RECOLLECTION

Lawrence Gore 1989

“LIST AND TRIM”

My job as “Oil King” had kept me moving . I had to insure that the boiler fuel pumps were taking suction on service tanks that had enough fuel, regardless of the ship’s speed to be maintained. This could mean consumption of a few hundred gallons an hour at very slow speed, to a few thousand gallons an hour when at flank speed, on up to full power. At the higher speeds this would mean transferring fuel to the service tanks every few hours, around the clock. In my less busy times I tested the purity and reported the quantity of the ship’s portable and feed water. Feed water for the ship’s boilers required constant vigilance. In fact the water used in the boilers had to contain less impurities than our drinking water. At the same time my responsibility required that I maintain certain chemical levels inside the boilers as well, Such as hardness, salinity and alkalinity. When we arrived in port for a bit of “R & R” guess who waved bye to the liberty party as they scampered across the gangway for a well deserved “72” or whatever? You guessed it, the oil King in charge of fueling ship until the wee hours of the morning. On my luckier nights, when fueling ship, we could take on a 100,000 gallons or so without a big mess. Black oil is messy! So, from where I was sitting, at any given time there was never a dull moment.

With the constant movement of these many liquids, of considerable weight, about the ship in a normal operating atmosphere, the “LIST”and “ TRIM” is always uppermost in the Oil King’s mind. The goal ALWAYS, zero degrees list and zero degrees trim. Consequently, one of my primary duties , when assigned as a member of a Repair Party during General Quarters, (battle stations) was to maintain a stable list and trim condition under whatever circumstances might prevail.

The past several days had been long indeed. Sleep for the crew had, at best, been intermittent and very brief. But spirits were high, for tonight was the culmination of many months of preparation. We were actually just a few hours from the long awaited invasion to create a southern front for the European theater, a landing on the island of Sicily. Everyone was aware of the fact that a successful landing here would give our forces the base needed to forge on up the Italian “boot”, to eliminate the Italian army as a threat, and soon bring the Nazi forces to surrender on our terms.

It’s the wee hours of the morning, 10 July 1943 and we are closing in on Sicily. The crew has been at “battle stations” for hours. The galley has passed out a midnight snack of Spam sandwiches and we’ve had our umpteenth cup of coffee. Everyone is “Manned and Ready”. I’m assigned to the main Repair Party located in the machine shop amid ships, on the main deck. There are two other Repair Parties. The forward Repair in the foc’sle near the anchor windlass room. The after Repair Party located in the Ship Fitters’ shop near the steering engine room.

The log room, which is the Oil King’s office, is an integral part of the machine shop compartment and on

this night, during General Quarters, I’m sitting on the log room door sill making small talk with a group of the

repair gang, just passing the time…………it’s almost 0300 hours ……. With out warning the ship’s P.A.

system screams:

“STAND BY FOR COLLISION TO PORT !

STAND BY FOR COLLISION TO PORT !”

Simultaneously, the ship’s whistle emits a series of urgent ear piercing blasts !

BLAHUUOUGH ! BLAHUUOUGH ! BLAHUUOUGH ! BLAHUUOUGH !

Vaguely I recall the ship’s siren screaming through the still night air. The adrenaline was already coursing our

veins, as a flood turned loose.

Repair Party personnel instantly made a dash for the starboard side… In less time than it takes to think about

it, the ship pitches wildly, heeling over about 15 to 20 degrees starboard, amid a deafening clash of tearing metal

as the crew is slammed against the deck and bulkheads, I’m grasping to hold on to anything within reach, at the same

time trying to realize the import of the current situation. The tearing , clashing and deafening screech of grinding metal

increased as the ship rolled quickly from 20 degrees starboard back to over to a good 20 to 25 degrees to port .

My guess would be that within the next 3 seconds we were quite aware of the fact that we had been struck in the vicinity

of the forward fire room, on the port side, by another ship. Training , had put the repair party personnel in a state of

automation. Without thinking , we were setting out to open the starboard hatch of the battered fireroom to rescue the

men on watch below. Imagine our thrill and utter surprise , when we got the hatch open, to see the watch personnel

bounding through the top of the hatch and out to safety. Just for a fleeting moment I envisioned this as not too different

from the Road-runner cartoons. These guys just seemed to continue on above the main deck, climbing now on

nothing but thin air. Everyone let out a cheer when we found that every single man had escaped to safety. It was truly

a miracle.

The repair party had already set about their assigned tasks of cutting off the oil flow to the boilers; securing the

main feed valves; wrapping up the main and auxiliary steam lines from the boilers; in short, isolating the damage forearm

from the rest of the engineering plant aft. For the most part, this was accomplished through remote control devices

located along the main deck. If a stop watch had been started when the emergency wrap-up and isolation of the

fireroom began, it may not have registered much more than 90 seconds from start to finish. Possibly a record.

Looking back on that situation now, I don’t believe a single man had any thought of a possible explosion from the

boilers, or had any fear of personal danger, although the possibility had real potential. Training had given priority to

saving the ship.

We could now go about the business of surveying the damage and start corrective action.

The flooding must be stopped. The effect of damages to the ship minimized . A few things stood out very clearly in every ones’ mind, and that was, the ship had a nasty list of several degrees to port with the Mediterranean lapping ominously across the main deck even though the sea was relatively calm. It appeared that the ship could be in eminent danger of sinking if the waves started kicking up just a little bit. There was an outage of power in the forward part of the ship affecting vital equipment. There was lots to do and no one had to be told where to start first.

My first priority was to start shifting the ship from it’s severe list of several degrees to port. This would give another foot or so of freeboard and added safety. I realized that I had lost one of my high capacity steam transfer pumps located in the forward fire room. I also knew that any roll to be moved probably have to be aft as the manifolds controlling the forward tanks were in the forward fire-room now under at least 12 feet of water.

I stopped by the log room to pick up my latest tank soundings and headed aft. Since we only had one remaining fire-room to depend on for the ship’s mobility and electrical power every effort must be made to insure it’s safety. SO, BE CAREFUL! After checking the tanks, insuring the after fire-room had plenty of fuel for safe operation at present, I bounded back topside, splashed up the main deck and bolted down into the after engine room.

I lined up the electric oil transfer pump, hit the switch and started moving oil from port to starboard. I would check back once in a while to make sure power was still available for the pump. The electricians on the main switch board aft were not anticipating any further problems aft. As it turned out there were areas in the ship, particularly forward, where lines were cut and power had been lost. Power aft had only been intermittent in the first several minutes of the collision. Repair party personnel were working to restore power in forward areas as rapidly as possible. Others were involved in damning the flood waters entering the ship. Again, the ship’s P.A. system squaked out very loud and clear:

“ATTENTION ALL HANDS, STRIP SHIP ! STRIP SHIP !”

“ATTENTION ALL HANDS, STRIP SHIP ! STRIP SHIP !

Now there’s a message that might tend to curl your hair. It usually preceded the word to “ABANDON SHIP”. I wondered if more flooding had occurred forward and if the flooding was getting ahead of our valiant repair gang working feverishly to stem the flooding. I remembered that most scuttle coamings on the main deck were only 6” high. But, not to worry ! I finished my job in the engine room, calculated that pumping could go along without me for at least an hour, if I was lucky.

Up the ladder to topside, and it seemed that every man available was engaged in heaving strip ship items overboard.

During all this melee, I heard the roar of anchor chains clanging and grinding through the hawse pipes as an

anchor was being let go. Another roar, and the other anchor was down. In a few minutes the ship gave a heavy

shudder as tons of anchors and chains were jettisoned. Strip ship! And how! I spent a while helping strip ship. A glance over the side revealed the fact the ship had gained freeboard as a result of the strip ship operation. I walked aft, sighted the mast and saw that the ship was gradually easing away from that serious port list. We were indeed making progress. HALLELUJAH!

Then , just before dawn, about 0500 hours, a couple of us were on our way to the galley to get a cup of coffee and try to bum a snack of some sort. We noticed that some additional blowers had just started up forward, signaling that there had been a further restoration of power. GREAT! We remarked to each other that under the circumstances we were almost back to normal except for the gapping hole in our side and a flooded fireroom. We had noticed a plane circling some distance off and concluded it must be one of ours since we had not opened fire. We didn’t know that we had not had the power to operate the fire control equipment until just a few minutes ago. We knew something was going down when the P.A. system bellowed out:

“STAND CLEAR OF ALL 5 INCH MOUNTS !

“STAND CLEAR OF ALL 5 INCH MOUNTS !

Weep no more my sad young sailor. Ye may yet have thy day.

We talked with the duty cooks for a few minutes, got a good cup of coffee and believe it or not , a fresh, piece of hot toast, with plenty of butter. We sat down on the deck, the dry side, just aft of the forward fireroom, and began to enjoy one of life’s’ small pleasures. The solitude of a dawn breaking, a cup of coffee, a piece of buttered toast. The morning had been hectic. This moment was a little bit of Heaven in the middle of a whole lot of Hell. “How long could it last ?” A question answered by the deafening blasts of our 5 inch guns. They had fired only a few shells. It was over within seconds. They were accurate and they were deadly. There were cheers going up from the bridge area, the man in the director was sticking his head out flailing his hat in the air. Walla – we had just shot down a German ME110 Fighter bomber. We jumped up to see a streak of billowing smoke kiss the sea. Wouldn’t you know it ? Something to write home about and our mail is censored!

The best things in life may be free, but some of them sure as hell don’t last long. The truth of this was being revealed to me as I looked down the main deck. The smoke had hardly cleared from the guns until Chief Burton came into view around the deck house. He came over to where we were sitting. “Hey there Gore, when you finish that coffee I’ve got a little job waiting for in the Machine Shop.” He stuck around and finished his coffee along with us. I believe that was the best coffee and toast I had ever had. “Humm,Humm, good!” He went along with us to the galley to return our coffee cups. Burton and I then headed for the machine shop.

When we arrived Burton approached a big pile of gear, pointing as he went. I was thinking that it looked as if it may be a candidate for going over the side with the strip ship items and he just wanted me to do the heavy work. But no dice. He began to explain what he had on his mind. “This is a shallow water diving outfit, Gore. This is the helmet here, made or a copper alloy and weighs about 35 pounds. It has windows you can see out of.” He. continued, “This is a one-man air pump with about 200 feet of air hose to connect between the helmet and the pump. Very simple”, I looked it all over, thought about it a minute, then said, “That all seems very simple all right , but why bring this gear out while we’re on the verge of sinking , right here and now, in the Mediterranean?” He sorta chuckled , then replied, “Gore that’s just whey we’ve got it out here now. Because you are going to do some diving, and between the two of us we’re going to pull the bow up to where it ought to be.” He continued , “As you know we have a serious trim situation now with the ship down very heavily by the bow. A very bad and unstable condition.” The theory, of course , was to lighten the forward part of the ship by pumping oil from the forward tanks. Before thinking, I said, “But the manifolds are at the bottom of the forward fire room under………..” It No sooner left my mouth than I SAW THE PROVERBIAL LIGHT! It was me! I was going into the dismal depths of the flooded fireroom!

He explained that I was the only person in the world who could find and operate the correct manifold valves and line up the system valves in the total darkness of the flooded fireroom. At that moment I recalled WT1/c Gelzer, while instructing me in the duties of Oil King, said that I had to know the job so well that I would have to perform , to his satisfaction, in total darkness. He had tested me for this skill as well as having WT1/c Beske check me out in total darkness. I believed that I could accomplish the task, but I didn't know about the shallow water diving outfit. Burton assured me, that would be no problem. You’ll just learn as you go along. I was thinking to myself, “On –the-job-Training, Oh boy!” Also, it was pretty scary to think about Chief Burton topside, working the long handle of the air pump methodically back and forth keeping me alive in the bowels of a flooded fire room. What if he fainted, went off to get a cup of coffee? Any thing could happen! Terror gripped me for a moment . There were extra beads of perspiration on my fore head. He assured me there would be two people at the pump, and there was really nothing for me to worry about. Well, HE could say that. There no danger of him drowning in his cup of coffee, nor did he need a pump to furnish him air to breathe.

We finally sorted out our plans, tested the equipment and figured out how we’d strap the helmet on me after

we got down into the forward part of the fireroom. There was only about 12 to 16 inches of air/breathing space

in the upper part of the fireroom. Later we found that presented more than just a little problem. The air space

varied from zero to about three feet as the ship lazily rolled back and forth along in a light sea. Burton accompanied

me into the fireroom, across the blower trunk to the forward bulkhead. He had planned to standby and do what he

could to keep the air hose from becoming fouled, tend the signal line and be near in event of some unforeseen

circumstance. We found, however, that he couldn’t stay in the fireroom due to lack of air space in which to breathe

at least half the time. Breathing is important, even for a Chief Petty Officer. So, with both of strangling and gasping for breath, we finally got the helmet fairly well secured over my head. He gave me the signal that he was leaving as he gasped for air and spewed out water. Air was filling my helmet. After a minute or so I began to resume somewhat normal breathing. I was ready to dive, I kept telling my self. I thought about Burton for a moment while saying a little prayer, hoping he had not drowned on the way out.

It took me several attempts to actually make the dive as the water in the fireroom was like water sloshing back and forth in a huge bowl. It was almost impossible to remain upright underwater and to keep the helmet from filling with water. After a few scary attempts and gasping for breath from the water filled helmet, I learned that I could move freely only for very brief intervals. Then I’d get a death grip on any thing handy until the bigger surges passed, holding myself upright as best I could. Then move on again. I finally made it down the ladder to the manifold platform.

Let me tell you, I had been in some dark places in my life time, but this was unbelievable. The darkness was so oppressive it tended to disorient me completely at times. My brain felt as though it was being closed off from the rest of my body by a heavy veil. I would feel in the darkness for the valves, then my mind would go blank as I held on for dear life through the next surge. Then the same routine again. I tried to make my mind tell me what valves, what tanks, what system? Why am I here ? Then over again. When will it end? There were to five valves on each manifold, and it took a lifetime to be sure about the ones I needed to operate to set up the system There in the darkness, alone with my soul, a wheezing helmet and the manifolds. I was finally satisfied that the valves were aligned properly. HOW? I do not know ! It was a miracle !

I yanked on the signal line to let topside know I was coming up. On moving back up the ladder I realized that the force of water rushing back and forth became stronger nearer the top. Very interesting. I had really had it good down below and didn’t know it. Smudged oily light was beginning to streak through the thick lenses of the helmet. I was beginning to fee a little light headed, over powered by darkness being swept away by the movement of a figure. It spoke to me. Then I knew I had returned to a world that I knew. That I had longed for in the darkness….. “O.K. Gore let’s have that helmet. Take a deep breath. Be ready for the next surge!”……Fortunately, Burton had not drowned. He was the first thing I saw as I came to the surface. He had climbed across the boiler blower trunk once again, to see me out. He knew I’d need help. That I appreciated.

I had to make one more dive to the center of the fireroom to open a crossover valve connecting the forward tanks to the pump in the after fireroom. This dive was no more fun than the first. I just felt I was improving with experience.

All was ready. I left Burton with the shallow water diving equipment while I made tracks to the after fireroom. I

Started the transfer pump rolling on the beginning of what eventually amounted to discharging about 50,000 gallons of fuel oil over the side. We would be at least 150 tons lighter and that we really needed.

We were headed for the island of Malta. Out LIST and TRIM were under control. The list was corrected by mid-morning. The trim down by the bow was improving by the minute. We had enough freeboard by mid afternoon that the crew could breathe easier. A moderate sea would not have caused much concern.

Every Man-Jack on board Swanson earned his salt on this day. Without the TEAM WORK of the entire crew pulling together, with SPEED and EFFICIENCY to the fullest extent of human will, and the admirable LEADERSHIP of our Captain and Officers, Swanson may well have entered the confines of Davy Jones Locker. A hearty “Well Done” for one indomitable crew!

NOTE: Lawrence C. Gore was awarded a Fleet Commendation Medal for his actions

on 10 July 1943.