Standing Into Danger Read online

  The Pollux was not comfortable with the escort. It was restricting and disrupting to the even tenor of the ship’s normal operation. Nudged and prodded by the stream of messages, Commander Turney, a man who seldom became ruffled, was annoyed.

  The Pollux was uncomfortable in other ways. In the crew’s quarters, among the regular crew, there was talk tonight of the U-boats, and the general opinion seemed to be that the Germans were having a picnic. There was usually a continuous game of acey-deucey going on before “lights out,” but tonight there was an uneasiness among the men, and it seemed that everyone and his brother were in the heads taking showers. Most unusual on the North Atlantic run in winter. In a system that ruled four hours on duty, four hours off, there was barely enough time for them to grab some sleep, let alone take showers.

  No one remarked on it, but practically all who showered put on clean dungarees and shirts. As recruits they had been trained that in the event of injury, cleanliness reduced infection. They were preparing themselves in case of attack or collision. In the cafeteria where the sailors just off duty gathered to get the chill out of their bones and fright of possible collision with the Truxtun out of their system, there was talk also about what they considered to be the stupidity of the Navy in general. Outside was a blinding snowstorm and two destroyers zigzagging somewhere near them. “They’re hanging on

  our bow, and one bad turn on the zigzag is all we need to run into each other,” someone growled.

  But . . . theirs was not to reason why. Still cold, they crawled into their bunks.

  Chief Boatswain’s Mate Edward Vincent Jabkowsky – “Skee,“ as he was nicknamed – was an old-timer, a Regular Navy man. He had already begun instructing the young recruits on their way to Argentia, and with the U-boat scare he had told them that in the event of disaster they were to keep a close watch on him. “Follow me,” he had told them.

  Tonight “Skee” was in sick bay with an attack of malaria. Vincent Popolizio, fireman second class, was not feeling so well either. Popolizio suffered from chronic seasickness and, whenever the Pollux got under way, the big joke was: “Up anchor, down Pops.” In warm weather they could always find the suffering Popolizio trying to sleep topside under the lifeboat. Patiently resigned, he lay in his berth.

  Lawrence Calemmo, fireman first class, had a definite premonition that this time the Pollux’s number was up. It wasn’t something that had come upon him suddenly; it had been lurking in the far corners of his mind from the very first time he set foot on her in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, with her brand-new all-over coat of gray paint. He had disliked her instantly. After all, they had been trained for destroyer duty, and he had expected to see a big destroyer, the pride and joy of all sailors. The Pollux, as a converted cargo ship, didn’t look like a very cheerful home. He had said to his companions: “She looks like a floating coffin to me.”

  Prophetic words!

  Gus Tortorici,* a buddy and boyhood friend of Calemmo’s from the Lower East Side, Manhattan, had looked around and said, “What a bucket.”

  Calemmo never did shake the feeling that the Pollux was a floating coffin, and so overwhelming was his premonition of disaster before this present trip north that he had taken special precautions before leaving the Boston Navy Yard. He had been ordered to install a heating system in No. 4 hold for the recruits that were

  to be transported to Argentia. He had taken it a step farther: the lifeboats were powered by diesel engines, which were notorious for not starting in cold weather without preheated air, and Calemmo had constructed heaters by mounting four one-hundred-watt bulbs inside metal boxes with wood bottoms. The bulbs generated as much heat as a small space heater; Calemmo then installed a box under the hood of each lifeboat’s engine. The makeshift heaters were plugged in for the whole voyage and periodic checks showed they were working well. If or when the U-boats struck, all lifeboats would be immediately operational.

  While Calemmo felt that disaster was pending, he had no feeling of personal danger. Whatever happened, he knew he would be all right, but he felt that somewhere in the gray waters of the North Atlantic a torpedo had the Pollux’s name on it.

  Gradually the crew settled uneasily, fully clothed, in their bunks. Except for Warren Allen “Wag” Greenfield, signalman second class. He had nerves of steel, and the talk of U-boats hadn’t bothered him in the least. Stripping to his underwear, Wag crawled into the top bunk and fell sound asleep.

  Across from him was Isaac Henry “Hank” Strauss, quartermaster third class. Strauss was Jewish, full of pizzazz, and remarkably popular. He was a college graduate as well, which was practically an insult to some of the Regular Navy sailors, and because of it he wound up in the hold more often than not, testing his skill in the boxing area. And since he was rather slight and short, he often wound up on the deck. On one such occasion a lucky blow had felled a hefty opponent, and Hank had been accepted wholeheartedly by the crew.

  The general uneasiness that had prevailed had not bothered Alfred M. Dupuy, storekeeper third class. As a member of the Supply Corps, Dupuy had received no training as a Navy man; he was, as the rank indicated, a storekeeper. He had never been aboard a ship before and didn’t know port from starboard. Tall, lean, with a sense of humor and a deep, resonant voice that was reputed to carry through any gale, Dupuy, after six months aboard, still didn’t know a square knot from a granny knot. To him ladders were stairs and bulkheads were walls and to hell with it. Today he had washed half a dozen pairs of his skivvies and strung them across No. 2 hold, where they danced wildly to the ship’s movements.

  Lieutenant (jg)* William C. Grindley, navigator, aged thirty-three, had been going to sea from the time he had left high school. Employed with the United States Lines, he had come up through the ranks to chief officer and had already passed examinations for license as master unlimited, oceans, which was the highest license a U.S. flag merchant officer could hold. He was well prepared in every respect for command of his own vessel.

  There was a vast difference between the Merchant Navy and the U. S. Navy, he discovered. In the merchant ships the captain was God. He made all the decisions and was fully responsible for the vessel, crew, and cargo. The same precept applied to the U.S. Navy, but it seemed to Grindley that Navy Regulations were God, and the captain of a U.S. Navy ship could consider himself in complete command as long as he did not run afoul of them.

  Now Commander Tumey and Lieutenant Grindley were in the chartroom poring over the charts, and Grindley was not at all happy about being tied to the commands of the flagship Wilkes, for they must zigzag continually, which made navigating in heavy weather very difficult. On top of that, atmospheric conditions were playing havoc with their navigational aids.

  Grindley was beginning to feel very uneasy.

  The USS Truxtun, an ancient four-stacker destroyer, was much less comfortable than either the Pollux or the Wilkes. Only 31 feet wide and 310 feet long, she seemed to stand on beam end as the seas worsened.

  Her master was Lieutenant Commander Ralph Hickox, a thirtynine-year-old Naval Academy man with a distinguished career. The crew thought he was the best. The navigator and executive officer was Lieutenant Arthur Lester Newman, aged thirty-one, another U.S. Naval Academy man who had joined the Truxtun in December 1941.

  Ensign James O. Seamans, aged twenty-three, a recent graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, had stepped aboard the Truxtun only a few days before her departure for Argentia.

  At the present time Seamans was sleeping soundly while Ensign William J. Maddocks, another U.S. Naval Academy graduate, was preparing to take over the midnight watch.

  Tonight, the main concerns of the officers and crew on duty watch, aside from the Pollux, were the U-boats and the possibility of a drifting iceberg, which might do the Truxtun in, as one had the Titanic thirty years earlier.

  The Truxtun was traveling blind. They had lost all track of the other ships after nightfall, and their sonar had been unable to pick up the sound of the Pollux’s propeller due to the increasing noise of the ocean itself as sea conditions worsened. Because they had lost contact, Lieutenant Commander Hickox had ordered the Truxtun to cease zigzagging, although by adhering to the base course as laid down by the division commander of the Wilkes he was confident they were still on the port bow of the Pollux.*

  It was customary for the captain and the navigator to divide up the night when in formation and trying to keep station on other ships. One or the other was always available to handle any emergency that might arise that the officer of the deck might not be able to handle alone.

  That emergency was closer than they dreamed.

  Pitching heavily, the ships steamed onward, their crews oblivious to the fact that they were heading into danger.

  CHAPTER 3

  USS WILKES

  FEBRUARY 17, 1942-2300 HOURS

  THE PRELUDE to disaster had its unspectacular beginning in the hazy starlit dawn of February 17, when Lieutenant Barrett, the navigator of the USS Wilkes, on course 069° true, toward the U.S. Navy base in Argentia, Placentia Bay, Newfoundland, took star sights on Vega, Mizar, Dubhe, Antares, and Arcturus, to verify their position. According to his calculations they were in latitude 44°30’00”N, longitude 60°28’00”W, roughly 60 miles south of Chedabucto Bay, Nova Scotia, and approximately 30 miles northward of Sable Island. Her base course was carrying her on a course parallel to the Nova Scotia coast.

  The navigator did not realize it, but he had made a minor error on the star Antares. It was rising and east of the meridian; he calculated it west of the meridian. His reported position to Commodore Webb and Commander John D. Kelsey, was approximately 21/2 miles south and east of his actual position, which was closer to land.

  The error in itself was of such insignificance it would not normally rate a second thought, for to be within five miles of a position as determined by celestial navigation during hazy weather is considered reasonably accurate in northern waters. However, this incorrect star fix would have a deleterious effect on the three ships, for not only was the ship’s dead-reckoning track projected from this incorrect position, but it wrongly indicated to the navigator that the course made good had not been their base course of 069° true, but 071° true, giving the impression they had experienced a small drift southward away from land during the night.

  It did not surprise the navigator, as the Nova Scotia chart indicated that the deep-flowing offshore current set away from land. Yet, those same sailing directions indicated that the surface current was generally toward the land.

  As course 069° had been laid down by Commodore Webb, Lieutenant Barrett made no change to correct the supposed southward drift. In the circumstances this was a wise decision, for the Wilkes was already being influenced by the surface current toward land.

  To strengthen the navigator’s conviction that the current was flowing southward, at midday while taking soundings on the approach to the continuation of Cabot Strait, he noticed slush ice drifting southward across the bow of the Wilkes. It was further evidence to him that the set of the current was still away from land. He reported it to the commodore and the skipper.

  Had the gray wintry clouds and thickening atmosphere permitted a glimpse of the sun long enough to catch any sun lines, the error would have been corrected. Lieutenant Barrett caught no such glimpse of the sun and therefore got no celestial fix.

  Newfoundland waters were no less hazardous. Sailing directions warned that a ship could be set to the east, the west, or to the northwest, for the drift of the sea and current were “nearly toward the land, “ frequently setting northwestward with a velocity of about one knot offshore, and were greatly affected by the prevailing wind.

  This was the current that was pushing the ships off their course. Closer to shore the current swept in on the eastern side of the bays and out on the western side, and was complicated by tidal currents that changed with the locality and prevailing winds. Extreme caution was advised.

  With complete confidence in their dead-reckoning track, Commodore Webb had plotted their course up Placentia Bay to Argentia. Within the confines of the bay with its inflowing and outflowing current, a ship could be set either way. Webb, “splitting the middle of safe waters” laid off a course that cleared land to the port by twenty miles; to the starboard by twenty-five miles – ample allowance for a set in either direction, he felt.

  The wind, which had been blowing from the north for more than 30 hours, had shifted to the southeast – a bad-weather wind – and had been blowing against them since 1000 hours, still Commodore Webb did not think it necessary to make allowance for leeway on the approach to Placentia Bay. He was confident the current that appeared to be setting them southward would offset any wind effect from the southeast.

  So the die was cast, for this fact of no allowance for leeway, above all others, set the seal on what was to follow.

  Later, the wind increased to a moderate breeze and darkness fell early as lowering skies and heavy intermittent snow cut visibility. It was obvious they would not get an evening star fix, and at 1610 hours Commodore Webb ordered a message by TBS* to the Pollux: They were to change course from 069° to 047° at 2000 hours - roughly four hours time - without further orders from the flagship. If there was any necessity to change course later for navigational reasons, they had the permission of the flag officer to do so, but were to notify him of the change.

  This order gave the Pollux freedom of action during the night in case she needed to change course. It was mandatory that she notify them of such a change as the Wilkes and the Truxtun had to follow to maintain station on her.

  The weather continued to deteriorate, creating such unfavorable atmospheric conditions they were unable to obtain Radio Direction Finder (RDF) bearings from Cape Race or Cape Sable. They had to be satisfied that their dead-reckoning track was correct, although there was no way it could be verified until they began to cross the St. Pierre Bank, little more than an hour’s run ahead of them. The shallow fishing bank had been well charted over the years, whereas the greater depths of water over which they were now steaming was very sparsely charted and less than satisfactory in allowing them to pinpoint their position.

  At 2000 hours, the important last watch of the day began. The base course of 069° true was changed to 047° true, and the three ships headed northward for the center of the mouth of Placentia Bay. The wind had steadily increased.

  Of vital importance in determining their position as they approached the St. Pierre Bank were:

  • the 100-fathom depth, represented by a broken contour line on the navigator’s chart; and

  • the 50-fathom depth, represented by an unbroken contour line, signifying the shallowing of water before reaching the bank.

  Through soundings the navigator could pinpoint on the chart where they had crossed to the bank by calculating course, distance and speed of the ship between the two depths. Because the St. Pierre Bank rose steeply on the southward side, it would be only a matter of minutes between the 100-fathom and the 50-fathom contour lines, whereas at the northern end of the bank, where the slope was gradual, there was a run of nearly three hours between the 50-fathom and the 100-fathom lines.

  At 2106 hours, one hour and six minutes into the last watch of the day, on the right leg of the zigzag (course 080°), speed 15 knots the Wilkes crossed the 100-fathom line. Six minutes later, still on the right leg of the zigzag, she crossed the 50-fathom line and steamed onto the Bank.

  The six-minute crossing between the contour lines indicated they had steamed 1.5 miles, and the navigator pinpointed their position on the chart. It was southward of their dead-reckoning (DR) track. Once he knew where they were it was mandatory to backtrack one hour and six minutes to establish their 2000 hour estimated position, as demanded by Navy regulations. It was 5.6 miles south and east of their DR track. This signified to Lieutenant Barrett that the Wilkes was still under the influence of a southward drift.

  Actually, all navigation at this time was wrong because of:

  • the northward drift experienced throughout the night;

  • the incorrect star fix at dawn;

  • the incorrect suppositions during the day; and

  • the fact that the point where they had crossed to the Bank could have been 6 miles north or south, as the distance between the two lines did not vary to any extent within 6 miles either side of the ship’s presumed track.

  But the officers were satisfied, as it conformed to the Wilkes’

  DR track. All was well, they felt.

  According to the navigator’s calculations, the Wilkes would take 4 hours and 25 minutes before she dropped off the bank and crossed the 50-fathom line on the northward side into deeper water.

  As they seemed to be well out to sea, Commander Kelsey’s night orders followed normal procedure:

  • destination [Argentia];

  • base course [047° True];

  • speed [ 15 knots - to make good the base speed of 12 knots];

  • Wilkes to maintain position on the starboard bow of Pollux at a distance of 2000 to 3000 yards;

  • Wilkes to cease zigzagging and continue partrolling if visibility improved;

  • make radar search for 30 minutes each hour;

  • take and record fathometer readings every 15 minutes; and

  • take and record RDF bearings of Cape Race and Gallantry Head* every two hours from midnight.

  Commander Kelsey noted that the Wilkes was expected to cross the 50-fathom line on the northern side of the bank about 0130, and the 50-fathom line about 0420. He added a footnote: “After 0400 attempt to pick up land with radar – range about 20 miles.”

  Commander Webb, satisfied that all was well, went to his cabin and lay, fully clothed, on his berth. Commander Kelsey retired to his cabin shortly thereafter.

  Lieutenant Barrett, meticulously checking the dead-reckoning track across the St. Pierre Bank, prepared the fathometer log for the seamen on the middle watch, jotting down the times, 15 minutes apart, that they were to fill in. Since the Wilkes was expected to cross the 50-fathom line on the northern side of the bank at approximately 0138 hours, Barrett penciled in “Expect to hit 50-fathoms” opposite that time.