by D. A. Rayner
It was at this precise moment that the shell arrived that had been fired while the commanding officer of the U-boat had been distracted by his junior.
It plunged through the thin side plating at the after corner of number one boiler room, penetrated the bulkhead between that boiler room with its single boiler, and burst against the curved flank of the second boiler. The effects of this single hit were almost disastrous. The giant fans, whose high-pitched whirr was a constant feature of life in a destroyer, normally kept the boiler rooms under pressure while the torches were alight, in order to force the flame through the boilers and the hot gas up the funnel; and once the pressure was released through the torn side, the inevitable flashback occurred. For an instant before the automatic devices cut off the supply of oil, the boiler room was a searing furnace where tortured men shrieked in agony.
The position was bad in this boiler room, but it was even worse in the other. The bursting shell had destroyed at least a quarter of the tubes of number two boiler. From these tubes, and from the big main steampipe that was also damaged, there drained away every ounce of steam in the three boilers. In this room the crew died instantly.
From the bridge the particulars of the damage were not at once apparent. A huge cloud of steam rose in tortive waves from somewhere between the two funnels, carrying among its snow-white billows the black oily smoke from the fire in the forward boiler room. The throb of the engines died.
“Ship’s not answering her wheel, sir,” the Coxswain reported.
The Captain knew he must think. No need to wait on a report to know that his ship had received a vital wound. The wind, which was light, was on his starboard quarter. As she lost her way through the water, the Hecate would turn ever more quickly to starboard, until she came to rest almost beam on to the sea. When this had occurred, her head would be toward the U-boat and her after gun could then no longer be made to bear on the enemy. Provided the German Kapitän appreciated the position, there would be a big arc ahead of the destroyer in which the enemy could maneuver with impunity, whilst he fired into the Hecate’s unprotected bows until he had sunk her.
For the first time the Captain found his own confidence in the final outcome distinctly upset. The fates had been kind to the U-boat. The lucky chance of surfacing up-sun, the three hits, each in its own way tipping the scales more heavily against him—these had put him in an almost untenable position from which he could only be extricated if the wheel of fortune should turn once more.
Thank God the after gun was still firing! A white column of water rose ahead of the U-boat. Again the gun barked defiance. Wondering how much longer the gun would bear, and unable to see it because of the steam cloud, he turned to watch the fall of its shot. The U-boat now appeared to be beam on to the line of fire. Already it was moving slowly toward the arc of complete safety. For a moment it subsided into the hollow of a swell until only the conning tower and gun were visible. It rose swiftly as the sea passed under it. He could see the puff of yellowy-white smoke as its gun fired.
Then, miraculously, another more orange explosion occurred beneath the enemy muzzle, and a dark yellow blob of smoke hovered for an instant around the place where the orange flash had been. When the smoke cleared away, the gun barrel pointed aimlessly into the sky, and of the men who had tended it a moment before—there was no sign.
WHEN VON STOLBERG again trained the periscope on to the destroyer, he saw the havoc that the last shot had caused to his enemy. It did not seem likely that she would steam again before he could complete her destruction. If only he could get ahead of her, so that her after gun would not be able to train on him, he could sink her at his leisure.
“Port twenty,” he ordered.
Schwachofer repeated the order.
Slowly, desperately, the U-boat turned. Now there was hardly enough of a charge left in her one battery to keep her moving. Just as slowly the Kapitän moved around, grasping the periscope handles to keep the destroyer in view.
“Schwachofer, I believe she has stopped! Ask Braun if he can hear any propeller noise on the hydrophone. Her relative bearing now is approximately red nine-oh.” The Kapitän was not again going to let the destroyer out of his sight.
“No, Herr Kapitän, she is stopped,” the Oberleutnant reported back.
“It is very good. Soon we shall be out of the arc of fire of that after gun, and then we can sink the swine.”
“There is very little left in the battery, Herr Kapitän.”
“We only need a very little, Herr Oberleutnant. Once his gun cannot reach us, we shall stop the motor. In three hundred meters we shall be safe. Less than that, because as he stops he will lie beam on to the wind, and his head will come round toward us.”
Schwachofer could sense the appalling suspense under which his Kapitän was laboring. The knuckles of the hands that grasped the periscope showed white—as white as ivory. The man was breathing heavily with excitement, and his tongue licked his dry lips.
Their own gun fired again.
A second later there was a shuddering crash. The sound of the explosion was interlaced with high-pitched screams. The noise died away and left a silence that was full of foreboding.
“Himmel!” von Stolberg cried, leaping to the forward door of the control room. The gloom of the forepart of the boat was shot with a beam of daylight that came from the open fore hatch. Down the hatch there now spiraled a wisp of brown smoke. To the Kapitän it looked as if a serpent was slithering into the boat. He stopped short as he saw Muller run up the ladder. The feet paused when the head and shoulders were in the air. Then the sea boots began to come down the ladder slowly.
“Well, Muller?” the Kapitän asked.
“Kaput, Herr Kapitän, kaput.”
“The gun?”
“As I said, Herr Kapitän, kaput.”
“And the gun crew?”
Muller met the Kapitän’s stare with a glance that was strangely sullen. “They also.” He paused and added, “Herr Kapitän.” Then he turned and disappeared forward into the gloom.
The Kapitän made a mental note that either Muller’s nerve was cracking or the man, left to himself, would have already surrendered. Whatever the cause, it was a matter that would need investigation. For himself, he saw no reason to doubt their ability, even without the gun, to hold out until the arrival of the Cecilie. Perhaps if he coddled the crew with logical explanations, or took them into his confidence more than he was able by his nature to do, there would have been less peculiar behavior developing among them.
The Kapitän hurried back to the periscope. “Midships—steady,” he called as he placed his forehead once more against the rubber pad. “Good. I can no longer see the gun. Herr Oberleutnant, stop the motors.”
“I do not think, Herr Kapitän, that the propellers will turn again, unless we can get the diesels going. The battery is quite flat.”
Von Stolberg shrugged. “What matter? It’s now nine o’clock, and we have but three hours to wait. Let us go with the engineer to see if it is possible to get a diesel running. But first I will order Kunz and Muller to reload at least one torpedo. You have sufficient air, Herr Oberleutnant, to fire?”
Schwachofer bent to inspect the dials of the air bottles. In the dim light filtering from the open hatch, they were difficult to read.
“I think enough to fire one torpedo. Possibly two. No more, Herr Kapitän.”
“One is enough.”
“It will not be easy to reload with the boat rolling like this.”
“It is never easy, Herr Oberleutnant, to do one’s duty. But we will reload at least one tube.”
“Jawohl, Herr Kapitän.”
The Kapitän led the way forward.
“Leutnant Kunz, Petty Officer Muller,” von Stolberg called as he neared the foot of the forward ladder.
The two men appeared out of the gloom that shrouded the forward compartment.
“Reload one torpedo,” the Kapitän ordered.
“It is very dark—alm
ost too dark to see, Herr Kapitän,” Kunz dared to remark.
“Herr Leutnant, you will carry out my order—and at once.”
“Herr Kapitän,” the petty officer spoke quietly. It might be supposed that his age and experience would entitle him to a hearing.
“What is it, Muller?”
“The boat rolls too much. We will damage the torpedo and possibly crush a man.”
“Then load another torpedo.”
The two men looked at each other. Schwachofer watched the battle, and his sympathy ran out to the petty officer—if only because his Kapitän had in his reply considered only the torpedo. Long years of training might inculcate obedience, but they could not of themselves create willingness. The petty officer’s eyes fell from the Kapitän’s face.
“At once, Petty Officer Muller. And report to me as soon as you have reloaded.”
The Kapitän turned and, followed by Schwachofer and Kritz the engineer, stumped up the ladder.
To reload the heavy greasy torpedoes it was usual either to dive to a depth where there was no interference from the surface waves or else, if the sea were slight, to steam slowly with the boat’s head into the waves. To manhandle the two-ton monsters, even with the aid of grabs and chain blocks, while there was any movement on the boat, could only be attempted with serious risk both to the torpedoes and the men. It would have been dangerous enough with the usual good lighting; in semidarkness it would be doubly so.
Von Stolberg blinked in the strong sunlight and was suddenly aware of his own tiredness. The party of three men stood for a moment looking at the wreck of the gun. The British shell had exploded underneath its mounting, flinging the muzzle up and back, snapping one of the trunnion brackets, and breaking the cradle. Nothing that they could conceivably do to it would ever enable another shot to be fired.
They passed on around the conning tower and paused to inspect its battered after end, and the wreck of the A.A. gun. There were two more places on the after casing where shells had hit; and the jagged ends of torn metal twisted upward, revealing the red lead with which the underside of the deck had been painted.
The yellow-green fumes still eddied in waves from the open after hatch that led directly to the engine room; and even to look down from the upwind side they had to hold their breath. From inside came a continuous stuttering sound as the great batteries below the engine-room floor consumed themselves. The fire was as much electrical as it was organic—for no flames could be created without oxygen.
“I wonder if we could get down in gas masks,” Schwachofer suggested.
“I very much doubt it,” the engineer replied. “There is no oxygen down there at all.”
“We could perhaps use the oxygen escape masks?” von Stolberg asked.
“Herr Kapitän, no man could endure the heat. The floor plates will be too hot to stand on.”
“Pour some water down and see,” von Stolberg insisted.
The engineer hurried away to the fore hatch to call for a bucket to be passed up.
The Kapitän and his Executive Officer were left alone. There was a sharp metallic ping from close at hand. They looked at each other. “What the devil was that?” von Stolberg asked.
Both men turned to look at the destroyer. Half a mile away, she lay rolling in the swell. The cloud of steam and smoke was lighter now, but she still remained immovable, and with her bow toward them. A whine in the air above their heads convinced both the Germans. They jumped as one man into the shell-torn hole in the casing.
“One would have thought that we had given the British enough to do without their firing rifles at us,” von Stolberg grumbled.
The engineer was coming back now around the side of the conning tower carrying a bucket.
“Be careful, Otto,” Schwachofer called; “they are firing with rifles.”
The U-boat’s stern was pointing toward the destroyer, but one side of the casing offered a little protection. Kritz and his bucket disappeared over the side of the casing. Walking on the U-boat’s hull, he crept along toward the other two. The waves, lapping the circular hull, soaked his legs and he swore roundly.
“Bring some water with you,” von Stolberg ordered.
“There’s so much in my boots that I needn’t have gone for a bucket,” the engineer complained when he reached them.
In a moment he had handed up a bucket of water and joined the others in their shelter. A bullet whined over them as he crouched down. It made a metallic ping as it crumpled against the conning tower.
“Zum Teufel—the swine shoots well,” von Stolberg remarked.
“And he’s watching us the whole time,” Schwachofer answered.
“It is impossible to get to the engine-room hatch on the protected side because of the fumes,” Kritz informed them. “But there is shelter for one in the casing beside the hatch. If, Herr Kapitän, you will trust my report, I will go and pour some water down.”
“Herr Kapitän, I submit,” Schwachofer spoke, “that I should do so. You have only one engineer and if he were to be wounded or killed . . .” He did not finish the sentence.
“You are right, Herr Oberleutnant. Kritz, let Schwachofer have the bucket.”
Gathering himself, the Executive Officer made a dash for the after hatch. It was only ten feet away, and he arrived comfortably before the enemy had seen him and had the chance to send a bullet after him. A second sufficed to pour the water down the open hatch and to hear the sizzle of steam as it splashed on the deck below. In a minute, jettisoning the bucket, Schwachofer had rejoined his companions.
“Well?” the Kapitän asked.
“It is, as the engineer says, quite hopeless. The plates are so hot that the water turned at once to steam.”
“Then let us go back and torpedo the swine.”
One by one they leapt over the edge of the casing and made their way forward. Once past the conning tower they were hidden from the marksmen on the destroyer and could climb back on to the casing’s top.
From below, as they descended the ladder, came a heavy rumbling noise, shouts of alarm mingled with cries of pain, and then the sound of voices raised in anger.
The Kapitän stormed into the dark space of the forward torpedo room.
“Silence,” he barked. “Stand back, all of you.”
Following his commanding officer, Schwachofer could dimly discern the shining bulk of a torpedo lying diagonally across the confined space. Above it the two grabs swung silently from their chains. The Kapitän’s call for silence had been obeyed by everyone except the man who lay prone beneath that great silvery tube. Falling from its grabs, the two-ton masterpiece of machinery had pinned one of the handlers to the deck. His agonized whimperings filled the dimly lit cavern—a terrible strain to nerves that were already stretched to breaking point.
The Kapitän bent to look at the fallen monster.
“Both rudders and the propeller damaged. Herr Leutnant Kunz, how did this happen?”
“Petty Officer Muller had omitted to see that the after grab was properly secured.”
“That is a lie, Herr Kapitän.”
“Petty Officer, wait until you are spoken to.”
“It is a lie,” the man repeated.
“Be quiet, Muller,” the Kapitän ordered with fury.
“I cannot be quiet, Herr Kapitän, when this young fool accuses me of something I have never done,” Muller answered with considerable dignity.
The probability that he was being forced to back the wrong horse only made the Kapitän more angry. Discipline had to be maintained. The words spoken by a knowledgeable petty officer about an inexperienced young officer may have been right, but leaving the position as it was would have done incalculable damage. In any case the words seemed to von Stolberg to strike at the very root of the discipline that he maintained—a discipline that in its Germanic strictness set the officers as unquestionably superior to the men just because they were officers, and not because they had proved worthy of obedience. The situation, c
ommon enough in the fighting service of any nation, struck at the weakest link in the German armor—and left the Kapitän groping for a correct solution that his own nature and training denied him. As each second ticked by, he became more and more aware that his decision, when it came, would lose him the services of one of the most experienced men in his crew.
“Herr Oberleutnant,” he addressed Schwachofer, and his voice sounded unutterably weary. “Petty Officer Muller is to be placed under open arrest for insulting an officer.”
“Jawohl, Herr Kapitän.” As Schwachofer came forward, he thought that the day continued to grow more and more awful. Had they not, he wondered, sufficient with which to contend without falling into this kind of conflict among themselves?
“Petty Officer Muller,” Schwachofer called, and turned to lead the way back to the control room. Dazedly Muller stumbled after him. It now seemed unthinkable that he had ever dared to defy authority—however unreasonable it had been.
“Now,” von Stolberg said, “we will lift the fore end of the torpedo and release Schott. Then we’ll chock this torpedo on the deck here, and bring out another. And I will take charge of the loading.”
THE DAMAGE to the destroyer was even worse than was at first supposed.
The shell, in entering the ship’s side, had severed the steering rods that connected the wheel in the bridge superstructure with the steering engine that was right aft and above the rudder head. Even if her crew should get her steaming again, the helm orders would have to be passed by telephone from the bridge to the auxiliary hand-steering in the tiller flat.
The shell, exploding on the side of number two boiler, had been directly beneath the platform of the starboard Oerlikon gun. The force of the explosion had lifted the stalk clear of the deck and flung the gun from its bedplate.