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After shakedown along
the Pacific Coast, Kalinin Bay departed San Diego 3 January 1944 for
replenishment duty in the Pacific. Laden with troops and a cargo of
planes, she steamed via Pearl Harbor for the Gilbert Islands,
arriving off Tarawa Atoll 24 January to supply 5th Fleet carriers
then engaged in the conquest of the Marshalls. For more than 2 weeks
she provided logistic support from Tarawa to Majuro Atoll before
returning to Alameda, California, 24 February.
With VC-3 embarked 9 April, Kalinin Bay
reached Majuro, Marshalls, 23 April; conducted ASW air patrols off
Mili Atoll; and proceeded to Pearl Harbor 1 May to prepare for the
Marianas operation. She departed Pearl Harbor 30 May; and, while en
route to Saipan, she successfully evaded a Japanese torpedo that
crossed her bow close aboard. Touching at Eniwetok 9 June, Kalinin
Bay reached the eastern coast of Saipan 15 June and commenced air
operations in support of the invasion. After repelling an enemy air
attack at dusk on the 17th, she sailed 19 June to ferry planes to
and from Eniwetok. Returning to Saipan 24 June, she resumed
effective air strikes against enemy positions on the embattled
island until 9 July when she steamed via Eniwetok for similar duty
at Guam. Arriving 20 July, she launched direct support and ASW
sorties until 2 August, then returned to Eniwetok to prepare for
operations in the Palau Islands.
Kalinin Bay cleared Eniwetok 18 August and proceeded via Tulagi,
Florida Island, to the Southern Palaus where she arrived 14
September with units of the 3rd Fleet. Ordered to furnish air
support for the capture, occupation, and defense of Peleliu, Angaur,
and Ngesebus, she launched air strikes to support landing operations.
For 2 weeks her planes, flying almost 400 sorties, inflicted heavy
damage on enemy ground installations and shipping. On 25 September,
alone, they sank or destroyed three cargo transports and six landing
barges.
She departed the Palaus 30 September; and, upon arriving Seeadler
Harbor, Manus Island, 3 October, she received a new commanding
officer, Captain T. B. Williamson. Kalinin Bay departed Manus 12
October en route to the Philippine Islands. Ordered to provide air
coverage and close air support during the bombardment and amphibious
landings on Leyte Island, she arrived off Leyte 17 October. After
furnishing air support during landings by Ranger units on Dinagat
and Homonhon Islands in the eastern approaches to Leyte Gulf, she
launched air strikes in support of invasion operations at Tacloban
on the northeast coast of Leyte. Operating with Rear Admiral Clifton
Sprague's "Taffy 3" (Task Unit 77.4.3), which consisted of 6 escort
carriers and a screen of 3 destroyers and 4 destroyer escorts,
Kalinin Bay sailed to the east of Leyte and Samar as her planes,
flying 244 sorties from 18 to 24 October, struck and destroyed enemy
installations and airfields on Leyte, Samar, Cebu, Negros, and Panay
Islands.
Steaming about 60 miles east of Samar before dawn 25 October, Taffy
3 prepared to launch the day's initial air strikes. At 0647, Rear
Admiral Sprague received word that a sizable Japanese fleet was
approaching from the northwest. Comprising four battleships, eight
cruisers, and eleven destroyers, Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita's Center
Force steadily closed and at 0658 opened fire on Taffy 3.
So began the Battle off Samar—one of the most memorable engagements
in U.S. naval history. Outnumbered and outgunned, the slower Taffy 3
seemed fated for disaster; but the American ships defied the odds
and gamely accepted the enemy's challenge.
Kalinin Bay accelerated to flank speed; and, despite fire from three
enemy cruisers, she launched her planes, ordering the pilots "to
attack the Japanese task force and proceed to Tacloban airstrip,
Leyte, to rearm and regas." As salvos fell "with disconcerting
rapidity" increasingly nearer Kalinin Bay, her planes, striking the
enemy force with bombs, rockets, and gunfire, inflicted heavy damage
on the closing ships.
As the trailing ship in the escort carrier van, Kalinin Bay came
under intense enemy fire. Though partially protected by chemical
smoke, by a timely rain squall, and by valiant counterattacks of
screening destroyers and destroyer escorts, she took the first of 15
direct hits at 0750. Fired from an enemy battleship, the large
caliber shell (14 inch or 16 inch) struck the starboard side of the
hangar deck just abaft the forward elevator.
By 0800, the enemy cruisers, which were steaming off her port
quarter, closed to within 18,000 yards. Kalinin Bay gamely responded
to their straddling salvos with rapid fire from her single 5 inch
gun, which only intensified the enemy fire. Three 8 inch,
armor-piercing projectiles struck her within minutes of each other.
At 0825, the carrier's 5-incher scored a direct hit from 16,000
yards on the No. 2 turret of a Nachi-class heavy cruiser, and a
second hit shortly thereafter forced the enemy ship to withdraw
temporarily from formation.
At 0830, five enemy destroyers steamed over the horizon off her
starboard quarter. The closing ships opened fire from about 14,500
yards; and, as screening ships engaged the cruisers and laid down
concealing smoke, Kalinin Bay shifted her fire and, for the next
hour, traded shots with Japan's Destroyer Squadron 10. Many salvos
exploded close aboard or passed directly overhead; and, though no
destroyer fire hit Kalinin Bay directly, she took ten more 8 inch
hits from the now obscured cruisers. One shell passed through the
flight deck and into the communications area, where it destroyed all
the radar and radio equipment.
Under heavy attack from the air and harassed by incessant fire from
American destroyers and destroyer escorts, the enemy cruisers broke
off action and turned northward at 0920. At 0915, the enemy
destroyers, which were kept at bay by the daring and almost
singlehanded exploits of Johnston, launched a premature torpedo
attack from 10,500 yards. As the torpedoes approached the escort
carriers, they slowed down. A TBF Avenger from St. Lo strafed and
exploded two torpedoes in Kalinin Bay's wake about 100 yards astern,
and a shell from the latter's 5 inch gun deflected a third from a
collision course with her stern.
At about 0930, as the enemy ships fired parting salvos and reversed
course northward, Kalinin Bay scored a direct hit amidships on a
retreating destroyer. Five minutes later, she ceased fire and
retired southward with the surviving ships of Taffy 3. At 1050, the
task unit came under a concentrated air attack. During the 40-minute
battle, the first attack from a Kamikaze unit in World War II, all
except Fanshaw Bay were damaged. One plane of Lieutenant Yukio Seki
and his Shikishima squadron crashed through St. Lo's flight deck and
exploded her torpedo and bomb magazine, mortally wounding the
carrier. Four diving planes attacked Kalinin Bay from astern and the
starboard quarter. Intense fire splashed two close aboard; but a
third plane crashed into the port side of the flight deck, damaging
it badly. The fourth hit destroyed the aft port stack.
As part of Taffy 3, Kalinin Bay had prevented a Japanese penetration
into Leyte Gulf and saved General Douglas MacArthur's beachhead in
the Philippines. At a cost of five ships and hundreds of men, Taffy
3, aided by her own planes and those of "Taffy 2" (Task Unit
77.4.2), sank three enemy cruisers, seriously damaged several other
ships, and turned back the "most powerful surface fleet which Japan
had sent to sea since the Battle of Midway."
Despite the battle damage, Taffy 3 cleared the air of attacking
planes; at noon, the escort carriers retired southeastward while
their escort searched for survivors from St. Lo. Though Kalinin Bay
suffered extensive structural damage during the morning's furious
action, she counted only 5 dead among her 60 casualties. Weary and
battle scarred, Kalinin Bay was awarded the Presidential Unit
Citation for heroic conduct as a unit of Taffy 3. She steamed via
Woendi, Schouten Islands, to Manus, arriving 1 November for
emergency repairs. Getting under way for the United States 7
November, the escort carrier reached San Diego 27 November for
permanent repairs and alterations.
Repairs completed 18 January 1945, the veteran escort carrier
departed San Diego 20 January to ferry planes and men to Pearl
Harbor and Guam. For more than 8 months, she served as a
replenishment carrier in the Pacific Carrier Transport Squadron;
and, during six cruises between the West Coast and Pearl Harbor,
Eniwetok, and Guam, she transported more than 600 planes. Departing
San Diego 2 September, she steamed to the Philippines, arriving
Samar 28 September to participate in Operation Magic Carpet. With
1,048 men embarked, she departed Samar 1 October and arrived San
Francisco 19 October.
After conducting two more voyages between California and Pearl
Harbor, Kalinin Bay departed San Diego 8 December for the Far East.
On 25 December, while she steamed to Yokosuka, Japan, an intense
storm heavily damaged her flight deck. Arriving the 27th, she
received emergency repairs, then sailed 3 January 1946 for the West
Coast and arrived San Diego 17 January. On 13 February, she
proceeded to the eastern seaboard, reaching Boston 9 March. Kalinin
Bay was decommissioned 15 May, and she was sold for scrap 8 December
to Patapsco Steel Co., Baltimore, Maryland. |
