Reluctant Warriors (7 page)

The doorway curtain opened, and the steward stuck his head in the cabin. “Sir, if
you're okay, the captain says you are to eat something first, then come see him on
the bridge.”

“Okay. What's the time?”

“About 1600, sir.”

Twenty-four hours have passed
, Harry thought as he stood up.
I guess I feel okay
so far.
He was wavering a little, but only because he had been off his feet for so
long.

“Thanks,” he said to Botel, then stepped into the submarine's narrow hallway and
wobbled down to the Wardroom down the hall. There were only a few people there, drinking
coffee and talking amongst themselves.

Harry stood uncertainly in the doorway, looking around. One of the
guys looked familiar.
He stared, then remembered the man's name: Julian “Rocky” Fordyce, from the class
after his at the Naval Academy.

“Harry, come on in!” Rocky called.

Harry stepped in and was glad to sit down again.

“Sorry about your crew, Harry,” Rocky said.

“Yeah.”

Soon, they were joined by Ted Felders, whom Harry recognized—barely—from one of the
later Academy classes. Both men sat quietly and respectfully as Harry had some coffee
and a sandwich. He wasn't sure exactly what was in the sandwich—but it sure tasted
good.

Afterward, as he made his way past the Sonar Room to the Control Room, a passing
young officer stuck out his hand.

“I'm Pete Danford, sir. Glad to have you aboard.”

“Thanks.”

Harry nodded to each man in the Control Room and felt okay going up the ladder and
through the tiny opening to the conning tower.

“Is the captain on the bridge?” he asked. As the men looked his way, he recognized
Rudy Ferrell, who had been a year behind him at the Academy.

“Hey, Harry!” Ferrell bounced over to him, and they shook hands warmly. “I'm sorry
about Walter. I know how close you two were.”

“Thanks. The captain up top?”

“Yeah.”

Harry ascended the ladder to the bridge, feeling much more encouraged. As he emerged
into the light and wind, he immediately saw the captain from slightly behind.

The boat was traveling at Standard speed, about sixteen knots. Phelps' famous red
hair blew straight back. Harry remembered that Phelps had been a star on the Academy
football team and become famous for a particular goal line stand in the Army-Navy
game of 1935. He was well known throughout the service as a good commander, fair
in his dealings, good to the men.

“You okay, Harry?”

“I think so, sir,” he said as the two shook hands.

“Harry,” Phelps began, “there are several things I need to talk to you about.”

“Yes, sir?”

“Well, that's probably the first one. Harry, we're very informal on
Bluefin
. The
men might have called you ‘lieutenant' or ‘sir,' but that's only because they don't
know you yet. Soon they'll start calling you ‘Harry.' I want you to be okay with
that.”

Harry thought how different that would be from the formality Fostel had demanded—and
how much nicer. He'd already noticed a different air to this boat. The men were contented,
happy, something he had not seen before.

“That's fine, sir,” he answered.

“Everyone calls me ‘Red.'”

“Red, how the hell did you find us?”

“It was just sheer luck, Harry. We heard your report of the convoy, and Pearl ordered
us to back you up. We were coming up as fast as we could, dead astern of the convoy.
My exec [executive officer] Louie Rice was on the bridge, and he thought he saw an
explosion to the west. None of the lookouts saw anything, because they were concentrating
on the convoy to the north. He thought it was either a ship being torpedoed or hitting
a mine. Was it a mine?”

“I think so.”

“Anyhow, we couldn't raise you. We had to assume that either you had blown up or
were submerged ahead of the convoy. From your last transmission, Rudy Ferrell, who
was doing the plot with Louie on the bridge, came to the conclusion that you had
not had enough time to get that far ahead. But that's when the appendicitis hit Louie!
He just keeled over on the bridge. I was below. We took up the wrong heading, because
all he got out was that it was off to the west. He was doubled over and couldn't
even say anything. Botel, our pharmacist's mate, who you've met, performed the operation.”

“He did a nice job cleaning me up too.”

“He's a good man. Says Louie will be okay, but won't be getting out of his bunk for
probably a week. So it was several hours before we came this far west and found you.
The tip-off was that damn patrol boat firing away at
your men. I am very sorry about
that. You were unlucky that Louie got sick, but lucky that he saw anything in the
first place.

“Harry, I'll get straight to the point. I need an executive officer, and I want you
to fill that spot if you're up to it. You know Louie. He was in the class ahead of
yours, I think.”

“Yes, he was.”

“Well, he's laid up below with appendicitis. Fleet has already hinted that, when
we get back, Louie will be in line for his own command. We have some good young officers
aboard. I wouldn't trade any one of them for a trip to the Rose Bowl. They will be
ready soon, but they are not ready now. I know of your troubles on
Mojarra
. Hell,
the whole fleet knows. I hope you can do this for us. You up for it?”

“I would be honored!”

“I thought you would. Word came from Pearl an hour ago officially transferring you
to this boat.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Red.”

Harry nodded, and the two shook hands.

The Devil's Cauldron

Central Pacific, January 4, 1944

H
arry Connors was in the Control Room when the message came in to his submarine,
Bluefin
, over the radio from Commander Submarines Pacific at Pearl Harbor, known
as ComSubPac.
Bluefin
was to leave the convoy they'd been trailing for hours and
divert south to an island that no one on the boat had ever heard of before.

Harry called to the bridge with the message. Captain Phelps, Red to his crew, swore,
which was very unusual. “God
damn
it, Harry,” he said over the phone. One of the
lookouts later said he had thrown his cap down on the deck of the bridge. “What are
they thinking at Pearl?” he demanded. “How can they do that to me? I want you to
ask for a retransmission over my name. I know it will give away our position, but
I just don't care.”

In only a few minutes a message came back, which one of the other men painstakingly
decoded. It was identical to the first.
Red won't like this
, Harry thought, and buzzed
the bridge again.

“Red, here it is, ComSubPac at the top, etc., the same message: ‘PROCEED IMMEDIATELY
NISSAN ISLAND, GREEN ISLAND ARCHIPELAGO. HIGH PRIORITY. DETAILED TRANSMISSION WILL
FOLLOW.' By the way, Red, they even give us the heading of 175 degrees, I suppose
just in case we can't find this jewel on the map.”

Phelps swore again, and again Harry thought how unusual it was—Phelps must have mistakenly
left the intercom on. He couldn't recall ever hearing the captain cuss before. But
it was the fifty-fourth day of the patrol, and their pickings north of the Bismarck
Archipelago had been very slim—
only five ship sightings and only one sunk, a medium-sized
tanker of about four thousand tons. They weren't used to such poor luck on
Bluefin
,
and it wore hard on Red. This was only Harry's second patrol with the ship, but on
a submarine the patrols were long and you got to know people quickly, working in
close quarters. Harry had never seen the captain this low.

“All right, Harry,” Phelps said after a long pause, obviously disheartened. “Come
over to 175 degrees. Stay at flank speed.”

Almost immediately, the boat heeled over. Then she slinked off from the convoy, which
had never known she was there in the first place.

In a few minutes, Harry called up to Red again.

“Red, Rudy has the place on the map. It's part of an archipelago, a coral atoll,
oval in shape. Looks like about two hundred miles east of Rabaul, the big Japanese
base, nearly the same distance from our closest base on Bougainville.”

As Harry spoke, he could hear the captain's voice fading in and out, muttering to
himself, still cursing his luck. “I would have given my right arm for a crack at
that convoy. Well . . . duty . . . had them right there . . . right there! . . .
ah, to hell with it!”

Soon enough, the promised long transmission came in and was laboriously decoded.
Harry took it up to the bridge. By this time it was nearly 1530 hours on a bright
and beautiful day. Most of the crew on a submarine never got to see the light of
day, so Harry always felt privileged to go up through the hatch.

As usual, the first thing he noticed was the captain's famous red hair blowing back
as the 311-foot warship sped along at full speed, a shade over eighteen knots.

Still smarting, Phelps said, “Okay, Harry, read it.”

“FLEET ORDERS # 58-601 . . .”

Phelps interrupted, still agitated. “Hey, they are
serious
about this, aren't they?
Sorry, go on.”

“Yeah, looks like it,” Harry said. He looked up from the paper at the sour expression
on Phelps' face.

“Harry, you in there for the decoding?” the Captain asked.

“Yeah.”

“Well, cut through the crap and just give me the gist of it.”

“Okay. We're to rescue this German national from his plantation on this island, part
of the Green Island atoll. Fleet must want this guy real bad. They repeat this as
High Priority and you know what that means.”

“Yeah. We're supposed to ‘sacrifice all elements of the command, including men and
materials, to the mission at hand.' So why would we want to put ourselves out for
some German guy?”

“They don't say, Red. There are quite detailed directions, though, as to lying off
the easternmost point of the island, appropriately called East Point, and how to
get through the reef. Then his plantation is about two miles off down the coast road
to the south. They think there are no Japanese there. Looks like there are three
islands in this oval-shaped atoll. Nissan is the biggest one, looking like a lowercase
‘j.' It goes about three-quarters the way around the whole atoll. Then you have two
little islands, Sirot and Barahun. I'm guessing that Fleet wants to knock this place
over and construct the usual bomber strip, so they can use it to blast Rabaul. This
guy must know something. Goes on to say that the surf where we go in is very rough.
They call it the Devil's Cauldron.”

“Oh, that's just great! Doesn't this place have the usual passageways into the lagoon?”

“Yeah, but only on the Rabaul side, the west side in between those little islands.
Fleet says the Japs run up and down the west side like there's no tomorrow, so avoid
that at all costs. Besides, this guy lives on the east side.”

“So, why not send a seaplane in, have the guy row out, and fly him out?”

“Got me.”

“What's his name, this German traitor?”

“Vandelmann.”

“So, what's this ‘Cauldron' they talk about?”

“Doesn't say. Just says that we must land there at 1600 hours tomorrow afternoon
because the tide will be right just then. We have to find our way through the surf,
go to his plantation, get him, and get out.”

The phone buzzed. Phelps pushed the little lever down. It was Rudy
Ferrell. As executive
officer, Harry was supposed to do the navigating. But Ferrell was the best navigator
either Red or Harry had ever seen, so they let him do it instead.

“Red, here's what I've got. I recommend we come down to Standard speed. We'll still
make the place with a couple of hours to spare.”

“Thanks, Rudy, come to Standard now,” Phelps said.

Soon, the boat seemed to hang still for just a second, and the hum of the motors
lost a little of their intensity.

“Harry,” Phelps said, “that'll give us time to look the place over before we go in.
I'd better see the orders myself. I'll study them in my cabin. Take the boat for
me for about thirty minutes.”

Harry nodded.

Phelps sidled past, with the orders blowing in his hand. As he did, he said something
that would change Harry's life.

“Harry, I want you to command this thing. Okay?”

That's new
, Harry thought. “Sure, my pleasure. Can I pick who I want?”

“Take whoever you need.”

Harry watched Phelps go back down through the hatch, then looked out at the choppy
waves and thin blue horizon again, his stomach twisting with nervousness and anticipation.

Everything seemed to go well enough to start with.
Bluefin
arrived off what was obviously
East Point at a little before 1400, as planned. For two hours, she ran up and down
the coast submerged, taking sightings through the periscope, trying to figure out
how to get in through the surf.

Red and Harry had talked in some detail about the shore party. They had decided to
send in eight men in two inflatable rafts. The first, a large eight-man raft, contained
Harry, Torpedoman First Class Tony Polavita, Able Seaman Herman Czarik, and Pharmacist's
Mate Jim Botel. The second and smaller raft held young Ensign Howie Bennish, Chief
of the Boat Ulmer “Duke” Osborne, Sonarman Second Class Maldin “Mike” Ketchel, who
had had some high school German, and little Radioman Third Class Petey Minton, whom
everyone called “Phoebe.”

It took nearly two hours to make it through the coral reef, a maze of solid rock
pathways, most of which went nowhere. Only the unusual calmness of the sea and the
high tide the orders referred to made it possible to carefully explore and edge the
rafts in. The best way in was down two particular corridors, and then directly between
two extraordinary pinnacle rocks, the so-called Devil's Cauldron.

They made it in to shore at 1725, just as the sun was waning. After hurriedly covering
the rafts in palm fronds, the men picked a spot for their camp. Harry split them
into two groups. The young ensign, Bennish, along with Osborne, Ketchel, and Minton,
were to head south along the coast road in the direction of the Vandelmann plantation,
which they thought they had glimpsed seaward on the way in.

Bennish and his team left long before dusk. Understanding the time limits, they started
jogging immediately down the coast road, and soon disappeared from view. It seemed
like a good split to Harry. They didn't come any better than Duke Osborne. Ketchel
was a good man too. So Minton was a little bit young, but Bennish was a good young
officer, well respected on board.

The men from Harry's boat were to hold the landing spot, which Polavita jokingly
called “our little beachhead. Hey, it's closer to Tokyo than any of us have gotten
so far.” They crouched in the underbrush as the sun began to set, listening to the
soft lap of the waves and the sounds of birds in the jungle.

Harry saw an insect that resembled the walking stick he was used to at home on the
prairie, but this one had what looked like leaves for legs. Birds of many varieties
flew past. They all seemed to have curved beaks. He watched carefully for spiders
and snakes, but saw only one small red spider, ambling past a few feet away. There
was a beautiful parrot, some flying thing that looked like a bat, and worms on many
of the leaves. He knew to watch out for mosquitoes as carriers of the dreaded malaria,
but the wind blew steadily across the little peninsula, and he saw none.

The last sunset glow gave way to darkness, broken only by a three-quarter moon and
a scatter of stars. The group stayed quiet, alert for any signs of trouble in the
distance. No gunfire was heard, though the noise of the surf and the distance meant
they might not hear it if there was any.

Harry looked at his luminescent watch, which said 0230, and felt his stomach drop.
Five hours! They had figured Bennish's group would need only two, maybe three, hours.
What if the whole thing was an enemy trap? Fleet wasn't always right! Earlier in
the patrol they had said that the harbor at Kavieng was loaded with fat transports,
but when
Bluefin
showed up, the boats had mysteriously disappeared and the harbor
was clear.

With no other choice, Harry and his team remained spread out in the uncomfortable
grass. The men whispered to each other for the first few hours, but gradually became
quiet. Harry checked his watch again. It was 0330. His men seemed asleep; he was
oddly comforted by the faint sound of one of them snoring. Maybe the men on the patrol
were okay, were just held up by something. Maybe after the darkness closed in on
them they couldn't get back. If the patrol didn't show up by morning, Harry's men
would have to go looking for them.

Periodically, Harry felt some insect crawling over him and brushed it off. In the
time before nightfall, he had noticed the incredible life around him. Some plants
he recognized, bananas, breadfruit, pawpaws, and coconuts, but there were many more
he had never seen before. The jungle, though it wasn't especially dense, held countless
nonfloral examples of life. He could still spot some of the bugs in the moonlight:
four or five types of beetles alone, one with pincers that were as long as its body.
Armies of ants seemed to go in every direction. Luckily, they didn't seem interested
in him. Several times he noticed ants or swarms of caterpillars on leaves.

He wasn't sleepy. On his farm in Dorance, Iowa, he might have been lulled to sleep
by the sound of the land, but not here. This island was a forsaken land, with its
permanently rotting vegetation. Its smell was nauseating and kept him awake.
I would
hate to have to make a life for my family here
, he thought. There was certainly plenty
of rain and the soil was wonderfully fertile, both great for farming. But it was
too much of a good thing. The land was spoiled.
It smelled like that one time when
he was a boy and his father-in-law-to-be, Ray Woodson, tried to save a heifer that
had cut her underside open trying to get over a barbed wire fence. The poor animal's
intestines fell on the ground, and in the end Ray had to shoot her to put her out
of her misery. The island smelled like that, like decaying flesh.

He wasn't sure how much time had passed. The moon had set, throwing the surroundings
into darkness, and Harry didn't want to check his watch again and possibly draw the
attention of anyone who might be out in this jungle.