CHAPTER XI
GIBRALTAR AND THE CONVOY
AMERICAN VESSELS ESCORTED NINETY PER CENT OF SHIPPING BETWEEN ENGLAND AND MEDITERRANEAN—GREAT WORK ACCOMPLISHED BY SHIPS UNDER COMMAND OF ADMIRAL NIBLACK—U. S. NAVAL FORCES MADE POSSIBLE OPERATION OF CONVOY SYSTEM, ONE OF THE MOST EFFECTIVE MEASURES OF THE WAR.
Gibraltar was the gateway through which passed one-fourth of all the shipping of the Allies. When the convoy system was applied to the Mediterranean, July, 1917, it became the principal convoy port of the world.
United States naval vessels furnished ocean escort both going and returning for 90 per cent of all convoys between Gibraltar and Great Britain—200 of the 225 groups which sailed, 4,269 ships, representing 12,000,000 gross tons. The Mediterranean escort protected 5,120 vessels; our destroyers in that region, 1004; our Marseilles escort 73; and our men-of-war accompanied 12 other special ships, transports, cable layers and submarines. Thus the United States vessels of this force escorted a total of 10,478 ships.
Realizing the strategic importance of Gibraltar, the Navy Department, on July 5, 1917, decided to establish a base there, and on July 14th, directed 11 vessels, including gunboats and light cruisers, under command of Admiral Wilson, to prepare for distant service, and sail for Gibraltar at the earliest possible date. This base, one of the most important in Europe, was established by the Navy Department on its own initiative, as had been the bases at Brest and Bordeaux and the Azores. By the time our vessels arrived it became, for protection of Allied shipping, a point of prime importance.
The convoy system was inaugurated in the Mediterranean, by British Admiralty order, on July 22, 1917. Five days afterwards the first regular convoy of 14 ships sailed for England. August 6th the vanguard of the United States naval vessels, the cruiser Sacramento (Captain T. T. Craven) reached Gibraltar. On the 17th Admiral Wilson arrived in the Birmingham (Captain C. L. Hussey), followed next day by the Nashville (Captain H. E. Yarnell). Other ships followed—the gunboats Castine (Captain W. C. Asserson), Machias (Commander Austin Kautz), Wheeling (Commander H. W. Osterhaus), Paducah (Commander H. H. Royall), the cruiser Chester (Captain Philip Williams), the Coast Guard cutters Seneca (Captain W. J. Wheeler), Manning (Lieutenant Commander A. J. Henderson), Tampa (Lieutenant Commander Charles C. Satterlee), Ossipee (Lieutenant Commander W. H. Munter), Yamacraw (Lieutenant Commander Randolph Ridgely), Algonquin (Lieutenant Commander G. C. Carmine), the converted yachts Yankton (Lieutenant G. E. Lake), Nahma (Lieutenant Commander E. Friedrick), Druid (Lieutenant Commander J. F. Connor), Wenonah (Lieutenant Commander P. E. Speicher), Arcturus (Lieutenant Commander C. F. Howell), Lydonia (Lieutenant Commander R. P. McCullough), Cythera (Lieutenant Commander W. G. Roper), Wadena (Lieutenant Commander W. M. Falconer), and Venetia (Commander L. B. Porterfield), the Coast and Geodetic Survey vessel Surveyor (Commander R. E. Pope), the destroyers Bainbridge (Lieutenant T. A. Thomson, Jr.), Barry (Lieutenant H. P. Sampson), Chauncey (Lieutenant Commander W. E. Reno), Dale (Lieutenant Roy Pfaff), Decatur (Lieutenant Ralph R. Stewart), Gregory (Commander A. P. Fairfield), Dyer (Commander F. H. Poteet), Stribling (Commander G. C. Logan), Luce (Commander R. C. Parker), Israel (Lieutenant Commander G. N. Barker), Maury (Commander J. H. Newton), Lansdale (Lieutenant Commander C. W. Magruder), and Schley (Lieutenant Commander R. C. Giffen), and the destroyer tender Buffalo (Captain C. M. Tozer).
American vessels took a prominent part in escort duty practically from the beginning of convoy in that region, becoming in a short time, the largest factor in the system. In the latter part of October, Admiral Wilson was ordered to command our forces on the French coast, and was succeeded by Admiral A. P. Niblack, who directed our forces at Gibraltar to the end of the war, with fine judgment and ability. He and his force became a tower of strength in that region, to the Allies as well as our own Navy.
As the American vessels arrived, they were immediately placed on duty with convoys and as danger-zone escorts. The ships of the Allies were employed almost exclusively in the Mediterranean, with headquarters at Malta, and our naval vessels did nearly all the escort duty between Gibraltar and the United Kingdom. They also convoyed over 4,000 vessels in local Mediterranean traffic, or bound for Mediterranean and Far Eastern ports; ships supplying the American army through Marseilles, the French forces in North Africa; the Allied armies at Salonika; the British in Egypt and Palestine; and the forces of Italy.