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Karel Doorman | |
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 Doorman in 1930 | |
| Birth name | Karel Willem Frederik Marie Doorman |
| Born | (1889-04-23)23 April 1889 Utrecht, Netherlands |
| Died | 28 February 1942(1942-02-28) (aged 52) |
| Allegiance |  Netherlands |
| Branch |  Royal Netherlands Navy |
| Service years | 1906–1942[1] |
| Rank | Schout-bij-nacht |
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Karel Willem Frederik Marie Doorman (23 April 1889 – 28 February 1942) was aRoyal Netherlands Navy officer who duringWorld War II commanded remnants of the short-livedAmerican-British-Dutch-Australian Command naval strike forces in theBattle of the Java Sea. He was killed in action when his flagshipHNLMS De Ruyter was torpedoed during the battle, having chosen togo down with the ship.
Doorman was born 1889 inUtrecht,[2] and raised as aRoman Catholic from a military family. In 1906, he and his brother Lou ACM Doorman were commissioned asmidshipmen. In 1910, he was promoted to officer[2] and moved to theDutch East Indies aboard the cruiserTromp. During his first three years of duty from January 1912 to December 1913, he was placed aboard the survey vesselsHNLMS van Doorn andHNLMS Lombok and was mainly tasked with mapping the coastal waters ofNew Guinea. Early in 1914, he returned to the Netherlands on board the cruiserDe Ruyter. In March 1914, he requested a transfer to theAviation Service.[citation needed]
In April 1914, Doorman served on theNoord-Brabant during its mission to thePrincipality of Albania to recover the body of MajorLodewijk Thomson of theInternational Gendarmerie. Doorman's transfer to the Aviation Service was approved in mid-1915 and he became one of the first naval officers to be awarded hispilot wings.[citation needed][3]
From 1915 to 1918, Doorman was stationed atSoesterberg with the Aviation Service[2] under the command of Captain (later Major) of EngineersHenk Walaardt. There, he metAlbert Plesman, an observer who later became a pilot. In 1915, Doorman was awarded a civilian pilot's license and in 1916 he was awarded a naval pilot's license. From 1917 to 1921, he was an instructor atSoesterberg Air Base and from October 1918 at theNaval Air Base De Kooy inDen Helder. Doorman commanded this Naval Air Base from 1919 to 1921. Because of his merits as an organizer in the nascent field ofnaval aviation, he was made aKnight of the Order of Orange-Nassau in 1922.[citation needed]
Budget cuts and an arm injury ended Doorman's active flying career but from November 1921 to November 1923, he attended the Higher Naval School inThe Hague;[2] this training, which included coursework in aircraft and naval vessel communication, laid the groundwork for his later career. After he completed this training, he was placed with the Department of the Navy atBatavia in December 1923.[citation needed]
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From 1919 to 1934, Doorman was married to Justine A.D. Schermer. Their sonJoop Doorman [nl] was born in 1928. The marriage ended in 1934, soon after the birth of a third child. That same year, Doorman married Isabella J.J.J. Heyligers, with whom he had a fourth child.
In 1926, for the first time in eleven years, Doorman gained a longer appointment aboard the armored naval vesselDe Zeven Provinciën. Until late 1927, he was the ship's gunnery officer and later also became itsfirst officer. Early in 1928, Doorman returned to the Netherlands, where he ran equipment-purchasing for The Hague's Naval Aviation department. In 1932, under his command, themine-layer HNLMSPrins van Oranje sailed three times in the same year to the Dutch East Indies. The same year, he also commanded twodestroyers;Witte de With andEvertsen; the latter saw action against the rebels onHNLMSDe Zeven Provinciën in February 1933.[citation needed]
In January 1934, Doorman returned to the Netherlands withEvertsen and spent three years asChief of Staff of the naval commander inDen Helder. In 1936, he submitted a request to the Secretary of Defense to command a cruiser in the Dutch East Indies. Consequently, he departed as acaptain in 1937 for the Dutch East Indies, commanding the cruisersSumatra andJava. In August 1938, he was appointed Commander of Naval Aviation in the Dutch East Indies.[2] From his headquarters at Surabaya Morokrembangan Naval Air Station, he made a number of inspection tours in the archipelago.
On 16 May 1940, Doorman was promoted torear-admiral and on 13 June 1940, on board the light cruiserDe Ruyter, he took command of the squadron previously led by Rear-Admiral GW Stöve[4] atSurabaya. In early 1942 he led remnants of theABDA Combined Striking Force.
On February 3, Doorman led a group of ships that went to stop a Japanese invasion force that was heading towardsMakassar. Whileen route, his flotilla was observed by the Japanese and bombed, forcing it to turn back after several ships were damaged. This conflict was known asBattle of Makassar Strait, also called the Battle of the Flores Sea.[citation needed]
On 18 February, Japanese forces invadedBali. Doorman led another force attempting to stop the invasion the next day. Due to the short notice and the challenge of consolidating his troops, three waves of counterattacks were planned. The first wave involving cruisers and destroyers was unsuccessful, culminating in the sinking of the Dutch destroyerPiet Hein. The second wave, consisting of a Dutch cruiser and several American destroyers was also unsuccessful, although they caused severe damage to a Japanese destroyer. The third wave of patrol boats encountered no Japanese forces. The failure to stop the Japanese led to the occupation of Bali. This engagement is known as theBattle of Badung Strait.[citation needed]
Doorman was killed in action whenDe Ruyter was hit by a JapaneseLong Lance torpedo and sunk in theBattle of the Java Sea. Part of the crew was rescued but Doorman, following navy tradition, chose togo down with his ship.[2] On 5 June 1942, he was posthumously made a Knight 3rd class in theMilitary William Order. The medal was awarded to the rear admiral's eldest son on 23 May 1947 by Lieutenant-AdmiralConrad Helfrich on boardHNLMS Karel Doorman. The ceremony was attended byPrince Bernhard.[citation needed]
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Karel Doorman is often honoured because hesignaled"Ik val aan, volg mij" ("I am attacking, follow me") during theBattle of the Java Sea, which some have considered gallant.[5] However, one source doubts that he ever uttered those words.[6]
On 27 February 1942, at approximately 4pm, the Japanese and the allied squadrons spotted each other. Karel Doorman realised that the Dutch fleet was outnumbered but nonetheless proceeded to attack. His actions lost the fleet and he ultimately went down with his ship. The guns of the two Japanese cruisers had a greater range than the Allied guns and at about 5pm the British cruiserHMS Exeter was hit. Twenty minutes, later the Dutch destroyerHNLMS Kortenaer was torpedoed exploding and breaking into two. Confusion arose in the Allied squadron over the way forward, compounded because HMSExeter could only sail at half power and wanted to return to port at Soerabaja (nowSurabaya).
Following instructions issued by High Command, Doorman gave the order to attack at the approach of the Japanese fleet. The tactical command was "I am attacking, follow me"; he did not signal at the beginning of the battle in the Java Sea. It is a loose translation of the signal sent by him, "All ships – follow me" to remedy the confusion. The battle on 27 February 1942 which, with interruptions, lasted for over seven hours, ended with the almost complete destruction of Doorman's squadron. The squadron commander perished aboard the flagship, which sank after around 90 minutes.
Four ships in theRoyal Netherlands Navy were named after him: theescort carrierKarel Doorman (QH1), theaircraft carrierKarel Doorman (R81), thefrigateKarel Doorman (F827), and themulti-role support vesselKarel Doorman (A833).
Additionally in Rotterdam there is theKarel Doormanstraat (Rotterdam) [nl] named after him.
TheKloosterkerk inThe Hague has a memorial plaque. Commemorations of the Battle of the Java Sea are regularly held.
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