Over the Seas for Uncle Sam Part 15

And pretty soon, when this sc.r.a.p is over there'll be a fourth one hanging alongside of the others and Bill can look at it and say, "My pop got that one in the biggest war of all."

I only wish the youngster was old enough to enlist himself. We're a fighting family. I joined the navy in 1915. I was on a battles.h.i.+p then, but when war broke they transferred me to a destroyer. We didn't go out until the cold weather had set in. All of us were given Arctic outfits and it's lucky we were--we needed them, believe me! You are mighty grateful for the heavy woollen pants and the jumper with a hood that covers your ears.

Destroyer duty is the most exciting of all, for, while merchant crafts go out of their way to avoid submarines, our game is to go out of our way to hunt them. It was like a game of hide and seek, with a destroyer "It," trying to tag Fritz if he'd only give us half a chance.

One of Fritz's pet stunts was to send us an S.O.S., giving us the exact location at sea of a vessel in trouble--oh, he was awful careful to see that you got it right, all you needed to do was to steam up to that spot and be blown clear out of creation.

Of course, all the calls for help weren't false. One day we came close enough to see a cargo s.h.i.+p in flames, and her crew being ordered over her side to open boats. "Burn the cargo and sink the s.h.i.+p," was Fritz's creed and if you think that being set afloat in a life-boat in December is an experience you'll forget in a hurry, you're wrong!

By the time we reached the survivors, half of them were dead--frozen where they sat, their bodies covered with ice.

We were on duty every minute of the day and night. I don't think any of the crew slept soundly for the seven months that we stayed at sea without ever touching sh.o.r.e. Think of it, seven months on a s.h.i.+p that's never still, zig-zagging, doubling on its own course--charging any floating objects in hopes of downing a Fritz.

My, but the troops.h.i.+ps were glad to see us when we went out to meet them. We'd shoot up alongside of them, or cut clean across their bow, playing in front of them like a porpoise, as we asked them what sort of a trip they had had across and how things were going back home. We'd come so close to the convoy at times that they could almost reach out and touch us, then we'd dart away at the drop of a hat.

As Christmas came near, we hoped to touch port. We had been promised a Christmas ash.o.r.e, but it seemed we had sudden orders to go out and pick up a convoy, so we headed for the open sea again.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Christmas Eve was biting cold. I went up for air and I was glad to hurry back to the engine room again. It was at least warm down there. The men who stood watch on deck were m.u.f.fled to the eyes. I thought of my wife and the kid. I wondered if he was hanging up his little stocking and saying a prayer for his dad who was at sea. I hadn't heard a word from them, of course, since I had left home. But on that particular night they seemed very close to me. I could almost see our little sitting room, with a holly wreath in the window. I remembered just the corner where we always put up the Christmas tree and I thought of the fun we had tr.i.m.m.i.n.g it and trying not to make a breath of noise to wake the kid. All this while I realized dimly that the boat was pitching harder than ever and my mate broke in with:

"We're in for a gale to celebrate Christmas proper."

We were, all right! They say it was the worst storm that had been seen off that coast in many a year. It was the highest sea I've ever been on.

You could scarcely keep your feet, and as for food--our Christmas dinner consisted of hard tack and lucky we were to get that. You couldn't keep a thing on the ranges except the stationary kettles. They managed to make something that was supposed to be coffee in those and for twenty-two hours that was our chow.

There were moments through that long night when I thought we'd turn clean over. We never expected the rudder to hold with those giant waves breaking over the deck and turning everything to ice.

All the submarines afloat didn't give me the feeling of nearness to death that that storm had. I certainly was glad when the sea quieted down and the sun struggled through the clouds again.

Up to the first of the year we had not had a chance to get a shot at Fritz. He had been a bit too wily for us, getting in his dirty work before we arrived on the spot, leaving a trail of burning or sinking s.h.i.+ps but no sign of himself. But we got our revenge. It was in January.

We had met a string of troop and cargo s.h.i.+ps from the States, which we were escorting to port. We were so near the coast that I guess most of the boys aboard were getting their things together preparatory to landing.

It was eight o'clock in the morning and I don't suppose any of us really dreamed of a submarine turning up so close to sh.o.r.e, when suddenly the shrill whistle from a transport made the air around it blue with its noise! A second later came the roar of guns and I knew sure enough that some tin fish had welcomed us!

I stood by in the engine room, which was my place in time of danger, listening with all my ears to the boom of our own guns. Oh, we were after Fritz all right!

The rumor drifted in to us that there were ten periscopes to be seen, but soon it came down to three. The guns from all the s.h.i.+ps thundered--it was as if a battlefield were transported to the Atlantic Ocean.

The roar of guns deafened you, but you certainly got a thrill you never forgot. We worked like fiends. We knew they needed speed as never before. We were like cats after a mouse.

Someone sent up a shout and word came that oil had begun to show on the water--that meant one less submarine afloat! Again the roar of guns--again the shout! Two Fritzes sunk... !

In the midst of the firing came a strange new sound--a buzzing overhead.

French airs.h.i.+ps to the rescue! They were not more than two hundred yards above us, dropping bombs as they flew. I listened for the sound of cheering--it came! A third Fritz sunk. In port the sinking was officially verified--three German submarines destroyed, read the record.

Not bad, eh?

I don't believe a gun on any of the transports or destroyers was cold for fully two hours. When it was over, I went on deck for a breath of air. I was sweating like a horse and shaking all over from the strain.

The instant I stepped on deck, Fritz got a shot at us, splintering our deck and taking one of my fingers along as a souvenir.

Now I ask you, wasn't that rum luck? If I'd only stayed below where I belonged, I'd still be plus a finger. The s.h.i.+p's doctor finished up the job, but I couldn't use that hand, and, believe me, it made me sore as anything. I knew I'd miss all the sport going by having to be sent home.

I tried to argue with him. But he wouldn't listen to me--home I must go.

There wasn't any two ways about it--orders is orders.

I traveled back on a transport. I was all right. My hand was healing fine. I wanted to stand watch on the way across, but they wouldn't let me. Treated me like a blooming invalid and gave me a month's liberty to get well. Well! I was well ten minutes after it happened.

No, I didn't tell my wife how I lost it. I said I'd been mixed up in an accident in the engine room. That was pretty near the truth. You can slip so easily with the s.h.i.+p pitching and rearing that it isn't hard to lose an arm that way. Oh, if I was to tell her that a sub carried part of my hand away, she'd worry to death about having me go to sea again.

I'll break it to her after the war. Just now there's one thing on my mind--just one--to get back somehow in the Black Gang. I can handle a shovel--my arm's a bit stiff yet, but I'm all muscle. Believe me, they aren't going to shelve me just because one finger's gone! Not by a long sight!

I'm not going to miss one minute of this sc.r.a.p if I can help it. My kid's going to be proud of my record before I get through--wait and see if he isn't!

WARRANT CARPENTER HOYT SPEAKS:

THE FLOWER OF FRANCE

EVER see those red poppies that grow by the roadside in France? They always make me think of Angele. They are so graceful and vivid and gay.

It almost seems as though they enjoyed watching the soldiers march past, they spring up so close to the road. All the war that has swept through the land has failed to kill the crop. You will find innumerable scarlet patches of them nodding their brave little heads to the boys as they tramp by--cheering them on--for all the world like France's daughters--bless them!

I was one of the first Americans to go across after our declaration of war on Germany. Those were the days when the German propagandists in this country knew more about the movements of our fleet than we did ourselves.

They called upon us formally a way off the French coast, with two torpedoes. But they were bad shots, so their visiting cards never arrived and we continued our course without any further opportunity of making their acquaintance.

As we neared the coast the water became clotted up with wreckage--boxes and barrels and floating planks--yes--and bodies, too. I've never seen a sight to equal it and I have crossed eight times all told. But in the beginning of the war Fritz was pretty active. Never a day pa.s.sed that we received less than seven or eight S.O.S. calls. Oh, Fritz was having it all his own way then. We've changed all that--rather!

I'll never forget the little French port where we dropped anchor.

Nothing I can ever see in the years to come--with the exception of the Allied flags floating over the Kaiser's palace in Berlin--will equal the thrill I got from watching the first khaki-clad Yankees marching up that narrow street to the tune of Yankee Doodle!

I kept wondering who the d.i.c.kens I was, to be privileged to witness such a history-making sight!

The townsfolk mobbed us. They cheered us and hugged us and called down blessings on our heads. Someone took pity on us and showed us the way to an inn--a rambling white shallet with a big American flag hung from its windows. At the gate, the innkeeper and his plump little wife were awaiting us with open arms. They asked us if we would consent to eat "_poullet_." Consent! We would have devoured birch bark with a relish had it been cooked the way Madame Mousequet could cook!

I have never tasted such chicken or such potatoes. And while we ate and drank the little lady fluttered about us, hoping, in voluble French, that everything suited "the dear officers from the United States."

They would not take a cent of pay for the feast. It was, they a.s.sured us, "_une grande honneur_." Over and over they insisted that we must not think of spoiling their pleasure by having money pa.s.s between us. What can you do with people like that?

That night we went to a little cinema theater. When the lights were turned up and the audience caught sight of us, they rose in a body and cheered us. In one of the boxes were a group of French officers and their wives. One of the officers hurried around to where we were sitting.

"You must place yourself where all the people may see you," he insisted.

There was no refusing him. He was like a child, bubbling over with joy at having us there.

"Come," he pleaded, "let me seat you so that all may see."