In the Great War

A story from a rare issue of the The Subchaser Post from 1921, in which Ensign Alexander Moffat, commanding officer of subchaser SC 143, describes how he finagled a trip on USS Henderson, stepping to the front of a long line of soldiers and sailors waiting for a spot on a homeward bound ship.

On August 27, 1918, USS Felix Taussig shelled and sank submarine chaser SC 209, south of Long Island. We look at the official reports and personal accounts of the sole incident in WWI of a chaser being lost to friendly fire.

Henry Tegler trained to become a radio electrician in WWI, at the USN school set up at Harvard. The training was intensive and difficult. Tegler achieved a rank of Radio Electrician 3rd class, and was sent overseas for service on a submarine chaser. This selection of letters home tells the story of a young recruit entering the U.S. Navy and learning the ropes.

A personal account of Nathaniel Rubinkam, commanding officer of submarine chaser SC 38, describes an incident in which half a dozen mines were discovered off the coast of England, directly before a convoy was scheduled to sail. The base commander insisted that all six mines be located and destroyed before the convoy was allowed to proceed. An account of subchasers in the context of mine warfare and ASW operations out of Plymouth, England in 1918.

A short, unedited story from a member of the "black gang" on SC 272, in which he describes being rammed at sea off the coast of Ireland, and the efforts of the crew to keep the chaser from sinking. From a rare issue of The Subchaser Post, a newsletter printed in 1921.

On 2 October 1918, a notable naval event took place, the bombardment of the Austrian submarine base at Durazzo, Albania. This was the one major naval engagement of the war in which the U.S. Navy participated.

This episode describes the Durazzo bombardment, drawing on personal accounts of U.S. Navy crewmen who served in the submarine chaser force, eleven boats of which participated in the raid.

To address the submarine menace in WWI would require new ideas for technological inventions and tactics. Calling on the spirit of American ingenuity, leaders formed The War Committee of Technical Societies, to bring talented and ingenious civilians into the process of designing the new generation of war equipment.

Among the most ambitious military strategies in the naval war of WWI was the construction of mine barrages. Most notable is the North Sea Mine Barrage, extending from Norway to the Orkney Islands, intended to bottle up the U-Boat in the North Sea and deny it access to seaways.

We look at the Mark VI mine, and how it made the construction of the North Sea Mine Barrage feasible.

Script/narration: Todd Woofenden, Editor, The Subchaser Archives, at www.subchaser.org

When the U.S. declared war on Germany in April 1917, a massive military buildup commenced, including the construction of a large fleet of small boats, the 110' United States Submarine Chasers. The mission of the subchasers was to find and attack U-boats, to hunt the enemy down.

This episode introduces the new chaser fleet, as the subchaser crews trained in the new science of antisubmarine warfare, and coped with the coldest New London winter in history.