Clear the Bridge!

by Richard O'Kane

  It had always been the privilege of a captain to be last in visiting the dentist; there was no one to prod him. This morning, the dentist proceeded directly with putting four small fillings in one tooth that was giving me no trouble, and to my query about cleaning my teeth said, “Oh, we take care of that during the afternoons.” I was no expert in dentistry, but in the past cleaning and examination had always preceded any drilling. I assumed that I should have dropped in on the previous afternoon, but did so this day instead. The dentists were not in evidence, but I received a thorough scaling by a competent technician. When I returned aboard, Chief Ballinger posed a somewhat blunt and unexpected question, but that was his privilege.

  “Did they charge you for cleaning your teeth, Captain?” Then without really receiving my answer, he exploded. “Well, I just found out that those bastards have been charging our troops five bucks apiece, and no one could get a dental appointment in the afternoon because the dentists were always out sportfishing!”

  I thanked him for the report, turned on my heel, and headed for ComSubDiv 62’s office where, in slightly more formal language, I repeated what Ballinger had told me.

  The morning of July 30 broke on a nicer note. As a result of the recommendations hustled into the mail right here a month and a half before, awards for Fraz, Ballinger, Jones, White, and Leibold had arrived, and for me the Legion of Merit for my conduct of the rescues at Truk, as well as a third Silver Star from my beloved Wahoo. Happily, a belated award, under more recent directives, had also come for Hank from Tambor. Commander Will made the presentations, and we could not have been more proud of these shipmates.

  While we were still at quarters, Commander Will called Hank front and center again, and proceeded to read from a card attached to a large manila envelope: “Presented to Lieutenant (junior grade) Henry J. Flanagan, United States Navy, in recognition of his fifteen years of service in the furtherance of torpedo performance and capability.” The commander then withdrew a beautifully finished mahogany plaque bearing the same inscription and mounted with a highly polished and horribly mangled propeller lock. Hank received the plaque in good grace, helped by a cheer from his torpedomen and a good laugh by all.

  In the wardroom for coffee, Hank was reading his real citation when he blurted out, “I finally made it, after fifteen years I finally made it!” Then Hank, who had fleeted up from seaman in Uncle Sam’s regular navy, read from the citation: “Lieutenant (junior grade) Henry J. Flanagan, United States Naval Reserve.”

  “Well, move over, Hank, we might as well join your club,” Fraz commented. “The captain, Mel, Dick, and I are the only regulars left.”

  Tang’s final loading proceeded in the afternoon in an unhurried manner, with steam fish forward and electrics aft, and then continued on the 31st. By 1500 she was topped off with fuel and chow, and the lines were singled up. After a sincere Godspeed, Commander Will had left for an appointment, considering, no doubt, that we were taking the action required by a dispatch delivered by the base while he was aboard. In part he was correct. The message, from ComSubPac, directed that we leave witnesses to the dental shenanigans. Well, the force commander had sent the message he felt necessary, and we were making the only reply possible:

  WITNESSES HAVE IMPORTANT BATTLE STATIONS

  AND ARE NEEDED IN TANG ON THIS WAR PATROL

  Only Fraz’s formal report of ship ready for getting under way remained before casting off the lines, but now Tang had one man missing, Walker. Shipmates had him aboard in short order, though with his fists full of bills. His trip to buy money orders involved a repeat performance, and another detail was sent to round him up. We had a compulsive gambler!

  It was 1555, almost an hour after our scheduled departure, when the base took in the lines. Tang backed quietly from the dock and twisted toward the basin’s entrance leading to the dredged channel. Ahead lay the slice through the reef. The coral heads disappeared, and at my nod Hank ordered, “Rig ship for dive,” then brought us to the navigator’s recommended course, 270 degrees true. Tang was on her fourth war patrol.

  2

  Numbers 3 and 4 main engines were driving us through the moderate summer seas on a duplicate of the route we had followed on our last foray. Lieutenant (jg) Charles O. Pucket was standing his first watch as OOD on patrol. He was teamed with Hank, so little could go wrong, and nothing that couldn’t be taken care of by the diving alarm. Small and light-complected, Charles was from Chattanooga, Tennessee, and had come to Tang from the relief crew. The recommendation of our senior petty officers who had now been detached was in the main responsible for his orders. It might not be the Navy Department’s method of making assignments, but so far the selections were working out well for us.

  I was about to go below when Fraz joined me on the cigarette deck, the out-of-the-way area aft of the shears. It was his way of giving me a chance to speak in private of anything that was on my mind. He was probably thinking of our rather unconventional departure, but we spoke instead of Midway, now below the horizon but with its position still marked by an area of aquamarine sky. How tremendously its location had affected Japanese strategy. The Empire’s South and Central Pacific outposts had all become secure in operations following Pearl Harbor. Japanese conquest of Midway and the southern Aleutians would have completed a perimeter of bases from which their patrol planes could keep track of our naval operations. With the U.S. Pacific Fleet a shambles, a move against Midway was considered imminent, and Argonaut had patrolled there for two months awaiting the action. A submarine with two 6-inch, 53-caliber guns and 78 mines to defend an atoll, but she was the best our navy could do. Japan had the capability back then but delayed too long. When the battle did come, in early June, 1942, the enemy split his forces and lost four carriers to our one. Our victory in the Battle of Midway was won dearly, for nearly all of our torpedo bombers were lost. But their low-altitude attacks had diverted the attention of the Zekes and permitted our dive-bombers to carry out their task against the fleet so successfully. Now it was evident that this battle had been the real turning point of the war in the Pacific.

  We had just received our finest refit, so even though no longer near the van, Midway continued to make it possible for Tang and other submarines to be there. The charts Fraz and Jones had brought aboard told of our general destination, but I wished that those men in the relief crew and others who had worked on our equipment might have seen our Operation Order. Ballinger would now have posted the pertinent part in the crew’s mess, and to all hands the directive would more than formalize the rumors; it would provide a thrill and a serious challenge as well. The first lines read: “When in all respects ready for sea and patrol proceed by route south of Kure Reef to the Nampo Shoto and areas 4 and 5. Conduct offensive patrol against all shipping. There will be no friendly submarines in the adjacent areas….”

  To any seasoned submariner these two areas had long held the greatest possibilities—and the thunder, for they covered the whole south and a part of the east coast of Honshu, the main central island of the Japanese Empire. We had rounded up a goodly number of pertinent patrol reports, some dating back to the first months of the war. The tactics might have changed since some of these earlier patrols, but the areas had not, and there was just a chance that some of the tactics had come full circle. We would have only a week to study the reports, for they would all go to Davy Jones’s locker before we entered the areas, or at least before moving onto soundings.

  We would make our trim dive in the evening after all the mess gear was secured, trash dumped in weighted sacks, and the ritual of sanitaries completed. It had proved to be a good time on our last patrol, and on surfacing would be followed by the movies. Here was our ship on the same course, at the same speed, following the same routine, and now another pair of football legs was blocking the passageway forward. They belonged to Ensign Basil C. Pearce, Jr., from Palatka, Florida, who had come to Tang on the same recommendation as had Charles. In a moment his feet were solidly on the deck, and
after an apology, which was unnecessary but did no harm, Basil followed me into the wardroom.

  It was good to see and hear the wardroom buzzing again, and never had a cup of coffee at just the right temperature, hot, been served more quickly. Fraz had already told Walker that I chose to consider his antics in holding up Tang’s sailing a part of our leave and recreation. How could it be otherwise when, in truth, all hands had enjoyed this episode; and besides, pending mast cases were not compatible with the requirements of patrol.

  The watch schedule worked in well, giving Basil the first dive. Larry stood in the background, no doubt gritting his teeth a bit, but I had seen worse dives by experienced officers. Our seasoned planesmen and chief would help any dive, of course, but if we concentrated on our new officers, they should be ready by the time we reached the Nampo Shoto. Such demands on young officers, especially ones who had not had an opportunity to attend submarine school, would have been deemed preposterous as late as two years before. We were not asking for a total performance, however, just one that would get our ship safely below, to where shipmates could assist if necessary.

  This evening Fraz brought down the chart, with the position of his star fix plotted and then run ahead to 2000. We were doing well and would pass Kure Reef during the night. A change in course would be in order but could better wait until after the morning star fix, when we would not be turning toward a shoal during darkness. The only time that the cautions demanded by good seamanship might take second place was when in pursuit of the enemy. This night I penned normal night orders, but with additional information stressing some points for our new officers.

  Proceeding on course 270° true at 80/90 on two main engines. The SD radar is secured and will be turned on only with my permission. The SJ heaters are on. Require sweeps and reports by the operator every 10 minutes, and search continuously commencing a half hour before morning twilight till daylight.

  When in the conning tower, and as time permits, reread the standing night orders. Make all required reports and demand the reports you are to receive.

  Do not be lulled by the 2,500 miles between us and the enemy’s front door. He can be here just as surely as we will be there.

  Do not hesitate to call me to the bridge, or to dive.

  Our new course was 282 degrees true. We had come right the 12 degrees at 1230, after Frank’s noon sun line had verified our latitude. He was still our senior watch officer but at times would take himself from the list during this transit to navigate. The opportunity to work with both Fraz and Jones could be invaluable. Others were learning, too, for our short training period had been only an introduction for Charles, Basil, and our eight new unqualified men. Some dives were scheduled, but others were not so that this training would approximate the expected operations off the Empire. In order not to slow the transit, fire control drills were held while we cruised on the surface, using sound bearings and propeller noises generated by Tang’s shaving brush-microphone method.

  These propeller sounds were serving a dual purpose, for Tang had a new gadget. I had long thought it archaic for a sound operator to count a ship’s propeller beat with stopwatch in hand, keeping in phase with the rhythm by either a hand motion or a bouncing knee, like a bandleader. Then came the quadrupling or doubling of the count if its duration was for 15 or 30 seconds instead of a minute. Detecting a speed change, except for an experienced soundman, was likewise time-consuming, sometimes coming too late to correct a firing solution speed error. There were instant-reading tachometers for engine revolutions, even strobe disks for home phonographs; why wasn’t there something to give us an instantaneous reading for propeller sounds? A pulsing sound or note that the soundman could match with the propeller rhythm seemed a workable solution.

  Back in December, I had been walking past Sherman Clay & Co. in San Francisco when a metronome in their window caught my eye. I went inside to find that they had an electric one, the works contained in a small, gray metal box. A husky knob swung a pointer along a curved scale, which was already graduated in beats per minute, and the range covered that of the propeller beats of merchantmen and heavy ships. For fast screws, like a destroyer’s, the metronome’s beats might be matched with every other propeller swish. Time would not permit official purchase by the U.S. Navy—and such a device for a submarine would certainly raise some eyebrows—so, still feeling flush with recently acquired submarine pay, I bought my ship a present.

  We had figured various ways of feeding the metronome’s beat into the audio end of the JK sound receiver so that the operator would hear it in his earphones, but the task had low priority, and we were seeking perfection. Our coming operations, where information from sound could be of special importance, had changed all of that, and Midway mounted the little gray box on a bracket adjacent to the receiver, where the soundman, with his headset pushed off his ears a bit, could hear it direct. There was no coercion, but our soundmen found it worked fine on the propeller sounds we generated in the forward torpedo room. Some would reserve judgment till we had a real enemy ship, but as the captain’s gadget, the metronome was undoubtedly assured of a fair shake.

  At general quarters, when they were on watch, but especially in the wardroom, we were getting to know our new officers. My first impression of Charles as a quiet Southern gentleman needed some modification. Charles fitted in with the rest of us, and when it came to throwing an acey-deucey or pegging out, he could be as noisy as anyone else. With Hank, Frank, Dick, and now Basil aboard, the wardroom needed but one to round out a basketball team. Basil, like Dick, was a real all-American boy, pushed into growing up by the serious threat to our nation; he would fit in anywhere.

  Before Tang crossed the arcs of possible enemy air patrols, I made my customary inspection of our boat. It was for one purpose, to assure myself that all was secured for sea. Someone else’s word in this was not enough, for unless he had slugged it through a hurricane or typhoon on the surface, he could not appreciate its importance. One piece of heavy gear adrift almost surely meant injuries and damage as well. The walk-through took little time, for loose gear had been well lashed. Having observed the effort, I would not have to give the matter another thought on this patrol.

  Fraz dropped by my cabin after dinner to advise me that we would be within range of patrol planes from Marcus at dawn, and this threat would carry through until patrols from the Nampo Shoto area might be expected. It was just a double check, for we had changed to the east longitude date, which was always confusing, and he knew I would want to include extra precautions in the night orders. We would meet the small additional hazard with extra lookouts, as we had before. At my invitation, he occupied the preferred chair, my bunk, and we studied the ship contacts he had tabulated from reports of previous patrols in our areas. They were not yet plotted but listed by date with corresponding latitudes and longitudes. Over the past several months the contacts had dropped off steadily, and a glance at their latitudes showed practically all of them to the north, close to Honshu, on coastal shipping. We had no patrol reports from the last quarter, but a private message written by Admiral Lockwood covered that. I handed the penned note to Fraz.

  Dear Dick,

  I want to tell you why I am sending you and your Tang right back to the Empire, with hardly a breather. We have had two poor, and now a dry patrol in these areas, the boats reporting a dearth of shipping.

  Intelligence reports indicate that the merchant traffic must be there, and I am certain that Tang can rediscover it.

  Sincerely, and Godspeed,

  C. A. Lockwood

  Fraz read the note and didn’t bat an eye. “It requires nothing that we wouldn’t do anyway,” he commented, and in every respect he was absolutely right.

  “Well, we don’t need intelligence to tell us that the ships are there and running. The war is still going on, so they have to be either loading or at sea, but I don’t expect that we’ll find them off soundings, or off the ten-fathom curve for that matter. Of course the admiral’s note
underlines my responsibilities.”

  Fraz’s answer was a nod. We both knew that this note was a compliment to our ship and offered a challenge to each of us.

  Tang continued to enjoy yachting weather, with flying fish skimming away from her bow. Our camouflage seemed to be serving a dual purpose, for nightly a few fish would land on deck. Walker undoubtedly had something to do with the supply brought below, for Frank reported meeting him topside before the crack of dawn, waiting to scurry about the deck as soon as their white shapes were visible in the first gray light. Fish for breakfast remained the captain’s prerogative, though now others shared, especially Frank on Friday for, he pointed out, he was a good Catholic and thus a bona fide “fisheater.”

  Unlike the Nansei Shoto, whose spacing makes it troublesome for nearly 150 miles below Kyushu, the Nampo Shoto has a convenient passage. Forty miles wide, it lies between Mikura Jima and Hachijo Jima. The track that the navigator had laid down on our chart passed ten miles south of Mikura Jima. Only about eight miles in diameter and rising to nearly 3,000 feet, this volcanic island would make an excellent radar target and serve as our landfall as well. This was Tang’s destination on August 8, as a clear dawn promised another fine day.

  The yachting ended abruptly with Basil’s booming “Clear the bridge! Clear the bridge!” He had hooked them up in series, which was fine as long as the lookouts didn’t freeze in their tracks. Tang slid under the seas for 30 minutes, until a Betty bomber at about eight miles disappeared on to the south. The time of the sighting was 0950, and if there were still some who didn’t believe we were in enemy waters, another bomber at 1410 was the convincer. The range on this sighting was too great for identification, and this was as it should be. We were reasonably certain that neither plane had sighted us, but Bettys had played tricks on us before. With a full can, and plenty of time on our side, we cruised submerged for an extra half hour, content that no Zekes or other fast bombers arrived.