The USS Flier

by Michael Sturma

  The Macaw’s skipper, Paul Willis Burton, was well known within the fraternity of submariners. Beginning in 1929 the navy required the captains of rescue and salvage ships to have experience with both submarines and deep-sea diving. Burton had not only trained at the New London Submarine School but had also been the officer in charge of its underwater escape training tank. That 138-foot-high, silo-shaped tank near the Thames River was the most obvious landmark at New London, and the escape exercise was an ordeal that most submariners never forgot.

  After first being tested in a decompression chamber, submariner candidates had to simulate a submarine escape using the Momsen lung, named for its creator Charles “Swede” Momsen. The apparatus, designed specifically to facilitate the escape from a submarine stranded beneath the surface, consisted of a black rubber bag with a nose clip and a mouthpiece. A canister of soda and lime filtered out carbon dioxide and, at least in theory, allowed the submariner to breathe as he slowly made his way to the surface. Momsen had experienced firsthand the horrible sensation of being stuck underwater. During his first command on the O-15, the bow planes had jammed during a dive, causing the submarine to burrow into the muddy bottom. The vessel managed to surface only after the crew blasted water out of the forward torpedo tubes.3

  Momsen, acclaimed by some as America's greatest submariner, also had a hand in constructing the training tanks at New London. Submarine trainees descended 100 feet to the bottom of the water tank on a platform. Then, equipped with the Momsen lung, they had to slowly make their way to the top. Burton, known for his puckish sense of humor, had life-size pictures of curvaceous mermaids painted on the inner walls of the tank to mark various depths.4

  Despite the experience of Burton and his crew, their efforts to rescue the Flier had ended in disaster. With the Macaw stranded and all hope of an immediate rescue abandoned, the Flier’s crew tried to brace for what would be a long, uneasy night. Tanks were flooded to try to stabilize the submarine on the reef and reduce the pounding it was taking from the rough seas.

  By Monday morning, 17 January, the seas were a bit calmer, but there was no plan to try to refloat the Flier. By late morning, after several unsuccessful attempts, the men managed to fix a line and a wire between the submarine and the Macaw. Both vessels rode out another night on the reef as the seas continued to moderate.5

  On Tuesday morning the Flier began transferring some of its crew to the Macaw via a boatswain chair—a daunting experience. The boatswain chair, resembling a swing, was suspended from a line between the two ships and tended to sag perilously as the crafts rolled with the motion of the sea. Earl Baumgart was among those evacuated from the submarine, and he said a silent prayer as he began the transfer from the Flier to the Macaw. With both ships rocking, the boatswain chair hit the water at one point, and Baumgart inflated his life vest, fearing that the line might snap. Eventually, he made it safely to the Macaw.6

  On Wednesday morning the weather took another turn for the worse. The wind picked up, and it began to rain heavily. The Flier flooded the number one main ballast tank to try to prevent further drifting of the stern. At 4:00 in the afternoon the submarine received a portable high-frequency radio from the Macaw to facilitate communications.

  By Thursday morning, 20 January, the Flier had drifted farther onto the reef. But again, it appeared that salvation might be at hand. At 8:30 A.M. the submarine rescue vessel USS Florikan was spotted on the horizon. Under the command of George Sharp, the Florikan had made the trip from Pearl Harbor specifically to help rescue the Flier and tow it back to Pearl.

  Later that morning, at about 10:30 A.M., the body of James Cahl washed up on the beach at Midway. The senior medical officer, Ivan F. Duff, and the senior dental officer, Clement T. Hughes, confirmed Cahl's identity from dental records. The following morning at 11:00 A.M., Cahl's body was committed to the deep in a Protestant burial ceremony conducted on a motor torpedo boat. Although the specific details of Cahl's burial are unknown, the rituals were highly standardized. The body was either sewn into a canvas shroud or placed in a weighted coffin. An honor platoon was typically assembled on deck, and a service of scripture and prayers was read by a chaplain or another officer. At the appointed time, six to eight pallbearers tilted a board holding the body, sliding it feetfirst from under the national ensign into the sea. A party of seven men then fired three volleys into the air, a custom originally supposed to drive away evil spirits. The playing of taps followed. Under the direction of a chief master-at-arms, the flag was then encased and delivered to the commanding officer.7

  Most of Cahl's shipmates were still on the beleaguered submarine when he was buried at sea. Those who had already transferred to shore were not allowed to attend the ceremony, ostensibly to avoid the risk of any further loss of life in the rough conditions.8 Later that day, Cahl's personal effects were transferred to the Macaw via boatswain chair. Crowley was faced with the grim task of writing to Cahl's family and explaining the circumstances of his loss. As it happened, Cahl was one of the relatively few enlisted men on the Flier who was married.

  Cahl's crewmates likely found his death difficult to accept. In some ways, an accidental death was even more tragic than one that was combat related. The crew of the USS Pollack, for instance, was devastated when one of its members was crushed to death between two torpedoes while on patrol.9 And Cahl would not be the last submariner to drown at Midway. Only a couple of months later, on 5 March, the body of George Hepfler from the USS Archerfish would be recovered from the lagoon. Like Cahl, the waters at Midway became his final resting place.10

  On Saturday, 22 January, at about 8:00 A.M., Waite Daggy was finally transferred to the Macaw and then sent to the Midway base hospital for treatment of his injured chin.11 A total of twenty-three men left the submarine and were shuttled to land. There, they learned that their crewmate Clyde Gerber, last seen standing on a sand spit, was in the hospital with a fractured left arm.

  By that time, the Flier had been stuck on the reef for six days, being battered much of that time by heavy seas and waves that were sometimes high enough to break over the submarine's bridge. For Crowley it had been a painful and humiliating week, especially as he watched other submarines arrive en route to patrols. That Saturday morning, for example, the USS Kingfish made its way past the stranded Flier to the Midway harbor.

  At a little after 9:00 in the morning the Flier received a towing bridle from the Macaw, which was rigged around the submarine's four-inch deck gun. At around noon the Gaylord, a floating steam crane used for construction work, was towed by two tugs within a couple hundred yards of the Flier off the channel entrance. The Flier crew later hauled aboard a towing bridle from the Gaylord and cast off all lines except for a two-inch-diameter wire from the crane. The anchor was then pulled in, and the submarine lightened. With the aid of the crane, the Flier finally floated free of the reef at 2:29 P.M. By 2:45 the YT-188, the tug originally intended to lead the Flier into the Midway lagoon a week earlier, had the submarine in tow.

  Once the Flier was inspected and deemed seaworthy enough to be moved, the USS Florikan took the submarine in tow at 3:50 P.M. Although the Flier’s port propeller shaft was out of commission, it was believed that the starboard shaft might be used in an emergency. The Florikan set off from Midway at 4:52 P.M., pulling the Flier along at a sluggish eight knots. The submarine chaser USS PC-602 acted as an escort, armed with depth charges, one three-inch gun, and two 20 mm guns. Since the Flier was incapable of diving, it offered the Japanese an easy target.

  As the Flier was heading home to Pearl Harbor, the Macaw remained hard aground. When the submarine USS Halibut arrived at Midway on the morning of 1 February, the aftereffects of the Flier’s grounding remained all too evident. Owing to rough weather, the Midway Channel was closed, and the Halibut had to ride out the next twenty-four hours before being allowed to enter the sheltered atoll. When the Halibut’s commander, Ignatius J. “Pete” Galantin, finally conned his vessel up the channel, he passed the str
anded hulk of the Macaw. Galantin and the Macaw’s skipper had been classmates at the Naval Academy and the Submarine School.12

  Attempts to salvage the Macaw did not go well. Storms continued to rage, at times sweeping the ship with thirty-foot seas. In the early hours of 13 February, the Macaw began to list and slide back into deeper water. With the hull breached, the Macaw sank. Most of the crew managed to survive by clinging to life buoys or to the reef itself, but there were five fatalities. The dead included the Macaw’s skipper, Paul Burton.

  The wreck of the Macaw stood as a grim reminder of Midway's hazards. When the USS Tang arrived at the atoll on 3 March 1944, skipper Richard O’Kane steered gingerly past the protruding masts of the sunken ship. In rough weather some submarines elected to bypass Midway altogether rather than risk the Flier’s fate. Eventually the Macaw’s hulk threatened to block the south channel, and salvage divers from the USS Shackle used demolition charges and underwater cutting to break it up. Today the twisted wreckage and the relatively intact bow still lie on the ocean floor.13

  6

  Board of Investigation

  The Flier’s tow back to Pearl Harbor was not without incident. The day after leaving Midway, 23 January 1944, the ships encountered a severe storm in the predawn hours. At 5:42 A.M. the towline to the Florikan separated, leaving the Flier wallowing in the rough seas. The Flier tried to regain some steerage using the starboard screw, but it continued to drift. It took five hours under “the most adverse circumstances” to shackle up a new towline. John Crowley praised the efforts of the Florikan’s commander, George Sharp, as well as the work of several of his own crew, including Ensign Herbert “Teddy” Baehr, chief gunner's mate Charles DeWitt Pope, and coxswain Gale Winstone Hardy. At one point Pope was washed overboard, but he was quickly hauled back aboard by his lifeline.1

  Despite such heroics, the Flier’s crew must have felt a profound ambivalence. When they reached the submarine base at Pearl Harbor on the afternoon of 30 January 1944, there was no brass band waiting dockside to greet them. This was an ignominious return from a patrol of self-destruction.

  Sharp, at least, would get some recognition for his part in returning the Flier safely: he would be given a second chance at commanding a submarine. Sharp had been summarily relieved of command of the USS Spearfish after a bungled attack on a massive Japanese convoy in June 1943. Bringing the Flier back in one piece had wiped the slate clean, and Sharp replaced William Davis Irvin as skipper of the Nautilus. Soon he would be operating out of Australia on “special missions” to the Philippines.2 Whether Crowley would be given another chance to command was still undecided, pending an investigation.

  Charles Lockwood, commander of the Submarine Force Pacific Fleet, instructed Captain John Bailey Longstaff, commander of Submarine Squadron Fourteen, to convene a board of investigation to look into the Flier’s grounding at Midway. Also appointed to the board were Captain Frank Thomas Watkins, Captain William Vincent O’Reagan, and Lieutenant Commander Ralph B. Johnson. Watkins had distinguished himself by becoming the first division commander to skipper a submarine, taking the Flying Fish out on patrol in mid-1943. At the age of forty-five, he was also the oldest American to captain a submarine during the war. He was credited with sinking a ship off Formosa and received a Bronze Star for his trouble.3

  The inquiry was held on the tender USS Bushnell (AS-15), which had been launched by the Mare Island Navy Yard in September 1942 and commissioned on 10 April 1943. Displacing almost 10,000 tons, the ship was more than 530 feet long with a 73-foot beam. Eventually the Bushnell would serve as a submarine tender at Majuro, Midway, and Guam. In the meantime, having arrived at Pearl Harbor in July 1943, the Bushnell tended Longstaff's squadron. With the squadron and divisional staff domiciled on the ship, the members of the board could virtually step from their bunks to the inquiry.4

  Crowley was officially notified of the proceedings and of his “status of defendant.” By naval tradition, the skipper was ultimately responsible for all decisions, and Crowley was no doubt aware that his career and reputation were at stake. Next to a court-martial, a board of investigation was the most serious proceeding an officer could face. Before the war, any skipper who grounded his ship automatically and immediately lost his command, as well as any chance of future promotion. For instance, after the grounding of the submarine USS Razorback at Fisher's Island off Portsmouth, both the skipper and the executive officer were relieved of command and put on disciplinary leave.5

  The Flier was certainly not the first craft—or even the first submarine—to come to grief on a reef at Midway. After a refit at Midway in mid-1943, the USS Scorpion ran aground during training for its third war patrol. It took a tugboat five hours to pull the submarine free of the reef, and then, because of rough weather, the Scorpion had to wait another three days before returning to the Midway base. From there it sailed back to Pearl Harbor for repairs and an immediate board of investigation. The Scorpion’s skipper, William Naylor Wylie, as well as executive officer Harry Clark Maynard, were subsequently relieved of command.6 That was not the outcome Crowley was hoping for.

  The board of investigation met for the first time on Tuesday, 1 February. Crowley, who had arrived at Pearl Harbor less than forty-eight hours earlier, was present at 9:00 A.M. He waived his right to counsel and, at his request, was sworn in as a witness. After Crowley read a narrative of the events that he believed led to the Flier’s grounding, the board went to personally inspect the damage to the submarine at the navy yard dry dock. There was major damage to large sections of the outer hull plating; the flat keel, vertical keel, and bilge keels; the rudder, port strut, port propeller shaft, and both propellers; the main ballast tank; and the variable tank flood valves. There was moderate damage to part of the hull frames and tank bulkheads, the stern tubes and reduction gears, the liquidometer, and the Fathometer. In addition, the main engine saltwater cooling system was clogged with coral sand. The navy yard at Pearl Harbor estimated the cost of repairs at a staggering (by 1944 standards) $312,000.7

  When the board reconvened at 1:15 in the afternoon, Crowley was questioned at length about the Flier’s grounding. When asked whether he had ever considered delaying the submarine's entry into Midway Channel due to the weather and sea conditions, Crowley replied, it “crossed my mind.”8 But since a pilot had been sent out and the Flier had been assigned a berth in the harbor, he believed that the channel was considered safe. Neither Crowley nor his navigator had been to Midway before, so he had relied on what he assumed to be more competent local knowledge.

  The following morning the board interviewed the Flier’s executive officer, Benjamin Ernest Adams Jr. A defiant Adams told the board that he firmly believed the Flier had been in the channel when it grounded. When asked how he could reconcile this belief with the wreck, Adams suggested that the high seas combined with materials from dredging operations at Midway had created an obstruction.9

  The board continued to interview other personnel, including officers from the navy yard who reported on the Flier’s damage. On Saturday, the fifth day of the inquiry, Crowley asked to be recalled to testify on his own behalf. He had clearly had time to reflect on the situation and his previous testimony, and he wanted to get his subsequent thoughts on the record. Crowley told the board that although he accepted responsibility for the decision to enter Midway Channel, he wanted to explain the factors that had influenced his decision. He noted again his lack of experience with local conditions and reiterated that if the authorities at Midway expected him to enter the harbor, he had to assume that doing so would be safe. He also assumed, once it became clear that a pilot could not be transferred to the submarine, that following the pilot boat into the lagoon was an acceptable alternative. Crowley also subscribed to the explanation offered by his executive officer: when the Flier struck the reef, he believed that it was in Midway Channel. This belief was fostered by the fact that one of the channel buoys was missing and another eastern buoy was out of position, presumably due to
the rough conditions.10

  The wait for the board's findings was mercifully brief. The board members deliberated on Sunday morning and again on Monday, and on Tuesday, 8 February, they handed down their decision.

  The board concluded that Crowley's decision to enter Midway Channel had been correct. In their opinion, reduced visibility due to the weather had not been an important factor, but the missing channel buoy and the sea conditions had made controlling the Flier “exceedingly difficult.” They did, however, fault Crowley for entering the channel at the relatively low speed of ten knots. In addition, the board considered it proper for Crowley to order the anchor detail to the submarine's deck and did not find it “blame worthy” that the men in the detail had not been wearing life belts. With some ambiguity, the board of investigation concluded that Commander Crowley “is responsible for the grounding of U.S.S. Flier,” but “the grounding was not due to the culpable negligence of any person.”11

  Vice Admiral Charles Lockwood had to sign off on the report, and he was not quite as forgiving. Lockwood was one of the icons of the U.S. submarine service, having served since World War I. As such, he had played a significant role in the evolution of both its equipment and its ethos. Among the men under his charge, he was popularly known as “Uncle Charlie,” and although he could be tough when warranted, he had a reputation for fairness. For all these reasons, Lockwood's opinions were highly regarded.