- 7 weeks ago
Forty tons of plywood versus 2,700 tons of steel: that was the impossible matchup when PT-37 went after Japan’s largest destroyer off Guadalcanal. This WW2 naval history story follows Lieutenant Junior Grade Lester Gamble and the PT boat crews sent into Iron Bottom Sound after cruisers and destroyers had already failed to stop the Tokyo Express.
As Japanese destroyers raced through the Slot to resupply starving troops, Gamble and the other small patrol torpedo boats used darkness, smoke, and sheer nerve to close the gap. The attack on Teruzuki, Tanaka’s flagship, became one of the most dramatic PT boat actions of the Pacific War, ending with a destroyer burning out of control and a record that still stands.
This is a documentary-style military history narrative about Guadalcanal, night combat, PT boats, destroyer warfare, and the desperate struggle to cut off Japanese supply lines. It also shows how a tiny wooden craft could change a battle in the Solomon Islands.
For viewers searching WW2 stories, Pacific War history, PT boat attacks, Guadalcanal battles, naval warfare documentaries, and military history narration, this episode delivers a gripping account of one of the most famous small-boat strikes of the war. It is ideal for history fans, war story listeners, and anyone interested in real naval combat and forgotten WW2 stories.
As Japanese destroyers raced through the Slot to resupply starving troops, Gamble and the other small patrol torpedo boats used darkness, smoke, and sheer nerve to close the gap. The attack on Teruzuki, Tanaka’s flagship, became one of the most dramatic PT boat actions of the Pacific War, ending with a destroyer burning out of control and a record that still stands.
This is a documentary-style military history narrative about Guadalcanal, night combat, PT boats, destroyer warfare, and the desperate struggle to cut off Japanese supply lines. It also shows how a tiny wooden craft could change a battle in the Solomon Islands.
For viewers searching WW2 stories, Pacific War history, PT boat attacks, Guadalcanal battles, naval warfare documentaries, and military history narration, this episode delivers a gripping account of one of the most famous small-boat strikes of the war. It is ideal for history fans, war story listeners, and anyone interested in real naval combat and forgotten WW2 stories.
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LearningTranscript
00:00At 1900, on December 11, 1942,
00:04Lieutenant Junior Grade Lester Gamble armed PT-37 at Tulagi,
00:08tracking 11 Japanese destroyers heading for Guadalcanal.
00:12Gamble was 25, two months in Iron Bottom Sound.
00:15He had fired torpedoes at Japanese warships before, never once connected.
00:2111 destroyers had departed Shortlands that afternoon.
00:24Their flagship alone carried eight 100-millimeter guns,
00:27four torpedo tubes, and 54 depth charges.
00:31Gamble's PT-37 carried four torpedoes and two machine guns bolted to a plywood deck.
00:37For four months, the Imperial Japanese Navy had been running the Tokyo Express.
00:42Fast destroyer convoys raced down New Georgia Sound every few nights,
00:47delivering troops, ammunition, and rice to Japanese soldiers fighting for Guadalcanal.
00:52The runs followed a brutal schedule.
00:54Japanese destroyers left Shortlands Harbor after noon,
00:58sprinted 300 miles down the passage Americans called the slot at speeds up to 33 knots,
01:04arrived after dark, packed supplies into sealed steel drums,
01:08pushed them overboard near the coast, and turned for home before dawn.
01:12Soldiers on shore swam out to haul the drums in.
01:16American aircraft owned the daylight.
01:18Japanese destroyers owned the night.
01:20The United States Navy had thrown everything it had at the Tokyo Express.
01:25Cruisers, destroyers, submarines.
01:28The results were devastating.
01:31Since August, the Americans had lost two aircraft carriers, five cruisers,
01:36and a dozen destroyers in the waters around Guadalcanal.
01:40Thousands of American sailors lay on the bottom of Iron Bottom Sound.
01:44The ocean floor between Guadalcanal and Savo Island held so much sunken steel that it had earned its name.
01:51Twelve days before Gamble loaded his torpedoes,
01:54the Navy had made its strongest attempt to break the express.
01:57On November 30th, Rear Admiral Carlton Wright led five heavy cruisers and four destroyers
02:04into an ambush at Tassafuranga off Guadalcanal's north coast.
02:08The Americans had radar.
02:10They had surprise.
02:11They opened fire first.
02:14Rear Admiral Raizo Tanaka commanded the Japanese force of eight destroyers.
02:18His crews reacted within minutes,
02:21launching Type 93 Long Lance torpedoes into the darkness.
02:25Heavy cruiser Northampton went down.
02:27Minneapolis, New Orleans, and Pensacola took catastrophic hits that tore their bowels apart.
02:35395 American sailors died that night.
02:38Tanaka lost one destroyer.
02:41Five cruisers against eight destroyers, and the Americans were demolished.
02:45It was the most humiliating surface defeat of the Pacific War.
02:49After Tassafuranga, no heavy warships remained to intercept the express.
02:54The only vessels left were PT boats.
02:5777 feet of mahogany plywood.
03:0040 tons.
03:02Three Packard gasoline engines that could push them to 41 knots,
03:06but leaked fumes so badly that a single trace around could turn the entire boat into a fireball.
03:12Their main weapon was the Mark 8 torpedo,
03:15a weapon so unreliable that PT crews expected failure on every other launch.
03:20Since October, PT boats had been sorting from Tulagi nearly every night,
03:25firing dozens of torpedoes at Japanese destroyers.
03:29Almost none had hit.
03:31On December 7th, just four days earlier,
03:35PT boats attacked the 12-destroyer Tokyo Express run off Cape Esperance.
03:40Not a single torpedo found its mark.
03:43Japanese destroyers shelled the retreating boats without mercy.
03:46The PT boats were not stopping the Tokyo Express.
03:49They were barely slowing it down.
03:52And now, Tanaka was coming again.
03:55Intelligence confirmed he was leading tonight's convoy personally,
03:59flying his flag aboard Teruzuki,
04:01a brand new Akizuki-class destroyer completed just three months earlier at the Mitsubishi shipyard in Nagasaki.
04:09440 feet long, 2,700 tons of steel.
04:13Teruzuki had fought at the Battle of Santa Cruz in October.
04:16She had fought in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal in November,
04:19where her guns helped sink the American destroyer Cushing.
04:22Her crew of 300 had never lost an engagement.
04:26She was the most powerful destroyer operating in the Solomons.
04:30Gamble's PT-37 displaced 40 tons.
04:32His hull was three-quarter-inch mahogany plywood stretched over a wooden frame.
04:38One direct hit from any of Teruzuki's eight guns would reduce his boat to floating splinters and burning gasoline.
04:45The weight ratio was 67 to 1.
04:48No PT boat had ever sunk a warship of Teruzuki's size.
04:5240 tons of plywood against a steel warship.
04:55What Gamble did next still sounds impossible.
04:58Hit like if you want to see how it played out.
05:00It helps these stories reach more people.
05:03Please subscribe.
05:04Back to Gamble.
05:06At 2100, Gamble throttled PT-37 out of Tulagi Harbor into the blackness of Iron Bottom Sound.
05:13PT-40 under Stillie Taylor and PT-48 under Bill Kreiner carved wakes behind him.
05:20Further out, Frank Freeland's PT-44 and Charlie Tilden's PT-110 fanned toward patrol stations around Savo Island.
05:28Somewhere to the north, 11 Japanese destroyers were closing at 33 knots.
05:34Gamble had four torpedoes, a plywood hull, and roughly 90 minutes before Tanaka's fleet reached Iron Bottom Sound.
05:41On the Japanese side, Tanaka had not wanted this mission.
05:45Supply runs to Guadalcanal had been failing one after another.
05:49On December 9th, the submarine I-3 had been torpedoed and sunk, trying to deliver provisions underwater.
05:56Japanese soldiers on Guadalcanal were starving.
06:00Thousands had died of malaria and malnutrition since August.
06:03They ate roots, bark, and leather stripped from their boots.
06:07Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, commander of the Combined Fleet, sent Tanaka a direct order.
06:13Run the express again.
06:15Thousands of soldiers depended on this convoy.
06:18Without fresh supplies, the garrison faced mass starvation within weeks.
06:23Tanaka organized his 11 destroyers into two groups.
06:27Six, Oyashio, Kuroshio, Kagero, Tanikaze, Urakaze, and Ariake,
06:34carried hundreds of sealed steel drums lashed to their decks,
06:38packed with rice, ammunition, and medical supplies.
06:41Their decks were so crowded with cargo that their ability to fight was severely limited.
06:47The remaining five, Teruzuki, Arashi, Naganami, Kawakaze, and Suzukaze,
06:54sailed as combat escorts, fully armed.
06:57Teruzuki led the column.
06:59Arashi and Naganami fell in behind.
07:02Kawakaze and Suzukaze screened the flanks.
07:05The convoy covered 300 miles in under 10 hours,
07:09reaching the waters north of Guadalcanal after nightfall.
07:13Tanaka knew the Americans would detect his approach.
07:16Coast watchers, allied intelligence operatives hidden in the jungle hills of the Solomon Islands,
07:21tracked Japanese ship movements by day and reported to Guadalcanal by radio.
07:26Japanese float planes launched from shortlands ahead of the formation,
07:30hunting for American patrol boats.
07:32Tanaka's plan depended on speed and darkness.
07:36Arrive after sunset, drop the drums offshore,
07:39turn north, and vanish before American aircraft scrambled at dawn.
07:44What Tanaka did not know was that American intelligence
07:47had already identified his convoy's size and heading.
07:50The PT boat base at Tulagi had hours of warning.
07:54Gamble's five boats pushed northwest through Iron Bottom Sound in total darkness.
07:59The early Elko patrol boats carried no radar.
08:02Their crews relied entirely on eyesight to find enemy ships against the black horizon.
08:07On a clear night with moonlight, a destroyer silhouette might appear at roughly 1,000 yards.
08:13On an overcast night, detection range dropped to 500 yards or less.
08:18Tonight, broken clouds drifted across a partial moon.
08:21Visibility shifted from minute to minute.
08:25One moment, a crew could make out the dark mass of Savo Island.
08:29The next, everything went black.
08:32PT boat attack doctrine against destroyers was simple in theory and nearly suicidal in practice.
08:39Approach on idle engines to minimize wake and noise.
08:45Fire torpedoes, then slam the throttles forward and run at full speed
08:49while enemy gunners tried to track a small wooden target racing through the dark.
08:54The core problem was closing the distance.
08:57Japanese destroyers carried searchlights that could illuminate targets at 2,000 yards.
09:03Their main batteries fired 15 rounds per minute, per gun.
09:07A PT boat caught in a searchlight beam at close range survived only if the gunners missed their first salvo.
09:15The torpedoes added another layer of risk.
09:18They ran a straight course, no homing capability, no course correction after launch.
09:24The crew aimed the entire boat at the target, estimated the enemy's speed and heading,
09:30calculated a deflection angle, and fired.
09:33At 500 yards, a torpedo needed roughly 30 seconds to reach a destroyer moving at patrol speed.
09:40In those 30 seconds, the target could shift position by hundreds of feet.
09:45A small error in the deflection meant a clean miss.
09:49Each boat carried only four.
09:51Four torpedoes.
09:53Four chances.
09:54After that, the crew had nothing but machine guns against armored steel.
09:59As the boats approached the western passages around Savo Island, Gamble positioned his force.
10:06Taylor's PT-40 and Kriner's PT-48 advanced to a forward patrol line between Cape Esperance and Savo Island,
10:13where the channel narrowed to barely four miles.
10:16Any ship heading for the Guadalcanal coast had to pass through that gap.
10:21Their mission was to detect the enemy and radio the contact.
10:24Gamble held PT-37 further south, ready to strike on the signal.
10:30Freeland's PT-44 and Tilden's PT-110 spread wide to cover the flanking approaches.
10:37Then all five boats killed their throttles and drifted, engines murmuring at idle,
10:43crews pressing binoculars to their eyes.
10:46At 2215, trouble arrived before the enemy did.
10:51Kriner's PT-48 began losing power.
10:54One engine coughed and died.
10:57Minutes later, a second engine failed.
11:00PT-48 was crawling on one engine in the direct path of 11 oncoming destroyers,
11:07unable to make attack speed or outrun anything larger than a rowboat.
11:12Taylor, in PT-40, saw Kriner's boat falling dark and circled back to cover him.
11:18Then Taylor's lookout spotted them.
11:20Dark shapes on the northern horizon.
11:24Low silhouettes in column formation, heading for the gap between Cape Esperance and Savo Island.
11:30Taylor keyed his radio.
11:32The Tokyo Express had arrived.
11:35PT-48 was crippled and drifting directly in their path.
11:39And Gamble, in PT-37, was still south of the channel, racing north to close the distance.
11:47Taylor had seconds to decide.
11:49Kriner's PT-48 was drifting on one engine in the direct path of 11 oncoming destroyers.
11:55At their closing speed, the Japanese would be on top of PT-48 within minutes.
12:00Taylor swung PT-40 across the Japanese formation's approach and opened his smoke generators.
12:06White chemical smoke poured from canisters on his stern,
12:09billowing across the channel between Cape Esperance and Savo Island.
12:13The thick curtain masked PT-48 and bought Kriner precious minutes
12:17to limp toward the Guadalcanal coast on his single remaining engine.
12:22The Japanese patrol column, Arashi, Naganami, and Teruzuki in single file,
12:27was moving close to shore at low speed, scanning for a point to begin the supply drop.
12:32They did not detect the crippled boat behind Taylor's smoke.
12:36But the white wall drifting across the channel told them American torpedo boats were operating nearby.
12:41On the flanks, Kawakaze and Suzukaze went to full alert.
12:47Searchlights snapped on and swept the dark water.
12:50Gun crews manned their stations and loaded.
12:52Three miles south, Gamble heard Taylor's contact report over the radio.
12:57Eleven destroyers entering the channel, moving southeast, close to shore.
13:02This was the opening.
13:04Gamble pushed all three throttles forward, and PT-37 surged north through the blackness,
13:09bow rising as three engines drove her toward the narrowing gap between Cape Esperance and Savo Island.
13:16He needed to reach the channel before the Japanese column cleared it,
13:20dropped their drums, and dispersed along the coast.
13:23PT-37 closed the distance in minutes.
13:26As Gamble approached the channel from the south,
13:28dark shapes materialized through gaps in the drifting smoke.
13:32Three warship silhouettes in single file, moving close to the Guadalcanal coast.
13:37The lead ship's profile was strikingly different from the others.
13:40Longer, taller, heavier superstructure visible against the faint moonlit sky.
13:46At a thousand yards, Gamble could see the vessel dwarf the escorts behind it.
13:51Its outline matched the intelligence briefings.
13:54He was looking at Tanaka's flagship.
13:56Gamble throttled back for the attack run,
13:59speed dropping, wake shrinking to barely a ripple.
14:02Every man aboard went silent.
14:04Sound carried across open water at night for hundreds of yards,
14:08and an engine note or a hull slapping waves could give them away.
14:12The distance closed.
14:14One thousand yards.
14:16Eight hundred.
14:17Six hundred.
14:18Five hundred.
14:19His torpedo crews crouched low at their stations,
14:22fingers on the release mechanisms,
14:24eyes fixed on the dark mass growing larger ahead.
14:27At five hundred yards, details emerged.
14:30Gun turrets fore and aft.
14:32A tall bridge structure.
14:34Teruzuki was making barely six knots,
14:37creeping along the coast with her searchlights dark.
14:39Her guns pointed northwest,
14:41toward the smokescreen where Taylor had pulled the escort's attention.
14:45Gamble had a clean approach to her unguarded port side.
14:48He aimed for the stern,
14:50the engine rooms and fuel bunkers,
14:52where a hit would do the most damage.
14:54At six knots, deflection was minimal.
14:57The target was nearly stationary.
15:00Compressed air hissed.
15:02PT-37 shuddered twice as two torpedoes dropped into the water and began their run.
15:08Gamble slammed the throttles open and hauled the wheel hard over,
15:11turning away at full power.
15:14Seconds later,
15:15Taylor in PT-40,
15:16closing from a wider angle through the remains of his own smokescreen,
15:20fired at the same target.
15:21Multiple torpedoes were now cutting through the dark water toward Teruzuki.
15:26At 22.59,
15:28two struck home.
15:29The first torpedo hit the aft engine room beneath the main mast,
15:33punching through the hull and detonating inside the machinery spaces.
15:37Boilers ruptured.
15:38Steam lines burst.
15:40The second torpedo slammed into the fan tail,
15:43destroying the port propeller and smashing the rudder flat.
15:46The twin blasts cracked open the aft fuel tanks.
15:50Hundreds of gallons of burning oil poured from the shattered stern and spread across the surface,
15:56surrounding Teruzuki's entire aft section in a wall of flame that lit up the coastline for miles.
16:02The most powerful destroyer in the Solomons was dead in the water.
16:07Engines destroyed.
16:08Steering wrecked.
16:10Propulsion gone.
16:12Flames climbed from her stern toward the bridge,
16:15their glow visible across iron-bottom sound.
16:18On Teruzuki's bridge,
16:20Tanaka felt the deck plates heave beneath his feet,
16:22and then the searing bite of shrapnel tearing into his foot.
16:26Blood filled his boot.
16:28His flagship was burning from the stern forward,
16:30drifting without power,
16:32and she was never going to move again.
16:34But Gamble had no time to assess his target.
16:37As PT-37 raced south at full speed,
16:41searchlights snapped onto the east.
16:43Kawakaze and Suzukaze had heard the explosions
16:46and were now sweeping the darkness with concentrated beams,
16:50hunting for the boats that had just crippled their admiral's ship.
16:53Shells began falling around the fleeing PT boats,
16:56throwing columns of water into the air.
16:58And somewhere in the dark between the Japanese escort destroyers and Savo Island,
17:03Frank Freeland's PT-44 was heading directly into their gun sites.
17:08Kawakaze and Suzukaze reacted within seconds.
17:11The two escort destroyers had been screening the flanks
17:13when the explosions lit up Teruzuki's stern.
17:16Their searchlights snapped into wide sweeping arcs,
17:19hunting for the source of the attack.
17:21Their gun crews opened fire at every shadow on the water,
17:25sending shells skipping across the channel
17:27between Savo Island and Cape Esperance.
17:29Gamble ran south at full throttle,
17:32PT-37's three engines driving her through the blackness,
17:35wake streaming white behind the stern.
17:38Taylor in PT-40 was somewhere astern,
17:40also running hard.
17:42Japanese searchlight beams swept the water in broad arcs,
17:45passing over the positions where the PT boats had been moments before.
17:49Shells splashed to port and starboard,
17:51throwing columns of spray into the night air.
17:54But the boats were already too fast and too low for the gunners to track.
17:58Gamble held his course south,
18:00putting distance between his crew and the Japanese guns.
18:03Frank Freeland in PT-44 had no such luck.
18:07His boat had been approaching from a flanking position near Savo Island
18:11when the torpedo struck Teruzuki.
18:13The sudden glare of burning oil had illuminated the waters around him.
18:17Kawakazi and Suzukazi,
18:19swinging their searchlights east,
18:21caught PT-44 in a beam at close range.
18:25Both destroyers opened fire simultaneously.
18:28At 2308,
18:30shells slammed into PT-44's hull.
18:32The gasoline-fueled boat erupted.
18:35Two officers and seven enlisted men
18:37died in the dark waters southwest of Savo Island.
18:41PT-44 was gone in seconds.
18:44Nine men killed.
18:46That was the cost of sending plywood against steel.
18:49South of the engagement,
18:51Gamble eased back on his throttles
18:53as the searchlights faded behind him.
18:55PT-37 had made it out.
18:57Taylor's PT-40 had also cleared the area.
19:01Kriner's crippled PT-48
19:03had limped to safety along the coast.
19:05Tilden's PT-110 patrolling wide to the east
19:09had avoided the engagement entirely.
19:13Four of five boats survived the night.
19:15But Freeland and eight of his crew
19:18were at the bottom of Iron Bottom Sound.
19:21Gamble could still see the orange glow to the north.
19:25Teruzuki was burning brightly enough
19:27to light the underside of the low cloud layer.
19:30Whatever his torpedoes had done,
19:32the result was unmistakable.
19:34An enormous warship was on fire.
19:36But Gamble had no confirmation
19:39that the ship was sinking,
19:40no way to verify how severe the damage was,
19:43and no way to know whether the Japanese
19:46could bring the flames under control.
19:48He had fired, and he had hit.
19:51What happened next was beyond his reach.
19:54PT-37 turned southeast toward Tulagi,
19:57her crew watching the distant glow fade
20:00behind the dark mass of Savo Island.
20:02Aboard Teruzuki, the situation was deteriorating by the minute.
20:07The two torpedo impacts had wrecked the propulsion system entirely.
20:11The ship was without power, without steerage,
20:14drifting on the current off the Guadalcanal coast.
20:17Fires fed by ruptured fuel tanks had engulfed the stern
20:20and were advancing forward through the aft compartments,
20:23deck by deck.
20:25Commander Orita Tsuneo, Teruzuki's captain,
20:28ordered his damage control teams into the blaze.
20:31They fought hundreds of gallons of burning oil
20:33with portable extinguishers and bucket chains.
20:36The ship's fire mains had failed with the engines.
20:39Her pumps were dead.
20:41Every minute the flames gained another few feet toward midships.
20:45On the bridge, Tanaka assessed the damage
20:48through the pain of his shrapnel wound.
20:50Teruzuki was finished as a warship.
20:52She could not move.
20:53She could not fight.
20:55Her magazines were at risk if the fires continued their advance.
20:59At 2333, Tanaka made the decision to abandon his flagship.
21:03A boat was lowered from the Naganami,
21:06which had come alongside through the burning oil slick.
21:09The admiral and his staff transferred across.
21:12Tanaka's command flag now flew from a different bridge.
21:15Behind him, Teruzuki burned alone.
21:18The loss of the flagship threw the entire convoy into confusion.
21:22Tanaka had been the central command authority
21:25for the 11 destroyer formation.
21:27His emergency transfer disrupted communication
21:29among the scattered groups.
21:31The six transport destroyers,
21:33loaded with hundreds of drums of rice,
21:35ammunition, and medical supplies
21:37intended for the starving garrison,
21:40attempted to complete their drops
21:41along the Guadalcanal coastline,
21:43but the coordinated timing that made the express work
21:46had collapsed.
21:47Some drums were pushed overboard in the right locations.
21:50Others were dropped too far from shore
21:52for the soldiers to retrieve.
21:54Many never left the decks at all.
21:56The operation that Yamamoto had personally ordered
22:00was unraveling around a burning flagship.
22:02And Teruzuki was still burning.
22:05The flames had now reached the midship section,
22:08climbing toward the aft ammunition lockers
22:10and the storage racks holding dozens of depth charges.
22:14Each one was packed with hundreds of pounds of explosive.
22:17If the fire reached them,
22:19the detonation would tear the ship apart from the inside.
22:23Orita's damage control crews fought on,
22:25but they were losing ground foot by foot against the fire
22:28that had been burning for nearly an hour
22:30with no way to stop it.
22:32Teruzuki's crew fought for three hours to save their ship.
22:36They lost.
22:37The blaze had both fuel and momentum.
22:41Burning oil from the ruptured stern tanks
22:43had spread across the surrounding water,
22:46creating a barrier of flame
22:47that prevented other vessels from coming alongside.
22:50Inside the hull,
22:52the fire advanced forward through the aft compartments,
22:56feeding on paint,
22:57timber fittings,
22:58ammunition propellant,
22:59and oil that had pooled in every seam.
23:03Smoke flooded the passageways
23:05and drove damage control teams back
23:07faster than they could push forward.
23:10Commander Orita organized relay teams,
23:12passing buckets of seawater hand over hand
23:15through compartments ahead of the fire line.
23:18Without functioning pumps or pressurized mains,
23:21manual labor was all they had.
23:24Crewmen went below with soaked cloths over their faces,
23:27dragging empty hoses.
23:29Others cut fire breaks by ripping out deck plates
23:32and bulkhead fittings,
23:34trying to starve the flames of material.
23:36The effort was methodical,
23:38exhausting,
23:40and futile.
23:41The fire had too much fuel
23:42and too much forward momentum
23:44to be stopped by buckets.
23:46Naginami and the remaining escorts
23:48circled at a distance,
23:49unable to penetrate the burning oil
23:51on the water's surface.
23:53They lowered boats
23:54and sent them through gaps in the flames
23:56to take off the wounded.
23:58Tanaka,
23:59commanding from Naginami's bridge
24:00with his foot bandaged,
24:02faced a brutal calculation.
24:04The convoy still had a mission,
24:06and his escort destroyers were needed
24:08to protect the transports heading north.
24:10He could not keep the formation
24:12circling a burning wreck until dawn,
24:14when American aircraft from Henderson Field
24:16would catch them in open water.
24:19One by one,
24:20the escorts peeled away
24:21to cover the retreating transport ships
24:23as they abandoned whatever remained
24:25of their supply drops along the coast.
24:28By midnight,
24:29Teruzuki had been burning for over an hour.
24:32She drifted south on the current,
24:34her hull glowing orange against the Black Sea.
24:37The fire had consumed the stern entirely
24:39and was pushing past the main mast
24:41toward the forward superstructure.
24:44Heat warped the steel deck plates.
24:46Ammunition in the aft storage lockers
24:48began cooking off,
24:50sporadic blasts and tracer rounds
24:52arcing into the sky at random intervals.
24:55Every man still aboard
24:56could see the ship was dying.
24:58Orita ordered the Kingston valves opened.
25:01Seacocks built into the hull
25:03to flood the lower compartments
25:04and accelerate sinking.
25:05If Teruzuki could not be saved,
25:08she could at least be scuttled
25:10before the enemy salvaged her.
25:11But the valves were located
25:13in the engine room spaces,
25:14already flooded and burning.
25:17Crewmen who attempted to reach them
25:18were driven back by heat and toxic fumes.
25:21The scuttling attempt failed.
25:24Orita gave the order to abandon ship.
25:26Some men climbed down ropes into boats
25:28that the escorts had sent through the flames.
25:31Others dropped directly into the warm water
25:33and began swimming toward the dark coastline
25:36of Guadalcanal,
25:37more than a mile distant.
25:38The evacuation was remarkably orderly
25:41given the circumstances.
25:42Sailors helped wounded shipmates
25:44over the rail and into the water.
25:46Officers stayed on the burning decks
25:48until the last groups cleared.
25:50By 0200,
25:51the ship was empty of living men.
25:54Teruzuki drifted alone
25:55through Iron Bottom Sound,
25:56abandoned,
25:57burning from stern to bow,
25:59a floating torch visible in every direction.
26:02The last Japanese destroyers
26:03had already turned north toward Shortlands.
26:06The supply drums that had been pushed overboard
26:08drifted toward the coast,
26:09where starving soldiers would search for them
26:11at first light.
26:13Many would never be recovered.
26:14At approximately 0440,
26:17the fire reached the aft magazines
26:19and the depth-charged storage racks.
26:20The detonation was enormous.
26:22A column of flame,
26:24smoke,
26:24and steel fragments erupted hundreds of feet
26:27above Iron Bottom Sound,
26:29briefly turning night into day
26:30across miles of open water.
26:32The blast ripped through Teruzuki's midsection,
26:35splitting the hull from the inside out.
26:38Secondary explosions followed in rapid chain
26:41as remaining warheads cooked off.
26:43The ship broke in two.
26:46Her bow and stern sections folded inward
26:49as the center of the hull
26:51disintegrated beneath the waterline.
26:53Within minutes,
26:55the wreckage slipped beneath the surface
26:57and vanished into the deep water
26:59off Guadalcanal's northern coast.
27:02The ship whose name meant
27:03Shining Moon
27:04settled onto the floor of Iron Bottom Sound,
27:08joining the dozens of warships
27:09already resting in that graveyard.
27:12Nine of her crew were killed.
27:15197 had been pulled from the water
27:17by the escorting destroyers
27:18before the final explosion.
27:20Another 156 swam to the Guadalcanal shore
27:24and joined the same starving garrison
27:27they had been sent to resupply.
27:29They had arrived not as rescuers,
27:32but as additional mouths
27:33that could not be fed.
27:35Twenty miles to the southeast,
27:37Gamble nosed PT-37
27:39into her berth at the Tulagi dock
27:41as the first gray light of December 12th
27:44spread across the water.
27:45He knew his torpedoes had connected.
27:48He had watched the distant glow burn
27:50for nearly an hour
27:51as he withdrew south.
27:53But he did not yet know
27:54that the ship on the horizon
27:56had been the most powerful destroyer
27:58in the Solomons.
27:59He did not know
28:00that Tanaka was wounded.
28:02And he had no idea
28:03what his two torpedoes
28:05had just set in motion.
28:07Reports filtered into the Tulagi PT base
28:10throughout the morning of December 12th.
28:12Coast watchers in the Guadalcanal hills
28:14had observed the massive fire
28:16off Cape Esperance for hours,
28:18reporting its position
28:19and intensity by radio.
28:21At sea,
28:23signals intelligence operators
28:24intercepted Japanese fleet communications,
28:27distress signals,
28:28emergency reassignment orders,
28:30requests for rescue vessels.
28:32By mid-morning,
28:33the intelligence staff at Tulagi
28:35pieced together a picture
28:36that went beyond anything
28:38the PT crews had imagined.
28:39The ship that burned
28:41and exploded off Cape Esperance
28:42had not been a standard
28:44Fubuki or Kagero-class fleet destroyer.
28:47It was an Akizuki-class command vessel,
28:49the flagship of the officer responsible
28:52for the entire Tokyo Express
28:53resupply operation in the Solomons.
28:56For the PT boat crews,
28:58who had spent two months
28:59firing torpedoes into the dark
29:00and hitting nothing,
29:01the confirmation was almost impossible
29:03to process.
29:05Every failed attack,
29:06every night spent idling on black water,
29:08waiting for targets
29:10that outgunned them
29:10in every dimension,
29:12every close call
29:13with searchlights
29:14and destroyer shells,
29:15it had all built
29:16toward this single night.
29:17Two torpedoes from a boat
29:19that most of the surface navy
29:21considered expendable
29:22had struck the one target
29:24whose loss would cripple
29:25the Japanese supply network
29:26more than anything
29:27a cruiser task force
29:29had managed in months.
29:30The men at Tulagi
29:31had been told their job
29:33was to harass
29:33and delay the express.
29:35On the night of December 11th,
29:37they had done far more than that.
29:39The relief at the base
29:41was tempered by grief.
29:43PT-44 had not returned.
29:46Freeland and eight of his crew
29:48were confirmed lost.
29:49The men at Tulagi
29:51understood the arithmetic
29:52of their work.
29:53Plywood boats
29:54and young lives
29:55traded for a chance
29:56against steel warships.
29:57On this night,
29:58the trade had produced
30:00a result no one expected.
30:02But nine men
30:03who had motored
30:04out of the harbor
30:05the evening before
30:06would never come back.
30:08On the Guadalcanal coast,
30:10the supply run
30:11that Yamamoto
30:12had personally ordered
30:13proved to be
30:14a near total failure.
30:15At dawn,
30:17Japanese soldiers
30:17weakened by months
30:18of malnutrition
30:19waded into the surf
30:21searching for the sealed drums
30:23that had been pushed
30:23overboard during the chaos.
30:25The attack on the flagship
30:27had wrecked the coordination
30:28the drum drops required.
30:30Each drum had to be released
30:32at exact positions
30:33where the coastal current
30:34would carry it
30:35to designated collection points.
30:37Instead,
30:38the turmoil
30:39that followed
30:39the torpedo strike
30:40had scattered the drops
30:42across miles of shoreline.
30:44Soldiers found
30:45a handful of drums
30:46and dragged them
30:47onto the sand.
30:48The vast majority
30:49drifted out to sea,
30:51sank in deep water,
30:52or washed up
30:53on stretches of coast
30:54held by American forces.
30:56The garrison received
30:58almost nothing.
30:59For the Japanese
31:01high command,
31:02the loss compounded
31:03a crisis
31:03that had been building
31:04since November.
31:06The express had always
31:07been an imperfect solution.
31:09Fleet destroyers
31:10diverted from combat duty
31:11to haul rice drums
31:13through hostile waters,
31:14delivering a fraction
31:15of what the garrison required.
31:17Even the best runs
31:18sustained the troops
31:19for only a few days.
31:21Now the flagship
31:22of the destroyer force
31:23responsible for those runs
31:25was gone,
31:25its admiral wounded,
31:27its command structure
31:28fractured at the worst
31:29possible moment.
31:30The arithmetic
31:31was turning decisively
31:33against Japan.
31:34Since August,
31:35the express had cost
31:37the Imperial Japanese Navy
31:38dozens of destroyers
31:40damaged or sunk,
31:41warships that could not
31:42be replaced
31:43at the rate
31:43they were being lost.
31:45Japan's shipyards
31:46were already straining
31:47under combat losses
31:48across the Pacific.
31:49Every destroyer
31:51assigned to haul
31:51supply drums
31:52down the slot
31:53was a destroyer
31:54unavailable to escort
31:55carriers or screen
31:57the fleet in the battles
31:58that were certain to come.
31:59The express was consuming
32:01the force it depended on.
32:03After December 11th,
32:04the destroyer supply runs
32:06effectively ceased.
32:07A handful of submarine
32:09missions were attempted
32:10over the following weeks,
32:11but submarines carried
32:12far less cargo
32:13and proved equally vulnerable
32:15to American patrols.
32:16The submarine I-1
32:18was cornered and sunk
32:20off Commimbo Bay
32:21on January 29th.
32:23Another was damaged
32:24and forced to abort.
32:26The trickle of provisions
32:27reaching the garrison
32:28slowed to nearly nothing.
32:30Japanese soldiers
32:31on Guadalcanal
32:32began dying
32:33at an accelerating rate.
32:35Malaria,
32:36dysentery,
32:37starvation,
32:37and untreated wounds
32:39reduced entire companies
32:40to a handful of men
32:42too weak to hold a rifle.
32:43The fighting force
32:45that had numbered
32:45in the tens of thousands
32:46was dissolving.
32:48By late December,
32:49senior officers
32:50in the Imperial Japanese Navy
32:52began discussing
32:53what had been unthinkable
32:55four months earlier.
32:56Guadalcanal
32:57could not be held.
32:58The garrison
32:59could not fight
33:00without supplies.
33:02The supplies
33:02could not get through
33:03without unsustainable losses.
33:05And the commander
33:06the Americans called
33:07Tenacious Tanaka,
33:09the man who had humiliated
33:10a cruiser task force
33:11at Tassafuranga
33:12and kept the supply line
33:14running through
33:14sheer tactical skill,
33:16was recuperating
33:17from his wounds
33:18with orders
33:19to report to Singapore.
33:20His sea career
33:21was finished.
33:23The express
33:23had lost its best operator
33:25at the moment
33:26it needed him most.
33:27The question
33:28facing Japanese high command
33:29was no longer
33:31whether Guadalcanal
33:32could be won.
33:32It was whether
33:33the surviving soldiers
33:34could be pulled off the island
33:36before they all died.
33:37In the weeks that followed,
33:39the full significance
33:40of December 11th
33:41became impossible to ignore.
33:44Teruzuki was confirmed
33:45as the largest warship
33:46ever sunk by a PT boat
33:48in the entire
33:49Second World War.
33:50No patrol torpedo boat
33:52in any Navy,
33:53in any theater of operations,
33:55would destroy a vessel
33:56of greater displacement
33:58for the rest of the conflict.
34:00The record set off
34:01Cape Esperance that night
34:02would stand not only
34:03through the war,
34:04but through every decade
34:05that followed.
34:06It has never been broken.
34:08On December 29th,
34:10Tanaka was officially relieved
34:11of command over
34:12Destroyer Squadron 2
34:13and transferred to Singapore.
34:15His foot wounds
34:16required treatment,
34:18but the transfer
34:18was more than medical.
34:20Despite his unmatched record
34:22in night surface combat,
34:23no Japanese destroyer commander
34:25had inflicted more damage
34:27on American warships
34:28during the campaign.
34:29Tanaka had made powerful enemies
34:31within the Imperial Japanese Navy.
34:33He had been openly critical
34:35of the high command's decision
34:36to fight for Guadalcanal,
34:38arguing that the island
34:39could not be held
34:40and that the Navy
34:41was wasting irreplaceable destroyers
34:43on a losing cause.
34:45His superiors
34:46did not welcome the criticism.
34:47After recovering in Singapore,
34:50Tanaka was reassigned
34:51to shore duties in Burma,
34:52as far from a combat command
34:54as the Navy could send him.
34:55He would remain there
34:57until the end of the war.
34:58The most effective
35:00destroyer squadron commander
35:01in the Japanese fleet
35:02spent the final two and a half years
35:04of the conflict behind a desk,
35:06never commanding a warship
35:07at sea again.
35:09With Tanaka gone
35:10and the express broken,
35:12the Japanese garrison
35:12on Guadalcanal
35:13entered its final weeks.
35:15By mid-January 1943,
35:18Imperial General Headquarters
35:19in Tokyo
35:20authorized what had seemed
35:22unthinkable
35:23the previous autumn,
35:24the complete withdrawal
35:25of all Japanese forces
35:27from the island.
35:28The operation
35:29was designated K.
35:31It was kept secret
35:33even from the troops
35:33on Guadalcanal,
35:34who were told
35:35that reinforcements
35:36were on the way.
35:37The evacuation
35:38ran across three nights
35:40between February 1st
35:41and February 8th.
35:43Fast destroyers
35:44raced to the Guadalcanal coast
35:46under cover of darkness,
35:48loaded soldiers
35:49onto their decks
35:49at collection points
35:50along the shore,
35:51and sprinted north
35:53before American aircraft
35:54could scramble at dawn.
35:56Approximately 13,000
35:58Japanese troops
35:59were pulled off the island
36:00over those three runs.
36:01The men who reached
36:03the destroyers
36:04were barely recognizable
36:05as soldiers.
36:06Months of starvation
36:08had reduced them
36:08to skeletal figures,
36:10many weighing
36:11less than 90 pounds.
36:12Some could not
36:13climb the boarding nets
36:14and had to be hauled up
36:15by ship crews.
36:17Thousands more
36:18had already died
36:18on the island
36:19from starvation,
36:20malaria,
36:21dysentery,
36:22and wounds
36:23that went untreated
36:24because the medical supplies
36:25never arrived.
36:26On February 9th,
36:28Major General
36:29Alexander Patch,
36:30commanding American
36:31ground forces
36:32on Guadalcanal,
36:33sent a cable
36:34to Admiral William Halsey
36:35that closed the book
36:36on six months
36:37of the most brutal
36:38fighting in the Pacific.
36:39The message was brief.
36:41The Tokyo Express
36:42had reached its final stop
36:44on Guadalcanal.
36:45The campaign was over.
36:47It had cost both sides dearly,
36:49tens of thousands of lives,
36:52dozens of warships,
36:53and hundreds of aircraft
36:54lost in the air,
36:55on the ground,
36:56and beneath the waters
36:57of Iron Bottom Sound.
36:59For Japan,
37:00Guadalcanal was the first
37:01major ground defeat
37:02of the war,
37:03the moment the tide
37:04turned in the Pacific.
37:05The long retreat
37:06that followed
37:07would not end
37:08until August 1945.
37:10For the United States,
37:12it was proof
37:12that Japanese expansion
37:13could be stopped,
37:14held,
37:15and reversed.
37:16For the PT Boat Force,
37:18the destruction of Teruzuki
37:19validated a weapon system
37:21that the surface navy
37:22had largely written off.
37:23The small wooden boats
37:25had been sent
37:25to the Solomons
37:26as an emergency measure.
37:27Expendable craft
37:29rushed in to fill the gap
37:30left by the cruiser losses
37:31of the autumn.
37:32They had suffered
37:33chronic engine breakdowns,
37:35unreliable torpedoes,
37:37attacks by float planes,
37:38and devastating gunfire
37:40from warships
37:40that outclassed them
37:42in every measurable way.
37:43But on one December night,
37:45two of those boats
37:46had delivered a strike
37:47that helped break
37:48the backbone
37:49of the Tokyo Express
37:50and accelerate the end
37:52of the entire campaign.
37:54After Guadalcanal,
37:55the navy expanded
37:56PT boat deployments
37:57across the Pacific,
37:59to New Guinea,
38:00up the Solomons chain,
38:01and eventually
38:02to the Philippines.
38:03Gamble and the surviving
38:05PT crews
38:05continued operating
38:07out of Tulagi
38:07through January.
38:09PT-37 went on patrol
38:11after patrol,
38:12running the same
38:13dark waters
38:14around Savo Island
38:15where she had made history.
38:16The boat that had killed
38:18the flagship
38:18kept hunting in the shadow
38:20of its own achievement.
38:21But Iron Bottom Sound
38:22had not finished
38:23collecting its toll.
38:24On the night
38:25of February 1st, 1943,
38:28the same night
38:29the first Operation Key
38:30evacuation run began,
38:32PT-37 sortied
38:33from Tulagi
38:34to intercept
38:35Japanese destroyers
38:36operating off the coast.
38:38Waiting in the darkness
38:39was Kawakaze,
38:41the same destroyer
38:42that had screened
38:42Tanaka's convoy
38:43on December 11th
38:44and whose shells
38:45had sunk PT-44
38:47that night.
38:48Now Kawakaze
38:49was hunting
38:49in Iron Bottom Sound again,
38:51and PT-37
38:53was heading straight
38:54toward her.
38:55On the night
38:55of February 1st, 1943,
38:58PT-37 sortied
39:00from Tulagi
39:00for the last time.
39:02Japanese destroyers
39:03were running
39:04the first Operation Key
39:05evacuation mission,
39:06and American patrol boats
39:08were sent to intercept.
39:10PT-37
39:11and PT-111
39:13pushed into
39:14Iron Bottom Sound together.
39:15In the darkness
39:16off the Guadalcanal coast,
39:18Kawakaze found them.
39:20The destroyer's guns
39:21opened fire
39:22at close range.
39:23Shells ripped
39:24through PT-37's hull,
39:26and the boat
39:26that had killed
39:27a flagship
39:28less than two months earlier
39:29was torn apart
39:30in the same waters
39:31where she had made history.
39:33PT-111,
39:34caught alongside,
39:35was destroyed as well.
39:37Iron Bottom Sound
39:38swallowed them both.
39:40PT-37
39:41had been in commission
39:42since July of 1941.
39:44Built by the
39:45Electric Boat Company
39:46at the Elko Works
39:46in Bayonne, New Jersey,
39:48she had deployed
39:49to the South Pacific
39:50as part of
39:50Motor Torpedo Boat
39:51Flotilla 1
39:52in the autumn of 1942.
39:54In barely four months
39:56of combat
39:56off Guadalcanal,
39:58her crew had patrolled
39:59Iron Bottom Sound
40:00dozens of times,
40:01engaged Japanese destroyers
40:03in running night fights,
40:04and endured air attacks,
40:05engine failures,
40:06and the constant awareness
40:08that one shell
40:09could end everything.
40:10Her torpedo attack
40:11on December 11th
40:12had lasted
40:13less than five minutes
40:14from approach to impact.
40:15Those five minutes
40:17had reshaped
40:18the final chapter
40:18of the Guadalcanal campaign.
40:21Kawakaze did not
40:21survive the war either.
40:23On August 6th, 1943,
40:26during the Battle of Vela Gulf
40:27in the Central Solomons,
40:29American destroyers
40:30ambushed
40:31a Japanese transport group.
40:33Kawakaze took
40:34multiple torpedo hits
40:35and sank
40:36with heavy losses.
40:37The destroyer
40:38that had hunted
40:39PT boats
40:39through Iron Bottom Sound
40:41was herself killed
40:42by the same weapon.
40:44Torpedoes fired
40:45from the dark.
40:46Tanaka lived
40:47until July 9th, 1969,
40:49dying at the age of 77.
40:51He retired from
40:53military service
40:53in 1946
40:54with the rank
40:56of vice-admiral,
40:57though the promotion
40:58was largely ceremonial.
40:59He never commanded
41:00a warship
41:01after the night
41:02of December 11th.
41:03In the decades
41:04following the war,
41:05American naval historians
41:06came to regard him
41:08as one of the most
41:09formidable surface
41:10warfare commanders
41:11in the Pacific.
41:11Samuel Elliott Morrison,
41:14the official historian
41:15of United States
41:16Navy operations,
41:17wrote admiringly
41:18of Tanaka's
41:19tactical skill
41:20and aggressiveness
41:21in night combat.
41:22The officer
41:23whose own navy
41:24had sidelined him
41:25for speaking the truth
41:26about Guadalcanal
41:27received more recognition
41:29from his former enemies
41:30than he ever received
41:31from Japan.
41:32He spent his final years
41:34in quiet retirement,
41:35rarely speaking publicly
41:36about the war.
41:37For more than
41:38eight decades,
41:40Teruzuki rested undiscovered
41:41on the ocean floor
41:42off Guadalcanal's
41:43northern coast.
41:44The exact position
41:45of the wreck
41:46was unknown.
41:47She lay somewhere
41:48in the deep water
41:49beneath Iron Bottom Sound
41:50alongside dozens
41:52of other warships,
41:53American and Japanese,
41:55unmarked,
41:56unvisited,
41:56and slowly dissolving
41:58in the darkness.
41:59In 2025,
42:01a joint deep-sea expedition
42:02by the Ocean Exploration Trust,
42:04the National Oceanic
42:06and Atmospheric Administration,
42:07and the University
42:08of New Hampshire
42:09located Teruzuki
42:10using advanced
42:12sonar mapping equipment.
42:13Remote-operated vehicles
42:15descended to the wreck site
42:16and captured the first images
42:18of the ship
42:19in over 80 years.
42:20The hull lay broken
42:22on the seafloor,
42:23still split by the explosion
42:25that had destroyed her
42:26in the pre-dawn hours
42:27of December 12, 1942.
42:30Gun turrets,
42:31bridge structure,
42:32and the shattered remains
42:33of her stern
42:34were identifiable
42:35on the bottom.
42:36The wreck confirmed
42:38what the wartime records
42:39had always documented
42:40and what one PT boat crew
42:42had accomplished
42:43on a dark night
42:44off Cape Esperance
42:45with nothing but four torpedoes,
42:48three engines,
42:49and a plywood hull.
42:50You just heard
42:52how a plywood patrol boat
42:53took down
42:54one of the most powerful
42:55destroyers in the Pacific.
42:57If that story deserves
42:58to be told,
42:59do us a favor
43:00and hit like.
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43:08We dig through
43:09naval archives,
43:10unit records,
43:11and veteran accounts
43:12to find stories
43:13most people have never heard.
43:15PT boat crews,
43:17bomber gunners,
43:18tank men
43:19who changed a battle
43:20with nothing but guts
43:21and a wrench.
43:22New stories every week.
43:24Drop a comment
43:25and tell us where
43:26you are watching from.
43:27United States,
43:29United Kingdom,
43:30Canada,
43:31Australia,
43:33Germany.
43:34Wherever you are,
43:35we want to hear from you.
43:36If someone in your family served,
43:38tell us about them.
43:39These comment sections
43:41have turned into something
43:42we did not expect,
43:43families sharing stories
43:44their grandfathers never told.
43:48Gamble and the crew of PT37
43:50deserve to be remembered.
43:51Because you are here,
43:53they will be.