At Close Quarters: PT Boats in the United States Navy

by Robert J. Bulkley

Overview

"The thorough and competent account herein of over-all PT boat operations in World War II, compiled by Captain Robert Bulkley, a distinguished PT boat commander, should prove of wide interest. The widest use of the sea, integrated fully into our national strength, is as important to America in the age of nuclear power and space travel as in those stirring days of the birth of the Republic."
President John Fitzgerald Kennedy

Robert Johns Bulkley (1880 – 1965) was a United States Democratic Party politician from Ohio. He served in the United States House of Representatives, and in the United States Senate from 1930 until 1939.
A graduate of Harvard University for undergraduate studies and law school, Bulkley commenced the practice of law in Cleveland, Ohio in 1906. Bulkley served two terms in the House from 1911-1915 from the 21st District on Cleveland's East Side. During World War One he served as chief of the legal section of the War Industries Board. He was later elected to the U.S. Senate in 1930 to fill the vacancy created by the death of Theodore E. Burton. Bulkley was re-elected in 1932, but lost a bid for a second full term in 1938 to Robert A. Taft. After his term in the Senate ended, he resumed his practice of law.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9788822804532
Publisher:	Arcadia Press
Publication date:	07/29/2017
Sold by:	StreetLib SRL
Format:	eBook
Sales rank:	263,312
File size:	508 KB

About the Author

Robert J. Bulkley, a retired USNR captain now deceased, commanded PT boats in the southwest Pacific, mostly in New Guinea and the Philippines, from June 1942 to war's end.

Read an Excerpt

AT CLOSE QUARTERS

PT Boats in the United States Navy

Chapter One

Into Action-Pearl Harbor and the

When Japanese planes attacked Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7, 1941 there were three squadrons of PT's in the U.S. Navy. Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 1, commanded by Lt. Comdr. William C. Specht, had 12 boats based at Pearl Harbor, all of which opened fire on the attackers.

Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 2, under Lt. Comdr. Earl S. Caldwell, was in the New York Navy Yard, completing the fitting out of 11 boats which, loaded on the aircraft ferry ships Hammondsport and Kitty Hawk, were to leave New York 10 days later to augment the defenses of the Panama Canal. These boats were not to meet the enemy until nearly a year later, when, with desperate optimism, they were to stand out night after night in the path of the mighty Tokyo Express at Guadalcanal.

Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 3, six boats commanded by Lt. John D. Bulkeley, had arrived in Manila Bay on September 28. During the 4 dark months of the hopeless defense of the Philippines, the officers and men of Squadron 3 carried the fight to the enemy with determination and shining courage until the boats could fight no more.

Until war came, PT's in the U.S. Navy were an untried type. They had never met the test of action, and no standard doctrine for their employment had been established. But by the end of January, 1942, Rear Adm. Francis W. Rockwell, Commandant of the 16th Naval District, was able to write from Corregidor, "These boats are proving their worth in operations here, having sunk two ships of three to five thousand tons and three landing boats."

These boats did prove their worth: the Navy built more of them. On December 7, 1941, there were 29 PT's; on December 7, 1943, there were more than 29 squadrons. PT's met the Tokyo Express at Guadalcanal. They cut enemy barge supply lines in the upper Solomons and along the New Guinea coast. They torpedoed German cargo lighters in the Mediterranean, and overcame E-boats in gunnery duels in the English Channel. They contributed to the rout of Japanese task forces in the Battle of Surigao Strait, and successfully countered vicious Kamikaze attacks at Mindoro. Under cover of darkness they freely landed agents, scouts, and reconnaissance parties throughout the Solomons, New Guinea, and the Philippines, and on the coasts of France and Italy. PT's were in more frequent contact with the enemy, and at closer range, than any other type of surface craft. They specialized in close-range, close-to-shore attack, and everywhere demonstrated that they could hurt the enemy with proportionately small damage to themselves.

On the morning of December 7, 1941, six PT's, the 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, and 25, were moored at the Pearl Harbor Submarine Base in three nests of two boats each, alongside and ahead of the YR-20, a covered barge which served, for lack of anything better, as tender for Squadron 1. Aboard the barge the boat crews were eating breakfast. The Squadron Duty Officer, Ens. N. E. Ball, USNR, was standing on the edge of the barge. Looking out across Kuahua Island, he saw planes in the sky, and watched them idly for a moment as they started to dive toward Battleship Row and Ford Island just beyond. Then four things happened, almost simultaneously. Ensign Ball recognized Japanese insignia on the wingtips; a chief petty officer at his elbow remarked, "They look like Japs"; the first bomb dropped, and Ensign Ball plunged into the messhall, shouting, "Man the Guns!"

PT's in those days were lightly gunned-two pairs of .50-caliber machineguns mounted in power-driven turrets, but in a matter of seconds all were firing. Joy Van Zyll de Jong, GMic, and George B. Huffman, TMic, who had been sitting on the deck of PT 23, got a slight head start on the men from the messhall. They vaulted into the 23 boat's turrets and claimed first blood with hits on a low-flying plane carrying one torpedo, which crashed in flames near Kuahua Island. They also hit a torpedo plane flying over Magazine Point. It burst into flames and fell near Halawa, behind the Submarine Base.

Across Southeast Loch from the Submarine Base, about halfway to Ford Island, the other six boats of the squadron were being loaded aboard the USS Ramapo, an oiler, for shipment to the Philippines. PT's 27, 29, 30, and 42 were in cradles resting on the Ramapo's deck. PT's 26 and 28 were in cradles on the dock beneath the huge hammerhead crane which had been about to hoist them aboard the oiler. To reduce fire hazard during shipment, the gasoline tanks of all six PT's had been blanketed with carbon dioxide. Consequently the crews could not start the gasoline engines to compress the air which in turn forced oil through cylinders to move the power turrets. The boat crews quickly cut the hydraulic lines, freeing the turrets from the brake of residual hydraulic pressure. Then each pair of .50-caliber machineguns went into action with a four-man crew: one man to fire the guns, two men to slew the turrets around by hand, and an officer to direct and coordinate the slewing and firing. The Ramapo's guns were firing, too. Though her starboard 3-inch guns were blanked off by the hammerhead crane on the dock, they managed to fire from time to time, to the acute discomfort of the crews of the PT's in cradles on the dock, whose decks were just high enough to catch the muzzle blast. One bomb struck near the port bow of the Ramapo, midway between the repair ship Rigel in the berth ahead and the heavy cruiser New Orleans opposite. The PT's, undamaged, poured out more than 4,000 rounds of .50 caliber. They appeared to be hitting Japanese planes, but so many ships were firing simultaneously that it would be futile to attempt to make specific claims.

The Ramapo was to have carried those six boats to Manila Bay, to be transferred to Squadron 3. But the Japanese descended so swiftly on the Philippines and with such concentrated force that shipping anything into Manila Bay was out of the question. The boats were put back into the water at Pearl Harbor, leaving Squadron 3 to do the best it could with its six boats, PT's 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, and 41.

The PT's of Squadron 3, based at the Cavite Navy Yard, went into action on December 10, when the Japanese made their first heavy air attack in the Manila Bay area. The air raid warning system was working well that day, giving the boats plenty of time to get underway into Manila Bay, where they could maneuver freely. The first planes started bombing Nichols Field at 1247. A few minutes later a wave of some 35 started to work over shipping in Manila Bay. It was high-level bombing, 20,000 feet, well beyond the range of the PT's .50-caliber machineguns and the pair of .30-caliber Lewis guns which the Squadron 3 boats had installed in single mounts on the forward deck. Then five bombers peeled off deliberately and started to dive on the PT's. Theoretically, it was possible for a PT to wait until a diving plane reached its release point, and then, by putting the wheel hard over, to avoid the bomb. The boats proved the theory-not a bomb came close. Besides, PT 31 claimed to have shot down two planes and PT 35 one.

The first bomb fell on the Navy Yard at 1314. For more than an hour thereafter, 3 waves of 27 bombers each swept over, out of antiaircraft range, dropping their explosives at will. Practically every bomb fell within the Navy Yard limits, with direct hits on the powerplant, dispensary, torpedo repair shop, supply office, warehouse, signal station, commissary store, barracks, officers' quarters, and several ships, tugs, and barges along the waterfront. The entire yard and one-third of the city of Cavite were ablaze.

PT's could outmaneuver the planes; their spares and equipment could not. The only spares saved were nine engines which John Bulkeley had had the foresight to store in private garages in Manila. Of these, three were lost on January 2 when Manila was invaded. Of the other six, subsequently lightered to Corregidor, two were lost on January 9 when the Corregidor North Dock was bombed. The last four had to be left on Corregidor when the squadron departed in March. Nearly as serious as the loss of spares was the loss of thousands of drums of 100-octane gasoline.

The destruction of the Navy Yard was so complete that all remaining facilities had to be set up in new locations, well dispersed in anticipation of future air raids. Squadron 3 moved to Sisiman Bay, a little cove just east of Mariveles Harbor on the southern tip of the Bataan Peninsula, but not until after the boats had done yeoman service on the afternoon of December 10 transporting wounded from the Navy Yard to the hospital at Cañacao.

The first few weeks at Sisiman Bay were discouraging. The squadron took over a small fishing dock and a few native nipa huts ashore. Each morning John Bulkeley visited headquarters to receive orders for the night's operations. The boats made routine, nonproductive patrols of the Bataan coast north of Manila Bay, and along the Batangas Peninsula to the south, as far as Verde Island. Doctrine demanded that PT's patrol in two- or three-boat sections, so that if one boat should find itself in trouble, there would be another at hand to give assistance. But because there were so few boats, so few spares, so little gasoline, prudence had to make concessions. Seldom could more than one PT be spared for a patrol. Often one PT was accompanied by a YP, a small patrol vessel, either the Maryanne, the Perry, or the Fisheries II, or, until they departed from the area, one of two four-stack destroyers, the Pillsbury and the Peary. As the Japanese closed their net, nerves became tense and there were false reports of sightings along the Bataan coast. Many fruitless PT searches resulted.

PT's required constant maintenance. The only repair facilities available were the old submarine tender Canopus, anchored at Mariveles, which turned out miracles of improvisation for the boats, and the drydock Dewey which lifted each boat in turn. PT 32 had an accidental explosion in the engine-room. She was out of action for weeks.

During December most of the Asiatic Fleet moved south. The Japanese had command of the air and bombed Manila at will. Rear Admiral Rockwell moved his headquarters to Corregidor on December 21. Three days later he had a final conference with Adm. Thomas C. Hart, Commander in Chief Asiatic Fleet, at Admiral Hart's headquarters in the Marsman Building in Manila. During the conference the Marsman Building was bombed three times. Admiral Rockwell learned that Admiral Hart was moving south to be with the operating fleet, leaving Admiral Rockwell in command of all naval forces in the Manila area. On his return to Corregidor that evening, Admiral Rockwell found that Gen. Douglas MacArthur, President Manuel Quezon, and Francis B. Sayre, American High Commissioner to the Philippines, had also moved to the Rock.

On Christmas night Admiral Hart departed on the submarine Shark. Manila was about to be declared an open city, so Admiral Rockwell sent his aide, Lt. (jg.) M. M. Champlin, USNR, to arrange for destruction of gasoline and oil stores in the city. Lieutenant Champlin accomplished this with the help of oil company executives in Manila.

On December 26 Admiral Rockwell reported to General MacArthur for duty. During the day Japanese planes made determined efforts to sink gunboats, PT's, and especially the destroyers Pillsbury and Peary. Unwilling to risk the destroyers further, Admiral Rockwell ordered them south on the 27th. On December 28, the day Manila was declared an open city, Admiral Rockwell decided in conference with Capt. John Wilkes, Commander Submarines Asiatic Fleet, that "due to the increasing danger and difficulty of service in Mariveles, shortage and limitation of fuel and total lack of rest for personnel between patrols, as well as the likelihood of the Japanese blocking Manila Bay entrance," the basing of submarines in the area was no longer practicable. Captain Wilkes, his staff, and his submarines departed at the end of December, leaving behind the tender Canopus and the submarine rescue vessel Pigeon to serve as advance operating facilities for such submarines as might come into the Manila area.

Admiral Rockwell's forces, then, consisted of Canopus and Pigeon; three small, shallow-draft gunboats originally built to patrol Chinese rivers: Mindanao, Luzon, and Oahu; three old minesweepers: Quail, Finch, and Tanager; five tugs: Genesee, Vaga, Napa, Trabajador, and Ranger; three small patrol vessels: Maryanne, Perry, and Fisheries II; and the PT's of Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 3.

On December 22 a convoy with 76 Japanese transports began to unload in Lingayen Gulf, about a hundred miles away.

The U.S. Army completed its withdrawal into Bataan Peninsula on December 31. On January 2 the Japanese Army entered Manila.

5. SS "CORREGIDOR"

On the night of December 17 there was a large explosion in Sisiman Cove. Looking out across the entrance to Manila Bay, the men of Squadron 3 could see many flashing lights on the water. Lieutenant Bulkeley immediately got PT's 32, 34, and 35 underway. At the edge of the minefield at the entrance of the bay they found the water thick with oil and dotted with survivors of the SS Corregidor, a Filipino ship carrying evacuees from Manila to Australia. Leaving the harbor on a faulty course, the Corregidor had struck a mine and gone down almost immediately.

The PT crews rigged ladders and lines over the side, and worked until they were exhausted hauling the wet and oily passengers aboard. Not until they put the survivors ashore at Corregidor and aboard the SS Si-Kiang at Mariveles were they able to count them. When they did, they could scarcely believe the total. The three boats had picked up 296 passengers, of whom all but 7 survived. PT 32, a 77-foot boat designed to carry 2 officers and 9 men, had taken aboard, in addition to its own crew, 196 passengers from the Corregidor.

6. "MOTOR TORPEDO BOATS ARE RAPIDLY

PT 33, patrolling south of Manila Bay with the Pillsbury on the night of December 24, went hard aground on a coral reef 5 miles north of Cape Santiago. On Christmas Day, PT's 31 and 41 made three attempts to pull the 33 boat off the reef, but could not move her.

Continues...

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Excerpted from AT CLOSE QUARTERS by ROBERT J. BULKLEY, Jr.
Excerpted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Table of Contents

Part I.	Into Action--Pearl Harbor and the Philippines
1.	The Lineup	1
2.	"They Look Like Japs"	2
3.	Manila Bay	3
4.	The Fleet Withdraws	6
5.	SS Corregidor	7
6.	"Motor Torpedo Boats Are Rapidly Deteriorating"	8
7.	Visit to Binanga	9
8.	End of the 31	11
9.	Gunnery Actions	13
10.	Return to Subic	14
11.	The 32 in Action	14
12.	Subic Again	15
13.	The General Departs	16
14.	The 32	19
15.	President Quezon	19
16.	Engagement Off Cebu	21
17.	"We Could No Longer Fight"	24
18.	And Then There Were None	25
19.	End of the Squadron	26
20.	"Two Hundred Boats If Possible"	27
Part II.	Development--A New Type Emerges
1.	What Is a PT?	29
2.	Ancient History	38
3.	World War I and After	40
4.	Scott-Paine and Vosper	42
5.	Renewed Interest	43
6.	The Design Contest	44
7.	PT 9	45
8.	The Elco Contract	47
9.	The Squadrons	48
10.	The 77-Foot Boat	50
11.	Southern Waters and Lend-Lease	51
12.	PTC's	51
13.	The Plywood Derbies	52
14.	Standardization	56
15.	Reshuffling the Squadrons	58
16.	The Training Center	59
17.	Taboga	64
18.	Shakedown	66
19.	Commissioning Details	67
20.	Ferrying Command	68
21.	Tenders	68
22.	Bases	73
23.	Hellcat and Elcoplane	76
Part III.	Guadalcanal and Beyond--the Solomons Campaign
1.	Midway: Between Two Campaigns	79
2.	To the South Pacific	82
3.	The Struggle for Guadalcanal	84
4.	Meeting the Tokyo Express	86
5.	The Battle of Guadalcanal	91
6.	After Tassafaronga	95
7.	Evacuation	103
8.	A Lull in Operations	105
9.	Loss of the Niagara	109
10.	The Stanvac Manila	112
11.	The McCawley	114
12.	Transition	116
13.	First Action at Rendova	117
14.	Costly Errors	119
15.	They Didn't Pass the Word	120
16.	The 109	124
17.	Barge Hunting	128
18.	Vella Lavella	134
19.	Daylight Strikes	135
20.	End of the New Georgia Campaign	137
21.	Treasury and Bougainville	139
22.	A Brush with Torpedo Bombers	141
23.	Destroyers Again	143
24.	Shore Batteries	145
25.	To Green Island	146
26.	Collision	148
27.	Action in Empress Augusta Bay	149
28.	Rabaul	151
29.	March and April 1944	152
30.	The Rugged Life	154
31.	Task Group 30.3	157
32.	A Trap	159
33.	Task Group 70.8	161
Part IV.	Southwest Pacific--Conquest of New Guinea
1.	To the Buna Campaign	167
2.	The Cruise of the Hilo	168
3.	Tufi	172
4.	Task Group 70.1	175
5.	Battle of the Bismarck Sea	180
6.	Some Barges and a Fire	182
7.	Douglas Harbor and Morobe	183
8.	Thursday Island	185
9.	Kiriwina, Woodlark, and Nassau Bay	188
10.	Actions in Huon Gulf	191
11.	Lae, Salamaua, and Finschafen	196
12.	Morobe: October and November	198
13.	A Letter From General Berryman	205
14.	Tenders, Staff, and Logistics	206
15.	Kiriwina	212
16.	Dreger Harbor	213
17.	Action on a Reef	215
18.	A Submersible	216
19.	Planes at Arawe	217
20.	Actions Along the New Guinea Coast	219
21.	Expansion	222
22.	Destruction in Hansa Bay	224
23.	The Admiralties	227
24.	Rein Bay and Talasea	231
25.	New Britain: South Coast	234
26.	Saidor	236
27.	Aitape	239
28.	Mios Woendi	240
29.	Operations in Geelvink Bay	248
30.	Amsterdam Island	254
31.	End of the New Guinea Campaign	257
Part V.	The Aleutians--A Battle Against Weather
1.	A Race for Islands	261
2.	MTB Division 1	262
3.	Squadron 13	265
Part VI.	The Mediterranean--Torpedo War
1.	Squadron 15	277
2.	North Africa	278
3.	Bizerte	282
4.	Sicilian Invasion	285
5.	Palermo	287
6.	Invasion of Italy	292
7.	Maddalena and Bastia	295
8.	Winter Operations	299
9.	Collision With a Minesweeper	301
10.	Anzio	302
11.	TB Destroyers	303
12.	Fun With Rockets	305
13.	Operation Gun	307
14.	Expansion	311
15.	Corvettes and Destroyers	312
16.	Elba	315
17.	Capture of an MAS	320
18.	The Thunderbolt	321
19.	Southern France	322
20.	The Advance Landings	323
21.	Diversionary Operations	324
22.	Mines	327
23.	Porquerolles	329
24.	The Gulf of Fos	329
25.	Explosive Boats and Human Torpedoes	334
26.	Last Days at Bastia	337
27.	Leghorn	339
28.	Torpedoing the Harbors	345
29.	The Last Patrols	346
Part VII.	The English Channel--D-Day and After
1.	D-Day and the Mason Line	349
2.	The Channel Islands	359
3.	The Eastern Flank	362
4.	End of the Campaign	364
Part VIII.	Southwest Pacific--Return to the Philippines
1.	Morotai	367
2.	Rescue in Wasile Bay	368
3.	Losses	371
4.	Containing and Harassing	373
5.	Battle of Surigao Strait	376
6.	Air Attacks	390
7.	Leyte and Cebu	395
8.	First Days at Mindoro	402
9.	A Japanese Task Force	406
10.	Mindoro Convoy	408
11.	Task Group 77.11	411
12.	Mindoro Patrols	412
13.	Bases and Logistics	415
14.	Lingayen Gulf	420
15.	Return to Manila Bay	422
16.	Palawan	425
17.	Zamboanga	426
18.	Panay	427
19.	East to Davao	428
20.	Tarakan	432
21.	Tawi Tawi	434
22.	Brunei Bay	436
23.	Balikpapan	437
24.	MTBRonsPac	438
25.	Surrender	441
26.	The End and the Beginning	445
	Postscript	448
Appendix A	Composition of the Squadrons	449
Appendix B	PT Losses	486
Appendix C	Awards and Citations	489
Appendix D	Casualties	510
	A Note on Sources	520
	Index	533