Reply To: USS Hornet discovered

[oriskany 60789xp 2]

What a great lady.  She and Enterprise really were the only ones holding it together in the Eastern Solomons during that incredibly tense autumn and winter of 42-43.  I know people say Midway was the turning point, and it was, but the US Navy was really cutting it to the bone when it came to fleet aircraft carriers (by far the most important ships of any navy in that war).

Lexington was gone at Coral Sea.  Yorktown was gone at Midway.  Saratoga was always laid up, and patrolling the west coast (she was too slow to keep up with fast carrier ops anyway).  They brought in the Wasp from the Atlantic but she went down almost right away.  Then the Hornet went down, leaving only the legendary USS Enterprise, and even took damage to where one of her lift elevators was not working, meaning that for a few very tense days, there were NO US aircraft carriers functioning in the Pacific.  A good thing the Japanese never knew it.

In any event, Hornet will always be remembered as the base of the Doolittle Raid and one of the “Midway Three.”