“If I just took my cleaning gear and stowed it here, do you think anybody’d get sore?” the fellow with the scar said.
His gear was a canvas dressing kit with toothbrush, tooth paste, soap, and comb. Rolled up, it was no larger than a man’s fist. I’d heard enough. All my antagonism vanished.
I stepped up. “Bud, you’re sharing my cleaning-gear locker,” I said. “I haven’t got much in there, and there’s plenty of room.”
I don’t think he could have been twenty-two. He was so grateful, I felt like a skunk. As the days went on and I learned his story, I knew that we should have been damn proud to carry such passengers. He had been shot down twice by Jap Zeros. He had been flying a PBY—the old Navy flying boat, which could do only about 140 knots with everything bent on it.
The others had been through the mill, too. One had been shot down three times. Some had been forced to make their way for miles through semi-jungles and swamps before they reached the safety of the American lines. The Seawolf’s crew stopped griping about ferrying passengers and we filled those boys full of good submarine food, warmed them up with good hot coffee, and couldn’t do too much for them. They were amazed at the good food, the variety of it—steak, ham, lamb and pork chops, the pies and pastries we served. They grinned when they came in for breakfast and saw Doc Loaiza going through his daily routine of placing two vitamin pills at each plate.
We learned of the problems they faced fighting the Japs. Principally, they needed faster planes. “Those Zeros against what we had made it just like the old turtle and hare story,” we were told. “Those Jap ships are going to be mighty tough to get around, even with our new pursuits, because they’re so fast and maneuverable.” The youngster who was sharing my locker had been sent up “without definite orders,” he said. “Everybody could see the finale was coming, so we just went up with the idea of taking a smack at them whenever we spotted anything. I got in several good smacks, but I got smacked in return—twice by Zeros and once by the heaviest curtain of flak I’ve ever seen. I was lucky. I managed to bail out every time. Some of the boys didn’t. I know I wouldn’t have given much for my chances going down in a ’chute. The Japs butcher a man in the silk just like they do everything else. But I managed to get back every time, and now I guess the big boys have decided I’ve had enough.” He grinned. “They tell me I’m a little punchy. Maybe so. I’m inclined to believe them myself. All I want now is a good plane and a good crew, and then let me at ’em!”
The crew adopted the men. We showed them how we made our leisure time go by in Kelly’s Pool Room—cribbage, hearts, dice, acey-deucy. We let them wash their clothes in Baby, and they got a kick out of watching us in the evening, sitting on our bunks and darning socks or sewing buttons.
We loosened up and had fun with them. I sent some of them here and there for oxygen pumps and nitrogen needles and other tools that didn’t exist. One fellow, a boy from New York City, wandered into the sound shack.
“Come in,” I said. “Make yourself at home. I’ve got something to show you.”
“Thanks,” he said, “I was kind of looking for a place to park in.”
“Well, as long as you’re here, I might as well explain some of these gadgets to you,” I told him. “See that thing right over your head?” It was the direction finder loop antenna. “That’s what we call an oxometer.”
“Never heard of it,” he said. “What did you say it was?”
“Oxometer.” I spelled it out to him. “O-x-o-m-e-t-e-r. It’s a pretty complicated piece of gear, but it’s damned important, especially now that we have you people aboard.”
He looked surprised. “Is that so? Say, let me know about it, will you? Maybe I’d be able to give you a hand one of these days.”
“Oh,” I said, “the operation is quite simple. You merely stand over here and vary this control”—I pointed to the handle on the direction finder loop— “and watch that meter over there.” This was the sensitivity meter on the direction-finder receiver.
“And what does that do?”
“I’m telling you,” I said. “When that needle passes this point, that’s the danger signal. Then you bend down and roll up your trousers right to the knee.”
His mouth almost fell open. “My God, you mean water is coming in?”
“No,” I said. “Not water. This oxometer measures the flow of bull going fore and aft, and we have to prepare to walk through it. It’s been near the danger point ever since you fellows came aboard.”
“Why, you red-headed bastard!” he began, and then broke down laughing.
Now and then in the course of a routine test, we’d let a little air hiss out of a valve, and some wisecracker would whisper, loud enough for our passengers to hear, “Jeez, the Skipper’s taking her down to 1,000 feet.” The faces of the aviators would be a sight.
The thought of going down 1,000 feet under the water didn’t make them any too happy. Of course, no submarine can go that deep. This kind of tomfoolery went on all the way south. As we plowed on, we came into warmer waters. The water temperature ranged from the high 80’s into the 90’s, and our aviators never seemed to get over the fact that the Wolf was air-conditioned and that we could be so comfortable in those hot waters.
At night, when we surfaced, we caught up with the progress of the war. American and Dutch destroyers and planes had gone into the Macassar Straits and practically wiped out a Jap convoy.
That was our first knowledge of the great Macassar Straits battle, in which more than 50 Jap transports were sunk and perhaps as many as 25,000 Jap soldiers lost. This mass sinking was the best news we had heard for a long time. We knew it was all a surface affair and we were amazed that our old destroyers could do so well. About the fifth night out, with sea and sky black as pitch, we thought we might get a little action of our own. Over on our starboard bow a shape gloomed up just on the edge of visibility. A Jap submarine running awash? The battle alarm jangled through the boat. Our aviators squeezed into corners, fascinated, as the Wolf’s men clicked into position. We started to ease up for a shot. Then from the conning tower came a disgusted exclamation: “Oh, nuts! It’s a log with a branch on it!”
Two nights later the lookout saw what appeared to be a ship with mast and smokestack. We made a crash dive and deployed for a target very cautiously. I was at sound and absolutely miserable. I could hear nothing; no screws, no pings, nothing—only the ceaseless crackle of the water. Each time the Skipper asked, “Do you have anything?” I had to report, “Nothing on sound, sir.”
“Up periscope,” came from the Captain. Then—“Damn it!”—sharp and clear. “It’s a little island.”
If there are sea gremlins, they were certainly having a time with us.
We surfaced and continued on our course. We entered Macassar Straits, and finally we reached the great naval base of Surabaya, Java.
For weeks the Japs had been aiming for this chief base of operations for the United Nations in the Dutch East Indies, and when we arrived, Surabaya had already been dive-bombed three times in as many days.
We drew up to dock midafternoon. The sun shone like a brass plate. We had been going steadily since December 8—almost two months—and for most of that time most of us never saw daylight.
We tied up at Holland Pier. Less than 100 yards away we saw the evidence of Jap bombing—huge ten-foot craters in the road-way, where at least a dozen 500-pounders had landed. They struck several barracks—gray wood frame structures—and the roofs were smashed and splintered. Elsewhere fire-blackened charred walls pointed to the Japs’ fury.
Our twenty-six aviators looked much better when they stepped out on dock than when they came aboard. They were surprised to find themselves in Surabaya; they thought they were being taken to Australia. We shook hands all around. We really enjoyed having them aboard. For some reason the average submarine man and the average aviator aren’t too friendly. When a submarine begins a mission, it has no friends. Everyone must be considered an enemy, for a submarine flies no flags and from the distance all subs look alike—particularly to aviators. We were always wary of aircraft. Medal-hungry fliers will bomb anything resembling a submarine. Only the airplane could see us below the surface. It was our natural enemy. It was as though a natural antagonism exists between these two services whose medium is so different—one air, the other water.