CHAPTER SIX
A Sample of Quality
While details were shaping for proving the mine early in March, an urgent request came from the British Admiralty for one or more minelayers to help lay a field in the North Irish Channel. This passage was used by slow convoys to the west coast, making port first at Lamlash in the island of Arran, and submarine activity here needed to be checked. The sinking of the Tuscania had taken place in this vicinity.
At that time, only the San Francisco and Baltimore could be considered for this duty, and as the former was flagship, the Baltimore was sent. To “How soon can you go?” over long distance wire, Captain Marshall answered “Right away,” guessing at the destination, and on March 4 he sailed from New York to join H.M.S. Leviathan as escort for a fast convoy out of Halifax.
By popular standards, the Baltimore was a musty back number—years older than many of her officers and crew—but she had been at Manila Bay with Dewey and had otherwise distinguished herself in a long and varied career. Though classed as a poor steamer, the ease with which, time after time, she produced extra speed at a pinch was a standing joke. Thanks to a good overhaul early in the war and to the ability and contagious enthusiasm of her engineer, Lieutenant R. P. Molten, U.S.N., she now topped a 9-day transatlantic run at 13 knots, for the most part in rough weather, with a three-hour spurt at 18.6 knots—2 knots faster than was supposed to be safe for her engines—just to keep pace with the Leviathan.
She arrived at Greenock, Scotland, March 17, ready for work, but was so much earlier than expected that her first mines were not delivered until April 13. Without any preparatory trials, though the mines were British, of a type new to the Baltimore, she went out at once, beginning the deep minefield between the island of Islay and the Irish coast, which was to prevent submerged but not surface passage.
More mines in excess of her reported capacity having been sent to her, 10 had to be carried on the upper deck, and the last one of these mines, in going down the elevator, was jambed, due to the roll of the ship, and held suspended in the elevator shaft. William J. Powers, gunner’s mate, 1st class, promptly of his own initiative, at imminent risk of the 1800-pound weight falling or one of the mine’s firing horns breaking, removed the detonator and with it the great menace to the ship. Before the Baltimore’s next trip, her own mechanics extended the launching deck tracks, to accommodate 180 instead of 170 mines, since the British naval authorities wished her to plant the larger number each time. Four times more she planted 180 mines, April 18, 21, 28 and May 2, planting always at night, in an area infested with submarines.
Extra careful navigation was required, both to lay the mines just where intended, as their anchor cables had been cut to fit (anchors not automatic), and to approach close to the minefields previously laid, yet avoid them. In one such operation, the gyro-compass went wrong at a critical moment. The navigator, Lieut. Commander George W. Hewlett, U.S.N., kept his head and held his peace, applying the corrections to the magnetic compass with coolness and accuracy, as if maneuvering to avoid a sand bank, instead of to clear a minefield by only 500 yards.
The Baltimore laid this whole minefield unassisted, 899 mines in all. She worked directly under Rear Admiral Clinton-Baker, R.N., who wired his congratulations upon the successful completion of the first three operations, and when, at the end of May, she was recalled to our squadron, he wrote to Captain Marshall:
Once more I wish to thank you for all that you have done and for the very willing help which you, your officers and ship’s company have always given. It is much to be regretted that the work which you commenced and so admirably carried out is not to be completed, at any rate for the present, though doubtless you will be doing equally useful work elsewhere in the near future. Good luck to you and your ship.