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At seven in the morning the cruisers and destroyers entered Flying Fish Channel. The day was D-2, September 13. Before dawn, wearing the flag of Admiral Struble, Rochester had joined the darkened, radio-silent column and formed on Toledo, flagship of Rear Admiral John M. Higgins's Gunfire Support Group. Astern of Rochester were HMS Jamaica and Kenya, British light cruisers. Ahead were five destroyers: Mansfield, DeHaven, Lyman K. Swenson, Collett, and Henderson. A sixth destroyer, Gurke, broke across the dark western horizon and cut into the formation; amid a flurry of blinker signals she closed Toledo's starboard quarter, expertly sent over a heaving line, and transferred a canvas pouch. This was "the late dope": last-minute target information, yesterday's aerial photos, and the latest intelligence, obtained only two hours earlier from Valley Forge, flagship of the fast carriers. Then the bombardment group turned east toward Flying Fish Channel as the sun, red and round, broke through the gray haze of mist and woodsmoke from cooking fires ashore. The tide was still ebbing as the leading destroyers poked into the channel. At full low as they passed Palmi Do, it would be flooding when they reached bombardment stations at Inchon. Here was another of the infinite expert calculations required to make the operation succeed: with scant turning room up-channel, the rising tide would keep the anchored destroyers stemming it, bows downstream and full broadsides uncovered toward the enemy throughout the shoot. When the moment came to retire, even to slip anchor if need be, they would be headed out.

Overhead, covering the advance, were the Panther jets of Task Force 77's combat air patrol, or "CAP." In addition, a strike group of heavily armed ADs had reported in to Admiral Higgins at 0700. Aboard the destroyers final preparations were in -progress: additional boilers being lit off and put on the line for full power on short notice; fenders and towing gear being rigged out in case a cripple needed help; repair parties being armed, not with cutlasses but with rifles (the world's most ludicrous sight: a sailor with a rifle), so as to repel boarders or suicide sampans; then an early steak dinner for all hands before the covering air strike and the clangor of General Quarters.

Now the time was at hand to see whether Admiral Doyle and General Smith had been right in their insistence on a methodical naval gunfire bombardment. Would the destroyers goad the gunners of the 918th Coast Artillery into disclosing themselves?

Meanwhile, there was another disclosure. At 1145, as Mansfield, first in column, approached Pukchangjaso, an islet below Palmi Do, the port bridge-wing lookout sang out, "Mines!" Moments later the same report came from DeHaven, next in column. Riding on the muddy surface, exposed by extreme low tide, were the ugly black casings of 17 Russian contact mines.

Momentarily, perhaps because it was so ominous, the sight was unbelievable; DeHaven's skipper, Commander O. B. Lundgren, a minewarfare expert, had no doubts and quickly confirmed Mansfield's tentative report. The three leading ships opened fire with rifles and 40mm and 20mm guns, seconds later there was a thudding explosion and geyser of mud-"After that, nobody doubted me any further," recollected Lundgren.

Here was a turn of events, conceivably the very worst turn of events, for which preparation had not been made. The few minesweepers in the Far East had been pressed into service as escorts, and were far behind with the transports rather than ahead of the destroyers in the Salee River. For the four cruisers, there was no problem: their bombardment stations -at very long range for such work-were down-channel just below the mines. For the destroyers it was another matter; if more mines lay in the channel higher up, they would soon find out. Meanwhile, Captain Halle C. Allen, USN, the destroyer squadron commander, detached his rear ship; Henderson, with orders to destroy the mines by gunfire, and pressed on in the brilliant morning sunshine toward Wolmi Do.

Fortunately the channel was clear. Douglas MacArthur's luck had held. What had happened was that, after the British had shelled Wolmi Do on September 5 and 6, using the area now mined, the North Koreans had planted two fields of contact mines in case the Royal Navy came back. These fields were also located so as to commence closure of the junction of Flying Fish and East Channels. Later, when the harness cables arrived for the more dangerous ground mines, general mining would proceed at Inchon, and the cork could be put into the bottleneck between Pukchangjaso and Palmi Do.

As the cruisers' anchors clattered down from the hawseholes and the destroyers moved up, the ADs from the fast carriers shrieked down on Wolmi Do. At headquarters in Inchon the defense commander reached for a message blank and his ink block. Quickly brushing in the characters, he wrote :

The report was a good one. Alas for the Communists, there is no evidence that higher headquarters accepted it. In any case, even if the harness cables had arrived that very afternoon, time had run out.

At 1242, Gurke's anchor went down. Six minutes later, three miles upstream, north of Wolmi Do and Inchon, Mansfield anchored at the other end of the line. It might have been—in a very real sense it was—a visit by the Fleet. Aboard sampans in the harbor and the channel, white-robed Koreans in black hats stared at the warships as the 5-inch mounts and directors trained out to port. Even though Philippine Sea's AD Skyraiders slugged and swooped at Wolmi Do, a Los Angeles Times correspondent, observing from the bridge of Rochester, said the island "looked like a picnickers' paradise, green-wooded and serene."

A signal-"Commence scheduled mission"-fluttered at the dip from Mansfield's starboard yardarm. In 12 minutes Commodore Allen would two-block his signal just as the last AD pulled out of her dive. Then the destroyers would open fire. At the root of the Wolmi Do causeway, beside a railroad siding, Commander Lundgren could see a pyramid of black cylinders-Russian contact mines. That was how close it had been.

From DeHaven's director, Lieutenant Arthur T. White, USN, the gunnery officer, could see something else. On the tongue of land north of Red Beach in Inchon proper, a gun was being run out and uncovered. "Captain!" he reported over the battle phones. "They're running out a gun .... Captain! They're loading the gun . . . . Captain! Request permission to open fire."

"Permission granted," came the word, and seven minutes early, before the anchor windlass detail could clear the forecastle, DeHaven's 5-inch guns began the battle. The forward mount's blast nearly blew the chief boatswain's mate overboard while he was stopping down the starboard anchor. It also disconcerted Commodore Allen, a man who went by the book and kept a weather eye on how things might look to higher authority. But Lundgren had a good excuse, or so Admiral Struble thought when he heard the story, and there the matter rested.