Cruise of the Lanikai: Incitement to War by Tolley, Kemp - 1973

Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1973. Presumed First Edition/First Printing. Hardcover. Very good/good. xiii, [1], 345, [1] pages. Illustrations. Front endpaper map. Source notes. Bibliography. Appendix. Index. DJ is price clipped. DJ has slight wear and soiling. Nice inscription, signed by Charles Adair, formerly commanding officer of the U.S.S. Lanikai on half title, written at Annapolis on Christmas Day 1973. Adair later achieved the rank of Rear Admiral. It was inscribed to a United States Army Colonel and noted that the Lanikai was the only commissioned ship in the United States Navy to operate under sail in the combat zone! When World War II broke out, he was serving with the Asiatic Fleet based in the Philippines. Eventually, he led three officers and 18 sailors in an escape from Corregidor aboard an 80-foot schooner. The story of the escape was told in the book "The Cruise of the Lanikai," written by fellow officer Kemp Tolley, who later retired from the Navy as a rear admiral. The book detailed the schooner's 4,000-mile trip to Java, then the final 900-mile leg to Allied lines in Australia. The author was commanding officer of the Lanikai, which was commissioned as a U.S. navy ship on 5 December 1941; her real mission was to provoke the Japanese to sink her, thus triggering U.S. entry into World War II. Rear Admiral Kemp Tolley (29 April 1908 - 28 October 2000) was an officer in the U.S. Navy and is the author of three books and numerous articles on U.S. Navy activities in the Pacific, China, and the Soviet Union. On 5 December 1941 Tolley was given command of the sailing schooner Lanikai, and given orders to sail in waters off the Philippines and report any sightings of Japanese warships. The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor before Tolley could embark on this mission and the Lanikai was assigned to the Inshore Patrol. Lanikai was detached on 26 December 1941 and ordered to attempt to escape to friendly waters. This was the start of a two-month odyssey during which Lanikai sailed from Manila in the Philippine Islands, to Surabaya on Java in the then Netherlands East Indies. Lanikai participated briefly in the doomed defense of Java and was strafed by Japanese aircraft on at least one occasion. Just prior to the fall of Java, Tolley took Lanikai to Tjilatjap on the south coast of Java where she evacuated allied stragglers. Lanikai departed Java 26 February 1942 just prior to the Dutch surrender and arrived at Fremantle, Australia on 18 March 1942. After suitable recovery and refitting Lanikai was engaged in patrol work along the northern coast of Western Australia until April 27, 1942.USS Lanikai, was a schooner-rigged diesel powered yacht commissioned into the United States Navy during both World War I and World War II, before being transferred to the Royal Australian Navy. The ship was built as MY Hermes by W. F. Stone of Oakland, California, in 1914, for the Williams-Diamond Company, agents for the trading company Jaluit-Gesellschaft of Hamburg, Germany. Lanikai was taken into the United States Navy at Cavite Navy Yard, Philippine Islands, under charter from Luzon Stevedoring Co., on 5 December 1941, and commissioned the same day with Lieutenant (and future admiral) Kemp Tolley in command. On 2 December, President Roosevelt ordered, through Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Harold R. Stark, that the Commander in Chief, Asiatic Fleet, Admiral Thomas C. Hart "charter three small vessels to form a defensive information patrol... to observe and report by radio Japanese movements in the west China Sea and Gulf of Siam." Lanikai was one of the small ships chartered to learn of Japan's intentions. Fitted out at Cavite, the schooner lay at the entrance of Manila Bay in the early hours of 8 December (7 December east of the International Date Line) awaiting daylight. Tolley's orders read: "Patrol off the entrance of Cam Ranh Bay and report the direction taken by the Japanese Fleet when it emerges." However, at 0300 word of Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor arrived with orders to return to Manila. In ensuing weeks, the schooner patrolled the approaches to Manila Bay and served as dispatch vessel within the harbor. On 10 December she survived the devastating Japanese air raid which destroyed Cavite Navy Yard. On Christmas Day, she assisted in the evacuation of Manila, carrying Army Officers and equipment to Corregidor. As a result of plans and actions of Lt. Comdr. Charles Adair, Flag Lieutenant to Admiral Hart, approval was obtained for Lanikai to attempt to escape to the Netherlands East Indies. On the evening of 26 December, carrying as passengers one Dutch and three American officers, Lanikai, with her Filipino crew,[4] got underway from Mariveles harbor, Luzon, "destination unknown". Heading generally south, hiding in friendly coves during daylight, and traveling principally at night, the schooner sailed from island to island as Japanese forces spread across the East Indies with explosive speed. Storms covered her as she crossed the three large stretches of open water which lay between Luzon and Australia, and offered no coves for daylight concealment. When, as happened all too often, enemy aircraft approached the lightly armed schooner, they were preoccupied for the most part, with bigger game; but, at Surabaya, Java, on 3 February 1942, three Japanese bombs straddled the schooner so close aboard that Lanikai crewmen put off in a skiff to pick up a large quantity of stunned fish. In late February, under full sail despite heavy seas, Lanikai headed due south from Tjilatjap, Java. This course was taken to avoid enemy forces which might be searching the direct route from Java to Darwin, Australia. On 1 March, while about 200 miles east of Christmas Island, a large Japanese task force was sighted on the port bow. Evasive action by Lanikai was successful. On 18 March, 82 days after departing Mariveles, the schooner arrived at Fremantle, Western Australia. After replenishment and repairs, she got underway, on 4 April, to cruise along the northwest Australian coast and search for possible Japanese coast watchers. Lt. Comdr. Adair relieved Lt. Comdr. Tolley of command of the vessel on 27 April and continued the search into mid-May. Lanikai was decommissioned at Fremantle on 22 August, and was transferred to the Royal Australian Navy in which she served on harbor defense throughout the war. At the end of the war, Lanikai was sent back to the Philippines, and returned to her previous owner at Manila in 1946, but the owner refused to accept her in such poor condition. While undergoing repair at Subic Bay, the US Naval Base North of Manila, Lanikai sank during a typhoon in 1947.[1] In 2003 the wreck of the vessel was found in Nabasan Bay, and artifacts later salvaged.