Quote:
Originally Posted by Hylander_1314
Good catch there Roger!
And yes, you are correct about ratings and rank. The Silent Service was definitely not the norm compared to their surface running counterparts in the Navy. It was a very specialized service, that was tough to even get into, as a high percentage of volunteers didn't make it through the initial training.
When I was a teen, I had the priviledge of talkin' with a buddy's uncle who served on subs in the war, and he said you had to, (at least on his boat) do something really really stupid to lose your rating.
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Something seldom mentioned is that to gain 'The Order of the Dolphin' (granted the Dolphin insignia for the uniform), a man (enlisted or officer) had to be qualified to stand any watch, and know every valve and lever and pipe in every compartment on the boat. On top of that, the man would have to re-qualify on a new boat upon transfer. Not every man on a submarine got to wear the Dolphins.
Admiral Charles A. Lockwood, a WWI submariner who rose to commander-in-chief of the Pacific sub fleet during World War II, said this:
"The tasks of diving, attack and surfacing take scores of interlocking motions by dozens of crewmen with split-second timing, but more is required of submariners. They must be alert without being brittle, interested in their shipmates without being nosy, respect privacy without being seclusive, talk without being gabby, and be friendly without being tail-waggers - in short, round pegs for very closely machined round holes. The wrong kind of man aboard a sub can be an insufferable thorn in the sides of shipmates. He can, emotionally, cause almost as much damage as an enemy depth bomb .... In no other branch of military service are men required to remain away from normal human contacts as long as submariners assigned to lengthy patrols that demand long hours - sometimes days - at depths far below the least glimmer of sunlight and far away from the natural feel and smell of natural air. Moreover, these conditions must be endured with good cheer in overcrowded, sometimes ill-smelling, dew-dripping, steel compartments. Those whose tempers or temperaments cannot stand the strain are soon eliminated."
So rigorous was the selection and training process for Submarine School, during the course of World War II, only 2,000 officers and 22,000 enlisted volunteers, highly qualified men, graduated from "Spritz's Navy", out of over 250,000 men who had applied for entry into the Navy's Silent Service. Chief Torpedoman Charles Spritz was the Submarine Training School Master. I haven't been able to find his years of service in this position. (REF:
http://www.northofseveycorners.com/h...mem/spritz.htm )
I still have one friend left over from my school days that served on both diesel boats and nukes. He said that nuke boats were only a little less cramped than diesels.