Submarine and Anti-submarine

by Sir Henry John Newbolt

Perhaps the most trying time of all was that which now followed. What happened? Nothing happened. It was that which was so trying. From 9.5 A.M., when the third depth-charge exploded, till 4.7 P.M., the submarine lay motionless on the sea-bed; no one on board knew when it would be safe to move, or even whether it would be possible at all—for both helm and hydroplanes were jammed and other defects might be discovered. This was a test of moral stability as severe as any yet recorded, even in the submarine service, and it is not surprising that Commander Cooper was eventually ordered to add to his report a special statement on the moral effects of the strain upon his ship’s company. He reported accordingly, not in the picturesque style of the German officer, exhilarated by his successful fight, but with the brevity of a man of science and the simplicity of a narrator who has nothing to prove. The behaviour of the officers he assumes without a word; that of the men, he says, was admirable. Naturally it varied with the individual; the older and more experienced men observed the demeanour of their officers, and were content to abide by it; the younger ones showed more difference, each in accordance with his temperament; but they, too, did excellently, and having been assured that all was well, the whole company settled down to read or to occupy themselves in other ways. In the majority of cases the events of the day had no permanent effect, though for a short time afterwards some of the men would start on being wakened or touched suddenly by others. As to himself, the commander declares that he thought the chances of being destroyed by depth-charges small. To retain this opinion in the circumstances was a proof of remarkable constancy; the constancy of the ‘man convinced against his will’ in the proverb. And he felt at the time, as he frankly says, that he would much rather remain on the surface and engage an enemy, however large, and at all costs, than endure the strain of a further experience of the kind. It would be likely, he thought, to affect the judgment for some days, causing a tendency to act over-cautiously or over-rashly.

None the less he carried on. At 4.7 the submarine left the bottom and rose to a depth of 28 feet; at 8.35 in the evening she came to the surface and proceeded to her billet. There she carried out the duties of her patrol, and six days later, ‘at 1 P.M., British Summer Time,’ she returned to her base.

Of the hunted who do not return to their base we cannot hope to hear much. But there was a smart engagement towards the end of 1917 between an American convoy-escort and a German submarine, of which accounts have been given by both sides, those above water and those below. The convoy was approaching our shores towards dusk of a November afternoon when the attack was made. The U-boat’s periscope—a ‘finger’ one, of only two inches diameter—was sighted by the U.S.S. (destroyer) Fanning, which was at the moment turning to port at a speed of about fifteen knots. The submarine was 3 points on the Fanning’s port bow, distant about 400 yards, and going some two knots. The other destroyers had just passed the spot where she was seen; the second of these, U.S.S. Nicholson, was now on the Fanning’s starboard bow, and very handy for what was to follow. The commander of the Fanning, in order to continue his swing to port, put his helm hard over and at the same time increased speed to full. The periscope, of course, disappeared instantly. But every eye on the Fanning had marked her position. The commander, when he had turned about 30°, ported his helm so as to bring his ship right over the desired place, slightly ahead of the periscope’s last position, and there he dropped a depth-charge, within three minutes of the first alarm. It was a fine piece of work, and, as it turned out, a decisive stroke.

Nothing was seen for the moment, beyond the upheaval of water caused by the detonation. The Fanning continued to turn under starboard helm; the Nicholson altered course to starboard, turned, and headed for the spot where the charge had been dropped, intending, no doubt, to drop a shot of her own in the same place. She could not have made a luckier move. The conning-tower of the submarine suddenly broke surface between her and the convoy, about 500 yards from where it had disappeared. The boat was one of the new large-type U-boats, and was evidently hit, for she could neither submerge properly nor keep an even keel, but went rolling up and down like a gigantic porpoise in the direction of the convoy. The two destroyers headed for her at full speed; Nicholson, who was, of course, leading, passed over her, dropped her depth-charge, and turned to port, firing three rounds from her stern gun into the wash. Once more the enemy’s bow came up with a bound. This time he made a desperate effort to keep on the surface, and struggled along at two knots, being about 30° down by the stern. Finally he righted himself, no doubt by filling tanks and crowding men forward, and his speed seemed to increase. But by this time Fanning’s guns were speaking to him in unmistakable language; after the third shot the hatch opened, a white shirt was waved, and the whole crew came on deck holding up their hands.

‘The submarine suddenly broke surface.’

It was now 4.28; the fight had taken no more than eighteen minutes from first to last, and ten minutes later the U-boat sank. Her crew had opened the sea valves and nearly paid the penalty, for they were all in the water before they could be got off to the destroyer, and one who could not swim was rescued by two chivalrous Americans. They jumped into the dark, cold sea for him, forgetting all about the German rules of war, and were disappointed when he died on deck.

The account given by the survivors was full of interest. They were forty-one in number, including a captain-lieutenant, a first-lieutenant, a lieutenant and a chief-engineer. The boat had come straight from her base for the express purpose of attacking this particular convoy, and had been lying in wait for two days, paying no attention to any other ships. She carried twelve torpedoes, and she carries them still, for not one had been fired when she went down. The first depth-charge from Fanning had been practically a direct hit; it had wrecked her motors, diving gear, and oil leads, and sent her diving entirely out of control to a depth of 200 feet. The commanding officer thought at first that he would never be able to stop her, and that she would go on until the deep-sea pressure burst her sides in. He had only one possible course—he blew out all his four water-ballast tanks at once. This stopped the dive but brought the boat back to the surface with a rush and made her unmanageable. One witness in the destroyers says that she ‘leaped clear of the water like a breaching whale.’ It was then that Nicholson overtook her and dropped the second depth-charge; but even without this the end was inevitable, for in her porpoise-like gambols she could have been shot or rammed with certainty. Given a sufficient supply of patrol boats and depth-charges in the submarine chase there will be but few and evil days for the hunted. The American naval authorities have grasped this truth at once and founded a building policy upon it. The boats will be provided in any number, and if they are handled as the Fanning and Nicholson were handled, the U-boat will spend her short life in dodging a perpetual bombardment.

That the end of the pirate, when it does come, is terrible, may easily be conjectured, but probably no imagination could give any idea of the actual experience. There is, however, in existence a narrative, compiled by a neutral from the evidence of two Germans who survived, by an extraordinary chance, the destruction of their ship. These men were among the crew of a U-boat of the largest and newest type, one of the last to come out of Zeebrugge before the harbour was bottled up by the Intrepid and Iphigenia. She had not gone far from port when she hit a mine and exploded it. The shock was severe, but did not at once appear to be fatal. The electric switches were thrown out of position, the lights in some compartments went out, and the vessel began to sink rapidly by the stern; but the lighting did not take long to restore, and the crew were immediately ordered to trim the boat by making a combined rush forward. This manœuvre was successful in bringing her to an even keel, but by no effort could she be induced to rise to the surface.

Now began the terror; the plating of the ship had been shaken and forced apart by the explosion; water was pouring in; the leaks were rapidly enlarging, and all attempts to stop them failed. In very few minutes the boat would be filled either with water or with chlorine gas from the batteries. It was hardly possible to escape from the death-trap; but there was one desperate chance, if the conning-tower and forward hatches could be forced open against the pressure of the sea.