Many of the survivors of the "Lexington" were repatriated back to the United States aboard the . Among the "Barnett's" passengers was Australian-American journalist Stanley Johnston, who had been the sole journalist present aboard the "Lexington" during the Coral Sea action. Reporting for the "Chicago Tribune", Johnston was on his way back to file his stories about those events. Seligman knew Johnston and may have shared a cabin with him aboard the "Barnett". Johnston obtained access to a fleet dispatch containing an intelligence estimate of Japanese forces immediately before the 1942 Midway action that indicated clear foreknowledge of Japanese intentions and movements, a document to which Seligman had access. Johnston's subsequent story in the "Tribune" raised alarm in the White House and Navy that the Japanese, reading the story, would realize that their codes were broken and that they would change ciphers.