US Marine Corps - The Black Vault

Rear Admiral Anderson opined:
HUDDLE Slowly Scatded 455
In general, I think my services were satisfactory to Turner most of the
time, but in retrospect, I realize that during the six months I was with him,
was for him an uncertain, unhappy and trying time.
First, he had to remain in his flagship at anchor in Noumea harbor most of
the time while some of his force made only the necessary trips to Guadalcanal.
And again, I believe that it rankled him in that he thought some officers
(higher-ups) believed that he was somewhat responsible for the loss of the
three cruisers around Savo Island during the initial landing at Guadalcanal in
August 1942.
I also believe that he foresaw that the days of the Amphibious Force
SOPAC were coming to an end, and he wanted new fields to work in. He
often told me that an advance through the Central Pacific should be started
soon.
I really think that he was tired and somewhat bored. He didn’t have any
contemporaries to go around with and seldom saw Admiral Halsey outside of
the 9 a.m. conferences. . . .58
The members of the PHIBFORSOPAC Staff were all of a mind that
Captain Anderson was a very pleasant individual to have on the Staff, but
he was not cut from the same tempered steel as Richmond Kelly Turner.
In any case, he was in completely over his head. His mind was too slow to
follow Admiral Turner whose mind turned over on the step at about 1000
RPM, while Andy was airborne at about 100 RPM.
*****
Tom Peyton was unable to keep up with the Admiral’s thinking. Andy Ander.
son was even slower. ‘g
Rear Admiral Turner was just too damned impatient to deal with his staff
through his Chief of Staff. He wanted to tend to the matter and get it over
with and then get on to something else. When the Chief of Staff was unacquainted
with operational matters, which the Admiral already was 98 per-
cent up on, he just wouldn’t wait. Thus,
by the time Andy joined the Staff, the Admiral was as familiar with arnphibious
operations as any one who had spent six months working twenty hours
a day on the subject could be. Andy just never could catch up to be on a par
operationally with the Admiral.GO
Commodore Peyton remembered that
Turner was not a well man and during this period was always on edge for
* Rear Admiral Anderson to GCD, letter, 2 May 1962.
WStaff Interviews.
60Ibid.