Coral Sea: the battle where the fleets never met
A new kind of battle
In early May 1942, a Japanese invasion force was heading for Port Moresby, on the southern coast of New Guinea. Rear Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher took two carriers, Yorktown (CV-5) and Lexington (CV-2), into the Coral Sea to stop it.
What followed between 4 and 8 May was something no navy had fought before. NHHC calls it the first carrier-versus-carrier battle in history. The opposing surface ships never sighted each other. Every blow was struck by aircraft, launched from carriers far beyond the horizon. Both sides had to find the enemy before they could fight him, and scouting reports were not always right.
7 May: the first enemy carrier
On 7 May, aircraft from Lexington and Yorktown found the small carrier Shōhō, which was covering the invasion convoy, and attacked her off Misima Island. She sank. NHHC's combat narrative notes that she was the first carrier lost by either side in the war, and the first enemy carrier attacked by U.S. Navy aircraft.
8 May: the carriers trade blows
The next morning, both sides found each other's main carriers at almost the same time. American dive bombers from Lexington and Yorktown hit the carrier Shōkaku and forced her to retire. Japanese aircraft attacked both U.S. carriers in return. Yorktown was damaged, and Lexington was hit by torpedoes and bombs.
The damage did not end with the attack. Hours later, gasoline explosions tore through the ship, and the fires that followed were beyond control. In the words of the Navy's history, those explosions "rendered damage control impossible."
Abandon ship
Her commanding officer, Captain Frederick C. Sherman, called his crew up to the flight deck because he feared for the men below. At 1707 he ordered the ship abandoned.
The crew went into the water and were picked up by the cruisers and destroyers standing by. NHHC records that Sherman and his executive officer made sure their men were off before they left, and that the captain was the last man off. After dark, a whaleboat from the destroyer Phelps made a final pass along her side to make sure no one was left in the water there.
To prevent the enemy from ever taking her, Phelps closed to about 1,500 yards and fired torpedoes into Lexington. The carrier sank at 1956 on 8 May. She was the first U.S. aircraft carrier lost in the Second World War.
According to the Navy's account, 216 of her crew were lost and 2,735 were rescued. More than nine in ten of the men aboard came home.
What the battle decided
Tactically, the Coral Sea was close to a draw. The United States lost a large fleet carrier, while Japan lost a small one. Strategically, though, the invasion of Port Moresby was called off. Shōhō was gone. Shōkaku was badly damaged, and Zuikaku's air group was in no condition to fight. All three carriers had been part of the plans for Midway, and none of them took part in that battle a month later.
Found again
On 4 March 2018, the crew of the research vessel Petrel found Lexington about 3,000 meters down, roughly two miles, on the floor of the Coral Sea. Among the wreckage on the seabed were aircraft that had gone down with her. She is a war grave, resting where her crew left her.
When people tell the story of the Coral Sea, they often begin with the aircraft. The 2,735 who came home are a reminder of what else it took: a crew that knew its drills and a captain who stayed until they were clear.
Our Aircraft Carriers collection is made for those who served on the flight decks and below them.
Harborborne is an independent brand and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the U.S. Navy or Department of Defense.
