REVIEWS "We will Stand by You": Serving in the aviation gas tanks that supplied her the Pawnee, 1942-1945, by Theodore spotter planes. Despite the decided risk Mason (University of South Carolina of Houston sinking and taking Pawnee Press, Columbia SC, 1991, 269pp, illus, with her if the tow wire could not be cut $24.95hb) in time, the tu g's skipper sent his famous, "We Will Stand by You" deservedly message to Houston by signal lantern: won the prestigious 1990 John C. Lyman "We Will Stand By You." Award given annually by the North This award-winning book rightly deAmerican Society for Oceanic History. serves the accolades it has received and Author Theodore C. Mason, writing in- is a worthy addition to the impressive timately from three years of wartime University of South Carolina Press seenlisted service in the Pacific theater on ries, "Studies in Maritime History," edboard Pawnee, skillfully presents the ited by William N. Still, Jr. story of his ship in the hallowed tradition DR. W.M.P. DUNNE of Richard Henry Dana, Jr. 's Two Years Sea Education Association Before the Mast, from the crew's quarWoods Hole, Massachusetts ters rather than the all-too-common memoirs that emanate from the Ward Room. The Fighting Liberty Ships: A MemMason traces the 25-month history of oir, by A. A. Hoehling (Kent State Unithe ship from launching and commis- versity Press, Kent OH, 179pp, illus, sioning to the end of World War IL $22hb) Regularly under attack from torpedoes, This memoir of a US Navy gunnery offibombs, and mines, Pawnee survived all cer aboard American merchant ships in to play an active role as a fleet auxiliary World War II is very readable and inforthroughout the period, leaving a wealth mative, especially for people who have an of narrative material for the author. But ongoing interest in the history of that "We Will Stand by You" is much more worldwide conflict of half a century ago. than a ship's history, it is an intriguingly Although most Armed Guard Officwoven story of the ship's company with ers, as they were called, were newlyno punches pulled relative to the view of commissioned civilians with little naval the enlisted crewmen toward the occu- training, Hoehling held the rank of Enpants of "officer's country," forward sign USNR before the war. As a reporter and above them. for the Washington Post, he was asPawnee's designed mission revolved signed to Navy Public Relations when around deep-sea rescue operations in- called to active duty following Pearl cluding towing, fire-fighting, and sal- Harbor. Later, being an amateur pilot, he vage. The centerpiece of her combat requested and received a transfer to the episodes is the rescue of the cruiser H ous- new Navy blimp pilot-training program ton which had been torpedoed in the at Lakehurst NJ. Then, in mid-1943 , he approaches to Luzon Strait. When Paw- received a surprising and unwanted transnee came up with the wreck, Houston fer to Armed Guard. In view of the 1942 had a 15 degree starboard list, primarily slaughter of US merchant ships by Gerdue to her flooded engineering spaces. man U-Boats in the Atlantic, AG was not The deeply-wounded cruiser had lost a preferred assignment! rudder control and hydraulic power, Following gunnery training, Hoehling which meant she could neither steer nor was given his first command of a Navy use her winches to assist Pawnee in gun crew aboard a Liberty ship. He regetting under tow. While passing the fers to the vessel as the John Lesher, towline from close alongside a rogue although that was not her name. He had wave drove the ships together and some unpleasant experiences with the Houston's anchor punched a hole in merchant master who, like many oldPawnee's CPO mess. It was an ill omen timers, resented having men aboard his to begin a hazardous journey to a safe ship who were not under his command. position outside the enemy's range of Hence, neither the ship nor the master operations. A maximum speed of three are named in the book. to four knots placed the salvaged tug and Hoehling's second command was its charge in great danger from the Japa- aboard a new T2 class tanker, Tampico, nese aircraft and submarine attacks. On which joined a UKF convoy (United the first day an air attack added to Kingdom Fast). In December 1944, HoeHouston's already considerable damage hling was given his third command when a torpedo bomber scored a direct aboard another Liberty ship, James hit on the cruiser's fantail and exploded Harrod, which sailed in convoy from 38
Philadelphia with a cargo of aviation fuel in tin drums for delivery to Northern Europe to supply Allied armies then advancing on Nazi Germany. That voyage ended in disaster. In January 1945, while trying to make a night-time landfall at Antwerp, Belgium, James Harrod collided with another Liberty ship, resulting in a fire in her gasoline cargo. The crew was unable to launch lifeboats or rafts and the sea was too cold for swimmers to survive. Finally, the flames in the sky attracted a Dutch patrol boat, which rescued the entire crew, although four Navy gunners lost their lives. An experienced newspaper man and professional author, Hoehling did his research in depth. In every overseas port visited he reports in detail about wartime living conditions as well as historical events which occurred in those places during the war. Also, there are extensive details about the experiences of other US merchant ships attacked by enemy submarines and aircraft. LT. CoMDR. HAROLD J. McCORMICK Author of Two Years Behind the Mast Low Bridges and High Water on the New York State Barge Canal, by Charles T. O' Malley (Diamond Mohawk Publishing PO Box 526, Ellentown FL, 1991 , 283pp, illus, $19.95) For nearly seventy-five years fleets of tugboats, motorships and barges transported cargoes across the Empire State via the 20th century Erie, Champlain, Oswego and Cayuga-Seneca Canals, collectively called the Barge Canal System. Opened to navigation in 1918, the Barge Canal provided the primary passage between the Atlantic and the Great Lakes. With the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway in the 1950s commercial tows on the Barge Canal began to slowly then swiftly disappear. Where once there were hundreds of carriers, today there are maybe four. In the preface of Low Bridges and High Water, Charles T. O 'Malley offers his book as "a eulogy" to the passing of commercial water transportation on the New York State Barge Canal System. During the canal's commercial heyday an entire floating society existed whose customs, language and traditions were inherited from the ancestral boatmen of the legendary 19th century Erie Canal. O ' Malley has created his own genre, which could be termed "Barge Canalesque". His story (factual, anecSEA HISTORY 59, AUTUMN 1991