THE HUNT
During June and July, Evans devoted a liberal share of his attention
to the radio-compass problem. He felt that the apparatus was still on
trial. A slight lapse might cause this instrument of untold
possibilities to be lost to the navy because of the _Sheridan_
disaster and Rich’s subsequent effort to discredit the apparatus in
Mortimer’s eyes. Going frequently aboard the destroyers, he looked
over the apparatus and talked with both the operators and the
officers. With the former he discussed all details of operation; with
the latter, the prospect of using it effectively in the search for
subs; in talking to both groups he made sure that they understood what
was necessary for all hands to know.
The problem of submarine destruction was even more difficult than in
the war with Germany, for then the German U-boats to reach their
hunting ground must pass through British waters so narrow as to render
the mine barrage feasible and to facilitate a considerable
concentration of anti-submarine craft. Now the submarines emerging
from Gibraltar and Lisbon, both powerfully defended, could far more
easily lose themselves in the broad Atlantic.
From time to time when they attacked convoys the submarines were sunk
or damaged by the escorting destroyers. But the numbers dealt with in
this way were not nearly enough to give the needed protection to
shipping. The chasers now and then picked up suspicious noises with
their listening gear, but seldom were able to follow them to a
successful issue.
Hunting squadrons of destroyers, three in each squadron, were going
out and sweeping the seas, but encounters with the enemy were so rare
as to be almost negligible. As of old, the search was long and
tedious. Whole days of seeking in vain for a trace of the enemy were
telling on the men. They were growing stale and losing their
enthusiasm, and so the efficiency of their vigils waned. Encouragement
was sorely needed—something to rouse them with an intimation of the
great role that was theirs should the opportunity come and they use it
right. Especially some signal success was needed to awaken them to
renewed efforts. Both officers and men felt that they were groping in
the dark for the unseen foe. Occasionally they heard him send radio
signals, but usually the bored operators failed to get bearings before
the signals had ceased. No one had ever seen a submarine successfully
tracked down by radio compass and by hydrophone, and therefore the
prospect of this feat was not real to them.
The radio compasses on the shore stations, with their long range of
operation, were now beginning to get cross bearings on enemy
submarines from time to time, and were making an encouraging beginning
in tracing their movements about the sea. But as yet little had been
done to direct the destroyer squadrons by this method to the fruitful
hunting grounds. It was time for a concerted effort to bring about a
successful hunt which would serve to demonstrate what could be done
with the materials already at hand.
Evans found technical duties to perform at Communication Headquarters
on shore, as well as in the main radio room of the mother-ship to
which he was attached, and these duties gave him the opportunity to
follow closely the reports that were coming in from the radio-compass
stations on the various islands. In this way he knew as much as any
one in the force about the movements of enemy submarines. He watched
the increasing efficiency with which their movements were revealed,
and at the same time he gradually acquired a familiarity with the
habits of the undersea pirates and the general plan upon which they
operated.
He studied the personnel on the various hunting groups of destroyers,
and talked with their skippers whenever the opportunity offered. He
was looking for the most promising group with which to give a
demonstration that would wake up the men. If a squadron could once
pick up the scent by radio-compass triangulation and then get the sub
within hydrophone range, there would be a good chance of ending her
career; and even if they only gave her a hard run for her life, a
report of this would do a deal of good to the rest of the flotilla.
Therefore he searched diligently among the young skippers as they came
and went on their arduous patrols; with each he found business to
discuss, and thereby sized him up. At last he found the man he wanted,
one of the senior skippers in the flotilla, a man named Fraser, with
the rank of commander. He was a tall, well-built, fair-haired man,
clear-eyed and alert, with a magnetic personality. Wholesome and
vigorous, with a boyish enthusiasm and a genuine frankness about him,
he at once inspired in Evans a strong liking, and, more than that, a
confidence that he was a real man. He saw at once that Fraser was in
earnest, and open-mindedly seeking any and every means that human
ingenuity could devise to get the enemy. Fraser took Evans for what he
was, regardless of rank, and eagerly discussed with him the problem of
utilizing all the gear on his ship to the best advantage. Evans did
not take long to discern that, besides the charm which had attracted
him, Fraser had a mind of unusual quality, clear and strong, well
trained in his profession, but untrammeled by the fetters of
tradition; a mind that could grasp quickly, think straight, and see
with the vision that comes only with imagination—a quality without
which no man can be a truly great naval or military leader. Evans
found plenty of lines of approach to Fraser through questions of the
fitness of the radio gear for the various tasks required in the
team-work of the hunting squadron. Through such channels he led the
conversation into a discussion of all the possibilities that might
arise in the pursuit and attack of a submarine, a discussion which was
mutually profitable. They naturally spoke the same language; far fewer
words sufficed to convey ideas to each other than was the case with
most of the skippers. Each caught the other’s meaning with a minimum
of explanation, and each knew that the other had caught his. Chatting
together in the radio room they picked up the trail of an imaginary
submarine by radio compass and maneuvered to get her within range of
the hydrophones and magnetic detectors.
“I wish you’d go out with us on patrol,” said Fraser, “and see to it
that all this gear is being handled right. You could help us by seeing
that the boys understand their duties and are making the most of these
things.”
“There’s nothing I’d like better,” said Evans.
“I’ll get Larabee to let you come. It won’t be hard to arrange.”
This was what Evans wanted. He proceeded to interest Fraser in the
work that the radio-compass shore stations were doing in reporting the
movements of enemy submarines. Fraser had not appreciated the extent
to which this had become possible.
“I tell you what we’ll do,” said the Commander; “we’ll choose a time
when they’ve got a hot scent of some subs coming within striking
distance, and then we’ll go to it.”
Soon thereafter Evans and Fraser met more than once at Communication
Headquarters and looked over the radio-compass reports together.
Before long Fraser was making the same generalizations concerning the
habits of the enemy at which Evans had arrived. And as in the ensuing
days, they watched the reports, Evans visited the three destroyers in
Fraser’s squadron and made sure that men and material were up to
standard in every detail, from the radio sets to the hydrophones and
the internal communications on each ship. He drilled the radio-compass
operators in taking bearings on dummy signals, drilling them so hard,
with ever shorter and shorter messages, that soon they could give him
a fairly good bearing even on the briefest signals.
Before many days of waiting had passed, reports came in from the radio
compasses at the Grand Canary, Madeira, and the station at the eastern
end of Saint Michael’s, showing that two submarines were proceeding on
a northwesterly course from Lisbon toward the steamer lanes of the
North Atlantic. First, one had been detected communicating with her
base, and then the two communicating with each other and increasing
the power of their signals as their divergent courses required it. The
Flag Office, which had somewhat reluctantly acceded to Commander
Fraser’s request that he be allowed to hold his squadron in port in
order to await such an opportunity, now issued the orders to proceed
to the indicated area in search of the enemy, and granted his request
that the radio gunner should go with him on his ship.
Evans contrived to visit the weather station before sailing, and
received assurance of two days at least without storms or fogs. He
also arranged with Communication Headquarters that if the shore
stations should report another “fix” on their intended quarry, the
news should be transmitted to them without delay. The message was to
be repeated three times, and there would be no acknowledgment, for the
squadron had better keep quiet on this hunt. At dusk he went aboard
the destroyer, and as he reached the deck he heard with a thrill the
roar of the great blowers voicing the impatience of the ship to spring
to the full speed of her thirty thousand horse-power. His blood
stirred as he recalled half-forgotten days when to the tune of the
same roar the gaunt destroyer on which he lived—a mere lad
then—slipped her mooring at Queenstown and stood out into the wet
drizzle of the North Atlantic. “From chief radio electrician to radio
gunner,” he thought—not much change in status for twenty years.
It was just after dark when the three destroyers slipped their
moorings and, headed by Commander Fraser’s ship, took the opening in
the net at sixteen knots. Completely darkened, they headed south till
well out of sight of land, then turned east and rounded the end of
Saint Michael’s far enough away to be invisible from shore. It was not
forgotten in the navy that news had spread mysteriously from
Queenstown to Berlin with lightning speed in an earlier generation,
and there were those on shore who were not over-friendly at heart with
the Americans.
The last reported “fix” of the two submarines had shown them to be
proceeding approximately northwest by west at eleven knots, having
left Lisbon on the morning of the previous day. As the destroyers
cleared Saint Michael’s, Fraser laid his course north by east one half
east, or, as they say in the navy, seventeen degrees. Up to this point
they had steamed in column, but now they formed a scouting line,
Fraser’s ship in the center, each wing boat six miles away bearing
abeam from the flagship. The accuracy with which these ships could
place themselves by dead-reckoning, using engine revolutions for
distance and careful steering for direction, was such that they could
shift from column to line abreast and hold their relative positions
for a considerable time, dark as it was, without any direct means of
checking them. But this would not suffice for the task in hand; now
they must be prepared for accurate triangulation upon their victim by
radio compass with their scouting line as a base; they must at all
times be sure of their relative distances and bearings from each
other, for on this would depend their locating of the submarine by
radio bearings. Attached to staffs at the bow and stern of each ship
were two strange lanterns. No visible light came from them, but each
emitted horizontally a powerful beam of infra-red rays, invisible to
the eye, but capable of detection with a delicate instrument. By means
of this instrument observers on the bridge of each destroyer could
tell just where the other destroyers were—could register both
direction and distance, invisible though they were to the eye even
with the most powerful glass. Thus the two wing ships kept themselves
in their proper positions as the flagship steamed ahead through the
night, and thus the flagship verified the positions which they kept.
All night they steamed at eighteen knots, and though they did not
expect to be in the vicinity of the submarines they sought till the
following night, still all hands maintained a ceaseless vigilance. The
weather was fine, and the three slender ships left scarcely any wake
as they slipped quietly through the water.
There is no warrant officers’ mess on a destroyer; when warrant
officers are present, they live in the wardroom with all the other
officers, from the skipper down. Thus there is an informal atmosphere
which is far removed from the traditional etiquette of a battleship.
Evans found himself in a party of genial youths which might have been
taking a vacation cruise together in a small boat, as far as one could
judge from the wardroom life. Fraser put them all at ease, encouraging
in every way the informal spirit of good-fellowship, yet never for a
moment losing their respect nor failing to inspire them with the sense
of his leadership.
They were a heterogeneous mixture, the officers of this ship, eight in
all; three besides the skipper were graduates of the Naval Academy;
one was a temporary ensign who had worked up from the ranks through
the grades of chief petty officer and warrant officer; three were
college boys of yachting experience who had joined the navy for the
war. But months together at sea under the magnetic personality of
their commander had welded them into the most harmonious and congenial
crew of shipmates. One of the college boys, Jackson by name, was a
very good singer, having been prominent in his college glee club.
Besides this he was uncommonly handy with the mandolin, a gift which
was much appreciated on board the destroyer. He had brought with him
his mandolin and some old college song-books, both of which were in
demand. The skipper was fond of good singing and had a very fair voice
himself. So when the day’s duties were done, it was their wont, as
often as might be, when the supper dishes had been cleared away, to
make the wardroom ring with many a rousing chorus. All of the gang
would be there but the lone officer who “had the deck.” He, standing
on the bridge, alert and watchful, directed the man at the wheel and
the quartermasters as they moved swiftly about, performing the duties
of the ship’s nerve center. He held the lives of all on board in his
hands while the others made merry below. And whenever it was not
Jackson’s turn as officer of the deck during the eight-to-twelve
watch, he would “break out” his mandolin, and harmony would reign in
the cheery little wardroom.
On this occasion the day following their departure proved uneventful.
Steadily they held their course at eighteen knots. The visibility was
fair and there was no difficulty in maintaining the scouting line
according to plan. Fraser conferred with his executive officer and
Evans at some length over the details of their intended procedure. All
hands at the radio compass, the hydrophones, and magnetic detectors
were coached as for a great athletic contest till each man looked
forward to the coming night as the chance of his life. Early in the
morning a message had been received from Punta Delgada reporting the
submarines still heading northwest by west at eleven knots. The
destroyers themselves had not heard them, for their range was not
equal to those of the shore stations with their marvelous amplifiers,
too sensitive and too cumbersome to be successfully installed on
vibrating or crowded ships. All day long no signals were heard, and
none were expected till midnight, for the subs would not send signals
needlessly, and when they did they would use so little power that the
hunting squadron could hardly expect to hear them more than fifty
miles; at the present speed they should be within fifty miles of the
supposed position of the enemy about the middle of the night.
Darkness came, and the infra-red lanterns were again turned on. All
was in readiness, the radio operators on watch listening like wild
animals in the night. Fortunately Jackson did not have the
eight-to-twelve watch that night; so when supper was finished, the
skipper said to him: “Jackson, break out your mandolin and let’s have
some old-time songs; it’ll do us a lot of good.”
Evans had slipped off to look over the radio gear once more and see
that all was in perfect order. This done, he rejoined the crowd in the
wardroom just in time to join in the chorus of “Lucy Lee,” a song
which was having a great run of popularity at the time. Jackson turned
over the leaves of one of his song-books and picked out one favorite
after another according to the mood of the moment. Some he sang as
solos; some were familiar airs that all joined in singing. Fraser,
thoroughly enjoying himself, did his share of the singing, looking
over the book, and now and then suggesting a song that caught his eye.
In a lull between songs, Jackson rambled on with his mandolin through
a kaleidoscopic series of melodies till through some strange caprice
he stumbled on a Christmas carol which most of them knew. They sang
it, and Fraser then fell to recalling the winter evenings in his
boyhood when he with other children of the village where he lived had
sung this and other carols with the new-fallen snow on the spruce
trees reflecting the lamplight from the window with a golden glow.
Evans picked up the old Princeton song-book off the wardroom table and
began turning over the leaves. Suddenly his face lighted as he turned
to “Stand to Your Glasses Steady.”
“That’s the most stirring song ever written by man,” he said. “That
was written by a British army officer facing death in the great
cholera plague in India.”
Jackson looked at the song and started playing the air from the notes.
“Oh, yes!” he said presently. “I remember that. My older brother used
to sing it when I was a little kid. He had a crowd of them home from
college with him, and they all used to get going on that song. My God!
how they raised the roof with it! I’ll never forget it.”
Evans and Jackson sang the song together, Fraser looking over the page
and joining in after the first verse. There was a fire in Evans’s
voice which it took this song to bring out, and every one sat up and
took notice, and before the song was done each felt it.
Fraser spoke with warmth, “That is a wonderful song. Let’s try it
again; maybe every one can join in this time.”
They sang, and the song rang out with all the fire that’s in it—the
fire that makes it immortal. They had just begun the third verse,
“Who dreads to the dust returning?
Who shrinks from the sable shore?”
when a sharp call through the voice-tube from the bridge broke in:
“Radio room reports a high-pitched spark on five hundred metres.”
Almost before the others had taken it in, Evans shot out of the door,
saying, “The hunt’s on.”
Running aft along the matted deck, he climbed the ladder leading to
the radio-compass shack, and, silently opening the door, seated
himself beside the operator on watch who was listening intently as he
rotated the coil back and forth, his eyes glued on the dial. Evans
slipped the spare head-phones over his ears and plugged them into a
socket which enabled him to listen in with the operator. Not a sound
could he hear. After listening a moment, he said, “D’you get a
bearing?”
“Very rough,” answered the operator. “He only sent for about three
seconds after they opened the main antenna. I reported it, though.”
“What was it?”
“Fifteen degrees,” answered the man.
Evans made a mental calculation. “We’re headed seventeen; that makes
it thirty-two, true,” he said to himself.
They sat a moment in silence, then suddenly there came through the
receivers a rapid series of dots and dashes in a peculiar high-pitched
note. Both men grew tense as if struck by an electric shock. Almost
instantly a small light flashed beside the operator, showing that the
main radio room had heard and recognized the unmistakable note of an
enemy submarine, and had opened the main antenna to enable the radio
compass to function. With a rapid spin the operator whirled the coil
through a large angle, stopped it and spun it back a little more
slowly. The message stopped, but it was enough.
“How’s that?” said the operator, turning the coil partway back and
stopping it.
“Right, as near as I can judge,” said Evans. “Let ’em have it.”
The operator called through the voice-tube:
“Bridge—thirteen.”
Evans listened a minute more, then hearing nothing, took off the
head-phones and, saying, “Do your damnedest, and we’ll have this goose
cooked by morning,” he slipped out of the shack and ran up to the main
radio room to see how things were working there.
Ever since he left the wardroom the skipper had been conversing with
the wing boats by radio telephone. Both wing boats had reported their
bearings. Evans satisfied himself that enough power was being used in
the transmitter to reach the wing boats, but no further. Then he went
up on the bridge. Commander Fraser was at the moment talking to the
other destroyers.
“Now’s our chance,” he said. “Keep the boys on the job, and on your
life don’t miss any tricks.”
Fraser put up the phone. Catching sight of Evans, he said:
“Exec.’s plotting the fix in the chart room; let’s see how he’s coming
out.”
They went to the small chart room on the after part of the bridge, and
looked over the executive officer’s shoulder. He was just finishing
his plot of the second set of triple bearings from a line on the chart
representing the twelve-mile scouting line of the three ships. Where
the lines met they crossed in a pair of elongated triangles which
overlapped in a small area.
“Those look like good fixes,” said Fraser. “Where would you put him,
Evans, on the strength of them?”
Evans drew a pencil line around the two triangles, enclosing an area
about seven miles long and two miles wide. “It’s safe to say he’s
somewhere in that area. The second fix was the best; I’d go more by
that. If we put him there, we shan’t be far off,” and he marked with
his pencil a spot near the center of the triangle made by the second
set of bearings. This spot was thirty-eight nautical miles from the
present position of the flagship. Fraser said, “They’re undoubtedly
still steaming northwest at about eleven knots; but they’ll change
when they hear us coming.” Then he made a hurried calculation, stepped
to the radio phone, and called to the other destroyers:
“Course, twenty-three degrees, true; speed of port wing boat,
thirty-six knots; starboard boat, thirty-two knots till line is true
on the new course, then squadron speed thirty-six knots; keep six
miles distant for the present; speed up now.”
He put up the phone, said to the officer of the deck, “Course,
twenty-three degrees; speed, thirty-four knots.” Word was passed to
the engine room, and almost at the same moment the three destroyers
swung six degrees to starboard and leapt forward like greyhounds
unleashed.
There was a light head wind which at eighteen knots had scarcely been
noticed, but now, as they dashed headlong into the seas at double the
speed, masses of fine spray rose from the bow and swept madly past,
white and ghostly in the darkness, mingling again with the tumultuous
white wake receding rapidly astern.
But there was little thought of spray or foam on the bridge. Captain
and “exec.” alert and tense, conversed in brief sentences, while the
officer of the deck with brisk orders directed the business of the
bridge. Quartermasters, on the jump, dispatched their duties, noting
and reporting readings of the wing boats’ distance and bearing. The
helmsman, ignoring all else, kept the racing ship true on her course.
Elsewhere gun crews and depth charge crews were ready for instant
action.
Fraser turned to Evans.
“Has he heard our radio phones yet?”
“Not with the power we’re using,” said Evans. “He’ll get us by
hydrophone first. At thirty-six knots we’ll make a noise he can hear a
good way off.”
Ten minutes passed. Then the man at the radio-compass voice-tube
reported, “Bearing three degrees,” and a moment later the wing boats
each reported a bearing taken on the same signal of the enemy. In a
second the executive officer was plotting the bearings from the new
base line.
“Corking fix! They damn near meet in a point,” he said to the skipper
and Evans who were close behind him.
“The blighter hasn’t changed course yet,” said Fraser. “I don’t
believe he’s heard us.”
The new fix showed that probably the submarine was still traveling
northwest at about the same speed as before. But now her distance was
barely thirty miles.
After this no more radio signals were heard. Had she heard them racing
toward her yet? If so, she would soon be submerged, and they must find
her by hydrophone. By this time the three ships had squared their
scouting line and were tearing through the water at thirty-six knots.
For fifteen minutes they rushed on through the darkness, holding their
line in perfect order, but hearing no sound and seeing no sign. The
suspense grew. The submarine could not now be more than twenty-four
miles away. Fraser again called the other ships by radio phone, and
ordered them to close in till within two miles of him.
“How far off could he hear us coming at this speed?” he asked of
Evans.
“If he stopped to listen, he’d hear us all of thirty miles, if he has
the gear I think he has. But I trust he has had no intimation of our
coming, and hasn’t stopped to listen. Running at eleven knots he might
not hear us till we’re within fifteen miles or less.”
“When he does he’ll submerge and do his damnedest to fool us,” said
Fraser.
“He’ll know we’re closing in to cover him with our hydrophones,” said
Evans, “and assuming that, his best chance to get out of range is
either to hold the course he’s been on, nearly at right angles to
ours, or to double back about at right angles the other way.”
“I wonder which he’ll do.”
“I bet he’ll go back,” said Evans.
“He’s about as likely to think we’ll expect him to, and keep right
on.”
“They don’t think much of our intelligence,” said Evans. “Of course
it’s a gamble; but I bet he thinks we’re too stupid to think of his
doubling back; he’ll bet on our going for the place his course has
been taking him.”
“Well,” said Fraser, “suppose he hears us when we’re fifteen miles
off, and then submerges and changes course. His best speed submerged
is nine knots. By the times we get there he may be anywhere within a
radius of about four miles of that point. The farthest we can hope to
hear with our hydrophones, while we’re going faster than he, is a
mile. That means we can cover at best a strip six miles wide. We’ve
got to leave two miles of the circle uncovered on the first shot. If
we miss, we can double back. If he goes slow enough, we’re apt to miss
him altogether. I guess it’s our wits against his, with a betting
element thrown in. Anyhow, I’m not betting on him to-night.”
Twenty-five minutes of converging courses brought the wing ships
within two miles of the flagship, and dimly their dark forms and white
streaming wakes could be seen through the darkness on either side. Now
the assumed spot where the submarine, hearing her pursuers, had
probably submerged, lay seven miles dead ahead;—twelve minutes more at
their racehorse speed.
Fraser spoke. “Evans, I’ll chance it on your guess, and cover the
eastern half of the circle, leaving the western two miles to search
later if we miss.”
A few brief words were flashed out by radio phone, and the next minute
the squadron had changed course eight degrees to the eastward, and all
three charged on at top speed.
Presently the executive officer said, “Isn’t it about time to slow
down and give the listeners a chance, Cap’n? They can’t hear anything
while we go at this speed.”
“The trouble is, he’ll hear us and slow down, too,” said Fraser.
“He’ll slow down till we can’t hear him unless we’re right on top of
him. There’s little chance he’ll be near enough to hear yet. I’d
rather go full speed till we’re almost on the line I think he’s on,
and then stop quick and try to spot him before he has time to slow
down. Tell the engine room to be ready to stop all auxiliaries when I
give the word, and give the listeners warning.”
Calling the other ships by phone, he gave them similar instructions.
Nine minutes passed in silence save for the roar of the blowers and
the swish of the waves and the ghostly sheets of spray swirling past
over the bridge and lifeboats. The executive officer was beginning to
fidget. Commander Fraser stood with his eye on his watch.
“Stop the auxiliaries. Give the word to the listeners,” he called
quickly. “Ready? Stop the engines.”
A signal was flashed to the other ships. The great torrents of steam
pouring into the turbines of the three ships stopped almost as if the
valves controlling them were geared together. As the ships lost
headway, the suspense became almost unbearable. A minute elapsed, with
no word from the listeners, but to every man on the bridge it seemed
an hour. Then a voice from the hydrophone station down in the hull
called, “Motors heard slowing down, too faint to get bearing; slowed
and became inaudible about five seconds after engines stopped.”
“My God! I wish the wing boats would report,” said the skipper.
The words were hardly spoken when the radio phone from the starboard
ship reported, “Motors heard slowing down as we stopped, roughly
bearing fifty-five degrees, true.”
Fraser fairly jumped for joy. Eagerly he called the port ship: “Have
you heard anything?”
“Nothing heard,” was the answer.
“Starboard ship reports motors bearing fifty-five, true; motors heard
here, no bearing,” he replied. “Submarine probably three to six miles
east of us. Your course is eighty degrees, true, speed, thirty-five;
start now.”
“Aye, aye,” came back from the port ship.
To the starboard ship he called, “Course, eighty, true, speed,
fifteen; start now.”
Then to the officer of the deck, “Course, eighty, true, speed,
twenty-five.”
In a few seconds the pack was dashing forward again in a maneuver
calculated to bring them in nine minutes into line on their new
course, within a mile or two of their prey—perhaps less.
Fraser reviewed the evidence:
“Bearing fifty-five from starboard end; barely heard here; not heard
port. It’s a good scent, if it isn’t a fix.”
“We haven’t got him yet,” remarked Evans uneasily. “He may stop
altogether and balance with his tanks. Then we’ll have to find him
with the magnetic detectors, and that way we can barely cover a
thousand yards, the three of us. It won’t be any cinch.”
But the frightened submarine underestimated the hydrophones of her
pursuers and preferred trying to steal away at the almost silent speed
of three knots. In the last half of the ninth minute, as the ships
were coming into perfect line, Fraser again called a general halt; and
as the three ships made their sudden stop which enabled the sensitive
hydrophones to penetrate the silent deep about them, clearly the
listeners down in the three hulls heard at the same moment the faint
hum of motors, again dying quickly away as the fact that the pursuers
had stopped again to listen was reported to the submarine captain and
the motors were hastily shut down. But this time each ship had heard,
and each had read the bearing.
First the report came up the voice-tube from the flagship’s own
hydrophones, “Relative bearing three forty-three.”
“What does that make it?” said Fraser.
“Sixty-three, true,” answered Evans.
“That’s right,” said Fraser, and, turning to the executive officer,
“Plot it.”
Next in quick succession came the reports from the wing ships: “A
hundred and sixteen, true,” from port; “twenty-five, true,” from
starboard.
“Plot ’em lively,” said the skipper.
The “exec.” lost no time, and as the third line he ruled crossed the
other two almost at their point of intersection, Fraser gave a shout.
“A fix for fair!” he cried, and, seizing the radio phone, called
simultaneously to both wing ships, “Do you still hear submarine?”
Only silence was reported from all three ships; the sub was clearly
lying still to escape detection, or stealing along with her motors
barely turning over.
Receiving this report, he called back, “Submarine moving very slowly
or not at all; fixed at a point bearing sixty-three degrees, true from
flagship; distant twenty-five hundred yards; close in at thirty-five
knots to two hundred yards for attack,” This was followed by
instructions as to courses needed to execute this delicate maneuver,
bringing each ship on his flank at the right moment to cover with a
destructive pattern of depth charges the area where the submarine must
be. Again the three ships leapt to high speed, the wing ships
converging sharply toward the flagship, while she forged slightly
ahead of them.
“He knows we’ve got his trail,” said Evans. “He’ll probably strike out
to one side at full speed. If he does, he can get clear of the
destructive area of our pattern before we can get there to make it.”
Fraser, who, getting so clear a fix on a submarine so close at hand,
had felt ready to attack without further reconnoitering, especially as
the sub had apparently been motionless when he started his dash for
the attack, now did some quick thinking, making mental calculations
half aloud:
“Twenty-five hundred yards, two minutes and a half; subtract fifteen
seconds for hearing us start and giving orders, fifteen more for
getting up his speed; two minutes—nine knots—six hundred yards. That’s
right; he’ll just about clear us if he uses full speed.”
He looked at his watch, then gave orders preparatory to another halt,
then looked at his watch again. After a minute and a half on
converging lines he called a halt. Once more the listeners heard the
submarine motors stopping more quickly than before, but now they were
near enough to get a fix in spite of the abruptness with which the
sound ceased.
The fix showed the submarine now only a thousand yards from both the
flagship and the port wing boat. Fraser well knew that as long as the
destroyer lay still they could detect the submarine at this range if
she tried to move at a speed of more than one knot. Therefore, he took
his time planning how to place his depth charge pattern, for, though
the stern of each ship was well stocked with these destructive cans,
the total area which they could cover with the certainty of a kill
was, after all, not large. The maneuver planned to a nicety, he gave
the order for the final charge.
“We can cover him this time,” he said.
Jumping to thirty knots, the port wing boat and the flagship rushed in
on sharply converging courses till the men on the bridge of each ship
watched with their hearts in their mouths the black hulk of the other
looming up as if nothing could avert collision. But when they were
less than five hundred yards apart, Fraser calmly said, “Right
rudder,” and flashed a signal to the other ship, at which both
destroyers swerved upon parallel courses just before they reached the
spot designated by the last fix.
At that moment Fraser gave the signal to begin the barrage of depth
charges. From rack and Y-gun the great cans splashed into the water,
three every six seconds from each ship, and then shock after shock
seemed to jar the whole ocean. Astern through the flying sheets of
spray from the bow could be dimly seen a solid wall of white fountains
towering high against the sky. Meanwhile the starboard ship, left
behind by the submarine’s dodging to port, raced after the other two
with all the speed she had. Overtaking them she laid her pattern down,
piecing it on to those already begun by the other two, so that not a
square yard of the designated area should escape the force of the high
explosive. For half a minute the first two ships let loose this
frightful din, twenty charges from each ship; then, as the starboard
ship finished her pattern, it ended as suddenly as it had begun, and
at a single word from Fraser all three stopped short to listen. Had
they got her?
It was at this point that the magnetic detector showed what it could
do. This device was able to show the presence of a mass of steel the
size of a submarine if it came within a hundred and fifty yards. One
man on each ship had been assigned to keep his eye on this and nothing
else. As soon as the din had ceased, reports came to the flagship’s
bridge that toward the end of the area bombed a small deflection had
been seen on the flagship’s detector, and one twice as large on that
of the port ship.
“She couldn’t have been beyond the port boat, could she?” asked
Fraser.
“No; we shouldn’t have got any deflection at all in that case,”
answered Evans.
“Can you trust it not to make deflections out of nothing, or due to
the depth charges?”
“No gear is absolutely infallible, but I think you can trust this,
especially as the starboard boat got no deflection, and the sub hardly
could have got far beyond the port wing boat, in the time she had.”
“That’s reasonable,” said Fraser. “Anyhow, we’d better wait here and
listen a bit.”
Fifteen minutes passed, and not a sound was heard. Was the submarine
sunk? Was she so crippled that she could not move, or was she “playing
’possum”; playing dead in hopes they’d leave her? Submarines have
survived a barrage as dense as this one, damaged, but still able to
lurk beneath the sea.
At length Fraser said, “I think we’d better explore.” The three ships
turned cautiously round and headed back for the spot indicated by the
magnetic detectors, steaming at only six knots, so that no sound
should be missed, the flagship slightly in the lead. They had gone
perhaps two hundred yards into the bombed area when the man on the
flagship’s detector reported a deflection.
“Is it getting bigger?” asked the skipper.
“Yes,” came through the voice-tube.
“Let us know when it’s maximum,” he called back. Just then from the
starboard boat came the report, “Very slight deflection.”
A few seconds later from the voice-tube came, “No further increase.”
At a word from the skipper a float with a light was dropped over the
stern to mark the spot.
Dropping depth charges at six knots is unhealthy for the boat that
does it, as some learned to their cost in 1918. Therefore no “ash
cans” were dropped during this exploratory maneuver. As they passed on
away from the lighted float, the deflection of the magnetic detector
grew smaller and disappeared. The detectors of the three ships
indicated that the sub had been almost under the flagship, but a
little way to starboard. Her position was well marked by the light.
Proceeding far enough to get up a safe speed for bombing, the three
ships turned and formed their line with greatest care, this time
closer together. Then they steamed back at a good speed over the
marked spot. Just before they reached it, the signal was given, and a
small but deadly pattern of depth charges began to fall. Through the
skillful generalship of Commander Fraser the circle of certain death
surrounding each depth charge was made to overlap those of the
adjacent charges. Two men standing at the stern of the flagship,
straining their eyes back into the darkness, reported seeing black
things rise into the air in the midst of the great white fountain of
shattered water following one of the explosions. But this was not
enough for Fraser;—imagination may play strange tricks on a night like
this.
As soon as the last bomb had exploded, the ships stopped short once
more, and listened. Not a sound was heard beneath the waves. Again
they turned and steamed slowly back to the spot where the focus of the
attack had been and dropped overboard another lighted float to replace
the first which, needless to say, had been demolished by the barrage.
This time the magnetic detectors showed not the slightest deflection.
Slowly they steamed back and forth twice over the marked spot,
listening as well as watching the magnetic detector, but not a sign or
sound was recorded. Then they steamed at fifteen knots on a “retiring
search curve” like a watch-spring around the lighted float, listening
intently, till they had covered a circle with a radius of a mile and a
half, but no trace was found, magnetic or audible, of the submarine.
The inference seemed clear, for had she been slipping away from them
they would have heard her, or if too slow for that the magnetic device
would have found her somewhere in that area. Could there have been
some serious lapse in the vigilance of the trained listeners and
observers, or some error in their calculations, or had the submarine,
indeed, been sent to the bottom of the sea?
It was nearly two o’clock, and strained nerves were feeling the effect
of their prolonged nocturnal adventure. And now a tawny moon rose over
the eastern horizon, and under it a golden trail marked the crests of
the waves.
“That may help us,” said Fraser.
The light on the float glimmered faintly on the water near the focus
of their last barrage. Toward it the three ships steamed, swerving as
they approached it so that the supposed point at which the submarine
should have sunk would lie in the wake of the moon. As the light on
the float was lost among the flashing crests of the waves, the
squadron swung into line abreast, and laid its course straight into
the shimmering path of gold on the water.
“There!” said Evans eagerly, pointing toward the moon’s wake. “There’s
your oil slick, isn’t it, Captain?”
[Illustration: “THERE’S YOUR OIL-SLICK, ISN’T IT, CAPTAIN?”]
“Yes—yes, that’s it for sure,” said Fraser. “We’ll examine it a bit.”
As they approached, the smooth patch on the water, spreading across
the wake of the moon, was unmistakable. At first a slender line, it
widened to a band, as they came nearer, till it clearly covered a
large area, spreading out into the darkness on both sides of the
moon’s wake.
Slowing down as they approached the edge of the oil slick, they
prepared to skim the surface of the water for a sample of the oil,
that it might be identified by the chemist at headquarters.
Suddenly Fraser exclaimed, “Hullo! There’s something else. Left
rudder.”
The shining surface of the oil slick was broken by a small black
speck. He was heading the ship straight for it. Other dark fragmentary
objects were discerned. Fraser signaled to stop the engines. In
another moment he was down on deck directing the seamen as they fished
a few floating objects out of the water. Evans had followed him. When
the first of these was brought aboard, Fraser seized it and carried it
quickly into the light of the wardroom. It was a splintered piece of
wood. Fraser examined it carefully, then reached for another which a
boatswain’s mate brought him from the rail.
“That settles it,” he said. “We got her.”
To his professional eye there was no doubt that this wood had come
from the inside of an enemy submarine. Other fragments were brought in
which confirmed his conviction; mute testimony to the tragedy just
ended in the depths of the sea. Before long, enough fragments had been
gathered to provide souvenirs of the chase to every man on board.
“It has been a wonderful hunt,” said Evans with warmth, “and the
team-work of your squadron is the best thing I ever saw. The other
ships will like to hear the result.”
“Yes, I’ll tell them,” said Fraser, and went off to call them by radio
phone.
Evans left the wardroom and hastened aft to the radio-compass shack.
The operator who took the bearings had been relieved at midnight by
the other operator assigned to this duty, just before the final
barrage was dropped. But with things like this going on he did not, as
usual, turn in and go to sleep. He stayed beside his mate in the shack
where Evans now found him still listening with the extra phones. It
was not their part to question, but only eternally to listen. Through
the din of the bombing and through the long hours afterwards, they had
listened intently and patiently.
Evans came into the shack like a gust of wind.
“We got the sub,” he said to the tired operators, “and we have your
good work to thank for it, not forgetting the hydrophone listeners.
You gave us good fixes, you and the boys on the other ships, and
without ’em we couldn’t have got her; neither could we without the
hydrophone fixes later on; as for the skipper, you’re lucky to be on
his ship, he knows how to use your fixes when you give ’em to him.”
“I reckon I didn’t do much,” said the second operator.
“There’ll be another hunt, and maybe you’ll get your chance then.”
He then outlined to them the story of the hunt and attack, showing the
significance of what they had done. Then with a final word of
congratulation he left them and went forward. Whatever else those men
forgot about the war in after years, they never forgot that.
The men on all the ships were tired; the depth charges were so nearly
expended that had another submarine been found they couldn’t have
attacked her with much hope of success. Therefore they laid their
course for Punta Delgada and in the early dawn, twenty-six hours
later, slipped into the harbor and tied up to their moorings.
Commander Fraser submitted to the Force Commander a report of the
hunt, which was a model of instructive exposition. Copies of it were
distributed among all the destroyer captains for their enlightenment
and for the instruction of the officers under them. It made a great
stir, and was the chief topic of wardroom talk for the best part of a
week. Those skippers who studied it intelligently, grasped the lesson
taught, and then prepared their own ships to follow the lead, soon
began to harass the enemy submarines. Two or three squadrons,
conscientiously practicing the method indicated, actually had
encounters in which they sank their victims. Those skippers who lacked
the imagination and faith to see and do the thing right continued to
grope listlessly in the dark, and laid the success of the others to
luck.
One result of all this was that the enemy began to realize they were
losing submarines at an increasing rate; and consequently they studied
carefully the reports of those that came back damaged. This study led
the submarine commanders to operate with greater caution, to zigzag,
and especially to refrain as far as possible from using their radio.
And soon the upshot of this was that, while the Allied shipping had
gained materially in the restrictions placed on their ability to do
damage, the enemy submarines became almost as hard to find as ever.