“New Life for a Liberty”
(See T. A. Dietz, pp. 54-58, Winter 1990; A. J. Horn, Sr., R. Kuchen, and J. E. Wright, pp. 10-13, Spring 1990; E. S. Downs, p. 2, Fall 1990 Naval History)
Editor’s Note: We received several letters about the torpedoing of the George Ade, some citing sources such as Axis Submarine Successes 1939-1945 (Naval Institute Press, 1983) which listed the ship as having gone down on 12 September 1944. Captain Holmes wrote the following in response to these incorrect claims.
Captain Barton M. Holmes, U.S. Merchant Marine (Retired)—Commander Downs refers to a megaphone conversation he had with the chief mate of the torpedoed Liberty ship George Ade and the attack his vessel made on a submarine contact. 1 am that chief mate, and I trust this will prove once and for all that the George Ade did not sink or was ever abandoned during or after the hurricane that we encountered while under tow after being torpedoed. If she had sunk I doubt if I would be alive and writing this. I do not know how reports of her sinking ever got into publication. I can only guess that the ship was confused with the sinking at the time of the two U.S. Coast Guard cutters Jackson and Bedloe that were escorting us while we were under tow. These vessels were lost in the hurricane and I believe with all hands.
In brief, the vessel was hit right aft in the stem—no doubt by an acoustic torpedo—blowing away the rudder, most of the steering engine, breaking the propeller shaft, and opening the shaft alley to the sea. Closer inspection also showed hull buckling between number four and number five holds; however, very little sea water entered number five. This came, I believe, from seepage from the aft peak bulkhead, aft end number five hold. Further damage no doubt was caused to the hull by pounding on the beach and perhaps by the depth charges from Lieutenant Commander Downs’s vessel. After we were driven ashore by the hurricane, the wind shifted and returned us to deep water.
To clarify, after the hurricane, a Navy salvage tug took us in tow to Norfolk, Virginia, where all cargo was discharged. The crew was paid off on 23 September 1944. After discharge of the cargo, the vessel was towed to Newport News Shipbuilding, where she went into dry dock and was surveyed. I was in the first survey party and remember seeing extensive damage to the hull frames and plating. Members of the survey party remarked with wonder as to what held the ship together and why she had not broken up in the storm.
I had joined the George Ade in mid- August, 1944, while she was being built at Panama City, Florida. From there we went to Mobile, Alabama, to load cargo for Great Britain. After loading, we proceeded to Key West, Florida, independently, to convoy to New York. After a short time at anchor, we were ordered to proceed to New York under independent routing to join the convoy for Great Britain. We were attacked by a U-boat on 12 September 1944.
I left the vessel a day or two after the survey. At the time I doubted if they would bother to repair the ship, thinking they could build a new one in less time than it would take to make repairs. However, I have since read the following in the excellent book by Captain A. Moore. A Careless Word—A Needless Sinking: “The ship was repaired and returned to service on 18 December 1944.”
I can only agree with Lieutenant Commander Downs that the George Ade was a very, very tough ship indeed. She was of all-welded construction, and I would say more than 50%of the work was done by women (bless them!). I do believe he must have been looking at another ship that had a hole in her side—George Ade did not. George Ade was my first ship as chief mate. I surely received on-the-job training.
“Zeppelin Hunters”
(See F. Contey, pp. 37-41, Spring 1990 Naval History)
Lieutenant Commander James V. P. Goldrick, Royal Australian Navy—Mr. Contey refers to the captain of HMAS Sydney as DeMeritt, but is in error (probably because of confusion caused by reliance on oral material). Sydney's commanding officer was, in fact. Captain John S. Dumaresq (1873-1922), who was a distinguished cruiser captain and inventor of the Dumaresq, a gunnery instrument used to measure rates of change and deflection. A forward-thinking and innovative officer, Dumaresq had served as chairman of the Grand Fleet’s post- Jutland committee on cruisers. Although a Royal Navy officer, he later became the first Australian-born flag officer commanding the Australian fleet (his birth also having been a prime motivation in his appointment to HMAS Sydney).
While in Australia, Dumaresq pursued a continuing interest in aviation, although a lack of funds and unsuitable equipment made the task very difficult. Dumaresq died in the Philippines on his way back to Great Britain, a great loss to the Royal Australian Navy and Royal Navy and naval aviation. Ray Jones’s recent work Seagulls, Catapults and Cruisers (Ho- hart, Australia: Pelorus Publications, 1989) takes up the story of the Royal Australian Navy pre-carrier aviation to 1944.
“The 14-inch Naval Railway Batteries”
(See E. R. Lewis, pp. 41-45, Spring 1991 Naval History)
Lieutenant Commander E. M. McGann, U.S. Naval Reserve (Retired)—I was My delighted to read this entertaining account of a little-known bit of naval history. I was nine or ten years old when I first read about railway guns. A lengthy history had been printed in two parts in the Saturday Evening Post. In the interring years, I have attempted to obtain some source data on these unusual weapons. To my delight, in 1988 the U.S. Government Printing Office reissued the Navy’s 1922 account of these batteries.
The booklet, “The United States Naval Railway Batteries in France," is a gold mine. It includes action logs, complete crew lists, logistics, range, and deflection problems (well above my head!), and is amply supplied with photographs—plus a foreword by our own redoubtable Vice Admiral Joe Metcalf.
H. H. Caldwell—Dr. Lewis may be interested to know that the shot fired 11 November 1918 at 10:59 a.m. was officially recognized as the final shot of the “War to end all Wars,” and its primer was displayed in the Smithsonian Museum with a descriptive plaque that identified the battery commander as Lieutenant Ralston Hayden.
After demobilization, Hayden returned to an academic career in Michigan. Sometime between World War I and World War II he was appointed Lieutenant Governor of the Philippines, and also served as Governor for about one year during the illness of the incumbent.
I met Dr. Hayden in Brisbane, Australia, in 1944 when he was the only civilian on General Douglas Mac Arthur’s staff, and responsible for coordinating support for the Philippine guerrilla forces during the Japanese occupation of the islands.
“The Cuban Missile Crisis Quarantine"
(See F. R. Johns, pp. 12-18, Spring 1991 Naval History)
Captain Cary Hall, U.S. Navy (Retired)— This article has some surprising statements, and I find it difficult to agree on the importance assigned to the initial radius of the ’’blockade” or “quarantine”— whether 800 or 500 miles. The article states Vice Admiral Alfred G. (Corky) Ward’s personal diary says that at the meeting of the joint Chiefs on 20 October, with General Maxwell Taylor present. Admiral Ward took exception to two aspects of these instructions: first, the 500-mile distance from Cuba was excessive and would result in using too many ships; and second, inclusion of air interdiction would be impractical without an attack carrier. General Taylor stated in his opinion it was a foolish provision and that 180 miles should be adequate. When the orders came out the next day, the 500-mile restriction had been eliminated and substituted with the provision that the blockade lines should be outside the range of Cuban weapons. This seems to settle the matter as far as the facts are concerned.
Later, on 23 October, Admiral Ward states: “Even though the JCS directive had eliminated the 500-mile restriction, the CincLantFlt directive retained it but authorized a Blockade Commander to vary stations at his discretion. With CincLantFlt’s concurrence, I decided to establish initially the stations on the 500- mile arc and so directed the Force.” Consequently, the “quarantine” was established on the 500-mile arc on 24 October. On the same day, however, “Information from the highest authority prescribed ‘Do not stop and board. Keep under surveillance. Make continuous reports.’” For this reason there was never any actual quarantine or blockade and only one ship, the Soviet-chartered Lebanese Marcula was boarded—and in that case with the cooperation of the captain who waited for many hours for a party from the Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. (DD-850) to board on 27 October. “No forbidden weapons or cargoes were detected.”
Of considerably more interest than the positioning of the ships during this operation, which hardly seems to merit the importance ascribed, was the successful surfacing of four Soviet submarines exhausted by continuous underwater contact maintained by Atlantic Fleet destroyers. I witnessed one such surfacing from the oiler Neosho (AO-143) and took my ship in column astern of the destroyers as they passed close aboard the Soviet submarine, cheering, singing, quite justly proud of themselves. My crew, lacking antisubmarine capability, was willing to take credit for keeping the destroyers fueled and so joined in the celebration as we passed the submarine, where the bridge personnel kept their eyes stonily forward.
David E. Connor—In regards to the quarantine matter, the author, almost as an aside, states, “Actually, Vice Admiral Wallace M. Beakley, Deputy Commander in Chief, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, had suggested the use of the Joseph P. Kennedy to assist in the Marcula visit and search as a symbolic gesture.” Since the event occurred, many have thought that the appearance of the Joseph P. Kennedy on the scene was indeed a gesture. Many people regard it as being highly political— i.e., the visual identification of the Kennedy name, with the resolution of the crisis. Dr. Johns’s article lends more credence to that argument because, according to him, that destroyer was not assigned to the quarantine. It would be interesting to know just what “symbolic gesture” Admiral Beakley had in mind when he changed the Joseph P. Kennedy's assignment.
“Market Street Commandos”
(See T. C. Mason, 49-53, Summer 1990 Naval History)
Commander Strafford Morss, U.S. Naval Reserve (Retired)—Some of the comments in the article represent a phenomenon that I call “tribal knowledge.” “Tribal knowledge” is information widely held to be correct, not needing confirmation, with some, or sometimes no underlying basis in fact. An example in my experience is, “Tin Cans [destroyers] are designed to have an approximately five-minute life in combat.” The pernicious effect of this attitude on the destroyer force is expensively and very well documented.
“Considering the effective life of a battleship as 20 years, she was already six years past retirement,” wrote Mr. Mason about the status of the Pennsylvania (BB-38) in the spring of 1942. The various arms limitations treaties (Washington and London) had set 26 years as the service life of a battleship. The Arkansas (BB-33), New York (BB-34), Texas (BB-35), and Nevada (BB-36) were officially overage at the time Mr. Mason writes. The Pennsylvania would officially be overage in 1942. If there had been no war, all these ships were to be replaced by ships of the new-construction North Carolina (BB-55) and South Dakota (BB-57) classes.
There is no doubt that the Pennsylvania was overloaded, as Mr. Mason describes. Unfortunately, even today almost all ships suffer from this problem. The Massachusetts (BB-59) transited the Panama Canal in early 1943 with a 37- foot draft (a new canal record). Excess ammunition, spares, and fuel put the ship at 47,000 tons—more than 4,500 tons over her optimum battle displacement. During the Pacific War, HMS Renown Was found to be 4,500 tons overweight for similar reasons.
It is a pity that the crew apparently could not distinguish between 1916 normal- and full-load drafts, modernized (1928) normal- and full-load drafts, and ^signed emergency displacement of 39,224 tons—3,200 tons more than full load.
The problem of appreciating weight is underlined by the obvious lack of approbation of the fueling process.
The Pennsylvania topped off with 46,964 gallons of fuel oil: 169.5 tons, about 1 1/2-inch increase in draft. This is less than one third the fuel capacity of a Fletcher (DD-445)-class destroyer, or less than one-quarter that of a Gearing (DD-710)-class destroyer. The 169.5 tons taken on board should have been compared to full-load tank capacity of 2,220 tons or the ship’s emergency capacity of 5,724.7 tons. The chief quartermaster would have had access to the daily fuel and water reports.
Mr. Mason’s observation about the ship’s motion in a seaway is better described as a step function loss of Waterplane area and reserve buoyancy, as blister top submerged. The article’s first page stem view photograph shows this characteristic. The idea of the armor celt shifting in a seaway is patently ridiculous. The bolts holding the belt plates to [be hull watertight shell were clearly visible in the third deck side berthing compartments.
Mr. Mason’s comments on the inadequacy of the ship’s antiaircraft armament in 1942 are well taken. It is a pity that no editorial note was made that the stem view photograph shows the ship after her late 1942 modernization with 5-inch/38s, mark 37 fire control, 40mm. quads, and soon. It could also have been noted the basic light-ship displacement had been reduced by about 640 tons and stability had been improved by a more than one- foot increase in metacentric height during modernization.
Even the modernized Pennsylvania was not fit to stand in the surface battle line. She never achieved a main battery fire control solution at Surigao Straight in October 1944, and main battery fire control was updated afterwards.
When the Pennsylvania was torpedoed in August 1945, she was not the same ship Mr. Mason was on board in early 1942. This is not to say she was immensely battle-worthy. However, possible crew laxness and a definite lack of recommended structural modifications (addition of watertight access trunking) contributed to her problems. Two propeller shafts were initially blown off, and a third broke after she got under way. The Pennsylvania returned home on one shaft, temporarily patched and leaking. The leakage continued in 1946 as she steamed, still on one shaft, to Bikini. She survived the air and underwater nuclear bomb tests and was still leaking from her 1945 damage when sunk as a target in 1948—not bad for a “seagoing disaster waiting to happen.”
My experience in deflooding, floating, and drydocking the USS Texas (BB-35) during 1987-89 has convinced me that these older battleships were strong. Nearly 100 compartments, including tanks, were open to the sea. Seventy-five years after commissioning, including 40 years of intentional flooding to keep her aground, internal structures were still strong enough to set and maintain watertight boundaries to slow down and help control flooding.
The Texas's internal piping, including tank vents, drain lines, and so on, was a major inherent weakness. During my efforts, piping was as much a problem as breached shell plating. Upon examination of the rotted light-weight piping, it became apparent that the understanding of torpedo shock loadings, and knowledge to design piping systems to survive these loads, was not part of the capabilities of naval engineering when these ships were modernized during the 1920s.
I am convinced the same type of problems would have applied to the Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania was by no means perfect. Tribal knowledge often makes it difficult to use the positive characteristics built into a ship. Crew negativism, resulting from tribal knowledge, can leave a ship physically unprepared, and the crew mentally unprepared, to take those steps necessary to keep her running and, ultimately, to bring her home.
“Unseen Persuaders’’
(See B. Harral, pp. 10-13, Summer 1990; J. B. Lawrence, p. 8, Spring 1991 Naval History)
Senior Chief Operations Specialist John J. Regina. U.S. Navy—I agree completely with the assertion of the effects the U.S. Navy’s submarine campaign in the Pacific had on the Japanese; however, I believe the article failed to examine the real reasons why U.S. Navy submarines were so successful. Would the U.S. Navy’s submarine campaign have been so successful against the other major navies of the world at that time?
The Japanese never gained an understanding of antisubmarine warfare (ASW) or even the employment of submarines during World War II. They never let go of the concept of the great surface battle. The Japanese believed the submarine had only one major purpose: to wear down the U.S. fleet so that the surface fleet could finish them off. Their entrenched “bushido code” left no honor in the sinking of the enemy’s convoys or attacking auxiliaries. The Japanese felt submarines were warships meant to do battle with warships. Thus, our 10,000- mile supply line was left pretty much unmolested, even though it was truly the U.S. Navy’s Achilles’ heel.
The secondary result of this attitude was that ASW was never given any serious concern between the wars. No ASW professionals were standing by to improve the Navy’s ASW forces once they realized their error. By the time the Japanese started to mass-produce large numbers of frigates and corvette escorts, it was too late.
If we were not reading the Japanese code through the entire war, and if U.S. submarine forces were facing an enemy as proficient in ASW as the Royal Navy, how effective would the U.S. Navy’s submarine campaign have been? I believe in the end our large numbers of submarines would still have produced the same tonnage-sunk results, but we most certainly would not have gotten by with only 52 submarines lost in action, and the psychological effect on so many operations would not have happened.
I don’t want to understate the courage and determination of our submariners during the war. When you make an unbiased comparison of all the submarine services of the combatants, the U.S. Navy had some of the best submarines and the easiest opponent to operate against. The Japanese had poor sonar, radar, and only depth charges to fight with.
Admiral Harral brings out some good points; however, his article suggests a very dangerous attitude. No one weapon or service wins wars, but winning is a collective effort by all. It does not matter that if one element of our Navy accounts for 90% of the enemy’s forces, if the other elements of the Navy were not there, the 90% could not have been achieved. Too many admirals and generals forget this—even today.
“Life As ‘Employed Enemy Personnel’”
(See H. Raumann, pp. 28-34, Summer 1989;
J. R. Phillips, p. 11, Fall 1989; G. W. Lucky, pp. 10-11, Winter 1990 Naval History)
Dr. Charles Burdick—The Raumann article provided a good account of the Prim Eugen's transfer from German service to U.S. control for atomic tests. I have been in touch with Captain Arthur H. Graubart, who suggests the following:
► The command of the ship was never divided. The Prinz Eugen ceased to exist with Germany’s surrender. Subsequently, she was given the U.S. Navy hull number 1X-300. Graubart assumed command and told Captain Hans Jurgen Reinicke that he, Graubart, would give the orders. Reinicke, who spoke idiomatic English, would convey those instructions to the German crew. This arrangement worked well.
► The term “Employed Enemy Personnel” was new to Graubart. He had neither an explanation of the terminology nor a copy of the Geneva Convention. As a result, he decided in favor of human judgment as his standard.
► The German crew received pay from German funds according to their normal pay rates.
► There is some question concerning the disposition of the Arado aircraft on board the ship. It may be at Willow Grove, Pennsylvania, rather than the Smithsonian Museum.
► The ship’s crew did enjoy good relations. In fact, Graubart continues a pleasant relationship with the German crew- Whenever possible, he attends their annual reunions in Germany.
“Forgotten Heroes”
(See R. Barba, pp. 4, Spring 1991 Naval History)
Donald G. Kloenne—I have to concur with the observations about the sometimes strained relations between the merchant mariners and Navy armed guard crews. Many of the younger, recent merchant marine recruits sneered at us and called us suckers for facing the identical hangers for a fraction of their pay. We, on the other hand, regarded them as unpatriotic slackers who joined up one jump ahead of their draft boards in the belief that it was the lesser of multiple evils. Some of the veteran prewar merchant seamen tended to share our sentiments and were often friendlier toward the armed guard than toward their shipmates.
After earning my radioman third class rating in radio school. I was lucky to be assigned out of the Armed Guard Center Pacific on San Francisco’s Treasure Island. The Japanese basically left merchant vessels alone, so that we rarely traveled in convoy unless approaching a combat zone. When sailing unescorted, informality was the rule and the “uniform of the day” was anything short of buck naked, except for mealtime, when a shirt of some kind was mandatory.
The food was good—with one exception. Coming back stateside from Okinawa after the war ended, fresh provisions ran out, and we were reduced to eating dry stores. The merchant crew did not like this, and the union delegate insisted that we make an unscheduled stop in Hawaii to remedy the situation.
That skipper stopped, but some of the captains were crusty old salts who listened to no one. We had such a captain on my first ship, the John P. Altgeld. Coming back from a delivery to Portland, the chief mate took a look at conditions over the bar at the mouth of the Columbia River and advised the skipper to take on ballast. Well, nobody was going to tell that captain how to run his ship, so we went over the bar light. The bow lifted clear of the water and slammed down hard several times, opening up a welded seam clear across the deck between number two and number three holds. Luckily, the ship held together long enough to reach a repair yard.
Perhaps my most interesting trip was on board the Charles E. Smith, another Liberty. After delivering a cargo to Calcutta, India, and exploring the parts of the city that were not “out of bounds,” we loaded up with all sorts of heavy equipment belonging to the 20th Air Force for transport to newly-conquered Tinian, along with 28 ground crew to watch over their equipment. Apparently, the Army Air Forces had concluded that attempting to bomb Japan with China- based B-29’s was too much of a logistical headache and was moving the whole operation to the Marianas, lock, stock, and radar. We passed from the Indian Ocean into the Pacific Ocean via the Torres Strait between Australia and New Guinea, and the Aussie pilot informed us that we were the first U.S. merchant ship to make the west-to-east passage since the dark days of early 1942. At Tinian, our guns were secured, so a number of the gunners went calling at the airbase, where obliging fly-boys took some of them up as passengers while making practice bombing runs on the bypassed island of Rota. This was at a time when the B-29 was supposed to be secret. Unfortunately, as the sole Navy radio operator on board, I could not get away from the ship long enough to join in the fun.
All in all. World War II was not too hard on me. No ship I was on was ever attacked, at least not that we were aware of, except at Okinawa in the closing days of the war when we were included in a general area bombing. I, like many of the other armed guard third class operators, never tried for second class for fear that we would be assigned to a spit-and-polish transport or an out-and-out combat ship.