The United States Atlantic Fleet appreciates the message from the British fleet and welcomes opportunities for work with the British fleet for the freedom of the seas.
It may also be noted, as a fact which is not without significance, that the losses by submarine which had reached their highest mark in the last week in April began from that time steadily to diminish.
One of the main duties of the Navy was to convoy transports and supplies across the Atlantic. This was done with the assistance of Allied vessels with remarkable success. For a long period it seemed as if the U-boats would not be able to penetrate through the Allied convoy, but during 1918 four transports were torpedoed. The first was the Tuscania which was sunk in February off the north coast of Ireland, with 1,912 officers and men of the Michigan and Wisconsin guardsmen, of whom 204 were lost. The Oronsa, which was torpedoed in April, contained 250 men and all were saved except three of the crew. The Moldavia came next with five hundred troops, of whom fifty-five were lost. On September 6th the troopship Persic with 2,800 American soldiers was torpedoed but American destroyers rescued all on board, and the Persic, which was prevented from sinking by its water-tight bulkheads, was afterwards beached.
Several American ships, including the troop transport Mount Vernon, were torpedoed on return trips and a number of the men of their crews were lost, and several naval vessels were lost, including the destroyer Jacob Jones, and the patrol vessel Alcedo. The Cassin was torpedoed, but reached port under its own steam and later returned to service.
In September and October three more American transports were added to the list of American losses. On September 26th the United States steamer Tampa was torpedoed and sank with all on board, losing 118 men. On September 30th the Ticonderoga was also torpedoed, eleven Naval officers and 102 enlisted men being lost.
In addition to these submarine losses several ships and a number of men were lost through collision. The United States steamer Westgate was sunk in a collision with the steamer American on October 7th, with the loss of seven men. On October 9th the United States destroyer Shaw lost fifteen men in a collision, though she later succeeded in reaching port. On October 11th the American steamer Otranto was sunk in a collision with the British liner Cashmere. Of seven hundred American soldiers who were on board 365 were lost. At this time about three thousand anti-submarine craft were in operation day and night around the British Isles, and about five thousand working in the open sea. This was what made it possible for the Allies to win the war.
Inasmuch as the illegal use of the submarine by Germany brought America into the war it was extremely appropriate that she should take an active part in the suppression of the submarine menace. The methods which were used in fighting the submarines differed much in different cases. The action of the government in arming merchantmen and in providing them with trained gun crews did much to lower the number of such ships sunk by the U-boats.
The submarine, which had formerly been able to stop the unarmed merchantman and sink him at leisure, after a few combats with an armed merchantman began to be very wary and to depend almost entirely upon his torpedoes. It was not always easy for the submarine to get in a position where her torpedo would be effective, and the merchantman was carefully directed, if attacked, to pursue a zig-zag irregular course, and at the same time endeavor to hamper the submarine by shooting as near her periscope as possible.
Along the sea coasts and at certain points in the English Channel great nets were used effectively. Submarines, however, toward the end of the war were made sufficiently large to be able to force their way through these nets, and net-cutting devices were also used by them with considerable effect. The best way to destroy the submarines seemed to be in a direct attack by flotillas or destroyers.
By the end of the war the whole process of sinking or destroying submarines had been thoroughly organized. Practically every portion of the seas near Great Britain and France was carefully watched and the appearance of a submarine immediately reported. As the submarine would only travel at a certain well-understood speed during a given time, it was possible to calculate, after the locality of one was known, about how far from that point it would be found at any later period. Destroyers were therefore sent circling around the point where the submarine had been discovered, enlarging their distance from the center every hour. In the course of time the submarine would be compelled to come up for air, and then, if luck were with the destroyer, it might find its foe before it was seen itself. Having discovered the submarine the destroyer immediately endeavored to ram, dropping depth bombs at the point where they supposed the enemy to be.