No Banners, No Bugles

by Edward Ellsberg

  “CERTAINLY. CAN YOU SEND YOUR BOAT FOR THEM?”

  That seemed reasonable enough, since we already had a boat in the water, and the Laforey, compelled to keep moving at considerable speed, hadn’t. So I replied it would be sent at once.

  Harding immediately broke one of Andy Duncan’s scant remaining engineers off the auxiliaries below, took one of his even scantier deck force off chasing fires on his own topside, and sent them both away in the boat to bring back with them the promised assistance.

  “And your mates on the Strathallan’ll thank y’ kindly to shake a leg going both ways with their reliefs!” he shouted to his men in the boat as they shoved off. “They’re all about cooked by now!”

  We watched the boat for a few minutes rising and falling crazily to a quartering sea as it chugged off at six knots, its best speed. It was a good boat, not fast, but roomy and seaworthy; it would be just about big enough to take the forty men off the Laforey in one trip. However, it wasn’t a quarter of a mile along on its way when I began to regret I hadn’t gone in it myself for a discussion with the Laforey’s skipper over the arrangements for the night which was rapidly closing in, both in case we got torpedoed again, and in case we didn’t, but various other contingencies arose. This would especially be necessary if anything should happen requiring quick communication with the towing trawlers. We couldn’t see them nor could they see us because of the fire between, though the Laforey could keep us both, well illuminated by the fire, in view most of the time.

  But it was undesirable to delay the arrival of those imperative reliefs by calling the boat back for me. And besides if it were ready to shove off from the Laforey with the relief party before I finished the discussion with her skipper, I should be in the unwelcome position either of delaying the reliefs again or of leaving our arrangements only half settled.

  I decided I had better go in a separate boat. Harding had another which could be lowered quickly from his port davits, his clear side. I would act as coxswain; all that would be required for crew would be one other man as engineer so as to deplete the King Salvor’s remaining skeleton of a ship’s force as little as possible. So far as the Strathallan herself was concerned, everything was well in hand and she could safely be left to Harding to carry on during the hour I should probably be gone.

  Harding had only one objection. The engine in his port boat badly needed a thorough mechanical overhaul, was unreliable, and might break down, leaving me adrift in the open ocean. That would be especially bad if it occurred on my return trip, which would have to be made when it was completely dark and nobody could see me nor dare to turn on a searchlight to do any looking for a drifting boat. I considered that a moment, then decided it had to be hazarded. I should take a pair of good flashlights in the boat with me so at least I could flash an SOS roundabout if we broke down completely, and trust that the Laforey might see it and rescue us. I should warn that destroyer to keep a bright lookout for signals during my return trip.

  One more engineer was stripped out of the black gang, leaving poor Andy Duncan wondering whether the semi-conscious Hindoo sailor lying in our wardroom could be kept on his feet long enough to warrant turning him to with an oil can. But leaving that unsettled, the engineer and I climbed up into the boat. With some difficulty, between us we got the engine coughing spasmodically. At that, Harding and his signalman swung out the boat and lowered it away till it splashed into the sea. We two in it hurriedly cast it loose from the boatfalls lest it swamp, even at only three knots headway on the tow. The engineer leaped from the forward disengaging block to throw in his clutch; with equal haste, when the after block was freed, I seized the tiller to sheer off.

  In another moment, we were tossing badly in the seaway, swinging in a half circle to head aft for the Laforey. Very promptly I saw that the sea which had seemed only moderate from the Strathallan and not so bad even from the King Salvor, was a rough sea for a small boat, even when taking it on the quarter. It kept me fully occupied at the tiller to hold a reasonable course for the destroyer in that corkscrewing boat. Long before I was through I ached for a steering oar to hold her steady, instead of that tiller and a rudder half the time out of water and worthless.

  There were other troubles. The Laforey, starting to fade into only a shadow in the dusk, was underway for her own safety and steering no fixed course herself. I had to guess where she was going to be at the end of the next fifteen minutes, which was the time I estimated it would take us for the trip. But as the Laforey was purposely maneuvering to make such a guess extremely inaccurate for a U-boat bent on using her as a target, she wasn’t making it very simple for me and my tossing little craft aiming also for an interception.

  As the last straw, our worn-out engine (which had not once made a complete revolution firing on all cylinders and over which my engineer was constantly tinkering, trying to improve matters) caught a heavy sheet of spray coming over our weather quarter and quit cold. In a moment, in spite of my best efforts at the tiller, we were swung broadside to the seas, there to wallow heavily among the breaking waves and driving spray as we drifted helplessly dead to leeward before wind and sea in the increasing darkness.

  The engineer stopped tinkering with the carburetor he had been trying to adjust, and started to crank frantically. Not even a cough. I dropped the useless tiller, ripped a one-quart fire extinguisher from out its bracket beneath the sternsheets, twisted the handle to unlock it, and began furiously to spray carbon tetrachloride all over the spark plugs, the ignition wiring, and the magneto, to dry them out, meanwhile with my body shielding the engine as best I might from a further bath.

  It worked. A few more revolutions and the engine began to fire unevenly, no better than before, but at least to fire again. Hastily I dropped the open metal engine covers down about the engine to protect it from any more spray, and told the engineer we’d go the rest of the way with the engine limping along as well as it could, but at least limping; we’d quit striving for improvement. Then I leaped back for the tiller to straighten out the boat again.

  About five minutes later we were alongside the Laforey, which had obligingly sheered over toward us and slowed briefly to let us catch up. Her port side ladder was overboard. Our first boat was already secured to that and we secured directly alongside the destroyer herself, astern and inboard of our other boat, after which the Laforey speeded up again. I clambered across and into the other boat, then climbed the side ladder, followed by my engineer. He said he would try to obtain from the destroyer’s stores a set of new spark plugs (“sparking” plugs to him) which he felt might improve things for our return trip. I was wholeheartedly willing to let him try; it was too bad, I thought, in that short interval that he couldn’t procure a whole new engine instead.

  As I came over the rail, the Laforey’s executive officer, a lieutenant commander, met me. He apologized; his captain, he said, dared not leave the bridge. Would I mind stepping up there to talk with him?

  I wouldn’t, of course, but I paused first a moment. Lined up on deck just abaft the port gangway opening was the fire party, about ready to embark for the Strathallan. I looked them over in the last remnants of the fast-fading twilight. There was just light enough left now to make things out at close quarters.

  It was a fine looking fire party, all husky British seamen, and beautifully fitted out. With all those well-equipped men as reliefs on the hoses, we should certainly save the Strathallan now. Some of the seamen carried smoke masks, a few others had rolled-up asbestos suits draped over their shoulders, all had tin hats and in addition smoke goggles for eye protection. They even had a rescue breathing apparatus in a heavy case to revive a man knocked out by smoke, and the British equivalent of a hospital corpsman to take care of the injured. As I looked them over, they began to stream by me down the side ladder and into our waiting boat. Last of all went the two officers in charge of them, a sub-lieutenant and a lieutenant, R.N. I stopped the lieutenant, the last man, to give him some brief instructions.


  “You’ll find Captain Harding of the King Salvor in charge when you get there, Lieutenant. Lay alongside her and report yourself to him. Have your men relieve his crew immediately on the hoses aboard the Strathallan; they’ll have had a two-hour stretch at it by then. After that, you’re to alternate with his men—two hours on, two hours off, on the hoses till we make port. Understand, Lieutenant?”

  He nodded. He understood. It was quite simple. He dropped down the side ladder into the boat. The Laforey slowed again momentarily to let them cast off; as they swung clear, she speeded up once more. Accompanied by her exec, I started up her port side for the bridge.

  As I went, I looked briefly about. The Laforey was a huge destroyer, one of the two largest Britain had. Specially built as one of a pair for squadron leaders, she was practically a young light cruiser, with her three main turrets, her numerous heavy A.A. guns, and her eight torpedo tubes in two quadruple mounts. I judged my first guess on her had been correct; she must easily have had at least two hundred men in her crew. Raking up forty for a fire party could have been no difficult task for her, though no doubt it stripped her of most of her gun crews.

  Following the exec as a guide, I entered the superstructure forward and climbed an interior ladder to come out on her enclosed bridge, even darker there than it had been on deck. No light showed anywhere but a faint glow coming from the compass. The exec introduced me to his captain. Even in the gloom I was surprised to note, he was a captain—a four-striper, R.N., from the gold lace and curl over it on his overcoat shoulder marks. Before, I had assumed I would find at most a commander, as destroyer skippers ordinarily were when they were not just lieutenant commanders. But, I reflected, the Laforey was a squadron leader, not an ordinary destroyer; this skipper was really commodore for a large number of destroyers, hence the assignment of an officer with considerably more than normal rank to that command.

  But if I was surprised when introduced to the Laforey’s commanding officer, that surprise was nothing to the one I got when the latter promptly turned about and introduced me to another shadow on his bridge—the captain of the Strathallan! So of all persons, the captain of the deserted Strathallan was standing by as a spectator, watching his ship burn while others fought for her! And never signaling the King Salvor offering to come aboard her to help us with information as to his ship’s layout, if nothing more!

  We checked our position on the chart and stepped off the distance to land. With luck and the speed the trawlers were then making, and no increase in the wind and the sea, we should make Oran by around nine or ten o’clock next morning, a little better than I had hoped for. It was then somewhat past 6:30 P.M.; we should have about fifteen hours more of it—always providing there were no more torpedoes.

  On that contingency the skipper of the Laforey was noncommittal. He would do his best with his Asdic and his depth charges to protect both himself and us during the night but—He shrugged his shoulders. No more comment on that was necessary. He and all the other destroyers under his command had been doing exactly that when the Strathallan, the biggest and most valuable ship in their convoy, had been selected by the U-boat as target for the first torpedo.

  Whether he could do any better alone now with his Asdic, remained to be seen—much depended on that U-boat captain. Had he considered his torpedoed and burning victim already a loss and sought greener pastures? Or was he skeptical of results and following to watch, willing to attack again if we got the Strathallan close enough to port to make her rescue certain? This last wasn’t the case yet; we were still far out to sea. The captain of the Laforey doubted that the U-boat would expend any more torpedoes on the Strathallan for some hours yet, at least until the flames were visibly much reduced in volume.

  But of course his own case was very different. A large destroyer like the Laforey was always an enticing target for a U-boat captain brave enough to risk attacking one. If this were the same U-boat which had attacked the Porcupine eleven days before, then he was brave enough, no question. The dark hours now enshrouding us would tell. They favored the U-boat captain in attacking the Laforey; even more so, if he wished to attack the slow-moving Strathallan again. She stood out in the night now like a huge torch, a perfect target for a long range shot which could be made almost with impunity whenever the U-boat captain considered it worth another torpedo or several of them.

  To minimize that danger, the Laforey would shortly begin circling us in zigzags at high speed and at somewhat over extreme torpedo range as well as closer in, trying to search out beneath the sea the whole possible area of attack with her Asdic. And at my request, her captain agreed to keep close watch on the King Salvor for any signals, ready to communicate them if necessary to the towing trawlers.

  Long before we had covered all this, we could see in the lurid glare from the Strathallan that our first boat had reached the King Salvor and discharged the new men. I sighed with relief at that. They had reached her nearly two hours after we had started fighting the fire; those first two hours would unquestionably have been the worst of all. Harding’s men must have been made of cast iron if, after turning over their hose nozzles to the fresh seamen, they had been able to stagger down the fiery passages on their own feet on their way back to their bunks aboard the King Salvor. I could never have stood it myself half so long. We had been none too soon with reliefs for them.

  A seaman fumbled his way up on the now totally dark destroyer bridge to tell the captain that my boat would be ready in about twenty minutes more. It seemed some of the motor mechanics on the Laforey were helping my man not only to change the spark plugs but also to tune up the whole ignition system and the carburetor; when they finished, the boat should be good enough for the return trip, anyway. I thanked the captain for his help.

  The discussion was over. The captain of the Laforey turned back to conning his ship through the darkness on her weaving track. Had my boat been ready, I should have left immediately. But as I had no option except to wait till the mechanics got my engine tied together again, I felt I might as well learn what more I could of how many separate firerooms the Strathallan had, and how they were laid out. The knowledge would help when it came to smothering the fire below.

  The sole source of information was that vague shadow apparently trying to efface itself in the blackness against the after bridge bulkhead. I hardly blamed the man for that. Could it be that now when he had left his ship in the face of danger, he might at leisure be remembering the British skipper of a sister P. & O. liner, the Rawalpindi? And how that captain had conducted himself earlier in the war when he was suddenly confronted in the Arctic twilight off Iceland by a Nazi battleship, heavily armored, bristling with triple-turrets and 11-inch guns against which his own few 6-inch rifles were but popguns and his unarmored merchant ship sides but cheese?

  Against that powerful battleship, the Rawalpindi had not the chance of a snowball in hell, unless she turned instantly and fled off into the dusk where between her own high speed and the falling night, she could reasonably hope to escape unharmed. But that P. & O. skipper had also an obligation as a seaman from which he did not flinch even in the face of certain death. There were dozens of far more poorly armed and very slow freighters with him which would all die like sheep before a ravening wolf if he abandoned them by running to save himself.

  He was a seaman. While the freighters separated to flee in all directions into the night, he steamed directly for that battleship to engage her—of a more valiant act, the long history of war at sea has no record! Of course the Rawalpindi was shot to pieces and went down before those flaming 11-inch turret guns, a fiery coffin for her captain and most of his crew. But before that finally happened, the sheep were well scattered in the long night, saved, most of them, from the fangs of the wolf which had to be satisfied mainly with the hollow victory over the Rawalpindi.

  Dead now, the captain of that P. & O. liner and the Rawalpindi and her crew would live forever in the hearts of British seamen. I turned to the captain of the Raw
alpindi’s much bigger sister to ask him a question about his abandoned Strathallan. With some difficulty, I made him out enough to step over to his side.

  “Captain,” I asked, “how many firerooms has the Strathallan, and which ones caught fire from the torpedo explosion? And why didn’t you report that fire right off, instead of just the torpedo damage?”

  “Not any of ’em,” came the surprising reply. “The torpedo hit us in the engine room, where it killed my Chief Engineer. But it didn’t set any stokeholds afire. There wasn’t any fire to report till hours after.”

  “The torpedo didn’t light you off?” I asked incredulously. “What did then?”

  The skipper sought to explain. It was rather involved. His Chief Engineer was dead, his engine room was flooded, his ship was stopped. Not knowing what might happen, he busied himself getting away all his lifeboats in the darkness; it was 2 A.M. when he was hit. He managed that successfully, he said; about a thousand troops, including a hundred or more American women nurses, were shoved clear in the boats. That had gone all right. That left him with about 5000 others aboard, including his crew. No boats for any of them. There were still the rafts, which he started launching. But the ship showed no sign of sinking by then; he decided to wait till daylight.

  Dawn came, late of course, it being the winter solstice. Still no danger of sinking, nor any other danger save that of another torpedo. He decided to wait further before loading rafts, especially as all his boats had drifted from sight during the night. On the rafts it would be worse in the cold seas; he would take to them only as a last resort.

  Meanwhile through leaking bulkheads below some water was coming into the fireroom just forward of the flooded engine room; not enough, apparently, to endanger the ship by sinking her; enough, however, to be troublesome. But his Chief Engineer was dead; the other engineer fellows were taking care of it as well as they could, which was poorly; he himself knew little about what was going on below (and, I judged, had never gone below himself to find out). It seemed there was some heavy fuel oil from badly leaking oil bunkers floating on top of the water in the bilges (I had seen the like on the Porcupine recently, where in his fireroom Bartley had extinguished his fires); those engineer fellows must have been careless; it would have been different if the Chief had been alive. They had allowed the water with the fuel oil on it to rise so high it had swashed into the boiler fireboxes (Why in the name of common sense, I wondered, hadn’t someone ordered those boiler fires put out long before the water rose that high? They didn’t need steam for the engines any more, and not much for anything.) with the result that it had lighted off and started a bad fire in the firerooms.