At 0400 on 4 July 1917, the inhabitants of Ponta Delgada, capital of the Azorean island of Sao Miguel, were jolted from their beds by the reports of cannon fire and explosions all around. Homes mainly made of stonemasonry crumbled, a 16-year-old was killed instantly, and a massive chandelier in the Santa Clara church was torn from its fastenings and shattered on the floor. The source of the destruction was a German U-boat that had glided into the harbor unnoticed and, at dawn, bombarded the town with her deck cannon.
Return fire from two locations drove the U-boat back to sea. One battery of 4-inch Portuguese cannons fired from a position above the city called Mae de Deus. The other response came from the 3-inch gun mounted on the USS Orion (AC-11), an armed coaling ship moored in the Ponta Delgada harbor.
In retrospect, an incident seven months before this attack should have been a forewarning. On 3 December 1916, a German U-boat torpedoed three French ships in the unprotected harbor of Funchal on the Portuguese island of Madeira, farther south of the Azores Archipelago, and had also shelled the city there.
The attack on the Azores subsequently prompted a joint Portuguese-American decision to establish a naval base in the area. The base—to be named U.S. Naval Base 13— existed for nearly two years between September 1917 until August 1919.
Birth of a U.S. Naval Base
Following a declaration of war against Germany on 6 April 1917, the United States dispatched the Orion to the Azores with coal to refuel ships passing through this mid-Atlantic archipelago. The Orion arrived at Sao Miguel on 17 June 1917 and secured to a breakwater and quay in Ponta Delgada. Later it was presumed that this breakwater and quay are what prevented the U-boat from attempting to attack the Orion with her torpedoes.
The assault on Ponta Delgada resulted in the United States dispatching a station ship, USS Panther (AD-6), and five destroyers to Sao Miguel. The destroyers Smith (DD-17) and Lamson (DD-18) arrived at Ponta Delgada on 26 July 1917. The destroyers Reid (DD-21) and Preston (DD-19) reached port on 31 July. The destroyer Flusser (DD-20) accompanied the Panther, both taking up station at Ponta Delgada on 12 August.
Just days before the Panther arrived, the English steamship Hortensius entered Ponta Delgada on 8 August 1917 carrying 88 crew members rescued from another English ship, the Iran, which had been sunk by a German U-boat 220 miles southwest of Sao Miguel. The destroyers immediately initiated antisubmarine patrols of the surrounding Azorean waters to deter U-boats from getting too close to the islands. Their mission also included providing aid to ships in distress and rescuing any survivors of vessels sunk near the archipelago.
Although the Panther’s commanding officer sought permission from local Azorean officials to position ashore supplies, such as bunker coal, tools, machinery, and naval stores, national political instability caused the local authorities to deny the request. (The Portuguese Republic, which had replaced the monarchy by revolution only six years previously, already had changed governments 16 times. Portugal would replace its government nine more times during Naval Base 13’s two-year existence.) To further aggravate the strained situation, American sailors clashed with seamen from the Portuguese frigate Vasco da Gama in a bar on shore.
Ongoing negotiations between the two governments eventually produced cooperation. On 16 September 1917, the USS Wheeling (GB-14), accompanied by the destroyers Whipple (DD-15) and Turnon (DD-14), arrived in Ponta Delgada to relieve the Panther as station ship. The Wheeling’s commanding officer carried orders designating him as senior officer present and acting base commander, solidifying the U.S. commitment to a Lisbon agreement between the United States and Portugal.
The Whipple and the Truxton assumed the patrol duties of the five destroyers that had been on station in Azorean waters. On 28 October 1917, four U.S. submarines, K-l, K-2, K-5, and K-6, arrived in the harbor with instructions to relieve the destroyers and to assume patrols in Azorean waters. (A fifth submarine, E-1, reported on 1 December, further augmenting Naval Base 13 defenses.)
On 22 November 1917, apparently after learning of the U.S naval deployments, Germany declared the Azores region to be a “submarine barred zone,” implying by this declaration that the positioning of U.S. warships in the Azores had been interpreted as an act of provocation by the United States. Germany’s statement meant that its U-boats, without warning, would sink any vessel found transiting or operating in the area.
Although Naval Base 13 officially was created on 16 September 1917 when the Wheeling arrived at Ponta Delgada, the base subsequently developed into full operating status through the capabilities and drive of two men. These were U.S. Navy Rear Admiral H.O. Dunn and General Jose Augusto Simas Machado, High Commissioner of the Republic in the Azores.'
In November 1917 Admiral Dunn had been ordered to report to the Navy Department in Washington, D.C., where he was named commander of Naval Base 13. His assigned portfolio was to advise the Secretary of State and U.S. Mission Chief Thomas H. Birch in Lisbon concerning requirements needed to operate and sustain an effective naval base in the Azorean region.
General Simas Machado was ordered to relinquish command of the 2nd Division of the Portuguese Expeditionary Force in France and report to Lisbon. There he was asked to advise the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Interior, War and Navy on Portugal’s agreements and restrictions, if and when the U.S. naval base be provided shore installations. Subsequently, General Simas Machado arrived at Ponta Delgada on 15 April 1918, charged with the power and responsibility to implement the high-level agreements emanating from Lisbon and Washington.
On 9 January 1918, Admiral Dunn ordered his command ship, USS Hancock (AP-3), to weigh anchor from Philadelphia and proceed to the Azores. On board the Hancock was the First Marine Aeronautic Company under command of Francis T. Evans and a detachment of artillery Marines under command of Captain Maurice G. Holmes. Also on board were ten Curtiss R-6 float planes, two Curtiss N-9 float planes, two 7-inch naval guns, and miscellaneous cargo.
The Hancock reached Faial on 18 January 1918. Admiral Dunn raised his command flag, thereby activating his assignment as Commander, Azores Detachment, U.S. Atlantic Fleet. Admiral Dunn went ashore, made a courtesy visit under the proper protocol to the local Portuguese officials in Horta, and, departing for Ponta Delgada on 21 January 1918, entered its harbor the next day.
In accord with an agreement negotiated in Lisbon, Admiral Dunn established his headquarters in a building which stills stands today as the Hotel Sao Pedro. Thus, U.S. Naval Base 13 was ready for full operations seven months after a U-boat initiated hostile actions in the region.
Naval Base 13 was the site of many historic milestones in naval aviation. For example, it hosted the first Marine Corps unit to he outfitted with U.S. aircraft, equipped and trained in the United States, and deployed for the purpose of war duty overseas. A Marine Corps Curtiss N- 9 float plane became the first aircraft to fly in the Azores.
The First Marine Aeronautic Company (formed and assigned to Cape May, New Jersey, on 14 October 1917) specifically trained on seaplanes for duty in the Azores Islands. The company consisted of 12 officers and 133 enlisted men. In addition to the Curtiss R-6 and N-9 float planes, the company received six Curtiss HS-2L seaplanes. By 31 March 1918, the First Marine Aeronautic Company had flown 69 antisubmarine patrol missions.
Surface Operations
Casualties of the submarine war continued to mount. On 15 November 1917, the American yacht Margaret S. Roberts, carrying wheat to Madeira, was sunk between the Azores and Madeira. On 17 November, the Azorean lugger Aqoriana was sunk about 150 miles southeast of the Azores. In March and April 1918, an Italian bark and a Portuguese lugger were sunk between the Azores and Madeira.
In a memorable sea battle fought 276 miles from Ponta Delgada on the morning of 14 October 1918, two Portuguese ships en route from Madeira to Ponta Delgada were sighted by the German submarine U-139. The larger vessel, Sao Miguel, was carrying several hundred passengers and valuable cargo. The Sao Miguel was escorted by the Augusto de Castilho, a converted steam-powered fishing ship commissioned into the Portuguese Navy as a minesweeper. The U- 139 fired on the Sao Miguel, ignoring the Augusto de Castilho. Instead of the successful hit expected to disable the Sao Miguel, the German sub captain found himself confronting the minesweeper commanded by a naval hero of the 1910 Revolution that had overthrown the Portuguese monarchy.
When World War I broke out, Jose Botelho Carvalho Araujo had requested a return to sea duty and was given command of the minesweeper. During the battle, Carvalho Araujo turned his minesweeper for frontal attack. The Augusto de Castilho took direct hits from the U-139 as she continued to bear down on the U-boat. Carvalho Araujo and Cadet Eloi da Mata Freitas were killed and several crew members were wounded. The severely damaged minesweeper was then easily destroyed by the U-139, but the Sao Miguel had been given time to escape and safely reached Ponta Delgada at 0100 on 15 October.
Later that same day a Portuguese ship Ibo, two U.S. submarines, and a tugboat proceeded from Naval Base 13 to the locale of the sea battle. They found no survivors. Unknown to them at the time, however, some crew members of the Augusto de Castilho had escaped in a lifeboat and rowed to Arnel Point on Sao Miguel, arriving six days after the battle.
Even though the German U-boats continued to take their toll of Allied shipping near the Azores, they remained outside the patrol radius of aviation units operating from Naval Base 13. Because the radius of operation by aircraft flown from Naval Base 13 was about 70 miles, it was necessary for destroyers and submarines to conduct the search for U-boats beyond this distance. These patrols continued until the Armistice was signed on 11 November 1918.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, then Assistant Secretary of the Navy, visited Naval Base 13 between 16 to 17 July 1918. Roosevelt had sailed from the United States on the destroyer Dyer (DD-84). His mission was to inspect naval facilities in Europe. The Dyer arrived at Horta on Faial on 15 July. Roosevelt went ashore there, paid a courtesy visit to local officials, then proceeded on to Ponta Delgada.
In Ponta Delgada he visited the botanical garden established by Jose do Canto in 1846 and had lunch with General Simas Machado. Roosevelt was so impressed with Sao Miguel and Naval Base 13 that he commissioned a painting of the Dyer anchored in front of the island’s U.S. naval base. The painting hangs still in the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library in Hyde Park, New York.
Transatlantic Stop
On 19 May 1919, a battered Curtiss NC-3 seaplane, commanded by John H. Towers, limped into Ponta Delgada with one engine missing and came to rest at Naval Base 13. It was the first of two NC seaplanes that would reach Ponta Delgada. The other, NC-4, traveled its final 200 miles skimming along the ocean’s surface.
The Curtiss NC seaplanes were conceived as a counterweapon to German U-boat warfare. NCs were designed to fly to an overseas operating base from the United States without need for transport by ship. Their time on patrol had been substantially expanded over previous aircraft models. Weapons included both bombs and machine guns. The NC seaplanes were intended to replace the more fragile float planes, such as R-6 and N-9, and limited-range seaplanes, such as HS-2L. However, the first of the NC series flew in October 1918, too late for wartime duty.
Although the war had ended, Commander John H. Towers proposed a demonstration flight across the Atlantic to show the world the capability of the new seaplane. Roosevelt pushed the plan through the Washington bureaucracy, with a key stipulation that the flight, for greater safety, would use Naval Base 13 as a refurbishment stop. In accord with the plan, three aircraft—NC-1, NC-3, and NC-4—launched from Trepassey Bay in Newfoundland on 16 May 1919 for Ponta Delgada, a 1,206-nautical mile flight. NC-1 and NC-3 were forced to the ocean’s surface by adverse weather conditions on 17 May—NC-1 north of Faial and NC-3 southwest of that island.
NC-1 later sank, although the crew was saved. NC-3 taxied on the surface for 40 hours, reaching Ponta Delgada on 19 May 1919. NC-4, commanded by Lieutenant Commander Albert Cushing Read, also buffeted by heavy winds, landed safely at Horta, where he awaited more favorable flight conditions. On 20 May, he continued to Naval Base 13, surprised to see NC-3 already in the harbor. NC-4, still in good flying condition, left Ponta Delgada early on 27 May and landed on the Tagus River estuary in Lisbon 9 hours and 44 minutes after takeoff from Ponta Delgada.
Base Closure
In August 1919, U.S. Naval Base 13 closed. The U.S. Navy awarded General Simas Machado its Distinguished Service Medal in gold, and Great Britain honored him with the rank of Knight Commander in the Order of St. Michael and St. George. Portugal reciprocated, bestowing on Mission Chief Thomas H. Birch the Grand Cross of the Order of Christ and to Admiral H. O. Dunn, an equal medal in the Order of Aviz.
No American surface vessel, submarine, or aircraft operating from Naval Base 13 ever engaged a German U-boat in combat. Mission success was evident in that their combined efforts kept the U-boats outside immediate Azorean waters and away from the islands, where only targets of opportunity were accessible.
Still, the naval base had provided other services that supported the war effort. During its time, the base refueled, resupplied, or repaired 81 destroyers, 117 U.S. submarine chasers, 70 French submarine chasers, 17 U.S. submarines, and 135 miscellaneous ships.
At the base closure ceremony, a Navy band did not play the symbolic finality of “taps,” but instead offered the soul-stirring anthems of the U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps as the colors were solemnly lowered for the last time.
