ROCK's 1st war patrol is nearly its last!

Since 06-15-05

USS ROCK, SS-274

(as told by Charlie Gipe, who rode ROCK for 5 war patrols)

You may have heard that ROCK took a 5-inch round through the periscope shears on its 1st war patrol and thus had to terminate the patrol for repairs. Well, there is a little more to it than just that fact...

It seems, Charlie relates, that ROCK was making a night-time surface approach on a convoy escorted by a couple of JAP DD's. The lead DD went on by oblivious of ROCK being in the vicinity. The general word about in those days was that the IJN did not have RADAR on its escorts. Well, 'taint necessarily so...

ROCK was just about lined up to let loose on the targets when the trailing DD came around from behind the convoy straight at ROCK with a bone in its teeth and started letting go with its 5-inch guns. The first shell just hit ahead of ROCK, the second just cleared the bow. ROCK decided it was time to get the heck out of there and pulled the plug. On the way down, the 3rd shell hit the shears and the 4th and 5th round were just over and behind ROCK who was going deep to evade. Charlie says they got worked over pretty good with the follow-up depth charging.

The moral...? Well, it looks a lot like the IJN did have RADAR on at least some of their escorts. They were shooting awfully straight that evening. ROCK narrowly escaped (of course) and set a course back to Pearl Harbor. In route, the Radio boys rigged an emergency antenna and let PH know of their little adventure. When they arrive, they found a whole new superstructure waiting for them on the pier. After a couple of weeks repair, there were back out to finish up that patrol.