The Lucky Dutchman

[Pigboatcook]

It is early February, 1942 and my S-boat has been out of Java about two days working the straights off Borneo. Zeus and Neptune are pitching a fit. Fog is thicker than my Aunt Edna, waves pitching me at uncomfortable angles, the wind and rain straight out of Noah's flood.

I'm throwing up over the side of the bridge when the lookout yells "ship spotted". Dizzy and still drooling I man the deck gun and fire at the vague shadow not 100 meters off my starboard. Again and again I'm shooting off into the fog while being tossed around on the sea. Boom, boom, boom goes the gun. I cuss the gods after scoring no hits.

The scoundrel that surprised me suddenly looms out of the fog, his Dutch flag snapping in the wind. I unload the gun, head below decks, and bang my noggin on the bulkhead.

[pdiddy]

Maybe it was these guys:

Meanwhile back at Tarakan Island, a former manager of the Tarakan Branch of the Borneo Petroleum Manufacture Company agreed to work for the Japanese Army on condition they would employ him in repairing the wrecked oilfields in Tarakan. The Group Commander,therefore, with the consent of the Navy's commander, dispatched this men, together with a captured Dutch officer and three Japanese soldiers-interpreters, to Balikpapan on a captured Dutch ship, the motor boat Parsifal. They carried a message (http://dutcheastindies.webs.com/balikpapan_massacre.html) to the Balikpapan Garrison Commander, Lieutenant Colonel C. van den Hoogenband, demanding that the oil refinery installations there be handed over to the Japanese Army without being damaged. These emissaries left Tarakan Island on 16 January 1942. On January 20th, 1942, the Dornier flying boat X-21 spotted a small vessel off the coast of Samboaja, heading for Balikpapan. The flying-boat landed near the vessel, the motor boat Parsifal, and took aboard two KNIL Captains, G.L. Reinderhoff and A.H. Colijn, and flown to Balikpapan to deliver the message to the Balikpapan Garrison Commander. Lieutenant Colonel C. van den Hoogenband refused their demands and three Japanese soldiers-interpreters were immediately returned back to their unit on 23 January, while both Dutch officers did not return backFrom:http://dutcheastindies.webs.com/balikpapan.html

There have been some lucky Australians running around that area too that should be glad that they (or I) weren't Japanese!

[Armistead]

well, if it's the ghost flying dutchman, they only shoot cannons and being dutch, they attack the japanese, not u.....

[Pigboatcook]

Nah, it wasn't the ghost of the Luzon straights. It was just a Dutchman whom I'm sure was just eating his stamppot and rookworst and wondering what crazy Yank was shooting off fireworks.

[merc4ulfate]

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=546&pictureid=4903

[merc4ulfate]

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=546&pictureid=4903
SALUTE
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=546&pictureid=4901
EVEN THE JAPANESE WANT THE DUTCHMAN
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=546&pictureid=4899

THE WAITING