Tin Can Sailor

by Charles R. Calhoun

  We moored alongside the Royal Navy’s destroyer tender HMS Tyne. We had just secured to her when a disreputable-looking Royal Canadian Navy trawler came alongside our starboard quarter and secured her lines to us. Her young skipper, bearded and looking very seamanlike, came aboard. I met him as he walked forward on the Sterett’s main deck. “Good morning,” he called, coming up to me with his hand extended and with a disarming smile. “I looked over and saw you standing in a little while ago and asked my quartermaster, ‘Do I see the Stars and Stripes flying on that destroyer over there?’ When he confirmed that you were Yanks, I couldn’t wait to get over here to welcome you on behalf of the Royal Canadian Navy. You can’t imagine how wonderful it is to see these beautiful U.S. destroyers joining us over here.” I took him up to meet Captain Coward, who immediately asked if he and his crew would like to remain alongside the Sterett until their scheduled departure two days later, and in the meantime to make full use of our washrooms and eat their meals in our general mess. His gratitude was both genuine and touching. He and his men had not had either a freshwater shower or a decent meal in weeks. So the Sterett’s sailors adopted the Canadians and became good friends. In the process we learned how lucky we were by comparison. That little trawler had served as a convoy escort for two years in the North Atlantic, destroying one U-boat and discouraging many others from attacking. We were impressed with her mettle, and when she shoved off two days later we assured her skipper that whenever he found himself in port with the USS Sterett he was welcome to moor alongside for as long as he liked.

  Meanwhile, the officers and men of the HMS Tyne treated us to a superb brand of hospitality. We spent the first week alongside her, and every afternoon one of her officers came aboard the Sterett, rounded up all the officers who were not on duty, and took them aboard the Tyne for drinks. Despite the fact that their drinks were served without ice, the Scotch whiskey was excellent, and our little afternoon gatherings were tremendous fun. Usually they involved a lot of singing (not very good, but loud) and good-natured ribbing. One day perhaps a week after our arrival, Commodore Moon—now reassigned as our squadron commander and embarked in the Wainwright (DD 419)—assembled all of our squadron’s officers on deck. He told us that he had noticed the heavy flow of U.S. naval officers to the Tyne every afternoon, and he told us that he did not want to see any more of us going aboard her with “a thirsty look on our face.” We all complied with his directive: we continued to go aboard, but we made certain that we did not look thirsty.

  Occasionally a movie was shown on the Tyne or the HMS Dunluce Castle, an old tub that was used as a barracks and station vessel. We also attended a British USO show featuring English stage stars. I remember that a Royal Navy rear admiral volunteered to go onstage and allowed himself to be used as a buffoon, to the delight of the mostly enlisted audience. It was the kind of performance that, although attended by hilarious and undignified behavior, produced respect for the admiral’s good humor and stage presence.

  But we also had work to do at Scapa Flow. Our ships were to be assimilated into whatever Home Fleet operations best suited our armament and capabilities. Thus we had to learn their way of doing things, a process that our hosts seemed eager to facilitate. The day that we arrived, ten British signalmen came aboard to teach their American counterparts how to communicate with the Royal Navy. They were to live on the Sterett and be treated just like our own men. I was delighted with these men: they were all competent professionals with ten or more years of experience behind them, and they adapted quickly to our routines. Our sailors liked them and admired their proficiency. Their training enabled them not only to read and translate tactical signals, but also to understand the tactical maneuvers required to execute the commands received. On ships of the U.S. Navy at that time, only the officers had to learn what the ship needed to do in order to execute a signal command. Suddenly we had a team of signalmen who could advise the officer-of-the-deck on specific tactical responses. This was a boon to us, and it demonstrated how our Navy could more fully utilize the capacities of our bluejackets.

  Without question, the British tars found much about our ships for which to be thankful. The food was perhaps the most welcome of these advantages. Thumbing through Quartermaster Cleere’s diary recently, I came across this passage: “The ten English sailors aboard are really enjoying the quantity, quality, and variety of food they are eating. I guess it is no joke that food is not too plentiful in England. One limey said they were eating like the lords and ladies of London, and it’s probably true.”

  Combined British-U.S. operations out of Scapa Flow began on 7 April. With several British destroyers, we practiced screening the HMS Duke of York and the USS Washington. For communication purposes we were referred to as the HMS Steadfast to hide the fact that elements of the U.S. Navy were present at Scapa Flow. “Steadfast” was a good alias, denoting a sense of dependability of which I hoped we would prove worthy. While the ship engaged in daytime tactical maneuvers, we put the crew through all kinds of drills. Gunnery practice received a lot of attention, and at least once a day I managed to exercise the 5-inch crews at the loading machine for about a half-hour. The Home Fleet had one neat arrangement that I envied: a few miles from the harbor entrance was stationed a small tug with a target sled in tow. Every ship that went past that tug was free to shoot its guns at the target. The tug would then mark the fall of shot and signal the results to the ship. There was no wait and no voluminous report to be made. The Sterett fired her 5-inch guns whenever she went past that corner, and the practice allowed the crew to develop self-confidence and familiarity with the process of gunfire, including the noise and concussion. It prepared us for what lay ahead.

  Each afternoon as we approached the harbor entrance, the flagship hoisted a signal addressed to its destroyers: “Scatter!” At that moment all the destroyers in the screen—often as many as twenty—headed hell-bent and at flank speed for the opening in the antisubmarine net, which was held open just long enough for the returning ships to enter. This hole was only wide enough to allow at most two destroyers to enter together, abreast of each other. The exercise amounted to a game of “chicken” played out under the amused and approving eye of the officer in tactical command. It called for a precise sense of timing and relative movement, confidence in one’s engineering gang, and a lot of fortitude. The risks of collision were high; and in light of the cautious attitude of the U.S. Navy brass, our skippers were not very well prepared for this wild game. I could hardly blame them, because I doubt that our flag officers could have been as forgiving as their Royal Navy counterparts were when damage occurred in these mad dashes. (This is no reflection on U.S. Navy flag officers—congressional reaction would have been very negative.) When I asked one skipper what would happen to the C.O. if a collision ensued from one of the “scatter” exercises, he said, “Oh well, that happens now and then. It’s treated as a normal operational casualty, you know. No fuss!” The philosophy of the British seemed much more likely to produce aggressive ship-handling skills among their destroyer captains than our cautious approach; perhaps we learned something from it.

  On several occasions the Sterett spent two or three days moored alongside the HMS Tyne to make use of her services as a tender. Among her many capacities as a support vessel, the Tyne possessed an “attack teacher”—an antisubmarine training facility that was in essence a mock-up of a destroyer’s bridge complete with wheel, rudder-angle indicator, compass, and underwater detection equipment. Thanks to specially prepared recordings, student sonar operators and conning officers were able to hear the sounds of an actual sonar contact and the development of that contact to the point of a successful attack. Students also made sonar contact with a simulated sub maneuvered by a control team, conducted an attack (which they could watch as it developed on a visual display) using all of the normal ship control devices, and determined whether their attack solution would have worked in a real situation. It was the next best thing to training with a live submarine,
and we made maximum use of it. Our British instructor was a tall Leslie Howard look-alike who acted as though he considered us to be among the world’s most ignorant people. He fancied himself an infallible authority on the Doppler principle, which describes how sound rises in pitch as it approaches the listener and falls as it moves away, and claimed to be able to distinguish the exact speed of an approaching submarine by this means alone. We soon grew tired of his scolding: “No, no—cawn’t you heah the Doppla? You have up Doppla!” But we soon managed to disregard his arrogance and came away from each class a little better prepared to cope with U-boats.

  EVER SINCE OUR ARRIVAL we had wondered what kind of war mission awaited us once we learned to work smoothly with our British friends. Our old companion the Wasp and two members of our destroyer group, the Lang and the Madison, had made a quick dash into the Mediterranean in mid-April to deliver Spitfire aircraft to the beleaguered island of Malta. That British bastion had been under constant attack by German bombers for many months, and we knew from press reports that it was running critically low on fighters. The fresh Spitfires delivered by the Wasp had inflicted significant losses on the Germans, and we speculated that we might be utilized for a similar mission.

  On 29 April we moved down to Greenock, Scotland, arriving there the next day. As we moved through the channel en route to our assigned berth, we could see for the first time evidence of the attacks perpetrated by the Luftwaffe against the people of the British Isles. Bombs had destroyed whole blocks of homes, while dockside naval installations had escaped with minimal damage. Describing this scene in his diary entry, Chief Quartermaster Tim Cleere wrote: “I used to be pretty skeptical about those press reports which claimed that the German bombers always hit the residential areas, churches, and schools, but all the signs here indicate just that. We saw one church that was a complete wreck. It is said that five thousand people have been killed in this vicinity by the German air raids.”

  We sent liberty parties ashore on 30 April and 1 May. Glasgow was only about twenty miles away, and most of our bluejackets managed to get there for a firsthand look at one of Scotland’s busiest ports in wartime. I had visited Edinburgh on one of my middie cruises, so I elected to forgo a visit to Glasgow to save my money; but those who went returned with the sobering realization that the British had taken a savage beating—and that they were absolutely determined to win the conflict. Tim Cleere came back with these observations:

  A truck driver took a bunch of us into Glasgow. It was a wild ride over hairpin curves, and I would have been better off to have waited for the train, but we did enjoy the scenery along the highway. Nearly everyone in Glasgow wore some kind of uniform, many of them from other Allied countries. Even most of the girls were in uniform. My impression was that Britain is making a mighty effort to win this war, and I think the United States could learn something from these people. They are all very cheerful, and you have to wonder how they can be that way, with all they have endured. It was a sight to see the hands of some of the girls who are now employed in an auto factory. They were mechanics’ hands, so stained with carbon and grease that they probably would not come clean, no matter how long or how hard they scrubbed. I wondered if American girls could do the same, and like it. This is absolutely total war over here. The blackout at night was not so bad, because of the bright twilight, but it was an experience to walk through a darkened city, and I mean darkened! We had taken our flashlights (and gas masks) ashore with us, and it was a good thing. I’m glad I wasn’t hungry, because the only food available in the restaurants was fish and chips. Meat comes only once a week over here—in the Navy they feed it to us three times a day!

  On 2 May 1942 our favorite flattop, the Wasp, arrived in Greenock. We noted that she was loaded with Spitfires and immediately figured that we were about to escort her somewhere to deliver them to a friend in need. At 0500 the next morning we departed Greenock in company with the Wasp, the carrier HMS Eagle, our squadronmate the USS Lang, and the British destroyers HMS Intrepid and HMS Echo. As we had guessed, our destination was the Mediterranean. A single Hudson bomber provided air cover for us during most of the daylight hours. The sea state picked up the next day, and our ride became rougher as the day wore on. The British destroyers seemed to have an even tougher time because their bridge structures were more exposed than ours.

  On the sixth we were met by three British destroyers from Gibraltar. They relieved us of our screening duties so that we could run ahead to refuel and meet the heavy ships as they came through the straits. Obviously they did not want the Wasp and the other heavies to stop at the Rock. We sighted Cape St. Vincent Light, on the southern tip of Portugal, at about 0330 on 7 May. As we turned to the east we encountered a gale-force head wind and had to slow to 15 knots. We did not get to Gibraltar until just before dark, accompanied by the Lang, Intrepid, and Echo.

  A small minecraft patrolled Gibraltar’s submarine net, and just before the gate opened for us the minesweeper dropped several depth charges across the entrance. The British were taking no chances on a sub penetrating the harbor defenses while we were entering. As soon as the gate closed behind us, depth charges were again dropped across it. We proceeded at once to moor at the fueling dock, with the Lang securing to our starboard side. While we refueled we also received provisions—including fresh vegetables, which we had not seen in quite some time. We noted that the HMS Renown was present in the harbor and wondered if she might join us for our run into the Med.

  The Sterett and the Lang left Gibraltar just before midnight and patrolled outside for about two hours as the Renown and the rest of the escort force sortied. We joined their screen. I had the deck for this evolution, and I remember how nerve-racking it was to attempt to position ourselves ahead of the heavy ships without the help of radar as they steamed eastward at 20 knots in the pitch-black night. But as we converged on them the phosphorescent bow wave of the Renown became visible, and we took station ahead of her without difficulty. We caught up with the Wasp at about 0800 on 8 May and found that we were one of ten destroyers assigned to the screen. That seemed adequate to us, and we spent the day at general quarters, anticipating a reception committee of German bombers. Apparently they had no indication of our presence, and the only threat we encountered was a submarine contact by the HMS Intrepid. She dropped six depth charges, and we just kept on going.

  At first light on 9 May the two carriers turned into the wind, launched several of their own fighters, and then began to send out the Spitfires. I was on the bridge as officer-of-the-deck and found myself imagining how those young RAF pilots must have felt as they took off from a carrier flight deck for the first time—a fact that in itself warranted some concern. As they left the carriers they were still some three to four hundred miles west of Malta, and there was a good chance that they would have to fight their way to the landing field. In their new role on that island, they would be called upon to fly up and defend it from attack every day. Everyone aboard the Sterett saluted them for their courage and their flying skills that morning. The Wasp and the Eagle launched sixty-three Spitfires. One crashed into the sea shortly after takeoff; it sank immediately, leaving only a few small pieces of wreckage on the surface. The pilot was not recovered. Another developed engine trouble and had to turn back. He landed safely on the Wasp—no small feat, considering that the plane was not configured for carrier landings and that the pilot probably had never made one before. Tim Cleere’s diary noted that the pilot had to make a long run up the flight deck, but the bottom line was that he landed safely. Our hats were off to him.

  Once the Spitfires were on their way, the task force headed back to Gibraltar as quickly as possible. We continued to expect German air attacks and so remained at our battle stations all day; but once again our luck held. The Sterett entered Gibraltar at about 0100 on the tenth to refuel. The heavy ships continued on their way, and we were to dash after them and resume our screening duties just as soon as we were able. While there, we were told that the Spit
fires had arrived over Malta in the midst of an air raid and had fought their way in, shooting down some thirty German planes in the process (a figure I could never confirm). We all felt good about that news and were delighted to hear shortly thereafter that Prime Minister Churchill had sent a congratulatory message to the Wasp, asking, “Who said a Wasp can’t sting twice?”

  I was out on deck shortly after daybreak when two British destroyers came in and moored astern of us. I can still recall how much I admired the way in which they were handled. The line of our pier ran generally east to west. The two ships entered the harbor on a northerly heading, turned east for a few minutes, then simultaneously spun 180 degrees to the left. They slipped into their assigned berths without having to do anything other than backing their engines and throwing their mooring lines to the pier. It was a minor and routine maneuver, one that their crews no doubt had executed many times before, but it served to demonstrate the kind of smart and precise ship-handling skills our hosts made use of every day while we were a part of the Home Fleet—skills honed by the game the escorts played so gleefully every day as they returned to Scapa Flow and reacted to the “scatter” signal. I envied their abilities and hoped that as the war progressed we would learn to handle our destroyers with the same flair and precision. Just a few months later, when we joined the invasion fleet near Guadalcanal, I could see unmistakable signs that my wish had come true.

  Shortly after the arrival of the two British “cans” the Sterett finished fueling and got under way to leave the harbor. As we maneuvered to clear a huge mooring buoy our starboard quarter drifted against the side of a barge that was anchored nearby, and her anchor chain hooked our starboard propeller. Almost before Captain Coward knew that we had made contact, we had managed to wrap about fifteen turns of anchor chain around our starboard shaft. The chain parted, but it took only a few minutes to realize that we were not going anywhere until we removed it: the resulting vibrations were unacceptable. To add insult to injury, we had sounded one long blast on our whistle as we cleared the pier, and the whistle stuck in the open position. We must have awakened every soldier and sailor on the Rock, and perhaps a fair number of the citizens of neighboring Spain, before we managed to shut it off. To make this “Chinese fire drill” (as J. D. Jeffrey called it) complete, we almost collided with a four-engine flying boat that taxied across our path as we struggled back to our berth.