Find ’em, Chase ’em, Sink ’em: The Mysterious Loss of the WWII Submarine USS Qudgeon
Mike Ostlund. Guilford, CT: The Lyons Press, 2006. 471 pp. 111. Appen. Notes. Bib. Index. $26.95
Reviewed by Andrew G. Wilson
While there have been many fine books written about the missions, men, and exploits of the U.S. submarine fleet in World War II, few—if any—will be able to compete with the sheer detail and personal accounts presented by Mike Ostlund in Find ’em, Chase ’em, Sink ’em. In a word, this new work is comprehensive.
The fleet sub USS Gudgeon (SS-211) was one of the most successful steel sharks of the U.S. Pacific Fleet during the fight against imperial Japan—and the first U.S. submarine to undertake a war patrol against that nation following the attack on Pearl Harbor. However, in April 1944, on her 12th patrol, the impressive exploits of the men of the Gudgeon came to an untimely end when she mysteriously vanished. For years, the circumstances surrounding the boat’s final cruise have remained unknown. Nonetheless, motivated by a personal connection with the boat’s history, the author has brought new light to the story of her final encounter with the enemy—what has until now been a dark, watery abyss of information.
Beginning with the boat’s launch in January 1941, Ostlund relates the “story of the valiant sailors who manned her and officers who commanded” Gudgeon. But this work is much more than the story of a group of brave individuals; it presents the reader a window into the tedium, drill, and frequent terror that was life in the boats, and does so in the language of those who were there. The basis for such a complete account are the Gudgeon’s patrol reports, supplemented by many interviews with surviving crew, family members, personal letters and dairies, and secondary literature as well as the official records of the Imperial Japanese Navy.
The strength of the book is the human element so ably described by Ostlund. In addition to the vivid description of what it feels like to be on the receiving end of a Japanese depth-charge attack, Ostlund also goes into some often- amusing detail regarding the exploits of the crew while on shore leave, including their interactions with the Australians and a very supportive bar owner in San Francisco. Yet, after leave, the crew always returned to the fight, some with the languid tune and words of “Waltzing Matilda” in their heads, making them regret their departure. Another scene illustrative of the danger and strain that punctuated the tedium of patrol was the almost three-hour duel between the Gudgeon—with her deck gun—and a Japanese destroyer while the boat was trying to reach deep water.
This work offers the reader who is unfamiliar with the literature of the Pacific submarine campaign a wide- angle snapshot of all aspects of the submariner’s life and struggle during this heated contest. The only possible shortcoming of the book is the lack of a schematic of a Tambor (SS-198) -class fleet boat to assist the reader in fully understanding the rich detail Ostlund has provided. In the end, though, this volume represents a first-rate addition to the naval history bookshelf, especially within the human-interest section, as the Gudgeon’s story easily embodies the toll on life emblematic of the Pacific submarine campaign.
Finding Amelia: The True Story of the Earhart Disappearance
Ric Gillespie. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006. 296 pp. DVD. Illus. Index. $28.95.
Reviewed by Jon R. Donnelly
It can’t be easy relating in an exciting and readable form the events surrounding an incident to which everyone knows the ending. One that comes to mind is the saga of the Apollo 13 space mission. We knew the outcome but sweated with the astronauts and mission-control personnel as we read page after page of their story until the crew was safely on board the recovery ship.
Welcome Finding Amelia. While the general details of the tragic flight of the 1930s aviatrix are well known and the story’s ending isn’t happy, the excitement and mystery are woven into Gillespie’s book. Don’t be looking for secrets, evidence of espionage and conspiracies, or recent sightings of Amelia. The book’s subtitle is accurate. Gillespie offers no conjecture, speculation, theories, or predictions. He works with facts— cold, hard, unrelenting facts. Some are new, based on his exhaustive research; some are old and inflated. And many have been overlooked for years in the aftermath of Earhart’s disappearance on an around-the-world flight in the summer of 1937.
Gillespie is that rare person with a reporter’s instincts, a historian’s curiosity, and a story writer’s pen. He lays out in compelling detail the events leading up to, during, and after Earhart’s flight. He draws on official documents, newspaper accounts, letters, and messages. A delightful aspect of this book is the accompanying DVD that contains copies of the documents that Gillespie cites throughout his narrative. The DVD alone is worth the price of the book.
Gillespie the historian meticulously researched every aspect of his subject, pointing out differences in some reports and the obvious errors that apparently have gone uncorrected until now. Gillespie the writer presents his facts in a highly readable and logical form that allows his readers to comprehend new and old information, and then draw their own conclusions. The fact is that some aspects do not lend themselves to conclusions in the case of Amelia Earhart’ disappearance.
Earhart probably was the best-known woman in the world during the 1930s. Men marveled at and women admired and adored the tall, lanky, and strangely attractive woman pilot. Her husband, publisher George Putnam, was not above promoting his wife and basking in her worldwide acclaim.
After performing a series of aviation firsts for women that grabbed worldwide newspaper, radio, and newsreel headlines, Earhart and Putnam decided that she should be the first woman to circle the globe. A key point of Gillespie’s book is that while a famous aviator, Earhart was not a highly experienced or competent one. Aircraft at the time were not sophisticated, accurate navigation depended on access to the sun, and wireless communication still was in its developmental stage. An around-the- world flight would be a dangerous adventure for a woman, and the world knew it.
Equipped with a specially built twin- engine Lockheed Electra and an experienced navigator, Fred Noonan, Earhart took off on 20 May 1937 to begin her east-to-west flight. Newspaper reports—many written by Earhart and radioed to the United States—followed the journey. The U.S. Navy and Coast Guard were induced to provide radio and seaborne navigational help during the trans-Pacific portion of the flight. On 2 July, Earhart and Noonan took off from Lae, New Guinea, bound for tiny Howland Island near the equator in the South Pacific. After this, only two legs remained, Hawaii and then California.
The plane and its two-member crew never arrived at Howland. A large (for that time) air and sea search turned up no evidence of what happened to them. Reports of radio communications with the missing aviators, some valid and some not, flooded official agencies, confusing search efforts and planting false hopes. The disappearance of Earhart and Noonan was a frustration at the time and has been an enduring mystery, provoking wide ranges of speculation, ever since.
Finding Amelia is not likely to lead to the solution of the mystery. But for the first time, an accurate, up-to-date, and factual account of that flight is available in a single, highly readable book. Gillespie is the neutral reporter who sets forth the details of heroic intent, human error, technological limitations, and communications mix-ups that were key components of the Earhart disappearance.
The Earhart mystery remains. After nearly 70 years, Ric Gillespie has lifted the curtain and given his readers a deeper insight into the “whys.” And while we know the outcome, Gillespie has reminded us that it is the journey—not the destination—that fascinates us.
Don’t Give Up the Ship!: Myths of the War of 1812
Donald R. Hickey. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2006. 322 pp. 111. Maps. Appens. Notes. Index. $34.95.
Reviewed by Frederick C. Leiner
In this quirky, encyclopedic debunking of the mythology of the War of 1812, Donald R. Hickey displays his peerless command of the field and, with his concise, highly opinionated writing style, unlocks many of the mysteries and details of what he insists was not a second war of independence. Hickey’s premise is that almost every aspect and personality involved in the war has become shrouded in misconceptions, legend, and half- truths propagated by 19th-century turning his revisionist pen to every aspect of the war, but paying particular attention to the Canadian theater of operations. Hickey determines that James Lawrence, the mortally wounded captain of the USS Chesapeake, did say “Don’t give up the ship,” and that Colonel Richard M. Johnson, a war hawk congressman and militia leader, probably killed the great Indian chief Tecumseh at the Battle of the Thames, but if you thought that West Point cadets wear grey tunics because of Winfield Scott’s victory at Chippawa or that the village of St. Michael’s, Maryland, foiled a British night attack by hanging lanterns on neighborhood trees, you’ll need to read Hickey to be shorn of your misconceptions.
Hickey’s vast knowledge of the historiography in the field, old and new, is on constant display, making the lack of a bibliography particularly unfortunate. The book is lavishly illustrated, but the cartoonish sketches from Benson Lossing’s pictorial history instead of the distinguished, more accurate portraits by the likes of Gilbert Stuart and Rembrandt Peale is puzzling. Hickey’s writing is concise, incisive, and in the best sense, highly opinionated—he stakes out clear positions and bases them on reasoned historical argument. Many topics are dealt with in a few sentences, but when he writes expansively, Hickey is a good storyteller, as in, for example, his vignette on the nautical feats of Marine Lieutenant John Gamble in the Pacific. His analyses—Madison as a wartime president, or the British problems supplying their troops in Canada, to choose two diverse examples—are generally excellent. Even when one of Hickey’s conclusions is questionable, his arguments are substantial and will be ignored by future writers on the War of 1812 only at their peril.
There are few blemishes to this work. One may be the supposed “durable myth” that the militia saved the American republic; I am unaware of any respected historian positing that myth, at least in the last 100 years, and Hickey himself provides no citation for it or its supposed durability. This cavil, and the few others that might be raised, are small potatoes when measured against the great contribution this well-paced, vastly informed reference work will provide its readers. Don’t Give Up the Ship belongs on the shelf of everyone deeply interested in, or who writes about, the War of 1812.
Anti-Submarine Warfare In World War I: British Naval Aviation and the Defeat of the U-Boats
John J. Abbatiello. New York: Routledge, 2006. 240 pp. Index. Notes. $115.
Reviewed by Captain James B. Bryant. U.S. Navy (Retired)
This book is not an exciting, action- filled war story, but an interesting, well-researched and -written, thought- provoking academic study with “lessons learned” that have timeless value.
What happens when the world’s most powerful sea power is humbled by a new technology used in an unexpected manner? The technology is reliable, ocean-going submarines—U-boats; the manner is using them on the offensive. The Germans unexpectedly violated international prize rules in 1915 by declaring unrestricted submarine warfare. The submarine was more deadly than either side predicted, and when merchant ships of all flags were torpedoed without warning in declared zones, the U-boat became a key factor in World War I. To avoid defeat, the British had to rapidly develop new tactics and technology.
A standard argument is that the military, especially the Navy, is resistant to new tactics and technology. This study of British naval aviation offers evidence that when there is a desperate need, the standard argument is wrong.
The tactics and technology developed to counter the U-boat threat included submarines, camouflage, ramming, indicator nets, zigzagging, convoys, deep mine barrages, explosive sweeps, hydrophones, depth charges, and air power. John Abbatiello makes a good argument that air power played a greater part in defeating the U-boats than previously thought.
Abbatiello is a U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel, the deputy head of the U.S. Air Force Academy history department, and an experienced pilot and flight instructor. One of the first authors to study British naval aviation’s role in antisubmarine warfare (ASW) exclusively, he looks at production and development challenges, as well as training and operational organizations.
ASW aviation required a large variety of aircraft, including aeroplanes, seaplanes, flying boats, rigid and non- rigid airships, and kite balloons. Also needed was the rapid development and improvement of weapons, bombsights, radios, and tactics to go with these aircraft. The author provides a detailed analysis of how the most effective equipment, aircraft, training, and operational procedures were selected.
Abbatiello argues that the mere presence of aircraft deterred attacks, even though the number of U-boats sunk or aided by British naval aviation was small. Even the sighting of training aircraft was enough to make a submarine submerge.
A large U-boat could stay at sea for about three weeks and smaller ones only a few days, which gave them a limited time on patrol. When forced to operate submerged, the boats’ ability to search for and attack targets was reduced because of slow submerged speeds and loss of visual range. In many documented cases, aerial patrols kept U-boats away from shipping lanes.