Tag: Silent Service history

There’ll Be a Commotion Down Under The Ocean

With the war over and things finally settled down, US Submarine Veterans began to return to their homes and family. They were still keenly aware of the deep sacrifice the Sub Force had made, and the reasons why so many had died there was still a reluctance to talk about how they had carried out the destruction of the Japanese Empire.

But in newspapers around the country, stories began to appear that gave the public a taste of what the Sub force had been through and what it had accomplished. In Bogalusa, LA, a multi-part series was run, telling the stories of submarine veterans from the area who had served on the USS Ray SS-271.

On June 6, 1946, almost a year after the war had ended, one of these articles appeared. In it were the lyrics to “The Submarine Song,” without attribution or any author listed.

Continue reading “There’ll Be a Commotion Down Under The Ocean” →
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The Depths of Courage

It is the spring of 1943. The tides of war are shifting, but slowly, and not without price. Across the vast reaches of the Pacific, the United States Navy’s submarine force is waging an invisible war, slipping silently beneath enemy shipping lanes, severing supply chains one torpedo at a time. These boats are not the sleek, nuclear-powered giants of later decades, but diesel-electric beasts with steel hulls and sweat-stained decks. Their crews, young and dogged, live and die in a steel tube barely longer than a football field. It is here, in this crucible of pressure and silence, that the USS Kingfish (SS-234) earned her scars—and her survival. Continue reading “The Depths of Courage” →

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Secret Et Hardi

On a crisp winter day in Newport News, Virginia, the USS Lapon slid into the water, marking the arrival of one of the most advanced submarines of its time. Built as a Sturgeon-class attack submarine, Lapon embodied the technological innovations that redefined undersea warfare in the nuclear age. Its motto, Secret et Hardi—“Silent and Strong”—encapsulated the ethos of the men who would take it into the depths. Sponsored by Mrs. Charles D. Griffin, the Lapon became an integral player in America’s underwater chess game with the Soviet Union. Continue reading “Secret Et Hardi” →

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