Submarine! (11 page)

Men's jaws slackened. This was big-league stuff. Silence answered the Captain's announcement.

The carrier's escorts were two of the biggest and most powerful Japanese destroyers. And they were certainly doing a bang-up job of patrolling for submarines. The carrier was coming out of Tokyo Bay at high speed, zigzagging radically, but the tin cans were working on a complex patrol plan of their own, and they were all over the lot. Long before we reached firing position we rigged
Trigger
for depth charging and silent running. We knew we were going to catch it—there was simply no way to avoid it if we did our job properly.

There was even a good chance, the way the escorts were covering the area, that we'd be detected before shooting. For after firing, when a long, thin fan of bubbles suddenly appeared in the unruffled water—well, at the apex of the fan you were pretty sure of finding the submarine responsible.

I can remember how the palms of my hands sweated, and how the flesh crawled around my knees, as we bored steadily into firing position. This way and that zigzagged the carrier, and that way and then the other went our rudder as we maneuvered to keep ourselves in position ahead of the task group.

“Make ready all tubes!” Captain Benson is taking no chances, plans to have all ten tubes ready to shoot from either end of the ship. “Standby forward.”

We maneuver for a shot. This boy is coming like hell, and no fooling! Twenty-one knots, we clock him. One destroyer on either bow, the whole trio zigzagging radically.

We twist first one way, then the other, as the carrier presents alternately starboard and port angles on the bow. Evidently we lie on his base course. What a break!

“Up periscope. Bearing—mark! Three five zero. Range, mark! Down periscope. Range, six one double oh. Angle on the bow five starboard. How long till he gets here? What's the distance to the track? Control, sixty-three feet. Right full rudder. New course, zero six zero.”

I can hear snatches of the clipped conversation between Steve Mann and the skipper.

“He'll be here in eight and one-half minutes. Zigged three minutes ago, at thirteen minutes. Another zig due about three minutes from now, at nineteen minutes, probably to his right. Distance to the track, five double oh. Depth and speed, Captain?”

“Set all torpedoes depth twenty feet, speed high. Spread them two degrees. What's the time now?”

“Seventeen and one-half minutes.”

“We'll wait a minute. Sound, what does he bear?”

“Three five one—Sound.”

“That checks, Captain. Better take a look around. The starboard screen is coming right for us.”

“Up periscope. There he is—mark! Three five three. Range—mark! Four seven double oh. Looking around—bearing—mark! Three three seven—screen, down periscope! Angle on the bow seven and one-half starboard. Near screen angle on the bow zero. He will pass overhead. Sound, keep bearings coming on light high-speed screws bearing three three seven!”

“High-speed screws, three three seven, sir. Three three seven—three three seven—three three six-a-half—three three six-a-half—three three six—three three six—three three five—three three oh—three two oh—I've lost him, sir. He's all around the dial!”

The familiar
thum
—
thum
—
thum
sweeps unknowingly
overhead. We heave a big sigh of relief. He's out of the way for a minute.

“Never mind him now! Sound, pick up heavy screws bearing about three five eight.”

“Heavy screws zero zero one sir, zero zero two-zero zero three.”

“It's a zig to his left! Up periscope. Bearing—mark! Zero zero five. Range mark! Down periscope. Two two double oh. Angle on the bow thirty starboard. The son of a gun has zigged the wrong way, but it's better for us at that. Right full rudder. Port ahead full! Give me a course for a straight bow shot! Make ready bow tubes! Match gyros forward!”

“One two five, Captain, but we can't make it. Better shoot him on zero nine zero with a right twenty gyro.”

“Steady on zero nine zero! All ahead one third. How much time have I got?”

“Not any, sir. Torpedo run one one double oh yards. Range about one eight double oh, gyros fifteen right, increasing. Shoot any time.” Good old Steve is right on top of the problem.

I shout for more speed, which we will need to control the depth while shooting. Each torpedo being some three hundred pounds heavier than the water it displaces, we stand to become 3000 pounds lighter all of a sudden.

“Up periscope. . . . bearing—mark! Three three five! Set! Fire ONE! . . . Fire TWO! . . . Fire THREE! . . . Fire FOUR! . . . Fire FIVE! . . . Fire SIX! . . . All ahead two thirds.”

As we in the control room fight savagely to keep from broaching surface, I can feel the repeated jolts which signify the departure of the six torpedoes in the forward tubes. The sudden loss of about eighteen hundred pounds forward makes
Trigger
light by the bow. The increase in speed comes too late, and inexorably she rises.

WHANG! WHANG! WHANG! WHANG! Four beautiful solid hits. The carrier's screws stop. He lists and drifts, helpless. We have time to notice that he is brand-new, has no planes visible, and is of a huge new type not yet seen in action
. Little men dressed in white run madly about his decks. His guns shoot wildly in all directions.

We spin the periscope around for a look at the destroyers. Oh, oh! Here they come, and pul-lenty mad!
Take her down!

We are up to fifty-six feet when finally we start back down. Back to sixty feet, and now we can plainly hear that malignant thum, thum, thum, thum again. Down she plunges, seeking the protection that only the depths can give. THUM, THUM, THUM, THUM—WHAM!—WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! and so on for forty-seven consecutive bull's-eyes, no clicks at all! It seems inconceivable that any machine, made of man, can withstand such a vicious pounding. The air inside the
Trigger
is filled with fine particles of paint, cork, and dust. Ventilation lines and pipe lines vibrate themselves out of sight and fill the confined spaces with the discordant hum of a hundred ill-matched tuning forks. Everyone is knocked off his feet, clutches gropingly at tables, ladders, pipes, or anything to help regain his footing. A big section of cork is bounced off the hull and lands on the deck alongside the auxiliaryman; as he stoops to pick it up and drop it in a trash can he is knocked to his hands and knees and the trash can spills all over the cork. The lights go out, but the emergency lights give adequate illumination. The heavy steel-pressure bulkheads squeeze inward with each blow and spring out again. Deck plates and gratings throughout the ship jump from their places and clatter around, adding missile hazard to our troubles. The whole hull rings and shudders, whips and shakes itself, bounces sideways, up and down.

Two hundred feet, and still the agony continues, the rain of depth charges, if anything, increases in fury. How can man, made of soft flesh and not steel, stand up under such merciless, excruciating pounding? But stand it we do, with dry lips and nervous eyes.

We are scared, but fear leaves our brains clear, our bodies quick and sure. As usual, the temperature soars, 120 degrees or better. We reach 300 feet, but cannot stop sinking
for we are heavy. Forward torpedo room bilges are full of water taken in when we fire the torpedoes. Stern tube packing leaks at this depth, and motor room bilges are filling up. Pump room and engine rooms are taking water more slowly through tortured sea valves and fittings. Besides that, the compression of the hull due to the great depth decreases our buoyant volume. We are heavy by about three or four tons, and we dare not pump, because it would make too much noise, especially bucking sea pressure at this depth.

The depth charges cease, but we can hear the angry screws buzzing around overhead. Maybe they've temporarily lost us. If we can keep silent, creep away, we have a chance of evading. But we sink slowly, although we run with a fifteen-degree up angle. We dare not increase speed over the silent speed, and thus increase our chances of being heard. Absolute silence. The auxiliaryman and trim-manifold man have their tools laid on the deck instead of in their usual racks. Some men take off their shoes. The bucket brigade bails water silently from the motor room bilges and silently pours it into the after torpedo room bilges. All hands talk in whispers. The bow and stern planes and steering have been put into hand operation instead of hydraulic, and brawny sailors sweat profusely as they turn the huge wheels. They must be relieved every five minutes, for they gasp for breath in the foul air.

We've been breathing this same air since early morning, and now it is night again. Eighty-five men use up a lot of oxygen, especially when doing hard physical work. We test the atmosphere—2½ per cent carbon dioxide. Three per cent is the danger line—can knock you out. Four per cent will kill you, if you can't get out of it. So we spread Co
₂
absorbent, and release oxygen from our oxygen bottles. That helps. But the heat—nothing can be done about that. You simply sweat and eat salt tablets. Your clothes and shoes are soaked. The decks and bulkheads are slippery, and literally alive with water. The humidity is exactly 100 per cent. But you don't notice it.

Slowly
Trigger
sinks. Down, down, far below her safe
tested depth.
Trigger
, if you are worthy of your heritage, if you can keep the faith of those who built you—who will never know—and of those who place their lives in yours—who will know, if only for an instant—keep it now! We have faith in you, else we'd not subject you to this test. Vindicate that faith, we pray you!

Far, far below where she was designed to go,
Trigger
struggles on. Sinking slowly, her hull creaking and groaning at the unaccustomed strain, her decks bulging in the center, light partition doors unable to close because of the distortion caused by the terrific compression, she finally brings us to the point where it is safe to speed up a little, enough to stop her descent. And so we creep away, finally surfacing to complete our escape.

It wasn't until more than a year later that our carrier was spotted and photographed by a reconnaissance plane. We had set him back a long time, at a critical period. Too bad he didn't sink, but the effect on the Japs of seeing that half-sunken wreck come dragging back on the end of a towline and settle ignominiously into the mud of Tokyo Bay after his brave departure the day before must have been considerable and significant. For we had tagged the uncompleted aircraft carrier
Hitaka
on his maiden trial trip, just as he poked his freshly painted nose outside the torpedo nets.

Later we discovered that our first two torpedoes had “pre-matured”—exploded just before reaching the target—and that
Hitaka
had in fact received only two holes in his hull, both of them aft. It wasn't our fault that the enemy had had time to tow him back into the shallows, for the four hits we had earned should have taken care of him immediately. Our report did add impetus to the campaign ComSubPac was then waging to get the torpedoes fixed up, however, and had the additional unlooked-for result of starting a rash of stories about the submarine which lay on the bottom of Tokyo Bay for a month waiting for
Hitaka
to be launched. But this was all small comfort.

Trigger
had been so badly damaged that it took two months to repair her. During this period Roy Benson, now
promoted to Commander, who had commanded her for four patrols, and Lieutenant Steve Mann, who had placed her in commission with me, five patrols before, were detached. Commander Benson reported to the Submarine School at New London, as instructor, and Steve went as exec to the new submarine
Devilfish
, then under construction at the Cramp Shipbuilding Works near Philadelphia. I succeeded Steve as Executive Officer. Stinky, who by this time was trying to get us to call him “Sinky,” took over as engineer.

For a time we wondered who our new skipper was to be, and hoped it would be somebody who had had a lot of experience already as exec of a hot ship. Our hopes were fulfilled to overflowing when, after a short time, we learned that Robert E. Dornin, commonly known as “Dusty,” veteran of many patrols in
Gudgeon
, had been ordered to take over
Trigger
. Knowing his reputation, we expected great things of our ship in the next few months, and in this we were not to be disappointed.

In the meantime,
Seawolf
had been long overdue for repairs, and her crew for an extensive rest, so she was ordered to Mare Island Navy Yard for a complete modernization. While in California she received a new skipper, Lieutenant Commander Royce L. Gross, commonly known as “Googy,” and Fred Warder left the ship he had commanded for more than three years and for seven war patrols.