CHAPTER SIX
A REAL SUBMARINER
“Scoot Bailey never will have an experience like this as long as helives!” March said to himself. He was peering through the periscope ofthe submerged pigboat, looking over the tossing waters of the sea.
When the Captain had called “Up, periscope,” the long shaft had movedup by electric motor until the eyepiece and handles were at convenientheight. The Skipper had a look around, and March noticed that he turnedthe handles to adjust the focus.
“Here, have a look, Mister Anson,” he said, standing away.
So March had fitted his eyes against the rubber cup and looked. He sawwater, a long stretch of open water with nothing on it. It was notcompletely sharp so he turned one handle slightly, saw the image fuzzup, turned it the other way until it came sharp. Next he moved theperiscope around, stepping with it as he did so, looking over thehorizon in a sweeping arc.
Then he saw something! It was the shore of Long Island, almost twomiles away. He stepped back and said, “I saw the Long Island shore, Ithink. How far can one see through the periscope, sir?”
“About two and a half miles,” the Skipper replied. “Have a look, MisterBigelow.”
Stan stepped forward eagerly to look through the ’scope. He swung itaround in a different direction from which March had moved and suddenlyexclaimed, “A ship!”
The Captain took over for a look, then said, “Yes, small freighter.Just think how easily we could sink her!”
March looked at the ship. “Looks as though I could knock her down witha BB gun,” he said.
“On later trips we’ll simulate attacks on some of the ships in theSound,” the Skipper said. “So you’ll get a chance to practice somethinga little more powerful than a BB gun.”
For fifteen minutes the pigboat traveled under the water. Sutherlandtook Stan and March around the control room, explaining the variousinstruments and levers, answering their questions.
“What beats me, sir,” Stan said, “is the number of different things youhave to remember! I just can’t conceive of doing all that so fast andnot forgetting a thing.”
“It seems like that at first,” Sutherland said. “But after you do it afew times, you get used to it. Just think—driving a car is prettycomplicated if you’ve never even seen a car before. You’ve got to seethe emergency brakes are on, that transmission’s in neutral, then turnon ignition, step on electric starter, perhaps choke it a little tostart, then push back choke, step on foot throttle, warm up engine,release emergency brake, push in clutch, move gearshift lever, let inclutch, step on throttle, shove in clutch, take foot from throttle,move gearshift lever in another direction, let in clutch and step onthrottle for a time, then shove in clutch, take foot from throttle,move gearshift lever, let in clutch, step on throttle again. And allthis time, steer the car where you’re going, watch out for pedestrians,for traffic lights, for cars behind, for cars on side streets. Why,there are dozens of things you have to do, but when you’ve driven a cara little while, most of them are almost automatic.”
“I’d never though of it that way,” Stan said. “But it must take quite awhile of handling a dive to get used to it.”
“Not so long as you think,” Sutherland said, “if you’re any good atall. If not, you wouldn’t be here. And don’t worry—before you leavethis school you’ll be able to take her down—in three or four differentways—without worrying about it for a second.”
The executive officer then led them through the rest of the boat,giving them a quick once-over of the entire ship during their firsttrip. Stepping over the high door edges of the bulkhead doors leadingfrom one compartment to another, March realized that a fat man wouldhave difficulty getting around on a submarine. He noted how the doorscould be fastened watertight and airtight so that any compartment couldbe sealed off from all the others.
They saw the engine room, with its two banks of heavy Diesels, nowquiet and at rest as the ship traveled under water. Stan would havestayed there for the entire trip, talking to the engineers and lookingover the power plants, but they moved on to the motor room where thewhine of the two electric motors was loud and high-pitched. March knewthat the motors could be switched to act as generators driven by theDiesels when the ship surfaced, charging the batteries.
The battery room did not hold their attention for long, although thetwo banks of huge cells were impressive, but the torpedo roomfascinated them. Here was the real reason for the existence of theentire ship, which was nothing more than a vehicle to get the deadlyTNT charges into the side of an enemy ship. It was almost the largestof the rooms they had seen, perhaps seeming so because of theadditional clear space in the middle. There had to be plenty of room toswing the big torpedoes into position before their tubes.
First March and Stan saw the two racks of torpedoes along the walls.The long cylinders, twenty-one inches in diameter and about twenty feetfrom end to end, looked deadly. March noted the chain hoist by whichthey could be swung from their racks into position for loading into thetubes.
The tubes—there were four of them—stuck back into the room a littleway, and March and Stan knew they were about twenty-five feet longaltogether, their openings at each side just back of the bow of theboat. The tight-fitting doors closed the tubes, and the sub was readyto fire its charges at any moment.
“It must take a terrific blast of air to start these babies on theirway,” Stan said, running his hand along one of the big torpedoes.
“Yes, it does,” Sutherland replied. “But the air doesn’t have to moveit far. It just expels it from the tube, where there are triggercatches which trip switches here on the torpedo to set its ownmachinery going.”
“Wonderful piece of mechanism, aren’t they?” March mused.
“Yes, they’re really little submarines with an explosive charge insteadof a crew,” the executive officer agreed. “And the TNT takes up only asmall space, really. Half the length is compressed air to drive thetorp. It’s got to move pretty fast, you know, to get to the targetaccurately. There’s about four hundred horsepower packed into thatlittle fellow there—from compressed air, heated by an alcohol flame,blowing like fury against two trim little turbines turning thepropellers.”
“The aiming devices must be very accurate,” Stan said.
“Wonderful!” Sutherland exclaimed. “You probably know there’s a littlewhirling gyroscope that keeps the torp on the course which can be setby the operator in advance of firing. Then there’s the compensatingchamber and pendulum to keep it at its proper depth. It can’t very wellget off course.”
“But don’t you have to aim chiefly with the sub itself, sir?” Marchasked. “I mean—doesn’t the sub have to be aimed right at the target forthe torpedo to get there?”
“Not at all,” Sutherland replied. “The sub doesn’t have to be anycloser than sixty degrees in facing its target. You set the propercourse on the torpedo itself and the automatic devices put it on thatcourse right away—and keep it there!”
“Then the important thing,” Stan said, “is for the skipper to get thecourse right, not necessarily to line up the sub with his target.”
“That’s right,” the older officer agreed. “The skipper must determinethe course to his target and call it out. If he’s good, he gets hisship.”
With a last look around the torpedo room they turned to go back to thecontrol room.
“Later,” Sutherland said to them as they stepped through the bulkheaddoor, “you’ll have target practice with special torpedoes that don’tblow up what you’re aiming at. As a matter of fact, there won’t beanything you can’t do by the time we get through with you.”
_They Inspected the Torpedo Room_]
In the course of the next few weeks, March remembered that statementoften. He went on countless trips in the training subs, until he feltas much at home in them as he did in his own quarters. For the firstfew times he observed. Then he took over one position after anothe
r andexecuted its duties.
Stan was with him on all these trips, but often they were at differentends of the boats during their short journeys. One day, March wouldtake his position at the steering wheel. The next he would handle thebig levers controlling the Kingston valves on the main ballast tanks.Then he would work with the men in the engine room, after havingstudied Diesels in some of his classes. He did a stretch in the torpedoroom several times when they shot the practice torps at special targetstowed by a surface boat. He worked the interphone system as orderly,took over the little radio shack, spent several hours in the batteryroom, working the diving planes.
“I’ve done everything so far but cook lunch and cut the crew’s hair,”he said to Stan one day, as they relaxed wearily for fifteen minutesafter dinner before going to their studies.
“Same here,” Stan said. “But I haven’t been assistant pharmacist yet.”
“Oh, that’s right,” March recalled. “I haven’t passed out any pillsyet. And I don’t think I’ll have to.”
“Do you feel that you know the crew’s jobs pretty well now, March?”Stan asked.
“Most of them,” March replied. “I know I could take over most of themwithout any trouble. But I’d like another trip or two in the torpedoroom, and I want to be at the diving controls for a crash dive beforeI’ll feel sure of myself.”
“I agree with you on the diving controls,” Stan said, “but I feel okayon the torps now. What I want is a little time on the sound-detectordevices.”
“You can never have too much time on those,” March said. “Everyadditional hour of experience with them makes you all the better, Ithink. But it’s wonderful that they teach every officer to do every jobon the boat—not just the work of the other officers but of everyenlisted man on board.”
Not only did they handle every job of the crew on the sub, but theyspent hours every day in classroom and laboratory. They studied enginesand motors and navigation and torpedoes, and—above all, lately—theoriesof approach and attack. In addition to their work on the training substhemselves, they carried out attack problems in the wonderful “mock-up”control room in one of the buildings. Here was a real control room,with controls and periscopes complete. Standing in position at the’scope, as if he were the Skipper of the ship, March sighted about onthe artificial horizon which looked quite real to him. Suddenly he sawwhat seemed to be two ships appear on the horizon. First he had toidentify them. Then he had to judge their speed and course accuratelywhile they still looked like only tiny spots in his periscopes.
Calling out orders, he directed the course of the “submarine” he wascommanding so that he would be in position to fire torpedoes. Then the’scope went down, as would happen in actual combat. His “sub” wastraveling under water, without even the revealing ’scope-ripples toshow the enemy where he was. Then he surfaced again, looked through the’scope to see if he and the “enemy” ships were where they ought to bein relation to each other.
If he was right, he ordered the setting of the torpedo courses and thencalled “Fire one! Fire two!”
Then he would go over his record with the instructors. He would findout just how well he had done in handling the complete tactical problemthat had been presented to him. Had he identified the ships correctlyas to nationality, type, size? Had he judged their speed and coursecorrectly? And finally—had his torpedoes hit home? If he had handledthe problem correctly, he felt almost the thrill that might have comewith sinking an actual enemy ship.
Several afternoons a week, March went out on the training subs. Heasked for more time at the diving controls and got it. He asked for twotorpedo-room watches and his request was fulfilled. Then he began totake over the duties of the various officers. He served ascommunications officer, engineering officer, electrical officer,navigation officer—and finally as diving officer. The first time hegave the orders to take the ship down, his heart was in his throat,even though Sutherland was standing by his side to take over at theslightest mistake. He didn’t believe that he could possibly rememberall the things he had to, but he found, as the orders started comingfrom his mouth, that his mind ordered them out without his thinkingabout them. He knew so well, by this time, the logical order of events,that his mind went straight along that path without a hitch.
What pleased March most of all after this experience—even more than thepleasant commendation of the executive officer—was the word spoken tohim by Scott, the radioman. Scott had been on the training subs duringmost of March’s trips, too, and they had spoken to each otherfrequently. But on the dock after March’s turn as diving officer, Scottsaluted and nodded with a smile.
“If you’ll pardon me, sir,” he said, “I’d like to mention that youhandled that diving like a veteran.”
“Thanks, Scott—it’s swell of you to say that,” March mumbled.
“You know—a bunch of students is likely to get a little funny feelingwhen we know a new officer’s goin’ to take us down,” Scott said. “Butwe couldn’t have been safer with the Skipper himself than we were withyou.”
March wrote about that in the letter he wrote to Scoot Bailey thatevening. He had been so busy, working hard sixteen hours a day, thatScoot seemed miles and years away.
“I’m beginning to feel like a real submariner at last, Scoot,” hewrote. “For a while I thought there was so much to learn that I’d neverget there. But I’m at home now, and I think I can make it all right. Isuppose you’ve been feeling much the same way—despite the fact thatflying is so much simpler than pigboating—and that you’re getting thefeeling of being a pilot, without having an instructor in your lapevery minute.”
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March Anson and Scoot Bailey of the U.S. Navy Page 7