| Caption | APD Ward burning in Ormoc Bay, Leyte, Philippine Islands, after being struck by special attack aircraft, 7 Dec 1944; the firefighting ship was destroyer O'Brien, and photo was taken from APD Crosby ww2dbase | |||||||||
| Photographer | Unknown | |||||||||
| Source | ww2dbaseUnited States National Archives | |||||||||
| Identification Code | 80-G-335685 | |||||||||
| More on... |
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| Photo Size | 740 x 600 pixels | |||||||||
| Photos on Same Day | 7 Dec 1944 | |||||||||
| Added By | C. Peter Chen | |||||||||
| Licensing | Public Domain. According to the US National Archives, as of 21 Jul 2010: Please contact us regarding any inaccuracies with the above information. Thank you. |
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| Colorized By WW2DB |
Colorized with Adobe Photoshop |
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Visitor Submitted Comments
2. Don Mericle says:
18 Dec 2015 11:36:25 AM
I was onboard the USS COFER APD 62, saw twin engine betty hit the Ward on the port side, the air cover (p-38s with Bong covering us) between the ships and air we shot down 85 planes that day, the biggest ship was a DD in the landing force.
18 Dec 2015 11:36:25 AM
I was onboard the USS COFER APD 62, saw twin engine betty hit the Ward on the port side, the air cover (p-38s with Bong covering us) between the ships and air we shot down 85 planes that day, the biggest ship was a DD in the landing force.
All visitor submitted comments are opinions of those making the submissions and do not reflect views of WW2DB.
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Famous WW2 Quote
"We no longer demand anything, we want war."Joachim von Ribbentrop, German Foreign Minister, Aug 1939
8 May 2015 10:37:46 AM
The U.S.S. Ward is the destroyer that fired the first U.S. shot of WWII when it fired on a Japanese midget sub trying to enter Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7, 1941. She was commanded at the time by LCDR William W. Outerbridge.
The tale gets strange from here.
Reclasified an APD (high speed transport), it was sunk by gunfire from the U.S.S. O'Brien on December 7, 1944 when attmpts at damage control failed after a Japanese kamikaze attack exactly three years to the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
And even stranger, the commanding officer of the O'Brien was none other than William W. Outerbridge who had commanded Ward three years before on that fateful day off Hawaii.
The truth is stranger than fiction.