USS Houston (CA-30)

USS Houston (CA-30): The Galloping Ghost of the Java Coast

There are ships that carry legends, and then there is USS Houston. Commissioned on 17 June 1930 and named for the city of Houston, Texas, she became the flagship of the Asiatic Fleet and one of the most famous American warships of World War II, not for surviving, but for the ferocity with which she fought until she couldn't fight anymore. The Japanese called her the "Galloping Ghost of the Java Coast." They meant it as mockery. It became a badge of honor.

Houston was forward-deployed in the Far East when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, Malaya, and the Philippines simultaneously on 7-8 December 1941. As the Japanese swept through Southeast Asia with breathtaking speed, Houston was one of the few Allied ships capable of contesting them. She fought in the Battle of Makassar Strait and repeatedly ran the gauntlet of Japanese air attacks as Allied naval forces desperately tried to slow the Japanese advance through the Dutch East Indies.

By February 1942, the situation had become desperate. The American-British-Dutch-Australian (ABDA) Command was disintegrating. Houston fought at the Battle of the Java Sea on 27 February 1942, the largest surface engagement of the war to that point, as a combined Allied cruiser force tried to stop a massive Japanese invasion fleet. The battle was a disaster: the Dutch light cruiser De Ruyter and HNLMS Java were sunk, and Allied losses mounted. Houston and HMAS Perth were the last significant Allied surface combatants in the area.

Ordered to escape through Sunda Strait, Houston and Perth ran directly into a Japanese invasion convoy in the darkness. Rather than run, they attacked. The two cruisers fought an entire Japanese landing force, transports, destroyers, and cruisers, in a battle that lasted from shortly after midnight until both ships were overwhelmed. Houston absorbed multiple torpedo hits and gunfire from all sides. By 0033 on 1 March 1942, she was gone, taking 693 men with her. Of her approximately 1,061 crew members, 368 were rescued, many to spend the rest of the war as prisoners in the brutal conditions of Japanese POW camps. Dozens more died in captivity.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt had used Houston as his presidential yacht. She carried FDR's flag. The people of Houston, Texas adopted her crew and provided packages and support throughout the war. When news of her sinking reached America, the grief was nationwide. Texas has honored her memory ever since.

Two battle stars cannot begin to capture what Houston and her crew accomplished, fighting a war that was already lost before they ever fired a shot, going down fighting rather than surrendering, giving everything. Tactically Acquired's USS Houston (CA-30) collection is a tribute to those men and that ship. Honor the Galloping Ghost.