FIRST DAWN broke cold and still. As the fingers of light picked out our sentries—huddled, nodding figures, keeping a weary watch—the vast white cumulus clouds over Guadalcanal suddenly came alive with the roar of planes, and the familiar heavy rumble of bombs began to be heard from Tulagi. Andrew, himself hardly awake, shook me: “Sah, altogether Japan ’e catch’m trouble.” We rubbed our sleep-starved eyes and perked up. Then there was a rush to the banyan tree. We didn’t have very good binoculars, but it was obvious that Jap shipping in Tulagi was in serious trouble. I could hardly believe it—was it really true? As it slowly dawned upon us that it really was, a tattoo of sheer joy went out on the station drum. “Come and see,” it said, “come and see!”
About 0800 the noise of airplanes from the north increased, and we rushed out to witness the magnificent spectacle of twelve dive bombers plunging down out of the clouds over Tulagi. There was a steely glint at the bottom of their dive; we guessed it was from the torpedoes that they were launching.1 Another squadron of twelve bombers followed shortly afterward, and we spotted four fighters after 1230.2 What a sight for sore eyes—it was the largest number of Allied planes that most of us had ever seen.
The attack went on most of the morning. Wave after wave of planes dove on the Jap ships, collected together in Tulagi Harbor; I was glad that it had not been mined. It was a great tonic for everyone, even if I could not tell them who the attackers were. After noon, happy in the knowledge that the Cat boys had the radio watch and the Japs were too busy to bother us for the time being, I sank down in my chair and gratefully dropped off to sleep.
At teatime I awoke with a start, to be told that the battle was nearly over. During the afternoon, fourteen vessels had been counted limping out of the harbor. Some were in poor shape, and apparently unable to fire back at our planes. Several reportedly had sunk between Tulagi and Savo, and others were badly listing. A pall of smoke hung over Tulagi, which appeared to be engulfed in flames; we raised a cheer as two Catalinas lumbered up the strait and added to the conflagration. I figured we should be fairly safe that night unless we were disturbed by survivors, and Andrew thought that the tutelary sharks of Savo Island would prevent many of them from interfering with us! We kept watch nevertheless, in the same way as the night before; but this time there was a ray of hope and encouragement. There was much excited talk on the station that the Japs were finished, and that an Allied landing force would shortly arrive; I thought all the speculation rather premature, but could not help wondering, if that were true, whether we should have any warning of it. I began to worry about Ekins, whose convoy hadn’t returned; had he had trouble with the Chinese or the Japanese? Or had he been bombed by mistake?
At 0100 the night watch called out. It was one of Ekins’s schooners, the G. F. Jones, with a sad story to tell. Not only had they waited in vain at Su’u for the Morinda, but Davis,3 whom the RC had sent to supervise the loading, had pinched the Kokerana and shanghaied from Ekins the two police I had sent to help him. My one consolation was that they had managed to offload all the Chinese, who would henceforth be Michael Forster’s problem on San Cristobal. Wouldn’t he be pleased! I sent an indignant signal to Bengough about the “daylight robbery” of my “resources.”
From first light, there were three or four Kawanisi flying boats cruising up and down; the alarms continued all day. They were big, lumbering aircraft, and I always got a slight chill when I saw the big red “meatball” painted on their wings. A large transport, probably a ten-thousand-tonner, was seen going into Tulagi. She probably had more troops on board: in spite of the bashing they had had the day before, the Japs were consolidating their position. Everyone was very jumpy, but I did my best to carry on as usual. Snowy Rhoades, who now was sending out a much better signal, passed on the news that he had retired into the bush. I sadly reflected that I was the last one on the beach, with a Catalina on my doorstep to give the Japs the line!
At last, at teatime, Terry Ekins arrived. He was very sorry for himself. On the way back the two remaining schooners had lost contact in the rain; Ekins, relying on the local bosun, had been woken by a terrific jolt, to find Varuna hard aground on Rua Sura, a reef some miles off the coast. The crew had labored all morning trying to get her off; the sea was pretty calm, but one of the Kawanisis had flown up and down all the time, and Ekins had had to direct operations from the cabin, to keep out of sight of the plane. Alas, the Varuna was so firmly on the rocks that by afternoon they had decided to abandon her. Ekins had stripped the vessel of as much gear as possible and brought it back in the dinghy. “I’m terribly sorry, Martin,” he said, “but I’m better in the air.” I gave the bosun a smartening up, as he knew the waters and had gone to sleep on the job. And so ended another busy day.
The next two or three days were even busier. In spite of our attacks, the Japs seemed to have established a flying-boat base at Tulagi; the sooner we could get away from Aola, therefore, the better. It was obvious that the Catalina was done for, as no one could come to repair her; so Ekins and his men would have to be evacuated. I had mentioned this in my rude message to Norman Bengough. For once, my signal got immediate results: at dawn on 6 May a small cutter, Lo-ai, arrived, to take Ekins south—with profuse apologies from Bengough, and his promise to return my two police as soon as they reached Auki and could be sent over.
Shortly afterward, the Cat crew, Ekins, and I were standing on the beach, watching our dive bombers dropping their loads on Tulagi, when suddenly three Kawanisis, obviously fleeing the scene, zoomed low right over the station. We ducked pretty fast, and hoped they had not seen anyone. Anyway, they did not return. They must also have missed the camouflaged Catalina on the beach.
A long signal came in from Macfarlan, who had seen the whole show on Sunday and Monday but now found it too cloudy for good observation. He said that there had been three cruisers, one destroyer, and twelve other vessels in the harbor. As far as he could gather, there were only two left after Monday’s raid, but there were three “43s” operating out of Tulagi, along with a few high-speed floatplanes. These would stop our boat trips.
After a lot of argument, Ekins and his crew finally agreed that there was now no hope of their ever flying out the Catalina. The next morning, they stripped out the radios and other important parts, and stowed them on the Lo-ai for the trip to Kira Kira; one of their .303 machine guns poked out under the stern awning.
I spent most of my time on the teleradio, dashing out from time to time to see how things were progressing. The evacuation of Aola was now in full swing. All the police not on lookout watch, together with the prisoners, were packing everything up. Crates, boxes, bundles, even heaps of gear were piled under the jacaranda trees at the back of the station, where a solemn Daniel Pule, pencil and pad in hand, recorded each load as it departed for the bush on its way to Paripao. Our call for volunteers from the surrounding villages had been answered, and there were about four hundred men in the working party. Daniel’s job was to sort the stuff into loads, allot them to carriers, and make a list of who had taken what. A policeman went with every thirty or forty carriers, and another checked the loads at Paripao village, where they would be stored temporarily until they could be safely stowed away. Government records, stationery, stores, tools, pots and pans, furniture, even bedding—the list seemed endless.
That day, and most of the next, were spent clearing the station. By lunchtime on 7 May, the nearby coastal villagers had begun to realize that they ought to evacuate too, and our supply of carriers began to dry up; but the heaviest work had been done.
Ekins was ready to go. We had our last meal together. He and his men had been a great help, and I wished they could stay; but they were airmen, and it was only natural that they would want to return to the fight. I solemnly wrote him out a receipt for Catalina number A24–23, from which they had taken all movable equipment, and told him that I would endeavor to dispose of her! On the BBC news just after lunch, there was some mention of a “naval battle in the Coral Sea, in which a lot of Jap ships had been sunk.” We all wondered whether this was our show. If indeed it was, we felt that it was successful only insofar as it had rapped the knuckles of the Japanese: it certainly had not stopped them from turning Tulagi into an operations base, and driving our chaps away. At 1500, Ekins and his crew sailed for San Cristobal. I hoped that the Lo-ai would arrive in friendly territory, and they would be able to fly again.
Now the feeling of loneliness returned, for we really were on our own. As the swell, in timeless rhythm, thudded against the shore, Andrew, Daniel, and I stood, rather disconsolately, on the black sand beach, three desolate figures by the empty bay. Andrew glanced toward Tulagi. “Airplane ’e finish, Guvman ’long Aola ’e finish, altogether Japan ’e stop. More better youme go ’long . . .” He inclined his head over his shoulder to the dark green, steamy jungle, to which we would have to look for salvation. “Yes, Andrew,” I said wearily, “but tumas work ’e stop.”
For me, the issues now were clear. Here we were at Aola, and there were the Japs at Tulagi, less than twenty miles away. We would lead them as long a dance as we could. There was work to do on the beach, and masses of it. Unfortunately, the weather had cleared up, and I greatly feared that the Japs would see the flames as we disposed of the Catalina. Most of the Kawanisis kept morning hours, however, so we decided to get the job over and done with in the afternoon while we had the chance.
We surrounded the Cat with firewood and, when she was well alight, blew several charges, which broke her up. She burned for an hour and a half without exciting any attention; by then most of the fuselage was gone, and we were left with the very solid main plane, the two engines, and the tail plane. We got in amongst the remains of the main plane and fuselage with axes and hammers, until we had them pretty flat on the ground; several coconut trees had been cut down along the leading edge, so that the main plane would be overhung by the remaining coconut trees and difficult to see from above. Then we covered the skeleton with coconut fronds and creepers, which we hoped would soon grow over it. The next day we tried again to fire the tail plane, which still protruded from the trees; but this was not successful, and in the end the police dragged away the pieces and dumped them into the sea.
It was very sad having to destroy our own aircraft while the enemy sailed serenely above. The Kawanisis settled down to regular patrolling, and for the next few days they cruised up and down the coast, one after the other. Fortunately, they were not attracted by the wreck of the Catalina. So far, so good.