AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION
I
Our first division of destroyers reached Queenstown on a Friday morning,
May 4, 1917; the following Monday they put to sea on the business of
hunting the submarine and protecting commerce. For the first month or
six weeks they spent practically all their time on patrol duty in
company with British destroyers, sloops, and other patrol vessels.
Though the convoy system was formally adopted in the latter part of May,
it was not operating completely and smoothly until August or September.
Many troop and merchant convoys were formed in the intervening period
and many were conducted through the submarine zone by American
destroyers; but our ships spent much time sailing singly, hunting for
such enemies as might betray their presence, or escorting individual
cargoes. The early experiments had demonstrated the usefulness of the
convoy system, yet a certain number of pessimists still refused to
accept it as the best solution of the shipping problem; and to
reorganize practically all the shipping of the world, scattered
everywhere on the seven seas, necessarily took time.
But this intervening period furnished indispensable training for our
men. They gained an every-day familiarity with the waters which were to
form the scene of their operations and learned many of the tricks of the
German submarines. It was a strange world in which these young Americans
now found themselves. The life was a hard one, of course, in those
tempestuous Irish waters, with the little destroyers jumping from wave
to wave, sometimes showing daylight beneath their keels, their bows
frequently pointing skyward, or plunged deep into heavy seas, and their
sides occasionally ploughing along under the foamy waves. For days the
men lived in a world of fog and mist; rain in those regions seemed to be
almost the normal state of nature. Much has been written about the
hardships of life aboard the destroyer, and to these narratives our men
could add many details of their own. These hardships, however, did not
weigh heavily upon them, for existence in those waters, though generally
monotonous, possessed at times plenty of interest and excitement. The
very appearance of the sea showed that our men were engaging in a kind
of warfare very different from that for which they had been trained. The
enormous amount of shipping seemed to give the lie to the German reports
that British commerce had been practically arrested. A perpetual stream
of all kinds of vessels, liners, tramps, schooners, and fishing boats,
was passing toward the Irish and the English coasts. Yet here and there
other floating objects on the surface told the story. Now it was a stray
boat filled with the survivors of a torpedoed vessel; now a raft on
which lay the bodies of dead men; now the derelict hulk of a ship which
the Germans had abandoned as sunk, but which persisted in floating
aimlessly around, a constant danger to navigation. Loose mines, bobbing
in the water, hinted at the perils that were constantly threatening our
forces. In the tense imagination of the lookouts floating spars or other
debris easily took the form of periscopes. Queer-looking sailing
vessels, at a distance, aroused suspicions that they might be submarines
in disguise. A phosphorescent trail in the water was sometimes mistaken
for the wake of a torpedo. The cover of a hatchway floating on the
surface, if seen at a distance of a few hundred yards, looked much like
the conning-tower of a submarine, while the back of an occasional whale
gave a life-like representation of a U-boat awash--in fact, so life-like
was it that on one occasion several of our submarine chasers on the
English coast dropped depth charges on a whale and killed it.
But it was the invisible rather than the visible evidences of warfare
that especially impressed our men. The air all around them was electric
with life and information. One had only to put the receiver of the
wireless to his ear to find himself in a new and animated world. The
atmosphere was constantly spluttering messages of all kinds coming from
all kinds of places. Sometimes these were sent by Admiral Bayly from
Queenstown; they would direct our men to go to an indicated spot and
escort an especially valuable cargo ship; they would tell a particular
commander that a submarine was lying at a designated latitude and
longitude and instruct him to go and "get" it. Running conversations
were frequently necessary between destroyers and the ships which they
had been detailed to escort. "Give me your position," the destroyer
would ask. "What is the name of your assistant surgeon, and who is his
friend on board our ship?" the suspicious vessel would reply--such
precaution being necessary to give assurance that the query had not come
from a German submarine. "Being pursued by a submarine Lat. 50 N., Long.
15 W."--cries of distress like this were common. Another message would
tell of a vessel that was being shelled; another would tell of a ship
that was sinking; while other messages would give the location of
lifeboats which were filled with survivors and ask for speedy help. Our
wireless operators not only received the news of friends, but also the
messages of enemies. Conversations between German submarines frequently
filled the air. They sometimes attempted to deceive us by false "S.O.S."
signals, hoping that in this way they could get an opportunity to
torpedo any vessel that responded to the call. But these attempts were
unsuccessful, for our wireless operators had no difficulty in
recognizing the "spark" of the German instruments. At times the surface
of the ocean might be calm; there would not be a ship in sight or a sign
of human existence anywhere; yet the air itself would be uninterruptedly
filled with these reminders of war.
The duties of our destroyers, in these earliest days, were to hunt for
submarines, to escort single ships, to pick up survivors in boats, and
to go to the rescue of ships that were being attacked. For the purpose
of patrol the sea was divided into areas thirty miles square; and to
each of these one destroyer, sloop, or other vessel was assigned. The
ship was required to keep within its allotted area, unless the pursuit
of a submarine should lead it into a neighbouring one. This patrol, as I
have described, was not a satisfactory way of fighting submarines. A
vessel would occasionally get a distant glimpse of the enemy, but that
was all; as soon as the U-boat saw the ship, it simply dived to security
beneath the waves. Our destroyers had many chances to fire at the enemy
but usually at very long ranges; some of them had lively scraps, which
perhaps involved the destruction of U-boats, though this was always a
difficult thing to prove. Yet the mere fact that submarines were seldom
sunk by destroyers on patrol, either by ourselves or by the Allies, did
not mean that the latter accomplished nothing. The work chiefly expected
of destroyers on patrol was that they should keep the U-boats under the
surface as much as possible and protect commerce. Normally the submarine
sails on top of the water, looking for its prey. As long as it is beyond
the merchantmen's range of vision, it uses its high surface speed of
about 14 knots to attain a position ahead of the advancing vessel;
before the surface vessel reaches a point where its lookout can see the
submarine, the U-boat dives and awaits the favourable moment for firing
its torpedo. It cannot take these preliminary steps if there is a
destroyer anywhere in the neighbourhood; the mere presence of such a
warship therefore constitutes a considerable protection to any merchant
ship that is within sight. The submarine normally prefers to use its
guns on merchant ships, for the torpedoes are expensive and
comparatively few in number. Destroyers constantly interfered with these
gunning operations. A long distance shot usually was sufficient to make
the under-water vessel submerge and thus lose its power for doing harm.
The early experiences of our destroyers with submarines were of this
kind; but the work of chasing U-boats under the water, escorting a small
proportion of the many cargo ships, and picking up survivors, important
as it was, did not really constitute effective anti-submarine warfare.
It gave our men splendid training, it saved many a merchant ship, it
rescued many victims from the extreme dangers of German ruthlessness, it
sank a small number of submarines, but it could never have won the war.
This patrol by destroyers and light surface vessels has been criticized
as affording an altogether ineffective method of protecting shipping,
especially when compared with the convoy system. This criticism is, of
course, justified; still we must understand that it was the only
possible method until we had enough anti-submarine craft to make the
convoy practicable. Nor must we forget that this Queenstown patrol was
organized systematically and operated with admirable skill and tireless
energy. Most of this duty fell at this time upon the British destroyers,
sloops, and other patrol vessels, which were under the command of
Admiral Bayly, and these operations were greatly aided by the gallant
actions of the British Q-ships, or "mystery ships." Though some of the
admirable exploits of these vessels will be recorded in due time, it may
be said here that the record which these ships made was not only in all
respects worthy of the traditions of their great service, but also that
they exhibited an endurance, a gallantry, and seamanlike skill that has
few parallels in the history of naval warfare.
II
The headquarters of the convoy system was a room in the British
Admiralty; herein was the mainspring of the elaborate mechanism by which
ten thousand ships were conducted over the seven oceans. Here every
morning those who had been charged with the security of the Allies'
lines of communication reviewed the entire submarine situation.
Vice-Admiral Sir Alexander L. Duff, R.N., bore this heavy
responsibility, ably assisted by a number of British officers. Captain
Byron A. Long, U.S.N., a member of my staff, was associated with Admiral
Duff in this important work. It was Captain Long's duty to co-ordinate
the movements of our convoys with the much more numerous convoys of the
Allies; he performed this task so efficiently that, once the convoy
organization was in successful operation, I eliminated the whole subject
from my anxieties and requested Captain Long not to inform me when troop
convoys sailed from the United States or when they were due to arrive in
France or England. There seemed to be no reason why both of us should
lose sleep over the same cause.
The most conspicuous feature of the convoy room was a huge chart,
entirely covering the wall on one side of the office; access to this
chart was obtained by ladders not unlike those which are used in shoe
stores. It gave a comprehensive view of the North and South American
coast, the Atlantic Ocean, the British Isles, and a considerable part
of Europe and Africa. The ports which it especially emphasized were
Sydney (Cape Breton), Halifax, New York, Hampton Roads, Gibraltar, and
Sierra Leone and Dakar, ports on the west coast of Africa. Thin threads
were stretched from each one of these seven points to certain positions
in the ocean just outside the British Isles, and on these threads were
little paper boats, each one of which represented a convoy. When a
particular convoy started from New York, one of these paper boats was
placed at that point; as it made its way across the ocean, the boat was
moved from day to day in accordance with the convoy's progress. At any
moment, therefore, a mere glance at this chart, with its multitude of
paper boats, gave the spectator the precise location of all the commerce
which was then _en route_ to the scene of war.
But there were other exhibits on the chart which were even more
conspicuous than these minute representations of convoys. Little circles
were marked off in the waters surrounding the British Isles, each one of
which was intended to show the location of a German submarine. From day
to day each one of these circles was moved in accordance with the
ascertained positions of the submarine which it represented, a straight
line indicating its course on the chart. Perhaps the most remarkable
fact about the Allied convoy service was the minute information which it
possessed about the movements of German submarines. A kind of separate
intelligence bureau devoted its entire attention to this subject.
Readers of detective stories are familiar with the phenomenon known as
"shadowing." It is a common practice in the detective's fascinating
profession to assign a man, known as a "shadow," to the duty of keeping
a particular person under constant observation. With admirable patience
and skill an experienced "shadow" keeps in view this object of his
attention for twenty-four hours; he dogs him through crowded streets,
tracks him up and down high office buildings, accompanies him to
restaurants, trolley cars, theatres, and hotels, and unobtrusively
chases him through dense thoroughfares in cabs and automobiles. "We get
him up in the morning and we put him to bed at night" is the way the
"shadow" describes the assiduous care which he bestows upon his
unsuspecting victim. In much the same fashion did the Allied secret
service "shadow" German submarines; it got each submarine "up in the
morning and put it to bed at night." That is to say, the intelligence
department took charge of Fritz and his crew as they emerged from their
base, and kept an unwearied eye upon them until they sailed back home.
The great chart in the convoy room of the Admiralty showed, within the
reasonable limits of human fallibility, where each submarine was
operating at a particular moment, and it also kept minute track of its
performances.
Yet it was not so difficult to gather this information as may at first
be supposed. I have already said that there were comparatively few
submarines, perhaps not more than an average of eight or nine, which
were operating at the same time in the waters south and west of Ireland,
the region with which we Americans were most concerned. These boats
betrayed their locations in a multitude of ways. Their commanders were
particularly careless in the use of wireless. The Germanic passion for
conversation could not be suppressed even on the U-boats, even though
this national habit might lead to the most serious consequences.
Possibly also the solitary submarine felt lonely; at any rate, as soon
as it reached the Channel or the North Sea, it started an almost
uninterrupted flow of talk. The U-boats communicated principally with
each other, and also with the Admiralty at home; and, in doing this,
they gave away their positions to the assiduously listening Allies. The
radio-direction finder, an apparatus by which we can instantaneously
locate the position from which a wireless message is sent, was the
mechanism which furnished us much of this information. Of course, the
Germans knew that their messages revealed their locations, for they had
direction finders as well as we, but the fear of discovery did not act
as a curb upon a naturally loquacious nature. And we had other ways of
following their movements. The submarine spends much the larger part of
its time on the surface. Sailing thus conspicuously, it was constantly
being sighted by merchant or military ships, which had explicit
instructions to report immediately the elusive vessel, and to give its
exact location. Again it is obvious that a submarine could not fire at a
merchantman or torpedo one, or even attempt to torpedo one, without
revealing its presence. The wireless operators of all merchant vessels
were supplied at all times with the longitude and latitude of their
ships; their instructions required them immediately to send out this
information whenever they sighted a submarine or were attacked by one.
In these several ways we had little difficulty in "shadowing" the
U-boats. For example, we would hear that the _U-53_ was talking just
outside of Heligoland; this submarine would be immediately plotted on
the chart. As the submarine made only about ten knots on the surface, in
order to save fuel oil, and much less under the surface, we could draw a
circle around this point, and rest assured that the boat must be
somewhere within this circle at a given time. But in a few hours or a
day we would hear from this same boat again; perhaps it was using its
wireless or attacking a merchantman; or perhaps one of our vessels had
spotted it on the surface. The news of this new location would justify
the convoy officers in moving this submarine on our chart to this new
position. Within a short time the convoy officers acquired an
astonishingly intimate knowledge of these boats and the habits of their
commanders. Indeed, the personalities of some of these German officers
ultimately took shape with surprising clearness; for they betrayed their
presence in the ocean by characteristics that often furnished a means of
identifying them. Each submarine behaved in a different way from the
others, the difference, of course, representing the human element in
control. One would deliver his attacks in rapid succession, boldly and
almost recklessly; another would approach his task with the utmost
caution; certain ones would display the meanest traits in human nature;
while others--let us be just--were capable of a certain display of
generosity, and possibly even of chivalry. By studying the individual
traits of each commander we could often tell just which one was
operating at a given time; and this information was extremely valuable
in the game in which we were engaged.
"Old Hans is out again," the officers in the convoy room would remark.
They were speaking of Hans Rose, the commander of the _U-53_; this was
that same submarine officer who, in the fall of 1916, brought that boat
to Newport, Rhode Island, and torpedoed five or six ships off Nantucket.
Our men never saw Hans Rose face to face; they had not the faintest
idea whether he was fat or lean, whether he was fair or dark; yet they
knew his military characteristics intimately. He became such a familiar
personality in the convoy room and his methods of operation were so
individual, that we came to have almost a certain liking for the old
chap. Other U-boat commanders would appear off the hunting grounds and
attack ships in more or less easy-going fashion. Then another boat would
suddenly appear, and--bang! bang! bang! Torpedo after torpedo would fly,
four or five ships would sink, and then this disturbing person would
vanish as unexpectedly as he had arrived. Such an experience informed
the convoy officers that Hans Rose was once more at large. We acquired a
certain respect for Hans because he was a brave man who would take
chances which most of his compatriots would avoid; and, above all,
because he played his desperate game with a certain decency. Sometimes,
when he torpedoed a ship, Rose would wait around until all the lifeboats
were filled; he would then throw out a tow line, give the victims food,
and keep all the survivors together until the rescuing destroyer
appeared on the horizon, when he would let go and submerge. This
humanity involved considerable risk to Captain Rose, for a destroyer
anywhere in his neighbourhood, as he well knew, was a serious matter. It
was he who torpedoed our destroyer, the _Jacob Jones_. He took a shot at
her from a distance of two miles--a distance from which a hit is a pure
chance; and the torpedo struck and sank the vessel within a few minutes.
On this occasion Rose acted with his usual decency. The survivors of the
_Jacob Jones_ naturally had no means of communication, since the
wireless had gone down with their ship; and now Rose, at considerable
risk to himself, sent out an "S.O.S." call, giving the latitude and
longitude, and informing Queenstown that the men were floating around in
open boats. It is perhaps not surprising that Rose is one of the few
German U-boat commanders with whom Allied naval officers would be
willing to-day to shake hands. I have heard naval officers say that they
would like to meet him after the war.
We were able to individualize other commanders; the business of
acquiring this knowledge, learning the location of their submarines and
the characteristics of their boats, and using this vital information in
protecting convoys, was all part of the game which was being played in
London. It was the greatest game of "chess" which history has known--a
game that exacted not only the most faithful and studious care, but one
in which it was necessary that all the activities should be centralized
in one office. This small group of officers in the Admiralty convoy
room, composed of representatives of all the nations concerned,
exercised a control which extended throughout the entire convoy system.
It regulated the dates when convoys sailed from America or other ports
and when they arrived; if it had not taken charge of this whole system,
congestion and confusion would inevitably have resulted. We had only a
limited number of destroyers to escort all troops and other important
convoys arriving in Europe; it was therefore necessary that they should
arrive at regular and predetermined intervals. It was necessary also
that one group of officers should control the routing of all convoys,
otherwise there would have been serious danger of collisions between
outward and inward bound ships, and no possibility of routing them clear
of the known positions of submarines. The great centre of all this
traffic was not New York or Hampton Roads, but London. It was
inevitable, if the convoy system was to succeed, that it should have a
great central headquarters, and it was just as inevitable that this
headquarters should be London.
On the huge chart already described the convoys, each indicated by a
little boat, were shown steadily making their progress toward the
appointed rendezvous. Eight or nine submarines, likewise indicated on
the chart, were always waiting to intercept them. On that great board
the prospective tragedies of the seas were thus unfolding before our
eyes. Here, for example, was a New York convoy of twenty ships, steaming
toward Liverpool, but steering straight toward the position of a
submarine. The thing to do was perfectly plain. It was a simple matter
to send the convoy a wireless message to take a course fifty miles to
the south where, according to the chart, there were no hidden enemies.
In a few hours the little paper boat, which represented this group of
ships and which was apparently headed for destruction, would suddenly
turn southward, pass around the entirely unconscious submarine, and then
take an unobstructed course for its destination. The Admiralty convoy
board knew so accurately the position of all the submarines that it
could almost always route the convoys around them. It was an extremely
interesting experience to watch the paper ships on this chart deftly
turn out of the course of U-boats, sometimes when they seemed almost on
the point of colliding with them. That we were able constantly to save
the ships by sailing the convoys around the submarines brings out the
interesting fact that, even had there been no destroyer escort, the
convoy in itself would have formed a great protection to merchant
shipping. There were times when we had no escorting vessels to send with
certain convoys; and in such instances we simply routed the ships in
masses, directed them on courses which we knew were free of submarines,
and in this way brought them safely into port.
III
The Admiralty in London was thus the central nervous system of a
complicated but perfectly working organism which reached the remotest
corners of the world. Wherever there was a port, whether in South
America, Australia, or in the most inaccessible parts of India or China,
from which merchantmen sailed to any of the other countries which were
involved in the war, representatives of the British navy and the British
Government were stationed, all working harmoniously with shipping men in
the effort to get their cargoes safely through the danger zones. These
danger zones occupied a comparatively small area surrounding the
belligerent countries, but the safeguarding of the ships was an
elaborate process which began far back in the countries from which the
commerce started. Until about July, 1917, the world's shipping for the
most part had been unregulated; now for the first time it was arranged
in hard and fast routes and despatched in accordance with schedules as
fixed as those of a great railroad. The whole management of convoys,
indeed, bore many resemblances to the method of handling freight cars on
the American system of transcontinental lines. In the United States
there are several great headquarters of freight, sometimes known as
"gateways," places, that is, at which freight cars are assembled from a
thousand places, and from which the great accumulations are routed to
their destinations. Such places are Pittsburg, Buffalo, St. Louis,
Chicago, Minneapolis, Denver, San Francisco--to mention only a few.
Shipping destined for the belligerent nations was similarly assembled,
in the years 1917 and 1918, at six or eight great ocean "gateways," and
there formed into convoys for "through routing" to the British Isles,
France, and the Mediterranean. Only a few of the ships that were
exceptionally fast--speed in itself being a particularly efficacious
protection against submarines--were permitted to ignore this routing
system, and dash unprotected through the infested area. This was a
somewhat dangerous procedure even for such ships, however, and they were
escorted whenever destroyers were available. All other vessels, from
whatever parts of the world they might come, were required to sail first
for one of these great assembling points, or "gateways"; and at these
places they were added to one of the constantly forming convoys. Thus
all shipping which normally sailed to Europe around the Cape of Good
Hope proceeded up the west coast of Africa until it reached the port of
Dakar or Sierra Leone, where it joined the convoy. Shipping from the
east coast of South America--ports like Rio de Janeiro, Bahia, Buenos
Aires, and Montevideo--instead of sailing directly to Europe, joined the
convoy at this same African town. Vessels which came to Britain and
France by way of Suez and Mediterranean ports found their great stopping
place at Gibraltar--a headquarters of traffic which, in the huge amount
of freight which it "created," became almost the Pittsburg of this
mammoth transportation system. The four "gateways" for North America and
the west coast of South America were Sydney (Cape Breton), Halifax, New
York, and Hampton Roads. The grain-laden merchantmen from the St.
Lawrence valley rendezvoused at Sydney and Halifax. Vessels from
Portland, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and other Atlantic points
found their assembling headquarters at New York, while ships from
Baltimore, Norfolk, the Gulf of Mexico, and the west coast of South
America proceeded to the great convoy centre which had been established
at Hampton Roads.
In the convoy room of the Admiralty these aggregations of ships were
always referred to as the "Dakar convoy," the "Halifax convoy," the
"Hampton Roads convoy," and the like. When the system was completely
established the convoys sailed from their appointed headquarters on
regular schedules, like railroad trains. From New York one convoy
departed every sixteen days for the west coast of England and one left
every sixteen days for the east coast. From Hampton Roads one sailed
every eight days to the west coast and one every eight days to the east
coast, and convoys from all the other convoy points maintained a
similarly rigid schedule. The dates upon which these sailings took place
were fixed, like the arrivals and departures of trains upon a railroad
time-table, except when it became necessary to delay the sailing of a
convoy to avoid congestion of arrivals. According to this programme, the
first convoy to the west coast left New York on August 14, 1917, and its
successors thereafter sailed at intervals of about sixteen days. The
instructions sent to shipmasters all over the world, by way of the
British consulates, gave explicit details concerning the method of
assembling their convoys.
Here, for example, was a ship at New York, all loaded and ready to sail
for the war zone. The master visited the port officer at the British
consulate, who directed him to proceed to Gravesend Bay, anchor his
vessel, and report to the convoy officers for further instructions. The
merchant captain, reaching this indicated spot, usually found several
other vessels on hand, all of them, like his ship, waiting for the
sailing date. The commander of the gathering convoy, under whose
instructions all the merchantmen were to operate, was a naval officer,
usually of the rank of commodore or captain, who maintained constant
cable communication with the convoy room of the Admiralty and usually
used one of the commercial vessels as his flagship. When the sailing day
arrived usually from twenty to thirty merchantmen had assembled; the
commander summoned all their masters, gave each a blue book containing
instructions for the management of convoyed ships, and frequently
delivered something in the nature of a lecture. Before the aggregation
sailed it was joined by a cruiser or pre-dreadnought battleship of the
American navy, or by a British or French cruiser. This ship was to
accompany the convoy across the Atlantic as far as the danger zone; its
mission was not, as most people mistakenly believed, to protect the
convoy from submarines, but to protect it from any surface German raider
that might have escaped into the high seas. The Allied navies constantly
had before their minds the exploits of the _Emden_; the opportunity to
break up a convoy in mid-ocean by dare-devil enterprises of this kind
was so tempting that it seemed altogether likely that Germany might take
advantage of it. To send twenty or thirty merchant ships across the
Atlantic with no protection against such assaults would have been to
invite a possible disaster. As a matter of fact, the last German raider
that even attempted to gain the high seas was sunk in the North Sea by
the British Patrol Squadron in February, 1917.
On the appointed day the whole convoy weighed anchor and silently
slipped out to sea. To such spectators as observed its movements it
seemed to be a rather limping, halting procession. The speed of a convoy
was the speed of its slowest ship, and vessels that could easily make
twelve or fourteen knots were obliged to throttle down their engines,
much to the disgust of their masters, in order to keep formation with a
ship that made only eight or ten; though whenever possible vessels of
nearly equal speed sailed together. Little in the newly assembled group
suggested the majesty of the sea. The ships formed a miscellaneous and
ill-assorted company, rusty tramps shamefacedly sailing alongside of
spick-and-span liners; miserable little two-or three-thousand ton ships
attempting to hold up their heads in the same company with other ships
of ten or twelve. The whole mass was sprawled over the sea in most
ungainly fashion; twenty or thirty ships, with spaces of nine hundred or
a thousand yards stretching between them, took up not far from ten
square miles of the ocean surface. Neither at this stage of the voyage
did the aggregation give the idea of efficiency. It presented about as
desirable a target as the submarine could have desired. But the period
taken in crossing the ocean was entirely devoted to education. Under the
tutorship of the convoy commander, the men composing the twenty or
thirty crews went every day to school. For fifteen or twenty days upon
the broad Atlantic they were trained in all the evolutions which were
necessary for coping with the submarine. Every possible situation that
could arise in the danger zone was anticipated and the officers and the
crews were trained to meet it. They perfected themselves in the signal
code; they learned the art of making the sudden manoeuvres which were
instantaneously necessary when a submarine was sighted; they acquired a
mastery in the art of zigzagging; and they became accustomed to sailing
at night without lights. The crews were put through all the drills which
prepared them to meet such crises as the landing of a torpedo in their
engine-room or the sinking of the ship; and they were thoroughly
schooled in getting all hands safely into the boats. Possibly an
occasional scare on the way over may have introduced the element of
reality into these exercises; though no convoys actually met submarines
in the open ocean, the likelihood that they might do so was never
absent, especially after the Germans began sending out their huge
under-water cruisers.
The convoy commander left his port with sealed orders, which he was
instructed not to open until he was a hundred miles at sea. These
orders, when the seal was broken, gave him the rendezvous assigned by
Captain Long of the convoy board in London. The great chart in the
convoy room at the Admiralty indicated the point to which the convoy was
to proceed and at which it would be met by the destroyer escorts and
taken through the danger zone. This particular New York convoy commander
was now perhaps instructed to cross the thirtieth meridian at the
fifty-second parallel of latitude, where he would be met by his escort.
He laid his course for that point and regulated his speed so as to reach
it at the appointed time. But he well knew that these instructions were
only temporary. The precise point to which he would finally be directed
to sail depended upon the movement and location of the German submarines
at the time of his arrival. If the enemy became particularly active in
the region of this tentative rendezvous, then, as the convoy approached
it, a wireless from London would instruct the commander to steer
abruptly to another point, perhaps a hundred miles to north or south.
"Getting your convoy" was a searching test of destroyer seamanship,
particularly in heavy or thick weather. It was not the simplest thing to
navigate a group of destroyers through the tempestuous waters of the
North Atlantic, with no other objective than the junction point of a
certain meridian and parallel, and reach the designated spot at a
certain hour. Such a feat demanded navigation ability of a high order;
and the skill which our American naval officers displayed in this
direction aroused great admiration, especially on the part of the
merchant skippers; in particular it aroused the astonishment of the
average doughboy. Many destroyer escorts that went out to meet an
incoming convoy also took out one which was westward bound. A few
mishaps in the course of the war, such as the sinking of the _Justicia_,
which was sailing from Europe to America, created the false notion that
outward-bound convoys were not escorted. It was just as desirable, of
course, to escort the ships going out as it was to escort those which
were coming in. The mere fact that the inbound ships carried troops and
supplies gave stronger reasons, from the humane standpoint, for heavier
escorts, but not from the standpoint of the general war situation. The
Germans were not sinking our ships because they were carrying men and
supplies; they were sinking them simply because they were ships. They
were not seeking to destroy American troops and munitions exclusively;
they were seeking to destroy tonnage. They were aiming to reduce the
world's supply of ships to such a point that the Allies would be
compelled to abandon the conflict for lack of communications. It was
therefore necessary that they should sink the empty ships, which were
going out, as well as the crowded and loaded ships which were coming in.
For the same reason it was necessary that we should protect them, and we
did this as far as practicable without causing undue delays in forming
outward-bound convoys. The _Justicia_, though most people still think
that she was torpedoed because she was unescorted, was, in fact,
protected by a destroyer escort of considerable size. This duty of
escorting outward-bound ships increased considerably the strain on our
destroyer force. The difficulty was that the inbound convoy arrived in a
body, but that the ships could not be unloaded and sent back in a body
without detaining a number of them an undue length of time--and time was
such an important factor in this war that it was necessary to make the
"turn-around" of each important transport as quickly as possible. The
consequence was that returning ships were often despatched in small
convoys as fast as they were unloaded. The escorts which we were able
to supply for such groups were thus much weaker than absolute safety
required, and sometimes we were even forced to send vessels across the
submarine zone with few, if any, escorting warships. This explains why
certain homeward-bound transports were torpedoed, and this was
particularly true of troop and munition convoys to the western ports of
France. Only when we could assemble a large outgoing convoy and despatch
it at such a time that it could meet an incoming one at the western edge
of the submarine zone could we give these vessels the same destroyer
escort as that which we always gave for the loaded convoys bound for
European ports.
As soon as the destroyers made contact with an inward-bound convoy, the
ocean escort, the cruiser or pre-dreadnought, if an American, abandoned
it and started it back home, sometimes with a westbound convoy if one
had been assembled in time. British escorts went ahead at full speed
into a British port, usually escorted by one or more destroyers. This
abandonment sometimes aroused the wrath of the passengers on the inbound
convoy. Their protector had dropped them just as they had entered the
submarine zone, the very moment its services were really needed! These
passengers did not understand, any more than did the people at home,
that the purpose of the ocean escort was not to protect them from
submarines, but from possible raiders. Inside the danger zone this ocean
escort would become part of the convoy itself and require protection
from submarines, so that its rather summary departure really made the
merchantmen more secure. As the convoy approached the danger zone, after
being drilled all the way across the ocean, its very appearance was more
taut and business-like. The ships were closed up into a much more
compact formation, keeping only such distances apart as were essential
for quick manoeuvring. Generally the convoy was formed in a long
parallelogram, the distance across the front of which was much longer
than the depth or distance along the sides. Usually the formation was a
number of groups of four vessels each, in column or "Indian file," at a
distance of about five hundred yards from ship to ship, and all groups
abreast of each other and about half a mile apart. Thus a convoy of
twenty-four vessels, or six groups of four, would have a width of about
three miles and a depth of one. Most of the destroyers were stationed
on the narrow sides, for it was only on the side, or the beam, that the
submarines could attack with much likelihood of succeeding. It was
usually necessary for a destroyer to be stationed in the rear of a
convoy, for, though the speed of nearly all convoys was faster than that
of a submarine when submerged, the latter while running on the surface
could follow a convoy at night with a fair chance of torpedoing a vessel
at early daylight and escaping to the rear if unhampered by the presence
of a rear-guard destroyer. It was generally impracticable and dangerous
for the submarine to wait ahead, submerge, and launch its torpedoes as
the convoy passed over it. The extent to which purely mechanical details
protected merchant ships is not understood, and this inability to attack
successfully from the front illustrates this point. The submarine
launches its torpedoes from tubes in the bow or stern; it has no tubes
on the beam. If it did possess such side tubes, it could lie in wait
ahead and shoot its broadsides at the convoy as it passed over the spot
where it was concealed. Its length in that case would be parallel to
that of the merchant ships, and thus it would have a comparatively small
part of its area exposed to the danger of ramming. The mere fact that
its torpedo tubes are placed in the bow and stern makes it necessary for
the submarine, if it wishes to attack in the fashion described, to turn
almost at right angles to the course of the convoy, and to manoeuvre
into a favourable position from which to discharge its missile--a
procedure so altogether hazardous that it almost never attempts it. With
certain reservations, which it is hardly necessary to explain in detail
at this point, it may be taken at least as a general rule that the sides
of the convoy not only furnish the U-boats much the best chance to
torpedo ships, but also subject them to the least danger; and this is
the reason why, in the recent war, the destroyers were usually
concentrated at these points.
I have already compared the convoy system to a great aggregation of
railroads. This comparison holds good of its operation after it had
entered the infested zone. Indeed the very terminology of our railroad
men was used. Every convoy nearly followed one of two main routes, known
at convoy headquarters as the two "trunk lines." The trunk line which
reached the west coast of England usually passed north of Ireland
through the North Channel and down the Irish Sea to Liverpool. Under
certain conditions these convoys passed south of Ireland and thence up
the Irish Sea. The convoys to the east coast took a trunk line that
passed up the English Channel. Practically all shipping from the United
States to Great Britain and France took one of these trunk lines. But,
like our railroad systems, each of these main routes had branch lines.
Thus shipping destined for French ports took the southern route until
off the entrance to the English Channel; here it abandoned the main line
and took a branch route to Brest, Bordeaux, Nantes, and other French
ports. In the Channel likewise several "single-track" branches went to
various English ports, such as Plymouth, Portsmouth, Southampton, and
the like. The whole gigantic enterprise flowed with a precision and a
regularity which I think it is hardly likely that any other
transportation system has ever achieved.
IV
A description of a few actual convoys, and the experiences of our
destroyers with them, will perhaps best make clear the nature of the
mechanism which protected the world's shipping. For this purpose I have
selected typical instances which illustrate the every-day routine
experiences of escorting destroyers, and other experiences in which
their work was more spectacular.
One day in late October, 1917, a division of American destroyers at
Queenstown received detailed instructions from Admiral Bayly to leave at
a certain hour and escort the outward convoy "O Q 17" and bring into
port the inbound convoy "H S 14." These detailed instructions were based
upon general instructions issued from the Admiralty, where my staff was
in constant attendance and co-operation. The symbols by which these two
groups of ships were designated can be easily interpreted. The O Q
simply meant that convoy "No. 17"--the seventeenth which had left that
port--was Outward bound from Queenstown, and the H S signified that
convoy "No. 14" was Homeward bound from Sydney, Cape Breton. Queenstown
during the first few months was one of those places at which ships,
having discharged their cargoes, assembled in groups for despatching
back to the United States. Later Milford Haven, Liverpool, and other
ports were more often used for this purpose. Vessels had been arriving
here for several days from ports of the Irish Sea and the east coast of
England. These had now been formed into convoy "O Q 17"; they were ready
for a destroyer escort to take them through the submarine zone and start
them on the westward voyage to American ports.
This escort consisted of eight American destroyers and one British
"special service ship"; the latter was one of that famous company of
decoy vessels, or "mystery ships," which, though to all outward
appearances unprotected merchantmen, really carried concealed armament
of sufficient power to destroy any submarine that came within range.
This special service ship, the _Aubrietia_, was hardly a member of the
protective escort. Her mission was to sail about thirty miles ahead of
the convoy; when observed from the periscope or the conning-tower of a
submarine, the _Aubrietia_ seemed to be merely a helpless merchantman
sailing alone, and as such she presented a particularly tempting target
to the U-boat. But her real purpose in life was to be torpedoed. After
landing its missile in a vessel's side, the submarine usually remained
submerged for a period, while the crew of its victim was getting off in
boats; it then came to the surface, and the men prepared to board the
disabled ship and search her for valuables and delicacies, particularly
for information which would assist them in their campaign, such as
secret codes, sailing instructions, and the like. The mystery ship had
been preparing for this moment, and as soon as the submarine broke
water, the gun ports of the disguised merchantman dropped, and her
hitherto concealed guns began blazing away at the German. By October,
1917, these special service ships had already accounted for several
submarines; and it had now become a frequent practice to attach one or
more to a convoy, either ahead, where she might dispose of the submarine
lying in wait for the approaching aggregation, or in the rear, where a
U-boat might easily mistake her for one of those stragglers which were
an almost inevitable part of every convoy.
Trawlers and mine-sweepers, as was the invariable custom, spent several
hours sweeping the Queenstown Channel before the sailing of convoy "O Q
17" and its escort. Promptly at the appointed time the eight American
ships sailed out in "Indian file," passing through the net which was
always kept in place at the entrance to the harbour. Their first duty
was to patrol the waters outside for a radius of twelve miles; it was
not improbable that the Germans, having learned that this convoy was to
sail, had stationed a submarine not far from the harbour entrance.
Having finally satisfied himself that there were no lurking enemies in
the neighbourhood, the commander of the destroyer flagship signalled to
the merchant ships, which promptly left the harbour and entered the open
sea. The weather was stormy; the wind was blowing something of a gale
and head seas were breaking over the destroyers' decks. But the convoy
quickly manoeuvred into three columns, the destroyers rapidly closed
around them, and the whole group started for "Rendezvous A"--this being
the designation of that spot on the ocean's surface where the fourteenth
meridian of longitude crosses the forty-ninth parallel of latitude--a
point in the Atlantic about three hundred miles south-west of
Queenstown, regarded at that time as safely beyond the operating zone of
the submarine. Meanwhile, the "mystery ship," sailing far ahead,
disappeared beneath the horizon.
Convoying ships in the stormy autumn and winter waters, amid the fog and
rain of the eastern Atlantic, was a monotonous and dreary occupation.
Only one or two incidents enlivened this particular voyage. As the
_Parker_, Commander Halsey Powell, was scouting ahead at about two
o'clock in the afternoon, her lookout suddenly sighted a submarine,
bearing down upon the convoy. Immediately the news was wirelessed to
every vessel. As soon as the message was received, the whole convoy, at
a signal from the flagship, turned four points to port. For nearly two
hours the destroyers searched this area for the submerged submarine, but
that crafty boat kept itself safely under the water, and the convoy now
again took up its original course. About two days' sailing brought the
ships to the point at which the protecting destroyers could safely leave
them, as far as submarines were concerned, to continue unescorted to
America; darkness had now set in, and, under its cover, the merchantmen
slipped away from the warships and started westward. Meantime, the
destroyer escort had received a message from the _Cumberland_, the
British cruiser which was acting as ocean escort to convoy "HS 14."
"Convoy is six hours late," she reported, much like the announcer at a
railroad station who informs the waiting crowds that the incoming train
is that much overdue. According to the schedule these ships should reach
the appointed rendezvous at six o'clock the next morning; this message
evidently moved the time of arrival up to noon. The destroyers, slowing
down so that they would not arrive ahead of time, started for the
designated spot.
Sometimes thick weather made it impossible to fix the position by
astronomical observations, and the convoy might not be at its appointed
rendezvous. For this reason the destroyers now deployed on a north and
south line about twenty miles long for several hours. Somewhat before
the appointed time one of the destroyers sighted a faint cloud of smoke
on the western horizon, and soon afterward thirty-two merchantmen,
sailing in columns of fours, began to assume a definite outline. At a
signal from this destroyer the other destroyers of the escort came in at
full speed and ranged themselves on either side of the convoy--a
manoeuvre that always excited the admiration of the merchant skippers.
This mighty collection of vessels, occupying about ten or twelve square
miles on the ocean, skilfully maintaining its formation, was really a
beautiful and inspiring sight. When the destroyers had gained their
designated positions on either side, the splendid cavalcade sailed
boldly into the area which formed the favourite hunting grounds for the
submarine.
As soon as this danger zone was reached the whole aggregation,
destroyers and merchant ships, began to zigzag. The commodore on the
flagship hoisted the signal, "Zigzag A," and instantaneously the whole
thirty-two ships began to turn twenty-five degrees to starboard. The
great ships, usually so cumbersome, made this simultaneous turn with all
the deftness, and even with all the grace of a school of fish into which
one has suddenly cast a stone. All the way across the Atlantic they had
been practising such an evolution; most of them had already sailed
through the danger zone more than once, so that the manoeuvre was by
this time an old story. For ten or fifteen minutes they proceeded along
this course, when immediately, like one vessel, the convoy turned twenty
degrees to port, and started in a new direction. And so on for hours,
now a few minutes to the right, now a few minutes to the left, and now
again straight ahead, while all the time the destroyers were cutting
through the water, every eye of the skilled lookouts in each crew fixed
upon the surface for the first glimpse of a periscope. This zigzagging
was carried out according to comprehensive plans which enabled the
convoy to zigzag for hours at a time without signals, the courses and
the time on each course being designated in the particular plan ordered,
all ships' clocks being set exactly alike by time signal. Probably I
have made it clear why these zigzagging evolutions constituted such a
protective measure. All the time the convoy was sailing in the danger
zone it was assumed that a submarine was present, looking for a chance
to torpedo. Even though the officers might know that there was no
submarine within three hundred miles, this was never taken for granted;
the discipline of the whole convoy system rested upon the theory that
the submarine was there, waiting only the favourable moment to start the
work of destruction. But a submarine, as already said, could not strike
without the most thorough preparation. It must get within three or four
hundred yards or the torpedo would stand little chance of hitting the
mark in a vital spot. The commander almost never shot blindly into the
convoy, on the chance of hitting some ship; he carefully selected his
victim; his calculation had to include its speed, the speed of his own
boat and that of his torpedo; above all, he had to be sure of the
direction in which his intended quarry was steaming; and in this
calculation the direction of the merchantman formed perhaps the most
important element. But if the ships were constantly changing their
direction, it is apparent that the submarine could make no calculations
which would have much practical value.
In the afternoon the _Aubrietia_, the British mystery ship which was
sailing thirty miles ahead of the convoy, reported that she had sighted
a submarine. Two or three destroyers dashed for the indicated area,
searched it thoroughly, found no traces of the hidden boat, and returned
to the convoy. The next morning six British destroyers and one cruiser
arrived from Devonport. Up to this time the convoy had been following
the great "trunk line" which led into the Channel, but it had now
reached the point where the convoys split up, part going to English
ports and part to French. These British destroyers had come to take over
the twenty ships which were bound for their own country, while the
American destroyers were assigned to escort the rest to Brest. The
following conversation--typical of those that were constantly filling
the air in that area--now took place between the American flagship and
the British:
_Conyngham_ to _Achates_: This is the _Conyngham_, Commander
Johnson. I would like to keep the convoy together until this
evening. I will work under your orders until I leave with convoy
for Brest.
_Achates_ to _Conyngham_: Please make your own arrangements for
taking French convoy with you to-night.
_Achates_ to _Conyngham_: What time do you propose leaving with
French convoy to-night?
_Conyngham_ to _Achates_: About 5 P.M. in order to arrive
in Brest to-night.
Devonport Commander-in-chief to _Conyngham_: Proceed in execution
Admiralty orders _Achates_ having relieved you. Submarine activity
in Lat. 48.41, Long. 4.51.
The _Aubrietia_ had already given warning of the danger referred to in
the last words of this final message. It had been flashing the news in
this way:
1.15 P.M. _Aubrietia_ to _Conyngham_: Submarine sighted
49.30 N 6.8 W. Sighted submarine on surface. Speed is not enough.
Course south-west by south magnetic.
1.30 P.M. _Conyngham_ to _Achates_: Aubrietia to all
men-of-war and Land's End. Chasing submarine on the surface 49.30 N
6.8 W, course south-west by south. Waiting to get into range. He is
going faster than I can.
2.00 P.M. _Aubrietia_ to all men-of-war. Submarine
submerged 49.20 N 6.12 W. Still searching.
The fact that nothing more was seen of that submarine may possibly
detract from the thrill of the experience, but in describing the
operations of this convoy I am not attempting to tell a story of wild
adventure, but merely to set forth what happened ninety-nine out of a
hundred times. What made destroyer work so exasperating was that, in
the vast majority of cases, the option of fighting or not fighting lay
with the submarine. Had the submarine decided to approach and attack the
convoy, the chances would have been more than even that it would have
been destroyed. In accordance with its usual practice, however, it chose
to submerge, and that decision ended the affair for the moment. This was
the way in which merchant ships were protected. At the time this
submarine was sighted it was headed directly for this splendid
aggregation of cargo vessels; had not the _Aubrietia_ discovered it and
had not one of the American destroyers started in pursuit, the U-boat
would have made an attack and possibly would have sent one or more ships
to the bottom. The chief business of the escorting ships, all through
the war, was this unspectacular one of chasing the submarines away; and
for every under-water vessel actually destroyed there were hundreds of
experiences such as the one which I have just described.
The rest of this trip was uneventful. Two American destroyers escorted
H.M.S. _Cumberland_--the ocean escort which had accompanied the convoy
from Sydney--to Devonport; the rest of the American escort took its
quota of merchantmen into Brest, and from that point sailed back to
Queenstown, whence, after three or four days in port, it went out with
another convoy. This was the routine which was repeated until the end of
the war.
The "O Q 17" and the "H S 14" form an illustration of convoys which made
their trips successfully. Yet these same destroyers had another
experience which pictures other phases of the convoy system.
On the morning of October 19th, Commander Johnson's division was
escorting a great convoy of British ships on its way to the east coast
of England. Suddenly out of the air came one of those calls which were
daily occurrences in the submarine zone. The _J. L. Luckenback_
signalled her position, ninety miles ahead of the convoy, and that she
was being shelled by a submarine. In a few minutes the _Nicholson_, one
of the destroyers of the escort, started to the rescue. For the next few
hours our ships began to pick out of the air the messages which detailed
the progress of this adventure--messages which tell the story so
graphically, and which are so typical of the events which were
constantly taking place in those waters, that I reproduce them verbatim:
8.50 A.M. S.O.S. _J. L. Luckenback_ being gunned by
submarine. Position 48.08 N 9.31 W.
9.25 _Conyngham_ to _Nicholson:_ Proceed to assistance of S.O.S.
ship.
9.30 _Luckenback_ to U.S.A.: Am manoeuvring around.
9.35 _Luckenback_ to U.S.A.: How far are you away?
9.40 _Luckenback_ to U.S.A.: Code books thrown overboard. How soon
will you arrive?
_Nicholson_ to _Luckenback_: In two hours.
9.41 _Luckenback_ to U.S.A.: Look for boats. They are shelling us.
_Nicholson_ to _Luckenback_: Do not surrender!
_Luckenback_ to _Nicholson_ Never!
11.01 _Nicholson_ to _Luckenback_: Course south magnetic.
12.36 P.M. _Nicholson_ to _Conyngham_: Submarine submerged
47.47 N 10.00 W at 11.20.
1.23 _Conyngham_ to _Nicholson:_ What became of steamer?
3.41 _Nicholson_ to Admiral (at Queenstown) and _Conyngham_:
_Luckenback_ now joining convoy. Should be able to make port
unassisted.
I have already said that a great part of the destroyer's duty was to
rescue merchantmen that were being attacked by submarines: this
_Luckenback_ incident vividly illustrates this point. Had the submarine
used its torpedo upon this vessel, it probably would have disposed of it
summarily; but it was the part of wisdom for the submarine to economize
in these weapons because they were so expensive and so comparatively
scarce, and to use its guns whenever the opportunity offered. The
_Luckenback_ was armed, but the fact that the submarine's guns easily
outranged hers made her armament useless. Thus all the German had to do
in this case was to keep away at a safe distance and bombard the
merchantman. The U-boat had been doing this for more than three hours
when the destroyer reached the scene of operations; evidently the
marksmanship was poor, for out of a great many shots fired by the
submarine only about a dozen had hit the vessel. The _Luckenback_ was on
fire, a shell having set aflame her cargo of cotton; certain parts of
the machinery had been damaged, but, in the main, the vessel was
intact. The submarine was always heroic enough when it came to shelling
defenceless merchantmen, but the appearance of a destroyer anywhere in
her neighbourhood made her resort to the one secure road to
safety--diving for protection. The _Nicholson_ immediately trained her
guns on the U-boat, which, on the second shot, disappeared under the
water. The destroyer despatched men to the disabled vessel, the fire was
extinguished, necessary repairs to the machinery were made, and in a few
hours the _Luckenback_ had become a member of the convoy.
Hardly had she joined the merchant ships and hardly had the _Nicholson_
taken up her station on the flank when an event still more exciting took
place. It was now late in the afternoon; the sea had quieted down; the
whole atmosphere was one of peace; and there was not the slightest sign
or suggestion of a hostile ship. The _Orama_, the British warship which
had accompanied the convoy from its home port as ocean escort, had taken
up her position as leading ship in the second column. Without the
slightest warning a terrific explosion now took place on her starboard
bow. There was no mystery as to what had happened; indeed, immediately
after the explosion the wake of the torpedo appeared on the surface;
there was no periscope in sight, yet it was clear, from the position of
the wake, that the submarine had crept up to the side of the convoy and
delivered its missile at close range. There was no confusion in the
convoy or its escorting destroyers but there were scenes of great
activity. Immediately after the explosion, a periscope appeared a few
inches out of the water, stayed there only a second or two, and then
disappeared. Brief as was this exposure, the keen eyes of the lookout
and several sailors of the _Conyngham_, the nearest destroyer, had
detected it; it disclosed the fact that the enemy was in the midst of
the convoy itself, looking for other ships to torpedo. The _Conyngham_
rang for full speed, and dashed for the location of the submarine. Her
officers and men now saw more than the periscope; they saw the vessel
itself. The water was very clear; as the _Conyngham_ circled around the
_Orama_ her officers and men sighted a green, shining, cigar-shaped
thing under the water not far from the starboard side. As she sped by,
the destroyer dropped a depth charge almost directly on top of the
object. After the waters had quieted down pieces of debris were seen
floating upon the surface--boards, spars, and other miscellaneous
wreckage, evidently scraps of the damaged deck of a submarine. All
attempts to save the _Orama_ proved fruitless: the destroyers stood by
for five hours, taking off survivors, and making all possible efforts to
salvage the ship, but at about ten o'clock that evening she disappeared
under the water. In rescuing the survivors the seamanship displayed by
the _Conyngham_ was particularly praiseworthy. The little vessel was
skilfully placed alongside the _Orama_ and some three hundred men were
taken off without accident or casualty while the ship was sinking.
One of the things that made the work of the destroyer such a thankless
task was that only in the rarest cases was it possible to prove that she
had destroyed the submarine. Only the actual capture of the enemy ship
or some of its crew furnished irrefutable proof that the action had been
successful. The appearance of oil on the surface after a depth charge
attack was not necessarily convincing, for the submarine early learned
the trick of pumping overboard a little oil after such an experience; in
this way it hoped to persuade its pursuer that it had been sunk and thus
induce it to abandon the chase. Even the appearance of wreckage, such as
arose on the surface after this _Conyngham_ attack, did not absolutely
prove that the submarine had been destroyed. Yet, as this submarine was
never heard of again, there is little doubt that Commander Johnson's
depth charge performed its allotted task. The judgment of the British
Government, which awarded him the C.M.G. for his achievement, may be
accepted as final. The Admiralty citation for this decoration reads as
follows:
"At 5.50 P.M. H.M.S. _Orama_ was torpedoed in convoy.
_Conyngham_ went full speed, circled bow of _Orama_, saw submarine
between lines of convoy, passed right over it so that it was plainly
visible and dropped depth charge. Prompt and correct action of Commander
Johnson saved more ships from being torpedoed and probably destroyed the
submarine."
One of the greatest difficulties of convoy commanders, especially during
the first months the system was in operation, was with "slacker"
merchantmen; these were vessels which, for various reasons, fell behind
the convoy, a tempting bait for the submarine. At this time certain of
the merchant captains manifested an incurable obstinacy; they affected
to regard the U-boats with contempt, and insisted rather on taking
chances instead of playing the game. In such cases a destroyer would
often have to leave the main division, go back several miles, and
attempt to prod the straggler into joining the convoy, much as a
shepherd dog attempts to force the laggard sheep to keep within the
flock. In some cases, when the merchantman proved particularly obdurate,
the destroyer would slyly drop a depth charge, near enough to give the
backward vessel a considerable shaking up without doing her any injury;
usually such a shock caused the merchantman to start full speed ahead to
rejoin her convoy, firmly believing that a submarine was giving chase.
In certain instances the merchantman fell behind the convoy because the
machinery had broken down or because she had suffered other accidents.
The submarines would follow for days in the track of convoys, looking
for a straggler of this kind, just as a shark will follow a vessel in
the hope that something will be thrown overboard; and for this reason
one destroyer at least was often detached from the escorting division as
a rear guard. In this connection we must keep in mind that at no time
until the armistice was signed was any escort force strong enough to
insure entire safety. If we had had destroyers enough to put a close
screen, or even a double screen, around every convoy, there would have
been almost no danger from submarines. The fact that all escort forces
were very inadequate placed a very heavy responsibility upon the escort
commanders, and made them think twice before detaching a destroyer in
order to protect stragglers.
One late summer afternoon the American converted yacht _Christabel_ was
performing this duty for the British merchantman _Danae_, a vessel which
had fallen eight miles behind her convoy, bound from La Pallice, France,
to Brest. It was a beautiful evening; the weather was clear, the sea
smooth, and there was not a breath of wind. Under such conditions a
submarine could conceal its presence only with great difficulty; and at
about 5.30 the lookout on the _Christabel_ detected a wake, some six
hundred yards on the port quarter. The _Christabel_ started at full
speed; the wake suddenly ceased, but a few splotches of oil were seen,
and she was steered in the direction of this disturbance. A depth charge
was dropped at the spot where the submarine ought to have been, but it
evidently did not produce the slightest result. The _Christabel_
rejoined the _Danae_, and the two went along peacefully for nearly four
hours, when suddenly a periscope appeared about two hundred yards away,
on the starboard side. Evidently this persistent German had been
following the ships all that time, looking for a favourable opportunity
to discharge his torpedo. That moment had now arrived; the submarine was
at a distance where a carefully aimed shot meant certain destruction;
the appearance of the periscope meant that the submarine was making
observations in anticipation of delivering this shot. The _Christabel_
started full speed for the wake of the periscope; this periscope itself
disappeared under the water like a guilty thing, and a disturbance on
the surface showed that the submarine was making frantic efforts to
submerge. The destroyer dropped its depth charge, set to explode at
seventy feet, its radio meantime sending signals broadcast for
assistance. Immediately after the mushroom of water arose from this
charge a secondary explosion was heard; this was a horrible and muffled
sound coming from the deep, more powerful and more terrible than any
that could have been caused by the destroyer's "ash can." An enormous
volcano of water and all kinds of debris arose from the sea, half-way
between the _Christabel_ and the spot where it had dropped its charge.
This secondary explosion shook the _Christabel_ so violently that the
officers thought at first that the ship had been seriously damaged, and
a couple of men were knocked sprawling on the deck. As soon as the water
subsided great masses of heavy black oil began rising to the surface,
and completely splintered wood and other wreckage appeared. In a few
minutes the sea, for a space many hundred yards in diameter, was covered
with dead fish--about ten times as many, the officers reported, as could
have been killed by the usual depth charge. The _Christabel_ and the
ship she was guarding started to rejoin the main convoy, entirely
satisfied with the afternoon's work. Indeed, they had good reason to be;
a day or two afterward a battered submarine, the _U C-56_, crept
painfully into the harbour of Santander, Spain; it was the boat which
had had such an exciting contest with the _Christabel_. She was injured
beyond the possibility of repair; besides, the Spanish Government
interned her for "the duration of the war"; so that for all practical
purposes the vessel was as good as sunk.
V
Discouraging as was this business of hunting an invisible foe, events
occasionally happened with all the unexpectedness of real drama. For the
greater part of the time the destroyers were engaged in battle with oil
slicks, wakes, tide rips, streaks of suds, and suspicious disturbances
on the water; yet now and then there were engagements with actual boats
and flesh and blood human beings. To spend weeks at sea with no foe more
substantial than an occasional foamy excrescence on the surface was the
fate of most sailormen in this war; yet a few exciting moments, when
they finally came, more than compensated for long periods of monotony.
One afternoon in November, 1917, an American destroyer division,
commanded by Commander Frank Berrien, with the _Nicholson_ as its
flagship, put out of Queenstown on the usual mission of taking a
westbound convoy to its rendezvous and bringing in one that was bound
for British ports. This outward convoy was the "O Q 20" and consisted of
eight fine ships. After the usual preliminary scoutings the vessels
passed through the net in single file, sailed about ten miles to sea,
and began to take up the stipulated formation, four columns of two ships
each. The destroyers were moving around; they were even mingling in the
convoy, carrying messages and giving instructions; by a quarter past
four all the ships had attained their assigned positions, except one,
the _Rene_, which was closing up to its place as the rear ship of the
first column. Meanwhile, the destroyer _Fanning_ was steaming rapidly to
its post on the rear flank. Suddenly there came a cry from the bridge of
the _Fanning_, where Coxswain David D. Loomis was on lookout:
"Periscope!"
Off the starboard side of the _Fanning_, glistening in the smooth water,
a periscope of the "finger" variety, one so small that it could usually
elude all but the sharpest eyes, had darted for a few seconds above the
surface and had then just as suddenly disappeared. Almost directly ahead
lay the _Welshman_, a splendid British merchant ship; the periscope was
so close that a torpedo would almost inevitably have hit this vessel in
the engine-room. The haste with which the German had withdrawn his
periscope, after taking a hurried glance around, was easily explained;
for his lens had revealed not only this tempting bait, but the destroyer
_Fanning_ close aboard and bearing down on him. Under these
circumstances it was not surprising that no torpedo was fired; it was
clearly military wisdom to beat a quick retreat rather than attempt to
attack the merchantman. Lieut. Walter S. Henry, who was the officer of
the deck, acted with the most commendable despatch. It is not the
simplest thing, even when the submarine is so obviously located as this
one apparently was, to reach the spot accurately.
The destroyer has to make a wide and rapid turn, and there is every
danger, in making this manoeuvre, that the location will be missed.
Subsequent events disclosed that the _Fanning_ was turned with the
utmost accuracy. As the ship darted by the spot at which the periscope
had been sighted, a depth charge went over the stern, and exploded so
violently that the main generator of the _Fanning_ herself was
temporarily disabled. Meanwhile the _Nicholson_ had dashed through the
convoy, made a rapid detour to the left, and dropped another depth
charge a short distance ahead of the _Fanning_.
The disturbances made on the water by these "ash cans" gradually
subsided; to all outward appearances the submarine had escaped unharmed.
The _Fanning_ and the _Nicholson_ completed their circles and came back
to the danger spot, the officers and crew eagerly scanning the surface
for the usual oil patch and air bubbles, even hoping for a few pieces of
wreckage--those splintered remnants of the submarine's wooden deck that
almost invariably indicated a considerable amount of damage. But none of
these evidences of success, or half-success, rose to the surface; for
ten or fifteen minutes everything was as quiet as the grave. Then
something happened which occurred only a few times in this strange war.
The stern of a submarine appeared out of the water, tilted at about
thirty degrees, clearly revealing its ugly torpedo tubes. Then came the
conning-tower and finally the entire boat, the whole hull taking its
usual position on the surface as neatly and unconcernedly as though no
enemies were near. So far as could be seen the U-boat was in perfect
condition. Its hull looked intact, showing not the slightest indication
of injury; the astonished officers and men on the destroyers could
easily understand now why no oil or wreckage had risen to the top, for
the _U-58_--they could now see this inscription plainly painted on the
conning-tower--was not leaking, and the deck showed no signs of having
come into contact even remotely with a depth charge. The _Fanning_ and
the _Nicholson_ began firing shells at the unexpected visitant, and the
_Nicholson_ extended an additional welcome in the form of a hastily
dropped "ash can."
Suddenly the conning-tower of the submarine opened and out popped the
rotund face and well-fed form of Kapitaen-Leutnant Gustav Amberger, of
the Imperial German Navy. The two arms of the Herr Kapitaen immediately
shot heavenward and the Americans on the destroyers could hear certain
guttural ejaculations:
"Kamerad! Kamerad!"
A hatchway now opened, and a procession of German sailors emerged, one
after the other, into the sunshine, like ants crawling out of their
hole. As each sailor reached the deck he straightened up, lifted his
arms, and shouted:
"Kamerad! Kamerad! Kamerad!"
In all four officers and thirty-five men went through this ceremony.
Were they really surrendering themselves and their boat, or did these
gymnastic exercises conceal some new form of German craftiness? The
American ships ceased firing; the _Fanning_ gingerly approached the
submarine, while the _Nicholson_ stood by, all her four-inch guns
trained upon the German boat, and the machine-guns pointed at the
kamerading Germans, ready to shoot them into ribbons at the first sign
that the surrender was not a genuine one.
While these preliminaries were taking place, a couple of German sailors
disappeared into the interior of the submarine, stayed there a moment or
two, and then returned to the deck. They had apparently performed a duty
that was characteristically German; for a few minutes after they
appeared again, the _U-58_ began to settle in the water, and soon
afterward sank. These men, obeying orders, had opened the cocks and
scuttled the ship--this after the officers had surrendered her! As the
submarine disappeared, the men and officers dived and started swimming
toward the _Fanning_; four of them became entangled in the radio antennae
and were dragged under the waves; however, in a few minutes these men
succeeded in disentangling themselves and joined the swimmers. As the
thirty-nine men neared the _Fanning_ it was evident that most of them
were extremely wearied and that some were almost exhausted. The sailors
from the _Fanning_ threw over lines; some still had the strength to
climb up these to the deck, while to others it was necessary to throw
other lines which they could adjust under their arms. These latter, limp
and wet figures, the American sailors pulled up, much as the fisherman
pulls up the inert body of a monster fish. And now an incident took
place which reveals that the American navy has rather different ideals
of humanity from the German. One of the sailors was so exhausted that he
could not adjust the life-lines around his shoulders; he was very
apparently drowning. Like a flash Elxer Harwell, chief pharmacist mate,
and Francis G. Conner, coxswain, jumped overboard, swam to this
floundering German, and adjusted the line around him as solicitously as
though he had been a shipmate. The poor wretch--his name was Franz
Glinder--was pulled aboard, but he was so far gone that all attempts to
resuscitate him failed, and he died on the deck of the _Fanning_.
Kapitaen Amberger, wet and dripping, immediately walked up to Lieut. A.
S. Carpender, the commander of the _Fanning_, clicked his heels
together, saluted in the most ceremonious German fashion, and
surrendered himself, his officers, and his crew. He also gave his parole
for his men. The officers were put in separate staterooms under guard
and each of the crew was placed under the protection of a well-armed
American jackie--who, it may be assumed, immensely enjoyed this new
duty. All the "survivors" were dressed in dry, warm clothes, and good
food and drink were given them. They were even supplied with cigarettes
and something which they valued more than all the delicacies in the
world--soap for a washing, the first soap which they had had for
months, as this was an article which was more scarce in Germany than
even copper or rubber. Our physicians gave the men first aid, and others
attended to all their minor wants. Evidently the fact that they had been
captured did not greatly depress their spirits, for, after eating and
drinking to their heart's content, the assembled Germans burst into
song.
But what was the explanation of this strange proceeding? The German
officers, at first rather stiff and sullen, ultimately unbent enough to
tell their story. Their submarine had been hanging off the entrance to
Queenstown for nearly two days, waiting for this particular convoy to
emerge. The officers admitted that they were getting ready to torpedo
the _Welshman_ when the discovery that the _Fanning_ was only a short
distance away compelled a sudden change in their plans. Few "ash cans"
dropped in the course of the war reached their objective with the
unerring accuracy of the one which now came from this American
destroyer. It did not crush the submarine but the concussion wrecked the
motors, making it impossible for it to navigate, jammed its diving
rudders, making the boat uncontrollable under the water, and broke the
oil leads, practically shutting off the supply of this indispensable
fuel. Indeed, it would be impossible to conceive of a submarine in a
more helpless and unmanageable state. The officers had the option of two
alternatives: to sink until the pressure of the water crushed the boat
like so much paper, or to blow the ballast tanks, rise to the surface,
and surrender. Even while the commander was mentally debating this
problem, the submarine was rapidly descending to the bottom; when it
reached a depth of two hundred feet, which was about all that it could
stand, the commander decided to take his chances with the Americans.
Rising to the top involved great dangers; but the guns of the destroyers
seemed less formidable to these cornered Germans than the certainty of
the horrible death that awaited them under the waves.
Admiral Bayly came to meet the _Fanning_ as she sailed into Queenstown
with her unexpected cargo. He went on board the destroyer to
congratulate personally the officers and men upon their achievement. He
published to the assembled company a cablegram just received from the
Admiralty in London:
Express to commanding officers and men of the United States ship
_Fanning_ their Lordships' high appreciation of their successful
action against enemy submarine.
I added a telegram of my own, ending up with the words, which seemed to
amuse the officers and men: "Go out and do it again."
For this action the commanding officer of the _Fanning_,
Lieutenant-Commander Carpender, was recommended by the Admiralty for the
D.S.O., which was subsequently conferred upon him by the King at
Buckingham Palace.
Only one duty remained: the commanding officer read the burial service
over the body of poor Franz Glinder, the German sailor who had been
drowned in his attempt to swim to the _Fanning_. The _Fanning_ then
steamed out to sea with the body and buried it with all the honours of
war. A letter subsequently written by Kapitaen Amberger to a friend in
Germany summed up his opinion of the situation in these words:
"The Americans were much nicer and more obliging than expected."
VI
So far as convoying merchant ships was concerned, Queenstown was the
largest American base; by the time the movement of troops laid heavy
burdens on the American destroyers Brest became a headquarters almost
equally important.
In July, 1917, the British Government requested the co-operation of the
American navy in the great work which it had undertaken at Gibraltar;
and on August 6th the U.S.S. _Sacramento_ reached that port, followed
about a week afterward by the _Birmingham_ flying the flag of
Rear-Admiral Henry B. Wilson. Admiral Wilson remained as commander of
this force until November, when he left to assume the direction of
affairs at Brest. On November 25th Rear-Admiral Albert P. Niblack
succeeded to this command, which he retained throughout the war.
Gibraltar was the "gateway" for more traffic than any other port in the
world. It was estimated that more than one quarter of all the convoys
which reached the Entente nations either rendezvoused at this point or
passed through these Straits. This was the great route to the East by
way of the Suez Canal. From Gibraltar extended the Allied lines of
communication to southern France, Italy, Salonika, Egypt, Palestine, and
Mesopotamia. There were other routes to Bizerta (Tunis), Algiers, the
island of Milo, and a monthly service to the Azores.
The Allied forces that were detailed to protect this shipping were
chiefly British and American, though they were materially assisted by
French, Japanese, and Italian vessels. They consisted of almost anything
which the hard-pressed navies could assemble from all parts of the
world--antiquated destroyers, yachts, sloops, trawlers, drifters, and
the like. The Gibraltar area was a long distance from the main enemy
submarine bases. The enemy could maintain at sea at any one time only a
relatively small number of submarines; inasmuch as the zone off the
English Channel and Ireland was the most critical one, the Allies
stationed their main destroyer force there. Because of these facts, we
had great difficulty in finding vessels to protect the important
Gibraltar area, and the force which we ultimately got together was
therefore a miscellaneous lot. The United States gathered at this point
forty-one ships, and a personnel which averaged 314 officers and 4,660
men. This American aggregation contained a variegated assortment of
scout cruisers, gunboats, coastguard cutters, yachts, and five
destroyers of antique type. The straits to which we were reduced for
available vessels for the Gibraltar station--and the British navy was
similarly hard pressed--were illustrated by the fact that we placed
these destroyers at Gibraltar. They were the _Decatur_ and four similar
vessels, each of 420 tons--the modern destroyer is a vessel of from
1,000 to 1,200 tons--and were stationed, when the war broke out, at
Manila, where they were considered fit only for local service; yet the
record which these doughty little ships made is characteristic of the
spirit of our young officers. This little squadron steamed 12,000 miles
from Manila to Gibraltar, and that they arrived in condition immediately
to take up their duties was due to the excellent judgment and seamanship
displayed by their commanding officer, Lieutenant-Commander (now
Commander) Harold R. Stark. Subsequently they made 48,000 miles on
escort duty. This makes 60,000 miles for vessels which in peace time had
been consigned to minor duties! Unfortunately one of these gallant
little vessels was subsequently cut down and sunk by a merchant ship
while escorting a convoy.
For more than a year the Gibraltar force under Admiral Niblack performed
service which reflected high credit upon that commander, his officers,
and his men. During this period of time it escorted, in co-operation
with the British forces, 562 convoys, comprising a total of 10,478
ships. Besides protecting commerce, chasing submarines, and keeping them
under the surface, many of the vessels making up this squadron had
engagements with submarines that were classified as "successful." On May
15, 1918, the _Wheeling_, a gunboat, and the _Surveyor_ and _Venetia_,
yachts, while escorting a Mediterranean convoy, depth-charged a
submarine which had just torpedoed one of the convoyed vessels; we
credited these little ships with sinking their enemy. The _Venetia_,
under the command of Commander L. B. Porterfield, U.S.N., had an
experience not unlike that of the _Christabel_, already described. On
this occasion she was part of the escort of a Gibraltar-Bizerta convoy.
A British member of this convoy, the _Surveyor_, was torpedoed at six in
the evening; at that time the submarine gave no further evidence of its
existence. The _Venetia_, however, was detailed to remain in the
neighbourhood, attempt to locate the mysterious vessel, and at least to
keep it under the water. The _Venetia_ soon found the wake of the
submerged enemy and dropped the usual depth charges. Three days
afterward a badly injured U-boat put in at Cartagena, Spain, and was
interned for the rest of the war. Thus another submarine was as good as
sunk. The _Lydonia_, a yacht of 500 tons, in conjunction with the
British ship _Basilisk_, sank another U-boat in the western
Mediterranean. This experience illustrates the doubt that enshrouded all
such operations, for it was not until three months after the _Lydonia_
engagement took place that the Admiralty discovered that the submarine
had been destroyed and recommended Commander Richard P. McCullough,
U.S.N., for a decoration.
Thus from the first day that this method of convoying ships was adopted
it was an unqualified success in defeating the submarine campaign. By
August 1, 1917, more than 10,000 ships had been convoyed, with losses of
only one-half of 1 per cent. Up to that same date not a single ship
which had left North American ports in convoy had been lost. By August
11th, 261 ships had been sent in convoy from North American ports, and
of these only one had fallen a prey to the submarines. The convoy gave
few opportunities for encounters with their enemies. I have already said
that the great value of this system as a protection to shipping was that
it compelled the under-water boats to fight their deadliest enemies, the
destroyers, every time they tried to sink merchant ships in convoy, and
they did not attempt this often on account of the danger. There were
destroyer commanders who spent months upon the open sea, convoying huge
aggregations of cargo vessels, without even once seeing a submarine. To
a great extent the convoy system did its work in the same way that the
Grand Fleet performed its indispensable service--silently,
unobtrusively, making no dramatic bids for popular favour, and
industriously plodding on, day after day and month after month. All this
time the world had its eyes fixed upon the stirring events of the
Western Front, almost unconscious of the existence of the forces that
made those land operations possible. Yet a few statistics eloquently
disclose the part played by the convoy system in winning the war. In the
latter months of the struggle from 91 to 92 per cent. of Allied shipping
sailed in convoys. The losses in these convoys were less than 1 per
cent. And this figure includes the ships lost after the dispersal of the
convoys; in convoys actually under destroyer escort the losses were less
than one-half of 1 per cent. Military experts would term the convoy
system a defensive-offensive measure. By this they mean that it was a
method of taking a defensive position in order to force the enemy to
meet you and give you an opportunity for the offensive. It is an old
saying that the best defensive measure is a vigorous offensive one.
Unfortunately, owing to the fact that the Allies had not prepared for
the kind of warfare which the Germans saw fit to employ against them, we
could not conduct purely offensive operations; that is, we could not
employ our anti-submarine forces exclusively in the effort to destroy
the submarines. Up to the time of the armistice, despite all the
assistance rendered to the navies by the best scientific brains of the
world, no sure means had been found of keeping track of the submarine
once he submerged. The convoy system was, therefore, our only method of
bringing him into action. I lay stress on this point and reiterate it
because many critics kept insisting during the war--and their voices are
still heard--that the convoy system was purely a defensive or passive
method of opposing the submarine, and was, therefore, not sound tactics.
It is quite true that we had to defend our shipping in order to win the
war, but it is wrong to assume that the method adopted to accomplish
this protection was a purely defensive and passive one.
As my main purpose is to describe the work of the American navy I have
said little in the above about the activities of the British navy in
convoying merchant ships. But we should not leave this subject with a
false perspective. When the war ended we had seventy-nine destroyers in
European waters, while Great Britain had about 400. These included those
assigned to the Grand Fleet, to the Harwich force, to the Dover patrol,
to Gibraltar and the Mediterranean, and other places, many of which were
but incidentally making war on the submarines. As to minor
ships--trawlers, sloops, Q-boats, yachts, drifters, tugs, and the other
miscellaneous types used in this work--the discrepancy was even greater.
In absolute figures our effort thus seems a small one when compared with
that of our great ally. In tonnage of merchant ships convoyed, the work
of the British navy was far greater than ours. Yet the help which we
contributed was indispensable to the success that was attained. For,
judging from the situation before we entered the war, and knowing the
inadequacy of the total Allied anti-submarine forces even after we had
entered, it seems hardly possible that, without the assistance of the
United States navy, the vital lines of communication of the armies in
the field could have been kept open, the civil populations of Great
Britain supplied with food, and men and war materials sent from America
to the Western Front. In other words, I think I am justified in saying
that without the co-operation of the American navy, the Allies could not
have won the war. Our forces stationed at Queenstown actually escorted
through the danger zone about 40 per cent. of all the cargoes which
left North American ports. When I describe the movement of American
troops, it will appear that our destroyers located at Queenstown and
Brest did even a larger share of this work. The latest reports show that
about 205 German submarines were destroyed. Of these it seems probable
that thirteen can be credited to American efforts, the rest to Great
Britain, France, and Italy--the greatest number, of course, to Great
Britain. When we take into consideration the few ships that we had on
the other side, compared with those of the Allies, and the comparatively
brief period in which we were engaged in the war, this must be regarded
as a highly creditable showing.
I regret that I have not been able to describe the work of all of our
officers and men; to do this, however, would demand more than a single
volume. One of the disappointing aspects of destroyer work was that many
of the finest performances were those that were the least spectacular.
The fact that an attack upon a submarine did not result in a sinking
hardly robbed it of its importance; many of the finest exploits of our
forces did not destroy the enemy, but they will always hold a place in
our naval annals for the daring and skill with which they were
conducted. In this class belong the achievements of the _Sterrett_,
under Lieutenant-Commander Farquhar; of the _Benham_, under
Lieutenant-Commander D. Lyons; of the _O'Brien_, under
Lieutenant-Commander C. A. Blakeley; of the _Parker_, under
Lieutenant-Commander H. Powell; of the _Jacob Jones_, under
Lieutenant-Commander D. W. Bagley; of the _Wadsworth_, under
Lieutenant-Commander Taussig, and afterward I. F. Dortch; of the
_Drayton_, under Lieutenant-Commander D. L. Howard; of the _McDougal_,
under Commander A. L. Fairfield; and of the _Nicholson_, under Commander
F. D. Berrien. The senior destroyer commander at Queenstown was
Commander David C. Hanrahan of the _Cushing_, a fine character and one
of the most experienced officers of his rank in the Navy. He was a tower
of strength at all times, and I shall have occasion to mention him later
in connection with certain important duties. The Chief-of-Staff at
Queenstown, Captain J. R. P. Pringle, was especially commended by
Admiral Bayly for his "tact, energy, and ability." The American naval
forces at Queenstown were under my immediate command. Necessarily,
however, I had to spend the greater part of my time at the London
headquarters, or at the Naval Council in Paris, and it was therefore
necessary that I should be represented at Queenstown by a man of marked
ability. Captain Pringle proved equal to every emergency. He was
responsible for the administration, supplies, and maintenance of the
Queenstown forces, and the state of readiness and efficiency in which
they were constantly maintained was the strongest possible evidence of
his ability. To him was chiefly due also the fact that our men
co-operated so harmoniously and successfully with the British.
As an example of the impression which our work made I can do no better
than to quote the message sent by Admiral Sir Lewis Bayly to the
Queenstown forces on May 4, 1918:
"On the anniversary of the arrival of the first United States men-of-war
at Queenstown, I wish to express my deep gratitude to the United States
officers and ratings for the skill, energy, and unfailing good-nature
which they have all consistently shown and which qualities have so
materially assisted in the war by enabling ships of the Allied Powers to
cross the ocean in comparative freedom.
"To command you is an honour, to work with you is a pleasure, to know
you is to know the best traits of the Anglo-Saxon race."