USS Sailfish (SS-192) was a of the United States Navy, originally named Squalus. As Squalus, the submarine sank off the coast of New Hampshire during test dives on 23 May 1939. The sinking drowned 26 crew members, but an ensuing rescue operation, using the McCann Rescue Chamber for the first time, saved the lives of the remaining 33 aboard. Squalus was salvaged in late 1939 and recommissioned as Sailfish in May 1940.
As Sailfish, the vessel conducted numerous patrols in the Pacific War during World War II, earning nine battle stars. She was decommissioned in October 1945 and later scrapped. Her conning tower is on display at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine.
Construction and commissioning Squaluss keel was laid on 18 October 1937 by the Portsmouth Navy Yard in Kittery, Maine, the only ship of the United States Navy named for the squalus, a type of shark. She was launched on 14 September 1938, sponsored by Mrs. Thomas C. Hart, wife of Admiral Thomas C. Hart, and commissioned on 1 March 1939 with Lieutenant Oliver F. Naquin in command.
Sinking of Squalus and recommissioning as Sailfish
On 12 May 1939, following a yard overhaul, Squalus began a series of test dives off Portsmouth, New Hampshire. After successfully completing 18 dives, she went down again off the Isles of Shoals on the morning of 23 May at . Failure of the main induction valve (the means of letting in fresh air when on the surface). A repeat of incidents with and . After this accident, the more reliable Electric Boat design was adopted for new Navy-built subs. caused the flooding of the aft torpedo room, both engine rooms, and the crew's quarters, drowning 26 men immediately. Quick action by the crew prevented the other compartments from flooding. Squalus bottomed in of water.
Squalus was initially located by her sister boat, . The two submarines communicated using a telephone marker buoy until the cable parted. Divers from the submarine rescue ship began rescue operations under the direction of the salvage and rescue expert Lieutenant Commander Charles B. "Swede" Momsen, using the new McCann Rescue Chamber. The senior medical officer for the operations was Dr. Charles Wesley Shilling. Overseen by researcher Albert R. Behnke, the divers used recently developed heliox diving schedules and successfully avoided the cognitive impairment symptoms associated with such deep dives, thereby confirming Behnke's theory of nitrogen narcosis. The divers rescued all 33 survivors (32 crew members and a civilian)Express, 23 May 2019, p. 53. on board the sunken submarine. Four enlisted divers, Chief Machinist's Mate William Badders, Chief Boatswain's Mate Orson L. Crandall, Chief Metalsmith James H. McDonald, and Chief Torpedoman John Mihalowski, were awarded the Medal of Honor for their work during the rescue and subsequent salvage. The successful rescue of the Squalus survivors is in marked contrast to the loss of in Liverpool Bay in England just a week later, with four survivors from 104 people aboard. On Thetis, 99 of 103 crew, other naval personnel, and civilian technical observers died from carbon dioxide poisoning. Thetis was also recovered and recommissioned.
The naval authorities felt raising Squalus was important, as she incorporated a succession of new design features. With a thorough investigation of why she sank, more confidence could be placed in the new construction, or alteration of existing designs could be undertaken when cheapest and most efficient to do so. Furthermore, given similar previous accidents in and (indeed, in , as far back as 1920), determining a cause was necessary.
The Squalus salvage unit was commanded by Rear Admiral Cyrus W. Cole, commandant of the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, who supervised salvage officer Lieutenant Floyd A. Tusler from the Construction Corps. Cole also requested experienced Commander Henry Hartley as his technical aide. Tusler's plan was to lift the submarine in three stages to prevent it from rising too quickly, out of control, with one end up, in which case the likelihood of it sinking again would be high. For 50 days, divers worked to pass cables underneath the submarine and attach pontoons for buoyancy. On 13 July 1939, the stern was raised successfully, but when the men attempted to free the bow from the hard blue clay, the vessel began to rise far too quickly, slipping its cables. Ascending vertically, the submarine broke the surface, and of the bow reached into the air for not more than ten seconds before she sank once again all the way to the bottom. Momsen said of the mishap, "pontoons were smashed, hoses cut and I might add, hearts were broken." After 20 more days of preparation, with a radically redesigned pontoon and cable arrangement, the next lift was successful, as were two further operations. Squalus was towed into Portsmouth on 13 September, and decommissioned on 15 November. A total of 628 dives had been made in rescue and salvage operations.
Operational history of Sailfish Renamed Sailfish on 9 February 1940, she became the first boat of the U.S. Navy named for the sailfish. After reconditioning, repair, and overhaul, she was recommissioned on 15 May 1940 with Lieutenant Commander Morton C. Mumma Jr. (Annapolis, class of 1930) in command.
With refit completed in mid-September, Sailfish departed Portsmouth on 16 January 1941 and headed for the Pacific. Transiting the Panama Canal, she arrived at Pearl Harbor in early March, after refueling at San Diego. The submarine then sailed west to Manila where she joined the Asiatic Fleet until the attack on Pearl Harbor.
During the Pacific War, the captain of the renamed boat issued standing orders that if any man on the boat said the word "Squalus", he was to be marooned at the next port of call. This led to crew members referring to their boat as "Squailfish". That went over almost as well; a court martial was threatened for anyone heard using it.. No crewmembers are known to have been marooned, however.
World War II First five patrols: December 1941 – August 1942 Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Sailfish departed Manila on her first war patrol, destined for the west coast of Luzon. Early on 10 December, she sighted a landing force, supported by cruisers and destroyers, but could not gain firing position. On the night of 13 December, she made contact with two Japanese destroyers and began a submerged attack; the destroyers detected her, dropping several depth charges, while Sailfish fired two torpedoes. Despite a large explosion nearby, no damage was done, and the destroyers counterattacked with 18–20 depth charges.. The depth-charge attack caused Mumma to suffer a breakdown, and he was relieved. mistakenly attributes it to "sonar-equipped destroyers". She returned to Manila on 17 December.
Her second patrol (now under the command of Richard G. Voge),. Former skipper of , he went on to become Charles A. Lockwood's Chief of Staff, and a crucial liaison with HYPO. begun on 21 December, took the submarine to waters off Formosa. On the morning of 27 January 1942, off Halmahera, near Davao, she sighted a , making a daylight submerged attack with four torpedoes, and reporting the target was damaged, for which she got credit. However, the damage could not be assessed since the cruiser's two escorts forced Sailfish to dive deep and run silent. Running at , the submarine eluded the destroyers and proceeded south toward Java. She arrived at Tjilatjap on 14 February for refueling and rearming.
Departing on 19 February for her third patrol, she headed through Lombok Strait to the Java Sea. After sighting the heavy cruiser and two escorts heading for Sunda Strait following the Allied defeat in the Battle of the Java Sea, Sailfish intercepted an enemy destroyer on 2 March. Following an unsuccessful attack, she was forced to dive deep to escape the ensuing depth-charge attack from the destroyer and patrol aircraft. That night, near the mouth of Lombok Strait, she spotted what appeared to be the aircraft carrier , escorted by four destroyers. Sailfish fired four torpedoes, scoring two hits. Leaving the target aflame and dead in the water, Sailfish dove, the escorts delivering 40 depth charges in the next 90 minutes. She eluded destroyers and aircraft and arrived at Fremantle, Western Australia, on 19 March, to great fanfare, believed to be the first U.S. submarine to have sunk an enemy carrier. In reality, the Kaga was scuttled in June, 1942, after damage sustained during the Battle of Midway, in that vicinity. Postwar, Kaga was revealed to have been nowhere in the area of Lombok Strait, and the target had in fact been the aircraft ferry Kamogawa Maru, still a valuable target.
The Java Sea and Celebes Sea were the areas of Sailfishs fourth patrol, from 22 March–21 May. After delivering 1,856 rounds of antiaircraft ammunition to "MacArthur's guerrillas", she made only one ship contact and was unable to attack the target before returning to Fremantle.
The submarine's fifth patrol—from 13 June through 1 August—was off the coast of Indochina in the South China Sea. On 4 July, she intercepted and tracked a large freighter, but discovered the intended target was a hospital ship and held her fire. On 9 July, she intercepted and torpedoed a Japanese freighter. One of a pair of torpedoes struck home and the ship took a 15° list. As Sailfish went deep, a series of explosions was heard, and no further screw noises were detected. When the submarine surfaced in the area 90 minutes later, no ship was in sight. She was credited during the war with a 7000-ton ship, and although postwar examination of Japanese records confirmed no sinking in the area on that date, the Sailfish had damaged the Japanese transport ship Aobasan Maru (8811 GRT) off the coast of Indochina in position 11°31'N, 109°21'E.
Sailfish observed only one other enemy vessel before the end of the patrol.
Sixth and seventh patrols: September 1942 – January 1943 Shifting her base of operations to Brisbane, Sailfish (now under the command of John R. "Dinty" Moore) got underway for her sixth patrol on 13 September and headed for the western Solomon Islands. On the night of 17–18 September, she encountered eight Japanese destroyers escorting a cruiser, but she was unable to attack. On 19 September, she attacked a minelayer. The spread of three torpedoes missed, and Sailfish was forced to dive deep to escape the depth-charge counterattack. Eleven well-placed charges went off near the submarine, causing much minor damage. Sailfish returned to Brisbane on 1 November.
Underway for her seventh patrol on 24 November, Sailfish proceeded to the area south of New Britain. Following an unsuccessful attack on a destroyer on 2 December, the submarine made no other contacts until 25 December, when she believed she had scored a hit on a Japanese submarine. Postwar analysis of Japanese records could not confirm a sinking in the area. During the remainder of the patrol, she made unsuccessful attacks on a cargo ship and a destroyer before ending the patrol at Pearl Harbor on 15 January 1943.
Eighth and ninth patrols: May–September 1943