November 30, 1942: Rear Admiral Raizo Tanaka and IJN Destroyer Squadron 2 steamed to Lunga Point to drop supplies to their beleaguered countrymen on Guadalcanal.

Task Force 67, commanded by Rear Admiral Carleton H. Wright, moved to intercept. Led by 5 Destroyers ordered to make contact and dump torpedoes before clearing the field for the 4 CA's to rain hellfire upon the enemy.

The 8 IJN destroyers ceased resupply operations immediately upon sighting the American force, and Rear Admiral Tanaka ordered his ships to attack.

Rear Admiral Wright, wavered and his vanguard's torpedoes missed.

The American cruisers opened fire and the IJN DD Takanami and 197 souls, burned.

The U.S.S. Minneapolis, CA-36, was hit first by 2 Nipponese torpedoes, and lost her bow.

The New Orleans, CA-32 was struck next and her forward magazine detonated, ripping the bow of the ship off just forward of turret number 2. All 187 souls, in turret number 2 and forward, lost.

U.S.S Pensacola, CA-24, was set ablaze by a torpedo explosion that tossed flaming oil all across the ship.

Finally the Northampton, CA-26, met her fate. Two IJN torpedoes, fired from the IJN Kawakaze, ripped her open on the port side. Despite her crew's damage control efforts Neptune insisted she take her place in Ironbottom Sound.

395 American Sailors died disrupting, this, one of the last serious efforts to resupply the Japanese defenders on Guadalcanal. IJN commanders would decide to abandon the island several days later and begin what would become their retreat across the Pacific.

https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/w/war-damage-reports/uss-northampton-ca26-war-damage-report-no-41.html?fbclid=IwAR1Zrs9BycZQ-7tqUiy1OLc5heSYoGvmqMpDHBXbu7Q-T6lUfMvGp7gtaTA

They’re our friends now though, right?

Which side was your Great Grandfather on ?

Yes, what ship, what role aboardship?

He manned a 5 inch gun on the Northampton.

Didn't the Brits pull some really nasty shit during the Revolution?

Supposedly the redcoats funded our isolationist and peace movements leading up to world war II so as not to lose naval supremacy on the high seas. Fuck them.

Interesting. Have any leads where one could read further? Churchill, despite his public face, was no fan of the US and felt especially threatened about America's pre-War economic (hampered, of course, by the Depression) ascension vis-a-vis Britain's imperial interests and hegemony.

Have you read Hornfischer's Neptunes Inferno?
A pretty detailed account of the Guadalcanal campaign.
The U.S. Navy responded in lessons learned by launching fleets of destroyers & destroyer escorts, as well as working on their radar guided night attack drills.
Still lost a lot of ships in "Iron Bottom Sound" though.

Naval Institute Press has a book on it and it's on sale until midnight, Friday.

https://www.usni.org/store/books/ebook-editions/battle-tassafaronga

@lew  (sorry for the delay)

My only source for this was Samuel Eliot Morison's "History of United States Naval Operations of World War II Volume 1: The Battle of the Atlantic" He talks about it in the beginning before getting into the meat and potatoes of the situation in the Atlantic between 1939 through 1943. I will say, he also falsely states that Grand Admiral Karl Donitz gave an order to machine gun survivors of torpedoed ships, so Morison may be off base on this claim as well. This order was never actually proven to exist and is absent from the German Kriegsmarine War Diary. Admiral Dontiz also vehemently denied this in his interrogation, records of which can be found here: Grand Admiral Donitz Interrogations

Edit to add: I haven't had a chance to look further into this since I first read it in Vol 1. I will be getting around to it before I move on to Volume II though. I got the whole set of Morison's work at a library book sale for 40 bucks. Strongly recommend you guys visit your local library book sales if they do them. Great deals to be had.

Thanks ordered. I'd seen this book floating around before, just never pulled the trigger on it.

I had not. Just ordered this one as well. Thanks for the recommendation.

Actually, the "fleet of destroyers" was, like many of the newer cruisers (both heavy and light), battleships and carriers, were designed pre-war and were being laid down before the first bomb was dropped.  FDR knew that war was coming and got the navy in on it earlier.  Building ships took a long time and it required not only design, but dedicating shipyards,   material, construction crews, manning and training the crews.  Tanks and airplanes have a shorter time from board to field (except today).

The Fletcher class DDs were actually conceived in 1939 and the first ones coming out in 1942.

BTW, I dropped a lot of ducats on the Naval Institute Press for books.  Hanging around you guys is getting expensive.

True the designs were in, but the Escort Carriers & Destroyer Escorts were convoy escorts only until the Pacific Theater got hot.
800 Destroyer Escorts were commissioned in WW2 but were originally designed for convoy assistance under Lend Lease.
115 Escort Carriers commissioned in WW2, although prototype hulls were laid down in 1939.

One of the oddities of the war was the "light cruiser" designed as an antiaircraft cruiser. Instead of main batteries they went with multiple 5" guns. Those light cruisers were heavier in tonnage than our heavy cruiser, but when firing at night produced quite a light show.

Post treaty production gave us a head start in producing & launching heavier gun ships, although the Axis powers seem to have jumped out in front, Germany with the Bismark, wasn't a match for an Iowa class battleship, Japan with Yamato & Musashi both of which were much heavier than the Iowa class.

Honestly though, I believe Japan displayed a fatal flaw from war's outset in not going all in to win, trying to conserve their fleet.
Contrast that against the U.S. Navy at the Battle of the Philippine Sea with 15 aircraft carriers (not including escort carriers) ranging on the offensive searching for the Japanese Navy to take the fight to them.

Back to OP, do you know what destroyer picked your grandfather up?
Aside from searching DANFS, the are websites for the Destroyer Escort Assn. (desausa.org), Escort Carriers Seamen Assn. (escaa.org) & Destroyers - Tin Can Sailors Assn. (destroyers.org). Task group assignments are sometimes sketchy, but major task force compositions are listed.