LOST  AT  SEA – KILLED  BY  FRIENDLY  FIRE

On September 29-30, 1943, USS PT-126 conducted an overnight operation near Ropa Point on the north eastern shore of Kolombangara Island in the Solomons.  During the night the PT boat was hunting and strafing Japanese barges.  All friendly vessels had been instructed to withdraw from the area to avoid mistaken identity.  At 7:40 AM on September 30, three F4U Corsair fighters from Marine Squadron VMF-214, “The Black Sheep” flying from Munda Airfield, spotted PT-126 and its two accompanying PT boats.  As the three fighters swooped down to investigate the trio of PT boats they executed a recognition flare and two of the F4Us wagged wings in recognition. 

The third Corsair fighter was piloted by 1STLT Robert Austin Alexander and as he approached the trio of PT boats he fired on them resulting in casualties aboard PT-126.  Whether he fired intentionally or accidentally is not known but his actions resulted in the trio of PT boats returning fire.  Alexander’s plane was seriously damaged by their gunfire and he guided it to nearby Kolombangara Island where it crashed killing him.  On December 5 a group from VMF-214 journeyed to Kolombangara which was still in Japanese control.  They reported that it was not hard to find the plane because in crashing it had cut a path through the palm trees 50 feet wide and nearly 100 feet long.  1STLT Alexander was found in the wreckage.  The group buried his body in the sand near the crashed plane.  When the island came under U.S. control his body was recovered and sent to Manila in the Philippines.  In 1948 his body was returned to the U.S. for permanent burial at the Davenport Memorial Park Cemetery in Davenport, Iowa.

Newspaper articles written concerning 1STLT Alexander report that he graduated from Davenport High School, entered the service on April 23, 1942, and was sent to the South Seas in June 1943.  Articles also report that several days before his death, 1STLT Alexander shot down a Zero during an aerial engagement with several Japanese planes.  During the battle his plane was badly crippled forcing him to make a crash landing on a nearby island.  In a letter to his parents he told of his experience in shooting down the Zero saying, “It was the biggest thrill of my life.”  He also wrote, “We go to work at 4 a.m. and don’t get back to our station until 8 p.m.  We never see our quarters in the daylight and during the night we have to be constantly on the alert for raider attacks.”

Submitted by CDR Roy A. Mosteller, USNR (Ret)