Our Navy in the War Part 16

2. Carrying out offensive and defensive measures against enemy submarines in the Western Atlantic.

3. a.s.signment to duty and the despatch abroad of naval vessels for operations in the war zone in conjunction with the naval forces of our allies.

4. a.s.signment to duty and operation of naval vessels to increase the force in home waters. Despatch abroad of miscellaneous craft for the army.

5. Protection of these craft en route.

6. Protection of vessels engaged in coastwise trade.

7. Salvaging and a.s.sisting vessels in distress, whether from maritime causes or from the operations of the enemy.

8. Protection of oil supplies from the Gulf.

In order to carry out successfully and speedily all these duties large increases in personnel, in s.h.i.+ps of all cla.s.ses and in the instrumentalities needed for their production and service were demanded.

Briefly, then, it may be stated that on the day war was declared the enlistment and enrollment of the navy numbered 65,777 men. On the day Germany signed the armistice it had increased to 497,030 men and women, for it became necessary to enroll capable and patriotic women as yeomen to meet the sudden expansion and enlarged duties imposed by war conditions. This expansion has been progressive. In 1912 there were 3,094 officers and 47,515 enlisted men; by July 1, 1916, the number had grown to 4,293 officers and 54,234 enlisted men, and again in that year to 68,700 in all. In granting the increase Congress authorized the President in his discretion to augment that force to 87,800. Immediately on the outbreak of the war the navy was recruited to that strength, but it was found that under the provisions of our laws there were not sufficient officers in the upper grades of the navy to do the war work.

At the same time the lessons of the war showed it was impossible to have the combatant s.h.i.+ps of the navy ready for instant war service unless the s.h.i.+ps had their full personnel on board and that personnel was highly trained.

In addition to this permanent strength recourse was had to the development of the existing reserves and to the creation of a new force.

NAVAL VOLUNTEERS

Up to 1913 the only organization that made any pretense of training men for the navy was the Naval Militia, and that was under State control, with practically no Federal supervision. As the militia seemed to offer the only means of producing a trained reserve, steps were at once taken to put it on a sound basis, and on February 16, 1914, a real Naval Militia under Federal control was created, provision being made for its organization and training in peace, as well as its utilization in war.

As with all organized militia, the Naval Militia, even with the law of 1914, could not, under the Const.i.tution, be called into service as such except for limited duties, such as to repel invasion. It could not be used outside the territorial limits of the United States. It is evident, then, that with such restrictions militia could hardly meet the requirements of the navy in a foreign war, and to overcome this difficulty the "National Naval Volunteers" were created in August, 1916.

Under this act members of Naval Militia organizations were authorized to volunteer for "any emergency," of which emergency the President was to be the judge. Other laws included the same measure, provided for a reserve force, for the automatic increase of officer personnel in each corps to correspond with increases in enlisted men, and for the Naval Flying Corps, special engineering officers, and the Naval Dental and Dental Reserve Corps. It also provided for taking over the lighthouse and other departmental divisions by the navy in time of war. Briefly, then, on July 1, 1917, three months after the declaration of war, the number of officers had increased to 8,038--4,694 regulars, 3,344 reserves--and the number of enlisted men to 171,133--128,666 regulars, 32,379 reserves, 10,088 National Naval Volunteers. The increase since that time is as follows:

April 1, 1918 Officers Men

Regular Navy

Permanent 5,441 198,224 Temporary 2,519 .......

Reserves 10,625 85,475 Total 18,585 283,699

November 9, 1918

Permanent 5,656 206,684 Temporary 4,833 .......

Reserves 21,985 290,346 Total 32,474 497,030

THE NAVY THAT FLIES

The expansion of aviation in the navy has been of gratifying proportions and effectiveness. On July 1, 1917, naval aviation was still in its infancy. At that time there were only 45 naval aviators. There were officers of the navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard who had been given special training in and were attached to aviation. There were approximately 200 student officers under training, and about 1,250 enlisted men attached to the Aviation Service. These enlisted men were a.s.signed to the three naval air stations in this country then in commission. Pensacola, Fla., had about 1,000 men, Bay Sh.o.r.e, Long Island, N.Y., had about 100, and Squantum, Ma.s.s., which was abandoned in the fall of 1917, had about 150 men. On July 1, 1918, there were 823 naval aviators, approximately 2,052 student officers, and 400 ground officers attached to naval aviation. In addition, there were more than 7,300 trained mechanics, and more than 5,400 mechanics in training. The total enlisted and commissioned personnel at this time was about 30,000.

THE s.h.i.+PS

On the day war was declared 197 s.h.i.+ps were in commission. To-day there are 2,003. In addition to furnis.h.i.+ng all these s.h.i.+ps with trained officers and men, the duty of supplying crews and officers of the growing merchant marine was undertaken by the navy. There has not been a day when the demand for men for these s.h.i.+ps has not been supplied--how fit they were all the world attests--and after manning the merchant s.h.i.+ps there has not been a time when provision was not made for the constantly increasing number of s.h.i.+ps taken over by the navy.

During the year the energy available for new construction was concentrated mainly upon vessels to deal with the submarine menace.

Three hundred and fifty-five of the 110-foot wooden submarine chasers were completed during the year. Fifty of these were taken over by France and 50 more for France were ordered during the year and have been completed since July 1, 1918. Forty-two more were ordered about the end of the fiscal year, delivery to begin in November and be completed in January.

Extraordinary measures were taken with reference to destroyers. By the summer of 1917 destroyer orders had been placed which not only absorbed all available capacity for more than a year, but required a material expansion of existing facilities. There were under construction, or on order, in round figures, 100 of the thirty-five-knot type.

During the year, including orders placed at navy yards, the following have been contracted for: Four battles.h.i.+ps, 1 battle cruiser, 2 fuel s.h.i.+ps, 1 transport, 1 gunboat, 1 ammunition s.h.i.+p, 223 destroyers, 58 submarines, 112 fabricated patrol vessels (including 12 for the Italian Government), 92 submarine chasers (including 50 for the French Government), 51 mine-sweepers, 25 seagoing tugs and 46 harbor tugs, besides a large number of lighters, barges, and other auxiliary harbor craft. In addition to this, contracts have been placed for 12 large fuel s.h.i.+ps in conjunction with the Emergency Fleet Corporation.

s.h.i.+ps launched during the year and up to October 1, 1918, include 1 gunboat, 93 destroyers, 29 submarines, 26 mine-sweepers, 4 fabricated patrol vessels, and 2 seagoing tugs. It is noteworthy that in the first nine months of 1918 there were launched no less than 83 destroyers of 98,281 tons aggregate normal displacement, as compared with 62 destroyers of 58,285 tons during the entire nine years next preceding January 1, 1918.

There have been added to the navy during the fiscal year and including the three months up to October 1, 1918, 2 battles.h.i.+ps, 36 destroyers, 28 submarines, 355 submarine chasers, 13 mine-sweepers and 2 seagoing tugs.

There have also been added to the operating naval forces by purchase, charter, etc., many hundred vessels of commercial type, including all cla.s.ses from former German transatlantic liners to harbor tugboats and motorboats for auxiliary purposes.

Last year the construction of capital s.h.i.+ps and large vessels generally had been to some extent suspended. Work continued upon vessels which had already made material progress toward completion, but was practically suspended upon those which had just been begun, or whose keels had not yet been laid. The act of July 1, 1918, required work to be actually begun upon the remaining vessels of the three-year programme within a year. This has all been planned and no difficulty in complying with the requirements of the act and pus.h.i.+ng rapidly the construction of the vessels in question is antic.i.p.ated. Advantage has been taken of the delay to introduce into the designs of the vessels which had not been laid down numerous improvements based upon war experience.

WORK OVERSEAS

War was declared on April 6, 1917. On the 4th of May a division of destroyers was in European waters. By January 1, 1918, there were 113 United States naval s.h.i.+ps across, and in October, 1918, the total had reached 338 s.h.i.+ps of all cla.s.ses. At the present time there are 5,000 officers and 70,000 enlisted men of the navy serving in Europe, this total being greater than the full strength of the navy when the United States entered the war. The destroyers upon their first arrival were based on Queenstown, which has been the base of the operations of these best fighters of the submarines during the war. Every facility possible was provided for the comfort and recreation of the officers and men engaged in this most rigorous service.

During July and August, 1918, 3,444,012 tons of s.h.i.+pping were escorted to and from France by American escort vessels; of the above amount 1,577,735 tons were escorted in and 1,864,677 tons were escorted out of French ports. Of the tonnage escorted into French ports during this time only 16,988 tons, or .009 per cent, were lost through enemy action, and of the tonnage escorted out from French ports only 27,858, or .013 per cent, were lost through the same cause. During the same period, July and August of this year, 259,604 American troops were escorted to France by United States escort vessels without the loss of a single man through enemy action. The particulars in the above paragraph refer to United States naval forces operating in the war zone from French ports.

During the same time--July and August--destroyers based on British ports supplied 75 per cent of the escorts for 318 s.h.i.+ps, totalling 2,752,908 tons, and including the escort of vessels carrying 137,283 United States troops. The destroyers on this duty were at sea an average of 67 per cent of the time, and were under way for a period of about 16,000 hours, steaming approximately an aggregate of 260,000 miles. There were no losses due to enemy action.

The history of the convoy operations in which our naval forces have taken part, due to which we have been able so successfully to transport such a large number of our military forces abroad, and so many supplies for the army, is a chapter in itself. It is probably our major operation in this war, and will in the future stand as a monument to both the army and the navy as the greatest and most difficult troop transporting effort which has ever been conducted across seas.

(The Secretary says the convoy system was "suggested by President Wilson." He continues:)

This entire force, under command of Rear-Admiral Albert Gleaves, whose ability and resource have been tested and established in this great service in co-operation with the destroyer flotilla operating abroad, has developed an anti-submarine convoy and escort system the results of which have surpa.s.sed even the most sanguine expectations.

TROOPS CARRIED OVERSEAS

American and British s.h.i.+ps have carried over 2,000,000 American troops overseas. The United States did not possess enough s.h.i.+ps to carry over our troops as rapidly as they were ready to sail or as quickly as they were needed in France. Great Britain furnished, under contract with the War Department, many s.h.i.+ps and safely transported many American troops, the numbers having increased greatly in the spring and summer. A few troops were carried over by other allied s.h.i.+ps. The actual number transported in British s.h.i.+ps was more than a million.

Up to November 1, 1918, of the total number of United States troops in Europe, 924,578 made pa.s.sage in United States naval convoys under escort of United States cruisers and destroyers. Since November 1, 1917, there have been 289 sailings of naval transports from American ports. In these operations of the cruiser and transport force of the Atlantic fleet not one eastbound American transport has been torpedoed or damaged by the enemy and only three were sunk on the return voyage.

Our destroyers and patrol vessels, in addition to convoy duty, have waged an unceasing offensive warfare against the submarines. In spite of all this, our naval losses have been gratifyingly small. Only three American troops.h.i.+ps--the _Antilles_, the _President Lincoln_, and the _Covington_--were sunk on the return voyage. Only three fighting s.h.i.+ps have been lost as a result of enemy action--the patrol s.h.i.+p _Alcedo_, a converted yacht, sunk off the coast of France November 5, 1917; the torpedoboat destroyer _Jacob Jones_, sunk off the British coast December 6, 1917, and the cruiser _San Diego_, sunk near Fire Island, off the New York coast, on July 19, 1918, by striking a mine supposedly set adrift by a German submarine. The transport _Finland_ and the destroyer _Ca.s.sin_, which were torpedoed, reached port and were soon repaired and placed back in service. The transport _Mount Vernon_, struck by a torpedo on September 5 last, proceeded to port under its own steam and was repaired. The most serious loss of life due to enemy activity was the loss of the Coast Guard cutter _Tampa_, with all on board, in Bristol Channel, England, on the night of September 26, 1918. The _Tampa_, which was doing escort duty, had gone ahead of the convoy.

Vessels following heard an explosion, but when they reached the vicinity there were only bits of floating wreckage to show where the s.h.i.+p had gone down. Not one of the 111 officers and men of her crew was rescued, and, though it is believed she was sunk by a torpedo from an enemy submarine, the exact manner in which the vessel met its fate may never be known.

OTHER POINTS SUMMARIZED

Secretary Daniels records many other achievements of s.h.i.+ps and personnel, including those of the naval overseas transportation service.

Of the latter he says in substance:

In ten months the transportation service grew from 10 s.h.i.+ps to a fleet of 321 cargo-carrying s.h.i.+ps, aggregating a deadweight tonnage of 2,800,000, and numerically equalling the combined Cunard, Hamburg-American, and North German Lloyd lines at the outbreak of the war. Of this number 227 s.h.i.+ps were mainly in operation.

From the Emergency Fleet Corporation the navy has taken over for operation 94 new vessels, aggregating 700,000 deadweight tons. On March 21, 1918, by order of the President 101 Dutch merchant vessels were taken over by the Navy Department pending their allocation to the various vital trades of this country, and 26 of these vessels are now a part of the naval overseas fleet. This vast fleet of cargo vessels has been officered and manned through enrollment of the seagoing personnel of the American merchant marine, officers and men of the United States Navy, and the a.s.signment after training of graduates of technical schools and training schools, developed by the navy since the United States entered the war.