Wahoo

by Richard O'Kane

  In tactics, Morton never dallied, so 20 minutes later, three blasts sent Wahoo up and after the still-unalerted enemy. Passing beyond the sighting range would require over an hour, but all of that changed when a larger, northbound ship headed for Wahoo. For sure, she had not lost her affinity for ships, and with four in sight, the captain pulled the plug to attack the new arrival. She came by at 1,150 yards, and following Morton’s precise procedure, Verne’s constant bearing sent a single torpedo, set to run at 6-foot depth, to her midships. Again, all signs indicated a perfect run, this time with Carter’s, “Hot, straight and normal.” He was right, Verne reporting a water plume amidships as Jack’s count reached 41 seconds. The major cylindrical section of the torpedo, the air flask, with air at close to 3,000 pounds per square inch, had ruptured on impact, but again, the warhead had not detonated. Quartermaster Simonetti had logged the time of firing as 0222, but for a ship that had not sunk, it could be of little interest.

  Shortly after firing, the captain ordered, “Secure from battle stations,” for at this pace, the crew would be up all night, and with further watches pending. After time for setting the regular watch, the order, “Make all preparations for surfacing,” came over the IMC, and the following three blasts set off an end-around on the ship that had just been attacked.

  After helping with the torpedo reloads, groups in relays raided the crew’s mess to find that Rennels and Chief Phillips, as they had come to call him, had hot coffee and soup awaiting, with the makings for sandwiches laid out. Some tried their bunks for awhile, but with section tracking and the exec at work in the conning tower, and knowing their captain was about, a few at a time, and then all, returned to stand easy at their battle stations.

  The end-around proved also to be a race against the morning twilight, which Kemp had figured for 0415. The quartermaster had been right on, and Morton’s two blasts took Wahoo down for the third attack. The bells’ peal had been unnecessary, for stations were already manned. From a position on the freighter’s bow, Morton conned his submarine for a sharp track, but one where the ship would still present more than half her length. The combined relative motion brought on the firing point quickly, and from a range of 750 yards, Verne’s, “Fire!” sent one torpedo to her foremast, and repeating, another fish to her mainmast. Both torpedoes had a running depth of 6 feet. At least one had to hit, and perhaps the smaller angle of impact would activate the exploder mechanism, but there were no detonations or other explosions.

  Immediately after firing, with full speed and rudder, Morton swung ship to point Wahoo’s bow directly up the freighter’s broad stern. The torpedo run would be about 1,500 yards. No fire control was involved, just Verne’s, “Fire!” when the wire in his scope—held steady on zero degrees by Kemp—bisected the target’s stern. It zinged, and was tracked by Buckley blending with the freighter’s screws. It could have salvaged a bit from a frustrating night, but it too failed.

  There had been two detonations, logged by Simonetti at 0423 and 0427. The times did not jibe with possible hits by Wahoo. More likely, they were depth charges dumped as a deterrent by one of the freighters who had diagnosed the thump of a Wahoo torpedo. Such would not deter Morton, but daylight and the likely arrival of antisubmarine forces put Wahoo on the defensive, seeking deeper seas, while hands not on their regular watch sought their bunks.

  5

  Echo ranging commenced at 0930, and was followed by the arrival of an O tori torpedo boat, which carries a sizable number of depth charges. A second echo ranging commenced, but these did not interfere with the tasks at hand. Now with sufficient space in the forward torpedo room, and an assured steady platform, Richie and Jack, with Torpedo-man’s Mates, First Class Johnson, Deaton, and McSpadden, were about to swing a torpedo to check its vertical and horizontal rudder throws and with this its gyro steering and the depth mechanism. Verne went forward to witness. The gyro was spun as upon firing by compressed air from the flask, and then the turbines similarly, but without the alcohol fuel. Suspended by a chain fall and the spliced-wire handling strap, the torpedo was swung in azimuth and then elevated and depressed. The whole mechanism operated perfectly, just as it had in the Base shop. There was one more check, not involving material. Had Buckley or Carter reported hot, straight and normal for all five torpedoes? Their answers were the same; they might have missed one, but certainly would not have missed an erratic fish. The problem, as suspected, was narrowing down to exploders, for duds are not heard through the hull, and seldom by the sound operator unless a ruptured air flask is involved. Incorrectly, they’re called misses.

  Quartermaster Kemp had run the tracks of the ships to the south; they made a pattern indicating that they were using the Tsugaru Strait. This would not affect Wahoo, but it most certainly could Plunger, who now would be patrolling to the south of that passage. Her torpedoes, from Sperry, would still have erratic magnetic exploders, though most would work. But she could be without ships. The captain looked it over, thanked Kemp, and then said simply, “We’ll take care of that.”

  By noon, both patrols had withdrawn, but with evening twilight, the Otoris returned, obviously knowing that it was time for the submarine to surface. Wahoo slithered away, and after an hour, came up into a clear night and under a rising full moon. There would be no further shipping in this general area during the following days, so the captain asked for the course to the Hokkaido-Korea shipping route, where un-alerted traffic should be found. Verne picked 170 from the chart and received Morton’s, “Make it so.”

  A single engine was driving Wahoo quietly along the selected route. Two more were on a charge that would take twice as long as it did on the fifth patrol, but correspondingly, there would be twice the submerged endurance on the following day, Tuesday, August 17. Diving after Verne and Kemp had taken their round of stars, first sound and then high periscopes found no ships. But the day provided an opportunity to run back through the TDC the data that Quartermaster, Third Class Terrell had recorded. The first four fish, all with fresh eyes, should have hit at or within a very few yards of their point of aim. But this was another day, and there were nineteen torpedoes left.

  Verne, who excelled in math, was finding that there was an art in playing cribbage that verged on just plain luck. Phillips, officially Wahoo’s chief steward, had steaks thawed and ready for frying, so Morton obliged with three blasts. The dieseis would now gobble up the smoke from fast frying; a main course of steak and potatoes would always satisfy the troops, and the same could be said of the wardroom. Verne’s stars had fixed Wahoo’s position, and during the dark before moonrise, she headed for Hokkaido’s coast, searching.

  It was going on midnight when the first ship hove in sight. She was a freighter heading south and zigging so radically that gaining a position for an assured attack was proving difficult if not impossible. After midnight came a patrol, and more distant, another freighter. Diving, Wahoo avoided the patrol and then surfaced to find the new ship offering a better opportunity than the original freighter, so the captain shifted targets and pulled the plug for a moonlight periscope attack. The bells bonged, and a half hour later, on Verne’s, “Fire,” Morton hit the plunger, sending a single torpedo to hit the freighter in her port quarter. Perhaps the glancing blow, which other submarines had tried, would make this exploder work, but the fish—not the ship—went to Davy Jones’s locker.

  The time of firing had been 0226, and 20 minutes later, Wahoo commenced a 2-hour surface run away from the coast for another day submerged. In the wardroom, not dejected but grim, Captain Morton announced his plan for the following days. During daytime, officers not on watch would witness and assist in pulling and checking torpedoes for the following night’s firing. This would include rudder throws and depth mechanism. Wahoo would continue to close the coast during darkness, and attack submerged after moonrise.

  At 2224, still on August 17, Morton fired a single torpedo, with a depth setting of 4 feet and engine in low power, at a freighter 1,100 yards distant. The fir
ing was controlled by the TDC instead of by his favorite constant bearing. Again there was no explosion, and Morton announced the procedure for the next firing: Torpedo gyros would be set on zero manually, checked visually, and then the setting spindles would be withdrawn. The Mark-8 manual angle solver, an improved version of the prewar banjo, would be used to figure the lead angle. Though lacking the flexibility of the TDC, for a single lead angle it was just as accurate, maybe more so. It was the method Morton had been brought up with in submarines, so he would fire.

  The one highlight of an otherwise frustrating patrol had been the quality and quantity of all meals. The immediate frequency of shipping had apparently convinced Phillips that this would be a short patrol. So he had been following the approved menu rather broadly, having pulled out most of the stops. Rennels was not far behind with the baked goods, and as had become customary in Wahoo, his bread came out of the ovens before the mid watch. Would that some of the torpedoes might run as smoothly.

  Battle stations at midnight for attack number seven could not have been more timely. Tracking had been following a northbound freighter for three-quarters of an hour in moonlight, reaching a good solution as two blasts were sending Wahoo down. Tracking’s data was precise: speed 8½ knots, torpedo run 850 yards, track 90 port, torpedo gyro angle already set at 000. The lead angle for the low-power shot was 16. The captain kept the freighter’s bow in the scope, Kemp holding it at 16. The stack touched the wire; Morton barked, “Fire!” and the submarine, like a gun barrel, sent the torpedo straight ahead on the course to intercept. During the torpedo run, a southbound freighter passed the target close aboard, but even with two targets there was no detonation.

  Surfacing, Wahoo chased the southbound ship, but on closing the dark shore, she became difficult to see, so tracking was directed to work on a northbound freighter well to seaward. During this surface chase, two more small ships were passed up, but a likely position was reached by 0300. Diving for a submerged approach, an attack position was reached in 11 minutes. From 1,100 yards a torpedo sped to hit broad on her port bow, and as feared, another warhead or torpedo failed.

  As if to get the shooting over with, a second torpedo sped to strike her port beam. It broached 23 seconds into the run and detonated about 3 minutes later.

  6

  Ten torpedoes in nine attacks fired at six ships on an average track of 89, from an average range of 1,070, with no proper detonations had been enough. If a submarine is going to encounter one ship for each torpedo, and Wahoo had nearly doubled that, the maximum torpedo spread is obtained by firing one torpedo to the middle of each ship. This Captain Morton had done, and further had required all possible on-board torpedo checks. Adding to this, the firing by different methods left only the firing of more torpedoes to find that they would not work. Better by far would be the return of the remaining fourteen for examination and investigation. Only if the faults were thus found could this patrol become meaningful.

  Following a run to the west, away from the Tsugaru Strait, Buckley keyed the captain’s encoded message to ComSubPac and Plunger. It briefed the torpedo performance and Morton’s intention of bringing the remaining fourteen home. A receipt from NPM was immediate, and so was Morton’s order, “All ahead full,” as Wahoo headed for La Perouse Strait. The dash, lasting 2 hours, would clear the area of the radio transmission, and then Verne’s recommended two-engine speed would reach Soya Misaki late the following afternoon, August 19. The promontory would be the departure point for running the gauntlet during the dark of the night.

  The evening Fox brought ComSubPac’s orders to return to Pearl, but completely illogical was the accompanying instruction to leave ten torpedoes at Midway. That instruction had been noted before as a way of keeping Midway supplied, so had the staff blundered in tacking it on the admiral’s message? For sure, Wahoo was not going to inquire and give the enemy another radio direction finder position so he could station patrols to greet her, and Morton said simply, “Let them work it out.”

  Dawn again demonstrated Wahoo’s affinity for ships when a fine freighter came over the horizon on an intercepting course. Working torpedoes or not, two blasts initiated an approach until the captain called Pharmacist MacAlman to the conning tower so he could see the ship’s Russian flag. Another engine made up the lost time; Soya Misaki was passed submerged; and though challenged by light, a surface passage to the Sea of Okhotsk was completed before dawn. From there, a dogleg to the south avoided patrols along the direct route, and another zero-visibility passage through Etorofu Strait was completed without incident.

  The return route quickly intercepted two large motor sampans. At least the troops’ weapons should work. They did, destroying the sampans and taking six prisoners. At midnight, 5 days later, Wahoo took a large dogleg to the south, completely avoiding Kure Reef, and enjoyed two Tuesdays before mooring alongside Sperry at 1107 on August 25.

  After the semiformal greetings, Captain Morton accompanied Sperry’s skipper to the latter’s spacious cabin to brief him concerning the torpedo performance. On receiving assurance that the torpedoes with their warheads would be segregated for possible shipment to Pearl, and that every possible inspection and test would be performed, Morton provided a list of the torpedo and attached warhead serial numbers, given to him by Richie, so there would be no mistakes.

  Appearing somewhat relaxed on returning aboard, and noting that the 1730 sailing was more than 6 hours away, the captain ordered 2 hours ashore for each watch section. He would have preferred to follow suit, but luncheon with the deputy ComSubPac would this time be the dubious reward accompanying command.

  With only the national ensign flying from her main, Wahoo moored at Sub Base Pearl at 1035 on Friday, August 29, 1943.

  Seventh Patrol

  1

  After the usual greeting, coffee, and walk through the boat, Morton accompanied the senior officers to headquarters. The paymaster, with satchel in hand, moved into the wardroom as soon as it was vacant, so payday followed without wasting a minute. Sizing up the probable outcome of the captain’s conference, Verne sent two watch sections on their way to the Royal. His judgment was good, for soon a messenger brought the same instruction from the captain, who was going on to lunch.

  There was little Morton could relate that hadn’t been covered in the very complete patrol report. Besides the usual narrative and required sections, a separate page had been included for each attack. These pages were so detailed that there could be no doubt, on the part of any knowledgeable reader, as to exactly what had taken place. Further, the reviewing senior could not help recognizing that these small-to medium-sized freighters steaming at 7 to 8 knots posed a much simpler problem than did the shorter target for the single torpedo fired during qualification in submarines. The report had been kept current during the short patrol, and Sterling had been kept busy typing until 1 day before mooring, when the captain signed the forwarding letter. So with the time of arrival entered, he and Kemp were off immediately to deliver the report and track chart to the DivCom’s office, and from there, on to the Royal.

  The captain returned at midafternoon to tell Verne and those who needed to know of Wahoo’s next, or really continuing operation—cruising 3,430 miles to the Sea of Japan, sailing a week from Thursday, September 9. He would seek the southern half, although Plunger had reported sinking three ships in the northeast. The operation order would be secret, since it would involve Sawfish as well and the new, still-classified, Mark-18 electric torpedoes. Wahoo would be carrying a full load, while Sawfish’s load would be twelve Mark-14s and twelve Mark-18s. So starting the next day, all torpedomen would attend special instruction in these torpedoes.

  Chief Carr, all well from his ordeal, had reported back aboard, relieving Chief Lane. Verne arranged for a car and driver to retrieve the torpedomen each morning and take them back to the Royal after school. Carr, with the easy job, merely removed their names from the watch list. Richie and George would also attend, and soon found the ready-mad
e transportation better than fending for themselves.

  After their last days at the Royal, Wahoo would be losing eight men, mostly to new construction, but already their replacements were reporting aboard with two to spare. Similarly, Jack Griggs had orders to a new boat, and was good-naturedly boasting that it was taking two lieutenants and a lieutenant junior grade to replace him. They were Bill Burgan, a classmate of Richie’s; Hiram Greene; and Donald Brown. All were experienced, especially Bill and Hiram, so Wahoo would again have a breadth of submarine experience in each watch section.

  The angle-solver section of Wahoo’s TDC had cams that compensated for the original curving path of a torpedo fired with an angle. On a 90-degree Mark-14 shot, the curve ranges about 270 yards ahead, requiring a fairly accurate range determination to insure a hit. Similarly fired, a Mark-18 torpedo curve would range only about 50 yards ahead, so required only a rough range determination. In fact, the angle shot could probably be fired just as if it were a straight shot, but a cam especially designed for the Mark-18 was being installed by the Base. The other preparations were battery-charging panels and ventilation ducts. Everything was being completed handily. But all of this was overshadowed by a single feature of the Mark-18 torpedo itself: it left no wake, so a ship would not even know she had been attacked if the torpedo had missed, and if the fish hit, there would be no telltale wake pointing towards the submarine.

  The division, squadron, and acting force commanders were orally attributing Wahoo’s attack failures to Morton’s not using torpedo spreads. They were unable to realize that since there were more ships than torpedoes, he had applied the broadest possible spread by firing one or more torpedoes at each of the targets. The op-order required a commanding officers’ (CO) conference, which was scheduled at the Royal. It would also provide Morton an overdue visit with his crew, and at least a day away from headquarters. On the way, he gave a copy of the patrol report to the Sub Base commander, who not only had a willing ear, but told of a confidential dispatch from Tinosa at Truk, who had stopped the Tonan Maru, one of the enemy’s two largest tankers, but on trying to sink her from abeam, had had eight consecutive duds. She was bringing the one remaining torpedo back for investigation. “So it looks like you’ve got some support, both firing from ninety tracks.” And Morton told him about the ten more in Sperry, with their serial numbers in the report.