Author: FTB1(SS)

SS Bluegill’s 2nd War Patrol: The August 13, 1944 Battle and the Mark 18 Torpedo’s Trial

USS Bluegill began her life on the ways at Groton, Connecticut, in December of 1942. She was a Gato-class boat, built for the long patrols and hard work the war in the Pacific demanded. When Mrs. W. Sterling Cole christened her on August 8, 1943, she slid into the Thames River looking every bit the part of a warship that would soon prowl far from home. Commissioned that November under Lt. Comdr. Eric L. Barr, Jr., she went through the usual shakedown, torpedo shoots, and workups before making the long transit to the war zone.

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USS Croaker’s First War Patrol: Deadly Strikes in the East China Sea, August 1944

In the summer of 1944, USS CROAKER SS-246, embarked on her first war patrol, leaving Pearl Harbor in July and pushing deep into the East China and Yellow Seas. The early days were a mix of training sharpened by caution, with sporadic contacts and long stretches of empty water. By mid-August, she had skirted mines, traded information with other submarines, and patrolled close enough to hostile shores to feel the reach of Japanese air and sea patrols. It was in this tense environment, between the fourteenth and seventeenth, that CROAKER struck two decisive blows, demonstrating both the skill of her crew and the deadly precision of a well-handled submarine.

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S-44’s Bold Strike

 In the gray dawn of August 10, 1942, the crew of USS S‑44 settled into battle stations with a strange mix of nerves and purpose. They’d been pushing through the maze of New Britain and New Ireland for weeks, a tangle of islands in the Coral Sea where every rip of current hides a ship or a mine. The day before had passed quietly, submerged, covering New Hanover’s approach. Now, North of Simberi Island, at periscope depth in glassy seas, something unusual appeared.

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