CAPTURING A U-BOAT
The battle at the wharf was of short duration. Completely surrounded
and outnumbered ten to one, the party of isolated Germans threw down
their arms and surrendered. From his vantage point behind the conning
tower of the captured U-boat Jack kept tabs on the struggle until all
firing had ceased and he was sure the Germans had been completely
subjugated. The cheering of his rescuers apprised him of the defeat
of the enemy. Walking out on the deck of the U-boat, he pulled off
his hat and welcomed his deliverers with a lusty yell.
His sudden appearance from behind the conning tower of the U-boat
completely nonplussed his friends for a moment. The bluejackets
wheeled at the sound of his voice and a dozen rifles were trained on
him in an instant.
"Don't fire!" yelled Jack. "I'm Jack Hammond of the U.S.S. _Dewey_."
For a moment the blue jackets paused---and then pandemonium broke
loose.
"Hurrah, hurrah for Jack Hammond!" they shouted. Hastily a gangplank
was thrown out to the captive U-boat and Jack ran ashore only to be
surrounded by his fellow-countrymen and fairly lifted off his feet.
"We've heard all about you---how you escaped from the U-boat and called
for help from the German wireless station. Bully for you, Jack
Hammond; Uncle Sam can be proud of you," cried a sergeant of marines,
who was gripping his hand with a clasp of steel.
Through the crowd of sailors and marines at that moment came a slender
lad who elbowed his way forward with the ruthless violence of a
fullback determined upon a touchdown. Right and left he tossed the
bluejackets until he had fought to the side of the rescued American
in the center of the group.
"Jack!" he yelled in delight.
"Ted!" cried the other almost in unison.
Unabashed, the two old Brighton chums embraced each other like two
school girls just back for the fall term after summer vacation.
"Gee, chum, I never expected to see you again!" exclaimed Ted as he
released his companion from a regular bear hug.
"Nor I you, either," said Jack. "Tell me, what happened to the _Dewey_?
How did you get out? Where is McClure and all the rest of the crew?
How did you get here?"
Jack was so excited thinking of his old friends he forgot his own part
in the stirring incidents of the last few hours, and his own injury,
as he insisted on hearing the whole story from his old roommate.
"I'll tell you pretty soon; everybody is safe and all O.K.," answered
Ted. And then he beheld the blood dripping from Jack's wounded arm.
"Wait a moment; what's wrong here?" he exclaimed, lifting the arm
tenderly and disclosing to the view of the excited group of Americans
a wound just above the wrist.
"Oh, it's just a scratch on the arm; one of the Boches nipped me while
I was out there on the U-boat deck waiting for you fellows to come
down through the village," he replied lightly, trying to minimize his
injury.
A first-aid kit was produced and the wound hurriedly dressed. It
seemed to be but a slight flesh wound. In the midst of the dressing
a great shrapnel shell burst just on the other side of the canal
and threw some of its fragments into the water just beyond the U-boat.
At the same moment was heard the whirr of an airplane motor overhead
and very shortly a hand bomb crashed to earth not more than two
hundred yards up the canal towpath, exploding with a terrible detonation
and tearing up a fearful hole in the ground.
"The German guns are all in action now," said Ted as he watched the
airplane circling above the U-boat base.
Jack was soon told of the situation. He had been rescued by a landing
party from several warships of the U.S. fleet. Under the cover of
their guns, trained upon the German fortifications at Blankenberghe,
further up the coast, and another Hun fort further down the coast, the
bluejackets and marines had come ashore.
Seaward could be heard the incessant pounding of the American guns,
intermingled with the boom-boom of the German artillery in the coast
defenses. The German air patrol had flashed warning of the approaching
American fleet and given the range to their gunners.
As Ted finished dressing the flesh wound, Jack saw coming toward him
a naval officer whose epaulets showed him to be a Lieutenant-Commander
of the United States Navy. Jack saluted formally.
"Are you Mr. Jack Hammond of the U.S.S. _Dewey_?" the officer asked.
Jack replied in the affirmative.
"I am Lieutenant-commander Davis of the U.S.S. _Tallahassee_," replied
the officer. "You are the man we came after, and now that we have found
you we must get right out of here as quickly as possible. I should like,
however, to congratulate you on your remarkable exploit in getting away
from the submarine and signaling so fearlessly for aid. Furthermore,
I congratulate you, too, on capturing this U-boat single-handed."
Jack blushed and endeavored to stammer his thanks.
Immediately the American landing party prepared to retire. Deprived
of all arms, the German prisoners were turned loose and driven out
of the village, with instructions to get away as quickly as possible.
After communicating with the American fleet offshore, reporting the
rescue of Hammond and receiving instructions to get aboard ship as
quickly as possible, Lieutenant-Commander Davis ordered the destruction
of the wireless station. Likewise the two huge oil tanks at the
canal's edge in which the Germans had stored fuel for their U-boats
were fired, along with supply stores and every other thing that might
prove of value to the enemy.
Lieutenant-Commander Davis hurried up and asked Jack whether his
injury was sufficiently serious to incapacitate him for active service.
When Jack replied that he was capable of performing any desired
service, the American officer said:
"We shall certainly try and take that U-boat along with us. I am
going to detail twenty of my men to the U-boat under command of
Lieutenant Bridwell I should like you and Mr. Wainwright to assist
Lieutenant Bridwell in getting the U-boat out to sea. We shall
retire overland to our boats on the coast and leave you men to bring
out the submarine."
Forthwith a crew was made up for the U-boat out of the landing party.
Three Germans who still remained cowering within the conning tower of
the submarine submitted quietly to capture. Lieutenant Bridwell
decided to make the Germans assist in getting the U-boat out to sea.
"Put one of our men over each of the chaps and tell them to shoot at
the first sign of any funny business," was Bridwell's order to Jack.
It was found that the U-boat's fuel tanks had been but recently
replenished---in fact, the submarine bad been fitted for another
cruise and was all ready to put to sea.
Jack found himself acting as executive officer to Lieutenant Bridwell
in the operation of the submersible. Her oil engines were easily set
in motion and her steering apparatus; was not unlike that of the _Dewey_,
so the task of navigating the captured prize out to sea seemed not a
difficult one.
Lieutenant Bridwell summoned one of the German prisoners before him.
"You understand English?" he asked.
"Yes," answered the captive Teuton.
"Then listen to me," went on the American commander. "Either you
assist us to get out to sea or forfeit your life. I don't mean by
that that we will kill you. The channel out to sea is probably
mined and netted. If we explode a mine or run into a net and get
stranded you die with the rest of us. Which will it be?"
The German signified his willingness to assist. He knew the channel
very well, he continued, and would do his part. And then the most
surprising thing happened. Of his own free will the captive told how
he and his two companions aboard the U-boat had been pressed into the
submarine service against their will. They had not desired to embark
with one of the undersea fleet, but had been compelled to enlist in
the service.
Many of the Germans were in open revolt against U-boat service, said
the Teuton, because of the great number of submersibles being sunk
by the allied navies. Only the previous week a revolt had occurred
in the fleet at Cuxhaven, an admiral and a naval commander had been
thrown overboard and a number of U-boats were lying inactive at their
bases because of the inability to ship crews.
When the American lad had driven them inside the U-boat at the approach
of the victorious landing party, continued the loquacious prisoner,
they had decided at first to cripple the U-boat. But after talking
it over they had decided that it would be better to fall into the
hands of the Americans than to lose their lives by sinking the U-boat.
And now they were willing to assist their captors in getting safely
out to sea.
Lieutenant Bridwell smilingly accepted the offer, but with a knowing
wink to Jack which meant that the latter was to keep close watch over
the talkative and seemingly docile German.
Now the evacuation of the U-boat base was under way. Having razed the
place completely, Lieutenant-commander Davis was directing the retreat
of his men over the sand dunes to their waiting boats on the beach
front a mile or so off. German airplanes were making valiant efforts
to wipe out the American landing party, but were so hard pressed by
the heavy fire from the American battleships at sea that their aim
was inaccurate.
The U-boat got under way with Lieutenant Bridwell, Jack, and the
German pilot in the conning tower. Ted was dividing his time between
the engine room and the control chamber, where the other two Germans
were stationed under strong guard.
Moving very slowly, the U-boat was headed down the canal and very
soon emerged into the bay that Jack had found in his exploration of
the coast. In full view now was the American fleet from which the
landing party had been set ashore---the battleship Tallahassee, the
cruisers Detroit and Raleigh, the destroyer _Farragut_ and the
submarine _Dewey_. The Tallahassee was lying broadside of the coast
with all her monster fourteen-inch guns ready for action.
Soon the U-boat had wormed its way safely out into the open sea and
was skimming along under the heavy fire of the fleet that was being
directed against the German coast fortifications. As the U-boat, with
the Stars and Stripes flaunting astern, moved outward, the fleet got
under way.
Notwithstanding the heavy German fire from the coast defenses the
American ships got safely away virtually unscarred in the battle.
Fifteen miles out at sea the captured German U-boat came up with
the _Dewey_. Jack had a joyous reunion with "Little Mack," Cleary
and Binns, Bill Witt, Mike Mowrey and all his other friends aboard
the reclaimed American submarine. And then he heard the complete
story of his rescue.
No sooner had the _Dewey_ appeared upon the, surface, following the
successful consummation of Ted Wainwright's plan, than she had
sighted the destroyer _Farragut_. The latter had heard Jack's call
for help from the German wireless station ashore and had come dashing
to the rescue. At first the commander of the _Farragut_ had considered
the whole thing a ruse on the part of the Germans to lure an American
ship to its doom within range of the powerful coast guns; but the
continued silence of the wireless station after that first frantic
call for help had convinced the destroyer's commander that the message
was genuine.
Along the way, while still attempting to speak the wireless operator
ashore, the _Farragut_ had picked up the battleship Tallahassee and
enlisted its aid. The latter had summoned the Detroit and the Raleigh.
It was while the _Farragut_ was searching for some trace of the sunken
_Dewey_ that the escaped submarine had suddenly shot to the surface
within a half mile of the destroyer.
When the Tallahassee, the Detroit and the Raleigh had come up, there
had been a conference and then the landing party had been resolved
upon. Two hundred and fifty bluejackets and marines had successfully
accomplished the landing and after a brief search had spotted the
wireless station and the U-boat village. The German submarine base,
it was noted, was located along the banks of a canal leading into
the coast town of Blankenberghe---a waterway the Germans: had opened
up after their occupation of Belgium.
Jack Hammond got a rousing reception. The story of his escape from the
_Dewey_ and his bold adventure in the German wireless station had
become known and he was roundly cheered. When it was seen that the
Americans had brought back with them a huge German U-boat there was
great jubilation.
The captain of the Tallahassee, who was the ranking officer of the
assembled fleet, decided that the _Farragut_ should tow the captured
U-boat to the American naval base on the English coast, while the
_Dewey_ also was to return to the same port for thorough inspection
and repairs. A number of her crew were in bad shape from the long
confinement in the stranded sub.
"Your men need a bit of play after their hazardous experience," was
the message flashed to the _Dewey_ from the Tallahassee's commander
as he bade "Little Mack" and his men Godspeed.
And so, after an uneventful run across the North Sea, the _Dewey_
came back to England, bringing as her prize a monster U-boat of the
latest design, complete in every detail and ready for service under
the Stars and Stripes.
And with her came Jack Hammond---a new American naval hero, whose deeds
had fitted him for rank among the immortal list.