More bombs were falling ahead and around the French cruiser, but there was no let-up in her reply, even when one bomb made a direct hit just abaft her bridge. Smoke and wreckage were hurled everywhere, and Rowan saw a man lifted from a gun and flung fifty feet into the wash.
The gunnery speakers kept up their constant instructions. Aircraft were attacking from ahead and from either quarter, some flying with total disregard of the barrage and the danger of collision with their own comrades as they dropped their bombs and raked the ships with machine-gun fire.
A twin-engined bomber hit the sea and planed along the bow wave of a destroyer before lifting its tail and sinking from view. Two more fell to the criss-crossing tracer and cannon shells, and another lunged out of the sky like a burning torch.
A destroyer on the wing of the group had two hits in minutes and began to settle down, her people cutting free the rafts and floats and cowering in the bombardment.
Rowan listened to Bill’s voice and those of the pilots who were at last joining him from Hustler.
‘Watch it, Frank!’
Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Their voices faded and boomed through the barrage like lost souls in bedlam.
‘Here comes another!’ A lookout trained his glasses and snapped on his intercom. ‘Single aircraft at Green four-five!’
A small fighter-bomber was flying on a straight course diagonally to the ships’ line of advance. Gun crews, realising the aircraft was unsupported, concentrated their defences, and soon the air around the Zero was black with shellbursts and tracer.
‘Got him!’
Rowan watched the Zero stagger and a large portion of wing spiral away to the sea. But the pilot did not bale out, nor did he alter course by one degree, despite the growing cone of fire being directed into him.
Rowan followed him round with his glasses, propping himself against the screen to take the weight off his strapped leg.
The Japanese pilot was passing astern now, would he soon hit the –?
Something solid moved into his lens. It was Hustler’s flight deck, and he could see the parked Swordfish by her round-down preparing to take-off, though God alone knew what they could do.
He shouted harshly, ‘Tell the bridge! That Zero is going to crash-land on Hustler!’
The detonation, when it came, was muffled. The Zero hit the wooden flight deck and exploded as it tore through like a rocket. The impact rolled across the water and hit Growler with the force of a typhoon.
Everyone was yelling at once, and horrified, Rowan saw a wall of flame bursting up through Hustler’s deck, the smoke being forced from her hull and gun sponsons by more internal explosions.
‘Aircraft bearing Green nine-oh! Angle of sight four-five!’
Rowan snapped, ‘Hello, Bill, this is Jonah. Bandit attacking us from starboard beam. See if you can get him.’
He saw the familiar Seafire plunging through smoke from a sinking destroyer and gunfire as Bill went into a power dive.
There was no mistaking the newcomer’s intention. He was going to crash on Growler. A human bomb.
The gunnery officer was well aware of the danger, and every weapon which would bear, plus those from the two nearest escorts, were hosing the air between plane and ship with rapid fire.
Rowan licked his lips, seeing his friend come hurtling towards the ships. He had seen him do it so often, with the ease of a lifelong professional.
He watched the guns glitter along the Seafire’s wings, the fragments ripping from the brightly painted Zero before it exploded with a tremendous bang, making tiny feathers of spray over a quarter of a mile apart.
Bill pulled out of his dive and thundered over Chadwick’s flag, shouting. ‘There’s another bastard coming for you, Tim!’
The other Zero had plunged through the smoke between two frigates as if it were crashing, then with engine whining in protest pulled round the French cruiser’s stern almost at sea-level, and even now was lifting up and towards Growler’s port bow.
Creswell was yelling on the intercom, ‘Got you, mate!’ Then he screamed, and seconds later his fighter hit the water and broke up.
Rowan could feel the helm going over, the great effort of screw and rudder as Buchan tried to work his ship out of danger.
The Japanese pilot was either wounded or had lost control, for at the last second he pulled out of the dive, staggered in mid-air through a burst of machine-gun fire and fell within yards of Jonah Too’s remains.
The explosion was more feeling than sound. There was no daylight, and Rowan’s lungs were too scorched for him to breathe. He rubbed his streaming eyes and stared dazedly at the forward flight deck. He should not be able to see it. He was lying on his chest, his ears ringing, but he could see it.
Understanding returned reluctantly with his hearing. The front of his steel platform had been blasted away. How he had survived was nothing less than a miracle. The P.O., the communications team and even the lookout had vanished, sucked or blown outboard by the blast. Their deaths were marked only by dangling and severed wires and blood over everything.
Voices were shouting and screaming from every angle, and when he dragged himself to the shattered screen he saw the tail of the Zero at the opposite end of the flight deck, and three Swordfish, either completely wrecked or upended in the walkway. Below the bridge was a crater big enough for a bus.
But there were men already struggling through the belching smoke with hoses and extinguishers, and more stooping figures were running towards the wrecked aircraft where an officer was trying to pull himself from his cockpit, one arm ripped from his body.
Rowan wanted to vomit. He knew it was the big Dutchman, van Roijen, could almost hear him talking about his family, proudly showing his photographs.
He felt a seaman dragging at his shoulders.
‘Easy! I’m not dead yet!’
Then he realised the man was almost crazy with terror and pain. It was a bosun’s mate from the bridge staff.
‘They’re all dead up top, sir!’ He cringed down as a great explosion shook the hull. ‘I can’t find anyone!’
‘Help me!’ Rowan saw the wretched uncertainty on the man’s face. ‘Now!’
Together, while splinters clanged against hull and bridge, and the air was blasted by shells and bombs alike, they struggled to the upper bridge. Handrails were twisted like coils, and an Oerlikon gunner hung in his harness, his face contorted at the moment of impact.
The bridge was a scene of horror. Dead bodies, pieces of men were scattered amongst buckled voicepipes and shattered equipment.
Rowan dragged his leg through glass and torn clothing, clinging to the bosun’s mate, guiding him towards the forepart of the bridge, which was hanging open like a jagged door.
He saw Lieutenant Bray staring at him, his eyes very bright in the smoky sunlight. But he was dead, as were the men around him, and the admiral’s steward, Dundas, who had been hurled against the unyielding steel, his head stove in like an eggshell.
Rowan reached the captain’s chair and held on to it. It was solidly made, but now leaned sideways like reeds in a wind. Underneath it, Buchan was regarding him with glazed eyes. But he was breathing.
Rowan gasped, ‘Let’s get him up!’
But Buchan said in an almost normal voice. ‘No. Back’s broken. That bloody chair.’ The pain was coming now, making his eyes mist over. ‘Get Jolly up here. Watch for Hustler!’
Rowan held on to the buckled chair as an explosion echoed through the lower hull. The ship was out of control.
He looked at the bosun’s mate. ‘Call the commander.’ He gestured to the telephone rack. ‘Do what you can!’ If he let the terrified seaman off the bridge he’d not see him again.
A figure lurched upright between an upended flag locker and a gaping corpse. It was Chadwick. Rowan had imagined him to be in the Operations Room. Nobody down there could have survived, he thought. The Zero must have exploded right amongst them. James, Broderick, even Syms, the Met. Officer,
would have been at his action station there.
Chadwick wheezed, ‘Never mind Jolly. He’ll have his hands full below, if he’s still alive.’ He stared at his steward’s corpse and said, ‘He’ll never get that job now.’
Then his arm shot out and pointed through the shattered screen.
‘God! Look at Hustler!’
The other carrier was heeling right over, her aircraft falling alongside like broken toys, while the flames explored the hull and lit each loading port and gun sponson with sparks and fire. Ammunition was exploding, and burning fuel ran down her side like molten lava.
Rowan exclaimed tightly, ‘We’ll be into her in a moment!’
Chadwick nodded. ‘Take the con. You always said you were once a watchkeeper in a destroyer!’ He grinned, the effort bringing agony to his face like a mask.
Rowan almost fell on the voicepipes as another bomb exploded on the opposite beam and hurled pieces of metal and aircraft high over the bridge. He should have realised. Chadwick had been badly hit. There was blood on his legs and spreading on the deck by his feet. It was taking all his strength to appear in control.
‘Bridge – wheelhouse!’ Rowan ducked as more oddments from the radar position rolled over the chart house and down to the deck below.
‘Wheelhouse, sir!’
It was the coxswain’s voice, which was reassuring.
‘Starboard ten!’ He crouched over the gyro repeater and wiped the face free of blood and dust. He tried to avoid Bray’s unwinking stare as he watched the quietly ticking compass.
‘Midships. Steer one-five-zero.’ Thank God, the helm was still responding.
Chadwick groped for his glasses and let them fall to his chest again. He was staring at the other carrier, at the crackling flames which were consuming her insides from bow to stern.
‘Course one-five-zero.’
A sick berth attendant and men with stretchers clattered through the smoke and stood appalled by the entrance.
Rowan said, ‘See to the captain. He’s by the chair.’
To Chadwick he added, ‘What about you, sir?’
The S.B.A. stood up. ‘He’s dead, sir.’
Rowan looked down at Buchan’s face. ‘I didn’t know.’
‘Well then.’ Chadwick pulled out a silver hip flask. ‘That answers your question, Mr Rowan, I’ll stay here.’
He lurched against the voicepipes again as a new pattern of bombs came thundering across the zigzagging ships. Some had obviously hit their targets, the bomb-aimers taking full advantage of the suicide attacks earlier.
Then he said thickly, ‘Kamikaze they call themselves. The Divine Wind. According to that fool James they’ve already done for two American carriers the other day.’ He groaned, but took a long swallow from the flask. ‘Now. Get the bosun’s mate to find Jolly. Tell him I want to fly-on all the group’s aircraft while there’s still a deck left.’
Two more ratings had arrived and were huddled by the rearmost telephones.
Rowan looked at them. ‘Get the most senior pilot you can find. Lieutenant Commander Dexter is still on board.’
But Dexter was dead too, and the task of guiding the surviving aircraft from Hustler and Growler to the remaining length of flight deck fell to Bats making hand signals, assisted by a youthful telegraphist using an Aldis lamp.
Chadwick watched in silence as his command continued to fight back. If he was dying on his feet he showed no sign of leaving the bridge until the attack was finished. One way or the other.
‘Only one Seafire has survived from our squadron, sir.’
Rowan looked at the messenger, afraid to ask, and unable to see for himself which one had managed to land-on.
Chadwick was nearer the side, and said vaguely, ‘It’s your ball-kicking friend.’ He shook his head wearily. ‘Kitto must have bought it. Very good. For an amateur.’
The Japanese bombers made three more attacks, losing two of their number and sinking another Australian destroyer which had already been damaged.
Down the embattled ships the barrage eased, and men stood back amidst empty shell cases and dead comrades.
Chadwick said very slowly, ‘I’ll not give her a divorce, you know.’
Rowan pulled himself round, unable to grasp that Chadwick could speak like this when the enemy might attack again at any moment.
He answered quietly, ‘This group could have been wiped off the face of the sea. We’ve lost so many good men in the past two hours that victory or defeat will never come into it. Do what you like. Say what you will. But I’d never let her come back to a man like you. You’d destroy her just like everyone else.’
‘Aircraft bearing Red three-oh!’ One of the bridge speakers had come back to life.
Then with a break in his voice the unknown man said. ‘Disregard! These are friendly aircraft!’
Feet scraped through the broken glass, and Commander Jolly, as neat as ever in spite of the filth on his arms and legs, entered the bridge.
‘Fire out. Bulkheads shored up. Wounded taken below. Communications in process of being restored.’ He saw the captain’s body and looked at Rowan with astonishment. ‘I was told it was bad, but I thought he was still driving Growler.’ He covered Buchan with a bridge coat. ‘I could never imagine him dying.’
Chadwick turned his head as Bill appeared with some more spare seamen.
Rowan tried to smile, but was shaking so badly he had to hold on to the gyro with both hands.
‘Hello, Bill.’
Bill grinned, and then froze as he saw the carnage around him.
They all looked up as aircraft roared low overhead. When somebody could find a receiver which still worked they would no doubt be told who had come to the rescue. Not that they cared.
Jolly said, ‘You’d better help Tim below, I’ll take over now.’
Chadwick rasped, ‘You’ll take over nothing!’ He stepped away from the side and the silver flask fell unheeded by his blood. ‘I made this group what it is. I and nobody else had the imagination and the know-how –’ He gave a terrible cry and fell heavily on to his side.
Bill said, ‘I’ll get Minchin.’
Jolly shook his head. ‘No. I’ve seen enough dead men today. This is just one more.’
‘Signal from Spartiate, sir.’ The rating kept his eyes half closed as if to protect himself from the sights which awaited his entry. ‘Repeated from the new air escort.’ He held the pad to a bright shaft of sunlight which came through a fist-sized hole in the plating. Probably the one which had brought Chadwick’s last moments. ‘Can supply limited air cover until arrival of inshore squadron tonight. Have you ability to fly-off any aircraft yourself?’
Jolly looked from Rowan to Bill. ‘Well? That’s what I shall have to ask you two. There’s nobody else to ask.’
Rowan felt some of the tension and shock smoothing away. Like a ripple on water left by low-flying aircraft.
‘Affirmative.’ He looked down at Buchan’s body. ‘It’s what he would have said.’
Jolly nodded, studying Rowan’s face as if expecting to find the answer to something.
In his clipped, precise tone he said, ‘Make to Spartiate, repeated to air escort. We are pleased to have you with us. But normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.’
Bill put his arm round Rowan’s shoulders and helped him out on to what was left of the flying bridge.
Bill’s Seafire and a solitary Swordfish were already ranged on the flight deck.
Bill said softly, ‘Normal service indeed!’
Rowan did not answer, and was looking at the other ships, what there were of them. The cruiser, still smoking from her bomb damage. A destroyer towing a frigate, another frigate so low in the sea she looked more like a surfacing submarine. The rest, though few in numbers now, seemed untouched. But Hustler was gone, and Growler, from the look of her damage, would not be at sea again for a long, long while.
He touched the bent steel, recalling all the faces, and Buchan’s pride. Even
his last words had been a warning to Rowan to protect his ship from collision with the sinking carrier.
Overhead, the long-range aircraft which had come to look for them maintained a watchful patrol. Rowan thought of his own last flight. Back to base. To Growler. He ran his palm over the torn metal again.
Growler had been good to him when he had most needed her. As he looked at all the damage and extinguished fires along her stocky hull he was suddenly grateful that he had been aboard when she had needed him.
Epilogue
It was halfway through the forenoon on a cold March day in 1945 when H.M. Escort Carrier Growler entered Rosyth with a small group of watchful tugs and made fast to her pier.
For many of her company it was a very moving moment, as lined on the scarred flight deck, or standing at their allotted stations throughout the ship, they watched the buildings and ships gliding past, the crisp stillness only broken by the occasional trill of calls as the ships made their salutes and returned them.
And for others it was something of a mystery. Unknown to themselves, they were not merely replacements for the many who had died or been badly wounded five months earlier just south of Sumatra. They were standing-in for those same men as Growler came home.
To the dockyard men and tug skippers she was just one more responsibility in a port and dockyard which had become conditioned to such matters. But the tugs gave her a hoot or two, and from the jetty a small crowd of onlookers who waited to meet the ship waved and called, their voices still lost in distance.
Rowan stood on the bridge, his glasses scanning the upturned faces as the first heaving lines went ashore. Mostly officials and a few privileged relatives. He saw a pilot he had first met aboard when he had joined Growler. That was two years ago. It did not seem so long now. The pilot had been promoted and sent to another ship. But he had heard Growler was coming back and had been waiting with the others to see her dock.
Rowan glanced at the crude welding and fresh paint which scarcely hid the damage she had received in the last battle. Poor, beat-up old girl, yet she had meant that much to the pilot on the jetty, whose name he could not remember.
Winged Escort Page 30