by Bruce Gamble
The timing of the break could not have been more advantageous. Without warning, two B-26s appeared over the rim of the caldera to the southwest. The Marauders stayed low, hugging the contours of Tunnel Hill as they raced toward Simpson Harbor at 250 miles per hour. The B-26 flown by 1st Lt. Richard W. Robinson veered to the right, heading toward Lakunai airdrome; the other, piloted by 1st Lieutenant George F. Kahle, Jr., made straight for the Government Wharf and Komaki Maru.
In full view of the prisoners and hundreds of Japanese, four 500-pound bombs detached from the bomb bay of the low-level Marauder. The first exploded in the water just ahead of the ship’s bow; the next two were direct hits, one on the forward main deck, the other aft; and the fourth landed just astern of the vessel. The Komaki Maru shuddered under the impact of the two hits, which ignited the cargo of aviation fuel. “A few seconds later,” recalled an Australian eyewitness, “the ship was an inferno and the roar of the flames almost drowned the screams of the Japanese trapped aboard.”
Overhead, Kahle closed his bomb bay doors and accelerated from the target area. Across the harbor, Robinson scattered 100-pounders on the dispersal area of Lakunai airdrome while his gunners strafed targets of opportunity, including a moored Kawanishi flying boat. The sky all around the two Marauders erupted with angry black bursts from shore emplacements, but to no effect. As a Japanese soldier later noted: “Our antiaircraft guns and machine guns fired fiercely but were unable to score.”
Two patrolling Zeros also gave chase, though their attempt was in vain. The B-26s not only boasted the most powerful radial engines available but were fitted with four-blade propellers, giving them a slight speed advantage that even the Zero pilots had to grudgingly acknowledge. South of Rabaul, however, a third Marauder appeared from the opposite direction, flying toward Rabaul about a thousand feet below the Zeros. Piloted by 1st Lt. William A. Garnett, commanding officer of the 33rd Bombardment Squadron, the B-26 had taken off almost an hour behind schedule due to complications at Port Moresby.
Recently selected for promotion to captain, Bill Garnett was popular with his men and highly regarded as an administrator. But he did not fly often, nor did he currently have his own bomber or even a regular crew. A few weeks earlier, he had wrecked his B-26 (and a citizen’s house) during a landing mishap in Australia. Tapped to lead the Rabaul mission, Garnett borrowed a plane and then pieced together a crew. Some of the men had plenty of flight experience, including the radio operator, thirty-one-year-old Tech. Sgt. Theron K. Lutz of New Jersey. Others were rookies. Corporal Sanger E. Reed, a nineteen-year-old mechanic, had volunteered for the mission—his first combat sortie—and served as Garnett’s engineer/tail gunner. The crew’s trouble began early. As the six Marauders parked at Port Moresby went through start-up procedures on the morning of April 18, Garnett could not get either engine running. He flooded the carburetors, and then drained the batteries while cranking the electric starters. Young Reed watched in silence. “I was the engineer,” he said, “but in those days a corporal did not make suggestions to captains that were having trouble. You kept your eyes down and didn’t make any noise. He ran the batteries down, so then we had to pull the props through by hand to clear them.”
Because of the delay, Garnett delegated the lead to another pilot, and the rest of the Marauders departed. Finally, after getting an off-duty pilot to start the engines, Garnett and his crew got airborne some fifty minutes late. The original plan called for the formation to take a wide detour around the northern end of New Britain and then turn to attack Rabaul from the northwest. Garnett apparently reasoned that if he approached Rabaul directly from the south, he could erase much of the time deficit. He was unaware that three Marauders had already turned back because of a massive weather system over the Solomon Sea. The two that pressed on, flown by Kahle and Robinson, had not followed the planned detour either. Instead they flew straight to Rabaul, dropped their bombs, and were racing for home when Garnett approached them from the opposite direction.
Kahle and Robinson flashed by Garnett, a thousand feet over his head. Fast on their heels came the pursuing Zeros, which subsequently broke away from the retreating Marauders and went after Garnett’s bomber instead. Corporal Reed, manning the .50-caliber machine gun in the tail, watched the enemy fighters close the gap. “We couldn’t get away,” he later recalled. “Garnett tried to dive fast enough to get away from them, but the first plane caught up with us.”
Flying the lead Zero was twenty-four-year-old Lt. j.g. Jun-ichi Sasai, commander of the 2nd Chutai in the Tainan Air Group. The son of a navy captain, he was a rising star in the Imperial Navy and had earned the nickname “Gamecock” because of his determination. Now, with two victories already to his credit, he approached Garnett’s bomber from above and behind. The advantages of speed and altitude favored Sasai, but Sanger Reed, the Marauder’s young tail gunner, fired first. He saw the Zero emit smoke, but Sasai may have simply pushed the throttle to full power, for his Zero had sustained no damage.
In the Plexiglas dorsal turret of the B-26, Cpl. Reese S. Davies aimed his twin “fifties” to the rear and opened fire at Sasai, but after discharging just two rounds, the guns fell silent.
Standing at one of the .30-caliber waist guns in the fuselage, Sergeant Lutz heard the two rounds go off and wondered if the turret guns had jammed. The more plausible explanation is that Davies was killed or incapacitated when Sasai opened fire. There is no doubt that the chutai leader’s shooting was accurate: Sasai’s bullets and explosive shells ripped into the right engine of the Marauder, probably puncturing a fuel tank. The engine burst into flames and the fire spread rapidly across the wing, prompting someone in the cockpit to activate the bailout alarm.
Lutz moved aft to warn Reed, who was now shooting at the second Zero. “Lutz was pounding me on the back and telling me to bail out,” Reed remembered. “I realized then that the alarm bell was ringing. I pulled the pin on the gun tripod and pushed it ahead, and started to climb out over it. When I got part way out, I could see that our right engine and wing were on fire. At this time I saw the front escape hatch go flying over my head. So, somebody was trying to get out the front. As I tried to get out, my foot got caught on the tripod, and I couldn’t get back in because of the slipstream. Sergeant Lutz reached down and jerked my foot loose and away I went—my first parachute jump, and my last.”
Reed’s chute popped open and he began to rotate slowly. He caught brief glimpses of the Marauder, almost completly engulfed in flames, as it plummeted into the sea near the shoreline. No one else bailed out except Lutz, who followed Reed by jumping from the tail gun position.
Drifting down into a coconut grove, Reed sustained nothing more serious than a few scratches. While brushing himself off, he looked up and saw Lutz descending toward St. George’s Channel. After hiding his parachute under some bushes, Reed ran to the water’s edge in time to see Lutz swimming around a small promontory toward the opposite shore of a bay. Reed hurried along the beach toward Lutz’s position, but as he rounded the promontory he came face to face with a Japanese patrol. There was no point in trying to evade them, so Reed raised his hands, becoming the first American airman captured in the New Guinea region.
The Japanese sent natives in an outrigger canoe to pick up Lutz, who soon joined Reed on the beach. The two captives were then marched to what Reed described as “a Japanese rest camp,” probably near Vunapope. The information is supported in the diary of an unnamed Kempeitai officer: “An enemy plane was shot down near Higashisaki. No. 9 Company captured a signal sergeant and engineer corporal who had parachuted from their plane.” (The Japanese word Higashisaki, meaning “East Point,” identified the tip of the Gazelle Peninsula. The 9th Infantry Company was an element of Colonel Kuwada’s 3rd Infantry Battalion, encamped near Vunapope.)
Within an hour, a Buick sedan adorned with Japanese flags arrived at the camp. A Kempeitai officer jumped out and made the Americans stand at attention. “He had a riding crop and proceeded to beat the p
iss out of us,” remembered Reed. “When his arm got tired he’d switch hands and keep beating on us, the whole time yelling and screaming. Of course, we couldn’t understand a word he was saying.”
Lutz and Reed later discovered why the officer was so agitated. Thirteen miles to the north, the Komaki Maru burned uncontrollably. Its cargo of ammunition began to explode, adding to the wholesale destruction. At least eleven of the ship’s crew perished along with eleven members of the Tainan Air Group who were still aboard, and some thirty-one were wounded. Army casualties, although not recorded, were heavy according to Captain Hutchinson-Smith.
No one could get near the ship to fight the conflagration, which became even more intense when oil from the ship’s ruptured fuel tanks ignited. Fanned by the wind, the burning slick spread across the surface of the harbor, forcing other ships to move to safer anchorages.
Long into the night, the fires and explosions continued unabated. A Japanese observer noted, “The noise caused by the explosion of the projectiles and the rise of flames sky-high in the darkness made a gruesome scene.” The most spectacular explosion occurred shortly after 1900 hours, when the bombs stored deep in the hull erupted with a blast “that seemed to crumble heaven and earth.” Flaming debris rained down onto storage sheds along the wharf, setting those buildings afire. “All at once,” wrote the unidentified witness, “the situation was critical, because there were considerable provisions and ammunition within, and all around the vicinity there were mountains of [stockpiled] gasoline and oil. The ammunition exploded repeatedly, fuel fires flared up, and the area was a sea of flames.”
By some miracle not a single POW was hurt. However, several made the mistake of displaying their glee in front of the Japanese. “They must all be very happy after seeing today’s bombings,” wrote one observer. “Among them were some who clapped their hands. All the members of my unit who heard this agreed that [we should] kill them off one after another.”
Although no POWs were executed that night, an officer and an enlisted man were severely punished for laughing while the Komaki Maru exploded. First, the Japanese lined up all of the Lark Force officers on the parade ground, then forced them to watch as a dozen guards wielding stout wooden sticks pummeled the two offenders for thirty minutes.
WITHIN DAYS of the sinking, Vice Admiral Inoue began preparations for “MO” Operation, the dual invasions of Tulagi and Port Moresby. On April 21, with the Tainan Air Group and Rabaul’s land-attack units at full combat readiness, the aerial campaign against Port Moresby resumed. The Japanese attacked more ferociously than ever, generally with at least one full chutai of Type 1 bombers escorted by fifteen or more Zeros. Despite a valiant effort by 75 Squadron, the onslaught exacted a steady toll on the defenders.
A midday fight over Port Moresby on April 24 was typical of the David-versus-Goliath encounters. A dozen Zeros, one of them flown by Saburo Sakai, another by Hiroyoshi Nishizawa, strafed Seven Mile airdrome. “We swooped down on six B-26 bombers, fifteen P-40s, and one P-39, all of which seemed to be evacuating the field,” recalled Sakai. “We tallied two bombers and six P-40s as definite kills, with a probable for the P-39. After the one-sided air battle we continued up to Moresby [harbor], strafing and burning one anchored PBY.”
To their great frustration, neither Sakai nor Nishizawa scored any victories on this occasion. And, contrary to Sakai’s account, the Aussies put up only six Kittyhawks. Three were shot down or forced down, with one pilot killed in action.
Les Jackson and twenty-year-old Sgt. Robert W. Crawford were at five thousand feet when they saw at least three Zeros attacking a Marauder. They dived to intervene, and Jackson claimed a victory, but two of the Zeros performed rapid wingovers and got behind Crawford in the blink of an eye. The armor plating behind the seat undoubtedly saved Crawford’s life, but he suffered minor wounds nonetheless—and his fighter was sieved with holes. When the rudder cables were shot away, he had no choice but to ditch offshore.
Pilot Officer Oswald J. Channon was leading the other four Kittyhawks at twenty-five thousand feet when one of the pilots spotted Zeros almost three miles below. Plunging downward from the cold upper atmosphere into warm, humid air, the Kittyhawks’ canopies fogged up. The pilots zoomed back up to clear their windscreens, but Channon evidently became the victim of an opportunistic Zero. His P-40 was found later that day near a village, Channon’s body still inside the wreckage.
Sergeant Michael S. “Mick” Butler was shot down when the oil cooler in his P-40 was punctured during a brief but intense dogfight. Butler made a forced landing that severely damaged the aircraft, but he lived to fight again. Meanwhile, the Zeros conducted several strafing attacks that destroyed a Catalina and two parked Marauders. Overall it was a costly day for Port Moresby’s defenders.
AS THE MONTH of April wore on, the aerial punches and counterpunches intensified. Major General Brett assumed command of the Allied air forces on April 20, and during the next ten days American bombers conducted at least eight raids against Rabaul and Lae. The weary crews of the 40th Recon Squadron, the only heavy bombardment unit to hit New Britain thus far, finally received some help. The men and equipment of the 7th Bomb Group were absorbed into the 19th Bomb Group, whose squadrons were scattered all over northern Queensland. After a few weeks of training and refurbishing, the 30th Bomb Squadron at Cloncurry was ready to commence combat missions, with additional squadrons soon to follow.
The newcomers learned the hard way that New Guinea itself could be as hazardous as the enemy. On the afternoon of April 24, four B-17Es of the 30th Bomb Squadron landed at Seven Mile and refueled for their first Rabaul mission, scheduled for early the next morning. Taxiing commenced at approximately 0300, but the lead Fortress tilted into a muddy crater and became firmly stuck. The remaining B-17s took off at the prescribed time and began to join up while climbing in the darkness toward Rabaul, but the last of the three never rendezvoused. It had crashed into the upper slopes of Mt. Obree, instantly killing all eight crewmen. Back at Seven Mile, the mired Fortress was also destroyed despite the crew’s best efforts to pull it free. Shortly after 0800, fifteen Zeros of the Tainan Air Group strafed the airdrome, and the Fortress went up in flames.
Two days later, an attack by nine Type 1 bombers and eleven Zeros caused mayhem in the dispersal area at Seven Mile, destroying three A-24s and a B-26. The following day, Flg. Off. Montague D. Ellerton of 75 Squadron took off for Townsville in a Kittyhawk that needed depot-level maintenance. A veteran of the fighting in North Africa, Ellerton was approaching the Australian mainland when he spotted a P-39 that had made an emergency landing on a wide stretch of beach. Thinking he could assist the American pilot, Ellerton attempted a conventional landing on the beach, but the Kittyhawk’s wheels dug into the soft sand and flipped the fighter onto its back. Trapped upside down in the cockpit, the twenty-three-year-old Ellerton drowned in the rising tide.
By April 28, 75 Squadron was down to just five serviceable P-40s. John Jackson stood the alert duty that morning along with Barry Cox, Pete Masters, John Brereton, and Sgt. William D. Cowe. Two of the pilots, Cox and Masters, had just been released from the field hospital following severe bouts of dysentery. Still feeling ill, they flew anyway.
Shortly after 1100 hours, Leigh Vial radioed a warning that a Japanese raid was inbound from Lae. The pilots scrambled aloft, initially climbing southward to gain altitude before turning north toward the Japanese. Jackson spotted them first: eight Type 1 bombers at twenty thousand feet or above, plus eleven Zeros perched even higher. He swung the Kittyhawks eastward to gain more altitude and then turned to approach the bombers from below. Climbing steeply, the Aussies pushed the fighters to the very edge of their performance envelope.
Predictably, the Allison V-12 engines lost horsepower above sixteen thousand feet. The Kittyhawks’ airspeed bled off rapidly, and Masters was barely making headway by the time he maneuvered into position to shoot at one of the bombers above him. As soon as he opened fire, the recoil caused his f
ighter to stall. Tumbling earthward in an inverted spin, he could hear Jackson “shouting epithets” over the radio.
Jackson, despite all of his experience, had also gotten himself into a stall. Against a superior number of agile Zeros, it was a terrible position to be in. For a few agonizing moments, his Kittyhawk hung almost motionless in the air, completely vulnerable to the Zeros and rikko gunners. Brereton and Cox, trying to stay on Jackson’s wing, evidently stalled as well. Bullets suddenly pierced Brereton’s fighter, wounding him. He got out of danger, but Jackson and Cox were not so fortunate.
No one knows exactly what happened. Both Kittyhawks were seen to fall uncontrollably. One came down in a screaming vertical dive, striking a hill behind Mount Lawes with such force that its engine was buried six feet deep; the other also dove straight down at tremendous speed but smashed into a swamp. The wreckage of the latter was not located for months.
Les Jackson, hospitalized with an intestinal virus, got up from his cot upon learning of the combat and went with the squadron doctor to the mountain crash site. Initially there was some uncertainty about whose remains had been collected by AIF troops at the scene, but Les didn’t have to look. Upon learning that the troops had found a foot in a size ten boot, he knew it was John’s.
THE NEXT DAY was Emperor Hirohito’s forty-first birthday. All across Japan, and on every military post, airfield, and ship throughout the empire, the event was treated as a national holiday. At Lae, the men of the Tainan Air Group gathered for a special breakfast. “All sailors with any cooking experience joined the kitchen staff,” remembered Saburo Sakai, “and prepared the best possible breakfast from the limited supplies available.”