USS Washington (BB-56)

USS ''Washington'' (BB-56) was the second and final member of the of fast battleships, the first vessel of the type built for the United States Navy. Built under the Washington Treaty system, ''North Carolina''s design was limited in displacement and armament, though the United States used a clause in the Second London Naval Treaty to increase the main battery from the original armament of nine guns to nine guns. The ship was laid down in 1938 and completed in May 1941, while the United States was still neutral during World War II. Her initial career was spent training along the East Coast of the United States until after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, bringing the United States into the war.

''Washington'' was initially deployed to Britain to reinforce the Home Fleet, which was tasked with protecting convoys carrying supplies to the Soviet Union. She saw no action during this period, as the German fleet remained in port, and ''Washington'' was recalled to the US in July 1942 to be refitted and transferred to the Pacific. Immediately sent to the south Pacific to reinforce Allied units fighting the Guadalcanal campaign, the ship became the flagship of Rear Admiral Willis Lee. She saw action at the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal on the night of 14–15 November in company with the battleship and four destroyers. After ''South Dakota'' inadvertently drew heavy Japanese fire by sailing too closely to Admiral Nobutake Kondō's squadron, ''Washington'' took advantage of the Japanese preoccupation with ''South Dakota'' to inflict fatal damage on the Japanese battleship and the destroyer , while avoiding damage herself. ''Washington''s attack disrupted Kondō's planned bombardment of U.S. Marine positions on Guadalcanal and forced the remaining Japanese ships to withdraw.

From 1943 onward, she was primarily occupied with screening the fast carrier task force, though she also occasionally shelled Japanese positions in support of the various amphibious assaults. During this period, ''Washington'' participated in the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign in late 1943 and early 1944, the Mariana and Palau Islands campaign in mid-1944, and the Philippines campaign in late 1944 and early 1945. Operations to capture Iwo Jima and Okinawa followed in 1945, and during the later stages of the Battle of Okinawa, ''Washington'' was detached to undergo an overhaul, though by the time it was completed, Japan had surrendered, ending the war. ''Washington'' then moved to the east coast of the US, where she was refitted to serve as a troop transport as part of Operation Magic Carpet, carrying a group of over 1,600 soldiers home from Britain. She was thereafter decommissioned in 1947 and assigned to the Atlantic Reserve Fleet, where she remained until 1960 when she was stricken from the naval register and sold for scrap the next year.

Design

The ''North Carolina'' class was the first new battleship design built under the Washington Naval Treaty system; her design was bound by the terms of the Second London Naval Treaty of 1936, which added a restriction on her main battery of guns no larger than . The General Board evaluated a number of designs ranging from traditional battleships akin to the "standard" series or fast battleships, and ultimately a fast battleship armed with twelve 14-inch guns was selected. After the ships were authorized, however, the United States invoked the escalator clause in the treaty that allowed an increase to guns in the event that any member nation refused to sign the treaty, which Japan refused to do.

''Washington'' was long overall and had a beam of and a draft of . Her standard displacement amounted to and increased to at full combat load. The ship was powered by four General Electric steam turbines, each driving one propeller shaft, using steam provided by eight oil-fired Babcock & Wilcox boilers. Rated at , the turbines were intended to give a top speed of . The ship had a cruising range of at a speed of . She carried three Vought OS2U Kingfisher floatplanes for aerial reconnaissance, which were launched by a pair of aircraft catapults on her fantail. Her peace-time crew numbered 1,800 officers and enlisted men, but the crew swelled to 99 officers and 2,035 enlisted during the war.

The ship was armed with a main battery of nine 16 in /45 caliber Mark 6 guns guns in three triple-gun turrets on the centerline, two of which were placed in a superfiring pair forward, with the third aft. The secondary battery consisted of twenty /38 caliber dual purpose guns mounted in twin turrets clustered amidships, five turrets on either side. As designed, the ship was equipped with an anti-aircraft battery of sixteen guns and eighteen .50-caliber (12.7 mm) M2 Browning machine guns, but her anti-aircraft battery was expanded greatly during her career.

The main armored belt was thick, while the main armored deck was up to thick. The main battery gun turrets had thick faces, and they were mounted atop barbettes that were protected with the same thickness of steel. The conning tower had thick sides. The ship's armor layout had been designed with opponents equipped with 14-inch guns in mind, but since the treaty system broke down just before construction began, her design could not be revised to improve the scale of protection to defend against heavier guns. Despite this shortcoming, the ''North Carolina'' class proved to be more successful battleships than the better-armored but very cramped .

Modifications

''Washington'' received a number of upgrades over the course of her career, primarily consisting of radar and a new light anti-aircraft battery. The ship received three Mark 3 fire-control radar sets for the main battery, four Mark 4 radars for the secondary guns, a CXAM air-search radar, and an SG  surface-search radar. During her early 1944 refit, she received an SK air-search radar in place of the CXAM and a second SG radar; her Mark 3 radars were replaced with more advanced Mark 8 sets, though she retained one of the Mark 3s as a backup. Her Mark 4 radars were later replaced with a combination of Mark 12 and Mark 22 sets. In her final refit in August and September 1945, she had an SK radar forward, an SR air-search set aft, and an SG radar in both positions. A TDY jammer was installed on her forward fire control tower.

''Washington''s 1.1 in battery was replaced with forty Bofors guns in ten quadruple mounts in April 1943, and in August, the number of guns had increased to sixty in fifteen quadruple mounts. Her original light battery of eighteen .50-cal machine guns was decreased to twelve and twenty Oerlikon autocannon in single mounts were installed in early 1942. In June, she had her .50-cal battery increased to twenty-eight barrels, but by September, all were replaced in favor of a uniform battery of forty 20 mm cannon. During the April 1943 refit, her anti-aircraft armament was increased to a total of sixty-four 20 mm cannon. A year later, in April 1944, she lost one of the single mounts in favor of an experimental quadruple 20 mm mount. In November 1944, the ship was slated to have the battery reduced to 48 barrels, but this never happened and instead, in early 1945, she had eight single mounts replaced with eight twin mounts, bringing her final 20 mm battery to seventy-five guns.

Service history

The keel for ''Washington'' was laid down on 14 June 1938 at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. Her completed hull was launched on 1 June 1940, and after completing fitting-out work, she was commissioned into the fleet on 15 May 1941. She began builder's sea trials on 3 August, but like her sister ship , she suffered from excessive vibration while running at high speed from her original three-bladed screws. Tests with ''North Carolina'' produced a workable solution (though the problem was never fully corrected): two four-bladed screws on the outer shafts and two five-bladed propellers on the inboard shafts. Tests continued during her shakedown cruise and subsequent initial training, which were conducted along the East Coast of the United States, as far south as the Gulf of Mexico. She conducted high speed tests in December, during which she failed to reach her designed speed due to the vibration problems.

During this period, the United States was still neutral during World War II. ''Washington'' frequently trained with ''North Carolina'' and the aircraft carrier , with ''Washington'' serving as the flagship of Rear Admiral John W. Wilcox Jr., the commander of Battleship Division (BatDiv) 6, part of the Atlantic Fleet. Her initial working up training continued into 1942, by which time the country had entered the war as a result of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and Germany's subsequent declaration of war. Modifications to the ship's screws continued as late as February 1942, but these also proved unsuccessful.

Atlantic operations

With the country now at war, ''Washington'' was assigned as the flagship of Task Force (TF) 39, still under Wilcox's command, which departed for Britain on 26 March. The unit, which included ''Wasp'' and the heavy cruisers and , were to reinforce the British Home Fleet based in Scapa Flow. The Home Fleet had been weakened by the need to detach units, particularly Force H, to take part in the invasion of Madagascar, and the American battle group was needed to help counter the German battleship and other heavy surface units based in occupied Norway. The next day, while crossing the Atlantic, Wilcox was swept overboard. ''Tuscaloosa'' and a pair of destroyers searched for the admiral, and ''Wasp'' sent aircraft aloft to assist the effort, but lookouts on the destroyer spotted him, face down in the water, having already drowned. The search was called off and the task force continued on to its destination. Rear Admiral Robert C. Giffen, aboard ''Wichita'', took command of the unit, which was met at sea by the British cruiser on 3 April. The ships arrived in Scapa Flow two days later, where it came under the command of Admiral John Tovey, the commander of the Home Fleet.

For the rest of the month, ''Washington'' and the other American ships were occupied with battle practice and familiarization training with the Home Fleet to prepare the different countries' ships for joint operations. TF 39 was redesignated TF 99 in late April, ''Washington'' still serving as the flagship. The ships embarked on their first operation on 28 April to conduct a sweep for German warships ahead of the supply convoy PQ 15 to the Soviet Union. The ships of TF 99 operated with elements of the Home Fleet, including the battleship and the carrier . During the operation, ''King George V'' accidentally rammed and sank the destroyer ; ''Washington'' was following too closely to avoid the wreckage, and as she passed over the sinking destroyer, ''Punjabi''s depth charges exploded. The shock from the blast damaged some of ''Washington''s radars and fire-control equipment and caused a small leak in one of her fuel tanks. ''King George V'' had to return to port for repairs, but ''Washington'' and the rest of TF 99 remained at sea until 5 May. The ships stopped at Hvalfjörður, Iceland, where they took on supplies from the supply ship .

The ships remained in Iceland until 15 May, when they got underway to return to Scapa Flow, arriving there on 3 June. The next day, Admiral Harold Rainsford Stark, the Commander of Naval Forces Europe, visited the ship and made her his temporary headquarters. On 7 June, King George VI came aboard to inspect ''Washington'', and after Stark left she resumed escorting convoys in the Arctic; these included convoys QP 12, PQ 16, and PQ 17. The first two occurred at the same time, with QP 12 returning from the Soviet Union while PQ 16 carrying another load of supplies and weapons. ''Washington'', ''Victorious'', and the battleship provided distant support but was not directly engaged by the German U-boats and aircraft that raided PQ 16; QP 12 largely evaded German attention and passed without significant incident.

The PQ 17 operation resulted in disaster when reconnaissance incorrectly reported ''Tirpitz'', the heavy cruisers , , and '' Lützow'', and nine destroyers to be approaching to attack the convoy, when in reality the Germans were still off the coast of Norway, their progress having been hampered by several of the vessels running aground. The reports of German heavy units at sea prompted the convoy commander to order his ships to scatter, which left them vulnerable to U-boats and ''Luftwaffe'' attacks that sank twenty-four of the thirty-five transport ships. While in Hvalfjörður on 14 July, Giffen moved his flag back to ''Wichita'' and ''Washington'', escorted by four destroyers, got underway to return to the United States. She arrived in Gravesend Bay on 21 July and moved to the Brooklyn Navy Yard two days later for an overhaul.

Pacific operations

Guadalcanal campaign

After completing the refit, ''Washington'' got underway on 23 August, bound for the Pacific with an escort of three destroyers. She passed through the Panama Canal on 28 August and arrived in Nukuʻalofa in Tonga on 14 September. There, she became the flagship of Rear Admiral Willis Lee, then the commander of BatDiv 6 and Task Group (TG) 12.2. On 15 September, ''Washington'' sailed to meet the ships of TF 17, centered on the carrier ; the ships thereafter operated together and went to Nouméa in New Caledonia to begin operations in support of the campaign in the Solomon Islands. The ships, based out of Nouméa and Espiritu Santo in the New Hebrides, covered convoys bringing supplies and reinforcements to the marines fighting on Guadalcanal into early November.

During one of these convoy operations in mid-October, ''Washington'', a pair of cruisers, and five destroyers provided distant support but were too far away to take part in the Battle of Cape Esperance on the night of 11–12 October. Shortly thereafter, ''Washington'' was transferred to TF 64, the surface combatant force assigned to the Guadalcanal area, still under Lee's command. At this time, the unit also included one heavy and two light cruisers and six destroyers. Over the course of 21–24 October, Japanese land-based reconnaissance aircraft made repeated contacts with TF 64 as a Japanese fleet approached the area, but in the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands that began on the 25th, the Japanese concentrated their air attacks on the American carriers of TF 17 and 61. On 27 October, the Japanese submarine attempted to torpedo ''Washington'' but missed.

By early November, the US fleet had been reduced considerably in offensive power; the carriers ''Wasp'' and ''Hornet'' had been sunk, leaving just the carrier , ''Washington'', and the new battleship as the only capital ships available to Allied forces fighting in the campaign. ''Washington'' joined the other two ships in TF 16, which also included the heavy cruiser , and nine destroyers. The ships sortied on 11 November to return to the fighting off Guadalcanal. The cruiser and two more destroyers joined them the following day. On 13 November, after learning that a major Japanese attack was approaching, Halsey detached ''South Dakota'', ''Washington'', and four of the destroyers as Task Group 16.3, again under Lee's command. ''Enterprise'', her forward elevator damaged from the action at Santa Cruz, was kept to the south as a reserve and to prevent the sole operational American carrier in the Pacific from being lost. The ships of TG 16.3 were to block an anticipated Japanese bombardment group in the waters off Guadalcanal.

= Naval Battle of Guadalcanal

=

As Lee's task group approached Guadalcanal, his Japanese counterpart, Admiral Nobutake Kondō steamed to meet him with his main bombardment force, consisting of the fast battleship , the heavy cruisers and , and a destroyer screen. While en route, TG 16.3 was re-designated as TF 64 on 14 November; the ships passed to the south of Guadalcanal and then rounded the western end of the island to block Kondō's expected route. Japanese aircraft reported sighting Lee's formation, but identification of the ships ranged from a group of cruisers and destroyers to aircraft carriers, causing confusion among the Japanese commanders. That evening, American reconnaissance aircraft spotted Japanese warships off Savo Island, prompting Lee to order his ships to general quarters. The four destroyers were arrayed ahead of the two battleships. The American task force, having been thrown together a day before, had not operated together as a unit, and both of the battleships had very limited experience shooting their main battery, particularly at night.

At around 23:00 on 14 November, the leading Japanese destroyers in a screening force commanded by Shintarō Hashimoto sent ahead of Kondō's main force spotted Lee's ships and turned about to warn Kondō, while ''Washington''s search radar picked up a Japanese cruiser and a destroyer at about the same time. The ships' fire control radars then began tracking the Japanese vessels and Lee ordered both of his battleships to open fire when ready. ''Washington'' fired first with her main battery at 23:17 at a range of while her secondary guns fired star shells to illuminate the targets, followed shortly by ''South Dakota''. One of the Japanese destroyers, , revealed her position by opening fire on the American destroyer screen, allowing ''Washington'' to target her, inflicting serious damage that disabled her propulsion machinery and started a major fire.

Shortly thereafter, at about 23:30, an error in the electrical switchboard room knocked out power aboard ''South Dakota'', disabling her radar systems and leaving the ship all but blind to the Japanese vessels approaching the force. By this time, Hashimoto's ships had inflicted serious damage on the American destroyer screen; two of the destroyers were torpedoed (one of which, , survived until the following morning) and a third was destroyed by gunfire. ''Washington'' was now left essentially alone to engage the Japanese squadron, though they had yet to actually detect her presence. While ''Washington''s captain, Glenn B. Davis, kept his ship on the disengaged side of the flaming wrecks of the destroyer screen, ''South Dakota'' was forced to turn in front of one of the burning destroyers to avoid a collision, which backlit her to the Japanese ships, drawing their fire and allowing ''Washington'' to engage them undisturbed.

At 23:35, ''Washington''s SG radar detected Kondō's main force and tracked them for the next twenty minutes. At 23:58, ''South Dakota''s power was restored and her radar picked up the Japanese ships less than ahead. Two minutes later, the leading Japanese ship, ''Atago'', illuminated ''South Dakota'' with her search lights and the Japanese line promptly opened fire, scoring twenty-seven hits. ''Washington'', still undetected, opened fire, allocating two of her 5-inch guns to engage ''Atago'' and two to fire star shells, while the rest joined her main battery in battering ''Kirishima'' at a range of . ''Washington'' scored probably nine 16-inch hits and as many as forty 5-inch hits, inflicting grievous damage. ''Kirishima'' was badly holed below the waterline, her forward two turrets were knocked out, and her rudder was jammed, forcing her to steer in a circle to port with an increasing starboard list.

''Washington'' then shifted fire to ''Atago'' and ''Takao'', and though straddled the former, failed to score any significant hits; the barrage nevertheless convinced both cruisers to turn off their search lights and reverse course in an attempt to launch torpedoes. At 00:13, the two cruisers fired a spread of sixteen Long Lance torpedoes at ''Washington'', then about away, though they all missed. At 00:20, Lee turned his sole surviving combatant (he had ordered the surviving destroyers to disengage earlier in the engagement, and ''South Dakota''s captain, having determined that his ship had been damaged sufficiently to prevent her from taking further action, decided to break off as well) to close with Kondō's cruisers. ''Atago'' and ''Takao'' briefly engaged with their main batteries and the former launched three more torpedoes, all of which missed. Kondō then ordered the light forces of his reconnaissance screen to make a torpedo attack, but Hashimoto's ships were far out of position and were unable to comply. Rear Admiral Raizō Tanaka, who was escorting a supply convoy to Guadalcanal and had thus far not participated in the action, detached two destroyers to aid Kondō. When these ships arrived on the scene, Lee ordered ''Washington'' to turn to reverse course at 00:33 to avoid a possible torpedo attack from the destroyers.

Tanaka's two destroyers closed to launch their torpedoes while ''Washington'' was disengaging, prompting her to take evasive maneuvers. While withdrawing to the south, Lee kept ''Washington'' far west of the damaged American warships so that any Japanese vessels pursuing him would not be drawn onto the damaged vessels. An hour later, Kondō cancelled the bombardment and attempted to contact ''Kirishima'', but after failing to receive a response, sent destroyers to investigate the crippled battleship. She was found burning furiously, still turning slowly to port as progressively worsening flooding disabled her boilers. At 03:25, she capsized and sank; by this time, ''Ayanami'' had also been abandoned and sank as a result of the damage inflicted by ''Washington''. By 09:00, ''Washington'' had formed back up with ''South Dakota'' and the destroyers ''Benham'' and to withdraw from the area. In addition to blocking Kondō's planned bombardment, Lee had delayed Tanaka's convoy late enough that the transports could not unload under cover of darkness, and so they were forced to beach themselves on the island, where they were repeatedly attacked and badly damaged by aircraft from ''Enterprise'' and Henderson Field, field artillery, and the destroyer later that morning.

=Later operations

=

''Washington'' returned to screening the carriers of TF 11——and TF 16—''Enterprise''—while ''South Dakota'' departed for repairs. By late November, Lee's command was reinforced by ''North Carolina'', followed later by the battleship . These battleships were grouped together as TF 64, still under Lee's command, and they covered convoys to support the fighting in the Solomons into the next year. These operations included covering a group of seven transports carrying elements of the 25th Infantry Division to Guadalcanal from 1 to 4 January 1943. During another of these convoy operations later that month, Lee's battleships were too far south to be able to reach the American cruiser force during the Battle of Rennell Island. ''Washington'' remained in the south Pacific until 30 April, when she departed Nouméa for Pearl Harbor. On the way, she joined the ships of TF 16. The ships arrived on 8 May.

For the next twenty days, ''Washington'' operated as the flagship of TF 60, which conducted combat training off the coast of Hawaii. On 28 May, she went into dry dock at the Pearl Harbor Navy Yard for repairs and installation of new equipment. This included a new set of screws that again failed to remediate the vibration problems. Once this work was completed, she resumed training exercises in the area until 27 July, when she got underway with a convoy bound for the south Pacific. For the voyage, she was attached to TG 56.14, and on arriving in the area was detached on 5 August to proceed independently to Havannah Harbor at Efate in the New Hebrides, which she reached two days later. ''Washington'' spent the next two months conducting tactical training with the carrier task forces in the Efate area in preparation for upcoming campaigns in the central Pacific.

Now part of TG 53.2, which included three other battleships and six destroyers, ''Washington'' got underway on 31 October. The ships met TG 53.3, centered on the carriers ''Enterprise'', , and , the next day, for extensive training exercises that lasted until 5 November. The groups then dispersed and ''Washington'' left with escorting destroyers for Viti Levu in the Fiji Islands, which she reached on 7 November.

Gilberts and Marshall Islands campaign

''Washington'', still Lee's flagship, sortied on 11 November in company with the ships of BatDivs 8 and 9, and four days later they joined TG 50.1, centered on the carrier . The fleet proceeded on to the Gilbert Islands, where marines were preparing to land on Tarawa. The carriers of TF 50 launched their strikes on 19 November, continuing into the next day as the marines went ashore on Tarawa