PT Boats – August 1945

PT boat operating at Guadalcanal

In mid August, 30 squadrons of PT’s were in commission.  Nineteen were in the 7th Fleet.

Admiral Kinkaid could not foresee a need for patrol boats around Japan and Korea, so The 7th Fleet boats became the Motor Torpedo Boat Squadrons Philippine Sea Frontier.  The shooting was over but there were still jobs where they could be useful.

25-26 August – at Morotai, 16 PT’s under Lt.Comdr. T.R. Stansbury and Gen. Johnson got underway for a rendezvous with the commanders of the Japanese forces on Halmahera.  The Japanese commanding general was not there. That was unacceptable.

PT boat w/ native scouts aboard
(possibly PT-171)

The following day, BGen. Warren McNaught went with 6 PT boats and this time Lt.Gen. Ishii and Capt. Fujita, IJN commander were waiting.  The boats carried them to the 93rd Div. headquarters on Morotai.  It was here that they surrendered 37,000 troops, 4,000 Japanese civilians and a very large quantity of equipment.  This was the force that the PT boats had held at bay for almost a year.  The garrison commander, Col. Ouchi, reported that since 12 May, when 3 barges brought sorely needed supplies from Halmahera, not a single barge had crossed the 12-mile strait between the 2 islands.  Two of those barges were destroyed by PT boats when they attempted to return.

PT-174 at Rendova, Solomons, Jan. 1944

In the central Philippines, Pt 489 and 492 of Squadron 33 carried U.S. Army personnel and members of the Japanese surrender commission to isolated enemy outposts on Samar, Masbate and Romblon to accept the surrender of more than 500 enemy troops.

The Navy Depart. properly got rid of most of the PT’s; their job was done.  Because of their light wooden construction they could not be stored away for future use as the steel-hulled ships were.

All the boats in the western Pacific were carefully surveyed.  It was found that 118 hulls were defective due to broken frames, worms and dry rot, broken keels, cracked longitudinals * or battle damage.  These boats were stripped of all salvageable material and the bare hulls were burned on the beach at Samar.

Squadrons 4, 41 and 42 were being saved for training purposes and experimental work.

Behind the decision to cut the PT force so drastically, besides the obvious reason of economy, there was a realization that in the end of the old boats was the beginning of a new PT boat.  There were no major changes in design in the 80-foot Elco and the 78-foot Higgins, but with the war’s end, they could afford to take their time to redesign in light of 4-years worth of experience.

In 1951, the Navy accepted the first post-war PT’s.  They were all aluminum hulls and powered by 4 Packard engines of considerable higher horsepower than the original.  The first one built, PT-809 was built by the Electric Boat Co.  The overall length of the boat was 98 feet and the max beam was 26 feet.  PT-810 by Bath Iron Works; PT-811 by John Trumpy & Sons and the last experimental one, PT-812 was built by Philadelphia Naval Shipyard and equipped with gas turbines.  These boats operated as Motor Torpedo Squadron-1 from 1954-59.

* Longitudinals – (a system for framing vessels in which light, closely spaced, longitudinal frames are connected by heavy, widely spaced transverse frames with deep webs.)

Information derived from: “At Close Quarters, PT Boats in the United States Navy”  by Robert J. Bulkley

Click on images to enlarge.

##############################################################################################

Military Humor –

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

##############################################################################################

Farewell Salutes – 

Anthony Bosico – Haverstraw, NY; US Navy, WWII, submarine service, USS Grouper & tender Proteus

Jerry Cruce – Grayson, GA; US Merchant Marine, WWII

William Duncan – Tofield, CAN; RC Army, WWII, 5th BC Coat Brigade/25th General Pioneers

Frank Greco – Hendersonville, NC; US Army Air Corps, WWII, Korea & Vietnam (Ret. 30 y.)

Charles Heath  Gauley Bridge, WV, US Navy, WWII, USS Wyoming

George Johnson – Terre Haute, IN; US Army Air Corps, WWII, PTO, 11th Airborne Division, artillery

William Lewis – McGuffey, OH; US Navy, WWII, PTO, radioman, USS New Orleans

Jack Meyers – Seattle, WA; US Army Air Corps, WWII, B-29 mechanic

Stanley Szuba – Linden, NJ; USMC, WWII

John Widelski – New Bedford, MA; US Navy, gunner’s mate, USS Wingfield & Bronstein

#############################################################################################