Battle of Savo Island

Significance

The Battle of Savo Island was the first major naval engagement of the Guadalcanal campaign and the opening contest in what would become a series of naval battles fought in the straits later named Ironbottom Sound. Fought between Imperial Japanese Navy forces under Gunichi Mikawa and Allied forces under Richmond Turner and Victor Crutchley, the engagement resulted in 1,077 U.S. casualties, establishing early in the Solomon Islands campaign that Allied naval control of the waters around Guadalcanal was far from assured. As the first of several clashes in those straits, the battle set a pattern of costly attrition that would define the wider Guadalcanal campaign and the broader competition for the Solomon Islands.

Forces & casualties

Commanders (3)