Pigboatcook
03-01-15, 04:55 PM
Reckless Diving
It had been a long patrol and it would be even a longer retirement if the admiral found out the truth about the last kill. I looked across the bar at the faces. Four of my officers were enjoying several stages of intoxication. Paying for all their booze, as I promised, was going to clean me out.
I got up from my bar stool and wandered over to a table to listen to the singer and stare at her long legs peeking out of that mermaid dress she was wearing but my mind still wandered back to that minelayer. The boys better keep their mouths shut.
We were coming home, two fish left, and made a detour close into Iwo. Maybe we could expended the last of the taxpayer dollars we had in those aft torpedo tubes on something there. Approaching on the surface we could just make out a Japanese minelayer patrolling off the beach. With no other targets identified we decided to bait him into a trap.
General quarters was sounded and I had the gun crew send five long rounds in his direction. It got his attention alright and as he hit 3500 yards and closing we took Thresher to periscope depth. The sonar man counted it off. Thrity-two hundred, twenty-eight hundred, fifteen hundred. I sent the scope up to get his bearings. That is when the rat pulled a funny. He stopped, then started up a lazy wide circle directly aft of us. I didn't want to waste those last two fish on a turning target. I had to coach him closer.
We went up to fifty feet and I raised the air radar mast also. He didn't see it. The Japanese skipper and his crew must have been wearing coke bottles for glasses. I ordered us up so the shears were out of the water. He still didn't see us. Fine, I thought, we went decks awash. The minesweeper continued it's dizzy turns just 1500 yards behind us. We surfaced. Yes, I said it, we surfaced. Sun blazing down, almost flat sea, and that SOB still didn't see us. Ten five inch rounds later he was at the bottom of the sea.
The waiter came over with a full bottle of scotch with a note rubber banned around the neck of the bottle. I removed and opened the note.
"Thanks for bringing my nephew back. Gunners Mate 2nd class Royce." signed, Admiral Lockwood.
I looked around the bar for a hole to crawl into.
It had been a long patrol and it would be even a longer retirement if the admiral found out the truth about the last kill. I looked across the bar at the faces. Four of my officers were enjoying several stages of intoxication. Paying for all their booze, as I promised, was going to clean me out.
I got up from my bar stool and wandered over to a table to listen to the singer and stare at her long legs peeking out of that mermaid dress she was wearing but my mind still wandered back to that minelayer. The boys better keep their mouths shut.
We were coming home, two fish left, and made a detour close into Iwo. Maybe we could expended the last of the taxpayer dollars we had in those aft torpedo tubes on something there. Approaching on the surface we could just make out a Japanese minelayer patrolling off the beach. With no other targets identified we decided to bait him into a trap.
General quarters was sounded and I had the gun crew send five long rounds in his direction. It got his attention alright and as he hit 3500 yards and closing we took Thresher to periscope depth. The sonar man counted it off. Thrity-two hundred, twenty-eight hundred, fifteen hundred. I sent the scope up to get his bearings. That is when the rat pulled a funny. He stopped, then started up a lazy wide circle directly aft of us. I didn't want to waste those last two fish on a turning target. I had to coach him closer.
We went up to fifty feet and I raised the air radar mast also. He didn't see it. The Japanese skipper and his crew must have been wearing coke bottles for glasses. I ordered us up so the shears were out of the water. He still didn't see us. Fine, I thought, we went decks awash. The minesweeper continued it's dizzy turns just 1500 yards behind us. We surfaced. Yes, I said it, we surfaced. Sun blazing down, almost flat sea, and that SOB still didn't see us. Ten five inch rounds later he was at the bottom of the sea.
The waiter came over with a full bottle of scotch with a note rubber banned around the neck of the bottle. I removed and opened the note.
"Thanks for bringing my nephew back. Gunners Mate 2nd class Royce." signed, Admiral Lockwood.
I looked around the bar for a hole to crawl into.