside parts of the ship never meant to see the outside sun. So quickly did she fill with water that most of the crew never would see the sun again.
Anderson was picked up within an hour of Monaghan's sinking, but many of his friends were gone. Anderson wondered--like many--where were the fighters?
The toll at the end of the day was two destroyers and several transports. Later that night a submarine attacked the task force and another destroyer was sunk. The commanding Air General in New Guinea was sacked and his boss the commanding Admiral of all forces SoPac/SWPac received a stern tongue-lashing from CinCPac. Never again would CAP be so lax in a combat theatre.
The Japanese clearly were not ready to give up the area without a fight.
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