August 17, 1942 - Monday - 80 years ago today

Status - John Skinner - USS O'Brien: 

O'Brien had joined Task Force 17 at  Pearl Harbor. On August 17th, Task Force 17, centered around USS Hornet, left Pearl Harbor for the South Pacific.  Here is a description from the Dictionary of Naval Fighting Ships:

Hornet, loaded, fueled, and provisioned, cleared Pearl Harbor at 1024 on 17 August 1942 as flagship for TF-17, and wearing the flag of Rear Adm. George D. Murray, who had previously commanded Enterprise. The other ships bound for the South Pacific included Hornet’s old consort Northampton, Pensacola, San Diego, the destroyers Morris (DD-417), Mustin (DD-413) O’Brien (DD-415), Hughes (DD-410), and Russell (DD-414) and the oiler Guadalupe (AO-32). Hornet maintained inner air patrols as well as “A.M. and P.M. searches,” weather permitting. As needed, the heavy cruisers operated their float planes to spell the carrier pilots on inner air patrols.

Operation Watchtower  .

A tense quiet had settled over the south Pacific for the moment.  Plans were in motion to get an air contingent to Henderson Field on Guadalcanal.  On the Japanese side, transports would soon move toward Guadalcanal to deliver several hundred troops under Colonel Ichiki, who, confident of victory, prepared an immediate attack.

U. S. Navy Task Forces:

• Task Force 17 (Hornet) left Pearl Harbor on the 17th for the South Pacific..
  
• Combined Task Force 61 was patrolling in the Coral Sea..
  
• Task Force 16 (Enterprise) -> TF 61
  
• Task Force 11 (Saratoga) -> TF 61
• Task Force 18 (Wasp) -> TF 61

More Information:

• Official Navy Chronology, pp. 241-242.
  
•  The First Team and the Guadalcanal Campaign,  John B. Lundstrom, pp 89-97.
• The Struggle for Guadalcanal, Samuel Eliot Morison, pp. 1-69.
• Neptune's Inferno, The U.S. Navy at Guadalcanal, James D. Hornfischer, pp. 44-108.
  

 

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