This May fourth through the eighth, Australia commemorates what is close to a national holiday. Many Americans don’t remember it, but seventy-six years ago this Friday a naval battle, the Battle of the Coral Sea, determined the fate of the Pacific country. The small town of Woodstock, Illinois had its own part to play in this historic event, thanks to seaman Albin “Al” Kuppe Jr. of the United States Navy. And this year, interest in the event will be even greater thanks to the recent undersea discovery of his ship, the USS Lexington.
On March fourth of 2018, led by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, the research vessel RV Petrel used a remote undersea vehicle to confirm the location of the Lexington 500 miles off the coast of Queensland, Australia. The Lexington was sunk by Japanese torpedo bombers on May Eighth 1942, the last day of the Battle of the Coral Sea. Though 216 crew members lost their lives, the ship had over 2,000 survivors, among them Al Kuppe Jr. of Woodstock.
Kuppe recounts in a June 1942 edition of the Woodstock Sentinel that he “didn’t give up hope until the very last… no crew was ever more proud of their ship.” He was one of the last rescued from the Lexington, sharing a boat with Captain F. H. Sherman, last man off the ship. The rescue came “just as an explosion aboard the Lexington sent the amidship portion of the flight deck hurling into the air,” writes the Sentinel. Kuppe “couldn’t bear to see his home destroyed” and went below decks on the rescue boat instead of watching it sink. “The Lex was a lady to the end,” he stated.
The USS Lexington began life in 1921 as a battlecruiser, a heavily-armed but light ship class pioneered by the British – to little success, illustrated by the disastrous Battle of Jutland in World War One. With this in mind, and with the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 limiting the construction of heavily-armed capital ships, the Lexington was redesigned as one of the first aircraft carriers in the United States Navy. The Lexington was assigned to the Pacific fleet, and in the 1920s and 30s it aided disaster relief in Nicaragua, spent a month powering the city of Tacoma in place of a drought-addled hydroelectric dam, and during war games launched two successful surprise attacks on the naval base at Pearl Harbor. During this time, Robert A. Heinlein, author of Starship Troopers and The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, was aboard as an ensign, and had one of his first defeats when he lost a shipboard writing contest.
Woodstock’s Al Kuppe Jr. joined the crew as a fireman, or engine worker, in November of 1939. He writes in a letter home, “I am on one of the biggest warships in the world, an aircraft carrier. She has her own library, soda fountain, barber, tailor and cobbler shops and everything needed to make her a small city. We have free movies every night and use the hangar deck as gym… Even though this California weather is great, there are times I wish I could be in Woodstock, ice skating or attending basketball games. Though I get homesick at times, I sure am enjoying the life of a sailor.” He writes, “When I see the flags of warring nations on merchant ships here, I realize how lucky I am to be wearing the uniform of Uncle Sam” – little did he know that within the next two years, he and the crew of the Lexington would be joining them in the largest naval war ever fought by the United States.
On December 7, 1941, the carriers Lexington, Enterprise, and Saratoga were all absent from Pearl Harbor, and aside from the battleship Colorado, were the only major ships of the Pacific fleet unaffected by the Japanese attack. With almost half of the fleet’s battleships sunk and the rest out of commission, the three carriers would be instrumental in the early days of the War in the Pacific. After an unsuccessful attempt to relieve the defenders of Wake Island, the Lexington’s finest hour came a few months later at the Battle of the Coral Sea. In May 1942, the Japanese launched Operation MO, the planned invasion of Port Moresby in New Guinea. The port, only a few hundred miles from Australia, would have made the perfect staging ground for an invasion of the Allied country. On May 4th, the Japanese invasion fleet was intercepted by the American and Australian Navy.
The Battle of the Coral Sea was the first in history between naval aircraft carriers, and the first where the opposing fleets were too far apart to see each other. The battle was completely dependent on planes from the Lexington and Yorktown, and on the Japanese side, from the carriers Shōhō, Shōkaku, and Zuikaku. The battle saw the Shōhō sunk and the Shōkaku heavily damaged, and the loss of 92 of the 127 Japanese aircraft. Although the Allied ship losses were greater, and the battle was a tactical victory for the Japanese, the loss of their air cover forced them to abandon the invasion of Port Moresby. With Australia safe, the Japanese carriers damaged, and scores of highly-trained Japanese pilots killed, the Battle of the Coral Sea was a major strategic victory for the Allies, playing a key part in the eventual victory in the Pacific.
Among the Allied losses was the Lexington. Though the ship was not badly damaged enough to sink on its own, it was ordered to be scuttled to prevent its capture by the Japanese. It remained two miles below the sea for three-quarters of a century, along with 35 aircraft, eleven of which – Dauntlesses, Devastators, and a single Wildcat – have been found, remarkably well-preserved. The site has been designated a war grave by the US Navy, and attempts to raise the ship will not be made. But in the United States and Australia, the spirit of “Lady Lex” has come home to high regard.
Willcockson Wordsmithing 