DigitalAura
10-08-09, 03:31 PM
I still don't recall a night as dark as the one on which our first patrol began. The crew and I had just finished the final sea trials for our fleet boat, the USS Flying Fish. The Golden Gate Bridge which had loomed behind us only seconds ago had now been swallowed up in blackness. There was no moon, no stars, even the wake of the boat seemed invisible in the inky black water. By this time, everyone on board already knew what kind of mission this was, although the details wouldn't be known until we were hours from Mare Island Naval Yard and I opened the official orders. Yes, it was obvious that this wiry old gentleman was special cargo. He looked Asian, although I couldn't say he looked Japanese, or Filipino, or Chinese, or anything else. But he was critical to this mission. The documents he carried were ULTRA... hell, even the orders I now opened in the ward room were handed to me by Nimitz himself!
When we reached the designated grid, I smoothed out our orders and massaged the corners into submission on the table. My eyes suddenly caught the destination, and my quick brain automatically calculated that we should reach our destination by May 14 or 15. The exec waited across from me trying not to appear impatient, but I could see he was losing that battle. He, too, wrestled with who this man was and why this newly commissioned boat was silently seen off on such a dark night without pomp or fanfare.
"Guam", I whispered. "We're going to Guam with this one. Says we aren't to ask him any questions or even talk to him. Says it's a matter of national security. Top Secret. Ultra."
"But who is he?" the XO almost pleaded.
"Couldn't tell ya", I flatly mumbled.
The man kept to himself and although he lived in our midst for those many days and nights until we reached Guam, he was largely ignored by the men of my boat. He spoke not at all, he ate little, and contributed nothing. We were a still a couple nights out from Guam, when the watch called down a sighting of a small convoy appearing as dots on the horizon on our starboard. They would have gone unnoticed had there been no moon or stars, but tonight the night sky betrayed them all... the moon was behind their formation, beckoning us to see them. I felt a sudden thrill, knowing this diversion would certainly revive my men's dipping morale. But as quickly as I stood to take the bridge, a glut of disappointment ate away that thought. I knew we could not attack. We were to do nothing until we had made our drop on Guam.
"Dooly, get a message out... Small Convoy leaving Saipan. Heading for Solomon's...Request permission to attack."
Minutes seemed like hours. Indeed, we were sweating despite the welcome cool breeze that scooped down the hatch into the control room. It was usually cooler this time of year. May 12, 1942. Finally, Dooly, the radioman, slumped at his station with HQ's reply. "Negative. Continue current objective. Maintain radio silence until accomplished." We resigned ourselves knowing we had only one more day to reach Guam.
The following morning we took our fix, and determined we would reach Guam easily by evening just as we had hoped. I ordered the diesels slower and figured on waiting until dark to broach the shallows there. As I climbed into the conning tower to contemplate the sunset, I caught my first sight of Guam through the portal.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/portal.jpg
The serenity of the moment was good medicine. Although we had felt robbed of an eventful mission up to now, the calmness of the environment perked me up. I realized that after tonight we'd become the hunter we were trained to be. The men were allowed to come up on the deck to take in the glorious sunset.Guam rolled out into the orange rippling mirror that embraced us all.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/cigardeck.jpg
Another dark night, despite the large white moon above. We were as close as we could get to the island. I ordered the men into action and preparations were made to get the inflatable into the water, and to help the old agent into the dinghy. He was now crisply dressed and in full uniform, and highly decorated too. It was the uniform of an officer. A Japanese officer. To this day I don't know if it was a ruse. A decoy. Or if he was the real deal. I can't even imagine what role he played in our war. But I remember being glad to have him off my boat, and before he was even 100 yards from the submarine I dispatched a radio message to SUBPACCOM.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/thedrop.jpg
Half an hour later we had a new mission. It was a patrol mission. We were to head for Japan and at my discretion search out and sink all enemy shipping. I smiled as I broadcast our new mission to the whole crew. A raucous moment of 'whoops' and 'hurrahs' followed.
As the waters in grid "Maple Grove" slid behind us, we turned our sights towards the homeland of our enemy. Although it was a week before we even saw any sign of them, the crew's high morale accounted for their lustrous performance as I drilled them over and over again. They performed emergency dives and trim dives at any and every hour, and each time they displayed the skill of a boat full of veterans. We were ready.
We were more than ready when the watch called down to us this time at 1100 on a sunny morning on May 22nd, 1942. "Smoke spotted on our port at two-two-zero! Captain to the bridge!" All the men stopped to watch me flick up the ladder. My breath caught as I saw the banquet off our stern. "Come to bearing two-seven-oh! all ahead full! What the heck, Pensky! That's not smoke, that's a bloody forest fire!" We couldn't make any boats out yet, but it was clear this was a big fat convoy, and we had a perfect opportunity.
The sub veered to intercept. Half an hour later I called to the diving officer, "Bring 'er down, James... periscope depth!" The sonarman had an easy time finding the spread of the convoy now ahead of us. It was sluggish group of tankers heading back home with a booty of fuel and oil they had plundered. Likely from the Phillipines. Just the other day we had received a message of the Yips move from the Phillipines pushing towards the Solomon Islands. Dealing a blow to this convoy would certainly hinder the Japanese war effort. They were using resources quicker than they could replenish them. We huddled over the maps and rechecked our intercept. The convoy was moving 6 knots, and moving in a straight, even course. Even though this was our first engagement with the enemy, we knew this was going to be easy.
The sun was high overhead, but there was some chop on and the periscope wouldn't be made by the escort leading the group. There was an escort on the convoy's starboard flank but he was too far away yet to be seen. We were assured of easy pickings as the first lazy hulk lurched across into my periscope at 1330. The solution was good. It had hardly been altered the last hour. We were set up for a vector attack. I held my breath as the behemoth crossed my firing line... "FIRE ONE!".. then "FIRE TWO!"... "FIRE THREE!"
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/fatconvoy.jpg
The ship was still 3000 yards out. With the torps set on slow, I had just enough time to set up for the next juicy target some 800 yards behind him. "Set torpedoes to HIGH SPEED in tubes 4, 5 and 6!"
"Torpedoes set and ready, sir"
"...FIRE 4, FIRE 5, FIRE 6!"
In moments, the sub lurched with the small shock of the torpedoes kicking out of their comfortable beds. Through the periscope I could see the telltale wake of the torpedoes heading to their intended targets. Seconds became minutes...still no impacts.
"Warship bearing 265, CLOSING!", shrieked the sonarman. I brought the periscope down quickly, and didn't have time to sneak a look.
"Get under the thermal layer, GO SILENT!"
"Warship bearing 273, Speeding up!"
"...For crying out loud, whats the time on those eels?" Then.. WHAM! WHAM! The high speed torps had found my second target. Immediately there followed three more loud impacts slightly ahead and to starboard. That was the big guy, our first target.
I wished we hadn't been chased under; I'm sure the explosions that we could hear would have been twice as satisfying if we could have seen the aftermath through the scope. Still, there were a few loud yelps of celebration amongst the crew.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/gapingmaw.jpg
"Where's the warship now?," I demanded.
"Still closing, 1000 yards... bearing 290", was the reply.
I was surprised I couldn't hear the destroyer at that range, but the waters were burdened with the sounds of the tankers in their death throes.
"Warship bearing 18 degrees! High Speed!"
I looked to the sonarman. Thomas was concentrating hard to hear past the din ahead of us. He nodded and I didn't have to ask. It was another. The lead escort doubling back to seek revenge. In my mind's eye I could see the convoy scattering on the surface, chaotically driving their rudders hard to change course and avoid both the wrecks and the destroyers that were carving their way through the flock to find the wolf that was now in their midst.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/brokenback.jpg
Depth 240 feet. "Deeper, get us deeper. Take us to 300 feet"
I had never been that deep before, but there was no pause for concern.
The first series of charges were a surprise. We hadn't heard the destroyer even arrive above us, but the explosions were much too close for comfort. They were exploding above us, and close enough to push us down further and faster than we would have liked. Frankie fought to trim the boat at 370 feet.
More explosions far ahead of us.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/davyjones.jpg
"Left, 90 degrees", I whispered. I diverted our heading for the first time since our attack. Now we would be running away from the convoy. I knew we'd likely be down for awhile and I didn't want to waste any time relocating the herd, but I needed to break away from the reapers above us. They probed us with pinging and I showed them our ass. Every 20 minutes or so they'd start their depth charge run again.
Three more charges detonated close to our stern and I heard things I couldn't explain. Things I didn't like. Minutes dragged into hours. Still the cans kept raining down. 128...129...
Was it me, or were they getting further away? We sweated it out in the dank, dark barrel. I gradually brought the boat back to a parallel course with the convoy. Every man sat grimly, even their breathing was quiet. I ordered the cook to serve out biscuits and preserves, which were welcomed by all, and went a long way to restoring the men to our cause. We continued to inch away from them, and after 7 hours had passed the charges stopped. Thomas detected props speeding back to the broken convoy to rejoin them and so I ordered the boat to periscope depth. By now the day was gone, and there was a large moon high overhead with not so much as a ripple on the surface. It wasn't a good night to hunt, but we surfaced the boat and ran two diesels full out with the other two diesels set to charge our depleted batteries. We ran on the surface for 3 hours. I stayed up on the bridge with the watch and at 0330 I detected a destroyer moving slightly away from us. He would be covering the convoys port side flank probably. I turned the boat to starboard by 20 degrees and hoped to work my way around the other side of the convoy until we could close for the attack. I was concerned because I knew we were throwing a good wake, but I also knew that before our attack would commence the moon would be working in my favour by backlighting the convoy. Sure enough, when we were finally in a position to strike the moon was casting a brilliant net over the ships of the convoy. We were no more than 4800 yards out from the closest merchant, but I didn't want to risk being spotted by their escorts.
"Periscope depth", I belched. I couldn't see any destroyers yet, but I knew there were at least three of them out there and I knew they were being extra vigilant after today's intrusion. Behind the scope I watched as we came perpendicular again to the convoy. We were ready to attack again only now from the opposite side.
Thomas had detected one of the escorts just ahead of the first column moving to our starboard but out of sight.
"Open tubes 1 through 6!", I hollered. At the TDC we were busy plugging in data and we were confident with our numbers. "Ready on tube 1... FIRE!" And 5 seconds later, "Fire tube 2!"
I carried on sighting in on two other targets and unloaded all our tubes. This time I left the periscope up. I held out the stop watch... less than 26 seconds... then... A brilliant column of white light shot up over a hundred feet into the air and showed me that the vessel had been hit dead centre. BOOM! The sound finally followed and it was louder than we expected, rattling even the deckplates. We couldn't even hear the other torpedo hit.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/inferno.jpg
Soon flashes erupted behind the first ship. For long moments it was brighter than daylight, and I could see the other merchantmen veering out of the path of the destruction around them. We heard another torpedo loudly TING! another target. Dud. But then BOOM! as the next torpedo slammed into the same small split freighter. I was enamored with the hell that was being wrought on the water ahead of us.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/listing.jpg
I let the XO and a few others had a quick peak. It was odd, but while we were elated with our score, we were somewhat disparaged by the ferocity of the carnage and the instant death that we had inflicted to dozens if not hundreds of men.
"HARD RIGHT RUDDER!" I ordered. "Ready stern tubes!" The tubes were opened and we slowly
turned into firing position again. I could see one escort trying to pick survivors off of rafts and out of the water.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/rescueop.jpg
Other men flailed in the water caught in the inferno. How strange to die in a ocean as a result of burning to death. I wouldn't fire on the rescue vessel, but another destroyer was plucking its way through the mayhem and was headed in our general direction.
"New Target... Angle on Bow, 20 portside. Range... 1200 yards! Closing at 16 knots!"
This would be tricky. He wasn't zigging or zagging yet, probably didn't see my scope. But he had bone in his mouth that told me he wasn't stopping until he was on me. He continued to close. When he was within 800 yards I gave the final numbers and took my shot. We loosed four torps in a spread, to ensure at least one hit.
One hit is all we got, but it was good enough. It caught him just as he swung out to avoid the first torpedo, hammering into his stern. There was a loud KREEKOOOOOW! and the ship immediately listed 45 degrees to his starboard. Within one minute he was simply gone. No survivors there either. I scanned the vicinity, seeing no more of the escorts. The fight had gone out of them, they must have hightailed it back to the fleeing convoy. Close by, a raft of terrified sailors huddled together staring after there only means of rescue. We surfaced the boat and came up alongside them.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/survivors.jpg
I didn't like the thought of leaving them to die, but I wasn't about to take that many enemy combatants into my care. I called down the hatch for blankets, water and canned peaches. It wasn't much. But it was all I would concede.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/surfaceatnight.jpg
I wanted to get going again.
"Radio HQ... Attacking large convoy heading north-north-west. Sunk 5 and 1 destroyer. 34,000 tons."
I expected to hear "Good Find!" but the next message from command was "Cease the hunt! Head for the Solomon Islands immediately!".
My XO blinked in shock. I must have done the same. We had several more torpedoes and a crippled convoy in our grasp. We realized that something important must be going down at Guadalcanal. There was a lot of activity being reported there recently. I knew our fuel reserves were good, having only been traveling for 4 weeks.
"Lets see what's going on in the Solomon's, men." I chirped, trying to sound upbeat. While we were upset about having to pull out of this engagement, the crew of the USS Flying Fish were flying high. We'd accomplished our first objective, and left our mark on the Japanese too! Whatever was in store would surely be the 'coup de grace' for our successful first patrol! And so with that, we turned the boat and sailed off to the east. We hadn't gotten far when.. but wait! That is certainly another story... for another time. :DL
When we reached the designated grid, I smoothed out our orders and massaged the corners into submission on the table. My eyes suddenly caught the destination, and my quick brain automatically calculated that we should reach our destination by May 14 or 15. The exec waited across from me trying not to appear impatient, but I could see he was losing that battle. He, too, wrestled with who this man was and why this newly commissioned boat was silently seen off on such a dark night without pomp or fanfare.
"Guam", I whispered. "We're going to Guam with this one. Says we aren't to ask him any questions or even talk to him. Says it's a matter of national security. Top Secret. Ultra."
"But who is he?" the XO almost pleaded.
"Couldn't tell ya", I flatly mumbled.
The man kept to himself and although he lived in our midst for those many days and nights until we reached Guam, he was largely ignored by the men of my boat. He spoke not at all, he ate little, and contributed nothing. We were a still a couple nights out from Guam, when the watch called down a sighting of a small convoy appearing as dots on the horizon on our starboard. They would have gone unnoticed had there been no moon or stars, but tonight the night sky betrayed them all... the moon was behind their formation, beckoning us to see them. I felt a sudden thrill, knowing this diversion would certainly revive my men's dipping morale. But as quickly as I stood to take the bridge, a glut of disappointment ate away that thought. I knew we could not attack. We were to do nothing until we had made our drop on Guam.
"Dooly, get a message out... Small Convoy leaving Saipan. Heading for Solomon's...Request permission to attack."
Minutes seemed like hours. Indeed, we were sweating despite the welcome cool breeze that scooped down the hatch into the control room. It was usually cooler this time of year. May 12, 1942. Finally, Dooly, the radioman, slumped at his station with HQ's reply. "Negative. Continue current objective. Maintain radio silence until accomplished." We resigned ourselves knowing we had only one more day to reach Guam.
The following morning we took our fix, and determined we would reach Guam easily by evening just as we had hoped. I ordered the diesels slower and figured on waiting until dark to broach the shallows there. As I climbed into the conning tower to contemplate the sunset, I caught my first sight of Guam through the portal.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/portal.jpg
The serenity of the moment was good medicine. Although we had felt robbed of an eventful mission up to now, the calmness of the environment perked me up. I realized that after tonight we'd become the hunter we were trained to be. The men were allowed to come up on the deck to take in the glorious sunset.Guam rolled out into the orange rippling mirror that embraced us all.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/cigardeck.jpg
Another dark night, despite the large white moon above. We were as close as we could get to the island. I ordered the men into action and preparations were made to get the inflatable into the water, and to help the old agent into the dinghy. He was now crisply dressed and in full uniform, and highly decorated too. It was the uniform of an officer. A Japanese officer. To this day I don't know if it was a ruse. A decoy. Or if he was the real deal. I can't even imagine what role he played in our war. But I remember being glad to have him off my boat, and before he was even 100 yards from the submarine I dispatched a radio message to SUBPACCOM.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/thedrop.jpg
Half an hour later we had a new mission. It was a patrol mission. We were to head for Japan and at my discretion search out and sink all enemy shipping. I smiled as I broadcast our new mission to the whole crew. A raucous moment of 'whoops' and 'hurrahs' followed.
As the waters in grid "Maple Grove" slid behind us, we turned our sights towards the homeland of our enemy. Although it was a week before we even saw any sign of them, the crew's high morale accounted for their lustrous performance as I drilled them over and over again. They performed emergency dives and trim dives at any and every hour, and each time they displayed the skill of a boat full of veterans. We were ready.
We were more than ready when the watch called down to us this time at 1100 on a sunny morning on May 22nd, 1942. "Smoke spotted on our port at two-two-zero! Captain to the bridge!" All the men stopped to watch me flick up the ladder. My breath caught as I saw the banquet off our stern. "Come to bearing two-seven-oh! all ahead full! What the heck, Pensky! That's not smoke, that's a bloody forest fire!" We couldn't make any boats out yet, but it was clear this was a big fat convoy, and we had a perfect opportunity.
The sub veered to intercept. Half an hour later I called to the diving officer, "Bring 'er down, James... periscope depth!" The sonarman had an easy time finding the spread of the convoy now ahead of us. It was sluggish group of tankers heading back home with a booty of fuel and oil they had plundered. Likely from the Phillipines. Just the other day we had received a message of the Yips move from the Phillipines pushing towards the Solomon Islands. Dealing a blow to this convoy would certainly hinder the Japanese war effort. They were using resources quicker than they could replenish them. We huddled over the maps and rechecked our intercept. The convoy was moving 6 knots, and moving in a straight, even course. Even though this was our first engagement with the enemy, we knew this was going to be easy.
The sun was high overhead, but there was some chop on and the periscope wouldn't be made by the escort leading the group. There was an escort on the convoy's starboard flank but he was too far away yet to be seen. We were assured of easy pickings as the first lazy hulk lurched across into my periscope at 1330. The solution was good. It had hardly been altered the last hour. We were set up for a vector attack. I held my breath as the behemoth crossed my firing line... "FIRE ONE!".. then "FIRE TWO!"... "FIRE THREE!"
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/fatconvoy.jpg
The ship was still 3000 yards out. With the torps set on slow, I had just enough time to set up for the next juicy target some 800 yards behind him. "Set torpedoes to HIGH SPEED in tubes 4, 5 and 6!"
"Torpedoes set and ready, sir"
"...FIRE 4, FIRE 5, FIRE 6!"
In moments, the sub lurched with the small shock of the torpedoes kicking out of their comfortable beds. Through the periscope I could see the telltale wake of the torpedoes heading to their intended targets. Seconds became minutes...still no impacts.
"Warship bearing 265, CLOSING!", shrieked the sonarman. I brought the periscope down quickly, and didn't have time to sneak a look.
"Get under the thermal layer, GO SILENT!"
"Warship bearing 273, Speeding up!"
"...For crying out loud, whats the time on those eels?" Then.. WHAM! WHAM! The high speed torps had found my second target. Immediately there followed three more loud impacts slightly ahead and to starboard. That was the big guy, our first target.
I wished we hadn't been chased under; I'm sure the explosions that we could hear would have been twice as satisfying if we could have seen the aftermath through the scope. Still, there were a few loud yelps of celebration amongst the crew.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/gapingmaw.jpg
"Where's the warship now?," I demanded.
"Still closing, 1000 yards... bearing 290", was the reply.
I was surprised I couldn't hear the destroyer at that range, but the waters were burdened with the sounds of the tankers in their death throes.
"Warship bearing 18 degrees! High Speed!"
I looked to the sonarman. Thomas was concentrating hard to hear past the din ahead of us. He nodded and I didn't have to ask. It was another. The lead escort doubling back to seek revenge. In my mind's eye I could see the convoy scattering on the surface, chaotically driving their rudders hard to change course and avoid both the wrecks and the destroyers that were carving their way through the flock to find the wolf that was now in their midst.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/brokenback.jpg
Depth 240 feet. "Deeper, get us deeper. Take us to 300 feet"
I had never been that deep before, but there was no pause for concern.
The first series of charges were a surprise. We hadn't heard the destroyer even arrive above us, but the explosions were much too close for comfort. They were exploding above us, and close enough to push us down further and faster than we would have liked. Frankie fought to trim the boat at 370 feet.
More explosions far ahead of us.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/davyjones.jpg
"Left, 90 degrees", I whispered. I diverted our heading for the first time since our attack. Now we would be running away from the convoy. I knew we'd likely be down for awhile and I didn't want to waste any time relocating the herd, but I needed to break away from the reapers above us. They probed us with pinging and I showed them our ass. Every 20 minutes or so they'd start their depth charge run again.
Three more charges detonated close to our stern and I heard things I couldn't explain. Things I didn't like. Minutes dragged into hours. Still the cans kept raining down. 128...129...
Was it me, or were they getting further away? We sweated it out in the dank, dark barrel. I gradually brought the boat back to a parallel course with the convoy. Every man sat grimly, even their breathing was quiet. I ordered the cook to serve out biscuits and preserves, which were welcomed by all, and went a long way to restoring the men to our cause. We continued to inch away from them, and after 7 hours had passed the charges stopped. Thomas detected props speeding back to the broken convoy to rejoin them and so I ordered the boat to periscope depth. By now the day was gone, and there was a large moon high overhead with not so much as a ripple on the surface. It wasn't a good night to hunt, but we surfaced the boat and ran two diesels full out with the other two diesels set to charge our depleted batteries. We ran on the surface for 3 hours. I stayed up on the bridge with the watch and at 0330 I detected a destroyer moving slightly away from us. He would be covering the convoys port side flank probably. I turned the boat to starboard by 20 degrees and hoped to work my way around the other side of the convoy until we could close for the attack. I was concerned because I knew we were throwing a good wake, but I also knew that before our attack would commence the moon would be working in my favour by backlighting the convoy. Sure enough, when we were finally in a position to strike the moon was casting a brilliant net over the ships of the convoy. We were no more than 4800 yards out from the closest merchant, but I didn't want to risk being spotted by their escorts.
"Periscope depth", I belched. I couldn't see any destroyers yet, but I knew there were at least three of them out there and I knew they were being extra vigilant after today's intrusion. Behind the scope I watched as we came perpendicular again to the convoy. We were ready to attack again only now from the opposite side.
Thomas had detected one of the escorts just ahead of the first column moving to our starboard but out of sight.
"Open tubes 1 through 6!", I hollered. At the TDC we were busy plugging in data and we were confident with our numbers. "Ready on tube 1... FIRE!" And 5 seconds later, "Fire tube 2!"
I carried on sighting in on two other targets and unloaded all our tubes. This time I left the periscope up. I held out the stop watch... less than 26 seconds... then... A brilliant column of white light shot up over a hundred feet into the air and showed me that the vessel had been hit dead centre. BOOM! The sound finally followed and it was louder than we expected, rattling even the deckplates. We couldn't even hear the other torpedo hit.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/inferno.jpg
Soon flashes erupted behind the first ship. For long moments it was brighter than daylight, and I could see the other merchantmen veering out of the path of the destruction around them. We heard another torpedo loudly TING! another target. Dud. But then BOOM! as the next torpedo slammed into the same small split freighter. I was enamored with the hell that was being wrought on the water ahead of us.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/listing.jpg
I let the XO and a few others had a quick peak. It was odd, but while we were elated with our score, we were somewhat disparaged by the ferocity of the carnage and the instant death that we had inflicted to dozens if not hundreds of men.
"HARD RIGHT RUDDER!" I ordered. "Ready stern tubes!" The tubes were opened and we slowly
turned into firing position again. I could see one escort trying to pick survivors off of rafts and out of the water.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/rescueop.jpg
Other men flailed in the water caught in the inferno. How strange to die in a ocean as a result of burning to death. I wouldn't fire on the rescue vessel, but another destroyer was plucking its way through the mayhem and was headed in our general direction.
"New Target... Angle on Bow, 20 portside. Range... 1200 yards! Closing at 16 knots!"
This would be tricky. He wasn't zigging or zagging yet, probably didn't see my scope. But he had bone in his mouth that told me he wasn't stopping until he was on me. He continued to close. When he was within 800 yards I gave the final numbers and took my shot. We loosed four torps in a spread, to ensure at least one hit.
One hit is all we got, but it was good enough. It caught him just as he swung out to avoid the first torpedo, hammering into his stern. There was a loud KREEKOOOOOW! and the ship immediately listed 45 degrees to his starboard. Within one minute he was simply gone. No survivors there either. I scanned the vicinity, seeing no more of the escorts. The fight had gone out of them, they must have hightailed it back to the fleeing convoy. Close by, a raft of terrified sailors huddled together staring after there only means of rescue. We surfaced the boat and came up alongside them.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/survivors.jpg
I didn't like the thought of leaving them to die, but I wasn't about to take that many enemy combatants into my care. I called down the hatch for blankets, water and canned peaches. It wasn't much. But it was all I would concede.
http://i823.photobucket.com/albums/zz153/DigitalAura/surfaceatnight.jpg
I wanted to get going again.
"Radio HQ... Attacking large convoy heading north-north-west. Sunk 5 and 1 destroyer. 34,000 tons."
I expected to hear "Good Find!" but the next message from command was "Cease the hunt! Head for the Solomon Islands immediately!".
My XO blinked in shock. I must have done the same. We had several more torpedoes and a crippled convoy in our grasp. We realized that something important must be going down at Guadalcanal. There was a lot of activity being reported there recently. I knew our fuel reserves were good, having only been traveling for 4 weeks.
"Lets see what's going on in the Solomon's, men." I chirped, trying to sound upbeat. While we were upset about having to pull out of this engagement, the crew of the USS Flying Fish were flying high. We'd accomplished our first objective, and left our mark on the Japanese too! Whatever was in store would surely be the 'coup de grace' for our successful first patrol! And so with that, we turned the boat and sailed off to the east. We hadn't gotten far when.. but wait! That is certainly another story... for another time. :DL