Purple Heart and Good Conduct Medal to CCS Ernest F. Baca, USS San Francisco (CA 38); USS Ommaney Bay (CVE 79); KIA USS Columbia (CL 56) Kamikaze 1/6/

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On Sunday, December 7, 1941, SC1c Ernie Baca was aboard USS San Francisco, moored to a dock in berth B-17, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor just before 8 am. The night before had been the semi-finals in the “Battle of the Bands” at Bloch Auditorium with the USS Pennsylvania’s (BB 38) musicians taking honors. The whale boats had brought thousands of sailors and marines back to Battleship Row and the smaller ships at the East and West Lochs, after a typical Saturday night’s liberty in the Paradise of the Pacific. Baca may have been below decks in the galley overseeing the chow line for the enlisted crew, some groggy or nursing hangovers, as the cook strikers and non-rated men loaded up their plates with a big- ship, peacetime, Sunday morning breakfast; or he might have been topside with a steaming cup of joe in hand, enjoying the bright morning sunshine with fellow shipmates, some in dress whites or Marine blues, returning from divine services. Many looked forward to a day at the beach in Waikiki, enjoying the sand, surf and swimsuit-clad beauties, until paradise was blown up before their eyes.

 

The scores of planes zooming overhead were not on a training flight. With red meatballs on their wings, bombs and torpedoes slung underneath and machine guns loaded, they were hell-bent on delivering a blind-sided knockout to the American fleet. USS San Francisco and New Orleans berthed next to her and also undergoing overhaul, were spared the explosive devastation of many less fortunate ships during the Japanese air raid. Frisco’s engines had been broken down for overhaul, her 8-inch and 5-inch ammunition had been removed for storage, her 3-inch guns had been removed for quad 1.1-inch guns, which had not yet been installed, and her .50 cal. machine guns were broken down for maintenance. All told, San Francisco met the Japanese attack with two .30 cal. machine guns and what rifles could be broken out of the small arms lockers. With badly damaged ships taking priority for the dry-docks and shipyard, Frisco’s overhaul was accelerated and down-scaled so that on 14 December, the cruiser left the yard and two days later sortied with Task Force 14 (TF 14) to relieve Wake Island. The force moved west with a Marine fighter squadron onboard USS Saratoga (CV-3) and a Marine battalion embarked in Tangier. However, when Wake Island fell to the Japanese on 23 December, TF 14 was diverted to Midway Atoll which it reinforced. On 29 December, the force returned to Pearl Harbor. The next day, SC1c Baca received an honorable discharge, with average marks of 3.9/4.0, signed by CAPT Daniel J. Callaghan, and re-enlisted for 4- years on New Year’s Eve 1941 aboard USS San Francisco.

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Ernie was appointed Chief Commissary Steward (acting appointment) (CSC AA) on 1 November 1942, putting him in charge of menu planning, serving 23,000 meals a week, brewing hot joe all night long, requisitioning provisions and storing food for the 1,100-hundred man, heavy cruiser. The ship’s pay master allotted 43 cents a day for each enlisted man’s three squares. He expected the men to be happy with the food since Frisco had a reputation as a “happy ship”. Napoleon said an “An army marches on its stomach.” A navy sails on its ships, but as any sailor knows, its big ships better be stocked with decent chow to sustain life and morale. The man responsible for that on USS San Francisco during her most trying and desperate time in World War II, the Naval Battle at Guadalcanal, was Chief Ernie Baca. By then, Frisco had already earned four battle stars, the Japanese Attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941; Pacific Raids (Feb-March 1942); Guadalcanal - Tulagi Landings, August 7-9, 1942; and Battle of Cape Esperance at Savo Island, October 12, 1942.

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On November 4 and 12, 1942, the ship earned her fifth battle star when she participated in the Capture and Defense of Guadalcanal Island in the Solomons. During the night of 12-13 November off Savo Island, San Francisco earned her sixth and costliest battle star, along with one of the first Presidential Unit Citations (PUC) during the first part of the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, a savage, gun- and torpedo-night action at close-quarters due to the confined, often uncharted waters around Guadalcanal, and likened by one officer that was there, to a “barroom brawl after the lights had been shot out”. At 1530 on 12 November, the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) task force of VADM Hiroaki Abe set out for Guadalcanal after grouping 70 miles north of Indispensable Strait with the objective to bombard Henderson Field and neutralize the “Cactus Air Force” so that the planned Japanese landings on the 13^th would be unopposed. At dusk on the 12^th, RADM Callaghan, San Francisco’s former commanding officer (CO) and now commander of Task Force 67.4, received a reconnaissance report on the enemy formation and ordered his ships into a line formation. At 2200, Callaghan’s task force finished its escort of the transport and cargo ships that had brought troops and heavy field artillery to bolster the Guadalcanal garrison for the expected Japanese offensive, and returned through Lengo Channel into Savo (Ironbottom) Sound.

 

At 0124 on Friday, 13 November, light-cruiser USS Helena (CL-50), equipped with the latest SG radar, but steaming eighth in the battle column, detected the Japanese formation in two groups at 27,000 and 32,000 yds. Helena had also been the first ship to detect the onrushing Japanese at the Battle of Cape Esperance the previous month. Three minutes later, Callaghan ordered his 13-ship column to change course two points to starboard, to meet the enemy head-on. At 0130, Helena reported the event ships on port bow, distance 14,500 yds. Ten minutes later, USS Cushing (DD 376), lead in the four-destroyer van of the column, made the first sighting of the IJN formation, the destroyers Yudachi and Harusame at 3,000 yds. Frustrated, the junior (but more experienced) task force second- in- command, RADM Norman Scott aboard the lead cruiser, USS Atlanta (CL 51), growled, “Well, if Admiral Callaghan doesn’t say commence firing, I will.”

 

A minute later, Cushing suddenly veered left to expose her torpedo batteries, forcing the ships following her to bunch up as they suddenly changed course to avoid collision. Before she could fire, Atlanta was forced to veer suddenly to port to avoid hitting USS O’Bannon (DD 450), the destroyer immediately in front of her. By then, all the IJN ships were aware of the contact with the American formation. From San Francisco’s navigation bridge, immediately behind USS Atlanta, RADM Callaghan radioed on the TBS ship-to-ship channel, “What are you doing?” CAPT Samuel Jenkins on Atlanta, curtly replied, “Avoiding our destroyers.” to which Callaghan responded, “Come back to your course as soon as you can. You’re throwing the whole column into disorder.” But any hope of an organized battle formation for Callaghan’s force was already gone. When Cushing finally followed his order and turned north again, the Japanese cruiser Nagara, was visible on her starboard bow. That meant the entire American task force was sailing into the heart of the enemy formation.

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A 0145, Callaghan gave the order “Stand by to open fire!” Three minutes later, the IJN destroyer Akatsuki and battleship Hiei, flagship of VADM Abe, turned on their large searchlights and illuminated USS Atlanta at a distance of 3,000 yds. (2,700 m)—almost point-blank range for the battleship's main guns. In Atlanta’s after gunnery control position, LT Lloyd Mustin gave the order, “Action port! Illuminating ship is target. Open Fire!” Atlanta’s forward gun fired a 5-inch salvo, knocking out Akatsuki’s searchlights, and was immediately taken under fire by other IJN destroyers.

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Almost simultaneously, USS San Francisco opened fire on Yudachi, hitting her multiple times. A minute later, with enemy ships on both sides of his fraying column, Callaghan gave the order, “Odd ships commence fire to starboard, even ships to port.” however, there was confusion as some ships had to stop tracking targets in order to comply with the order, many ignored it and others were not sure if they were odd or even. Atlanta, which was number five in line, opened fire to port, while San Francisco, number six in line, opened up fire to starboard. The engagement quickly deteriorated into a free-for-all, with ships firing at each other in close-quarters and changing course at will to pursue targets or evade fire.

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The destroyer, USS Laffey (DD 459) passed so close to Hiei that they missed colliding by 20 ft. (6 m). Hiei was unable to depress her main or secondary batteries low enough to hit Laffey which was able to pepper the Japanese battleship with 5-inch shells and rake her with machine gun fire that heavily damaged the bridge, wounding VADM Abe and killing his chief of staff. Laffey fought the Japanese ships with the three remaining main battery guns in a no-quarter duel at point-blank range. She was hit by a 14-inch shell from Hiei. Then, a torpedo in her fantail put Laffey out of action. As the order to abandon ship was passed, a violent explosion ripped the destroyer apart and she sank immediately with heavy loss of life.

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As other American ships started to pummel Yudachi and Akatsuki, Frisco shifted fire to the destroyer Harusame, which suddenly reversed course and passed behind the disabled and drifting Atlanta, which was caught in the crossfire and heavily hit by two salvos from San Francisco’s main battery gunners that either didn’t see Atlanta or mistook her for an enemy ship. RADM Scott was killed on USS Atlanta’s bridge. Scott had led Task Force 64.2 to victory from flagship, USS San Francisco, in the Battle of Cape Esperance, the Navy's first surface victory of the campaign, when he successfully "Crossed the T" of the opposing Japanese force. Callaghan was likely attempting to maneuver his force for the same tactic, but had instead sailed into the enemy formation.

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The accidental shelling of Atlanta, prompted RADM Callaghan to issue the order “Cease fire own ships,” which inadvertently went out on the TBS channel, resulting in further confusion in the fractured column of American ships. Few captains obeyed but many questioned it, as Callaghan quickly clarified, “Give her hell,” then “We want the big ones! Get the big ones first!”

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Frisco then encountered Hiei on opposite course. Both flagships fired broadsides into each other at a range of 2,500 yds. while they were each being hit by other ships from opposite directions. During this brief duel, USS San Francisco hit Hiei with numerous 8-inch shells, one of which crippled Hiei’s steering and would be the cause of the battleship’s doom later that day. San Francisco was hit by fire from the light cruiser Nagara and was engaged by the battleship Kirishima as well. The destroyer Amatsukaze fired four torpedoes at Frisco, too close for them to arm, and narrowly avoided a collision. With San Francisco taking hits on both sides, Hiei’s third 14-inch salvo hit the cruiser in the bridge area at 0200. Several hits from Hiei’s secondary batteries mortally wounded CAPT Cassin Young, another hit killed RADM Callaghan and all but one of his staff on the navigation bridge, and yet another hit killed the acting executive officer (XO), CDR Joseph C. Hubbard in after control, while the XO, CDR Mark Crouter, was killed in his bunk, where he was convalescing after being severely burned in an air attack earlier that afternoon. The only survivors on the navigation bridge were the communications officer, LCDR Bruce McCandless and a 20-year old sailor.

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After nearly 40 minutes of brutal, close-quarters fighting, the two sides broke contact and ceased fire at 0226, when IJN RADM Abe and the senior surviving US officer, CAPT Gilbert Hoover, commanding the light cruiser, USS Helena (CL-50), ordered their forces to disengage. With one battleship, a light cruiser, four destroyers with light damage and four moderately damage destroyers, the reasons for Abe’s decision to stall the planned bombardment of Henderson Field on Guadalcanal, to finish off the remaining US naval forces defending it and land reinforcement troops to retake the island, were unclear but fortunate for the American defenders that had only one light cruiser and one destroyer left that could deliver effective resistance.

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While future Congressional Medal of Honor (CMOH) recipients, McCandless lay in his bunk tending to a facial shrapnel wound that had knocked him unconscious, and senior surviving officer LCDR Herbert Schonland, sat unscathed in his quarters wondering what would happen next, until he was approached by his friend, McCandless, and asked to turn over command of the ship to him (a good decision that Schonland gladly made), the sailor was alone on the darkened and blasted navigation bridge, steering USS San Francisco.

 

Locked on the wheel, with no directional orders, all electrical severed, no communication with the task force, or with the rest of the ship, and surrounded by dead bodies scattered in the pitch blackness, he was terrified and knew there were islands surrounding the ship, but where? Keeping his cool, the man reduced speed and eased the ship into small circles, passing orders to the after steering station. He kept this up for an hour, until shortly after 3 am, when LT Jack Bennett, fourth division officer commanding the stern deck guns, realized that the cruiser was steaming in circles and ran up four decks to the bridge to see what was going on, only to discover the devastation.

 

Bennett had been wounded at 1416 that afternoon in an aerial strike on Callaghan’s task force by nineteen Mitsubishi G4M “Betty” bombers, when one of the planes, crippled by San Francisco’s anti-aircraft batteries, crashed into the after superstructure, demolishing a 20 mm. AA battery and knocking out the after control radar while killing 24 and wounding 45 others.

 

The wounded and dead were quickly transferred to the transport, USS President Jackson (APA-18), as the convoy continued unloading at Lunga Point anchorage. Each of the eleven men killed instantly on Frisco’s AA gun platform, later had a destroyer escort named in his honor. That afternoon, Bennett and LT John Wallace, also wounded, had tried to save the wounded. Bennett saw a man hanging over the edge, with only his legs visible on the deck. Grabbing the legs to pull him back on the ship, Bennett discovered the rest of the man was gone. During the attack, all the “Betties” were shot down by the ships and fighters scrambled from Henderson Field. No ships were hit by aerial torpedoes and only San Francisco was damaged.

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Later that evening, after the empty transports and their escort of three destroyers and two ancient Lapwing-class minesweepers were sailing southeast back to the big American base at Espiritu Santo, and RADM Callaghan’s task force was steaming northwest along the Guadalcanal coast towards its midnight battle, Bennett had stood in the command station and witnessed an agitated CAPT Young, waving his arms and exclaiming to the rear admiral that it was “suicide” for the American task force (two heavy cruisers, three light cruisers and eight destroyers) to engage a superior Japanese force (two battleships, a light cruiser, and twelve destroyers). Callaghan, who was untested in combat, replied, “Yes, I know, but we have to do it.”

 

Now, several hours later, with Callaghan, Young and the rest of USS San Francisco’s command dead, neither Bennett nor the sailor on the wheel were aware of the danger that San Francisco was dangerously top-heavy, after a 14-inch projectile from Hiei had exploded at the bow waterline an hour earlier, allowing thousands of gallons of seawater to flow into the ship, sloshing on the main deck, and increasing each time the cruiser plowed through a wave. The slow maneuvering of the ship through the waves, probably mitigated the threat of the cruiser capsizing and bought time until later that night when a chief bosun’s mate determined that the water had to be drained to the two engine rooms below. Men took turns diving with wrenches in hand to open the eight bolts securing each hatch cover, submerged in three feet of water, the first time this damage control measure had been done on a Navy ship. But there was another threat facing Frisco. In the inky darkness, Bennett saw the twinkling light of another ship miles away. "Was it Japanese or part of the task force?" Either way, with no lights and no means to communicate with the mystery ship, Bennett, an old Boy Scout, grabbed a three-cell flashlight from the bulkhead and began sending out Morse code signals “CA 38 CA 38 CA 38” into the darkness.

 

Helena saw Bennett’s identifying signal, as her gun crews were making ready to fire on what they mistakenly believed was a Japanese cruiser running without lights. Instead of finishing off San Francisco, at about 0400, the heavily damaged cruiser followed Helena and the crippled, USS Juneau (CL 52) along with three surviving destroyers out of the battle zone through Sealark Channel and into safer waters. Secured from battle stations, Chief Baca ordered his men to inventory the undamaged provisions stored forward and aft, since coffee and food would again be needed to feed the eleven hundred souls on Frisco.

 

At about 1000, USS Juneau transferred a medical doctor and three unhappy medics to San Francisco to assist in treating the wounded. An hour later as burial services were being conducted on the nearly stopped San Francisco, Juneau, herself battle-damaged and running on one screw, took a torpedo fired by the Japanese submarine I-26 on the port side, in the vicinity of the bridge and where she had been struck by a Long Lance torpedo the night before. The torpedo had been fired at USS San Francisco, but adjusting its depth while maintaining a straight course, it dove and passed under Frisco amidships, going on to strike Juneau travelling 800 yds. off the starboard quarter. The explosion ignited the magazine and blew the cruiser in half. The 675- man Juneau was gone in less than a minute. The remaining ships of the task force did not remain on scene owing to the risk of further torpedo attacks. Of the initial 115 survivors from Juneau, only ten men were rescued from the water 8-days later, after exposure, exhaustion and sharks had taken their toll.

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McCandless’ after action battle report, and so, the Navy’s official account of the events, makes no mention of a sailor conning USS San Francisco, alone and in the dark for an hour amid the death and destruction on the navigation bridge. Nor does McCandless’ report mention that the unidentified “man” that signaled Helena with a flashlight, was LT Jack Bennett. Bennett was one of 32 USS San Francisco men awarded the Navy Cross for the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. McCandless made a career decision about what facts to exclude from his report to FADM William “Bull” Halsey. Aside from RADM Callaghan (a true hero), McCandless and Schonland, the fourth (and only enlisted) man on San Francisco to receive the Medal of Honor for the battle was Boatswain’s Mate first class (BM1c) Reinhardt Keppler. Keppler was Bennett’s lead BM1c and despite Bennett’s wounds from the afternoon air attack that had excused him from duty, the two men had worked shoulder to shoulder dragging the wounded to safety that terrible night and fighting fires in the darkness near the hanger station where aviation fuel was stored for the floatplanes. Keppler was severely wounded in the leg and bled to death with a fire hose in his hand. He received the CMOH only because Bennett demanded that Bruce McCandless put his man in for it.

 

Atlanta and Juneau were lost, seven destroyers, thirty-six aircraft and more than 1,700 men during the two parts of the naval engagement at Guadalcanal that unfolded over three days, including Waterloo, Iowa’s five Sullivan brothers on Juneau. The Japanese lost two battleships, a heavy cruiser, four destroyers, sixty-four aircraft and more than 1,900 men. On the afternoon of 14 November, San Francisco headed back towards Espiritu Santo. Badly damaged, the cruiser proudly sailed under the Golden Gate Bridge on 11 December 1942 and headed for Mare Island Naval Shipyard. CCS Baca’s battle station during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal is unknown, but the acting executive officer, Herbert Schonland wrote, “Outstanding conduct and performance of duty.” After all, barroom brawls were nothing new to Ernie Baca. Following repairs and modernization, on 2 February 1943, Frisco got underway to return to the South Pacific, earning two more battle stars over the next several months: Aleutian Operation, May 11 - June, 1943 and Pacific Raids of Wake Island, October 5-6, 1943. In September, USS San Francisco was awarded a Presidential Unit Citation for action at the Battle of Cape Esperance and the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. Frisco’s task group returned to Pearl Harbor on 11 October 1943.

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Ernie Baca was promoted from acting to permanent appointment (PA) chief commissary steward on 1 November. Seven days later, he detached from USS San Francisco for assignment to “new [ship] construction” on the West Coast. Frisco was the only ship Baca knew. Attached to the heavy cruiser for 7-years and 7-months, he had advanced from apprentice seaman to chief petty officer. When he saluted Frisco’s Officer of the Deck (OOD) for the last time, Ernie Baca was tied for 7^th among the 1,100 crewman for longevity on San Francisco. After Baca left, USS San Francisco went on to rack up nine more battle stars by V-J Day, for a total of seventeen and the distinction of being the third-most decorated US Navy ship during the Second World War.

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Chief Baca was a “plank owner” of the Casablanca-class escort carrier, USS Ommaney Bay (CVE 79), “the Big O”, when she was commissioned on 11 February 1944 at Astoria, Oregon. Baca was given 22-days leave before reporting to the commissioning crew and was able to stay with his wife and young son in Long Beach. Following shakedown and carrier qualification, the “baby flattop” saw action in September 1944 when she stood off Peleliu and Anguar Islands and provided air cover for the fleet and close air support strikes for the invasion of the Palau Islands. After sailing to Manus Island to renew her depleted stock of fuel and ammunition, Ommaney Bay joined RADM Felix Stump's "Taffy 2" (TU 77.4.2) for the invasion of Leyte. At the beginning of the Battle off Samar on 25 October, the escort carriers began launching air strikes in an effort to cripple as many of the approaching enemy force as possible. In the ensuing battle, aircraft from Ommaney Bay contributed to the sinking of one Japanese cruiser and helped to damage a number of other warships. USS Ommaney Bay launched some six strikes that day, and helped to turn threatened defeat into victory.

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The carrier spent the month of November at Manus and Kossol Passage for availability and replenishment, and from 12 to 17 December 1944, operated in the Mindanao and Sulu Seas in support of operations on the Island of Mindoro. On the 15th, a day of heavy enemy air attacks, she splashed a Yokosuka P1Y "Frances" enemy bomber as it dived for the ship from the port bow.

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On 19 December she returned to Kossol Passage to prepare for the landings in Lingayen Gulf. USS Ommaney Bay stood out on New Year's Day 1945 and transited Surigao Strait two days later. On 4 January, while in the Sulu Sea, a twin-engine Japanese “Betty” bomber “suicide plane” penetrated the screen undetected and made for the carrier. The plane nicked the carrier’s island then crashed into the flight deck on the forward starboard side at 1715. Two bombs were released; one of them penetrated the flight deck and detonated below, setting off a series of explosions among the fully gassed planes on the forward third of the hangar deck. The second bomb passed through the hangar deck, ruptured the fire main on the second deck, and exploded near the starboard side.

 

Account by one of the air crewman of VC-75, Aviation Ordnanceman (AOM) 3c Jose “Andy” Chacon:

 

“Following New Year's 1945 we pulled up anchor in the dark of the night and moved out into the Sulu Sea. The next morning, for as far as the eye could see there were men-of-war (naval vessels) on the horizon. Some were transports carrying the Army troops that were to land at Lingayen Gulf, MacArthur's western landing in the Philippines. On January 4, 1945 at 1712 hours, the USS Ommaney Bay received a direct hit by a kamikaze, i.e. a suicide aircraft, a stripped down twin engine Betty. I had just returned from combat air patrol. I was hungry and went directly to the mess hall in the lower decks. Other airmen who were in the flight went instead to our living quarters in the gallery deck to change clothes. That was exactly where the suicide hit. The impact knocked out the electrical power below decks and it was pitch dark in the mess hall. I was thrown against the bulkhead and got a gash over my right eye. Through our ingenuity those in the mess hall held hands and we made our way topside. We finally made it to the fantail on the main deck. There were people burning all over the place. The Betty had splattered napalm and there were many severely injured from the blast. Chief Guynes, my boss, was among them. Chief Wahoo Flores who actually ran flight operations, and on whom the Ommaney Bay pilots depended to land on deck, died in a fire ball. Marty Martinez, a promising baseball player and Flores' right-hand man lost both arms and asked not to be taken off the ship. He preferred to go down with it rather that to survive and not play baseball.

 

There was mad confusion at the fantail. We were pulling survivors out of the water and pulling them back on deck. Communications between the front part of the Carrier, where the Captain had given the order to abandon ship, had been lost and those of us on the fantail had not gotten the word. We learned that the order to abandon had been given from those we fished out of the water. They did not know they were being pulled back on the same ship. The Big O was listing badly but was still underway. Pandemonium broke out. A barber jumped right into the turning propeller screw with a bag of money he kept in the barber shop. All we saw of him was a blotch of red sea water.

 

I went over the side with a group that included Willard Capistrant. What we did was unleash one of the big corked nets that hang on the side of all ships. We got it on the water but it was still all bundled up and a big problem. There was a sailor who had his stomach ripped open among our group. He needed help badly but we just could not get him on the net. The swells were too strong, some of us were exhausted. I ripped the boot laces off and took my reverse uppers (marine style boots) off in order to stay afloat better. I grabbed a hold of the net and the others rolled the man with the open stomach over me. I took in all of his shinola and got sicker than I have ever been. I threw up and wound up swallowing my own vomit. Then it got dark. A Destroyer Escort, I thought to be the USS Patterson (Records show it was the USS Twiggs), came alongside and it threw a line towards me. I grabbed it, locked my hands on to it, and passed out. When I came to, I was on the deck of the USS Patterson (Twiggs). I was later told that for several minutes after they pulled me on board I still had my hands locked on to a knot on the line and refused to let go. That night, with both vessels underway, we were transferred to the USS Columbia, a Heavy Cruiser and some days later to the USS California, a Battleship, then on to Manus Island to get a new sea bag issued, get our records reconstructed and eventually we returned by troopship to stateside. My group returned to San Francisco on February 17th the day the US Navy announced that we had been sunk! I came home on thirty day survivor's leave.”

 

 

By 1750 nearly the entire topside area was engulfed in the inferno and the order to abandon ship was given. At 1945, the carrier was sunk by a torpedo from the destroyer USS Burns (DD 588). She was the eleventh of twelve US Navy flattops sunk during the Second World War. A total of 95 men were lost, including two killed from an assisting destroyer when torpedo warheads on the carrier's hangar deck finally went off while the hapless rescuers were picking up survivors from the water in their motor whaleboat. Ommaney Bay earned three battle stars for her service in the Pacific during the six months that she was in action.

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