One incident may be worthy of note. A flock of troop-ships was under escort through the torpedo zone. The eagle eye of a trained observer caught the tell-tale symptoms of a submarine trying to manœuvre into striking position. Activities began at once, if not sooner. Those of us whose job it was to look after the sub, did it. Those of us whose job it was to screen the troop-ships, did that. On one of the transports were many negroes who knew more about shore duties than seafaring. On the ship they were passengers pro tem.
The process of dealing with a submarine certainly must send thrills through a spectator who has never attended any rehearsals. The negroes in question were all novices and their chief emotion was primitive terror. The simultaneous explosion of forty or fifty barrels of dynamite made the whole ocean heave and rumble. Even those of us who were used to dropping ’em over and who were braced for the shock, felt considerably jolted.
The darky soldiers thought the end of creation had sure busted loose in epidemic form. One of them excitedly dug down into his pack and fished out a Bible. Opening it on deck, he knelt upon it, wrung his hands to Heaven and cried in accents that could be heard above the racket of the explosions, “O Lawd, O Lawd, I’se never gwine roll dem bones no mo’. Ah promise it. Ah promise it absotively.”
Another one decided that this method of imploring grace was worth imitating in the terrible crisis, so he rushed over and tried to get knee-room on the same Bible. Shoving his comrade aside, he managed to find a sacred anchorage and his supplication was, “Good Lawd Jesus, lemme see jes’ one green tree. Ah ain’t askin’ you to send me back home across dis yere big ocean till th’ war is done. Ah’ll stay right where I is put, but lemme see jes’ one green tree befo’ all dem German su’marines gobble dis pore niggah like Jonah an’ th’ whale.”
Half an hour after the excitement was over, these devout passengers were shooting dice as busily as ever. There were negroes in another unit which we escorted into France. In wandering about the port, they came across some of their own race, black troopers from the French African colonies. Negotiations were opened to start a conversation going, but they could find no common language until one of the bunch produced a pair of dice. This, it seems, instantly broke down the barrier, and they soon had going as fine a little game of international craps as a man ever saw. Both sides whooped and haw-hawed until traffic was blocked and the police interfered.
The convoy work in which the Corsair took part during the four months from February 15 to May 30, 1918, comprised the following cruises, arranged in the form of a summary so as to make the record more complete and also to suggest the volume of the shipping which was entrusted to the protection of the yachts and destroyers in French waters:
Feb. 16-20. (Westbound from Verdon.) Ships in convoy: Eugene Grozos, Mont Pelvoux, Kalfarli, Lenape, Mariana, Lamertin, Mundiale, Bergdalen, Amphion, Northern, Joseph Cudahy, Stensland, Ariadne, Lady of Gaspe, Thibet.
(Vessels in escort.) Corsair, Aphrodite, May, Regulus (F), Aventurier (F).
Feb. 25-28. (Westbound from Verdon.) Ships in convoy: El Occidente, Anglo Saxon, Erny, Borinquen, Montanan, Aurelien Sholt, Appelus, Balti, Gusta Vigiland.
(Vessels in escort.) Corsair, Aphrodite, May, Cassiope (F).