Dave Saxton wrote:
No its a book of some 500 pages. It's absolutely the best and most important history of the Guadalcanal naval battles yet written. I highly recommend it. Its not perfect, but I put more faith in Hornfischer's (or Hammel's) analysis than I do in the battle reports and such. The battle reports and damage reports from the war are badly confused and/or incomplete.
I've finished reading this book, up to the last third (still reading that) which deals with the effect on the sailors when returning to the States. I agree that it is a very good book, and gives a lot of details from both sides not often available in other books.
The comment with respect to South Dakota's main battery being out of commission after the hit on the Turret 3 barbette, I make the following observations:
The crew member testimony he gives is from a loader on the left gun in turret 3. He recalls the turret officers discussing whether they should continue firing after the hit on the barbette, not knowing how much damage was done. They decide to continue firing, and the alarm sounds in the turret indicating it will fire. It doesn't. That could be for any number of reasons unknown the the loader on the left gun. The most likely one I can think of is as follows: As I understand the process, when the turret officer closes his firing key in normal centralized FC operation, all that happens is the turret ready light goes on in Main Battery Plot. If they don't close their key, nothing happens. If they had then explained to the turret officers that they had lost their target or lost the director, or some other reason, the loader on the left gun in turret 3 wouldn't know that unless the turret officer announced it over the interior circuit. They were being hit repeatedly and had lost most of the ship's radars and there was a lot of confusion. Note that the officers didn't say "we've lost power and can't fire". The thought they could fire, and they would definitely have noticed if the lights had gone out in the turret, and the alarm wouldn't have gone off.
I don't know why Mr. Hornfischer then stated that South Dakota's main battery was out of action, but as far as I can tell if it was it wasn't because of the hit on the after turret's barbette. While I agree that after action reports can be in error, especially when recapping an engagement that was so confusing for South Dakota, the very detailed part submitted later by the yard regarding the ship's electrical problems and how they were going to fix them would tend to be much more accurate. That part of the report lists the effect of a lot of the electrical problems, but never says the damage during the large number of hits prevented the main battery turrets from engaging the enemy. I think its quite possible that they fell silent because the Spot I director couldn't find a target, though.
Mr. Horfischer made the following errors that I noticed right away:
He states that this was Washington's first deployment. It wasn't. Her first deployment was with the British Home Fleet, after which she went into overhaul and was then deployed to the South Pacific.
He states that the 16"/45 main battery guns used eight powder bags, the exact number depending on range. They actually used five, and would never have used less than that when firing AP.
He says that there were bad feelings between the crews immediately after the battle. I don't think that is true, and there would be no reason to think there was. What DID happen is South Dakota went back to the states after the battle and was credited with all the damage Washington did and got all kinds of acclaim, and Washington didn't ... she was still in the combat area while this was going on. Her crew read about all this in the paper, and THEN there were very bad feelings between the crews and when South Dakota returned to the battle area it was not a good idea to have them both ashore at the same time and place.
Those are not terribly significant errors and not really material to the story except that it indicates Washington's crew was a lot greener than it was. Overall, I think it's a great book.
Finally, I've heard that the reason Turret 3 set the aircraft on fire and then blew them overboard was that the fire control equipment connecting turret 3 to the main fire control computer hadn't been properly aligned after the initial power outage and was sending an offset of 90 degrees right to that turret. I can't find my reference for that, though, so you all can take it or leave it. Note that Washington was firing at the same or a close target to the one that SD was firing at, and she didn't set her aircraft on fire or blow them overboard. Overall, I think Washington's crew was simply more experienced and better trained.