At around 12.30, when only forty five miles from Leyte Gulf, Kurita decided that it wasn't worth risking the destruction of his fleet just to sink empty transport ships. To license content, please contact licenses [at] americanheritage.com.Trusted Writing on History, Travel, Food and Culture Since 1949 The Battle off Samar The Saga of Taffy 3 October, 1944: United States forces, including most of the Third and Seventh Fleets, arrived in Leyte Gulf to begin the long-awaited invasion of the Philippine Islands. At 7.01 he issued a call for help in the clear, ordered his aircraft into the air and headed for a nearby rain squall. The track charts below show the progress of the battle.
Intended primarily for antisubmarine patrols, the lightweight escorts were no match for some of the world’s most powerful ships. But confirmation came from another source—a lookout on one of Sprague’s other carriers, the Kitkitu Buy. Through that exit Kurita’s still very menacing force was steadily plowing in order to turn southward off the eastern coast of Samar and come in to Leyte Gulf on October 25—its role in Sho No. Please support this 70-year tradition of trusted historical writing and the volunteers that sustain it with a donation to The magazine was forced to suspend print publication in 2013, but a group of volunteers saved the archives and relaunched it in digital form in 2017. His lookouts had just seen antiaircraft fire on the northern horixon, and his radar had picked up an unidentified something in the same direction. Then, even though Kinkaid’s ships were not in top shape for battle after their heavy night action in Surigao Strait against the Japanese Southern Force, the Americans would have some chance of stopping the enemy.Deployed in a formation of two concentric circles—the six carriers forming the inner circle—the U.S. flotilla was rapidly being overtaken by the speedier enemy ships.

If Kurita had advanced into Leyte Gulf then his fleet would almost certainly have been destroyed - if not by Kinkaid's escort carriers and old battleships then by the 3rd Fleet.


If only he could keep his ships swinging in a wide circle around to the southwest without being overtaken or cut off, Sprague thought, he could hope to lead the Japanese fleet into the guns of the now-alerted battleships of the Seventh Fleet. Admiral Kurita said to his officers before the battle: “I know many of you are strongly opposed to this assignment. This Japanese force was made up of four regular carriers, two converted battleship-carriers, and smaller screening vessels. The battle of Samar (25 October 1944) was the nearest the Japanese came to success during the The Japanese realised that an American invasion of the Philippines or of Formosa would cut their Empire in half and prevent vital supplies reaching the Home Islands from the south part of the empire. Suddenly, by miscalculation, nothing stood between its most powerful task force and the American beachhead at Leyte Gulf but a small group of U.S. escort carriers. Through that exit Kurita’s still very menacing force was steadily plowing in order to turn southward off the eastern coast of Samar and come in to Leyte Gulf on October 25—its role in Sho No. The first man to enter the gun mount after the shattering detonation found the gun captain, his body blown open, holding a cannon shell in his scorched hands. Only the As the battle unfolded, Admiral Sprague saw that the greatest immediate danger to his group were the four enemy heavy cruisers Although smoke screens and maneuvering threw Japanese marksmanship off, Admiral Sprague’s flagship, the Shrewd guesswork and clever steering by her skipper saved the Meanwhile Taffy 3 aircraft pounced like hawks on the enemy cruisers. Bomb bursts erupted on the ships as the Japanese paid for their lack of air power. But the war situation is far more critical than any of you can possibly know. Fast warships from Halsey’s Third Fleet reached the strait soon afterward, too late to catch Kurita but in time to bag one lagging Japanese destroyer.But despite Kurita’s departure, the ordeal of Taffy 3 was not quite over.A single-engined Zero fighter crashed on the port side of the Having dispatched the surviving Taffy 3 escort ships to pick up crewmen of the stricken Sf. Soon after this, at about 5.30, he learnt that Admiral Nishimura's force had been destroyed and Admiral Shima was retreating (At about dawn (6.30) Kurita found Admiral Sprague's Sprague realised that he was in trouble. Nothing but the three light Taffy forces now stood between the U.S. invasion troops on Leyte and possible disaster. 1 cost her three battleships, four carriers, ten cruisers, and almost a dozen other fighting ships. At the cost of eighteen dive bombers and torpedo planes, they sank the gargantuan Admiral Halsey was very much pleased by his carrier pilots’ reports of their successes over the Sibnyan Sea. Both can be defended using the information available to Kurita at the time, but he later believed the second decision to have been a mistake. Suddenly, one of the charges ignited in the hot breech before the 5-inch gun could be fired. From the gently swaying flight decks of the carriers, white-starred planes took oil on routine early-morning missions.The first warning of a break in the morning routine came shortly after six thirty as the ships’ crews sat clown to breakfast. Far to the north, off Cape Engaño, too distant to do any good, Halsey’s Third Fleet was only now reluctantly giving up its chase of Ozawa’s Northern Force and turning about in answer to urgent messages from Admiral Kinkaid and Pacific Fleet Headquarters at Pearl Harbor. In addition to the battleships Prepared to have to fight their way through to Leyte Gulf, the Japanese sailors were pleasantly’ surprised when dawn revealed nothing on the southern horizon but open water. This first destroyer attack cost the Americans dearly. And then, after hours of brain-pounding battle that demanded automatic response, they had been cast into a tropical sea shadowed by the haze of gunsmoke and burning ships. Naval History and Heritage Command


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