# Japanese destroyer Asagumo (1937)

Asagumo (朝雲, Morning Cloud) was the fifth of ten Asashio-class destroyers built for the Imperial Japanese Navy in the mid-1930s under the Circle Two Supplementary Naval Expansion Program (Maru Ni Keikaku).

## History

The Asashio-class destroyers were larger and more capable that the preceding Shiratsuyu class, as Japanese naval architects were no longer constrained by the provisions of the London Naval Treaty. These light cruiser-sized vessels were designed to take advantage of Japan’s lead in torpedo technology, and to accompany the Japanese main striking force and in both day and night attacks against the United States Navy as it advanced across the Pacific Ocean, according to Japanese naval strategic projections. Despite being one of the most powerful classes of destroyers in the world at the time of their completion, none survived the Pacific War.
Asagumo, built at the Kawasaki Shipyards in Kobe was laid down on December 23, 1936, launched on November 5, 1937 and commissioned on March 31, 1938.

## Operational history

At the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, Asagumo was assigned to Destroyer Division 9 (Desdiv 9), and a member of Destroyer Squadron 4 (Desron 4) of the IJN 2nd Fleet, escorting Admiral Nobutake Kondō's Southern Force Main Body out of Mako Guard District as distant cover to the Malaya and Philippines invasion forces in December 1941. In early 1942, Asagumo escorted troop convoys to Lingayen, Tarakan, Balikpapan and Makassar in the Netherlands East Indies.

### Battle of the Java Sea

On February 26, Asagumo was on convoy escorting duty when a Japanese floatplane spotted a large allied task force consisting of two heavy cruisers, three light cruisers, and nine destroyers, attempting to intercept and sink Japanese troop convoys, prompting Asagumo to join a fleet of two heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, and 13 other destroyers to track down and neutralize the enemy ships. In the evening of the next day, the Japanese ships made contact with the enemy fleet, prompting Asagumo to close the range for a torpedo attack. Closing to around 6,000 meters from the enemy ships, Asagumo unleashed a full spread of eight torpedoes, but none hit.
However, shortly afterwards Asagumo noticed the limping heavy cruiser HMS Exeter, crippled by a shell hit from the Haguro, attempting to escape the battle, and more crucially three British destroyers attempting to cover her, prompting Asagumo and her sistership Minegumo to attack the trio, Asagumo in particular engaging in a gunnery duel with HMS Electra. During the 1v1, Electra managed score hits with her 4.7-inch (12 cm) guns that forced Asagumo to temporarily halt for repairs, killing 4 men and injuring 19 others, but Asagumo inflicted far more damage than she received, hitting Electra with shells that destroyed her engine room and her A and X turrets, wrecked her communications, and disabled electrical power. Dead in the water with half her gun battery functional, the crippled Electra fired off her torpedoes, but none hit, and in turn Minegumo switched fire from the other destroyers and joined Asagumo in pounding Electra, which they together quickly finished off, forcing Electra's crew to abandon ship after her remaining guns were destroyed and leave the destroyer to sink.
After her take down of Electra, Asagumo began to pick up speed after damage control restarted her engines, and immediately evacuated from the battle and returned to Balikpapan for emergency repairs, which lasted from March 1–18, immediately followed by Asagumo escorting the repair ship Yamabiko Maru to Makassar, and returned at the end of the month to the Yokosuka Naval Arsenal for further repairs which lasted until the end of the month. At the end of May, Asagumo joined the escort for the Midway Invasion Force during the Battle of Midway, but returned to the Aleutians once the battle turned into a devastating defeat which lost Japan four aircraft carriers and a heavy cruiser. In July, she was sent to northern waters, patrolling from Ōminato Guard District towards the Kurile Islands. Afterwards, she was sent south to Truk together with the cruiser Chōkai, and onwards to Kwajalein, returning to Yokosuka on 8 August 1942.
Returning to Truk later that month, Asagumo escorted aircraft carriers in the Battle of the Eastern Solomons to offer additional AA defence. From September, she was assigned to patrols from Truk towards Shortland, and in October and November was assigned to nine "Tokyo Express" high speed transport operations in the Solomon Islands. During this time, she was made the flagship of the 4th Torpedo Squadron, and escorted aircraft carriers during the Battle of Santa Cruz.

### Naval battle of Guadalcanal

On November 9, Asagumo departed Truk as part of a force with a mission to bombard Henderson Field, a former Japanese air base which was captured by US forces and being used against Japanese shipping. The force centered around the battleships Hiei and Kirishima, with an escort of the light cruiser Nagara and eleven destroyers, Asagumo included. The destroyers initially operated in standard formation, but rain squalls broke up the formation and left the destroyers operating in small clusters, in turn leaving Asagumo operating alongside the destroyers Murasame and Samidare. Eventually, their plan was intercepted by US intelligence, and by 1:25 in the morning of the 13th, signs of enemy ships began to appear. At 1:48, an engagement between the Japanese ships and a total of two US heavy cruisers, three light cruisers, and eight destroyers began in what became the first naval battle of Guadalcanal, but Asagumo's group was on the far side of the formation and initially prevented from seeing action.
Eventually, Asagumo joined the battle after 2:00, and immediately noticed the destroyer Amatsukaze under fire from the light cruiser USS Helena, and with Murasame and Samidare covered her fellow destroyer and engaged the cruiser. Murasame falsely claimed to torpedo Helena, and in turn Murasame and Samidare both took shell hits, but Asagumo was not damaged and successfully saved Amatsukaze from potentially being sunk. Shortly afterwards, the destroyers noticed another target as star shells illuminated the destroyer USS Monssen, which mistook the star shells for friendly ships signaling her and signaled back. Asagumo, Murasame, and Samidare blasted Monssen to starboard, Asagumo in particular firing off 88 12.7 cm (5 in) rounds against the target, several of which hit. Simultaneously, Hiei flanked Monssen to port, and under two minutes, Monssen was hit by three 35.6 cm (14 in) shells from Hiei and at least 36 12.7 cm (5 in) shells from the destroyers, crippling the ship. Asagumo then fired off eight torpedoes against the hulk. It is sometimes stated one of these torpedoes hit Monssen and served as the final blow, but this remains unconfirmed, either way Monssen sank 20 minutes later. However, during the battle, the destroyer Yūdachi was crippled by gunfire from the destroyer USS Sterett, prompting Asagumo to assist the mauled vessel, watching as her crew was removed and a scuttling attempt failed (she was later finished off by the heavy cruiser USS Portland).
Asagumo continued on to take part in the bombardment, even after Hiei was sunk by American forces, seeing no action the next day. However, in the early morning of the 15th, the force was encountered by another US task force during the second naval battle of Guadalcanal. In the ensuing action, three US destroyers were sunk and the battleship USS South Dakota was badly damaged, but in turn Kirishima lost a gunfight to the battleship USS Washington, being hit by twenty 16-inch (406 mm) shells and seventeen 5-inch (127 mm) shells. Asagumo unleashed four torpedoes against Washington, but none hit, before she helped to evacuate Kirishima, taking on several survivors before leaving Kirishima to sink.
At the end of the year, Asagumo returned to Yokosuka in the company of the aircraft carrier Chūyō. Returning to Truk in mid-January 1943 in the company of the aircraft carrier Jun'yō, she conveyed a convoy to Wewak in New Guinea. During the remainder of January and February, she assisted in the evacuation of surviving Japanese forces from Guadalcanal and other points in the Solomon Islands.
During the Battle of the Bismarck Sea of 1–4 March she survived numerous air attacks while rescuing survivors from various sunken vessels. During the remainder of March and first week of April, she made several transport runs to reinforce the Japanese position at Kolombangara. She returned to Yokosuka for repairs on 13 April.
After repairs were completed in late May, Asagumo was based at Paramushiro in the Kurile Islands. She participated in the Japanese retreat from Kiska Island in July and returned to Yokosuka with Maya in briefly in August. At the end of October, she was reassigned to the IJN 3rd Fleet. She was also modified by the removal of her X-turret, which was replaced by two triple Type 96 25 mm AT/AA Guns.
Asagumo returned to Truk in early January 1944 to escort the battleship Yamato back to Kure Naval Arsenal. She returned to Singapore with the carriers Shōkaku and Zuikaku in February, returning with Zuikaku to Kure in March and back again to Singapore. She escorted a convoy to Tawitawi in May, from which she escorted the battleship Fusō to Davao. During the Battle of the Philippine Sea in June, she was part of Admiral Ozawa's force, but sent on detached duty to Okinawa owing to fuel problems. In July, she returned to Manila, and was in Brunei in mid-October.
In October, she was assigned to Vice Admiral Shōji Nishimura's fleet at the Battle of Surigao Strait, Asagumo was torpedoed by the destroyer USS McDermut and subsequently finished off by gunfire from US Navy cruisers and destroyers at position (10°04′N 125°21′E﻿ / ﻿10.067°N 125.350°E﻿ / 10.067; 125.350). Of her crew, 191 were killed, but 39 survivors, including her captain, Commander Shibayama, were taken prisoner by the Americans. Asagumo was removed from the navy list on 10 January 1945.
It was said that she had rescued survivors of the battleship Fusō.
Her wreck was discovered by RV Petrel in late 2017, with her hull and superstructure mostly intact.

## Citations

* ↑ Nelson. Japanese-English Character Dictionary. Page 750
* ↑ Peattie & Evans, Kaigun .
* ↑ Globalsecurity.org, IJN Asashio class destroyers
* ↑ Nishidah, Hiroshi (2002). "Asashio class 1st class destroyers". Materials of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Archived from the original on 2012-07-21. Retrieved 2011-03-25.
* ↑ Allyn D. Nevitt (1998). "IJN MInegumo: Tabular Record of Movement". combinedfleet.com.
* 1 2 3 主要兵器, 大日本帝国軍 (2018-02-03). "朝雲【朝潮型駆逐艦 五番艦】Asagumo【Asashio-class destroyer】". 大日本帝国軍 主要兵器 (in Japanese). Retrieved 2024-11-12.
* 1 2 3 4 5 "IJN Asagumo: Tabular Record of Movement".
* ↑ Cox, Jeffrey. (2014). Rising Sun, Falling Skies : the Disastrous Java Sea Campaign of World War II. Oxford: Osprey Publishing Ltd. p. 300. ISBN 978-1-4728-0834-9. OCLC 881164955.
* 1 2 Hara (1961) Chapter 20
* ↑ Brown, David (1990). Warship Losses of World War Two. Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-55750-914-X.
* ↑ "Rv Petrel". Archived from the original on 2018-08-15. Retrieved 2018-10-15.

## Books

* D'Albas, Andrieu (1965). Death of a Navy: Japanese Naval Action in World War II. Devin-Adair Pub. ISBN 0-8159-5302-X.
* Brown, David (1990). Warship Losses of World War Two. Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-55750-914-X.
* Hammel, Eric (1988). Guadalcanal: Decision at Sea : The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, Nov. 13–15, 1942. (CA): Pacifica Press. ISBN 0-517-56952-3.
* Howarth, Stephen (1983). The Fighting Ships of the Rising Sun: The Drama of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1895–1945. Atheneum. ISBN 0-689-11402-8.
* Jentsura, Hansgeorg (1976). Warships of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1869–1945. US Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-893-X.
* Nelson, Andrew N. (1967). Japanese–English Character Dictionary. Tuttle. ISBN 0-8048-0408-7.
* Watts, Anthony J (1967). Japanese Warships of World War II. Doubleday. ISBN 978-0-3850-9189-3.
* Whitley, M J (2000). Destroyers of World War Two: An International Encyclopedia. London: Arms and Armour Press. ISBN 1-85409-521-8.
* Cox, Jeffrey R (2014) Rising Sun, Falling Skies: The Disastrous Java Sea Campaign of World War II. Osprey. ISBN 978-1-4728-1060-1
* Hara, Tameichi (1961). Japanese Destroyer Captain. New York: Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-02522-9.