While flying the first mission during the Battle of Midway, a faulty oxygen canister had created gases that turned to caustic soda. He was transferred to the hospital in Pearl Harbor, where X-rays showed cloudy spots on his lungs. I dropped all the way to the deck to get out of there.”Īlthough Best returned unharmed after a day’s work in hitting the Akagi and the Hiryu, the Battle of Midway turned out to be his last.Īfter returning to the Enterprise, he began coughing up blood and developed a fever. “I never tried to look where my bomb hit: she was shooting, the battleships were shooting, and the Zeros were swarming around. “Hiryu threw everything she had at us,” Best told Portz. That afternoon, Best and his remaining squadron members and another Enterprise bomber squadron went after the Hiryu, the one Japanese carrier that had escaped being hit in the morning.īest and his squadron succeeded in destroying it, but unlike the morning mission when the Japanese fighters were down low defending against the American torpedo bombers, they were aloft. A fourth plane came in later but was badly shot up. Of the 15 planes in Best’s squadron, Portz said, only three returned to the Enterprise in good condition. Dive bombers from the Yorktown hit the Soryu. That morning, Portz said, torpedo bombers from the three American carriers attacked three of the Japanese carriers and were almost wiped out by Japanese fighter planes and anti-aircraft fire.īut the attacking American torpedo bombers drew down the enemy fighters close to the water, Portz said, and while the Japanese fighters were attacking the torpedo bombers, the American dive bombers were able to hit the Japanese carriers.īombers from the Enterprise hit the Akagi and the Kaga. On the morning of June 4, 1942, the Enterprise and two other American carriers-the Yorktown and the Hornet-were a few hundred miles from Midway Island when a patrol plane spotted Japanese aircraft carriers and their escorts heading toward the island.
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Portz, who interviewed Best recently for an upcoming article in the Order of Daedalians’ quarterly magazine, said that the Americans had broken the Japanese code and learned that the enemy fleet was on its way to Midway. “I knew that I could make the most contribution as a bomber rather than a fighter,” he told The Hook, a journal of carrier aviation, in 1996.īy mid-1942, Best was an experienced combat pilot assigned to the aircraft carrier Enterprise in the Pacific. In June 1940, Best returned to the fleet and requested to be assigned to dive bombers. He later taught instrument flying and evaluated torpedo bomber tactics in Pensacola, Fla. Naval Academy in 1932, served on the light cruiser Richmond and began flight training in 1934. Born in Bayonne, N.J., Best was inspired to become a pilot by listening to the exploits of air veterans of World War I.