The Corsair in the war zone

by Ralph Delahaye Paine

We kept dropping farther and farther behind, the firemen still shy their sea-legs and also some of the crew. Nobody saw the doctor and the paymaster for four days.... Then the doctor made a brief appearance in the sick-bay. He looked at a cut in a man’s hand, clapped his own hand over his mouth, and we didn’t see him again for two days more. But he came around in fine shape after that, on the job every minute, although he was not needed often, I am glad to say.

To make a long story short, we abandoned all hope of staying with the first division and ploughed along by ourselves for a few days, then picking up the second group consisting of four transports and the same type of escort. Everything went along smoothly for four days and then our destroyers came out to meet us from Queenstown. There were five of them and a bully good sight they were to us who were getting pretty close to the danger zone with our precious transports. The destroyers came zipping up like gray streaks and were on us almost before we knew it. We stood on deck and cheered ourselves hoarse. They were the boys who had gone over early, the first of the Navy to see active service. They were glad to see us, too, it appeared, and many messages were wig-wagged back and forth. They fell into position and all hands felt as safe as a church.

About two o’clock in the afternoon of the next day, I was below getting a drink of water when suddenly there was a loud explosion. I remember that at the time I thought somebody had dropped a hatch cover directly over my head. I realized in a moment that it was something else, for I heard loud shouts and the tramp of feet on deck. I was topside in no time and rushed for my gun as I was the loader of Number Three gun.

The transports had all stopped. One of them, nearest to us, was giving the submarine warning, a number of blasts on her whistle which sounded uncanny to us because it was the first time we had heard anything from the transports since leaving New York. They had moved across the ocean like so many ghosts. It was a beautiful, clear day and the sea was as smooth as a carpet.

I took my position at the gun, broke open a box of ammunition, and laid hands on a shell. The doctor came rushing aft with a handful of cotton which he told us to stuff in our ears. Then we were all set to be torpedoed. I wasn’t scared—I was too busy, I guess—but I was a little bit jumpy. I looked at my watch and it was just five minutes of two. I wondered how long it would take our yacht to sink after the torpedo hit us.

The transports, as I have said, were making no headway and were all grouped together like a flock of frightened sheep, while the destroyers were just getting into motion. This was one of the prettiest sights I ever saw. No sooner had the transports halted than the destroyers, six in all, darted out in a fan-shaped formation and then worked back and forth, looking for all the world like greyhounds on a scent. And maybe they didn’t make knots! We were moving at top speed ourselves, but those destroyers gave us the impression that we were standing still. Zoom, one would cut across our bow at about thirty knots, then another would flash astern at the same rate.

For a time we could discover nothing else out of the ordinary. Then suddenly the captain of Number Four gun gave a yell and pointed astern. “There she goes!” he shouted. “It’s a torpedo as sure as you live, or I never saw one.” We all rubbered astern with our eyes sticking out like onions, and there, sure enough, was a wake foaming along at tremendous speed about fifty yards away, but it was not heading in our direction, thank goodness. I don’t know whether it was a torpedo or not. I have never seen one, but our regular Navy men swore it was.

The paymaster was sure it was, although he had never seen one either, and he dashed up and down the deck, clapping his hands and loudly exclaiming, “Oh, it is a torpedo! It is a torpedo!” This relieved the strain considerably. We all laughed until we almost cried. The officer upon the after deck-house suddenly cried out, “Stand steady, boys. Don’t get excited. A school of porpoises is coming toward us.” We saw them, and I imagine there would have been a heavy mortality in that bunch of porpoises if the keen-eyed officer had not warned us in time.

That was about all I saw of the submarine attack, but I heard other stories from the deck and bridge. The explosion at the outset had been caused by the dropping of a depth charge from a destroyer, quite close aboard the Corsair. No wonder I thought somebody had banged a hatch cover over my head! The firemen below thought we had been torpedoed and were all for erupting on deck for a breath of fresh air. That depth charge was powerful. Our men said they saw the destroyer’s stern lift high in air while a great spout of water leaped just astern. We saw oil smeared over the water and I hope the destroyer was given official credit for sinking a submarine.

One of our officers told me that more than one submarine must have been in the attack, and that the activity of the destroyer escort drove them off. There was one incident which some of the men thought rather a joke, but I felt sorry. In the morning an old British tramp picked us up, and seeing all the destroyers, etc., concluded that we were good company to travel in, so she stuck with us all the forenoon, keeping a mile off to port. No sooner did she hear the submarine warning than she lit out at full speed, about ten knots, for safer waters. Two hours after that, our radio men got an S.O.S. from her, that she had been torpedoed and was sinking. It seemed too bad that we couldn’t go and help her.