The "boss" and I had the dawn inner air patrol from 0400 until 0900. The engine of my plane didn't turn up properly, so I sat up there on the catapult for about ten minutes until the leads were dried off. I have explained this procedure in the section Launching and recovering the Curtiss "Seagull" SOC-1 Scout Seaplane.

At about 0630 hours, the destroyers took turns coming alongside and transferred 1,550 survivors from the Yorktown to us. We also fueled the destroyers. On this afternoon, a number of Yorktown survivors were transferred to the destroyer Hammann. They were going back to try to salvage the Yorktown. There were now quite a few officers aboard Portland that I knew very well. Lieutenant. Mead was there. He had been my flight instructor in Squadron One (seaplanes) at NAS (Naval Air Station) Pensacola. Lieutenant (jg) John R. (Mac) McCarthy and a couple more Enterprise pilots were aboard Portland because they had been unable to find their own carrier, and so, came back to the Yorktown. Mac was the fellow I saw make the forced landing on water in his SBD. He hit the dashboard so had his head bandaged up. Mac was a classmate of mine at Pensacola. With so many survivors on board, Portland had become crowded. Two of them were sleeping on the deck in my room. They told me that only two of the twelve TBD torpedo bombers sent out on that morning ever returned.

Survivors of the Battle of Midway are being transferred at sea from the heavy cruiser Portland (right) to the submarine tender Fulton.

That evening, we started steaming towards Hawaii at 25 knots because we were to meet the submarine tender Fulton on the following day and transfer the survivors to her for transportation to Pearl. That meant Portland would not be going to Pearl. Task Force 16 was still engaging the enemy!

At 1100 hours, we met a tug that was on its way to help tow in the Yorktown. About 1200, the Fulton came alongside and we commenced transferring the survivors. They rigged three "trolley-cars", and sent them over two at a time in the basket. The stretcher cases were tied in the stretcher and hoisted over to the Fulton on cranes. At about 1800, when we had only ten more men to transfer on stretchers, the destroyers got a submarine sound contact and we hoisted "emergency unit", cut the lines to the Fulton, and the ships scattered. After dark, we transferred the remaining men in a motor launch.

We were to rendezvous with the Astoria and the tanker Platte in the morning so that we could fuel. The scuttlebutt suggested that we would be joining the carrier Saratoga when she reached us in a couple of days. We heard that the crippled Yorktown had taken two torpedo hits from a submarine today. I wrote to Kay and asked John McCarthy to mail it for me.

Al and I were to have the dawn patrol, but as it turned out, I was the only one to fly. We were waiting on the catapult until we sighted the Astoria, Platte and two destroyers before being shot off. About 0500, just at sunrise, a number of people sighted a yellow Very flare a couple of miles behind us. The destroyer Morris was sent back, and I was also catapulted to try and locate its source. I searched for an hour and a half but couldn't see a thing. I was hoping I might see one of our lost pilots in a life raft, but I believe it must have been a submarine because the emergency recognition for subs on this morning was a yellow flare.

When I returned, we had joined the other ships and the tanker Platte was alongside us. Two Astoria seaplanes were up for the inner air patrol so I was recovered.

On this day I made Lieutenant (Junior Grade) and my pay and allowances would jump from $264.25 to $371.01 per month. I took the oath of acceptance for Lieutenant (jg) about 1630 from Captain Dubose. I then bought two boxes of cigars and passed them out in the wardroom and the warrant officers' mess for dinner and to the men in the division this evening.

We heard that Dutch Harbor had been attacked again yesterday, and that the destroyer Hammann had been sunk by a submarine yesterday while it was tied up to the Yorktown.

The good news of this day was that four Japanese carriers had definitely been sunk in the Battle of Midway.