23 August 2004  
  Dear, John  
  I served aboard U-2513 in Key West.  So in the words of Paul Harvey here is the rest of the story.  
As an 18 year old Fireman I graduated from Submarine School in March of 1946 and was given orders to the U-2513 in Key West.  Being a country boy from Indiana, when I got off the train in Miami and got on a bus to Key West I was totally amazed that you can take a Greyhound Bus to the South Sea Islands.
 

"Jug Head" Casler was captain when I was on board from March of 46 till May of 48.  Casler was a mustang and had been a Quartermaster in the Asiatic S-boats in the 30's.  He loved to chew ass at Quarters and say that the officers were the only ones on board that he could trust.  One morning I was on dock near the brow when Casler came on board.  We all came to attention and saluted when he came on board.  A Chief said "Good morning Captain".  Casler replied "Who the hell asked you for a weather report".  The XO was "Ajax" Miller who was admired by the entire crew.  I went to Captain's Mast and got a couple weeks restriction for something I don't remember.  When the restriction was over I had weekend liberty and went to Miami.  I missed the last bus to Key West and had to hitch hike.  At that time there was about one car an hour headed south on the overseas highway.  I got to the dock where we tied up to see the U-2513 disappearing around the mole.  I was on the dock handling lines when the boat came in.  Mr. Miller just shook his head and held out his hand and I put my I.D. and liberty cards in his hand.  About a week later I asked Mr. Miller when I was going to Mast and he replied "I'm still thinking of charges".  Three weeks later when my section had weekend liberty again I was on the dock rigging hoses to take on high pressure air and fresh water.  Mr. Miller handed me my I.D. and liberty card and said, "Go ashore and lets see how screwed up you can get this time".  I had just made third class (MoMM3) and he knew that if he took me to Mast Casler would just bust me and he knew I did a good job on board and he didn't want to see me busted.  They don't make officers like that any more.  "Rock" Armour was the Engineering Officer.  He was a Mustang and had also served on Asiatic S-boats in the thirties.  We had some ASW exercises scheduled when the Starboard engine broke down.  The Rock personally supervised the overhaul and the entire Engine Room crew worked 48 hours straight to do it.  When it was done and we ran the engine the Rock set a 5 gallon can of pure grain alcohol on the Engine Room deck and said "have a drink on me boys".  The Commissary Officer was an ROTC JG and tended to be a little chubby.  The Captain told him he should lose weight.  When they were eating in the ward room every time he would reach for meat or potatoes the Rock would slap his hand with his butter knife.  Big Al Newton, the steward, would double over laughing, Ha Ha Ha.  To say the least it was an interesting ward room.

  
  The engines were two six cylinder MAN diesels.  They had a 17 inch bore.  When the pistons were out a person could fit inside the liner.  A little game we played during overhaul was six men would  
     
     

 

 
 

   

crawl inside the liners.  The Rock would call out the firing order and when he called your cylinder you would pop your head up.  I was in the auxiliary gang but stood quite a few oiler watches in the Engine Room.  To be an oiler you did a lot of the oiling.  There was an open cam shaft about waist high on the passage way side of each engine.  There were then push rods up the engine from the cam shaft to rocker arms on top of the engine.  Once an hour you would get on a cat walk by the cam shaft and lean over the top of the engine.  You would get your arm in sync with the rocker arms and use an oil can to oil the three holes in each rocker arm.  Next there were oil cups all along the cam shaft that were filled with cotton waste.  You would snap the covers and fill each oil cup.  We had composite drive, the engine, a clutch, the motor, another clutch, and then the propeller shaft.  There were annunciators in the Engine Room so you could answer bells.  The engines were not reversible so all reverse bells had to be answered on the motors.  To the best of my recollection ahead standard was 600 RPM.  We were the first boat in the American Navy to schnorkel but it was no fun.  The temperature in the Engine Room would go to 130°F and the back pressure on the exhaust would cause so many leaks the throttle man had to use a flash light to see the gauges.  One of the things that beat us was the Junker Company diesel air compressor.  There was one aft of the starboard engine, I don't remember if there was one on the port side or not.  It was a marvel of engineering but we couldn't get it to work.  It had 2 free floating pistons, the outboard side of one piston was first and third stages of air compression and the outboard side of the other piston was second and fourth stages of air compression.  The inboard side of each piston was for opposed piston diesel compression.  After the air compression stroke check valves bring the pistons together on diesel compression and an injector would fire.  The Engine Room crew would very carefully overhaul it and then start it.  It would go BANG BANG BANG for six or eight times and then quit.  I still think it was a great idea and I wonder why no one has perfected it.

  President Harry Truman took his winter vacations in Key West at the Submarine Base.  When he saw the U-2513 he decided he wanted to go for a ride.  We took President Truman out for the day and dove to test depth (440 ft.).  On the way the President was sitting in the ward room and we lost forward lighting.  The Auxiliary electrician rushed forward to repair it.  Outside the ward room in the passage was a secret service agent kneeling with a gun pointed at him.  He yelled don't shoot I'm the electrician to fix the lights.  I am sure President Truman had an interesting day.  
  One of the orders we had because of the boat's unique design is that once on board you couldn't be transferred except for discharge when your hitch was up.  This led to an interesting event.  Rip Kelly EN2(SS) had the battery charge and stayed ashore during operations the next day.  We were operating with a mine sweeper and several other ships.  We were at periscope depth and the Captain was interested in something behind us and didn't see the mine sweeper dead ahead.  When he did see it he ordered the boat to go deep.  We hit the mine sweeper with the periscope and then  
     
     

 

 
 

   
went to 200 ft.  The mine sweeper saw us hit and then go deep so they radioed the squadron Sub sunk and the location.  Key West, being a small town at the time, the news was immediately all over the island.  A guy went into the bar where Kelly was drinking and said Kelly your boat sank.  Rip's only reply was "I knew I'd find a way to get off that SOB".
  When I was on the Cutlass in Key West in the 50's the U-2513 was towed into Key West to be sunk and act as a target for submarine rescue training.  Rock Armour was in charge.  He saw an engine man named Dutch Schultz who had served on the U-2513 on the dock and got him assigned TAD to keep the bilges pumped.  Myself and several other ex-crew members went on board to take souvenirs.  I got the deep depth gauge and I know Hal Clark got the engines tacs.  I later donated the deep depth gauge to the Submarine Museum in Groton.  
  Sailors that brought the U-boats over from Ireland had a unique tattoo, FSBI (forgotten submarine bastards of Ireland) on the left cheek of their ass.  
The 2 years that I spent on the U-2513 were the most interesting of my life and I loved every minute of it.  I rode several other boats before I retired, the Irex and the Quillback being the most memorable, but the U-2513 was something special.
     
  Submitted by;   
  Kenneth D. Collins ETC(SS) Retired  
     
     
     
     
     
     

 

 
 

   
30 August 2004
  Dear Shipmate Kenneth,  
     
  Thank you for the wonderful article about the U-2513 which I received last week.  You and I went on the boat at about the same age, but under some different circumstances.  I graduated from Sub School in December 1948 at age 17, and after leave reported to the boat in Key West in January 1949 as a SA.  I had my 18th birthday a couple of weeks after I reported on board.  I think I was the only one who knew it was my birthday.  I think I made SN a few months after I went on board.  
  They put me in the Engine Room as a FN striker when I first went on board.  I don't know what all I did, but I remember one job was to open the exhaust valves when they started the engines.  For some reason the Engine men wanted to start both engines at the same time.  I don't remember why; but anyway, you will recall that to open those valves you had to turn those great big red handles in the stern part of the Engine Room.  I may be wrong but as I recall they were at least two feet in diameter, maybe three.  Anyway, I was short (5'9") and had short arms.  I stood in the middle of the passageway and tried to open those valves at the same time but I couldn't do it.  My arms were too short and I couldn't reach the outer extent of the valve wheels at the same time.  So I would have to open one valve at a time.  For some reason this infuriated the Engine men and they must have reported to the Chief.  So the end result was they kicked me up to the deck gang where I became a deck ape, lookout, and operator of the bow and stern planes.  
 

I qualified in about four months, but whoever was in charge of such things (I don't remember if it was the XO or the Skipper) said no one could qualify until they had been on board six months.  I almost didn't make it, because my six months weren't up until June and we took off for Portsmouth shortly after that.  I don't remember who the skipper was.  I don't think it was Casler, but I remember that name.  Maybe he left shortly after I went on board.  It seems to me like I remember a new temporary skipper who came on board just to put the boat out of commission.  Doesn't make sense but that is what I remember.  Maybe it was Casler, because, whoever it was, I remember that he was a real jerk.

  
  Sometime after I had been put in the deck gang we were firing torpedoes for some reason.  I remember it well because my battle station was in the fire control chair way forward just behind the torpedo tubes and up next to the overhead.  I don't know why that was my job.  Maybe it was because I was small and wouldn't bump my head.  Anyway, we had a "hot run" in one of the tubes.  Being just a dumb Seaman I didn't realize the danger, but the Torpedo men sure did.  The reason I know the skipper was a jerk (whoever it was) was because he came running forward to the Torpedo Room to find out what was going on instead of taking action.  I remember so well because one of the Torpedo Seamen cussed him out something terrible.  Told him to get his dumb ass back  
     
     

 

 
 

   
to the Control Room and order a down angle so we could get rid of the fish.  He finally did and everything ended up OK.  The Seaman's name was Norbert Meridith.  I remember him well.  He had been on the boats in WWII but had gotten out.  A few years later when he came back in (1948 or 1949) the Navy made him start all over (I think he had been a TM2 in WWII).  He made his rates back real fast as soon as he was eligible.  He later served with me on the Diablo and I think when I got out he was a TM2 and later made TM1.  He probably eventually became a Chief.  He is dead now.  Everyone thought there would be hell to pay the way he talked to the skipper over that hot run.  Some of us thought he might even be Court Martialed, but nothing ever happened.
  Another time our officers showed us what dumbos they were.  We were at about 150 feet and had a fire in the Maneuvering Room.  When the fire alarm went off I was asleep in my bunk in the Torpedo Room.  I came out of my sack in a half daze and someone shoved a mattress in my gut and told me to get to the Maneuvering Room.  By the time I got to the Control Room or Chow Hall (I don't remember which) they had the fire out.  I was told that the Engineering Officer ordered everyone out of the Maneuvering Room, but two of the electricians grabbed fire extinguishers and got the fire out while he was still giving orders.  In the mean time the OD in the Control Room froze.  My good buddy, Harlan Lowe, who was on the stern planes didn't wait for any orders, which never came, he jammed the planes in full rise.  The bow planes man also reacted and we broached from 150 feet.  Not a tank had been blown so we started back down again, but finally some officer got some sense and ordered the tanks blown and we surfaced properly.  Of course, by that time the fire was out.  I don't know what the Chief on the ballast tanks was doing.  I guess he had his head in his a-- also.  We were operating with some surface craft and we were supposed to fire a flare before we surfaced.  I believe there was some flap over that, but it all quieted down when the facts became known.  
  I also remember that we schnorkeled a few times, but it was no fun.  One time there must have been some pretty good waves on the surface, because the safety valve kept closing and we would pull a temporary vacuum.  It felt like our rear end was going to come through our eyeballs.  
  Your time on the U-boat was sure different than mine.  We had some of the sorriest Officers (and Chiefs) that I knew in my time in the Navy.  I later felt like they must have been sent to the boat as some kind of punishment.  Or they had all been passed over for promotion and were putting in their time.  There was one exception.  The XO was LT, A. H. Jerbert.  He was a good guy.  He must have taken a liking to me, because he recommended me as a candidate for Prep School for Annapolis, filled out the paperwork and sent it in.  But in the months later after decommissioning, going to New London, and being reassigned to the Diablo they never caught up with me so I don't know what happened.  
  Jerbert saved my bacon once.  A bunch of us were on Liberty over in Key West.  We had been drinking some, but none of us were drunk.  There were four or five of us strolling down Duval Street.  Suddenly the SPs showed up with the Paddy Wagon and threw us all in.  I came right back out.  They grabbed me and threw me back in and I came out again protesting that we had not done  
     
     

 

 
 

   
anything wrong.  Then they got rough with me so I settled down.  They hauled us to the Brig.  When we got there I had been charged with all kinds of stuff.  Disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and I don't remember what else.  The Chief on duty was one of the Chiefs from the U-boat on temporary SP duty.  I tried to explain to him and I thought that he would give me a break, but he wouldn't listen and threw the book at me.  I didn't learn until later what had caused it all, but it turned out that one of the guys was taking a leak over a cast iron fence into someone's yard.  I had my back to it and didn't see a thing.  That is why I reacted the way I did.  I think we spent the night in the Brig and then they took us back to the U-boat.  The Captain was going to throw the book at me and they held a Captain's Mast.  He was going to send me to the Brig, but Jerbert finally talked him out of it and I ended up with 10 day's restriction.  Since we were living in the Barracks that meant ten days there, except when we went to sea.  I do not even remember if the Captain's Mast even went on my record.  Jerbert was a great guy.
 

But the rest were really a sorry bunch.  I remember one time they put us deck apes over the side to chip paint on the port bow.  We really had a tough time with that paint.  It was so good that we had to scrape with the edge of the scraper to get it off.  After several hours I had done a section maybe two or three feet square down to bare metal and it was just like shiny new steel.  I was amazed.  The deck officer happened to be strolling up on deck so I asked if I could speak to him.  He looked over the side and asked what I wanted.  I tried to talk as dumb as I could, but as respectfully as I knew how.  I said to him, "Sir, I don't know a lot about Chemistry (I did know a little from High School), but it seems to me like with all of the smart people we have in the Navy we must have some real smart Chemists.  I would think that one of them could take a sample of this paint we are scraping and analyze it and find out how it is made.  Then we could make some of the same kind of paint and we wouldn't have to scrape so often."  Actually I was being sincere (that paint, at least in that spot had been on there for four years and there was no rust).  But he thought I was being a smart ass.  He called me up on deck and chewed me up one side and down the other.  Told me that I was just a dumb Seaman and it wasn't my job to think just to scrape.  He even lectured me about the Military Industrial complex and asked me if I wanted to put the paint companies out of business.  And what would all of those paint companies do if they couldn't sell paint to the Navy but every four years.  At the time I didn't know what he was talking about but later on in my Engineering career I learned. Much of our crew seemed to be misfits.  After we went to Portsmouth they put us on a train to New London.  Most of the crew got dead drunk.  It got so bad that they closed us up in the diner car and wouldn't let us onto the rest of the train.  Someone must have reported it, because when we got to New London the SPs were waiting at the station with a bunch of Paddy Wagons.  They hauled the whole crew to the Brig.  My good buddy, Harlan Lowe, was so drunk they didn't even put him in the wagon.  They threw him up on the trunk loaded with all our seabags.  I don't remember what happened, I guess they sorted out those of us where reasonably sober and put us in a Barracks.  Eventually we were all in the Barracks while we waited for reassignment. 

 
  So you can see your U-boat experience was far different than mine.  But a couple of good things came from it.  First, I grew up in a hurry.  I went on as a kid, but by the time I got to New London at age 18-1/2 I was a man after just one year in the Navy.  
  And I made a couple of good buddies on the boat.  One was Norbert Meridith and the other was Harlan Lowe, both of whom I have mentioned.  They both served with me on the Diablo.  Harlan was a good friend over many years.  He even lent me money to help me get through college.  Came to see me a couple of times.  A year or so ago I wrote to the records center in St. Louis and they responded that their address was old.  However, they told me that Harlan was deceased.  So both of my good buddies are gone.    
  Enough for now.  More than enough.  Let me know if you want more.  
     
  John Cunningham