WINSLOW-WALTER

Walter Gillespie Winslow entered the Navy as an Aviation Cadet in 1937.  He served aboard USS LANGLEY (AV-3) until August 1941, when he was ordered to the USS HOUSTON (CA-30) as a scout plane pilot.  He was one of the crewmembers who survived the HOUSTON’s March 1942 sinking.  He swam for ten hours before being picked up by the Japanese and was a POW for 3½-years until the war’s end.  In retirement, he was an author and the following are excerpts from his 2014 article published by the U.S. Naval Institute:

 

THE  ‘NIGHTMARE’  NIGHT  USS HOUSTON  WENT  DOWN

On the night of February 28, 1942, the USS HOUSTON vanished without a trace off the coast of Java.  The mystery remained until the war ended and small groups of survivors were discovered in prison camps, scattered from over Southeast Asia to Japan.  Of the 1,008 officers and men who manned her, approximately 350 survived the sinking.  Only 266 lived through the ordeal of filth and brutal treatment in Jap POW camps.

On that fateful evening, I stood on the quarterdeck and pondered the question racing through the mind of every man aboard, “Would we get through Sunda Strait?”  Many aboard felt that, like a cat, HOUSTON had expended eight of its nine lives and that this last request of fate would be too much.  Jap planes had shadowed us all day and it was certain that our movements were no mystery to the enemy closing in on Java.  I had been relieved as Officer-of-the-Deck and felt my way to my stateroom through the darkened ship.  I rolled into my bunk and let my exhausted body sink as I relaxed in sleep.

It was nearly 2400 when the nerve shattering General Alarm burst and brought me upright on both feet.  The alarm was deadly earnest and meant only one thing, “Danger—man your battle station and get ready to fight.”  I found myself in my shoes before I was even awake.  I was putting my tin hat on my head when a salvo from the main battery roared out overhead, knocking me against the bulkhead.  In the passageway, I passed assembling corpsmen and climbed the ladder to the bridge.  As I climbed I realized the five-inch guns were taking up the argument and it was getting to be one hell of a battle and I started running.  Momentarily I caught a glimpse of tracers hustling out into the night.  They were beautiful.  Before I reached the bridge every gun on the ship was in action.  The noise they made was magnificent.

As I stepped on the bridge, HOUSTON became enveloped in the blinding glare of searchlights.  Behind the lights I could barely discern the outlines of Jap destroyers.  Battling desperately for existence, HOUSTON’s guns trained on the lights, and as fast as they were turned on, they blasted out.  I later learned that we had actually run into an estimated sixty fully loaded transports, twenty destroyers and six cruisers.  We were in the middle of this mass of ships before either side was aware of the other’s presence.  Surrounded by ships, HOUSTON and our companion, HMAS PERTH, immediately opened fire in an effort to break free.  However, the fury of the Japs was not to be denied and PERTH was mortally wounded by torpedoes.  Lying dead in the water she continued to fire with everything she had until she sank.  Our captain then turned HOUSTON into the heart of the Jap convoy, determined in the face of no escape to sell the HOUSTON dearly.  At close range, HOUSTON pounded the Jap transports throwing salvo after salve to everything around us.  HOUSTON was taking terrible punishment.  A torpedo exploded in the engine room, reducing our speed and power went out.  The shell hoists stopped the flow of five-inch shells to the guns from the almost empty magazines.  Men attempted to go below and bring shells up by hand but debris and fires from numerous hits blocked their way.  Number Two turret was smashed by a direct hit sending wild flames flashing up over the bridge.  The heat, so intense that it drove everyone out of the conning tower, temporarily disrupted communications.  The fire was soon extinguished but when sprinklers flooded the magazine our last remaining supply of eight-inch ammunition was ruined and HOUSTON was now without a main battery.

Numerous fires were breaking out all over the ship and it became increasingly difficult to cope with them.  Another torpedo plowed into HOUSTON somewhere forward of the quarterdeck and I realized that we were done for.  Slowly we listed to starboard as we lost steerageway and stopped.  The few guns still in commission continued to fire, although it was obvious that the end was near and the captain ordered, “Abandon Ship.”  When I heard those words, I did not wait to go down the ladder; instead I jumped over the railing to the deck below.  Although we were still the target for continuous shells and the ship was slowly sinking, there was no confusion.  Men went quietly and quickly about the job of abandoning ship.  The Captain was saying goodbye to several of his officers outside his cabin when a shell exploded, sending a piece of a gun mount crashing into his chest.  The Captain, beloved by officers and men, died in their arms.

I hurried to the base of the catapult tower to get floats over the side.  I was working to uncouple a line when a torpedo struck directly below.  I heard no explosion, but the deck buckled and jumped under me, and I found myself suddenly engulfed in a deluge of fuel oil and salt water.  I suddenly felt helpless and could only think of fire.  I was gripped with the sudden fear of blazing fuel oil on my person and covering the surface of the sea.  I was panicked.  A salvo of shells plowed through, exploding deep below decks.  There was only one idea left in my mind and that was to join the others who were going over the side in increasing numbers.  Quickly making my way to the port side I climbed down the cargo nets that were hanging there.  When I reached the water’s edge I dropped off into the warm Java Sea.  When my head came above the surface I was surrounded by men all swimming for their lives.  Frantic screams for help from the wounded and drowning.  Desperately I swam to get beyond reach of the sinking ship’s suction.  A few hundred yards away I watched the death of my ship.  The magnificent HOUSTON and most of my shipmates were gone.  Hundreds of Jap soldiers and sailors were also struggled amidst the flotsam of their sunken ships and as I watched them drown or swim for their lives, I smiled grimly and repeated over and over, “Well done, HOUSTON!”

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