ADMIRAL WILSON COMES TO BREST
During all this time the fleet of yachts had gone clear of misfortune.
In fog and mist and blackness they were banging up and down the
rock-bound Breton coast amid ragged reefs and pinnacles, through
crooked passages, and over German mine-fields. Offshore they dodged
collisions by a hair or steered where the “Allo, Allo,” of the wireless
submarine warnings indicated that the enemy was active. Good luck and
good seamanship had saved them from disaster. It seemed as though these
yachts bore charmed lives, but the pitcher can go too often to the well
and the _Alcedo_ was fated to be the victim. She had often cruised with
the _Corsair_ on escort duty, and between them there was bound to be
a feeling of companionship. In port the officers and men had become
acquainted, either visiting aboard or meeting ashore. And together they
had stood by to aid the people of the _Antilles_ and the _Finland_ at
the risk of destruction by torpedo attack.
[Illustration: CHIEF YEOMAN PAULSON]
[Illustration: GUNNER’S MATE WILEY]
The _Alcedo_ left Quiberon Bay in the afternoon of November 4th with a
convoy bound to the United States. In the middle of that same night,
with murky weather, the yacht was fairly blown to pieces and twenty men
were killed or drowned with no chance to try to save themselves. It
was assumed by the survivors, and quite plausibly, that in the darkness
the yacht might have been mistaken for one of the transports by the
commander of the U-boat, who, if he knew his business, would have
preferred to pot one of the big troop-ships rather than a small escort
vessel.
Commander W. T. Conn, Jr., of the _Alcedo_, was carried down with his
ship, but somehow came to the surface and fought his way clear of the
suction and the fearful confusion of _débris_ and agitated water. He
described the disaster as almost instantaneous, a disintegration of the
yacht whose frames, bulkheads, and plates must have been ripped apart
from end to end as though they were so much cardboard.
While asleep in the emergency cabin immediately under the upper bridge
[said he], I was awakened by a commotion and received a report from
some man unknown, “_A submarine, sir_.” I jumped out of the bunk and
went to the upper bridge where the officer of the deck, Lieutenant
Drexel Paul, informed me that he had sounded general quarters at
sighting a submarine on the surface about three hundred yards on the
port bow, and that a torpedo had been fired. From the port wing of the
bridge I was in time to see the white wake of the torpedo as it drove
straight for the ship. Lieutenant Paul had put the rudder full right
before I arrived, hoping to avoid the blow. The ship answered slowly
to her helm, however, and before any other action could be taken I saw
the torpedo strike the ship’s side just under the forward port chain
plates.
I was thrown down and dazed, for a few seconds, by falling wreckage
and torrents of water. On regaining my feet, I sounded the submarine
alarm on the siren to call all hands if they had not heard the general
alarm gong, and to direct the attention of the convoy and the other
escorting vessels. I shouted to the forward gun crews to see if they
were at their stations, but by this time the forecastle was awash. The
foremast had fallen, carrying away the radio aerial. I passed the word
to abandon ship.
I then left the bridge and went into the chart-house to obtain the
ship’s position from the chart, but the lights had gone out and I was
unable to see. Stepping out of the chart-house, I met the Navigator,
Lieutenant Leonard, and asked him if he had been able to send a radio
and he said, “No.” I then went with him to the main deck and told him
to take charge of cutting away the forward dories and life-rafts.
At the starboard gangway I stumbled over a man lying face down. I
rolled him over and spoke to him, but received no reply and was unable
to make out who he was, as we were all in darkness. It is my opinion
that he was already dead. Moving to the after end of the ship, I
took station on a gun platform. The ship was filling rapidly and her
bulwarks amidships were level with the water. I sung out to cut away
the after dories and life-rafts and throw them in the water, and told
the men near me to jump over the side.
Before I could follow them, however, the ship listed heavily to port,
plunging down by the head and sinking. I was dragged down with her,
but came up again and swam to a life-raft to which three men were
clinging. We managed to lift ourselves upon it, and then, looking
around, I observed Doyle, chief boatswain’s mate, and one other man
in the whaleboat. We paddled over to them and crawled into the boat.
It was half-filled with water and we started to bale and to rescue
survivors from the wreckage. The whaleboat was quickly crowded to
capacity and no more could be taken aboard. We then picked up two
overturned dories which were nested together, separated and righted
them only to find that their sterns had been smashed. Presently we
discovered another nest of dories which were found to be seaworthy. We
shifted some of the men into them from the whaleboat and proceeded to
pick more men from the wreckage. During this time, cries of distress
were heard from others adrift who had floated some distance away. Two
of them were believed to be Ernest M. Harrison, mess attendant, and
John Winne, seaman. We proceeded to where they were last seen, but
could find no trace of them.
About this time, which was probably an hour after the ship sank, a
German submarine approached the scene of the torpedoing and lay to
near some of the dories and life-rafts. No effort was made to assist
the men freezing in the water. Three Germans, presumably the officers,
were visible upon the top of the conning tower as they stood and
watched us. The U-boat remained on the surface about half an hour and
then steered off and submerged. I then made a further search through
the wreckage to be sure that none of my men were left in the water. At
4.30 in the morning we started away from the scene to attempt to make
the nearest land.
The flare of Penmarch Light was visible and I headed for it, observing
the star Polaris and reckoning the light to be about northeast. We
rowed the boats all through the forenoon and sighted the Penmarch
Lighthouse at 1.15 P.M. Keeping steadily at the oars, turn and turn
about, we moved toward the coast until 5.15 in the afternoon when
a French torpedo boat took us aboard. There were three officers
and forty men of us, who were promptly carried into Brest, where I
was informed that two other dories, containing three officers and
twenty-five men, had landed at Penmarch Point. This was the first news
that these had been saved, for they had not been seen by any of my
party near the place of the disaster.
It was true of the _Alcedo_ that in the moment of gravest crisis the
cohesion and discipline of the Navy manifested itself. Orders were
given and obeyed while the shattered yacht was dropping from under
the feet of the young men and boys who had worn the uniform only a
few months. It was a nightmare of an experience in which panic might
have been expected, but officers and bluejackets were groping to find
their stations or endeavoring to cut away boats so that others might be
saved. Such behavior was fairly typical of the patrol fleet, although
no other yacht was doomed to such a fate as this, but there was the
stuff in the personnel to stand the test and the spirit of fidelity
burned like a flame.
The yachts had been playing the game lone-handed, hoping to be
reinforced by enough destroyers to move the American convoys which were
subjected to long and costly delays in the French ports for lack of
escort vessels to carry them out through the danger zone. The news that
the United States proposed to build two hundred destroyers sounded
prodigious, but it failed to fit the immediate occasion. To the
Queenstown base were assigned the up-to-date oil-burning destroyers as
fast as more of them could be diverted from home, and they were doing
superb and indispensable service in cruising a thousand miles offshore
to meet and escort the troop convoys in to France, but they could not
tarry to take the ships out again nor to protect the slower supply
convoys and undertake the other work of the Breton Patrol.
The French coast was compelled to do the best it could with the cards
that were dealt. There was no such thing as discouragement in the
_Corsair_ or her sister ships, but the feeling grew that the job
was vastly bigger than the resources. It was singularly cheering,
therefore, when the flotilla of veteran coal-burning destroyers came
storming in from the Azores, all stripped and taut and ready for
business, looking for trouble and unhappy until they could find it.
They became close kindred of the yachts, sharing the rough weather
cruises with the convoys and, when in port, taking their doses of
the dirty, back-breaking work of eternally shovelling coal in little
baskets. And by the same token, their men wore the common mark of the
trade, the shadows of grime beneath the eyes which soap and water could
never entirely remove. Yachts and destroyers took orders from each
other at sea and seldom disagreed. The authority depended upon which
commander held the senior naval rank to qualify him to direct the
movements of the patrol division.
_Reid_, _Smith_, _Flusser_, _Lamson_, and _Preston_, they were rated as
no longer young and in size were lightly referred to as the “flivver”
class when compared with the thousand-ton destroyers operating out of
Queenstown, while bets were made that a winter in the Bay of Biscay
would be too much for them. But they stood the gaff and sailed home
again after the war, while the unterrified crews bragged of the merits
of their sturdy boats and forgot all the hardships. Like the yachts
they had a sprinkling of college rookies among the bluejackets, and of
Reserve officers on the bridge, while the Regular Navy leavened the
lump.
[Illustration: BUCKING INTO THE WINTER SEAS]
[Illustration: SHE TAKES ’EM ABOARD GREEN]
When the November winds began to show their temper, blowing strong from
the west and north, the _Corsair_ had a foretaste of what the winter
service would be like. There happened to be no one aboard who took the
trouble to set down on paper, in diaries or letters home, just what
the life was in the crowded compartments below decks when the ship
was bucking and rolling five hundred miles offshore and the combers
toppled green over the bows. In the _Reid_ destroyer, however, was a
young lawyer from Wisconsin, Timothy Brown, who was not only a very
able seaman, but also something of an artist with a pen, and he managed
to convey very adequately what all these young mariners put up with in
order to make the seas safe for democracy. Almost word for word, he
might have been writing of the _Corsair_:
A wave suddenly lifted us and I went down on my right hip, sustaining
severe contusions and abrasions, not to mention a general shaking up.
Our chief pharmacist’s mate rushed up with a tourniquet, iodiform
gauze, and sticking plaster and asked me what I needed worst. Thanking
him, I made my way below and moored to a stanchion for chow. I call
attention to the stanchions because our tureens, containing food and
silverware, were hitched to them while the rest of the food was in
aluminum platters which the mess cooks surrounded as best they could
with their feet and knees. Occasionally a platter would get away from
our inexperienced mess cook of the Reserve Force and he would dive
across the compartment to nab it, only to lose other dishes which he
was safeguarding. The hungry sailors would assemble the chow again,
whereupon each man would help himself and eat under whatever endurable
circumstances he could find.
Gentle reader, imagine yourself perched upon a camp-stool with your
face to port and your back to starboard, at the seamen’s dining-table,
trying to steer a bowl of soup safely into your face. The ship rolls
forty-five degrees and your stool and soup bowl begin to slide at the
same time. You hold the edge of the table with your left hand, clamp
your spoon down hard into the bottom of the bowl to secure it, then
cautiously push yourself to your feet, for the stool threatens to
carry you across the compartment in a jiffy. The angle of the bowl
now being constant with the relation it bears to the table, the angle
described by the ship’s lurch spills half your soup. You quickly
release your grip on the table edge and take the soup in both hands
to steady it. This leaves the soup suspended perfectly between zenith
and nadir, fixed in its relation to the bowl, if you don’t weaken.
Your spoon and slice of bread have been sliding all over the table,
kept from hitting the wet deck only by a wooden flange. Before you can
plan a campaign to absorb the soup, your feet begin to slip and ere
you can blink an eye you have slid four yards across to the starboard
mess table, your feet tangled with a stool, and you bump into a
shipmate who turns loose his own soup so that it fits perfectly down
the back of your neck.
The other day a tureen of canned salmon skidded off a near-by locker
and landed under the starboard table. The mess cook plunged after
it, but missed it by a hair. The tureen bounded into the lap of our
Irish oiler, who shouted gleefully, as he clutched it with both hands,
“I’ve got the bloody thing.” I was reminded of a fat football player
receiving the ball on the kick-off in his centre of gravity and not
knowing what to do with it. The ship’s swing back upset our hero and
the salmon slipped away from him, landing on the locker of a gunner’s
mate and spoiling a brand-new suit of liberty blues.
I had the misfortune, at this sad moment, to let a ration of stew get
away from me to the deck. There was no use in staying below to hear
the mess cook rave, so I seized a cold potato between my teeth and
followed it madly all the way to the chart-house where I feasted in
peace. I was thankful to be alive, thankful that I had a slippery deck
to skate on, a speaking-tube to cling to, and an oilskin coat which
fitted so snugly about my neck that not more than a quart of briny
water seeped into it every time our good ship did a courtesy to the
waves. Only a third arm could have made me happier. Every sailor needs
one in his business.
The deck continued to be a sort of good-natured joggling board which
playfully teased you, smashed you, and tried to exterminate you. In
another hour I had contracted decorations on my knees that stuck
out like hens’ eggs, slivers of skin had been peeled off my shins,
and pains of various kinds convinced me that, although my heart,
lungs, and diaphragm were still working, they had shifted from their
accustomed places. I had grown so feeble from underfeeding and
excitement that you could have knocked me flat with a dried herring.
It would have been an advantage to go below and try to sleep, but the
ship was as unsteady down there and the stifling air was not tempting.
When it was time to go below, a sudden encounter with a wave sent
me to my hands and knees. Bethlehem steel is hard, so I crawled the
distance to the ladder and fell to the quarter-deck, then fell down
the other ladder to the head of my bunk. Only one light was burning
and it was all wrapped up in black cotton socks so the submarines
couldn’t see us. I groped my way into the bunk and removed my shoes,
this being an old custom with sailors, to rest the feet. Then I
stretched out and was ready for a few hours of slumber. However, the
waves continued to pound us and made the night hideous. The machinery
creaked and groaned and a leaky steam-pipe kept whistling like a
peanut roaster. To stay in my bunk it was necessary to run my arms
beneath an elastic strap that goes over the middle of the mattress and
under the metal frame.
In this position I remained doggedly silent until midnight when our
watch was called again. I was so sleepy that I remembered little of
what happened during the next four hours, except that at the end of
it I noticed a radio man swinging around a smokestack in an effort to
snag our flying wireless apparatus and put it to rights again. After
two or three hours more of misery in the bunk, breakfast time came,
with beans and loaf bread on the menu, and I felt sure that I would be
lucky if I could stomach a single bean. Beans didn’t look a bit good
to me, yet I was forced to eat something or I couldn’t stand another
watch.
At the table we did not waste much time on etiquette. To wash your
face for breakfast during a gale was considered a decided economic
disutility, and we didn’t care what place we occupied just so we got
a mouthful of grub. But one thing was always insisted on, and that
was for a man to remove his headgear at meals. It didn’t make any
difference whether a fellow had any pants on or not, but he must not
presume to wear a white hat or a watch-cap. All hands would howl him
out of the compartment.
The foregoing fragment of a deep-sea idyll is included in a war story
of the _Reid_ destroyer as deftly compiled by George M. Beatty, Jr.,
one of that dashing crew, and published with the title, “Seventy
Thousand Miles on a Submarine Destroyer.” This young man was heartless
enough to print in the volume a ballad of his own devising which had
such things as these to say of the author of this chronicle of the
_Corsair_:
“Grim Father Neptune has his throne
In the Bay of Biscay, all alone,
And on the day of which we speak,
He served out weather rough and bleak;
He sent us hail and he sent us rain,
And ’twas not long ere Ralph D. Paine
Did hie himself to the skipper’s bunk
And swear the writing game was punk.”
Soon after the flotilla of coal-burners came to Brest, the whole scheme
of American naval operations in France took on a new aspect with the
arrival of Rear-Admiral Henry B. Wilson. He was the man to perceive
the vital need of expansion and to create the organization so urgently
required. Outspoken yet tactful, with the hearty affability of a sailor
and the energy of a captain of industry, Admiral Wilson proceeded
to build upon the surmise that the war might last three years and
demand an American army of four million men. The pulse of the service
quickened and the response was loyal and instant.
It was not long before the executive offices of the Admiral and
his staff, in a tall building of Brest, resembled the headquarters
of a busy firm in Wall Street. It was the centre of a network of
communication by wire and radio with the entire shore-line of France,
from Dunkirk to the edge of Spain, and with the Allied naval chiefs of
Paris, London, and Washington.
The _Corsair_ received her orders and did as she was told, but guiding
her movements was the complex and far-flung activity of the secret
intelligences which revealed only the deductions and the results. The
Admiral’s changing charts were dotted with tiny flags and lines of red
ink which recorded, hour by hour, the track of every German submarine
that stole seaward from Zeebrugge, and the plodding courses of every
Allied convoy that steered in hopes of a safe haven. The decoding room
unravelled the messages that whispered by day and night from a hundred
sources, or caught and read the German ciphers that were sent to the
U-boat skippers far out at sea.
Bit by bit was put together an organization of equipment and personnel
which extended from Brest to a dozen other bases and separate patrol
divisions, each with its own subordinate commander. Gradually it came
to embrace such a list of departments and responsibilities as these:
Coastal convoy escorts
Harbor tug fleet
Naval Port Officer
Marine Superintendent
Supply office
Repair shops
Repair ship
Barracks
Personnel
Pay Office
Public Works.
Yard Boatswain’s Office
Radio repair shop
Naval magazine
Naval hospitals
Shore patrol
Docks
Canteens
Oiling stations
Coastal stations
Coaling stations
[Illustration: THE SHIP’S COOKS AND THE WARDROOM STEWARD]
[Illustration: THE NOBLE JOB OF PEELING “SPUDS”]
All this was not set in motion in a week or a month. Admiral Wilson
had to build almost from the foundation. The French organization was
depleted and worn. Vice-Admiral Moreau and Rear-Admiral Grout achieved
everything in their power to assist the American undertaking, with
men, ships, and material, but it was unfair to expect too much of
them. When the Queenstown destroyers came into Brest and the officers
found time to go ashore, you might have heard them boast, in the
most gentlemanly terms, of the splendid efficiency of their own base
and the extraordinary ability of Admiral Sir Lewis Bayly, who directed
their operations. At this, an officer from the _Corsair_ was likely
to fling back that the Queenstown outfit ought to get on, with the
vast resources of the British Admiralty at its disposal and a base
that had nothing much more than a fleet of destroyers on its mind. The
whole French coast was cluttered up with transports and cargo boats,
from Brest to Bordeaux, and it was some job to keep them moving, not
to mention chasing Fritz. And as for Admiral Sir Lewis Bayly, K.C.B.,
he was said to be a fine old bird, but he wasn’t the only two-fisted,
“iron-bellied” admiral in the war zone, and the doctrine of the Breton
Patrol was “Wilson, that’s all.” In such manner was voiced the spirit
of friendly rivalry between the Navy men of Brest and Queenstown and it
was the kind of loyalty which you might expect.
French opinion of the work of the American naval forces found
expression in the newspapers. Admiral Wilson was held in the highest
regard, personally and officially, and _L’Illustration_ said of him:
The indomitable will of our Allies is represented by Admiral Wilson.
He has a physiognomy which you never forget. His quick manner of
shaking your hand while looking you squarely in the face, the smile
which, I dare say, follows up the orders he gives, his brief and
concise speech, denote a great firmness of character. He knows what he
is here for and what to do, and as he wishes to carry on a big task
properly he frees himself completely of details,—on his desk are no
papers, no books, no litter of documents. He is precisely aware of
what he wishes to be done, and when he has spoken his serenity shows
that not for a second does he doubt that he will be obeyed.
_La Dépêche_, one of the journals of Brest, manifested the cordial
feeling of the city in stating:
Admiral Wilson is now a well-known figure among us. He takes part
in our daily life, shares in all our sorrows as well as in our
hopes. Later, without doubt, the title of “Citizen of Brest” will be
conferred upon him. It is a pleasure to converse, if only by means of
an interpreter, with this fine mind which has a natural tendency to
action. He makes his resolutions without embarrassing himself with
paper work or useless formalities.
In the first week of November, the _Corsair_ was sent to England with
a group of American ships which were to join an outward-bound convoy
assembling at Mount’s Bay, Penzance. Quartermaster Carroll Bayne
mentioned this trip in his diary, as follows:
_November 5th._ Penzance is very interesting. All sorts of seaplanes,
etc., flying about. I did not rate liberty, but most of the men did
and went ashore for a few hours. I amused myself by holding a long
conversation with a naval quartermaster on a British yacht, the
_Venetia_, anchored near us. He was a good chap and a typical “Limey,”
with his “carry on” and “awfully.” ... _6th._ Left Penzance. Night
very dark. We have in the convoy, besides the four destroyers, the
steamers _Houston_, _Evangeline_, _Montanan_, and two others. The
_Clan Cummings_ was to have come with us, but joined the British
convoy which left half an hour ahead of us. She was torpedoed at 8
P.M. She was the biggest ship in the whole flock and was right in
the middle of sixty-five other vessels. How the Germans do it, I
can’t see. We had a scare this morning when the _Evangeline_ hit
something, either a mine or a wreck, or a submarine, or a torpedo. We
dashed around and stirred things up, but there was no explosion or
disturbance in the water. We proceeded to Saint-Nazaire and anchored
safely.... Had a great fight on board. The “Spic” cook got into an
argument with one of the firemen and it was some set to. The cook drew
a knife which Dave Tibbott snatched away from him. The skipper took a
hand and he surely had a full head of steam.
Another trip out with empty transports and then the _Corsair_ was
assigned to the escort of two of the huge ships which were unlucky
enough to be torpedoed several months later, the _President Lincoln_
and the _Covington_. This time they passed safely through hostile
waters, and with them were the _Pennsylvania_, _Nansemonde_, and
_Neches_. When these towering troop-ships began crowding into Brest,
including those which had been German liners, it was significant
of the fact that the American Army was really moving into France.
Instead of battalions or regiments, the convoys were thenceforth to
disembark whole divisions, and Brest was to see from fifteen thousand
to forty thousand stalwart American soldiers pour out of one group
of ships after another. The responsibility of the escort vessels was
heavily increased, and officers and men thanked God when one of these
tremendous argosies had been moored outside the breakwater without
hindrance or mishap.
It was while waiting for this convoy, just mentioned, to be ready
for sea, on November 16th, that the _Corsair_ became considerably
agitated for fear that Commander Kittinger had been lost or mislaid.
Quartermaster Bayne reflected the general state of mind when he noted:
Still in Quiberon Bay, waiting for the captain. Everybody is
getting worried as to what has happened to him and the _Smith_. The
scuttle-butt is full of rumors.... Tibbott, Houtz, Evans, Barry, and
others are to be sent home to get commissions, but not a chance for
me. The only thing, I guess, that our captain would recommend me for
is a firing squad.
Commander Kittinger was having troubles of his own which may serve to
convey an idea of the little trials and tribulations which were apt to
beset the course of events in French seaports. In language admirably
restrained, considering the provocation, he reported to Admiral Wilson:
The escort commander left the _Corsair_ and embarked in U.S.S. _Smith_
to make passage to Saint-Nazaire for conference with the Naval Port
Officer. Shortly after passing du Four Light, the _Smith_ was lost in
the fog and anchored about 9.30 A.M. A boat was lowered and by noon
the ship was located as between Grand Charpentier and Le Pierre Perce.
At this time a strong ebb tide was running which made navigation by
dead reckoning doubtful. The _Smith_ also had on board the French
military pilot. Another attempt was made to reach the mouth of the
Loire, but the soundings indicated shoal water and the ship was again
anchored. Finally, at 10.30 P.M., the fog lightened sufficiently so
that the principal navigation lights were visible and the ship got
under way and anchored at Saint-Nazaire at 11.30 P.M. The fog again
set in and continued through the night.
At 6 A.M., November 17th, I left the _Smith_ to go ashore to confer
with the Naval Port Officer. At this time the tide was running about
five knots ebb and the fog was so thick that objects could not be
distinguished for more than a hundred yards distant. The boat missed
the landing and fetched up on the beach at Le Petit Taraict. I walked
ashore and reported to the Naval Port Officer about 9.30 A.M. He
informed me that he had no news, and calls were made at the Army Base
and upon the Commandant Marine. No information of importance was
obtained at the latter place. Afterwards a call was made at the Bureau
de Renseignements which was found closed. An appointment was made for
me to get the latest news at this office at 1.00 P.M.
Upon my return at that time the office was still closed. About 2 P.M.
the fog lifted and I returned to the _Smith_ in the captain of the
port’s launch. On going aboard I found that urgent engine repairs
were being made which would delay the ship for two hours or more.
As it was impossible to get to Quiberon and hold conference in time
to move the convoy that night, I decided to delay sailing until the
following morning. An appointment was made for a visit at the Bureau
de Renseignements at 7 A.M. on the 18th, by the Naval Port Officer. I
reported at that time and found the office was closed. I communicated
by telephone with the office of the Commandant Marine and received no
further news. Returned to _Smith_ and got under way for Quiberon.
Six months of service in the _Corsair_ had hammered most of the
greenhorns into rough-and-ready sailor-men who had come to know the
ways of a ship and the feel of the sea. A few still suffered and
were pallid about the gills when the waves rolled high, but it was
everlastingly to the credit of these unfortunates that they made no
effort to be shifted to shore duty and were resolved to stick it out
to the bitter end. The war bred many kinds of heroes and among them
is to be rated the sailor who continued to be seasick. One youth
in the _Corsair_ confessed that he could never sleep below, but in
all weather, month after month, he curled up on deck, in a boat, or
wedged himself in odd corners, wet or shivering, nor had he any other
intention than to stay with the ship until she flew her homeward-bound
pennant.
[Illustration: BOATSWAIN’S MATE HOUTZ IN THE NAVY’S STORM CLOTHES]
[Illustration: SWOLLEN SEA, FROM THE FORWARD CROW’S-NEST]
The enlisted personnel, in respect of intelligence, ambition, and
education, excelled the average of the Regular Navy. This was bound
to be true of a Reserve Force recruited as this was. Many of them
were anxious to win promotion and to attain commissioned rank. It was
realized that the swift expansion of the Navy, with a strength of
fifteen hundred ships and four hundred thousand men already in sight,
had made the shortage of officers acute. There was no prejudice against
the Naval Reserve, and from its ranks were chosen most of the ensigns
and lieutenants for the new fleets of destroyers and submarine chasers,
for the transports and the armed guard of the merchant marine.
The word had passed through the _Corsair_ that examinations could
be held and commissions granted on board ship or at the base, and
also that applicants whose records merited it might be chosen by the
commander to go to Annapolis for the three months’ intensive course
which would turn them out as temporary ensigns in the Regular Navy.
Some of the aspirants preferred to study while in the ship and try to
pass the tests, a little afraid that if detached for Annapolis they
might not be sent back to the war zone.
It was inspiring to find the ship’s officers anxious to assist these
ambitions. The _Corsair_ became more or less of a nautical school.
Earnest young men were to be found frowning over problems and
text-books instead of playing cards at the mess tables or reading old
magazines. Those who had been in college had a certain advantage in
that they had been compelled to make some sort of an acquaintance with
mathematics and were presumed to have acquired the habit of study.
It was the popular thing to be a grind. Lieutenant McGuire and Chief
Quartermaster Shelton Fair showed keen interest in teaching navigation
and were very helpful to the pupils who wrestled with the knotty points
of the subject.
The novelty wore off, of course, and the laggards fell by the wayside,
for the requirements were stiff, and dogged persistence and many a
headache were required to master the technique of the naval ensign’s
job. The reward was waiting, however, for those who deserved it, and
there was no taint of caste or favoritism. The service was essentially
democratic, barring only the differences in station which discipline
demanded. Through the autumn and winter, the _Corsair_ was schooling a
fine group of ensigns for duty in other ships.
It may be of interest to explain what this course included, as defined
by the Bureau of Navigation in a formidable document “Relative to
Examinations of Enlisted Men of Regular Navy for Appointment as Ensigns
for Temporary Service, also of Certain Reservists and National Naval
Volunteers to Ensigns, Naval Reserve Force.”
In a general way the would-be ensign of the line was expected to pass
examinations, written and oral, in such departments of knowledge as
these:
GENERAL INSTRUCTIONS
Acquaintance with Navy Regulations and Naval Instructions and General
Orders of the Navy Department.
Care of enlisted men’s clothing, bedding, and equipment and marking
same.
Emergency drills,—such as fire, collision, abandon ship, etc.
NAVIGATION (_except Nautical Astronomy_)
Rules for preventing collisions, international and inland.
System of buoyage in the United States.
Use of charts.
Describe a magnetic compass.
Describe how to lay a course.
What is variation and deviation?
Use of a pelorus.
Ability to take bearings and determine position by same.
Use of hand lead and precautions to be taken in obtaining soundings
with hand lead.
Use of soundings in fixing positions.
Ability to read mercurial barometer.
Ability to navigate by dead reckoning.
Use of Chip log.
Use of patent log.
Adjustments of a sextant.
Use of an azimuth circle.
Use of Sir William Thompson’s sounding machine.
How to obtain chronometer rate by tick at noon.
NAVIGATION (_Nautical Astronomy, Sights, etc._)
Ability to take and work out the following sights of the sun:
Meridian altitude, time sight for longitude, obtain error of compass.
SEAMANSHIP
Types of boats used in the Navy and their equipment.
Handling of boats under oars and sail.
Boat salutes.
Hoisting boats.
Man overboard—lowering and handling of lifeboats.
Ground tackle and how to care for. Marking chain.
Duties of officer of the deck.
Ship’s log, what is put in, etc.
Etiquette of the side.
Routine ceremonies, such as colors, etc.
Orders to steersman, right rudder, etc.
ORDNANCE AND GUNNERY
School of the squad and company in infantry.
School of the section and battery in artillery.
Precautions to be taken in handling small arms and their ammunition.
Describe any Navy gun with which you are familiar.
Describe the projectile, fuses, and primers for any Navy gun with
which you are familiar.
Brief description of the care and preservation of the battery.
While this mental fodder was in process of digestion, you might,
perhaps, have overheard such abstruse and breezy dialogue as this,
aboard the _Corsair_:
“Good-morning, old top. When may the officer of the deck decline to
relieve the deck?”
“I pass. When shall the sides be piped, and what are the limitations
placed on sending official signals?”
“You can search me. But I’ll bet you don’t know how to swing ship for
reciprocal bearings.”
[Illustration: A LETTER FROM HOME. COALING SHIP MUST WAIT]
[Illustration: CARROLL BAYNE GETS HIS ENSIGN’S COMMISSION]
“A cinch, my boy. Right off the bat, now, what is the correct dope on a
Traverse Table and how do you use it?”
“You make me smile. Upon getting under way what special entry must
be made in the ship’s log? Likewise and also, what is a Polyconic
Projection? Snap it out, now!”
“You poor simp! I’m the man that invented that gadget. On the level,
there’s only one question on the whole list that you are sure of.”
“What is it? I’ll bite.”
“When and where is the meal pennant flown?”