Sailor, Rest Your Oar. Remembering the crew of the USS LAGARTO
In the last months of World War Two, the U.S. fleet submarine USS LAGARTO departed on a war patrol from which it would never return. For sixty years the fate of the submarine had remained a mystery until it was found, silently resting on the sea floor, as if the ocean was finally ready to return the boat and her crew back into the world.
This web site serves as a tribute not only to the USS LAGARTO and surviving family memebrs of the crew, but also to the people who found her after all these years and continue to preserve her memory.
http://www.dbfnetwork.info/lagarto/
WWII Submarine on ‘Eternal Patrol’
60 Years Later, a World War II Submarine May Finally Come Home
Searching for the USS Grunion Has Become a Labor of Love for Three Brothers
The USS Grunion, lost near the Bering Sea in 1942. (U.S. Navy)
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=2330193&page=1
Lost submarine found off Alaska. Search for father may have turned up USS Grunion
By RALPH RANALLI THE BOSTON GLOBE
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/281753_grunion18.html
Long-Lost World War II Sub May Be Found
by Charles Homans
Weekend Edition Saturday, August 26, 2006 · The USS Grunion disappeared in July 1942, leaving 70 American families in grief. Researchers, funded by one of the sons of skipper Mannert L. “Jim†Abele, say they may have found the sub in the Bering Sea. Charles Homans of member station KIAL in Unalaska reports.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5715082
USS Wahoo, Sub found 60 years on.
USS Wahoo, lost in the Pacific in October 1943.
Neale Maynard ONLINE NEWS EDITOR August 19, 2006 12:00am Article from: 
A US submarine lost after claiming to have sunk four Japanese ships during a WWII patrol from Brisbane has been found more than 60 years later.
Reports from Moscow said Russian divers had spotted the wreckage of the USS Wahoo, lost in the Pacific in October 1943.A diving team from the Far Eastern State Technological University in Vladivostok found the sunken submarine in the La Perouse Strait, the Itar-Tass news agency said yesterday.
The La Perouse Strait is between Sakhalin Island and northern Hokkaido, Japan.
Under the command of Dudley “Mush” Morton, USS Wahoo became one of the most famous US WWII submarines.
With 19 Japanese ships totalling 55,000 tonnes sunk, Morton was ranked as one of the top three submarine skippers of the war.
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,20172668-3102,00.html
Infamous World War II Sub Discovered Off Russian Coast
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=2330657&page=1
Russian divers find legendary WWII US submarine Wahoo
Russian divers have discovered the legendary American
WWII submarine Wahoo in the Sea of Japan. The Russian
sailboat Iskra was looking for the Russian L-19
submarine, the last Russian naval loss of the war in
1945, when it came across the wreck of the USS Wahoo,
thought to have gone down in the La Perouse Strait in
1943. Video shows search boat, interviews with members
of the expedition and underwater footage of the
submarine.
http://www.warfish.com/gazette.html
USS WAHOO (SS 238) October 11, 1943 - 79 Men Lost
http://www.csp.navy.mil/ww2boats/wahoo.htm
The Far Eastern State Technical University (FESTU)
http://www.wtec.org/loyola/subseafe/c1_s2.htm#f1_4
The Submarine USS Wahoo Home Page (SS 238)
In espanol
http://www.elsnorkel.com/esp/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1281&FORUM_ID=28&CAT_ID=1&Forum_Title=PECIOS&Topic_Title=USS+Grunion%2C+un+misterio+de+60+a%F1os
The Search for the Wahoo - Sonar and photographic images
http://www.oneternalpatrol.com/uss-wahoo-238-possible-photos.htm
USS GRUNION
A Short Life
By
John Pollock
In the year 2000 the U.S. Navy commemorated their
submarines’ one hundred years of history. In recognizing this event,
the USPS issued five commemorative stamps that portrayed five
different classes of submarines that saw duty during that time frame.
One particular class stood head and shoulders above the rest that
fought in any war that was the Gato which achieved the highest
Japanese tonnage sunk in WW II. At the start of the US entering the
war on December 7, 1941 the Navy had only one Gato boat available.
During the course of the war over seventy would be built and
commissioned; nineteen would be lost. These boats were commonly
known as a Fleet Boat, also nicknamed the “Pacific Warhorse†for
their daring and aggressive attacks on the enemy. Not only did they
perform well in sinking ships, they excelled on special missions,
plucking downed US pilots from the ocean even though under heavy
enemy fire. These operations took place mainly while the US was
defending or invading the pacific islands. At the end of the war,
when information of these daring exploits were released to the
public, some submarines became household names, for example
the top three submarines for sinking the most Japanese tonnage were
Flasher, Rasher and Barb in that order, all Gato boats. In addition,
other courageous boats, Wahoo and Harder, sank nineteen and
sixteen ships respectively. Harder’s effort included sinking five
destroyers within a two day period, and Commander Samuel David
Dealey received the United States Congressional Medal of Honor
for that feat. Commander Eugene Bennett Fluckey of the Barb also
received the medal for daring courageous action. The Gato class
submarine showed such resilience that some of these vessels were
still seeing service in the late sixties.
One Gato boat was not as fortunate for achievements as those
mentioned above, it was the USS Grunion (SS 216), and she had a
short career. Her keel was laid on March 1, 1941, launched December
20, commissioned on April 11, 1942 and lost with all hands on her
first patrol on July 30, 1942. The major features of the submarine
were: length 312 feet, surface displacement 1526 tons, six torpedo
tubes on the bow and four on the stern, one three-inch deck gun,
four engines and a diving depth of 300 feet.
Figure 1 shows a first day of issue cover that commemorates the
role the Gato class submarine played during WW II. The stamp is a
$3.20 Gato class, designed by Carl Herman, Sc. 3377 issued on
March 27, 2000. The cover is from Artcraft and the cachet design
shows a bird’s eye view photograph of the midship and bridge of a
post WW II submarine.
Figure 2 shows a naval cover issued for the keel laying
ceremony on March 1, 1941. The cover is franked with two stamps,
1c bright blue green Eli Whitney and 2c rose-carmine Samuel F. B.
Morse, both American inventors honored in the Famous American
Issues. The stamps are Sc. 889 and Sc. 890 issued on October 7,
1940. The cover has a Groton Connecticut postmark dated March
1, 1941 and is addressed to Perkins Institute Watertown,
Massachusetts. The cachet was designed by W. Spader which shows
a profile of a plunging Grunion in the foreground of a scroll giving
information on the keel laying ceremony and the builder’s name,
the Electric Boat Company Groton, Connecticut.
Continued on page 8
Figure 3 shows a naval cover that commemorates the
launching of Grunion, December 20, 1941. The cover is franked
by a 2c rose carmine National Defense Issue, Sc. 900 issued on
October 16, 1940. The cover has a U.S.S. Falcon postmark dated
December 20, 1941 with the slogan GRUNION LAUNCHED. The
cachet was designed by K. Streeter which shows the submarine in
the launching slip and a silhouette of a grunion fish.
Grunion under the command of Mannert Lincoln Abele left
New London Connecticut and headed for the Aleutian waters via
Panama Canal and Pearl Harbor. The first war action that Grunion
experienced took place in Panama during a heavy storm. It was
mostly a rescue effort in which more than fifteen merchant sailors
were plucked from the ocean after their ship was sunk by a German
U-Boat. This rescue was a highly successful operation performed
under rough weather conditions, and was recognized by higher naval
authorities for a job well done. After discharging the rescued
seamen, Grunion continued to Pearl Harbor, reporting there for
servicing and for operation briefings before heading to the Aleutian
Islands, Alaska.
Operating in the Aleutians at any time can be hazardous.
Navigation charts for the waters around the islands were extremely
poor and in some cases simply wrong. Coupled with that, the
Alaskan weather for most times of the year was foul and foggy, and
making matters worse for Grunion, were reports circulating that
the Aleutian waters were teeming with Japanese submarines. This
then was the environment that Grunion gallantly had to face.
In the middle of July 1942 on her first patrol off Kiska, Grunion
had her first kill, sinking two small 300 ton Japanese patrol crafts.
These crafts were used mainly as submarine chasers, and were akin
to a much larger version of the Swift Boats that were used in the
Vietnam War, much talked about during the Bush/Kerry Presidential
campaign. If the Grunion crew were elated it was short lived. A few
weeks later and still on patrol in the same area, Grunion vanished,
cause unknown, presumed lost after failing to answer a call from
Dutch Harbor naval headquarters. Analysts concluded that Grunion
was possibly destroyed by depth charging from anti-submarine
vessels that were known to have been operating in that area.
Although Grunion was an exception to most other Gatos
having a short service in the war, her commander and crew were
acknowledged as heroes who fought and perished during the WW
II conflict. Commander Mannert L. Abele, admired by the naval
authorities as a great seaman was memorialized by having a
destroyer named after him. Unfortunately the destroyer also became
a casualty. In the dying days of the conflict it was destroyed and
sunk by kamikaze pilots.
References:: Blair, Clay Jr. Silent Victory
Continued from page 7 (USS GRUNION A Short Life)
USS GRUNION
A Short Life
By
John Pollock
http://www.rieschapterafdcs.com/November%202005%20Newsletter.pdf#search=%22uss%20grunion%22