USS Yorktown (CV-5)

USS Yorktown (CV-5)
USS Yorktown (CV-5)
	USS Yorktown in July 1937
Name:	USS Yorktown (CV-5)
Namesake:	The Battle of Yorktown
Ordered:	3 August 1933
Builder:	Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Co.
Laid down:	21 May 1934
Launched:	4 April 1936
Sponsored by:	Eleanor Roosevelt
Commissioned:	30 September 1937
In service:	1937
Out of service:	1942
Struck:	2 October 1942
Honors and; awards:	3 battle stars American Defense Service Medal; ("A" device)/American Campaign Medal / Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal (3 stars) / World War II Victory Medal
Fate:	Sunk 7 June 1942
General characteristics
Class & type:	Yorktown-class aircraft carrier
Type:	Aircraft Carrier
Displacement:	As built:; 19,800 long tons (20,100 t) light; 25,500 long tons (25,900 t) full load
Length:	As built: 770 ft (230 m) (waterline @ design draft); 824 ft 9 in (251.38 m) overall
Beam:	As built: 83 ft 3 in (25.37 m) (waterline); 109 ft 6 in (33.38 m) (overall)
Draft:	25 ft 11.5 in (7.912 m) (as built)
Propulsion:	9 × Babcock & Wilcox boilers,; 4 × Parsons geared turbines,; 120,000 shp (89 MW); 4 × screws
Speed:	32.5 knots (37.4 mph; 60.2 km/h)
Range:	12,500 nautical miles (23,200 km; 14,400 mi) at 15 knots (17 mph; 28 km/h)
Complement:	2,217 officers and men (1941)
Sensors and ; processing systems:	CXAM RADAR from 1940
Armament:	As built: 8 × single 5 in/38 cal guns; 4 × quad 1.1 in/75 cal guns; 24 × .50 caliber machine guns; From February 1942: 8 × 5 in/38 cal; 4 × Quad 1.1 in/75 cal; 24 20mm Oerlikon guns; 24 × .50 caliber machine guns;
Armor:	As built:; 2.5-4 inch belt; 60 lb protective decks; 4 inch bulkheads; 4 inch side and 3 inch top round conning tower; 4 inch side over steering gear
Aircraft carried:	As built:; 90 aircraft; 3 × elevators; 2 × flight deck hydraulic catapults; 1 × hangar deck hydraulic catapults

For other ships of the same name, see USS Yorktown.

USS Yorktown (CV-5) was an aircraft carrier commissioned in the United States Navy from 1937 until she was sunk at the Battle of Midway in June 1942. She was named after the Battle of Yorktown in 1781 and the lead ship of the Yorktown class which was designed after lessons learned from operations with the large converted battlecruiser Lexington class and the smaller purpose-built Ranger. She represented the epitome of U.S. pre-war carrier design.

Early career[]

Yorktown was laid down on 21 May 1934 at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Co.; launched on 4 April 1936; sponsored by Eleanor Roosevelt; and commissioned at the Naval Operating Base (NOB), Norfolk, Virginia, on 30 September 1937, Capt. Ernest D. McWhorter in command.

After fitting out, the aircraft carrier trained in Hampton Roads, Virginia and in the southern drill grounds off the Virginia capes into January 1938, conducting carrier qualifications for her newly embarked air group.

Yorktown sailed for the Caribbean on 8 January 1938 and arrived at Culebra, Puerto Rico, on 13 January. Over the ensuing month, the carrier conducted her shakedown, touching at Charlotte Amalie, St Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands; Gonaïves, Haiti; Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and Cristóbal, Panama Canal Zone. Departing Colon Bay, Cristobal, on 1 March, Yorktown sailed for Hampton Roads, arrived on 6 March, and shifted to the Norfolk Navy Yard the next day for post-shakedown availability.

After undergoing repairs through the early autumn of 1938, Yorktown shifted from the navy yard to NOB Norfolk on 17 October and soon headed for the Southern Drill Grounds for training.

Yorktown operated off the eastern seaboard, ranging from Chesapeake Bay to Guantanamo Bay, into 1939. As flagship for Carrier Division 2, she participated in her first war game - Fleet Problem XX - along with her sister-ship USS Enterprise (CV-6) in February 1939. The scenario for the exercise called for one fleet to control the sea lanes in the Caribbean against the incursion of a foreign European power while maintaining sufficient naval strength to protect vital American interests in the Pacific. The maneuvers were witnessed, in part, by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, embarked in the heavy cruiser USS Houston (CA-30).

The critique of the operation revealed that carrier operations - a part of the scenarios for the annual exercises since the entry of USS Langley (CV-1) into the war games in 1925 - had achieved a new peak of efficiency. Despite the inexperience of Yorktown and Enterprise - comparative newcomers to the Fleet - both carriers made significant contributions to the success of the problem. The planners had studied the employment of carriers and their embarked air groups in connection with convoy escort, antisubmarine defense, and various attack measures against surface ships and shore installations. In short, they worked to develop the tactics that would be used when war actually came.

Pacific Fleet[]

Following Fleet Problem XX, Yorktown returned briefly to Hampton Roads before sailing for the Pacific on 20 April 1939. Transiting the Panama Canal a week later, Yorktown soon commenced a regular routine of operations with the Pacific Fleet. The Second World War started on 1 September 1939, but the USA was not yet involved. Operating out of San Diego, California into 1940, the carrier participated in Fleet Problem XXI that April. Yorktown was one of six ships to receive the new RCA CXAM RADAR in 1940.^[1]

Fleet Problem XXI - a two-part exercise - included some of the operations that would characterize future warfare in the Pacific. The first part of the exercise was devoted to training in making plans and estimates; in screening and scouting; in coordination of combatant units; and in employing fleet and standard dispositions. The second phase included training in convoy protection, the seizure of advanced bases, and, ultimately, the decisive engagement between the opposing fleets. The last pre-war exercise of its type, Fleet Problem XXI contained two exercises (comparatively minor at the time) where air operations played a major role. Fleet Joint Air Exercise 114A prophetically pointed out the need to coordinate Army and Navy defense plans for the Hawaiian Islands, and Fleet Exercise 114 proved that aircraft could be used for high altitude tracking of surface forces - a significant role for planes that would be fully realized in the war to come.

With the retention of the Fleet in Hawaiian waters after the conclusion of Fleet Problem XXI, Yorktown operated in the Pacific off the west coast of the United States and in Hawaiian waters until the following spring, when the success of German U-boats preying upon British shipping in the Atlantic required a shift of American naval strength. Thus, to reinforce the U.S. Atlantic Fleet, the Navy transferred a substantial force from the Pacific including Yorktown, Battleship Division Three (the New Mexico-class battleships), three light cruisers, and 12 accompanying destroyers.

Neutrality patrol[]

Yorktown departed Pearl Harbor on 20 April 1941 in company with destroyers USS Warrington (DD-383), USS Somers (DD-381), and USS Jouett (DD-396); headed southeast, transited the Panama Canal on the night of 6–7 May, and arrived at Bermuda on 12 May. From that time until the United States entered the war, Yorktown conducted four patrols in the Atlantic, ranging from Newfoundland to Bermuda and logging 17,642 miles (28,392 km) steamed while enforcing American neutrality.

Although Adolf Hitler had forbidden his submarines to attack American ships, the men who manned the American naval vessels were not aware of this policy and operated on a wartime footing in the Atlantic.

On 28 October, while Yorktown, battleship USS New Mexico (BB-40), and other American warships were screening a convoy, a destroyer picked up a submarine contact and dropped depth charges while the convoy itself made an emergency starboard turn, the first of the convoy's three emergency changes of course. Late that afternoon, engine repairs to one of the ships in the convoy, Empire Pintail, reduced the convoy's speed to 11 knots (13 mph; 20 km/h).

During the night, the American ships intercepted strong German radio signals, indicating submarines probably in the vicinity reporting the group. Rear Admiral H. Kent Hewitt, commanding the escort force, sent a destroyer to sweep astern of the convoy to destroy the U-boat or at least to drive him under.

The next day, while cruiser scout planes patrolled overhead, Yorktown and USS Savannah (CL-42) fueled their escorting destroyers, finishing the task as dusk fell. On 30 October, Yorktown was preparing to fuel three destroyers when other escorts made sound contacts. The convoy subsequently made 10 emergency turns while USS Morris (DD-417) and USS Anderson (DD-411) dropped depth charges, and USS Hughes (DD-410) assisted in developing the contact. Anderson later made two more depth charge attacks, noticing "considerable oil with slick spreading but no wreckage."

The short-of-war period was becoming more like the real thing as each day went on. Elsewhere on 30 October, more than a month before Japanese planes attacked Pearl Harbor, U-552 torpedoed the destroyer USS Reuben James (DD-245), sinking her with a heavy loss of life, the first loss of an American warship in World War II.

After another Neutrality Patrol stint in November, Yorktown put into Norfolk on 2 December and was there five days later during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 which triggered full US entry into the Second World War.

World War II[]

Battle of the Coral Sea[]

Main article: Battle of the Coral Sea

At 15:17 the next afternoon, two Dauntlesses from VS-5 sighted a Japanese submarine, running on the surface. Three Devastators took off from Yorktown, sped to the scene, and carried out an attack that only succeeded in driving the submarine under.

On the morning of 3 May, TF11 and TF17 were some 100 miles (160 km) apart, engaged in fueling operations. Shortly before midnight, Fletcher received word from Australian-based aircraft that Japanese transports were disembarking troops and equipment at Tulagi in the Solomon Islands. Arriving soon after the Australians had evacuated the place, the Japanese landed to commence construction of a seaplane base there to support their southward thrust.

Yorktown accordingly set course northward at 27 knots (31 mph; 50 km/h). By daybreak on 4 May, she was within striking distance of the newly established Japanese beachhead and launched her first strike at 0701-18 F4F-3's of VF-42, 12 TBD's of VT-5, and 28 SBD's from VS and BY-5. Yorktown's air group made three consecutive attacks on enemy ships and shore installations at Tulagi and Gavutu on the south coast of Florida Island in the Solomons. Expending 22 torpedoes and 76 1,000 pound bombs in the three attacks, Yorktown's planes sank the destroyer Kikuzuki, three minecraft and four barges. In addition, Air Group 5 destroyed five enemy seaplanes, all at the cost of two F4F's lost (the pilots were recovered) and one TBD (whose crew was lost).

Meanwhile, that same day, TF 44, a cruiser-destroyer force under Rear Admiral Crace (RN), joined Lexington's TF11, thus completing the composition of the Allied force on the eve of the crucial Battle of the Coral Sea.

Elsewhere, to the northward, eleven troop-laden transports - escorted by destroyers and covered by the light carrier Shōhō, four heavy cruisers, and a destroyer - steamed toward Port Moresby. In addition, another Japanese task force - formed around the two Pearl Harbor veterans, carriers Shōkaku and Zuikaku, and screened by two heavy cruisers and six destroyers - provided additional air cover.

On the morning of 6 May, Fletcher gathered all Allied forces under his tactical command as TF17. At daybreak on the 7th, he dispatched Crace, with the cruisers and destroyers under his command, toward the Louisiade archipelago to intercept any enemy attempt to move toward Port Moresby.

While Fletcher moved north with his two flattops and their screens in search of the enemy, Japanese search planes located the oiler USS Neosho (AO-23) and her escort, USS Sims (DD-409) and misidentified the former as a carrier. Two waves of Japanese planes — first high level bombers and then dive bombers — attacked the two ships. Sims, her antiaircraft battery crippled by gun failures, took three direct hits and sank quickly with a heavy loss of life. Neosho was more fortunate in that, even after seven direct hits and eight near-misses, she remained afloat until, on the 11th, her survivors were picked up by USS Henley (DD-391) and her hulk sunk by the rescuing destroyer.

Neosho and Sims had performed a valuable service, drawing off the planes that might otherwise have hit Fletcher's carriers. Meanwhile, Yorktown and Lexington's planes found Shōhō and sank her. One of Lexington's pilots reported this victory with the radio message, "Scratch one flattop".

That afternoon, Shōkaku and Zuikaku - still not located by Fletcher's forces - launched 27 bombers and torpedo planes to search for the American ships. Their flight proved uneventful until they ran into fighters from Yorktown and Lexington, who proceeded to down nine enemy planes in the ensuing dogfight.

Near twilight, three Japanese planes incredibly mistook Yorktown for their own carrier and attempted to land. The ship's gunfire, though, drove them off; and the enemy planes crossed Yorktown's bow and turned away out of range. Twenty minutes later, when three more enemy pilots made the mistake of trying to get into Yorktown's landing circle, the carrier's gunners splashed one of the trio.

However, the battle was far from over. The next morning, 8 May, a Lexington search plane spotted Admiral Takeo Takagi's carrier striking force - including Zuikaku and Shōkaku. Yorktown planes scored two bomb hits on Shōkaku, damaging her flight deck and preventing her from launching aircraft; in addition, the bombs set off explosions in gasoline storage tanks and destroyed an engine repair workshop. Lexington's Dauntlesses added another hit. Between the two American air groups, the hits killed 108 Japanese sailors and wounded 40 more.

While the American planes were occupying the Japanese flattops, however, Yorktown and Lexington - alerted by an intercepted message which indicated that the Japanese knew of their whereabouts - were preparing to fight off a retaliatory strike, which came shortly after 11:00.

American CAP Wildcats downed 17 planes, though some managed to slip through the defenses. "Kates" launched torpedoes from both sides of Lexington's bows. Two "fish" tore into "Lady Lex" on the port side; "Val" dive bombers added to the destruction with three bomb hits. Lexington developed a list, with three partially flooded engineering spaces. Several fires raged below decks, and the carrier's elevators were put out of commission.

Meanwhile Yorktown was having problems of her own. Maneuvered by Captain Elliott Buckmaster, her commanding officer, the carrier dodged eight torpedoes. Attacked then by "Vals", the ship managed to evade all but one bomb. That one, however, penetrated the flight deck and exploded below decks, killing or seriously injuring 66 men.

Lexington's damage control parties brought the fires under control, and the ship was still able to continue flight operations despite the damage. The air battle itself ended shortly before noon on the 8th; within an hour, the carrier was on an even keel, although slightly down by the bow. However, an explosion caused by the ignition of gasoline vapors later caused a fire and tore apart the inside. Lexington was abandoned at 17:07, and later sunk by USS Phelps.

The Japanese had won a tactical victory, inflicting comparatively heavier losses on the Allied force, but the Allies, in stemming the tide of Japan's conquests in the South and Southwest Pacific, had achieved a strategic victory. Yorktown had not achieved her part in the victory without cost, and had suffered enough damage to cause experts to estimate that at least three months in a yard would be required to put her back in fighting trim. However, there was little time for repairs, because Allied intelligence - most notably the cryptographic unit at Pearl Harbor - had gained enough information from decoded Japanese naval messages to estimate that the Japanese were on the threshold of a major operation aimed at the northwestern tip of the Hawaiian chain - two islets in a low coral atoll known as Midway.

Battle of Midway[]

Main article: Battle of Midway

Armed with this intelligence Admiral Nimitz began methodically planning Midway's defense, rushing all possible reinforcement in the way of men, planes and guns to Midway. In addition, he began gathering his comparatively meager naval forces to meet the enemy at sea. As part of those preparations, he recalled TF16, Enterprise and Hornet (CV-8), to Pearl Harbor for a quick replenishment.

Yorktown, too, received orders to return to Hawaii; and she arrived at Pearl Harbor on 27 May, entering dry dock the following day. The damage the ship had sustained after Coral Sea was considerable, and led to the Navy Yard inspectors estimating that she would need at least two weeks of repairs. However, Admiral Nimitz ordered that she be made ready to sail alongside TF16. Yard workers there, laboring around the clock, made enough repairs to enable the ship to put to sea again in 48 hours. The repairs were made in such a short time that the Japanese Naval Commanders thought they had mistaken Yorktown for another vessel as they thought she had been sunk after the previous battle, yet she had returned. Her air group was augmented by planes and crews from USS Saratoga (CV-3) which was then headed for Hawaiian waters after her modernization on the West Coast. Yorktown sailed as the core of TF17 on 30 May.

Northeast of Midway, Yorktown, flying Rear Admiral Fletcher's flag, rendezvoused with TF16 under Rear Admiral Raymond A. Spruance and maintained a position 10 miles (16 km) to the northward of him.

Patrols, both from Midway and the carriers, were flown during early June. At dawn on 4 June Yorktown launched a 10-plane group of Dauntlesses from VB-5 which searched a northern semicircle for a distance of 100 miles (160 km) out but found nothing.

Meanwhile, PBYs flying from Midway had sighted the approaching Japanese and broadcast the alarm for the American forces defending the key atoll. Admiral Fletcher, in tactical command, ordered Admiral Spruance's TF16 to locate and strike the enemy carrier force.

Yorktown's search group returned at 0830, landing soon after the last of the six-plane CAP had left the deck. When the last of the Dauntlesses were recovered, the deck was hastily respotted for the launch of the ship's attack group: 17 Dauntlesses from VB-3, 12 Devastators from VT-3, and six Wildcats from "Fighting Three." Enterprise and Hornet, meanwhile, launched their attack groups.

The torpedo planes from the three American carriers located the Japanese striking force, but met disaster. Of the 41 planes from VT-8, VT-6, and VT-3, only six returned to Enterprise and Yorktown; none made it back to Hornet.

As a reaction to the torpedo attack the Japanese CAP had broken off their high-altitude cover for their carriers and had concentrated on the Devastators, flying "on the deck", allowing Dauntlesses from Yorktown and Enterprise to arrive unopposed.

Virtually unopposed, Yorktown's dive-bombers attacked Japanese aircraft carrier Sōryū, making three lethal hits with 1,000 pound bombs and setting her on fire.^[2] Enterprise's planes, meanwhile, hit Japanese aircraft carrier Akagi and Japanese aircraft carrier Kaga, effectively destroying them. The bombs from the Dauntlesses caught all of the Japanese carriers in the midst of refueling and rearming operations, causing devastating fires and explosions.

Three of the four Japanese carriers had been destroyed. The fourth, Japanese aircraft carrier Hiryū, separated from her sisters, launched a striking force of 18 "Vals" and soon located Yorktown.

As soon as the attackers had been picked up on Yorktown's radar at about 1329, she discontinued fueling her CAP fighters on deck and swiftly cleared for action. Her returning dive bombers were moved from the landing circle to open the area for antiaircraft fire. The Dauntlesses were ordered aloft to form a CAP. An auxiliary 800 gallon gasoline tank was pushed over the carrier's fantail, eliminating one fire hazard. The crew drained fuel lines and closed and secured all compartments.

All of Yorktown's fighters were vectored out to intercept the oncoming Japanese aircraft, and did so some 15 to 20 miles (32 km) out. The Wildcats attacked vigorously, breaking up what appeared to be an organized attack by some 18 "Vals" and 6 "Zeroes."^[3] "Planes were flying in every direction", wrote Captain Buckmaster after the action, "and many were falling in flames." The leader of the "Vals", Lieutenant Michio Kobayashi, was probably shot down by the VF-3's commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander John S. Thach. Lieutenant William W. Barnes also pressed home the first attack, possibly taking out the lead bomber and damaging at least two others. Despite an intensive barrage and evasive maneuvering, three "Vals" scored hits. Two of them were shot down soon after releasing their bomb loads; the third went out of control just as his bomb left the rack. It tumbled in flight and hit just abaft number two elevator on the starboard side, exploding on contact and blasting a hole about 10 feet (3 m) square in the flight deck. Splinters from the exploding bomb killed most of the crews of the two 1.1-inch (28 mm) gun mounts aft of the island and on the flight deck below. Fragments piercing the flight deck hit three planes on the hangar deck, starting fires. One of the aircraft, a Yorktown Dauntless, was fully fueled and carrying a 1,000 pound bomb. Prompt action by Lt. A. C. Emerson, the hangar deck officer, prevented a serious fire by activating the sprinkler system and quickly extinguishing the fire.

The second bomb to hit the ship came from the port side, pierced the flight deck, and exploded in the lower part of the funnel. It ruptured the uptakes for three boilers, disabled two boilers, and extinguished the fires in five boilers. Smoke and gases began filling the firerooms of six boilers. The men at number one boiler remained at their post and kept it alight, maintaining enough steam pressure to allow the auxiliary steam systems to function.

A third bomb hit the carrier from the starboard side, pierced the side of number one elevator and exploded on the fourth deck, starting a persistent fire in the rag storage space, adjacent to the forward gasoline stowage and the magazines. The prior precaution of smothering the gasoline system with carbon dioxide undoubtedly prevented the gasoline from igniting.

While the ship recovered from the damage inflicted by the dive-bombing attack, her speed dropped to six knots; and then at 14:40, about 20 minutes after the bomb hit that had shut down most of the boilers, Yorktown slowed to a stop, dead in the water.

At about 15:40, Yorktown prepared to get steaming again; and, at 15:50, the engine room force reported that they were ready to make 20 knots (23 mph; 37 km/h) or better.

Simultaneously, with the fires controlled sufficiently to warrant the resumption of fueling, Yorktown began refueling the fighters then on deck; just then the ship's radar picked up an incoming air group at a distance of 33 miles (53 km). While the ship prepared for battle, again smothering gasoline systems and stopping the fueling of the planes on her flight deck, she vectored four of the six fighters of the CAP in the air to intercept the raiders. Of the 10 fighters on board, eight had as little as 23 gallons of fuel in their tanks. They were launched as the remaining pair of fighters of the CAP headed out to intercept the Japanese planes.

At 16:00, maneuvering Yorktown churned forward, making 20 knots (23 mph; 37 km/h). The fighters she had launched and vectored out to intercept had meanwhile made contact with the enemy. Yorktown received reports that the planes were "Kates." The Wildcats shot down at least three, but the rest began their approach while the carrier and her escorts mounted a heavy antiaircraft barrage.

Yorktown maneuvered radically, avoiding at least two torpedoes before another two struck the port side within minutes of each other, the first at 16:20. The carrier had been mortally wounded; she lost power and went dead in the water with a jammed rudder and an increasing list to port.

As the ship's list progressed Commander C. E. Aldrich, the damage control officer, reported from central station that, without power, controlling the flooding looked impossible. The engineering officer, LCDR. J. F. Delaney, soon reported that all boiler fires were out, that all power was lost and that it was impossible to correct the list. Buckmaster ordered Aldrich, Delaney, and their men to secure and lay up on deck to put on life jackets.

The list, meanwhile, continued to increase. When it reached 26 degrees, Buckmaster and Aldrich agreed that capsizing was imminent. "In order to save as many of the ship's company as possible", the captain wrote later, he "ordered the ship to be abandoned."

Over the next few minutes the crew lowered the wounded into life rafts and struck out for the nearby destroyers and cruisers to be picked up by their boats, abandoning ship in good order. After the evacuation of all wounded, the executive officer, Commander I. D. Wiltsie, left the ship down a line on the starboard side. Buckmaster, meanwhile, toured the ship one last time, to see if any men remained. After finding no "live personnel", Buckmaster lowered himself into the water by means of a line over the stern, by which time water was lapping the port side of the hangar deck.

Salvage and sinking[]

After being picked up by the destroyer USS Hammann (DD-412), Buckmaster transferred to USS Astoria (CA-34) and reported to Rear Admiral Fletcher, who had shifted his flag to the heavy cruiser after the first dive-bombing attack. The two men agreed that a salvage party should attempt to save the ship, since she had stubbornly remained afloat despite the heavy list and imminent danger of capsizing.

While efforts to save Yorktown had been proceeding apace, her planes were still in action, joining those from USS Enterprise (CV-6) in striking the last Japanese carrier - Hiryū - late that afternoon. Taking four direct hits, the Japanese carrier was soon helpless. She was abandoned by her crew and left to drift out of control.

Yorktown, as it turned out, floated throughout the night. Two men were still alive on board her; one attracted attention by firing a machine gun, heard by the sole attending destroyer, Hughes. The escort picked up the men, one of whom later died.

Meanwhile, Buckmaster had selected 29 officers and 141 men to return to the ship in an attempt to save her. Five destroyers formed an antisubmarine screen while the salvage party boarded the listing carrier, the fire in the rag storage still smouldering on the morning of the 6th. USS Vireo (AT-144), summoned from Pearl and Hermes Reef, soon commenced towing the ship, although progress was painfully slow.

Yorktown's repair party went on board with a carefully predetermined plan of action to be carried out by men from each department - damage control, gunnery air engineering, navigation, communication, supply and medical. To assist in the work, Lt. Cdr. Arnold E. True brought his ship, USS Hammann (DD-412), alongside to starboard, aft, furnishing pumps and electric power.

By mid-afternoon, it looked as if the gamble to save the ship was paying off. The process of reducing topside weight was proceeding well - one 5-inch (127 mm) gun had been dropped over the side, and a second was ready to be cast loose; planes had been pushed over the side; the submersible pumps (powered by electricity provided by Hammann) had pumped a lot of water out of the engineering spaces. The efforts of the salvage crew had reduced the list about two degrees.

Unknown to Yorktown and the six nearby destroyers, Japanese submarine I-168 had achieved a favorable firing position. Remarkably - but perhaps understandably due to the debris and wreckage in the water in the vicinity - none of the destroyers picked up the approaching I-boat. At 15:36 lookouts spotted a salvo of four torpedoes approaching the ship from the starboard beam.

Hammann went to general quarters, a 20 millimeter gun going into action in an attempt to explode the torpedoes in the water, her screws churning the water beneath her fantail as she tried to get underway. One torpedo hit Hammann directly amidships and broke her back. The destroyer jackknifed and went down rapidly.

Two torpedoes struck Yorktown just below the turn of the bilge at the after end of the island structure. The fourth torpedo passed just astern of the carrier.

About a minute after Hammann sank there was an underwater explosion, possibly caused by the destroyer's depth charges going off. The blast killed many of Hammann's and a few of Yorktown's men who had been thrown into the water. The concussion battered the already-damaged carrier's hull and caused tremendous shocks that carried away Yorktown's auxiliary generator, sent numerous fixtures from the hangar deck overhead crashing to the deck below, sheared rivets in the starboard leg of the foremast, and threw men in every direction, causing broken bones and several minor injuries.

All destroyers immediately commenced searches for the enemy submarine (which escaped) and commenced rescuing men from Hammann and Yorktown. Captain Buckmaster decided to postpone further attempts at salvage until the following day.

Vireo cut the tow and doubled back to Yorktown to pick up survivors, taking on board many men of the salvage crew while picking up men from the water. The little ship endured a terrific pounding from the larger ship but nevertheless stayed alongside to carry out her rescue mission. Later, while on board the tug, Buckmaster conducted a burial service, and two officers and an enlisted man from Hammann were buried at sea.

The second attempt at salvage was never made. Throughout the night of the 6th and into the morning of the 7th, Yorktown remained stubbornly afloat. By 05:30 on 7 June, however, the men in the ships nearby noted that the carrier's list was rapidly increasing to port. At 07:01, the ship turned over onto her port side, rolled upside-down, and sank, stern first, in 3,000 fathoms (5,500 m) of water.

Honors and rediscovery[]

Yorktown (CV-5) earned three battle stars for her World War II service, two of them for the significant part she had played in stopping Japanese expansion and turning the tide of the war at Coral Sea and at Midway.

On 19 May 1998, the wreck of Yorktown was found and photographed by renowned oceanographer Dr. Robert D. Ballard, discoverer of the wrecks of the RMS Titanic and the German battleship Bismarck. The remains of the Yorktown, 3 miles (5 km) beneath the surface, were surprisingly intact after having been on the sea bottom since 1942; much paint and equipment were still visible.^[4] As of 2013, no subsequent expeditions to the Yorktown's wreck have been made.

In culture[]

In the 2001 science fiction novel by Connie Willis entitled Passage, one character, a loquacious elderly man named Ed Wojakowski, claims to be a World War II veteran in the United States Navy who served on the Yorktown.

"My background, huh? Well, I'll tell ya, I'm an old navy man. Served on the USS Yorktown... Aircraft carrier. Best damn one in the Pacific. Sank four carriers at the Battle of Midway before a Jap sub got her. Torpedo. Got a destroyer that was standing in the way, too. The Hammann. Went down just like that. Dead before she even knew it. Two minutes. All hands."^[5]

While unreliable (something of a psychopathical liar), Wojakowski is charming and full of truthful anecdotes, whether they happened to himself or otherwise. Willis has written extensively about war, particularly World War II, in her novels, and through her character Ed Wojakowski she celebrates numerous acts of war-time bravery. Among the stories he tells are of John James Powers and his self-sacrifice during the Battle of the Coral Sea, of the Japanese aircraft carrier Shōhō, of Malakula, and of being attacked by Mitsubishi A6M Zero fighters.

In the Star Trek universe, there are at least two ships named USS Yorktown.

Yorktown plays a prominent role in the 2007 real-time tactics/action game Battlestations: Midway, were the player gets to control her in three of the game's primary missions; The Strike on Tulagi, the Battle of the Coral Sea, and the opening of the Battle of Midway.

References[]

Notes

↑ ^1.0 ^1.1 Macintyre, Donald, CAPT RN (September 1967). "Shipborne Radar". United States Naval Institute Proceedings.
↑ "Soryu (Aircraft Carrier, 1937-1942)". Online Library of Selected Images: Japanese Navy Ships. Department Of The Navy -- Naval Historical Center. 21 March 1999. http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-fornv/japan/japsh-s/soryu.htm. Retrieved 2006-12-06.
↑ Parshall, Jonathan; Tully, Anthony (2005). Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway. Dulles, Virginia: Potomac Books. p. 262. ISBN 1-57488-923-0.
↑ "Titanic explorer finds Yorktown". CNN. 1998-06-04. http://www.cnn.com/TECH/science/9806/04/yorktown.found/index.html. Retrieved 2007-07-01.
↑ Willis, Connie (2001). Passage. New York: Bantam Books. pp. 67. ISBN 0-553-11124-8.

This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.
This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the Naval History & Heritage Command.

Further reading

Cressman, Robert (2000) [1985]. That Gallant Ship: U.S.S. Yorktown (CV-5) (4th printing ed.). Missoula, Montana: Pictorial Histories Publishing Company. ISBN 0-933126-57-3. OCLC 14251897.
Friedman, Norman (1983). U.S. Aircraft Carriers: An Illustrated Design History. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-739-9. (Google Books link)
Ludlum, Stuart D. (1997). They Turned the War Around at Coral Sea and Midway: Going to War with Yorktown's Air Group Five. Merriam Press. ISBN 1-57638-085-8.

Coordinates: 30°35′59″N 176°34′4″W / 30.59972°N 176.56778°W / 30.59972; -176.56778

External links[]

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[RADAR-1] 1.0 ^1.1 Macintyre, Donald, CAPT RN (September 1967). "Shipborne Radar". United States Naval Institute Proceedings.

[2] "Soryu (Aircraft Carrier, 1937-1942)". Online Library of Selected Images: Japanese Navy Ships. Department Of The Navy -- Naval Historical Center. 21 March 1999. http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-fornv/japan/japsh-s/soryu.htm. Retrieved 2006-12-06.

[3] Parshall, Jonathan; Tully, Anthony (2005). Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway. Dulles, Virginia: Potomac Books. p. 262. ISBN 1-57488-923-0.

[4] "Titanic explorer finds Yorktown". CNN. 1998-06-04. http://www.cnn.com/TECH/science/9806/04/yorktown.found/index.html. Retrieved 2007-07-01.

[5] Willis, Connie (2001). Passage. New York: Bantam Books. pp. 67. ISBN 0-553-11124-8.

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