Tag: World War II submarines

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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The 8th Patrol of USS Pike

She was old by the standards of war, yet USS Pike (SS-173) had not lost her bite. By the summer of 1943, the Porpoise-class submarine had already patrolled the Pacific through some of its darkest days. She had been on the front lines when the war broke out, prowling the waters off the Philippines. She had weathered early operations out of Darwin, ducked depth charges near Wake Island, and fired torpedoes into the teeth of Japanese convoys off Truk. But nothing in Pike’s history to that point matched the success of her eighth war patrol.

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One Final Run

The USS S-33 didn’t start out as a headline boat. She wasn’t sleek or fast, and by the time World War II exploded across the Pacific, she was already a grizzled old hull in a Navy that was rapidly modernizing. But like a lot of things built with care and kept in working order, she still had something left to give. And give she did. Not in flashy battles or dramatic duels at sea, but in hard miles, cold dives, and one final mission that helped pave the way for an American victory in the Aleutians.

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