On the Bottom: The Raising of the Submarine S-51

by Edward Ellsberg

  The river, unlike the sea, had a calm surface, and we could use derricks. A radio was sent to the Navy Yard, asking for two derricks and additional tugs to handle them. While we waited, the sailors cleared away the tangled mass of hoses and towlines, carefully keeping the hoses to the engine and motor rooms unharmed.

  Tremendous crowds gathered on the docks along both sides of the East River, while numerous small boats circled round to watch the wreck.

  In an hour the first derrick arrived, with a tug on either side to handle it. The derrick was run against the starboard bow pontoon, heading upstream, with the tugs pushing constantly to hold it in position against the outgoing tide. Lowering the boom of the derrick as far over its bow as possible, riggers hooked both pontoon chains with wire slings and heaved in till the strain on the wires took the whole load of the lift off the pontoon. The tide had partly fallen; the pontoons were more than half out of water.

  When the derrick had the strain, we opened the flood valves on the pontoon and allowed it to fill slowly and bury itself deeper and deeper. With the pontoon practically all awash, just showing a few inches above water, while the chains stretched taut to the derrick overhead, I burned out the studs in the links just above the top of the pontoon; the riggers pulled the toggle bars out of their old links and resecured them in the newly cleared links nearly seven feet lower. This done, Niedermair, on signal to the Falcon, blew air into the pontoon till it became a little more buoyant and took up hard against the toggles, taking the strain back on the pontoon, as the derrick slacked away on the slings.

  Quickly the riggers shifted the wires to the mate pontoon on the port bow of the submarine; there in a similar manner we flooded down and resecured in an awash position the other pontoon. It was ticklish work on top of the pontoon as the swift water rushed by; the two tugs had to keep steaming ahead full power to prevent the derrick from being swept downstream.

  A little after noon, the two bow pontoons were done. The derrick let go and attempted to back clear, but the tide swept derrick, tugs, and all pell mell down the starboard side of the submarine straight for the hawser holding the Falcon in position. Someone on the Falcon swung an ax,—the line parted and allowed the hurtling group of vessels to shoot past without becoming entangled in the wreck; some distance down the stream the tugs finally brought the derrick to rest in quieter water close inshore, where they anchored it.

  Shortly afterward was low tide; the current slacked off somewhat and we attempted to send a diver down to investigate. Eadie was dressed, and went down from the Navy Yard diving launch abreast the spot where the second pair of pontoons had broken free. We dropped a fair-sized anchor on a line alongside the submarine for him to go down on and prepared to lower Eadie overboard, but just before he started, the tide changed and the submarine, pivoting once more round her bow, swung her stern rapidly upstream nearly one hundred and eighty degrees from its former position, and in a moment was pointing down the river just as she was before she first struck.

  We thanked our luck Eadie was not down when the movement started, shifted the diving launch and anchor over to the new position, and Eadie went overboard. He grasped the anchor line, started to descend, and immediately disappeared in the thick water. He was down only ten minutes when he signaled to be hauled up. We brought him up and, while the tenders undressed him, he reported.

  “She’s resting on a shelf of rock from her bow back about fifty feet. The rest of her is all clear aft and floating in deep water. There’s a huge boulder against her port side now that keeps her from swinging to port any further; there’s another one just about as big a little ways off on her starboard side that she probably leaned against just before her swing started. Looks to me as if she sort of ran right into a pocket in the reef.” He paused a moment while his suit was pulled off. “The current here is fierce. I had to haul myself down that anchor line in order to get down at all, and the sweep of the tide when I reached bottom was so bad that I had to crawl on my hands and knees to keep from being washed away. At that, I couldn’t stay down any longer because the current was increasing and I couldn’t hold against it another minute.”

  The prospects did not look bright for diving. That was at slack water as the tide turned; now it was running flood stronger and stronger. I gave up any hope of working with divers to replace the lost pontoons.

  A larger derrick from the Navy Yard was nearby with two powerful tugs to handle it. This I brought down against the port midship pontoon with the tugs as before to hold it against the current. Once more the riggers took the strain of the chains off the pontoon, heaving the chains upward with slings made of plow steel wire one and one-half inches thick, till the full strain was off the pontoon.

  Then with Badders and Schissel to help, I opened the flood valves on the pontoon and started to flood it down. To let the air out while the water came in, we first opened the air vents on top of the pontoon, but as these vents were only small three-quarter-inch valves, the air could escape through them only gradually and the pontoon accordingly filled very slowly.

  The afternoon was getting on and I now hoped to finish before the next turn of the tide; consequently, to accelerate matters, the men on the bow of the derrick over our heads dropped a Stillson wrench down to Badders and he unscrewed both the vent and blow valves in each compartment of the pontoon. That left four clear holes, each one inch in diameter, in the top of the pontoon,—one at each end and two near the middle. Through these clear holes, the air whistled out and the pontoon filled and sank somewhat more rapidly. Badders laid the unscrewed valves carefully on top the pontoon, so that when it was nearly awash we could quickly screw back the valves.

  Half an hour went slowly by. Just beyond the pontoon, I could see the periscopes and the top of the conning tower of the S-51 leaning over about fifteen degrees to starboard against the midship pontoon on that side, which fortunately prevented it from rolling over any farther. The port pontoon that we were standing on had sunk four feet and had perhaps still three more feet to go before it was awash. The heavy nickel steel toggle bars, left behind as the pontoon sank, still dangled through the chain links about four feet above the pontoon, while the wire slings holding the chains up ran far above our heads to the top of the derrick boom. The overhanging bow of the derrick was just over us.

  On the far side of the river, a large steamer passed swiftly northward and disappeared behind Blackwell’s Island.

  A minute later, a heavy swell from the steamer’s wake rolled under us. The derrick pitched in the trough of the waves, brought up with a jerk on the slings. The wires parted. The bow of the derrick, freed of the load, flew upwards while the chains, no longer supported, brought the toggles down with the crash of eighty tons weight on top of the pontoon. The pontoon promptly disappeared, taking its three passengers with it. Just before I submerged, I saw the starboard side pontoon suddenly bob up and the periscopes roll heavily to starboard.

  “The submarine’s capsized now,” I thought, “it’s all over!”

  On the derrick, the crew, looking down over their wildly heaving bow, saw nothing. Hastily they ran aft, seizing life preservers, waiting to throw them to Badders, Schissel, or me, when the tide, carrying us up the river, washed us clear of the bottom of the derrick.

  Fortunately for us, the forward toggle bar had snapped under the shock; no longer held down, that end of the pontoon, after a brief submergence, floated up again, just barely showing above water, with the three of us still clinging to it. We came up, soaked, sputtering, still in water over our waists, but all with one mind. The pontoon under our feet was submerged with open flood valves and open vents; soon it would fill and sink to the bottom of the river, and in that tide getting it up again would be a desperate job. It must not sink! With one accord, we plugged the three submerged vents with our thumbs. Schissel, at the deep end, went completely underwater; Badders and I, amidships, could just keep our heads above the surface; the fourth vent hole at the high end was out of water and safe. About o
nce a minute, just Schissel had to pull his thumb out of his hole, come up a second for air, and dive down again to plug the opening.

  On the stern of the derrick, the crew waited anxiously, lifebuoys poised, wondering what had become of us. Our shouts finally brought them back to the bow, where, seeing two of us in water up to our necks, apparently standing on nothing, they threw us lines.

  “Never mind the lines,” I yelled, “cut us some one-inch wood plugs quick!” Schissel popped up, gasped for breath, disappeared again. On deck, the riggers scurried round, smashed a box, whittled out a plug, dropped it down to me. Schissel came up again. I left my hole a second, swam to him, gave him the plug, and went back to my job.

  Schissel found his hole, pushed the plug in, hammered it down with his fist, and then, standing erect, stamped it in hard with his heel. Meanwhile, more plugs came down, Badders and I withdrew our thumbs, sealed up the holes amidships. I crawled up the slope to the high end of the pontoon, drove a fourth plug into the opening there, then sat down in water on the pontoon to survey the situation. It was bad.

  The starboard midships pontoon was floating high, carrying practically no load. The two pontoons at the stern, which fortunately had before been riding quite high, were now nearly awash, carrying the load lost by the midships pontoons. Another foot down, and the stern pontoons would have sunk, letting the stern go to the bottom of the river.

  The periscopes had vanished. Had the boat turned completely over? I looked across, could just barely make out the sides of the periscopes about a foot under the surface. The submarine was only lying on her side!

  I breathed a sigh of relief. There was still hope if we could only resecure the midships pontoons. I looked at the remains of the pontoon I was sitting on. Only a few inches of it was visible.

  I could cure that. In the surfboat, I ran around to the mate pontoon, clambered aboard with a wrench, opened the flood valves, opened the vents. As this pontoon sank on the starboard side, its mate rose on the port side till the whole top of the submerged pontoon was a foot above water. Then with all valves closed on the starboard pontoon, I went back to the other one.

  One chain with its toggle bar still showed above the after hawsepipe. The forward toggle bar had vanished and so had the chain. Looking down the forward hawsepipe, we could just see the remains of the broken wire sling, and that only because a manila line we had secured to the sling shackle as a preventer was still intact and held the broken wire from dropping down the hawsepipe. The manila line was not very strong; gingerly we took it up till we were able to get a firm grip on the wire, when we breathed more freely. We heaved on the wire till the end of the chain came in sight and immediately slipped a spare steel toggle bar through the chain. We were safe. If that chain had got away from us, getting another under the submarine in that tide would have been difficult.

  With both chains in sight, things moved rapidly. The port pontoon being already awash, it was only necessary to remove the wood plugs and screw back the vent and blowing valves. Then with a new pair of wire slings, we took hold of the chains on the starboard pontoon, held them up with the derrick while we sank that pontoon till it went awash. To prevent further accident, the toggle bars there were shifted down, link by link, as the pontoon sank, while the harbor police stopped all further traffic in the river.

  It was late evening and we were working in the darkness when the second pair of pontoons was finally secured in the awash position. The tide was rising steadily. The bow pontoons, awash when we secured them at low tide, were now four feet below the surface. The middle pontoons disappeared also in the rising water a few minutes after the toggles went in.

  At 9 P.M., I boarded the Falcon again. Our airhoses were connected to all pontoons. Captain King had rearranged his ships. The Iuka and the Sagamore, anchored near the Manhattan shore, had lines to the Falcon’s stern, ready to heave on her. The derricks were gone; two Navy Yard tugs were lashed alongside the Falcon, their bows to her stern, while from the bow of the Falcon a solitary wire line ran to the submerged stern of the S-51. Michels and Eiben had secured that line around the submarine as she lay at the bottom of the sea off Block Island. Now it was the only hold we had left to the S-51, and with it we must drag the submarine off the reef.

  High tide came at 9:30 P.M. Just after 9 o’clock, Niedermair turned air on all the pontoons, once more the Falcon’s compressors throbbed as they pumped away. But no longer did we have the heavy pressure at the bottom of the sea to buck; here the pontoons were submerged less than twenty feet, and against such a head of water the air went quickly through.

  Once again our searchlights gleamed over the spot where lay the S-51; but instead of the blackness of the ocean night for a background, the fairyland of lights which makes up the New York skyline glittered over Manhattan as we worked; on the riverfront, a vast crowd could still be seen watching.

  As the tide rose, our bow pontoons and midships pontoons had vanished completely underwater. Soon bubbles started to rise over the midships pair,—they were dry. All air now went forward. Anxiously I watched, still in my soaked uniform, the spot where the light played over the bow. The air went in steadily. Some bubbles rose, then more bubbles, then a slight disturbance, and in the searchlight’s glow we could see a few links of anchor chain rise through the surface,—nothing more. But something must have lifted to bring those chains up. Blinker lights flashed, the Falcon’s siren shrieked. The Iuka and Sagamore heaved on their lines, the Falcon and tugs alongside churned up the water violently with their propellers. The line to the S-51 tautened under the pull.

  Eagerly I sighted across our deck to the lights on the Queensborough Bridge. The lights shifted towards our bow, we were moving! The S-51 pulled smoothly astern off Man of War Rock; she was afloat again! The sailors on the Falcon yelled wildly; on the shore, the movement of the pontoons under the searchlights was caught, and a loud cheer roared across the water from the crowd there, answering ours.

  The Falcon cast off the lines to the Iuka and the Sagamore; going astern herself but with the tugs lashed to her going ahead, the Falcon moved across towards Manhattan till Captain King was certain we were back in the channel, then swung down the river.

  Once more we headed for the Navy Yard. For the first time since morning the pilot who had kept out of sight since stranding us came up on the bridge and offered to take charge again. In vigorous terms, his offer was refused and Captain King piloted the rest of the way.

  As the crestfallen pilot disappeared from the bridge and we caught the last glimpse of the cause of our troubles on the rocks, Niedermair remarked:

  “Well, if a pilot has got to run a ship up on a reef, it’s just as well to have him pick out a ship that has a wrecking crew aboard!” A long laugh all around, breaking the tension of our overwrought nerves, greeted his sally.

  The makeup of the tow was peculiar. The Falcon, running backward, moved down the East River, dragging the S-51, which was also going stern first. There was no longer anything secured to the submarine’s bow, which now brought up the rear of the procession. On each side, the Falcon had a tug, headed opposite to herself, lashed to her, helping her to tow, while the Iuka and the Sagamore quickly took position again as leaders of the tow and flung new lines to the Falcon’s stern to assist in dragging the wreck. And so in the night, we resumed our way towards the Navy Yard.

  The tide was again running a strong ebb, and rapidly falling. We covered the mile and a half of river, passed under the Williamsburgh Bridge, and started to make a turn to port to enter the basin of the yard. Immediately trouble started. As we headed across the river, the swift current caught the submarine broadside, and with nothing to restrain it swung the bow of the S-51 rapidly downstream, dragging the Falcon with it. Almost before we knew it, the Falcon, the tugs alongside her, and the submarine had rotated one hundred and eighty degrees. To avoid tangling his propeller in the lines leading to the Iuka and the Sagamore during this unlooked-for maneuver, Hartley had to cut the hawsers with an a
x and let those tugs go free.

  The tide had us in its grip; in a moment we were swept down the river past the Navy Yard, and well down towards the Brooklyn Bridge. The Falcon and the two tugs still tied to her sides struggled desperately; the Falcon’s engine, running reversed under a full head of steam, pounded violently, the tugs churned the water to a froth; in spite of all three engines, the tide carried us steadily farther away from our haven.

  Whistles shrieked for assistance, the Falcon trembled as her engine raced. At the Falcon’s bow I looked out over the hoses leading to the submarine below us. The stern pontoons were nearly awash, the bow pontoons were practically out of sight. The reserve buoyancy was negligible, the S-51 was floating only on a shoestring. Niedermair was blowing constantly through all the hoses; if a few tons of water were to enter, the S-51 would sink both fore and aft.