Stories From the US Submarine Force
In honor of Navy’s Liberty Bowl Win…
The Springfield Daily Republican, January 4, 1944
Cutter, Chapple, Navy Stars Now Starring Underseas
By BOB CONSIDINE
New York, Jan. 3—(INS)—Some of the Naval Academy’s best athletes have gone into the navy’s silent service—submarine work. They couldn’t ask for or receive tougher duty. The submarine boys regard publicity in the same light as they regard enemy depth charges. They want neither.
December 10 tends to sit quietly on the calendar, a date that rarely makes headlines and never asks for much. Yet, across the long and strange saga of the United States Navy Submarine Force, this ordinary wintery day has carried more weight than it lets on. It has seen explosions in cramped early hulls, the smoke of war hanging over Cavite, the long shadow of strategic deterrence, and the uneasy reality that even the most powerful navy in the world still depends on shipyards that run behind schedule and politicians who promise to fix them.
The morning of 29 November 1943 opened with a sky the color of steel wool. The sea rolled slow and indifferent as Bonefish moved through the Flores Sea, stalking her patrol track with the quiet patience of a hunter. At 0525 the lookout broke the monotony with a single hard call that snapped every head around. Smoke on the horizon bearing 068 true at a distance of about twenty five thousand yards. The log placed Bonefish at latitude 06 34 south and longitude 116 47.7 east. Smoke at that distance meant a sizeable ship and the scale of the plume suggested speed and purpose.
Patrol Reports 