During the night of 10 December 1941, Wake’s lookouts vigilantly scanned the horizon. Those of her defenders who were not on watch grabbed what sleep they could. Shortly before midnight, the Triton was south of the atoll, charging her batteries and patrolling on the surface. At 2315, her bridge lookouts spied “two flashes” and then the silhouette of what seemed to be a destroyer, dimly visible against the backdrop of heavy clouds that lay behind her. The Triton submerged quickly and tracked the unidentifiable ship; ultimately, she fired a salvo of four torpedoes from her stern tubes at 0017 on 11 December 1941—the first torpedoes fired from a Pacific Fleet submarine in World War II. Although the submariners heard a dull explosion, indicating what they thought was at least one probable hit, and propeller noises appeared to cease shortly thereafter, the Triton’s apparent kill had not been confirmed. She resumed her patrol, submerged.
The 3,587-ton light cruiser Yubari, seen here at Shanghai, China, in April 1937, was completed in July 1923. Armed with 5.5-inch guns, she served as Rear Admiral Sadamichi Kajioka’s flagship for the operations against Wake in December 1941.
Naval Historical Center Photo NH 82098
The ship that Triton had encountered off Wake’s south coast was, most likely, the destroyer deployed as a picket 10 miles ahead of the invasion convoy steaming up from the south. Under Rear Admiral Sadamichi Kajioka, it had set out from Kwajalein, in the Marshalls, on 8 December. It consisted of the light cruiser Yubari (flagship), six destroyers—Mutsuki, Kisaragi, Yayoi, Mochizuki, Oite, and Hayate—along with Patrol Boat No. 32 and Patrol Boat No. 33 (two ex-destroyers, each reconfigured in 1941 to launch a landing craft over a stern ramp) and two armed merchantmen, Kongo Maru and Kinryu Maru. To provide additional gunfire support, the Commander, Fourth Fleet, had also assigned the light cruisers Tatsuta and Tenryu to Kajioka’s force.
Admiral Kajioka faced less than favorable weather for the endeavor. Deeming the northeast coastline unsuitable for that purpose, invasion planners had called for the converted destroyers to put 150 men ashore on Wilkes and 300 on Wake. If those numbers proved insufficient, Kajioka’s supporting destroyers were to provide men to augment the landing force. If contrary winds threatened the assault, the troops would land on the northeastern and north coasts. Since the weather had moderated enough by the 11th, though, the force was standing toward the atoll’s south, or lee, shore in the pre-dawn hours, confident that two days of bombings had rendered the islands’ defenses impotent.
Meanwhile, far to the east, at Pearl Harbor, the Pacific Fleet continued to pick up the pieces after the shattering blow that the Japanese had delivered on the 7th. The enemy onslaught had forced Admiral Husband E. Kimmel, the Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet (CinCPac), to revise his strategy completely. Kimmel wanted to relieve Wake, but deploying what remained of his fleet to protect sea communications, defend outlying bases, and protect far-flung territory, as well as to defend Oahu, would have required a wide dispersal of the very limited naval forces. By 10 December (11 December on Wake), the scattered positions of his aircraft carriers, which were at sea patrolling the Oahu-Johnston-Palmyra triangle, militated against deploying them to support Wake. Cunningham’s garrison, however, in a most striking fashion, would soon provide inspiration to the Pacific Fleet and the nation as well.
Wake’s lookouts, like Triton’s, had seen flickering lights in the distance. Gunner Hamas, on duty in the battalion command post, received the report of ships offshore from Captain Wesley McC. Platt, commander of the strongpoint on Wilkes, and notified Major Devereux, who, along with his executive officer, Major George H. Potter, stepped out into the moonlight and scanned the southern horizon. Hamas also telephoned Cunningham, who ordered the guns to hold fire until the ships closed on the island.
Cunningham then turned to Commander Keene and Lieutenant Commander Elmer B. Greey, resident officer-in-charge of the construction programs at Wake, with whom he shared a cottage, and told them that lookouts had spotted ships, undoubtedly hostile ones, standing toward the atoll. He then directed the two officers to order an alert and immediately headed for the island’s communications center in his pickup truck.
As the Japanese ships neared Wake, the Army radio unit on the atoll sent a message from Cunningham to Pearl Harbor at 0200 on the 11th, telling of the contractors’ casualties, and, because of the danger that lay at Wake’s doorstep, suggesting early evacuation of the civilians. Army communicators on Oahu who received the message noted that the Japanese had tried to jam the transmission.