Here we go on with the beginning of WW2 in the pacific area. In the early hours of 8th December 1941, just after the attack on Pear Harbour, a message arrived the Philippines. JAPAN STARTED HOSTILITIES. GOVERN YOURSELVES ACCORDINGLY. With this short and cryptic message sent out by Admiral Hart at 3:10 am on December 8, 1941 – December 7, 1941, in Hawaii – the Pacific War began for the United States Asiatic Fleet. Deployed in Malalag Bay with a secret stash of aviation fuel ashore and three PBY-4 Catalina flying boats moored on the water, the William B. Preston and her skipper, Lieutenant Commander Etheridge Grant had been given their orders. They had their plans. Now would be the time to execute. The Preston received Admiral Hart’s note that the war had broken out at 3:40 am. By 5:15 am, one Catalina, P-6, was already in the air on a scouting mission. The other two flying boats, P-4 and P-7, were moored to buoys close to the beach. In the meantime, Commander Grant set the Preston at Condition Two, which meant that half her guns were manned. No Japanese forces had been reported in the area but, ominously, no one – or at least no one in the Asiatic Fleet – knew where the fearsome Japanese aircraft carriers were at present. They would soon find out. At 7:10 am, the air raid alarm on the Preston sounded. Nine Japanese fighters roared overhead beneath low cloud cover. Not the famous Japanese Zeros, but the older, fixed-landing gear Mitsubishi A5M4 fighters, to which the Allies would give the reporting name “Claude.” The Preston opened up with her considerable antiaircraft guns, but the fighters had no interest in her. The PBYs never had a chance. Lacking armor and self-sealing gas tanks, the flying boats were shredded by gunfire. Both Catalinas exploded, vomiting expanding pools of flaming gasoline into the bay. The William B. Preston sent word to Patrol Wing 10 that she was under attack and got under way, moving toward the entrance to the bay for maneuvering room. The attack on the Preston and its PBYs had come from the light carrier Ryujo, under the command of Lieutenant Aioi Takahide. It had made an earlier sweep over Davao City but, having found nothing there (much to the disgust of Lieutenant Aioi), it proceeded to go after the Preston. The Japanese had done their homework. They knew exactly where, when, and what they wanted to attack. The Preston and her flying boats had been spotted in the Malalag anchorage on December 6. Like all the other Japanese pieces on the Pacific chessboard, the covering force had left Palau on December 6 in order to be close to its targets. Two precious Catalinas had been lost, but his ship had survived unscathed and even shot up a Claude so badly that it had to ditch, though its pilot was rescued. The Preston turned back toward the beach and rescued survivors of the flying boats, but its efforts were cut short by the unexpected return of Catalina P-6 with unwelcome news: three unidentified destroyers had been sighted 15 miles south of the Gulf of Davao, headed toward the Preston. Commander Grant ordered the Preston to get out before the trap closed, squeezing out all 25 knots her ancient engines would allow. P-6, completely unaware of the earlier attack, was left to make sense of all the messages from Patrol Wing 10 asking for updates on the status of the Preston. Both tender and Catalina were ordered to Polloc Bay on the west coast of Mindanao. They were on the run, hunted by an adversary that was more numerous, more powerful and relentless, with whom they had only barely survived their first encounter. It was the first day of the war.