Submarine!

12 Tang

On July 20, 1943, USS Wahoo completed her overhaul in Mare Island Navy Yard, and departed for Pearl Harbor, carrying her skipper, Mush Morton, into his last action with the enemy and to his final resting place somewhere in the Sea of Japan. But before Wahoo left, her Executive Officer, whom Morton had once characterized as “the bravest man I know,” was detached and given command of the uncompleted Tang, then building at Mare Island. The two men separated with visions of meeting in the not-too-distant future — perhaps to carry out combined operations together. Less than three months later Mush Morton and his Wahoo were dead.

Now, O’Kane was not an oversentimental man, and he was as ready as the next to accept the trials of war and the losses that inevitably must come with them. But only one who has experienced the extinction of a whole unit of comrades without trace can fully appreciate the icy fingers which must have clutched around his heart when he received the grim news back in the temporary safety of Mare Island. The effect, perhaps, was not fully evident, since he simply went on with his preparations to ready Tang for war. Only O’Kane himself — and perhaps even he did not fully realize how deeply the iron had entered into his soul — could have given a hint of his dedication. For Tang and Dick O’Kane had a mission of vengeance to carry out.

They finally headed for Pearl Harbor, impatient to complete their training, and on January 22, 1944, six months after O’Kane had bid farewell to Wahoo, three months since that ship had become overdue, Tang set her prow westward to seek revenge.

Tang had only one skipper and her whole life was encompassed within the short span of one year—1944. During this period Tang and O’Kane reached the top of the Submarine Force Roll of Honor, and the most outstanding record of damage and destruction to enemy shipping ever credited to one submarine was established. The Joint Army-Navy Assessment Committee has the officially documented and incontestable proof of twenty-four vessels sunk. It is well known that Tang’s total score was much higher than even that imposing figure, and that a round sum total of thirty would be nearer the truth, for the Japanese tendency to save face resulted in concealing or minimizing many losses, and the confusion into which their merchant marine was thrown by the continuous depredations of United States submarines upset their whole accounting system, until they themselves had not the slightest idea which of their ships remained afloat.

It is early morning, February 17, and Tang draws her first blood. Radar contact! Man tracking stations! Tang stops zigzagging, steadies on course at constant speed while the well-trained though as yet unseasoned plotting parties go to work.

The problem has been gone over many times in drill after drill, and O’Kane’s insistence for perfection now bears its first fruit. Within a matter of minutes, Plot has the answer: enemy course, 100, speed 8, zigzagging about forty degrees every ten minutes. This is all that is needed for the moment. All ahead full! Obediently the electrician’s mates on watch in Maneuvering signal to the engine rooms to start the two idle diesels and at the same time increase the loading of the two diesel-generator sets already in operation. Tang’s easily turning propellers increase their beat as the rheostats are turned up, and soon she is making full speed for the two engines. When the ready signal for the other two engines is received, the electrician’s mates bend over their main control board and pull and push the control levers back and forth in rapid succession — seemingly haphazardly but actually in strict accordance with certain rules of procedure — for what they are doing is simply bringing two more generators up to voltage, paralleling them with those already on the line, and then increasing the loading on all four to the maximum rated power output. Sounds simple, but an error might result in burning out one or more motors, or arcing sufficient to cause a bad fire — and there goes your submarine! The nonchalance of these young men — most just boys in their early twenties, some still in their teens — as they unconcernedly race through the motions they have learned, belies the significance of the whole thing.

Plot tells the anxious skipper that their calculations show they will get in front of the convoy well before daylight and have plenty of time for several night attacks.

Dick O’Kane and Murray Frazee, his Executive Officer, have made night attacks many times before in other submarines. It should be old stuff to them, of course, but it isn’t. In the first place, both have been rather a long time away from the war, and the unspoken worry crosses their minds that they may have lost their touch, that the life of ease and safety they have been leading back in the States may have softened them up — that, in short, they may have lost their nerve. Besides, this is Dick’s first command. He is burning with the desire to make good, and he wonders whether he really has what it takes, or whether the test will prove that Mush Morton was carrying him along. Likewise, Murray has never been an exec before. Although he has complete confidence in his skipper, and shows it in every move, he, too, has his small secret worry. And Tang herself, what about her? Is she not a neophyte? Is she not also burning with the desire to prove herself, to join the ranks of the Dragon Slayers? Or will she join the unhappy company of tired ships, who somehow never found the war?

The symphony of four roaring diesels has a hypnotic effect, to which is added the song of the waves gurgling in the superstructure and the moan of the wind sweeping across Tang’s narrow bridge. The vibration communicated to the soles of your feet sets your pulses jumping and your heart beating faster, and it all adds up to the anthem of the chase, which drums in your mind, growing ever louder and more powerful, beating in an ever-rising tympanic crescendo which drugs your senses and drives you beyond normal capabilities, which takes possession of you, wipes out all external considerations, and makes itself the undisputed master of your soul. On and on you run, an irresistible juggernaut which even you could not turn back, if you would. And as they proceed with the chase, both O’Kane and Frazee realize that things have not changed for them, and that it will always be thus.

0200. The convoy has been pretty well identified as consisting of eight ships: two large ones, a medium-sized one which might be a destroyer, and five smaller vessels, probably small anti-submarine patrols. Tang is almost in position ahead, and O’Kane is about to give the order to start in for attack, when suddenly one of the flanking escorts appears out of the night, closing rapidly. Only one thing to do — dive!

Ah-ooh-gah! Ah-ooh-gah! — The automobile horn blasts of the diving alarm resound twice throughout the submarine. Alert men in the control room swiftly open the hydraulically operated vent valves, thus releasing the air entrapped in the main ballast tanks. The lookouts tumble down from the bridge. One of them presses the button which causes the bow planes — housed against the superstructure while on the surface — to rig out, and stands by to operate the planes the instant the indicator light glows. Another takes over the stern planes, places them immediately on full dive.

In the maneuvering room, a lever in the overhead of the compartment has been pushed, causing all four engines to stop immediately by action of compressed air on the governors, and the “ampere hounds” quickly rearrange their control switches and levers to put the ship’s main storage battery on propulsion in place of the generators.

In the engine rooms the four straining engines are shut down by hand, individually, upon the first notes of the diving alarm. There is always rivalry between the machinist’s mates and the electrician’s mates as to just who caused the engines to stop in any given instance, and of course there is no answer which either side will accept. But the engines stop, and the engine crew races around the two engine room compartments, shutting outboard exhaust valves, inboard exhaust valves, and inboard air induction flapper valves. Circulating water lines and such lesser openings which do not communicate directly with the interior of the ship may be left for a moment or two, but they, too, are closed quickly.

Meanwhile the Chief of the Watch in the control room has been watching the engine indicator lights closely, and as soon as all four go green, indicating that the engines are no longer pumping air overboard through their exhaust lines, he pulls toward him a handle which operates the main air induction valve, thirty-six inches in diameter — non-closure of which was responsible for the loss of USS Squalus in 1939—and closes it hydraulically with a sharp thump. He also has been watching the depth gauge, and would have closed the valve before it went under even if there were still an engine running, on the theory — considered incontestable in informed submarine circles — that an insufficiency of air is much more to be desired than a superabundance of water.

All this while men have been jumping down below from the bridge of the submarine. The last man down is the Officer of the Deck, who is responsible for the proper closing of the upper conning tower hatch and for seeing that no one is left languishing topside. As he leaves the bridge, water is already lapping over the main deck, and he mentally checks off the thump of the main induction as he and the quartermaster of the watch dog the hatch down and inspect it.

It has taken Tang less than a minute to dive completely beneath the surface of the water, but she doesn’t stop there. If the escort has sighted her, he must mean business, and the thing to do is to put as much black water between the sub and his keel as possible. Tang is still in a headlong dive for the friendly depths when the first depth charge goes off, to be followed closely by four more.

But evidently this fellow is not sure of his contact, because he drops his five half-hearted depth charges and goes on his way — fatal error. The moment Sound reports the screws going away, up comes Tang. Free of further disturbance by this little man, she bores surely in to firing range, remaining submerged to periscope depth to avoid detection.

0300. The medium-sized ship is positively identified as a destroyer, as he moves unsuspectingly across the bow of the submerged sub. Dick withholds fire, much as he’d like to get this one, for the heavily laden freighter not far astern of him looks like the more valuable target. With so many escort vessels running around, O’Kane feels that his chances of getting off more than one shot are not too good, and his chances of getting an immediate depth charging excellent. The convoy is in rather loose formation, and the ships are too far apart for a simultaneous shot at more than one. That was one of Wahoo’s favorite stunts, and how O’Kane would have liked to start Tang off with a double bang. But wisely he figures that a sure sinking is far better than two possibles. Tang’s first salvo is going to be cold, deadly, and calculated.

0330. The leading freighter lumbers into view. Tang has already fired forty-three torpedoes in drill and the efficiency of her fire-control party has been proved. But this time every man on board feels a tightening of nerves, a tenseness of atmosphere, a feeling that these, of all fish, must be good. The range is 1,500 yards; the TDC shows that torpedoes fired now will strike the target exactly broadside on — a perfect setup. Everything is ready.

Here’s the first one, Mush.

“Standby aft!”

The men in the after torpedo room watch closely the gauges and instruments for number-seven tube, and prepare to fire it by hand if the electrical firing mechanism fails. In the control room, the diving officer motions for the chief on the vent manifold to open the vents so that any gases from a depth charge going off directly beneath would pass right through the ballast tanks, rather than being entrapped therein. It is hard enough to keep from surfacing after the sudden loss of weight when a salvo of fish are fired, without adding an entirely unpredictable factor to the problem.

“Bearing — mark!”

“Zero one three!” calls out the quartermaster.

“Set!” from the TDC operator.

“FIRE!” The word lashes out from Dick O’Kane’s lips. Tang’s first war shot is on the way.

The TDC operator takes over the remainder of the salvo. He waits ten seconds, sings out, “FIRE!” Then ten seconds, “FIRE!” and again, “FIRE!”

Now comes the wait. One minute. Can something have gone wrong? Can we have made some mistake? O’Kane watches anxiously through the ’scope. A lot depends on this, Tang’s first target!

“WHANG!” The first torpedo explodes exactly at the point of aim, the target’s screws. A flash of light momentarily blocks the vision and swiftly subsides to show a large column of dirty water flung high above the poop deck of the hapless vessel, falling heavily all about his afterparts.

“WHANG!” The second fish strikes home, about one third of the way forward. Another flash of light, and another column of water. The speed of the stricken ship already becomes perceptibly slower, as the sudden braking effect of two jagged holes in his once-smooth skin, as well as the loss of his propeller, destroy his forward motion. He has sunk lower in the water already, in the ten seconds between explosions, and has begun to list.

“WHANG!” A third hit from the pitiless torpedoes. This one is fairly far forward, in the bow of the ship, and it decisively completes the job. His forward motion now completely disrupted, he slithers agonizingly to a stop, and the fourth torpedo, which Tang had aimed at his bow, misses ahead.

A quick turn about with the periscope shows the submarine skipper that he is clear of escorting vessels and can spare a moment or so to verify the sinking. The stern single eye of the Tang swings back to the doomed Japanese freighter. There is not the slightest doubt that this ship is a goner, but it has been a long time since Dick O’Kane stood at Wahoo’s periscope and saw one of her victims go down; besides, this is his — and Tang’s—first, the start of his plans for a long vendetta.

To only a few men is the opportunity given to watch a big ship sink, and there is a certain sadness, combined with a sort of fierce, unholy joy and glee, in watching one which you yourself are responsible for.

Another quick look around with Tang’s periscope shows that one of the escorts is headed in her general direction, and the sound man reports that he can hear pinging from that direction. Obviously, the Nip is trying the natural and logical tactic of running down the torpedo wakes in hopes of picking up their source. No sense in the source hanging around any longer. Besides, there is no chance of getting the other freighter, for he never had been close enough for a shot, and he is now headed directly away from the area as quickly as he can. So the periscope is pulled down all the way, and the boat is secured for deep depth and depth charging. This promises to be an all-around day for Tang: Her first depth charges have already been received, her first attack has been carried out successfully, her first ship has been seen to sink, and now she is due for another working over.

But this Nip destroyer doesn’t have his heart in his work, either, and he merely unloads a few charges and goes on his way. Tang chalks up practically a free ride, and is back on the surface an hour and a half later, as dawn breaks.

By the time O’Kane was ready to return to port he had added four more scalps to Tang’s belt — one a huge naval tanker carrying a crew estimated at more than three hundred men. When she arrived at Midway after that first run, the Submarine Force, Pacific Fleet, knew that spiritually as well as actually it had received the replacement for Wahoo. Not only was Dick O’Kane the logical man to inherit Morton’s crown as the most successful submariner — he had also earned it. At least he was well on the way to earning it, if he could only keep up his record.

In passing, it is a curious. commentary on O’Kane to note that not once in any of his patrol reports did he capitalize the word “Jap” or “Nip.” To him they were “japs,” “nips,” and “other debris,” if he bothered to mention them at all.

On her second run, no enemy vessels were sunk, for the simple reason that none were sighted, despite Tang’s utmost efforts. About the only thing worthy of note in that line was her meeting with Trigger off Palau, during the latter’s ninth patrol, and supplying her with necessary spare parts after a terrific beating absorbed a few days before. This fortunate encounter was instrumental in Trigger’s being able to remain on station and finally discover a large convoy which she all but wiped out. Though gratifying, however, this was not doing any ship sinking herself, and O’Kane might have been excused for being a bit peeved. However, a chance for action of another kind came, with orders to the Truk area to perform lifeguard duties for an air attack scheduled for that enemy base.

It was a characteristic of O’Kane — as well as of Morton before him — that the most thorough and meticulous preparation was always made for any mission, and this one was no exception. Employing daring tactics, using to the fullest extent all available assistance such as search planes, special radio circuits, and the like, and bombarding the shore batteries whenever he found (or made) the opportunity — usually during the height of an air raid, thus confounding the enemy all the more—Tang proceeded to the rescue of twenty-two aviators who had been forced to land in the water. For this most remarkable feat, performed in seven different pickups close to the reef at Truk, usually under enemy gunfire, Tang and her skipper won the plaudits of the whole Submarine Force, and the heartfelt gratitude of the carrier task force. This was one of the rare instances in which a sub returning from patrol with no scalps to add to her belt needed no excuses, and actually added to her reputation.

And on her third run Tang sank ten ships, for a total of fifteen. O’Kane still seemed to be possessed of a fierce driving urge to sink more Japanese ships, his mission of vengeance not yet accomplished, his search for perfection not yet satisfied. By the time Tang’s third patrol was completed, however, the lure of the chase seemed uppermost in O’Kane’s mind, and the desire for revenge, and the dedication of all victims to the old Wahoo, was no longer the primary motivation. In other words, Tang was now working for herself.

While she sank only two ships on her fourth patrol, this was the toughest one to date, for Tang was bothered with excellent anti-submarine forces and poor torpedo performance. Shades of poor old Mush Morton! But the trouble was not so serious as Wahoo had experienced, and effective results were achieved in spite of it.

On August 11, O’Kane had selected a spot off the coast of Honshu known as Miki Saki for a submerged patrol. It soon became evident that he had correctly gauged a hot spot, for a modern gunboat, which he described as “loaded with depth charges,” cruised in the area, while a nondescript motorboat wandered about with six lookouts keeping a sharp watch. All day was spent in avoiding these two characters, but at about 1500 the motorboat, by great good luck, sighted the periscope of the questing submarine, and tailed her from then on.

Not good, this, but Tang is not one to give up just because a little boat latches on to her. Surfacing and giving him a quick going over would not be advisable because of the gunboat which had been sighted earlier and the possible presence of planes. Apparently the motorboat is not positive about its contact, for no heavier anti-sub forces come out to help, so Tang nonchalantly keeps patrolling the area, although this little fellow is annoying.

Shortly before 1700 smoke is sighted. Tang starts the approach, and the smoke resolves itself into two heavily laden ships, escorted by the gunboat, and another escort. Both ships are running as close to the beach as they dare, and Tang goes right on in after them, followed by the ubiquitous motor-boat. The approach develops normally, and it is not long before O’Kane finds himself just where he wants to be, broad on the leading target’s beam, ready to shoot. Just then there is an excited report from the sound man:

“Fast screws, Captain! Bearing two one five!” The sound man has been obeying the standing order for torpedo approaches to search continually all around unless specifically directed otherwise. These screws are on the port quarter; the targets are on the port bow, coming up on the firing point.

O’Kane spins the periscope around for a quick look. Damn that motorboat anyway! He has evidently warned the gunboat, and that worthy is now charging down on Tang with a bone in his teeth and a look of fury suffusing his sleek hull. A minute and a half to get here. There is time — barely — to fire the fish.

Tang’s periscope turns back to the enemy. The situation has suddenly changed dramatically, for the worst! There may be just enough time to shoot the torpedoes, but, oh-h-h-h, are we going to catch it! Dick O’Kane is a marvel of concentration. Although the tension has suddenly leaped up to a terrific pitch he calmly goes through all the many motions associated with firing torpedoes. But his voice is clipped, short, and sharp. He expects every man to get it the first time, and no repeats.

“Standby forward!”

“Final setup!”

“Bearing. — mark!”

“Set!” From the TDC operator.

“Fire!” Three torpedoes, properly spaced, are fired at the leading ship.

“Shift targets! Second ship! Bearing—Mark!”

“Three four one!”

“Set!”

“FIRE!” Even before the second fish of this three-torpedo salvo is on its way, O’Kane turns back to the gunboat, JUST in time to see him charge across the stern at full speed. Evidently he had misjudged the sub’s direction of motion, which is a lucky break. Another minute free, at least. In the meantime, as soon as the last torpedo is fired, the word is passed through the ship: “Rig for depth charge!”

Back goes the periscope toward the targets. Many a man would have pulled his down in this juncture, but not O’Kane. He simply must see these targets sink! “Take her down!” he orders, but he keeps the scope up.

“Come on! Come on!” He has only a few seconds left to see the hit — he must see it — WHANG! Right in the middle. It must have caught his old-style boilers, for the ship virtually disintegrates. Dick has time to see the explosion, and the ship breaking into two pieces, before the periscope goes under as Tang seeks the shelter of the depths.

Two more explosions are heard. One of the members of the control party is assiduously logging the times and characteristics of all explosions — proper evaluation of results requires that some record be kept — and these are later identified as the fourth and fifth torpedoes striking into the second freighter. But the log of the attack merely lists two explosions, ten seconds apart, which “sounded like torpedoes.”

But this is by no means all for this merry afternoon. The Jap gunboat has quickly realized his mistake and has reversed course. Sound carefully keeps on him, and soon his bearing is steady. His screws slow down — he is listening and probing with his echo-ranging gear. The high-pitched ping of his sound gear coming in over Tang’s receiver—Peep — peep — peeeeeeep — peeeep—searches relentlessly this way and that, growing louder when he is on the bearing, diminishing when he is off.

There is a loud-speaker mounted near the sound console, but it is not used. The frenetic bleeps of the enemy apparatus are audible throughout the conning tower from the operator’s earphones. Since contact has been so recently lost, it does not take long to regain it, and soon the horrid “Peep, peep, peep!” noise is coming in regularly. It won’t be long now!

“Screws have speeded up!” suddenly reports Sound.

All at once it becomes obvious to everyone that the interval between successive pings has decreased. The sound man’s report—“Shifting to short scale!”—is totally unnecessary. As the enemy approaches, the time necessary for an echo to return from the submerged submarine of course decreases, its length determining the range. But as it decreases, it then becomes possible to send out more peeps, and thus get more echoes. The gunboat’s shifting to a more frequent ranging interval indicates that he has an excellent contact and that he is coming in for the attack.

“Standby! He’s starting a run!” The word is whispered over the ship’s sound-powered telephones, as though the use of full voice might help the enemy in locating the sub.

Tang has not been idle in the short time since the firing of the torpedoes. Preparations for receiving a beating are more or less standard among the submarine force, and it took less than a minute for the well-drilled crew to rig ship for depth charge attack.

The effect upon the various members of the crew would be revealing, were there any way to detect it. Some men secretly pray, as they go about their tasks. Others feel a sort of masochistic pleasure, secure in their own private fatalistic concepts of life and death. All essay a nervous little smile, and watch furtively to see how the others are taking it.

Up in the conning tower, Dick O’Kane has not been idle either. Evasion, like attack, is the skipper’s responsibility in a submarine. He has been twisting and turning, presenting the smallest possible target to the probing fingers of the enemy sound gear. At the same time he has been endeavoring to move away from the coast of Honshu, out to sea, where Tang will have deeper water and more room to maneuver.

But try as he may, the enemy gunboat has far too good a contact to be shaken so easily. The menacing propellers come ever closer, and their beat is speeded up gradually as the attack is developed. Tang has received depth charges before, but never from such a deliberate fellow.

Closer and closer come the malevolent screws, and the bleat of the echo-ranging signals are one continuous “Peep, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep,” until it seems that the mind must reel. Beads of sweat roll down the forehead and cheeks of the concentrating sound man, curving into the corners of his mouth, and occasionally his nervous tongue licks at the salty taste thus produced. Murray Frazee once wipes off his forehead and the back of his neck, but Sound shakes his head uneasily, and the exec lets it go.

“Coming on the range now!” The report is muttered as though in meditation. “Coming on the range… He’s dropped the first one!” The sound man has caught the splash of the depth charge dropping into the water.

“How fast do Jap depth charges sink?” The question hangs pregnantly in mid-air. Frazee tries to remember his destroyer days: about ten feet a second—200 feet — that’s as deep as we can go — twenty seconds — hope he hasn’t got the depth set right…

“He’s dropped six of them!” The report sounds oddly loud in the confined conning tower, and O’Kane realizes with a start of sympathy that this operator — his best — has been on duty for two strenuous hours without once removing his earphones.

“Ten seconds more, Captain!” Frazee tries to assume the disinterested voice of an observer at a target practice.

“WHAM!.. WHAM!.. WHAM!.. WHAM!.. WHAM!.. WHAM! The shock is beyond all expectation, beyond reason. With a scream of agony, the sound man jerks off his earphones and stands up trembling before his instrument. The poor fellow had forgotten to turn down his gain control before the charges went off, and is really in severe pain. Dick O’Kane clutches the steel hoist cable of the periscope to keep from falling down, and with his free hand supports the shuddering sound man, who has been flung off his balance by the succeeding blows. Several cigarette receptacles are flung to the furiously vibrating deck plates of the tiny compartment. The explosions resound throughout the ship like pile-driver blows. The atmosphere is filled with a strumming many-pitched roar, produced by the sudden vibration induced in the bulkheads and all the pipes and fittings. Occasionally a piece gives way with a peculiarly explosive noise of relief which only adds to the discordant uproar.

Several men are knocked off their feet by the intensity of the barrage. The air within Tang’s tough steel hull is filled with flying bits of dust and specks of paint, plus larger items such as sections of cork insulation and other material not firmly nailed down.

Frazee and O’Kane look at each other with dismay. This birdie certainly has the range all right. Wonder how much of this kind of pounding good old Tang can stand. So far, not much serious damage, but there’s no telling when one of these blockbusters will be a bull’s-eye.

Regaining control over his jumping reflexes and somehow quieting the ringing in his ears to at least bearable level, the sound man returns to his listening equipment, and immediately picks up the gunboat’s screws on Tang’s port bow, where he is heard to slow down, apparently waiting for possible results to his first attack, and no doubt planning another.

The Captain speaks to the conning tower telephone talker. “Check and report all compartments!” The crisp command goes out to all the eight other watertight compartments of the ship, and the reports come back immediately, indicating that the men in each have already taken stock of their situation. So far all is reassuring, although no one in the ship can recollect ever having received a barrage as close as this one before.

O’Kane’s mind is a boiling mass of ideas for evasion; so is Murray Frazee’s, and the two hold hurried counsel. It is probable that the enemy will try to box Tang, in shallow water, against the not-too-distant coast of Honshu.

By this time it is deathly quiet again, even the prolonged swishing noise produced by the depth charges having died down and the querulous “Peep… peep… peep” can again be heard by the people in the conning tower. O’Kane would like to take a sounding, but dares not, since the signal of his depth finder would furnish the Jap with precisely the information he is seeking — the location of Tang. But after a moment’s thought Dick has the answer for that one. The operator of the depth-finding equipment receives instructions to take one sounding in the middle of each depth charge barrage, and to leave the gear turned off otherwise. The scheme is instantly obvious to all, for naturally the Jap sound man will not expect to hear anything while the depth charges are going off-while Tang’s operator, knowing when to expect the return echo, can probably catch it through the terrific uproar of the explosions. A neat dodge, and one requiring considerable skill.

“He’s turning this way!” The sound man in the conning tower diagnoses the maneuver heralding the arrival of a second attack, the one which Dick O’Kane has been waiting for, during which he will put into effect the evasive maneuver he has planned.

“Here he comes! Shifting to short scale! Screws speeding up!”

“Right full rudder! All ahead full!” Until this moment Tang has been creeping along at evasive speed, which is as slow as she can go and, of course, running as noiselessly as possible, which can only be accomplished effectively while at creeping speed. This full-speed business will surely be detected over the Jap sound gear, though the enemy’s own speed will make this more difficult. But O’Kane is figuring on completely outwitting him. Tang turns quickly and heads straight for the Jap gunboat. Perhaps Dick has remembered something which Mush Morton did one time, in a similar situation when brought to bay by a Nipponese destroyer — only difference now is that Tang has had no opportunity to get any torpedoes ready forward. And Dick’s plan proves to be a modification of the one Morton had used in Wahoo, for Tang rockets along, figuratively laying her ears back alongside her head, and runs at full speed directly beneath the on-rushing Jap.

But though this unorthodox maneuver has caught him somewhat by surprise, the Jap skipper is not napping, and unloads a full cargo of ash cans as the submarine passes beneath him. The deliberate attack he had planned is frustrated, but he makes with a mighty good one, nonetheless.

Sixteen depth charges this time. Because of her high speed, Tang’s sound gear is unable to pick up the splash of the depth charges dropping in the water, and there is therefore no warning as to how many to expect. It is just WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM! One prolonged, unpunctuated, smashing, shattering cataclysm! Nearly everyone in Tang is knocked off his feet by the fearful pounding! Deck plates are hurled about, the very frames ring, and the bulkheads and built-in fixtures resound in a hundred different keys. Tang shakes throughout her length, seems to whip convulsively in fishtailing fashion, every part of her jumping around weirdly and frighteningly. The unfortunate men handling vital equipment, such as the bow planes, stern planes, and steering, grip their large stainless-steel wheels with white knuckles and bloodless joints, for they have come alive in their hands as though electrified, transmitting a shivering vibration into the very marrow of their bones. In the maneuvering room, where the full power of the battery is being fed into the straining propellers, there is continual arcing and flashing in the control cubicle, the heart of the electric-propulsion equipment. If some of those huge switches should fly open, or if an unusually heavy arc were to fuse some errant piece of copper or steel into a dead short circuit, the whole place would go up in smoke. The battering and pounding are terrific, but the electrician’s mates, knowing their lives depend upon it, are holding the most crucial levers and switches in by hand — and lucky is the man who has asbestos gloves.

O’Kane and Frazee, having had perhaps more warning than the others, have hung on where they were, still on their feet. It seems to both that Tang’s last moments must have come, for how can a simple steel shell, no matter how strongly and honestly built, withstand a succession of near bull’s-eyes? But the unholy barrage finally stops, and a breathless quiet suddenly envelops the ship.

The Jap had been so thrown off balance by Tang’s sudden maneuver that he was unable to regain contact, and searched fruitlessly in the wake left by her mad dash for deep water. Thirty-eight minutes after the torpedoes had been fired, Tang was back to periscope depth, to see her recent antagonist still searching and depth charging the area, planes circling overhead, and the other escort, which had never been involved in the action, cruising about slowly, picking up survivors. There was nothing else in sight.

Eleven days later Tang was back at Miki Saki, with unpleasant memories of the depth charge expert she had encountered there. But the hunting had been elsewhere, and now that the area might be presumed to have cooled off a bit, she was back to try her luck once again. Shortly after midnight the sleek submarine rounded Miki Saki and quietly poked her nose into Owase Wan, a small bay nearby, in quest of a ship. Since by this time it must have become plain to the Japs that they had incurred their worst losses at night, it was logical that at least some of their ships would anchor in a more or less sheltered anchorage to ride the night out, and thus accept the relatively lesser risk of a daylight submerged attack. Tang’s idea was to knock off one of these sitting ducks.

Sure enough! Anchored right in the middle of Owase Wan, unmistakably pointed out by radar, was a ship, rather small, but certainly worth torpedoes.

O.K., chum. Battle stations surface torpedo! The call rings throughout the ship, brings all hands out of their bunks or away from whatever else they might have been doing — it was not unusual for submariners to “turn night into day,” so far as their sleeping habits were concerned when on patrol, and this particularly was the case with Tang, who made most of her fame at night. All hands go to their stations, and a picked crew of gunners mounts to the bridge, there to make ready the twenty-millimeter guns in case it becomes necessary to shoot their way out of shallow water.

First the plotting parties track the ship, to make sure he is at anchor. Correct — speed zero. Then Tang noses in slowly cautiously. It is necessary to get a look at him, to line him up for a broadside shot, so Dick O’Kane takes his ship completely around the enemy, looking him over away from the dark land background. When finally revealed, his silhouette brings a thrill to the skipper. There is no mistaking that long, low shape. This is the gunboat which had given Tang that tooth-shaking barrage of depth charges on her last visit to this area!

Boys, we’re going to get this bastard! He has it coming to him! Tang twists on her heel, presents her stern to the enemy. One electric torpedo is set for an absolutely straight stern shot, aimed carefully, and fired. It leaves a phosphorescent wake in the water, by which its progress may be followed, but the wake stops after 100 yards of travel, and a loud rumble is heard over Tang’s sound gear, indicating that it has suddenly dived to the bottom. One wasted.

Two minutes after the first one, a second electric torpedo is fired, also from the stern. Surely the Japs must be keeping a watch of some kind. But no sign, and the second phosphorescent wake heads straight for the target and passes exactly beneath him. Two wasted, and how can he fail to notice what is going on?

Something wrong with the electric fish? Maybe he had better quit shooting them, check them over again. Besides, O’Kane wants to keep the three he has left aft for a full salvo against some other ship. So Tang circles, brings her bow around to bear. She is less than half a mile from the target now, but there is still no sign of life on board.

A steam torpedo is made ready in one of the bow tubes. Tang is carefully lined up, absolutely steady in the water, and the torpedo is fired. Damn! It takes a large jog to the left, then runs properly, and roars past the target, missing to the left by only a few feet. A steam torpedo puts out a most extensive and visible wake under normal circumstances, and the phosphorescence makes it even more visible. Besides, it is a much faster torpedo than the electric, and makes a high-pitched sewing-machine noise which can easily be heard at some distance. But still no reaction from the enemy. Tang has been in the harbor now for half an hour, shooting torpedoes from about nine hundred yards, and still he sleeps.

Another steam torpedo is made ready, and fired as before. At last, this one settles down right for his middle, draws its greenish-white pencil line unerringly into the belly of the enemy.

KERBLROOM! A pillar of fire shoots out of the amidships section of the stricken ship! Five hundred feet in the air it is topped by a regular Fourth-of-July fireworks, tongues of flames shooting out in odd directions — rockets, pinwheels, and several more explosions. Of the gunboat there is absolutely nothing left.

Every man of Tang’s crew now feels much better about that gunboat. The score has been settled, and he won’t be around to heckle any more hard-working submariners trying to do their jobs. Sage heads are wagged below decks over the inevitable coffee and acey-deucy games. Most indubitably he has been taught a lesson he will never forget.

Tang’s bag of two ships on her fourth patrol boosted her total to seventeen. Although you would have thought her outstanding performance rated a rest, that was not the way Dick O’Kane saw it. As a matter of fact, the normal refit time was cut short by four days in order to enable him to get back on the firing line. The coming Philippine campaign promised many action possibilities in the form of Japanese reinforcements sent to help the defenders, and Tang intended to be in on the fun. It was known that the favorite route was inside of Formosa, where the Japs evidently hoped that United States submarines would not be able to enter or dare to patrol. Ceaseless coverage, flying both from Formosa and the mainland, plus strategically located and extensive mine fields, was intended to cut down the efficiency of such operations and to increase their hazard.

It is not recorded in history, but the story as known in the Submarine Force is to the effect that Dick O’Kane called his crew together shortly before getting under way, and informed them that he had volunteered Tang for the toughest assignment ComSubPac had to offer. He could not tell them where it was until the ship was underway, but he promised them all that there would be plenty of targets. Although the risks were to be many, the rewards would also be many, measured in terms of damage done to the enemy. It is a matter of pride in our service that not one man requested to be transferred out of that intrepid crew. Some, of course, had already been transferred or detached, for rotation of some personnel between patrols was one of the standard policies of the Submarine Force. The biggest loss was that of Tang’s Executive Officer, Murray Frazee, who had received orders to command USS Gar, and was already on leave awaiting availability of his first command. Frank Springer, who had been the third officer, moved up to exec, and on September 24 Tang departed from Pearl Harbor on what was to be her last and most glorious patrol.

On the night of October 10 Tang moves into the Straits of Formosa. Dick’s predictions and expectations begin to bear fruit, for in the early morning a ship is sighted. Tang tracks him, maneuvers ahead of him, and with dawn about to break, dives on his track. The ship comes on unsuspectingly, and is greeted with three torpedoes, fired in standard salvo fashion. The first two hit exactly as aimed, and the Jap blows up with a thoroughly satisfying explosion. The third would have hit also, had the enemy ship been there to receive it — as it is, it passes just slightly ahead of the suddenly stopped hulk, which is even then in the process of blowing sky-high.

One down, and Dick O’Kane has further evidence that if the fish are working right — and it now seems they might be — one torpedo would have sufficed to dispose of this ship, and the other two were wasted. Well, maybe he’ll put the matter to the test next time.

Next time does not long delay in coming, for another ship is sighted several hours after daybreak. O’Kane could attack immediately, but the water is shallow and air cover excellent; consequently he tracks the ship all day submerged. Only a combination of the slow speed of the prospective target and the fact that he follows the shore line religiously, evidently in the hope that by so doing he is avoiding attack, makes this possible, for ordinarily a submarine is a target of opportunity, and must do all its chasing and end-arounding at night on the surface, or else well out of sight of possible air cover. This time, however, Tang has no difficulty in keeping up with the enemy submerged, and after dark a long, dripping shadow silently surfaces 4000 yards astern of him.

With murmuring diesels, the gray wraith ghosts on past the unsuspecting freighter. There are two small patrol vessels up ahead of the oncoming ship, apparently maintaining a permanent anti-submarine barrier. Tang avoids these neatly, gets dead ahead of the enemy ship, then turns off the track and lies to in the wallowing seas, deck aft awash with spray and spume whipped across it by the wind. She has selected her position so as to be only 500 yards away as the target comes by astern. Three torpedoes are ready aft, but this time Dick O’Kane decides to try Morton’s idea. Undoubtedly there will be many ships through this area before Tang’s time here is over. This is a straight run-of-the-mine freighter; and anyway, if the torpedo does miss him, Tang will go on up ahead of him once more and try again.

But no further attacks prove necessary, for the one single torpedo fired does the trick, hitting the target exactly in the middle with a terrific explosion. Two down.

The next few days are uneventful, but in the early morning of the 20th a small task force, consisting of a cruiser and two destroyers, is sighted headed south at high speed. Even though they cut down their speed made good by a radical zigzag plan, Tang barely is able to overtake them, racing along the surface using all available power. A normal attack from the usual position on the target’s beam is manifestly impossible, since there is not a chance of getting there before dawn. The only possible shot is one up the tail, and Tang nearly breaks her neck getting into position. Since the target is running directly away at 19 knots, and zigzagging frequently, it is necessary to get very close — not more than six hundred yards astern of him — before shooting, in order to give the fish a chance to reach him before he is off on another zig. Tang manages to get in to 800 yards before the Jap realizes that his little task force has grown. He also notices that the newcomer has the annoying habit of wanting to climb right up on the cruiser’s fantail, which would annoy any cruiser captain.

That, of course, is as far as Tang gets, for a searchlight suddenly outlines her in pitiless detail, and she barely manages to get under as the first salvo of eight-inch shells screams overhead.

Two days later another convoy is picked up on the radar, a few minutes after midnight. Its disposition is quickly made out to be roughly in the form of a cross, a single column of three tankers flanked by two freighters or transports, the whole group heavily guarded by anti-submarine vessels.

Tankers are the biggest prizes, outside of actual warships, and Tang is delighted at the prospect of getting three of them. The night is dark, and the submarine is able to track from dead ahead until, seizing a favorable opportunity, she stops, allowing the enemy ships to overtake her. As they do so, Tang turns and sets herself up for the three tankers with all torpedoes ready, six forward and four aft.

On they come, oblivious. The relatively tiny submarine is lying in their path in such a position that the column of three ships will pass across her bow, while the single flanking vessel will cross her stern. Then, when the range to the nearest Jap ship is about three hundred yards, Tang commences firing.

Two torpedoes into the first one, one into the second, two into the third. One saved in reserve forward for an emergency. The range is so close that the first two fish hit the leading tanker before the last two are fired, and he goes up in a roaring whoosh of flame, lighting up the whole scene as though it were broad daylight It is too late, of course, for any of the doomed ships to maneuver to save themselves, for the torpedoes are in the water within the space of seconds, and the range is so short that all maneuvers would be useless anyway. As Tang watches the destruction she has wrought, all three tankers burst into furious blaze — an unprecedented, unparalleled holocaust!

But in the meantime the freighter is passing astern, and Dick O’Kane must get set to let him have one or two fish. It takes only a few seconds until finally the word, “Set below!” is received on the bridge, but much has happened in the interim. The freighter alters course, having sighted the submarine’s low-lying form in the glare of the explosions and flames of the tankers. He obviously intends to ram. Also, the large freighter-transport on the far flank of the convoy has changed course and is heading straight for the submarine with the probable intention of ramming. The situation is desperate. No time to dive, for she would only be hit an even deadlier blow while on the way down. No time to fire torpedoes — they would only miss anyway. One thing to do — avoid on the surface, and trust to your superior maneuverability to get yourself out of this mess.

“Standby to ram! Collision quarters! All ahead emergency! Right full rudder!” The commands crack from O’Kane’s lips. Tang gathers way, curves to the right, across the bow of the oncoming transport. The latter alters his course to his left, in order to ram the submarine amidships. At precisely the right instant Dick O’Kane shouts the crucial command—“Left full rudder!” and swings his stern out from in front of the onrushing enemy with feet to spare. As he does so, there is the sharp rat-a-tat of machine-gun fire from the huge vessel towering above her, and Tang’s skipper sends everyone below to avoid danger of injury, remaining on the bridge alone in order to handle the ship.

Again the situation changes with catastrophic suddenness. The transport has had to continue his swing, in order to avoid the freighter which had also attempted to ram. A good chance for a shot! Four torpedoes previously made ready aft for the freighter are still ready. “New setup!” the TBT goes into action once more, and the new fire control information is set into the TDC. “Standby aft!”

Tang’s fire control party sets up the new targets in jig time. “Set below!” comes up to the skipper.

“Fire!” The order comes down instantly. Four torpedoes, spaced ten seconds apart, lurch out of the stern torpedo tubes and head for the careening transport. Suddenly, it becomes obvious that he has not been able to avoid the freighter, and with a rending, groaning crash of tortured and distorted steel the two huge hulks rip into each other — at precisely the instant the four torpedoes fired a moment before begin to hit!

A quarter of a mile away the double-barreled crash is tremendous. And the results are equally spectacular. A fantastic surrealistic V, broad and shallow, composed of two smoking, steaming ships, pitching back and forth in the roiled water of their own devastation, men leaping over the sides, bits of debris falling in the water from the explosions, and a huge pall of smoke from the three burning oil tankers covering it all, wafted like a blanket by the stiff north wind.

As Tang races away from the area, it is noticed with astonishment that the total elapsed time of the engagement, in which a whole convoy consisting of five ships has been wiped off the face of the earth, is only ten minutes.

As far as Tang is concerned, the fateful 24th of October begins quite normally, and it is not until after dark that the last big convoy is encountered. When contact is made, however, the radar goes wild with pips, and there is no doubt that this is really a big outfit. Dick O’Kane orders the customary tracking procedure prior to the attack and commences the approach to a firing position. Tang has eleven torpedoes left on board, and this looks like the perfect chance to get rid of all of them.

But the escort vessels apparently have become suspicious — perhaps news was sent to them of the fate which had overtaken another convoy in this same area yesterday — and commence the unusual tactic of running down the length of the group of ships on opposite course, firing bursts of gunfire. A moment later one of them starts signaling to the massed body of ships with a large searchlight — which simply makes it easier for Tang to pick out the targets. The near column of three huge ships shows up plainly. The leading two are transports, loaded with irregularly shaped deck gear — evidently landing equipment; the third is a large tanker, also heavily laden.

Tang’s crew are at battle stations surface torpedo, of course, and again she employs the familiar tactic of ghosting in, bows pointed at the nearest enemy ship to present the minimum silhouette, at slow speed until the best possible firing position is reached. Surprisingly, in spite of the evident alerted condition of the convoy, there is not the slightest attempt at evasion or zigzag by any of the ships. Maybe they think that the protection of the escort ships is sufficient. If so, they are soon disabused of this idea, for two torpedoes, fired at close range, hit into each of the three ships. Even as the explosions start to come in, Tang is swinging around to present her stem tubes at another tanker and cargo carrier moving up astern of the chaps just torpedoed. Steadying on course, the new setup is fed into the fire-control instruments, and the never-failing “Set below!” is sent up to the bridge.

In the meantime, pandemonium has been breaking loose. The abrupt transposition of three of the largest vessels of the convoy into three broken, gutted, sinking hulks has thrown the escorts into a tizzy for fair. They mill around, shooting in all directions, flashing their lights indiscriminately, and, in general, doing their best to add to the confusion already generated. The ships comprising the convoy are so closely packed that maneuvers on their part are virtually impossible, but they do what they can, shoot off their guns wildly also, and make large puffs of black smoke as they try to speed up.

Even as Dick O’Kane on the bridge starts to draw a bead for the stem tube shot, there are splashes all about; someone has spotted the submarine’s strange low hull, and has rightly diagnosed it as the cause of all the trouble. Unperturbed, Dick puts in the final shooting bearings, and three torpedoes are fired aft at the two new targets.

As the last fish is fired aft, a whole salvo lands alongside Tang, just as the skipper shouts, “All ahead flank!” It is undoubtedly high time that the sub got out of here. The four muttering diesels roar their song of defiance, and four puffs of gray-black smoke pour from the exhaust ports as the submarine’s screws bite into the water. O’Kane is intently looking aft at the melee he has brought about, when suddenly a large destroyer looms into sight astern of one of the stricken tankers. This, undoubtedly, is the source of that unpleasantly close salvo. And he surely has a bone in his teeth! So thinks Dick O’Kane, while he watches narrowly, in order to make the decision whether to continue running in hopes of giving this new chap the slip, or dive and take the inevitable beating.

At this moment the torpedoes just fired start hitting. One hits the transport and one hits the tanker, who is evidently laden with aviation gasoline, for he blows up instantly. The destroyer is at the moment coming around the stern of this very ship, and either catches the third torpedo or is set off by the explosion of the nearby tanker, for without warning he is blown sky-high himself. And, consequently free from pursuit, Tang races away again to reload her last two torpedoes, completely unscathed.

How many times must Dick O’Kane have wished that he had left well enough alone at this point, but that, of course, was never Tang’s style. There are two torpedoes left, and there are still ships afloat; so the two fish are thoroughly checked, and then loaded into the forward torpedo tubes. And how the Fates must have laughed as number twenty-four torpedo slips greasily and treacherously into number four tube!

Tang returns to the scene of the recent action, finds the transport which had been damaged during the last attack low in the water, stopped, but not sinking. Two destroyer escorts are patrolling around her, both to seaward. So Dick orders a wide circle, comes in from the land side slowly and quietly, gets all set, and fires torpedo number twenty-three, which runs straight for the doomed ship, a perfect coup de grâce. And then, to make sure of the crippled ship, torpedo number twenty-four is fired.

Instantly, this torpedo is observed to begin a circle to the left!

O’Kane screams down the hatch! “All ahead emergency!” Then, a moment later, as the ship commences to gather way, “Right full rudder!” There is only one thing to do — get out of the way of the oncoming torpedo. If its rudder has jammed, as appears to be the case, or if the gyro or steering engine has gone haywire, the deadly fish will certainly come back to the point from which it was fired.

Will we make it? The question is almost a prayer to those on the bridge. Down below it is known that something is wrong, but they are used to Dick O’Kane’s wild and unorthodox maneuvers. Still, this smacks of a real emergency. Then the word comes down via conning tower telephone:

“Torpedo running circular!”

The slightly phosphorescent wake can be seen, off to port, describing a perfect circle. It curves back toward Tang—it looks as if it might hit the bridge — there is nothing anyone can do except hope that it will veer off on another erratic phase. With eyes popping out of their sockets, the men on the bridge stare at the Frankenstein monster they have released coming back to claim them — now it looks as though it will hit aft — still it comes — maybe it will pass astern — here it is — here it is — hold your breath—

WHRANGG! A terrific blow strikes Tang in the after torpedo room! Instantly the three after compartments fill, and the ballast tanks in that section of the ship are completely destroyed. The stricken hull of the submarine sinks by the stem immediately, as though it had been held up at the bow and the stern and the stern support had suddenly been removed.

O’Kane gives his last order to the white face of the telephone talker in the conning tower hatch at his feet, staring up at his captain as though somehow he could do something which would prevent this monstrous thing from happening to them. “Shut the hatch!” But there is no time to carry out this order, which had been intended to help preserve as much of the watertight integrity of the ship as possible. Even as he utters the words, Dick sees the water of the far western Pacific pour into the swiftly submerging hatch, and he is swept off the bridge of his ship into the Straits of Formosa.

And, as he comes to the surface, sputtering and splashing in the choppy but warm salty water, he sees two things — a flash of fire in the distance, followed by the sound of torpedo number twenty-three striking home in the transport which had been his last target, and the gray bow of Tang sticking out of water, still buoyant, though the stern of the ship must be on the bottom. His first thought for his crew, O’Kane notes that the torpedo tubes are all under water and that an attempt to escape via that route — assuming that there must have been some men in the forward part of the ship who survived the fatal explosion — could not succeed, and would only result in flooding the forward torpedo room and preventing all chance of escape.

He looks around in the water and counts heads. There are eight in the water with him, like himself swept off the bridge when that part of the ship went under. Only one thing to do now. His heart like lead within him, Dick O’Kane keeps himself afloat, using the minimum possible effort. The instinct of self-preservation dies hard, even though there may not seem to be much left to live for. Every now and then the Captain glances back to the bow of his ship, still exposed above the surface. After about five minutes the head of a man appears in the water alongside, and Lieutenant Larry Savadkin swims over and joins the pitiful party of survivors. He had gone down with the ship, inside the conning tower. Finding a tiny pocket where air had been entrapped, he had pressed his mouth into it, taken what breaths he could, and then moved to the still-open hatch, where he found another air pocket. Still another one was under the bridge overhang, and, stopping there for several moments, he had finally ducked out and swum to the surface.

This story he repeats to O’Kane between gasps in the choppy sea. And as he is telling it, there comes a sudden burbling of air from alongside the protruding bow of Tang, and it swiftly sinks from sight.

The Captain stares, and his heart leaps within him. That was not accidental! That looked as though one of the undamaged ballast tanks had been deliberately flooded, in order to level off the submarine. True, she would sink to the bottom, but she would be on an even keel, the men trapped inside would have a fighting chance to get out! Wild, hopeless plans race through his brain. Maybe enough of his crew will get out to form a good-sized party. Maybe they will be able to capture some small vessel, and in some way arrive intact at some part of the Chinese coast not under Jap domination. Or maybe there will be some way of contacting a friendly submarine.

But nothing comes of it, though O’Kane watches throughout the remainder of the night. The first thing which should come up is the escape buoy, and that he never sees. Japanese patrol boats make their appearance about this time, and they run about, dropping occasional depth charges. Perhaps these explosions have temporarily dissuaded the rest of Tang’s crew from attempting to escape….

Dawn finally arrived, and a Japanese destroyer escort picked up O’Kane and several others, who were immediately subjected to merciless beatings and clubbings — hardly what would have been meted out to Jap submariners had the positions been reversed. Of the ten men left floating about in the water when Tang went down, including the one who made his escape from the conning tower, only four were ultimately recovered from Japanese prison camps.

And what of the men who remained alive inside the submarine, who leveled her off on the bottom to make it possible for them to escape? Their story is equally tragic.

By quick action they had managed to seal the afterpart of the ship, confine the flooding to the after engine room, maneuvering room, and after torpedo room. The men in the control room, directly beneath the conning tower, had been able to close the hatch between those two compartments, thus localizing the flooding through the open upper conning tower hatch to that compartment alone, but not before considerable water had found its way into the control room; and since the lower conning tower hatch had been sprung by the terrific force of the explosion, it leaked badly and could not be made tight. Then they opened the vent valve to number-two main ballast tank, using the hand operating gear, since hydraulic power had also been lost, and by this means lowered the bow of the ship to the bottom. They were thus in an excellent position for escape. The ship was in 180 feet of water, not too far from the coast of China. They had by no means despaired.

The next operation was to burn all the confidential and secret papers, which was accomplished at the expense of filling the control room and forward battery compartment with smoke. Much of this smoke also entered the forward torpedo room, an unfortunate circumstance. At about this time depth charging commenced, and all escape operations came to a standstill for several hours until it ceased. In the meantime, all survivors gathered in the forward torpedo room, about thirty in all, and they were forced to seal off the door to the battery compartment and the rest of the ship because of progressive flooding from the control room and an electrical fire which had started in the forward battery compartment. This fire increased in intensity, and finally prevented successful escape of many men who otherwise could have got out.

In all, four parties left the ship, using the Momsen lung, via the escape hatch built into the forward torpedo room. Owing to the great pressure due to the depth, this process was laborious, and the men, already debilitated from the effects of the foul air and smoke fumes they had been breathing, suffered exceedingly. Toward the end, the heat from the fire in the forward battery compartment had begun to blister the paint on the after bulkhead of the torpedo room, and puffs of acrid smoke were coming past the door, where the rubber gasket itself was burning. Steadily increasing pressure in the battery compartment, due to slow flooding, also helped to destroy this gasket. Finally, the inevitable happened — the gasket blew out, or was burned out, and all men remaining in the forward torpedo room were asphyxiated.

Thirteen men made an underwater escape from Tang’s forward torpedo room several hours after she went down, but only five were picked up by the Japs the next morning. Five of them had never reached the surface, and three, evidently suffering some form of the bends, had been unable to remain afloat.

Of the crew of eighty-eight men and officers, only nine in all came back.

We of the submarine force grieved silently, as men are wont to do, at the news that Tang was no more. With submarines, this news is not the sudden receipt of specific information; it is the gradual realization that it is a day or two since a certain ship should have reported in from patrol. It is the intensified waiting, hoping against hope that some inconsequential matter, such as a broken-down radio transmitter, might prove to be the cause of the silence. You hear the chatter of messages from boats on patrol, going out, or coming back, reporting contacts, requesting rendezvous, or reporting results to date, but never do you hear the faint, clipped call from the vessel you listen for — never the right message comes in over the burdened ether waves. Finally, since it is possible that some casualty may have prevented transmission, although reception of radio signals might still be possible, a “blind” rendezvous is arranged for the non-reporting ship. A message is sent repeatedly, giving the place and setting a period for arrival of the submarine which is within the realm of possibility if the lost boat is still alive. Then an escort vessel is sent out, to wait — and wait — and finally to return, empty-handed. And then you know what has happened, and you take the missing boat’s name off the operations board, trying to pretend that the lump in your throat doesn’t exist, that your action in so doing cannot be considered to have any relationship to what has happened out there.

And, as it was with all the others, so was it with Tang. We knew only that she was gone, leaving to the rest of us a legacy of consistent aggressiveness, success, and daring. But after a few months some rather odd stories began to be bruited about. Tang had singlehandedly taken on a huge convoy, with many escorting destroyers, in shallow water. Tang had shot the hell out of the enemy, but had been caught in water so shallow that, upon diving, she struck bottom before the top of the periscope shears went under — and thus was easy meat for an enraged enemy. Tang had deliberately entered an enemy harbor at night on the surface, expended all her torpedoes on the anchored Jap ships, and been caught by shore batteries on her way out. Tang had been so damaged by a furious depth charging she had undergone in shallow water that she was unable to dive, and had been forced to scuttle herself upon the arrival of enemy forces. And so on.

But all stories seemed to agree on three particulars — great damage to the enemy, shallow water, and Dick O’Kane in a Jap prison camp! Knowing the cool daring of which O’Kane and Tang were capable, the absolute fearlessness of their tactics, and the unprecedented, original, and completely logical thinking they had time after time demonstrated — a quality partly inherited, no doubt, from Mush Morton and Wahoo—it was impossible to conceive of a set of circumstances which would fit all the reported details. But we knew that Tang’s last mission had been fraught with more than usual secrecy — and so we wondered, until Dick O’Kane himself came back from the living dead, his starved and bruised body a testimonial to the brutality of his captors, to give us the story of those last glorious moments of Tang’s short but action-packed life.