THE CREW OF THE SUBMARINE
YOU will remember, back there in the first chapter, we told you about
Fulton’s submarine and how one man operated it, so naturally he was his
own superior officer and able-bodied seaman both rolled into one.
Since those early days of underwater navigation wonderful advances have
been made, not only in submarine construction, but in the crew that
mans her as well, for not only are there many men in the crew of a
submarine of to-day, but each man is highly trained for the work he has
to do.
At the present time the _personnel_, which means the force of men
employed as well as their fighting qualities taken as a whole, includes
a list of no less than 48 officers and seamen, and each and every one
of them is a picked man. The smaller submarines, of course, carry a
smaller _complement_ of men, for there is neither as much work to be
done nor is there room to bunk them.
=Conditions on Early Submarine Craft.=—What with the great array of
instruments, apparatus, and machines that must form the equipment of
the submarine to make her an efficient fighting unit, there is but
little space left in her for her crew, and this was especially so in
the early days.
Owing to the fact that space was, and still is, at a premium, the crew
of a submarine does not list a man who has not one or more important
parts to play in the actual operation of the boat; for every addition
to the crew means that much less comfort for each one, and interferes
moreover, with the carrying out of orders in a rapid and effective
manner.
=When Crews Were Hard to Sign.=—There were no conveniences provided on
the first submarines for their crews; indeed, as we look back now on
those pioneer attempts, it seems verily as if no thought at all was
given to the health and safety of the men who manned them.
It was enough, albeit, to get a boat that could be submerged and which
stood a fair chance of coming to the surface again; so of course there
was not enough air, and the little there was was bad; the quarters, if
there were any at all, were very small and close, and there was a deal
of danger attending the most ordinary maneuvers.
Now, the able-bodied seaman knew all these things only too well, and,
what was more, he had heard tall yarns spun around of the terrors of
the new and strange craft, and these did not tend to strengthen his
desires to hurry up and enlist in that arm of the naval service.
When the various governments began to take a real interest in the
submarine and to keep up an active flotilla, they began to realize
that unless the comfort and the safety of the men were looked after
better than they had been in the past the submarine service would soon
be shorthanded and badly crippled.
So as a sop for the bad conditions which the crew must stand, the men
were offered a large _bonus_—that is, extra money besides the regular
pay—and also extra privileges. In truth, the offers were so generous
and alluring that it was not long before seafaring men began to rush
to the call, and from that time to this there has never been the least
trouble in getting crews for undersea fighting craft.
As the construction of the submarine moved on apace and it grew in
size, and as new inventions and improvements were made to supply pure
air and enough of it, all the discomforts vanished, until a berth on an
undersea craft is as agreeable, nearly, as it is on a man-o’-war.
=What the Base-Ship Is For.=—While, of course, the chief object of a
submarine is, as you can tell by its very name, to travel undersea when
needs be, it is, as you have already learned, not fitted to run for
more than forty-eight hours at a stretch when totally submerged, and
as a matter of fact it spends most of its time afloat and in the awash
condition.
From this you will see that living on a submarine is for the greater
part of the time just about the same—though a little more confined—as
it is aboard any other craft. Her actual cruising _radius_—that is the
distance she can sail from her base of supplies—is seldom more than
2,500 miles; and she is limited to this mileage simply because of the
lack of storage for the food and fuel she needs.
For this reason every submarine must have a supply base, and this
usually is a ship which is supplied with the necessities of life and
power. The _base-ship_, as it is called, is also a _floating dock_,[29]
has a complete machine shop, and every other conceivable thing that she
needs to take care of her flotilla of submarine children. A _mother
ship_ is shown in Fig. 60.
The base-ship follows after her submarines, not directly on their
heels, but so that they will be within easy cruising distance of her.
It may seem that 2,500 miles—nearly the span of the Atlantic—is a long
distance, and it is for a submarine to make one continuous trip; but
ten short runs of 250 miles each will use up her supplies and then she
will have to return to her base for more.
[Illustration: FIG. 60. THE BASE SHIP, SHOWING HOW SUBMARINES CAN ENTER
BOW FOR DRY-DOCK REPAIRS OR HIDDEN TRANSPORTATION.]
In times of peace a submarine never strays far from her base-ship,
indeed, she spends most of her time laying alongside of her except
when at practice. At such times the submarine and the base-ships are
considered _integral_[30] parts of each other, and under these
conditions most of the crew stay aboard the ship.
Thus it is that a submarine sailor’s life is nearly all spent above
water, and it is not such an unhappy one at that.
=How Men Are Trained for Submarine Duty.=—The base-ship is also used
as a training ship for _rookies_—that is green hands—and on it they
are let into the secrets and mysteries of the working, sailing, and
fighting machinery of the submarine.
The rookies are taken in hand by the officers and the more highly
skilled sailors of the submarine and drilled in whatever they are to do
until it becomes second nature to them, for a _fluke_ of any kind might
spell disaster for the whole crew and craft.
=The Complement of a Submarine.=—The word _complement_ (notice that it
is spelled with an _e_ instead of an _i_) means not some pretty bit of
flattery but the full number of men that is needed to man the boat.
The complement of a submarine is not very different from that of a
torpedo boat or other small naval craft. There is, first of all, the
_commander_, or _commanding officer_, who is in charge of and is
responsible for the crew and his boat.
His word is law and he is as able a navigator and _tactician_—as an
expert in directing a submarine, with skill and shrewdness is called—as
it is possible to get. His brain is the master brain of the mighty
craft, for it is he who plans what his crew must do, and when they
must do it to the end that the enemy ship shall be sunk.
Then there are the officers under him—_lieutenants_ (pronounced
_lef-ten´-ants_, with the accent on the second syllable, by stage folks
in naval plays)—and these correspond to the first and second mates,
etc., of a sailing ship.
These officers are also thoroughly competent navigators, and should
anything happen to their superior officer, any one of them could take
command of the submarine and give a good account of himself.
The rest of the crew is made up of engineers and oilers, torpedo-men
and gunners, wireless and signalmen, cooks and able-bodied seamen. The
engineers not only must know how to run the engines to get the most
power with the least fuel, but they must be machinists of the highest
class in order to make repairs of every kind should the boat be damaged
by shell fire.
The torpedo-crew, as the men who have charge of the torpedoes are
called, take care of these mighty missiles from the time they are
lowered into the hull from the base-ship to the moment they are shot
from the tubes on their courses to sink the enemy ships.
This crew also takes care of the trimming tanks, which must, as we
have explained before, be filled with water to offset the effect of
lightening the submarine by the sudden discharge of the torpedoes. The
gunners, of course, look after the guns and are expert _gun pointers_.
All of the new submarines are equipped with _wireless_ and this is
worked by two or more experienced wireless men who are on constant duty
while the boat is afloat and who operate the conductivity telegraph
system when the craft is running submerged.
The submarine is kept in constant touch with the _mother ship_, as
the base-ship is sometimes called, and as the latter has a much more
powerful sending apparatus it can, in turn, communicate with the land
either directly or by relaying the message by another ship.
The wireless operators also keep busy listening for the first faint
signals sent out by enemy ships which may come within range of their
instruments, and though they will not be able to read the messages
if they are sent in _cipher code_[31] they can at least know of the
proximity of the ship.
=Breaking in Raw Recruits.=—When there is peace on earth and good will
toward men the submarine never gets very far away from its base-ship,
about its only excursions being for drill and practice, which is made
up of _maneuvering_ the submarine and torpedo practice.
[Illustration: _Courtesy of Leslie’s Weekly_
THE CREW OF A SUBMARINE. (NOTE SAILOR GOING BELOW THROUGH HATCH IN
AFTER-DECK.)]
To _maneuver_ the craft means to make adroit moves and changes of
position, that is, the boat is put from the afloat into the awash,
submerged, and totally submerged conditions by and for the benefit
of both the new men and old hands.
The submarine’s _place at sea_—that is, her _longitude_ and
_latitude_—is found solely by _log distances_ and _compass courses_
while the boat is running submerged, and her course is corrected for
_drift_ and _leeway_; navigating the submarine by these means is called
_dead reckoning_.
Torpedo practice consists of firing torpedoes with _dummy heads_, that
is, heads which do not contain a charge of explosive, at floating
targets which the submarine or a lighter tows out to sea and anchors
fast. Whether the torpedoes hit or miss they come to the surface after
having been shot and are picked up again and returned to the submarine.
By constant practice the men of the torpedo-crew become highly skilled
in hitting the target with the cigar-shaped projectile, and they are
not allowed to get rusty for want of constant practice.
To add to the knowledge which actual practice gives the raw recruits,
as well as the more experienced men, the officers lecture to them
on every subject that has to do with the design, construction, and
operation of every working part of the submarine.
In this way the crew is trained to do their several individual duties
with clock-like precision and is fit and ready at a moment’s notice to
handle the craft for all she is worth when war comes.
=The Conditions in War Time.=—When the dove of peace has had its
tail-feathers plucked out by the god of war and the enemy nations are
arrayed in battle formation against each other, then the submarine and
her crew are welded into a destroying unit of the most treacherous and
dangerous kind that the sea has ever known.
The conditions on board a submarine are quite different in war time
from those when the nations are at peace. In the first place, when
submarine chasers and aircraft are scouting the seas in search of
underwater boats it is not only dangerous but often impossible for a
submarine to keep in touch with the base-ship by wireless.
We say _dangerous_ because wireless messages flashed forth and back
would betray its presence to an enemy ship, and we say _impossible_ in
virtue of the fact that the craft often has to run under water for as
long a time as she can stay down.
When cruising on the surface the sharpest lookout must be kept every
moment of the time for an enemy ship, which may be torpedoed if it is
a merchant vessel, or the submarine must dive and get away from it, if
it should be a chaser or other kind of armed and armored boat that is
looking to sink her.
Under these strenuous conditions the crew is keyed up to the highest
pitch and the severest discipline is maintained on board. Torpedoing,
diving, submerging, and all the other drills that have been learned
under the easy routine of make-believe war now become stern realities
upon which the very safety of the submarine depends and hence the lives
of the crew.