The Battle of Midway was a major naval battle in the Pacific Theater of World War II that took place on 4–7 June 1942, six months after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor and one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea. The Japanese Combined Fleet under the command of Isoroku Yamamoto suffered a decisive defeat by the U.S. Pacific Fleet near Midway Atoll, about 1,300 mi northwest of Oahu. Yamamoto had intended to capture Midway and lure out and destroy the Pacific Fleet, especially the U.S. aircraft carriers which had escaped damage at Pearl Harbor.
USS Yorktown (CV-5) was an aircraft carrier that served in the United States Navy during World War II. Named after the Battle of Yorktown in 1781, she was commissioned in 1937. Yorktown was the lead ship of the Yorktown class, which was designed on the basis of lessons learned from operations with the converted battlecruisers of the Lexington class and the smaller purpose-built USS Ranger.
USS Wasp (CV-7) was a United States Navy aircraft carrier commissioned in 1940 and lost in action in 1942. She was the eighth ship named USS Wasp, and the sole ship of a class built to use up the remaining tonnage allowed to the U.S. for aircraft carriers under the treaties of the time. As a reduced-size version of the Yorktown-class aircraft carrier hull, Wasp was more vulnerable than other United States aircraft carriers available at the opening of hostilities. Wasp was initially employed in the Atlantic campaign, where Axis naval forces were perceived as less capable of inflicting decisive damage. After supporting the occupation of Iceland in 1941, Wasp joined the British Home Fleet in April 1942 and twice ferried British fighter aircraft to Malta.
Ensign George Henry Gay Jr. was a Douglas TBD Devastator pilot in United States Navy Torpedo Squadron 8 operating from the aircraft carrier USS Hornet in the Pacific Theater of Operations during World War II. Of the 30 VT-8 aircrew from Hornet that participated in the pivotal Battle of Midway, Ensign Gay was the sole survivor.
Marc Andrew "Pete" Mitscher was a pioneer in naval aviation who became an admiral in the United States Navy, and served as commander of the Fast Carrier Task Force in the Pacific during World War II.
The Douglas TBD Devastator was an American torpedo bomber of the United States Navy. Ordered in 1934, it first flew in 1935 and entered service in 1937. At that point, it was the most advanced aircraft flying for the Navy, being the first metal monoplane in the United States Navy; however, by the time of the US entry into World War 2, the TBD was already outdated.
The Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, fought during 25–27 October 1942, sometimes referred to as the Battle of Santa Cruz or Third Battle of Solomon Sea, in Japan as the Battle of the South Pacific, was the fourth aircraft carrier battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II. It was also the fourth major naval engagement fought between the United States Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy during the lengthy and strategically important Guadalcanal campaign. As in the battles of the Coral Sea, Midway, and the Eastern Solomons, the ships of the two adversaries were rarely in sight or gun range of each other. Instead, almost all attacks by both sides were mounted by carrier- or land-based aircraft.
The Douglas SBD Dauntless is a World War II American naval scout plane and dive bomber that was manufactured by Douglas Aircraft from 1940 through 1944. The SBD was the United States Navy's main carrier-based scout/dive bomber from mid-1940 through mid-1944. The SBD was also flown by the United States Marine Corps, both from land air bases and aircraft carriers. The SBD is best remembered as the bomber that delivered the fatal blows to the Japanese carriers at the Battle of Midway in June 1942. The type earned its nickname "Slow But Deadly" during this period.
Midway, released in the United Kingdom as Battle of Midway, is a 1976 American war film that chronicles the Battle of Midway, a turning point in the Pacific Theater of Operations of World War II. Directed by Jack Smight and produced by Walter Mirisch from a screenplay by Donald S. Sanford, the film starred Charlton Heston and Henry Fonda, supported by a large international cast of guest stars including James Coburn, Glenn Ford, Ed Nelson, Hal Holbrook, Robert Webber, Toshiro Mifune, Robert Mitchum, Cliff Robertson, Robert Wagner, Pat Morita, Dabney Coleman, Erik Estrada and Tom Selleck.
This is the order of battle for the Battle of Midway, a major engagement of the Pacific Theatre of World War II, fought 4–7 June 1942 by naval and air forces of Imperial Japan and the United States in the waters around Midway Atoll in the far northwestern Hawaiian Islands.
Task Force is a 1949 American war film filmed in black-and-white with some Technicolor sequences about the development of U.S. aircraft carriers from USS Langley (CV-1) to USS Franklin (CV-13). Although Robert Montgomery was originally considered for the leading role, the film stars Gary Cooper, Jane Wyatt, Walter Brennan, Wayne Morris, Julie London and Jack Holt. Task Force was the only film Gary Cooper and Jane Wyatt made together, and was the last of the eight films Cooper and Walter Brennan made together. The U.S. Navy provided complete support in not only lending naval vessels and facilities, but also allowed the use of archival footage of the development of naval air power.
Mikuma was a heavy cruiser of the Imperial Japanese Navy. The second vessel in the four-ship Mogami class, she was laid down in 1931 and commissioned in 1935. During World War II she participated in the Battle of Sunda Strait in February 1942 and the Battle of Midway in June 1942, and was sunk the last day of the latter engagement, on 6 June.
Miles Rutherford Browning was an officer in the United States Navy in the Atlantic during World War I and in the Pacific during World War II. An early test pilot in the development of carrier-based Navy aircraft and a pioneer in the development of aircraft carrier combat operations concepts, he is noted for his aggressive aerial warfare tactics as a Navy captain on the Admiral's staff aboard USS Enterprise and at Nouméa during World War II. His citation for the Distinguished Service Medal states: "His judicious planning and brilliant execution was largely responsible for the rout of the enemy Japanese fleet in the Battle of Midway." Naval historian Craig Symonds disagrees, however, writing that "the citation claim that Browning was 'largely responsible' for the American victory at Midway, an assertion that some historians have taken seriously. .. is manifestly untrue."
Wing and a Prayer, The Story of Carrier X is a black-and-white 1944 war film about the heroic crew of an American aircraft carrier in the desperate early days of World War II in the Pacific theater, directed by Henry Hathaway and starring Don Ameche, Dana Andrews and William Eythe. It was nominated for the 1944 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.
Norman Francis Vandivier was a United States Navy aviator during World War II. He was posthumously awarded the Navy Cross for action during the Battle of Midway.
Maxwell Franklin Leslie was a naval aviator in the United States Navy during World War II. He is credited with having played a major part in the Battle of Midway.
Richard Halsey Best was a dive bomber pilot and squadron commander in the United States Navy during World War II. Stationed on the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, Best led his dive bomber squadron at the 1942 Battle of Midway, sinking two Japanese aircraft carriers in one day, before being medically retired that same year due to damage to his lungs caused by breathing bad oxygen during the battle.
Norman Jack "Dusty" Kleiss was a dive-bomber pilot in the United States Navy during World War II. He was the only pilot to hit three Japanese ships with bombs during the Battle of Midway.
Yoshikazu Nagahama (1921-1943) was a fighter ace in the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) during World War II. He became ace in a day during the Attack on Darwin, where he first destroyed one US Navy PBY Catalina flying boat and then single-handedly engaged five, and shot down four, US Army Air Force P-40 Warhawk fighters.
Bruno Peter Gaido was an American sailor who served in the United States Navy as an Aviation Machinist's Mate during World War II. While flying as a gunner for pilot Frank O'Flaherty in a Douglas SBD Dauntless during the Battle of Midway, he was shot down and captured by the Japanese whilst waiting for rescue from American forces. Gaido, along with O’Flaherty were taken P.O.W. and subsequently tortured, interrogated and executed by being thrown overboard.
