Membership In the - Council of American Master Mariners

In the
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watch, so Don Stoker, the messman, and
I teamed up for town touring. We spent
our day off riding in rickshaws, lying on
the beach, etc. The place seemed to be a
nice resort community, and we relaxed
in the sunshine.
When we sailed from Durban with a
full load of manganese ore, the ship was
down to her marks (fully loaded).
While rounding Cape of Good Hope,
we ran into a storm with following
winds. The large seas coming over the
stern washed away the gratings on which
we coiled our mooring lines. In doing so,
the loose gratings cut off the tops of the
air vents around the poopdeck. A door
on the midship house was also torn off
and managed to sever the hydraulic lines
from the bridge to the steering engine.
For the rest of the trip into Capetown,
we steered with the steam valves in
the steering engine room, standing in
seaboots and oilskins in the hot steamy
room, occasionally sidestepping the columns
of sea water pouring down the
vents.
All along the trip, I had been getting
copies of the sights from the mates and
working out the ship’s navigation for
myself on a pilot chart for practice. At
the ship’s union meetings, I had been
typing the minutes and sending typed
letters to my pen pals. After repairs in
Capetown, as we were headed north to
Trinidad for bunkers, the captain asked
me, “Where did you learn to type?”
I said, “In high school.”
He said, “Call your watch partner to
take over the wheel.” Then he took me
down to his cabin and set me to typing
up manifests, letters of protests and
other items of ship’s business.
When we arrived in Trinidad, we started
meeting outbound freighters with
anti-sub guns mounted on their sterns.
The ominous feeling of impending entry
into the war in Europe was heavy.
Captain Stevens told me he was going
to approach the company, American
Export Lines, about signing me up as
a cadet. However, since the Maritime
Commission was setting up training
Membership
schools, the private company cadet programs
were discontinued.
The day before we rounded Cape
Hatteras, about 11:00 a.m., the usual
engine breakdown was signaled on the
engine room telegraph. The third mate
started out to the wing of the bridge to
answer it, and damned near jumped over
the wheelhouse when he spotted a submarine
surfacing about 200 yards off our
port beam. The date was November 5,
1941. No armament was on these ships
then, and a submarine surfacing so near!
Needless to say, the mate lost no time in
sending me aft to raise a new American
flag, just in case. By the time I got it up,
the sub had hoisted an American flag too
and steamed off on the surface. We got
the engines going a few hours later and
were relieved as we sailed into Baltimore.
News events for the months of 1941
we had been at sea included the landing
of the passengers of the Zam Zam
SS WeSt Jaffrey
Company: American Export Lines, Inc. New York, NY
Master: Earle S. Stevens
Gross Tons: 5663
Home Port: Portland, OR
Built: 1919@ Portland, OR
Dimensions: 410’ x 54’ x 28’
who had been prisoners on the German
Raider Atlantis from the time of their
capture on the way to Capetown.
Germany attacked her Axis partner,
Russia, on June 22. This event alone
changed the face of the war as far as the
Isolationists and also the Communist
front organizations in the United States,
whose propaganda up until that event
had been to keep the United States out
of the war in Europe.
September 18: Several Italian transports
were sunk by the Malta-based British submarine
Upholder while they were en route
to Benghazi. This delayed reinforcements
to Rommel in North Africa.
September 23: The sinking of Russian
naval units Marat and Kirov at Leningrad
by German air raids.
November 14: The HMS Ark Royal,
pride of British Navy, was sunk in the
Mediterranean by U-81.
The Freighter, SS West Jaffrey, was stranded and wrecked on Harriet Ledge
off Halfbald Island, Nova Scotia (43-36 North/66·02 West) at 2350 EWT on
February 8, 1942 while en route from Boston, Massachusetts to Halifax, Nova
Scotia. She carried a crew of 38 men plus an Armed Guard of fourteen. There
were no casualties. The ship was declared a total loss on February 13th. Photo
courtesy of Mariners Museum, Newport News, VA.
24 Sidelights December 2012 The Council of American Master Mariners, Inc.