3 OCTOBER 1944 THE LOSS OF SHELTON (DE-407) On this day, Task Unit 77.4.3, affectionately known as “Taffy 3,” centered around the escort carriers FANSHAW BAY (CVE-70) and MIDWAY (CVE-63), was operating north of Morotai. The island had been taken quietly Read More
24-27 SEPTEMBER 1778 THE LOSS OF RALEIGH On December 13th, 1775, the Continental Congress issued our young nation’s first naval construction authorization, ordering that 13 frigates be built for the Continental Navy. Five of these were to be rated at 32 Read More
21-30 SEPTEMBER 1942 CONVOY RB-1 In the decades before practical automobile transportation, Americans traveling between cities of the eastern United States often did so by way of intercoastal steamer. Numerous private steamship companies offered passenger service on 200-400-foot, shallow draft screw Read More
13 SEPTEMBER 1847 “FROM THE HALLS OF MONTEZUMA…” (cont.) Meanwhile, a diversion created by Quitman’s troops allowed a second Army division under MGEN Gideon J. Pillow to carry the lower walls of Chapultepec from the west. And, to the south, Quitman’s Read More
13 SEPTEMBER 1847 “FROM THE HALLS OF MONTEZUMA…” By this date in the 17-month-old war with Mexico, the United States had gained control of California from San Francisco to Los Cabos in southern Baja. But complete victory in the war required Read More
8 SEPTEMBER 1923 DEVIL’S ELBOW DISASTER On the map of California one will notice a prominence north of Santa Barbara at which the coast takes a sharp turn to head nearly east/west for 80 miles. This prominence, bounded by Point Arguello Read More
2 SEPTEMBER 1944 PILOT DOWN! By September of 1944 the Allied advance across the Pacific reached the Bonin Islands, an 1800-mile-long chain that includes Iwo Jima. At 0715 this morning, a squadron of Grumman TBF Avengers took off from USS SAN Read More
30 AUGUST 1993 RESCUE AT SEA Just after midnight 31 August 1993 a chopper from NAS North Island set down on Naval Medical Center San Diego’s pad to offload a patient, Eugene P. Scheller. Mr. Scheller, the Chief Engineer on the Read More
26 AUGUST 1863 INTERCEPTING THE MEGA-GUNS When South Carolinians fired on Fort Sumter to start the Civil War, all but one of the foundries in the United States were in the North. Only the Tredeger Iron Works in Richmond could bore Read More
21 AUGUST 1858 USS DOLPHIN vs. ECHO Despite human slavery being a way of life in the antebellum American south, official US policy forbade trafficking in slaves as early as 1807. On 3 March 1819 Congress granted President James Monroe the Read More