Brett Ashton - Vengeance - Hatred and Honor

I couldn’t help saying to Commander Kenworthy “Wouldn’t you just love to serve on a ship like that?”

The commander turned and looked at me and said, “It would be a lot better than fighting against her!” I couldn’t help but notice that he seemed a little more excited, like he knew something I didn’t. And in a few days, I found out why.

I was still working the area down by the hull of the overturned Utah . We were preparing the area for the eventual salvation of the ship, or at least an effort to roll it out of the way. It was very dirty work. Now there were some officers who didn’t like to get their hands in the dirt and oil, but I wasn’t one of them. It seemed to help the crew that was assigned to me to know the officer in charge didn’t mind getting some dirt under his nails. I was almost startled to hear the familiar voice of Commander Kenworthy close behind me. “Good Lieutenant Commander Williams, you are still in a clean uniform,” the XO said. Fortunately, it was still early.

“Come with me,” he said. “We have an important meeting.” I couldn’t help feeling there was something unusual about him. I couldn’t put my finger on it other than to say he seemed very formal and very serious, even for a military officer.

We got in the staff car that he had arrived in and drove around to the other side of the island. We stopped at a small building that is usually used as a meeting place and temporary office for higher-ranking officers of task forces and ships when they are in port. Whoever we were going to see was sure to be at least a captain and probably an admiral.

My curiosity then getting the best of me, I couldn’t resist asking him, “What’s going on, sir?”

“I’ve been ordered not to tell you, Jake. All I can say to you about it is to just be yourself, the officer I know you to be, and everything will work out. Don’t ask me anymore, and that is an order.”

Having asked and heard his answer, I began to wish I hadn’t. This sounded like I had to prepare myself to be on the defensive, like I was being investigated for something.

We went inside the building, down the hall, and into an office on the left. A lieutenant junior grade was sitting at the small desk and asked Commander Kenworthy if he could help us.

The XO replied “Yes, I am Commander Kenworthy, and this is Lieutenant Commander Williams. I was here earlier, and the admiral and captain wanted to see him as soon as possible.”

The lieutenant got up from the desk, went over to the other door in the room, and opened it. He stuck his head inside, and I heard him tell someone that we had arrived. “Send them in,” said a voice from the other side of the door.

We entered the small room, which had a table with a few chairs around it. Only one of them was occupied by a captain. There were papers and a briefcase spread out on the table. To the left side of the room, there was a large window that was open just enough to let the morning breeze in. Outside the window was the battleship North Carolina . On the right side of the room was a small couch and an end table with a lamp on it. The couch was occupied by an older vice admiral wearing a cap with an unusually long bill. He was sitting with his legs crossed, leaning with his right arm on the end table. Both of them looked at me when we entered. I followed the XO’s lead and remained at attention in front of the captain at the table with my hat under my left arm.

“Commander,” the captain said to the XO, “this is Williams?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Lieutenant Commander Williams, I was reading your Executive Officer’s reports of the attack on December 7th of 1941, on the battleship Oklahoma and, to tell the truth, I’m quite alarmed,” he said as he fixed his gaze on me.

“Sir?” I replied not knowing what else to say.

“I want to know what made you think, that as an assistant gunnery officer, a mere lieutenant commander, you had the authority to order an abandon ship?”

The captain and admiral, unflinching, were both looking at me. Commander Kenworthy had for all intents and purposes become a statue.

“Sir, I don’t understand. What’s—?”

“I’ll ask the questions here, Lieutenant Commander Williams,” the captain said, interrupting me. “It says here you went around passing by word of mouth the order to abandon ship. Why?”

“I believed Oklahoma was going to capsize, sir, so—”

“How did you know that?” the captain asked cutting me off again.

“At the time I arrived topside, she had already been struck by five torpedoes on the port side and was listing over fifteen to twenty deg—”

“It says here you had no communication with Captain Bode, is that correct?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Why not?”

“He was not aboard at the time of the attack, sir.”

“How about Commander Kenworthy here, did you have any communication with him?”

“No, sir.”

“How about damage control? Did you talk to Lieutenant Commander Hobby?”

“No, sir.”

“A fifteen to twenty degree list could be corrected under combat conditions assuming the crew stays on board to fight the flooding; are you aware of that, Lieutenant Commander Williams?”

“Yes, sir,” I said, thinking in horror to myself, “My God, they can’t be setting up to blame me for the loss of the Oklahoma , could they?”

In the chaos that followed the attack, several of the higher-ranking officers in charge found themselves in a lot of trouble for not being prepared. So in my mind at the time, it was entirely possible that I might wrongly become one of them.

“I see,” the Captain said. “Then why on God’s green Earth would you think it was appropriate to abandon ship, let alone think you had the authority to do it?”

“We were not under normal combat conditions, sir,” I answered, believing that I was beginning to get a fix on what this was really about and setting myself up for a defense.

“In what way?”

“The bilges were all open, sir, in addition to condition X-Ray being relaxed for Admiral Kimmel’s inspection t—”

“Damn it, Commander!” the Captain said, obviously losing his patience a little bit. “You just told me you had not communicated to Lieutenant Commander Hobby prior to your decision to abandon ship. Now, how would you know about the material condition of the bilges, let alone the rest of the ship?”

“I make it a point to always know the condition of the—”

“I’m not here to listen to you brag, Williams; I’m here to find out why you gave an unauthorized order to abandon Oklahoma .”

Any ideas I had about what this line of questioning had to do with disappeared by this point. And my own patience was wearing thin. I was becoming convinced that this man was on a crusade of some sort, but to what end, I had no idea.

“Captain, if I may explain, the only chance the Oklahoma had of surviving was if she settled on the harbor bottom before rolling over. Either way, the safest—”

“So you just saw the Oklahoma listing and decided it was time to leave?”

“Sir, the priority at the time was to save as much of the crew as—”

“Who the hell are you to be setting priorities for a ship that you are not in command of?”

About then, I had had enough of the way this was going, and with all caution abandoned and no place else to go, I decided it was time to “turn into the wind” and confront this captain. I was tired of being cut off in my answers, and I was either going to have my say or be court-martialed in the attempt, but I wouldn’t tolerate the possibility that the Oklahoma ’s loss was going to be blamed on me.