The Whale Has Wings Vol 3 - Holding the Barrier by David Row Page A

ship. The falling flare illuminated what was clearly a large cruiser of Japanese design, and the next order was to shoot for effect. The escorting cruiser, HMS Ceres, also opened fire at this point. The Kumana was taken by surprise by the sudden illumination of the starshells, but her well-trained crew reacted swiftly, turning to fire off her own illuminating rounds. The identity of the enemy hiding in the dark was made very clear as the first salvo of five 15" shells plunged into the water close to the hapless cruiser, sending monstrous pillars of water into the air.
     
    The cruiser was not surprised to see that it was illuminating what was obviously a battleship, already at close range for the calibre of guns she mounted. Rather than try to escape, which was probably futile, the captain ordered a general sighting report to be made out to Admiral Kondo and the rest of the cruiser force. He did not know that Kondo was already dead by this time. Although only a few ranging salvoes had been fired, the battleship's huge shells were already far too close for comfort, the Japanese captain being impressed by how fast the British had found the range at night. It was already looking like his ship would not escape, so instead he turned to bring his torpedoes to bear. The Kumana had twelve torpedo tubes for the Long Lance torpedo, six on each side. At the same time, her 8" guns were firing back at the British ships - two now, as she saw the gun-flashes from a second, smaller ship in company with the battleship.
     
    The cruiser fired her first salvo of six torpedoes from her port tubes, and then, still firing, started to turn in order to bring her starboard tubes to bear. She never completed the turn, as at that point a 15" shell crashed into her side and exploded. The whole ship shuddered. The Kumana had been built lightly in order to cram in the maximum firepower, and even if that hadn't been the case, no cruiser was designed to take that sort of punishment. As she kept on turning, she was hit again, this time on the bridge. The explosion killed the entire bridge crew, leaving no one in charge of the cruiser at a critical moment. Ironically, the absence of helm orders actually helped her for a few minutes, as the battleship's fire control had assumed she would keep dodging, but once these had passed the ship was hit heavily by a number of 15" rounds as well as shells from the Prince of Wales's secondary armament and the escorting cruiser. It took very little time to turn the Japanese ship into a floating target, and although the crew brought her under control again, it was too late. A shell (it was never known from which ship) finally exploded close enough to the torpedoes to send white-hot splinters into some of the oxygen tanks, and the aft of the ship exploded in a huge fireball. When the observer's on the battleships  dazzled vision cleared, the cruiser was already broken in two and sinking.
     
    The Long lance torpedoes were fast, but even so it took time for them to cross the eight miles between the ships. With only six torpedoes in the salvo, the chances of a decisive hit were small, but this time the Japanese had luck on their side. Although five of the torpedoes missed, the final one hit the cruiser HMS Ceres aft. Ceres was small for a cruiser, at only 4,300 tons well under half the displacement of the more modern ships in the fleet, and had been modified into an anti-aircraft ship before the war. The hit by the large warhead of the Japanese torpedo was too much for the old ship to absorb, and it was obvious to her crew within a few minutes that she was doomed. One of the escorting destroyers, who had already closed when they saw the action in progress, moved up alongside her to take her crew off as the ship slowly sank under the inrush of water.
     
    The men on the bridge of the Prince of Wales were puzzled by the sudden explosion of what was surely a torpedo. The cruiser seemed to have been far too far away for a torpedo