Читать книгу The Scarlet Stripe--being the adventures of a naval surgeon - Henry Taprell Dorling - Страница 6

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I HAD rather a shock when I joined the Parham at Devonport. She was a comparatively new cargo coasting steamer of about 1300 tons gross, taken over for service as a ‘Q Ship,’ and carried a concealed armament of one 4-inch gun and a couple of 12-pounders, besides a ·303-inch Maxim and some Lewis guns. I think she also had depth-charges fitted astern, and that her bulkheads had been strengthened and her holds stuffed with wood to make her more or less unsinkable. As a merchant ship she would have carried a crew of thirty at the outside. As a ‘Q Ship’ she had 9 officers and 50 or 60 petty officers and men, all of the R.N., R.N.R., or R.N.V.R. The accommodation was squeezed almost to bursting point.

Everybody must have heard of the ‘Q Ships’ used during the war, or ‘Q Boats,’ or ‘Mystery Ships’ as the public usually called them. At one time or another all sorts of vessels were used for the purpose—mail-steamers and tramps, coastal colliers, small passenger steamers, steam trawlers, small sailing craft like fishing smacks and the topsail-schooners one sees round the coast, and convoy sloops. The first of them were used in about the middle of 1915, by which time the German submarines had started sinking our merchant ships. Two years later, when I joined the Parham, the ‘Q Ship’ service was more or less established. It was also infinitely more dangerous than it had been in its earlier days.

The really intensive effort of the German U-boats, the ‘unrestricted submarine campaign,’ started in February 1917. Broadly speaking, this meant that every ship, British, Allied, or neutral, sighted within a certain prescribed area off the British Isles was liable to be torpedoed and sunk without warning. April 1917 was the worst month of the whole war, when 430 merchantmen with a total gross tonnage of 852,000 were sent to the bottom. Of these 430 ships, 196 were British and 108 flew Allied flags. On April 19th, the blackest day of the war, 11 British merchantmen and 8 fishing craft were sent to the bottom. Throughout that month, one out of every four ships that left the British Isles never returned.

I, personally, did not know all this at the time. Neither was I aware that ships were being sunk faster than they could be replaced, and that the German submarines were being built faster than they were being sunk. Starvation, indeed, stared us in the face and, if these sinkings had continued at the same rate, August or September would have seen the war won by the enemy submarines. With all our raw material and food held up and sunk, we should have had to sue for peace. It was the Convoy System, started in May 1917, that really won the war for the Allies, and to me it is surprising how few people, even now, seem to realise it.

The Convoy System, however, is outside my province. I am only concerned with one of the methods used to fight the submarines in their own element—the ‘Q Ships.’

The first of them, as I’ve already said, appeared in 1915, and it didn’t take the Germans long to discover that not every merchant ship was as innocent as she was painted. Various unsuccessful actions in which decoy vessels had disclosed their hidden armaments and the submarines had escaped, taught the latter to be more wary. They would appear on the surface and open fire at long range, in which case, with their greater speed and heavier guns, they were more than a match for the ‘Q Ships,’ most of which were steamers of 10 knots or so. As an alternative method of attack if they could get into a favourable position under water, the submarines would use their torpedoes.

In 1917 it was extremely unlikely that an U-boat would ever run the risk of using the old method of coming to the surface near a merchantman, summoning her to stop by a shot across the bows, and then, after ordering the crew into their boats, sinking her by explosive charges or opening the inlets. That sort of manœuvre was far too dangerous. Any merchant vessel might be a ‘Q Ship,’ and, provided fire was not opened except under the White Ensign, it was a perfectly legitimate ruse de guerre for ‘Q Ships’ to be disguised as neutrals, with the Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish or other colours emblazoned on their sides and queer-sounding names written in large white letters for all the world to see.

At the time I joined the Parham it was necessary that a decoy ship should first take a torpedo, or else that she should allow herself to be shelled at long range. The ship was then ‘abandoned’ in the boats by what purported to be her merchant-service crew. We always referred to this as the ‘panic party,’ since the men forming it were carefully drilled to run about in a confused sort of way and to lower the boats lop-sided—in short, to behave as though they were an undisciplined rabble unaccustomed to strict naval routine.

But on board the ‘Q Ship,’ meanwhile, the guns’ crews remained hidden by their concealed weapons. The submarine might then approach submerged and cruise round the ship with her periscope showing. Seeing no signs of movement, or nothing suspicious in her victim, she might then come to the surface to take prisoners out of the boats, and to find out details of the vessel attacked. This was the chance for which every ‘Q Ship’ captain wished. If the submarine appeared in a position where his guns would bear, up would go the White Ensign, down would go the flaps or dummy boats and deckhouses concealing the guns, and crash would go the first rounds.

In order that they should remain afloat after being torpedoed, all the later decoy ships had their bulkheads strengthened and carried a buoyant wooden cargo. This saved a good many of them, though not all.

Nevertheless, it was a horribly risky and cold-blooded business. It was not like an honest fight between, say, two destroyers recognising each other as hostile, where they mutually hammered each other until one either sank or ran away. ‘Q Ship’ actions were generally a game of bluff, the wits and ingenuity of the decoy ship’s captain being pitted against that of the submarine. It was all on the lap of the gods who won, and though, as I have since been told, twenty-two submarines were sunk by ‘Q Ships’ of various types during the war, twenty-two of the latter were put under by German U-boats.

On joining the Parham I had speedily to drop all my previous ideas of naval discipline. As we were supposed to represent a merchant ship, we not merely behaved like one; but adopted even the merchant service lingo. Moreover, we wore plain clothes at sea, the more disreputable the better, with mufflers instead of collars. It was truly comic to see some of the men lounging about smoking and spitting in conspicuous positions throughout the ship, wearing bowlers or grimy felt hats, and garments that looked as if they had been bought from a rag-and-bone merchant’s barrow. Incidentally, as we necessarily hadn’t time to change into uniform if we went suddenly into action, I sometimes wondered what would happen to us if we were made prisoners in plain clothes. Should we be shot out of hand as franc-tireurs, or should we be saved by the facts that we had fought under the White Ensign and our names duly appeared in the Navy List? The main thing, of course, was not to be captured.

As our ship’s company was unduly large for a merchant ship of our size, and a crowd of men on deck would inevitably give us away as a ‘Q Ship’ to any submarine, not all the crew could be allowed on deck in daylight in any positions whence they were visible from outside the ship. Every little detail of this sort had to be thought of, and when washed underclothes were hung up to dry, for instance, care had to be taken that none of the distinctive naval ‘flannels’—in other words, the flannel shirts bound with blue jean round the neck—figured amongst the laundry.

Then, after dark, we sometimes altered the appearance of the ship. Spare ventilators or cowls might be fitted here and there, the positions of boats altered, the appearance of the masts changed by fitting crosstrees or topmasts, or painted strips of canvas lashed here and there to alter the silhouette of the ship from outside. We also carried a dummy deck cargo of wood, which looked all right from outside; but was really a mere skin of planks or pit-props piled up on either side of the forward and after well-decks. The large neutral markings we sometimes showed on our sides—blue with a yellow cross for Sweden; red with a white cross for Denmark; red, white, and blue horizontal for Holland, and so on—were either painted on large wooden flaps hinged in the middle, or on canvas. In either case, I believe, we were not supposed to open fire with these neutral markings showing, even if the White Ensign had been hoisted in place of the neutral colours.

We weren’t very long at Devonport, and soon after I joined we were ordered to Queenstown, our new base. Thence, after twenty-four hours or so in harbour, we sallied forth with orders to cruise up and down on the trade route along the south coast of Ireland to a position about 200 miles west of the Fastnet, off Cape Clear. This was where most of the traffic passed to and fro between England and America, and where enemy submarines were unusually active.

We generally arranged to be steaming eastward during the day, as if homeward bound. At night, when the submarines might be expected to be on the surface charging batteries or giving their crews a breath of fresh air, we turned out to sea again. During the hours of darkness we generally disguised the ship as already described, sometimes merely by altering our appearance, or else by adopting neutral colours or markings. I imagine our skipper, who was a lieutenant-commander R.N., had a pretty free hand in what he did.

Steaming to and fro at our best speed of 9 knots was a bit monotonous after the 20 knots we had invariably used in destroyers. We seemed literally to be crawling. All the same, the time didn’t hang heavily on my hands. There wasn’t much for me to do in the doctoring line, so I spent a good many hours on the bridge, and helping the paymaster with the mess accounts. The other officers, apart from the lieutenant-commander in command, comprised two lieutenants, one sub-lieutenant, three engineers, a paymaster—all of the R.N.R.—and my own humble self. The little mess was a bit crowded; but we were a happy, cheery lot, and so were the men.

Almost every day our wireless intercepted reports of ships being attacked or sunk. Sometimes they were twenty miles away, sometimes fifty, sometimes as much as a hundred. It seemed absolutely certain that our turn would come sooner or later, and at dawn each morning, when we had turned our bows homeward, the officers forgathered on the bridge or on deck anxiously scanning the sea through their binoculars for the peculiar black hump which might be the conning tower of a submarine. It was rather nervy work this, watching and waiting hour after hour, day after day, and, though I never dared to say so, I felt rather like the tethered calf or kid used as bait for a man-eating tiger. One consolation, however, was that the weather was pretty good, with no sea to speak of.

Dawn came as usual on our fifth or sixth day out on patrol, and found us steaming eastward as an ordinary British tramp steamer. Like all the other officers, I never took off my clothes at sea except for an occasional wash, and daylight found us all on deck for our usual scrutiny of the horizon. There was nothing in sight, so after a bit I went below again for another short sleep, and then got up and washed and had breakfast. The old ship was lurching about a bit, and when I went on deck for a smoke the sea was choppy and flecked with white horses, so that it would have been very difficult to see the flutter of spray thrown up by a submarine’s periscope. Patches of light mist were hanging about the horizon, and the visibility alternated, I should imagine, between 5000 and 8000 yards.

At about ten o’clock, when I was in the saloon with the paymaster, he writing up his store accounts and myself censoring some of the men’s letters which we hoped to post three or four days later on our arrival in harbour, we heard the din of the alarm-gongs sounding throughout the ship. We knew what that meant. A submarine was in sight. Grabbing our caps, we bolted.

The guns’ crews, keeping out of sight, were rushing to their stations at the 4-inch in the dummy deckhouse aft, and the two 12-pounders mounted either side amidships in small cabins with collapsible sides. I had no particular action station; but was ready to go to either of the dressing stations in case we had any one wounded. One of these was amidships under cover, and the other aft. I visited them both in turn to see that the first-aid parties were ready with all the paraphernalia, and then went on deck to see what was happening.

The ship was still jogging along on her course, and about two miles away, just before the starboard beam, was a grey submarine on the surface. Looking at her through glasses I could see the water washing over her low hull, the conning-tower and superstructure amidships with men upon it, and, just before it, what looked like a 4·1-inch gun. Apparently she had only just appeared, for even as I watched I noticed men making their way forward towards the gun. I saw them slew it round and cock up the muzzle in our direction, and knew what was coming next. We were about to be shelled. I had rather a sickish feeling as I waited for the first round. Our ship was a pretty big target, and we couldn’t retaliate until we were fairly certain of hitting at closer range. That chance wouldn’t be likely to come until we had been hit ourselves.

It seemed an age before I saw the red flash and the cloud of brown cordite smoke which showed that she had fired. Minutes seemed to pass until, simultaneously with the boom of the report, a great fountain of spray leapt out of the sea about 200 yards short of the ship, and the projectile, ricochetting off the water, went sailing over our heads with a fiendish whistle.

She fired again, and this time the shell came closer. Our own ship, meanwhile, was still steaming ahead, and was gradually edging in towards the U-boat. Old man Fritz, however, was wily. He seemed to realise we were a decoy ship, and, while still firing his gun, was moving ahead to keep at a respectable distance. I could see the water breaking over his bows, and realised that he was travelling at about 12 or 13 knots to our 9. In other words, he had the legs of us on the surface.

It was our job to tempt him into close range where every shot would hit, for a submarine at 4000 yards is a very difficult target. The only way to do this was to stop our ship and to send the ‘panic party’ away in our boats while keeping the guns’ crews on board. This might deceive him into thinking that the old Parham had been abandoned, when perhaps he would approach to have a look at the boats.

What orders were passed from the bridge I do not know; but the submarine still kept his distance and continued to fire. The shell came closer and closer, splashing the sea all around us. Then I heard a thud and a clang, followed by the roar of an explosion, as one landed somewhere forward.

The blighter had got the range accurately, and though we were doing our level best to close him, he still managed to keep his distance.

The next round whined over our heads and dropped into the sea about 20 yards on the other side of the ship. The next hit, and so did a third and a fourth. Things were getting too warm to last. We should be shelled to blazes before we could do anything to retaliate.

I was just going below in case we had any wounded, when an order came down from the bridge. I heard men shouting, and saw the White Ensign at our fore-masthead. Then the hinged sides hiding our guns rattled down, and the weapons came into action. I was lying flat on the deck not far from our midship 12-pounder, and was nearly deafened by its reports as it fired round after round.

Looking out I could see shell splashes fairly close to the U-boat, which seemed to have increased her speed and to be moving away from us. I put my glasses up, and noticed her men leaving their gun and running aft towards the conning tower. Our shell continued to plop into the sea all round her; but I didn’t see the ball of red flame and gout of smoke which showed that she had been hit. Accurate shooting, however, must have been very difficult for our chaps. The ship was wobbling about a lot, and the submarine, fully two miles off, was a very small target.

Then she disappeared altogether. She had dived.

We hovered about the spot for some time looking for further signs of her; but saw no trace. It was mortifying to think that she had escaped scot-free, while we had been hit four times. We had no casualties among the men, which was pure good luck. A shell, however, had burst in one of the storerooms, and missing our last case of whisky had smashed up a case of condensed milk and another of pickles. ‘Bingo,’ our mongrel dog, who happened upon the mess and greedily lapped it up, was violently sick in consequence.

We repaired damages, and, while steaming to the northward, spent the afternoon disguising the ship. It seemed safe enough, as the mist had thickened and the submarine was out of sight. I remember we transformed ourselves into a Swedish timber ship, by arranging the suitable markings on our sides and red-leading a few plates here and there to alter our appearance, while erecting our dummy deck cargo of wood. This latter job was rather a lengthy one, for all the baulks and planks had to be passed out of the hold and erected on either side of both well-decks in a sort of barricade.

And while we sweated and cursed and got splinters into our fingers, old man Fritz, whose under-water speed was practically the same as our full speed, must have been watching through his periscope and chuckling to himself. Indeed, he was stalking us, waiting for his opportunity.

It wasn’t long in coming!