Against the Tide Imperial: The Struggle for Ceylon (The Usurper's War: An Alternative World War II B by James Young (classic book list .txt) 📗

her crew, her designers had never foreseen a situation where the vessel would be caught flat-footed, at night, and with the crew not even at battlestations. Even worse, in order to gain her impressive speed, those same designers had skimped on her armor protection.

For all these reasons, Lieutenant Commander Willoughby’s opening salvo was particularly devastating despite hitting with only two shells. The first punched into the Trento’s superstructure and exploded in the captain’s day cabin, killing him and several other other personnel manning her anti-aircraft batteries. The second hit stabbed into the cruiser’s forward boiler room, causing a great gout of steam that broiled the space’s engineers as the ocean poured in.

“Starboard thirty degrees,” Jacob barked. “Signal the Repulse and let Vice Admiral Godfrey know that we are engaging Contact One.”

As the talker acknowledged his orders, Jacob quickly stepped into the compartment aft of Houston’s bridge. Previously part of the captain’s day cabin, the yard workers in Sydney had converted the compartment to house the new radar equipment. Jacob had ordered the Houston’s operations department to also install a temporary plot that he could quickly reference in the midst of battle without departing too far from the bridge.

Jacob quickly took in the developing situation while the Houston jumped again from another full broadside. If the group followed his proposed action orders, Repulse would likely take Contact Two under fire, leaving Nashville to engage destroyers or other escorts.

“Make sure guns knows where our destroyers are,” Jacob said, then ducked back onto the bridge as the main battery thundered again. This was followed by the secondaries firing starshells and the Houston’s searchlights winking out. The reason for the latter decision became readily apparent as four shells landed roughly five hundred yards short of the heavy cruiser.

“Helm, zig zag, standard pattern,” Jacob ordered, bringing up the binoculars again. The roar of the Repulse’s 15-inch broadside was audible aboard the Houston, and he watched the large shells head downrange towards their target. To his dismay, he saw the that Repulse was also engaging the Trento.

Goddammit, he thought, even as two of the battlecruiser’s hits wrecked the Italian cruiser’s forward turrets in a massive fireball. So much for distribution of fire.

The Trento’s crew would have had much more unfavorable things to say about the Allied’ vessel’s gang tackle. Lt. Cdr. Willoughby, having found the range with half of his second broadside, had put another five 8-inch shells into the cruiser’s hull. The onslaught had killed many of the crew as they were stumbling out of their berths and trying to respond to the general quarters alarm, smashed the rudder machinery, and set the cruiser’s aviation fuel storage afire. With the Repulse’s assault setting her forward armament ablaze, the Trento was rapidly becoming an inferno from stem to stern.

The focus on the Italian vessel had saved her companion, however. The H.M.S. Arethusa had joined the convoy after carrying a new ambassador from King Edward’s London to Pretoria. Appalled at the escort commander's lackadaisical attitude, the Arethusa's captain had maintained much better readiness than the Trento or the the five Italian destroyers accompanying her.

Recognizing the massive waterspouts indicated the presence of at least one capital ship, the Arethusa’s officer of the deck immediately put his helm hard about and began making smoke. By the time her captain made it to the bridge, the light cruiser’s crew was mostly to battle stations, her 6-inch turrets had swung out, and the vessel's torpedo tubes were at the ready. Passing down the far side of the three merchantmen and tanker that made up the Italian convoy, the light cruiser waited for clear targets. As the U.S.S. Nashville opened fire with her fifteen 6-inch guns, the American cruiser's lack of flashless powder outlined the vessel’s form.

“Nashville is engaging Contact Seven, possible destroyer,” the talker shouted over the din of Houston’s main and secondary armament. Before Jacob could respond, the destroyers’ initial torpedoes finally began to strike after their long runs. Before his eyes, two Italian destroyers erupted, their acceleration and turn towards the Allied force having carried them into torpedoes intended for the convoy. Jacob, looking at the clock, was briefly shaken to realize it had been barely ten minutes since radar had first detected the convoy.

“Repulse is ordering a forty-five degree turn to starboard to allow the destroyers to close,” the talker relayed. “Formation will turn when we do.”

“Acknowledge,” Jacob said. “Helm, starboard forty-five.”

“Training pays off, sir,” Commander Farmer stated, his voice conveying the same awe that Jacob was feeling.

Jacob nodded his assent. Admiral Hart, Commander-in-Chief of the Southwest Pacific Area, had initiated a vigorous training regimen in the aftermath of his vessels’ performance during the Dutch East Indies Campaign. His immediate subordinate, Admiral Victor Crutchley, Royal Australian Navy, had ruthlessly enforced the standards Hart had set forth. Vice Admiral Godfrey, Her Majesty's Commonwealth Navy, in turn made Crutchley seem like a kind, benevolent soul.

Three relieved captains and people realized the man was serious, Jacob recalled. Getting most of one’s navy destroyed will do that for–

“Sir, the Nashville is taking fire!”

Jacob rushed out to the starboard bridge wing, looking down the Houston’s length to where the Nashville continued to lash out at a flaming vessel on the horizon. Starshells were drifting down around the light cruiser as a group of splashes was just subsiding. Another salvo arrived around the Nashville’s stern, and Jacob watched as the vessel’s turrets stopped firing. After a moment, they began to orient towards very faint, distant flashes on the far side of the Italian convoy. As two shells hit forward along her hull in a flurry of sparks, the Nashville’s own stern turrets belched a bright retort towards her assailant.

What in the hell is out there? Jacob was still considering that question when, with a bright fireball, one of the convoy’s vessels exploded in flames.

“Repulse is ordering all large vessels to retire to the northeast,” the talker stated.

“Acknowledge,” Jacob repeated, then gave the necessary orders to the helmsman. As the Houston’s bow came around,