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The Fabulous PTs

They are fitted with a wide variety of armament especially suited to PT combat. Highangle, rapid-fire guns are not only offensive weapons against planes and ships, but can quickly knock out enemy searchlights. Torpedoes and depth charges pack the punch that enables them to accomplish the objective of every mission: "intercept and destroy".

The effectiveness and versatility of the Navy's potent PTs have been among the sensations of this war. The toll of enemy ships, planes and men taken by these speedy combat craft - often against heavy odds - is out of all proportion to their small size and relatively low cost.

PTs have sunk or damaged a huge Jap battleship, several cruisers, 15 to 20 destroyers, at least two submarines and many merchant vessels. They have shot down scores of planes and have destroyed hundreds of enemy troop-carrying barges, many of them fully loaded with men and equipment. They have carried commandos on fast hit-and-run raids and covered our landings on Axisheld shores. And they've completed countless daily missions on patrol in enemy-infested waters.

Today PTs are in action in the Mediterranean and the South Pacific, in the English Channel and the Aleutians, in Hawaii and in the Panama Canal area. As the war increases in intensity, more and more swift, deadly PTs are being rushed to the naval war fronts of the world. New uses, more effective tactics are being discovered and developed for these versatile battle boats. And day by day new exploits are recorded as communiques tell of actions by "light naval craft" - the fabulous PTs.

Theirs was the job of patrolling between Guadalcanal and Tulagi - and they did it well

Under his capable hands, a sturdy chair was taking shape. "You guys may like the idea of squatting around on cots for the next couple of years," said Chief Torpedoman Hobert Denzil Wisdom, emptying his dungaree pockets of nails which he had pilfered from the carpenter shop, "but me, I got to have comforts." Snorting disdainfully, he sawed a board in half and nailed the pieces into place.

The men grinned. But Wisdom worked on. In front of his tent lay an assortment of lumber and tools, also "borrowed" from the shop. Wiz was busy building furniture. It was good furniture, too. "The trouble with you guys," he growled, "you're not civilized." "Maybe," said Gunner's Mate Teddy Kuharski, "you figure to be here forever, huh? Maybe you expect to settle down and raise a family here." With a wink at the others, he placed a hand delicately on his hip and cocked his nose in the air - a dowager at a lawn party. "These, my deah, are our South Sea cousins, the Tulagi Wisdoms. Ah, yes. So unfortunate."

Wisdom grinned back but his hammer banged away without interruption. He put the chair beside a table he had constructed, then hauled another slab of lumber from the pile and applied try-square and pencil. Something puzzled him. Scratching his chin, he sat in the newly finished chair and for a moment was deep in thought.

Some of the others were building furniture, too; inspired, perhaps, by Wisdom's energy and the undeniable need for a few crude comforts. Comforts were scarce on Tulagi. This particular group of PT men, members of a squadron commanded by then Lieutenant Commander Alan R. Montgomery, of Warrenton, Va., had moved into a section of the torpedo boat base located midway between the huddled shacks on the shore and the lookout post on the bluff. They referred to it as "Snob Hill" and considered it an exclusive suburb.

Radioman George Gilpin came up. He was a dark haired southern lad with a sly sense of humor and a grin that could be hidden when necessary behind a studied lack of expression. "I got an idea," he said. "We ought to have some street signs around here to keep you guys from getting lost." "We ought to have some streets, too," said Chief Torpedoman Elvie 0'Daniel, "to get lost on." "Will you birds shut up?" groused Wisdom. "I'm concentrating." "He's concentrating," said Gunner's Mate Roy Beckers. "Everybody stand back." "We need a place to shoot the breeze," Wisdom said. "We need a bench. I'm going to build a bench." "The Seat of Meditation," said 0'Daniel. "He don't mean that kind of bench," Gilpin argued. "Besides, where would we get any mail order catalogs in this place?" "I mean a bench to sit on," said Wisdom. "So we can enjoy the view here and shoot the breeze. It gets too damn hot inside these tents and shacks, and there's too many bugs. Leave me alone, you guys. I got to dope out a bench."

He built one. It was finished a couple of days later and occupied a place of honor on " Main Street," where the boys could sit back and look out over the settlement below and the sea beyond On clear days, the sea was a soft, translucent green, very pretty.

It was a different sea at night. Too often, under cover of darkness, Jap destroyers or cruisers came "down the Slot" from Bougainville to put troops ashore on Guadalcanal and to shell exhausted American Marines encamped around Henderson Field. The midget mosquito boats of Squadron "X" patrolled the bloody waters between Guadalcanal and Tulagi, to prevent enemy infiltration. That was their job. It was grueling work, nerve-racking work, murderous on men and boats alike. For the PT men, those October-November nights of 1942 were long indeed. The fate of Guadalcanal still hung in the balance.

Ashore, the men made the best of what they had. Inspired by Wisdom's work, the occupants of Snob Hill shed their dungarees in the broiling heat of those long afternoons and pitched in to make their surroundings homelike. They swept out the native huts and constructed shelves and cupboards. They put up pictures of wives and sweethearts, built tables for red dog and poker, dug trenches to carry off the rain water which otherwise would have inundated them.

It was terribly hot. Though nearly naked, the men oozed perspiration which attracted swarms of insects. Behind them, Tulagi's gaudy hills rose tawny and green, flecked with flowers and streaked by the passage of brilliant red and snowy white parrots. It was an unhealthy gaudiness, dank and stifling. No one was eager to explore it.

Tables and chairs grew in abundance, and the "snobs" enjoyed unheard of comforts in their high suburb. On the Seat of Meditation, the problems of the war were solved in heated bull sessions. Chief Machinist's Mate Halward Peterson remembered the good times in Panama. Gunner's Mate Leon Nale, a tall, slender lad from Alabama, talked wistfully of the girls he knew. Gilpin and O'Daniel ribbed each other. John Legg taught other quartermasters the finer points of navigation. It was a little like a front porch at home.

One of the men one evening said, "These islands, these lousy, stinking islands - what good are they? For all of me, the Japs can have 'em. Nobody but a goddam Jap would want 'em!" Said Chief Torpedoman Marvin Crosson, a quiet, studious boy with a fine knowledge of history, "They're not islands. Guadalcanal is not an island. They're nothing more or less than little points on a map." "So all right. Let the Japs have 'em." "That's just it. The Japs did have them, and it was important for us to win them back. Look here." Crosson took a dog-eared map from his pocket and spread it on his knees. "Here we are, right here. North of us the enemy is solid, with a string of stepping stones all the way down from Japan. South are Australia and the sea lanes we must use to defend it. From Guadalcanal the Japs could cover those sea lanes with bombers. See?"

They had known it anyway. Grousing was merely an outlet for cramped emotions. But, when the war was over and the Japs were liquidated, Guadalcanal and Tulagi could turn turtle and sink into the sea, for all these men cared. They wouldn't shed a tear.

A poker game was in progress one afternoon - Ship's Cook Frank O'Malley red hot as always - when the glittering sun was engulfed suddenly by swift clouds that let loose a flood. The men scurried for shelter. When it rained on Tulagi, you took no chances.

They plucked their personal possessions from the floors of huts and tents, hung them on anything handy, and pulled up their feet in the manner of a plane retracting its landing gear. Then dolefully they watched the ground about them turn into a sticky sea of mud. Without the drains they had constructed, Snob Hill would have been a complete washout. Tulagi weather was savage.

The Marines on Guadalcanal knew all about this freakish weather. They had been living and dying in it from the beginning, and their airmen had found it a foe almost as treacherous as the Jap. So did the overworked pilots of a handful of SOC biplanes based on Tulagi.

Brave men flew these Navy planes. They were the eyes of the PT boats, tirelessly searching the seas for signs of enemy activity. The weather made little difference to them. They knew that bad weather was a favorite weapon of the Japs and, under or behind any advancing front of swollen clouds, enemy warships were likely to be on the prowl. Consequently, they went out in the worst of it, under impossible conditions. The day of the poker game, one of them did not come back.

At the base, work went steadily on. In charge of the torpedo shop was Ensign (now Lieutenant jg) Stanley C. Thomas, who could make a torpedo talk. He and Chief Torpedomen Shorty Long and Herbert Wing had little time to be concerned about. Tulagi's weather. Sun or rain, they were everlastingly occupied with the boats. It was a six-hour job to get a tin fish' ready for firing, and the fish were fired often. "Ten thousand bucks it costs,” said Shorty, to send one of these babies on its way. We have to be sure they get what they’re sent for.”

Other men were transferred from boats to base whenever the squadron as a whole had need of their talents. Chief Machinist's Mate Arthur Stuffert left his PT to work in the engine shop. Ship's Cook Charlie May was coaxed against his will to slave in the shore galley. Some of the men liked the change; some didn't. Most of them preferred the boats. Typical was Ship's Cook Lloyd Hummer, who ducked his chores ashore and rode one particular boat at every opportunity, praying for action. "Just lemme at 'em," he begged. "We'll show those apes!"

The man who really ran the base force was Chief Boatswain's Mate Charlie Tufts. Nothing stumped Charlie. No job was too big or too pesky. When tools or parts were needed, he sometimes took a walk - usually to the Marine encampment. One day, returning from such a stroll, Charlie ambled solemnly into the torpedo shop and began emptying his pockets. A wrench came out. A handful of nuts and bolts. A weird and varied assortment of odds and ends for which the PT men had been tearing their hair. Charlie blinked at his collection. He was a mild man, a little bumpy in places, running short of hair but never of energy or ingenuity. "Now how in the world," he said, "did I ever get all this stuff? My, my. Someone must have framed me."

Those were the lighter interludes. Some of the others were less happily remembered. Like the night of November 7th. Three of the boats were patrolling that night within shouting distance of one another. One was commanded by Lieutenant Hugh M. Robinson, the squadron executive officer. Another was in charge of Lieutenant (jg) James Brent Greene. The third was skippered by Lieutenant (jg) Leonard A. Nikoloric. Youngsters, all of them. Robbie, the oldest, was 27. The other PT skippers had an affectionate name for him. They called him "Poor Old Robbie."

About midnight, the Japs came in. Brent maneuvered for a shot and fired a spread of four torpedoes at the leading enemy ship, a destroyer. One of the fish jammed in its tube. A fountain of sparks leaped skyward and the quiet night was bedlam. Torpedoman Brenton Goddard cleared the tube with a blow of his mallet.

The torpedoes may have winged home or may not. No one was sure. At any rate, the Jap was still in action and the dazzling fireworks of the "hot run" had given him a point of aim for his searchlights. In a heart beat of time, Robbie and Brent were trapped in the lights while the Jap's guns roared their defiance. The enemy was on his toes that night, performing at peak efficiency. His shooting was good. Too good. A salvo of 4.7's screamed from his main battery and one of them exploded with an earthquake roar on Robbie's bow.

Happily, every man on the mosquito boat was at his battle station. All were tossed about like tenpins but none was forward when the shell struck and none was seriously hurt. Where the bow of the boat had been, however, was now only a jagged mass of plywood splinters. The PT opened fire with her .50 caliber machine guns and struggled to escape. "We in our boat," Lieutenant Nikoloric recalls, "heard the explosion just after getting in a shot. We saw what happened. Robbie's boat was less than 100 yards abeam of us, and the glare of the shell burst lit up the night all around us. We thought it was all over for Robbie and his gang. If that shell hadn't finished them, the next hit certainly would. The Japs were sending everything they had at her."

Owen Pearle, Nick's radioman, sent out a yell over the radio to find out who was alive over there. Someone was, because Robbie's machine guns were crackling. But, after what had happened, there had to be casualties. Are you okay?" Pearle begged. "Are you all right?"

It was Lieutenant Robinson himself who answered. "Hell, yes!" he barked. "We're heading for home!" Despite the loss of her bow, the crippled boat was running with all the speed she could manage, executing a series of wobbly maneuvers that kept the enemy's shells wide of the mark. Meanwhile, Gunner's Mate Ben Parrish, wedged in his turret, clung fast to the grips of his guns and coolly shot out the destroyer's searchlights. It was sweet shooting.

The boat churned on, throwing up fountains of spray. She was getting away. But the Japs had a perfect target. The smoke generator had jammed, and the Jap had the range. Chief Torpedoman Alfred Norwood, an oldtimer with what was needed, started for the smoke pot. Soaking wet, half blinded, barely able to keep his feet on the twisting deck, he fell on the generator and tore at it with his hands. It had to work. Without smoke, the PT was doomed. There, on his knees, Norwood wrestled with the valves while enemy shells crackled overhead like whips.

The valves let go and smoke gushed out - but backward. Now the smoke used on the motor torpedo boats is a chemical mixture shot forth under pressure. It is thick and strangling. It burns cruelly, like acid, and can sear the skin off a man's face or hands quickly. Norwood was caught in the hissing stream and stumbled back out of it, his face and arms in torment. But he went back in. He got his hands on the balky generator and stayed there, pounding it, until the smoke poured out the way it was supposed to. In all this time, the enemy's fire had not diminished.

With the white screen swelling in her wake, the PT at last, shook off pursuit and left the Jap astern. Then Norwood looked at his hands. They were bright red, covered with thin, bulging blisters that broke and peeled away. They were aflame to the elbows. Norwood walked forward on the heaving deck and sat down by the port turret and was sick. But, without question, his coolness and ability in a grave emergency had saved the lives of his shipmates.

It was that way often in the little thunder boats. Fate put the finger on some one man and challenged him: "Brother, it's your turn." The chosen individual might be the skipper, the second in command, a man at the guns or a machinist's mate in the engine room. Officers or enlisted men, it made no difference. Fate played no favorites. Suddenly for a brief, bright flash of time, the lives of all aboard would depend on one man's ability and courage. None knew when his turn might come.

The PT made port that night, limping through the dark with the sea growling in her vitals. It was incredible, but it happened. The Jap who had crippled her was less lucky. Too avid for the kill, he forgot the other PT and left himself unprotected. His searchlight beams and the bright light of his gunbursts were a tempting target. The PT, with Nick at the wheel, Lieutenant (jg) Bernie 0'Neill and Chief Quartermaster John Legg spoting, had stalked him half way across the Slot. Now she slipped up on his silent side, away from the thunder of the guns, and loosed her torpedoes.

A few hours later, Chief Yeoman John Wicks stood on an upturned box in front of the squadron office and, with red and white paint dripping brightly from his brush, added yet another Jap flag to the PT emblem over the doorway. The Guadalcanal Marines were sleeping better. The Japs were learning, the hard way, that Sleepless Lagoon was an area of peril, patrolled by savage little thunder bugs whose sting was often fatal.

Hugh B. Cave. Elco PTs In Action. Squadron "X". Electric Boat Co. 1943.

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