USS Tambor [KTB 175]

No sound was reaching us from above for quite some time and Captain Kefauver decided to risk surfacing. Was the enemy cunning enough to be waiting for us? There was no way to tell. We went into action, but DECIDING to surface and REALLY surfacing were two different things. The TAMBOR had been sitting on the bottom for over fifteen hours, and the sand had locked her in solidly. Instead of being at 268 feet, we had settled to 280 feet! Even with all the tanks blown, she wouldn’t budge. Power to the screws had to be used cautiously – the screws couldn’t turn. We were stuck!

If you have ever stood in the surf at a seashore, you will remember your feet were buried in the sand after a couple of waves. This should give you a mental picture of the problems and the task of getting the boat free from twelve feet of sand. The sea bottom was well stirred after about eighteen hours and seventy depth charges.

We were now in an extremely precarious situation. With the loss of almost all the air in our starboard storage bottles, we were left with only a limited supply. Submerged, we could not compress more air. If we were to survive, we must now use our remaining air in the most judicious manner. Air bubbles were carefully measured into all tanks in order to put equal lift by tank volume through the ballast system. Finally, there was a shudder and then another, and we were free. FREE!

Words cannot describe the tension and anxiety of those last few minutes stuck on the bottom. Every man knew that as the use of stored air was consumed, we came closer to remaining forever locked there on the bottom, surrounded by tons of sand and bottom silt. We had to shake free before all our compressed air was gone.

All stations had to be manned to react to surfacing and other necessary underway operations. We pumped bilges. We even blew the heads – the toilet holding tanks – and with thanks to William Blankenbaker, Chief of the Boat and his skill as a diving officer, he resorted to using air bubbles in the tanks for added buoyancy and at last, we broke loose. It was a tense few minutes to the surface, all the while maintaining control of the boat. Blankenbaker had two compartments still partially flooded, so keeping TAMBOR level was far from an ordinary job.

With most of the gauges inoperative, we did not know how much pressure we had in the boat. The gauges were either not reading correctly because of the shocks from the depth charges, or broken glass had shifted the original setting.

When the conning tower hatch was finally opened, the pressure almost carried the man up the ladder. The sudden change in air pressure was far more than we had ever before experienced. In an instant, the conning tower air turned to a smoky blue vapor. Topside, the odor of diesel fuel was heavy. We scanned an empty horizon and breathed a sigh of relief. No enemy destroyer in sight.

When the engines were called on the line, we found the governor base (used to control the speed of the engine) on Number Two engine was cracked. With some extra coaxing, the other engines responded. The seven hundred KW auxiliary engine was put on battery charge and, with some jury rigging, we finally got the governor to perform and eventually had all four engines putting distance between us and that unlucky location.

The time had arrived to assess our damage in details and then attempt to restore TAMBOR to fighting trim. Even a casual glance told us that nothing had escaped serious damage, so we set to work

It took many hours of concentrated work with Bob Hunt directing the forward torpedo room repairs, to restore the most crucial parts to use and reload the torpedoes in the tubes. The turbo blower had been ripped off its base, the bolts totally stripped. Gus Builder, auxiliaryman, worked with warren Link to fashion bolts from raw stock on the boat’s lathe. Gus hand-filed the hex-heads on these bolts and retapped the old holes, making it possible to refasten the blower to its base.

Both our compressors were destroyed almost beyond use, which meant we could not jam (compress) air. We would be restricted to the use of whatever air remained in the stored bottles of dives and torpedo shots…..not a good prospect. In the end, Gus and Art Stickle cannibalized the two compressors into one good one. It goes without saying that the motor on the turbo blower needed repair. This was efficiently handled by ‘Chesty’ DeBay.

Our air conditioning system was so full of line leaks that it could not be repaired. The refrigeration for our food freezer was also finished – the food had already started to defrost. Number One periscope was flooded as was the S.D. radar mast. The radio antenna was also gone.

The radio compartment itself was not in bad shape, except for the damaged antenna allowing water to leak into the transmitter. Bill Shoop, Harvey Rebensterf and ‘Red’ Mayo divided the work into areas of expertise, and went to it. They somehow succeeded in getting a weak signal by running a lead for the transmitter through the control room and out the conning tower hatch. We stationed a man there with an ax, just in case we had to dive in a hurry.

Another antenna was rigged to makeshift style across the deck as far as its length allowed. Incidentally, during this work ‘Red’ Mayo discovered he was deaf in one ear from listening to the depth charges on the sound gear. His condition lasted ten days.

Robert Dye sat on the control room deck struggling to fix the S.D. radar. The filament leads of the tube that drives the spark coil were shorted. Our cipher keys were outdated and we had no reception from Pearl Harbor. Since our operational commanders were not receiving our messages, the TAMBOR, ten days overdue, was presumed lost. ‘Tokyo Rose’ reported us as being sunk! This presumption was brought to the attention of Vito Vitucci’s wife while she was on duty at the Naval Communications Station in Washington, DC – but as soon as our weak radio transmissions were picked up, our real fate was known.

The conning tower was a near-total wreck. Glass, cork, charts and anything else that could be torn loose was on the deck. The Torpedo Data Computer was hanging from its fastenings. Two dials were missing, but we located them in the periscope well. A periscope well is only eighteen inches in diameter and about twenty feet deep to house the periscope – how to fish them out? Walter Post and Elmer Atchison make a yoke out of a pillow and two heaving lines, and lowered Warren Link with a flashlight hanging from his neck, to the bottom to pick up the much needed dials. Then, working continuously for fourteen hours, Post got the computer into operation & ‘Atch’ managed to get the navigational and plotting gear in order.

The five-inch gun on the after deck was off its trunnions. Imagine the power of the depth charge that lifted such a weight, and with the muzzle bracketed in place!

The depth charge that went off real close to TAMBOR left several grey-white blotches on the superstructure. Subsequent examination revealed a twenty-one inch split in the port side of the fuel ballast tank. We had thus lost a few thousand gallons of fuel oil along with the air we heard escaping from the air bottles. At the time the destroyer kept hammering us, the vast amount of fuel oil escaping must have convinced the enemy that he had done us in completely. TAMBOR, we felt, seemed to have had her own way of fooling the enemy to protect us.

Now we shifted fuel, but soon realized that the only way to rid ourselves of the oil leak was the flush the tank, and this could only be accomplished by reconverting the valves in the superstructure. John Scaduto, our ‘Oil King’ and Warren Link volunteered to make the conversion, which meant crawling among a jumble of lines and removing the ballast plates so the tanks could be blown and then reinstalled and tightened sufficiently to hold the pressure of the entire tank.

All this was done by the light of a battle lantern which a man handled from the deck. When the job was completed, the valves were quickly tested - - when the high pressure air hit those valves, there was a roar like the sound of a boat diving. As our ‘Oil King’ John Scaduto, ran past the men on the deck on his way to the conning tower, he yelled, “Don’t get in my way!”

So, with the fuel ballast tanks converted and flushed, the oil hazard was presumably overcome.

The maneuvering room was under ‘Chesty’ DeBay’s care, and he had serious problems there. When we started the battery charge, it was with a full voltage ground. We had survived seventy depth charges and now we faced a possible battery explosion that could wipe us out. ‘Chesty’s’ men scurried through the boat trying to resolve all kinds of electrical problems and many days later when we reached Midway, they were still chasing electrical problems and fixing them!

In spite of our continuous efforts to pull the after torpedo room hatches tight, they were still leaking. A spirits tank (fuel tank for servicing torpedoes) had ruptured from the bulkhead where it had been secured with ¾ inch bolts. The torpedo tube spindles were bent by the concussion and there was no way we could make them operational. The after tubes were useless. Ole Claussen, George Venditelli and Carl Johnson worked tirelessly to regain the use of even one tube so we would have stern protection, but all their efforts were unsuccessful. To think that seventy depth charges could do this to TAMBOR.

Nine days later, the Captain’s voice came over the P.A. system, “Boys, I’ve just completed a thorough inspection of our boat. as you well know, we’re in one helluva shape, but I think she’s good enough for another shot at ‘Ol Tojo’ so if you’ll back me up, I’d like to see what we can do to another convoy out there. I promise, one more try and then we’ll head for the barn.”

Any objections? You kidding? We sank another ship, the RONSAU MARU with one good hit out of the torpedo spread - - and we received the usual reply of depth charges for our audacity. But this time we were in deep water and our evasive action put us well in the clear. There was not even a close one.

At last, we were heading for home!

This is absolutely great first-person historical memories of the war at sea, remembered by those who were there – they experienced this time and thanks to the crew of USS TAMBOR, we have some superb history preserved for future generations.

Thanks guys, and thanks to MARC COHEN (166-A/LIFE-1986) for sending it along.