Scoot could not make up his mind for a few days. When he had thought of flying, he had always thought of the Army Air Forces. But the Navy had fliers, too. Eventually it was his burning hatred of the Japs that decided him.
“There’s a lot of water between us and them,” he said. “The Navy will have the biggest job in knocking them over—and aircraft carriers will be the answer! Navy it is for me, too!”
So March Anson and Scoot Bailey had joined the Navy. Gone were all thoughts of football, baseball, dances, and parties. And suddenly there seemed to be little difference between the two. Both were now serious, hard-working, for in the Navy’s program there was room for little but serious, hard work. Together they crammed into their heads more mathematics than they had thought of studying in a whole college course. Navigation, engineering, English, Navy custom and tradition—all were crammed into them with an intensity of which they had never thought themselves capable.
Both had put in early their requests for assignment to submarines and to air service. And, though they knew that the Navy tried to place men where they wanted to go, they realized that the Navy’s needs would come first rather than their wishes. So they were disappointed, though not surprised, when both requests were turned down. The submarine school at New London, even though greatly expanded, was full to overflowing. And the applicants for Naval Aviation exceeded by ten times the number that could be accepted.
New warships were coming off the ways in shipyards all over the country, and men were needed to man them. So, after some further specialized training—Scoot in engineering and March in navigation—they found themselves assigned to the new cruiser Plymouth which had been rushed to completion four months ahead of schedule.
On their shakedown cruise they had been too interested in their new life—the huge ship and the men they worked with—to feel disappointment over missing out on their chosen fields. They knew they were already a part of the war, and the job they were doing was important. As Ensigns, they were two very junior officers on the ship almost as large as their home town, but they had their jobs, and they learned more about them and about all ships every day.
The Navy lost no time, after ship and crew were deemed fit and ready for action, in getting them to the Pacific where the losses suffered at Pearl Harbor had put the United States at a great, though temporary, disadvantage. By the time they had made the long trip down the eastern coast, through the Panama Canal, and across almost half the Pacific to Pearl Harbor, Scoot and March felt like veterans. The Executive Officer of the Plymouth, Commander Seaton, had taken a liking to them because of their application to their jobs and their desire to learn all they could. He saw to it that they got varied experiences, shifting to different jobs carried out by junior officers from time to time.
In company with a battleship, two light cruisers, and twelve destroyers, they left Pearl Harbor as a task force heading for action in the southwest Pacific. And action was not long in coming.
In the Coral Sea, the small task force ran into a Jap convoy, heavily screened by warships, trying to sneak an end run around the corner of Australia. Two U.S. aircraft carriers had gone out to break up the convoy, but they were so outnumbered by the enemy that they were in a bad way when the Plymouth’s force arrived on the scene under full steam. The Japs were taken by surprise, lost their tight organization, and fled north, leaving behind three troopships and four destroyers heading for the bottom.
Scoot had been joyful at his first battle experience, but was angry that he had not been on the guns.