Battle of Rennell Island 1943
_low_in_the_water_on_30_January_1943.jpg){kind=link}
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Date | 29 January 1943 – 30 January 1943 | Wikidata |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 1943 | Wikidata P580 (start time) |
| Era | World War II era (1939–1945) | derived from year |
| Nearest landmass | At sea (nearest continent: Oceania) | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | Oceania | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | Guadalcanal campaign | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | Empire of Japan, United States | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | -11.4167, 160.9333 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Battle of Rennell Island (Japanese: レンネル島沖海戦, Hepburn: Renneru-shima oki kaisen) took place on 29–30 January 1943. It was the last major naval engagement between the United States Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy during the Guadalcanal campaign of World War II. It occurred in the South Pacific between Rennell Island and Guadalcanal in the southern Solomon Islands.
In the battle, Japanese land-based torpedo bombers, seeking to provide protection for the impending evacuation of Japanese forces from Guadalcanal, made several attacks over two days on U.S. warships operating as a task force south of Rennell Island. In addition to approaching Guadalcanal with the objective of engaging any Japanese ships that might come into range, the U.S. task force was protecting an Allied transport ship convoy carrying replacement troops there.
As a result of the Japanese air attacks on the task force, the heavy cruiser USS Chicago was sunk, the destroyer USS La Vallette was heavily damaged, and the rest of the U.S. task force was forced to retreat from the southern Solomons area. Partly because they turned back the U.S.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of Rennell Island (revision 1373594687), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
Nearby battles
- Actions along the Matanikau 1942 · 232 km
- Koli Point action 1942 · 234 km
- Battle of Edson's Ridge 1942 · 239 km
- Battle for Henderson Field 1942 · 241 km
- Battle of the Tenaru 1942 · 241 km
- Battle of Mount Austen, the Galloping Horse, and the Sea Horse 1942 · 244 km
Other battles of the Guadalcanal campaign
- Actions along the Matanikau 1942
- Battle of Edson's Ridge 1942
- Battle of Tassafaronga 1942
- Battle of Tulagi and Gavutu–Tanambogo 1942
- Battle of the Tenaru 1942
All 6 battles of the Guadalcanal campaign →
Browse more: battles at sea · Oceania · World War II era battles