Category Archives: World War Two

Double Seven

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80 Years Ago this month: 77th Naval Construction Battalion insignia on the cowling F4U Corsair at Bougainville, February 1944. Note the M1911 in the shoulder holster of the aviator to the right in case he wound up in the “walking club” and a bubble canopied F4U-4B in the background. During the period the image was captured, the base was home to Marine Aircraft Group 24 (MAG-24) which included VMF-211, 212, 215, 218, 222, 223, VMSB-235, 244, and VMTB-134, and 232. The plane painted was White 77 (possibly BuNo 17677?), with the cowling design applied by hand by T. Preuit, of the 77th’s Sign Shop.

Via The U.S. Navy Seabee Museum

The 77th NMCB was formed stateside at Camp Peary, WV on New Year’s Eve 1942 and shipped out just eight months later for points West via Port Hueneme in August 1943. Bound for Guadalcanal, the battalion’s first echelon began arriving in Vella La Vella by 25 September and from there transferred as a body to Bougainville starting that same December.

There, for the next four months, they constructed the YOKE field as well as a myriad of buildings and support facilities for MAG 24.

They were aboard when what was known as the three-week-long “Battle of Bougainville Perimeter” took place, with ‘Bees conducting 24-hour armed patrols while they worked and enduring nearly 1,000 Japanese artillery shells close to their camp, their personnel spending almost all of their off time sheltering in slit trenches.

M1903 Seabees in the 77th Naval Construction Battalion armory cleaning & checking their rifles

“At chapel services, attendance held up well despite the shelling,” noted the 291-page WWII cruisebook for the battalion.

Once that was accomplished, the “Double Seven” moved on to Emirau and Sangley Point, ending the war in the P.I.

Inactivated on 15 October 1945, the battalion earned 22 purple hearts, an NMCM, and three bronze stars for heroism.

Miami in Trinidad

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80 years ago today: The Cleveland-class light cruiser USS Miami (CL 89) at Trinidad during her shakedown, 19 February 1944, photographed from heavy cruiser USS Quincy (CA-71). Note her crew at quarters on deck in crackerjacks, the very weathered paint of her new Measure 32, Design 1D camouflage on her hull, and a pair of Vought OS2U-3 Kingfishers of Cruiser Scouting Squadron 8 perched on her catapults at the fantail.

Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph NH 98404

Commissioned at the Philadelphia Navy Yard on 28 December 1943, Miami had been in the fleet for just six weeks in the above image.

And from the same cruise, a great photo of the new cruiser with a bone in her teeth.

View of USS Miami (CL 89). Note spray coming over the bow, February 17, 1944. Photographed by crew of USS Quincy (CA 71). Official U.S. Navy photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives. 80-G-367898

As detailed by DANFS:

On 12 February 1944, Miami got underway from the Chesapeake Bay and in the late afternoon moored at the Norfolk Navy Yard, Portsmouth, Va. Underway again on the 14th, at 0835 she weighed anchor and shaped a course for Trinidad, British West Indies, to conduct her shakedown. She steamed to the Caribbean in company with the heavy cruiser Quincy (CA-71) and the destroyers Carmick (DD-493) and Doyle (DD-494). On the second day of her voyage she encountered heavy seas and at approximately 0415, Sea2c Leonard S. Dera, a native of Buffalo, N.Y., fell overboard. Despite a search for him for over an hour, Dera was never recovered.

Miami passed through the Boca de Navios Channel on 18 February 1944 and shortly thereafter anchored inside the submarine net off Trinidad. From 19 February to 1 March, the cruiser shifted between Trinidad and the Gulf of Paria to participate in drills and exercises. On 3 March, at 0522 she departed Trinidad and began her voyage back to Norfolk accompanied by Quincy and the destroyers Baldwin (DD-624) and Thompson (DD-627). She arrived at Norfolk without incident on the 7th.

Repainted and given a quick post-shakedown maintenance availability, Miami soon passed through the Canal Zone and headed to the war in the Pacific. In early June 1944, Miami joined the Fast Carrier Task Force conducting air strikes on Japanese-held islands in the Marianas on her way to earn six battle stars in 13 months for her service in World War II.

Post-war, she operated on the California coast training naval reservists until her decommissioning on 30 June 1947, at which point she entered the Pacific Reserve Fleet. Miami’s name was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register on 1 September 1961 and her hulk was sold for scrapping to Nicholai Joffe Corp., Beverly Hills, Calif., on 26 July 1962.

Denali Paratroopers Test New Next-Gen Weapons at 25 Below

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The only Arctic, Airborne, Recon cavalry squadron in the U.S. Army has been busy trying out the service’s new Next Generation Squad Weapon systems in some of the worst weather Alaska can offer.

The 1st Squadron (Airborne) of the 40th Cavalry Regiment, working with Fort Greely’s Cold Regions Test Center in one of the coldest parts of Alaska, has been putting the NGSW platform through its paces. The program includes SIG Sauer’s XM-7 rifle, which will fill the role currently held by the M4 Carbine series, the SIG XM250 light machine gun slated to replace the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon, and the Vortex-produced M157 Fire Control optics system used on both platforms.

“Extreme environmental testing is critical to ensuring reliable systems,” noted Col. Jason Bohannon, the Army’s Project Manager Soldier Lethality on Feb. 9.

Meanwhile, a social media page for the 1st Squadron-40th Cav noted that they have been experiencing “sub-Arctic conditions in the vicinity of Ft Greely where temperatures haven’t topped above -25 degrees.”

If your range gear includes “Mickey Mouse” Boots, you may be testing an NGSW in Alaska in winter. (Photo: PEO Soldier)

That just seems…really cold. (Photo: PEO Soldier)

The 40th has a long military history of making it work under terrible conditions. Based in its current form in Alaska since 2005– from where they deployed to Iraq (Southern Baghdad) once and Afghanistan twice (Paktya and Khost Provinces)– it draws its lineage from the old 40th Tank Battalion which entered combat on August 15 1944 fighting across northern France into Belgium where it made a significant contribution to the defeat of German forces at St. Vith during the Battle of the Bulge then drove into Germany linking up with the Soviets on the Baltic coast.

M4 Shermans in temporary position near St. Vith, Belgium, fire on enemy positions beyond the city. 40th Tank Battalion. 7th Armored Division.” Date: 24 January 1945. Salis, U.S. Army Signal Corps photo 111-SC-199467

Warship Wednesday Feb. 14, 2024: La Jeanne

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Here at LSOZI, we take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1954 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024: La Jeanne

Photo via Port of Fremantle

Above we see the stern of the beautiful French croiseur école Jeanne d’Arc as she sat in port at Freemantle’s North Quay, while visiting Australia in February 1962 on her 26th cadet cruise. Don’t let her fine lines fool you, she had survived a war and, within a year of this photo, would ride out a trio of back-to-back rogue waves that could have swamped just about any hull ever made by man.

Christened on Valentine’s Day 1930, Jeanne was a vessel any warship fan could love.

Meet Jeanne

By 1927, the quaint old armored cruiser Jeanne d’Arc, a 36-boilered coal-eating leviathan whose six tall smutty funnels led to the nickname “L’étui à cigarettes,” was getting very long in the teeth indeed. The only real reason she was still in service at all was that she had been re-tasked in 1908 for use as a training cruiser. While since the end of the Great War, she had completed nine lengthy officer cadet winter cruises– typically leaving Brest in September or October and returning around the following July– her 11,500 tons displacement was a drag on treaty limits and her armament (a pair of Modèle 1893 7.6″/40s and a dozen equally old low-angle 5.46-inchers) was obsolete.

French Cruiser Jeanne D’Arc in Gaillard Cut Dec 2nd, 1923 185-G-0990

Rather than replace her by retasking a younger cruiser on hand, it was decided to create a new, purpose-built, training cruiser that looked good– she would sail the world every year representing the Republic, after all– and had a modern armament, engineering suite, and commo suite which would translate into realistic preparation for future officers continuing into the fleet.

With almost cruise ship/large yacht lines, she ran 525 feet overall through 21 bulkheads with a raked bow and thin 57-foot beam while she displaced under 6,500 tons at standard load due to the fact she fundamentally carried no armor other than some light (20-25mm) plating around her conning tower and protecting her four main gunhouses/loading rooms.

French croiseur école Jeanne d’arc, Janes 1931

This allowed a small plant of just four Penhoët fuel-oil boilers and two sets of Parsons geared steam turbines, generating 32,500 shp on four shafts, to make 25 knots flank speed with ease and cruise at 19 knots with just half her plant going. She broke 27.84 knots on trials. Meanwhile, two Renault diesel gennies kept her electrical net alive and boilers offline while in port. She had a 5,000nm cruising radius which allowed an easy Med Cruise or Atlantic crossing.

Her armament consisted of a main battery of eight 155 mm/50 (6.1″) Modèle 1920 guns— the same as used in the new Duguay-Trouin-class light cruisers and in the casemated guns on the aircraft carrier Bearn.

Cadets having fun on the 155 mm guns of the French training cruiser Jeanne d’Arc. Note the gun houses are thinly armored, with just an inch of plate, and oversized to aid in training evolutions. 

Now compare to the same model guns in the bow turrets on the Trouin-class cruiser Lamotte-Picquet. Note the director and large searchlight above it. Besides the Trouin class, the French only used the 6.1″/50 Model 1920 on the training cruiser Jeanne D ‘Arc and the carrier Bearn.

Her secondary and tertiary DP AAA batteries were very light four 75mm/50cal M1927 singles and two 37mm/50cal M1925 singles, as they were basically just for instruction. This was augmented by two 21.7-inch torpedo tubes. A very modern design, she carried two catapults and floatplane facilities, typically for CAMS.37 flying boats.

She was designed to carry 20 officer-instructors and 156 cadet midshipmen for extended cruises in addition to her normal 572-man crew (28 officers, 120 petty officers, 424 quartermasters and sailors).

Laid down at A.C. de la Loire et Penhoët, St-Nazaire as Yard No. M6 on 31 August 1928, she was launched on Valentine’s Day 1930– and which point the old cruiser which was still in service was renamed Jeanne d’Arc II to keep the two ships straight– and commissioned on 14 September 1931, kicking off a long career.

The Salad Days of Interbellum Cruising

Her plankowner skipper, Capt. André Amédée Abel Marquis (who later, as a vice admiral in 1942, would earn certain fame/infamy for ordering the scuttling of the French fleet at Toulon), would take Jeanne out on her first world cruise, a tour of South America that stretched well into 1932.

One of the ship’s junior officers in her gunnery department on this inaugural cruise was LT Jacques-Yves Cousteau, a fellow with a keen interest in diving.

French Croiseur-école Jeanne d’Arc en 1932 à la mer. Note the two floatplanes on her catapults

Jeanne d’Arc, with extensive tropical awnings covering almost her entire form, was photographed in the Canal Zone on January 21, 1932, soon after completion. This photograph was taken by the U.S. Fleet Air Base, Coco Solo, Canal Zone, from an aircraft at 875 feet altitude. NH 89076

She would continue this pattern, crossing into the Pacific, and lapping the globe.

Jeanne d’Arc in the Gaillard Cut, Panama Canal, likely photographed by the USN for ONI purposes in 1934. Note her gun houses are oversized for aid in training. NH 89077

Jeanne d’arc photographed on December 8, 1934 off San Diego, California, by a U.S. Navy Aircraft. Note her cats are turned. NH 89078

French cruiser Jeanne d’Arc at Vancouver January 9, 1935, by Walter E Frost. City of Vancouver Archives CVA 447-2336

Same as the above

Training cruiser Jeanne d’Arc at Hong Kong

French Training Cruiser Jean d’Arc pictured at Honolulu on May 27th 1933.

Cruiser Jeanne D’arc French in Istanbul

French cruiser Jeanne d’Arc rendering honors to President Franklin D. Roosevelt aboard USS Indianapolis (CA-35), 11 December 1936. Indianapolis is carrying President Franklin D. Roosevelt on his “Good Neighbor” cruise to South America. NH 68180

War!

Although a love boat of sorts, Jeanne was fast and cruiser-like, with a decent main armament, a pair of seaplanes, and a couple of torpedo tubes. Sure, if she got in a surface engagement, couldn’t take much damage and still fight due to the fact she had almost no armor protection and she was in serious trouble in the event of an air attack (although she had been bolstered by four twin 13.2mm Hotchkiss AAA mounts in 1935), but she could still serve at least as effectively as an armed merchant cruiser in such roles as searching for blockade runners and Axis surface raiders.

Croiseur école Jeanne d’arc Brest 1940

Croiseur école Jeanne d’arc Brest 1940

Assigned to the Atlantic Squadron at Brest, Jeanne spent the first nine months of the war in a series of short patrols with an eye peeled for German merchant ships trying to make for home via the North Sea and the Bay of Biscay.

In May, with the Battle of France underway and not going too well for Paris, Jeanne was tasked, along with the light cruiser Émile Bertin, to take a run of gold from the Bank of France to Canada for safekeeping, just in case. Once in the Atlantic, the two cruisers joined with the carrier Bearn, with her skipper since May 1939, Capt. Pierre-Michel Rouyer, promoted to rear admiral with his flag on our subject. They arrived at Halifax on 1 June.

Meanwhile, her former junior gunnery officer, LT Cousteau, by then a more senior gunnery officer aboard the cruiser Dupleix, was preparing to bombard Italian territory for Operation Vado, his first taste of combat.

Vichy Days

With the Fall of France looming, the government ordered the ships on 18 June to hang on to the gold and head to the colony Martinique in the Caribbean, where Rouyer would become the local administrator. There, the three warships would be a squadron in being and, after the British attack on the neutral French Mediterranean Fleet at Mers-el-Kébir in July, the follow-on Vichy government ordered them to make preparations to repel the Royal Navy, if needed.

Then came an uneasy period, spanning 29 months, in which the Martinique force would neither in the war nor out of it, not fully in bed with the Axis nor friendly with the Allies. While the British had forced the matter in places like Syria, Lebanon, Senegal, and Madagascar, and the Japanese had pushed into Indochina, the French colonies in the Caribbean were left to wither on the vine.

The Germans, however, thought it risky to have the ships still armed and, therefore, easily able to sort out and join the Allies, ordering them to disarm and parole much of their crew in May 1942. RADM Rouyer was recalled to Toulon in August 1942 and, three months later, the Allies landed in French North Africa, a move that triggered the end of the Vichy regime and the de facto transfer of all of the Republic’s overseas possessions to De Gaulle’s Free French movement.

For those curious, Cousteau, who had been sidelined from his own cruiser a seconded to the counterintelligence in Marseilles, was by this time working for the Resistance as a spy while placed on “armistice leave” (congé d’armistice).

Back in the war

With the fall of Vichy France and the government in Martinique recognizing De Gaulle and company, Emile Bertin, Bearn, and Jeanne were all welcomed back into the Allied fleets, and scheduled to make a trip north to American shipyards.

Starting in June 1943, Jeanne was modernized by landing her catapults and aircraft gear, her torpedo tubes, and everything smaller than her main guns.

She then took on six 40mm Bofors, 20 20mm Oerlikons, and an SF-1 radar.

French croiseur école Jeanne d’arc, Janes 1946

So equipped, she sailed back across the Atlantic in May 1944 to join the Allied forces in the Med that were gearing up to liberate Corsica and carry out the Anvil-Dragoon Landings along the French Rivera, both campaigns in which she participated, alongside Emile-Bertin and six other French cruisers, and the battleship Lorraine.

Croiseur Jeanne d’Arc amarré en rade de Brest, marins sur le pont, 1945. Note the SF-1 surface search radar set, typical installation for American cruisers of the period. It had a 48,000 yard (23 nm) range. Via the Brest Archives 3Fi019-160

Cold War

Post-war, she landed some of her WWII AAA fit, cleaned up a bit, and welcomed her midshipmen again to start carrying out regular winter training cruises.

Again, a second generation of U.S. Navy aviators would overfly and photograph the venerable Jeanne.

French cruiser Jeanne D’Arc at Honolulu Harbor, Hawaii, photograph received 30 January 1952. She is docked at Pier 9. 80-G-439501

French training cruiser, Jeanne D’Arc, off the coast of Oahu, Hawaii. Aerial view taken in December 1955. 80-G-686520

In February 1963, while off Japan and headed towards Hawaii, she survived a dreaded “Three Sisters” event– three rouge waves back to back. Dubbed “Trois Glorieuses” in French parlance, the event was witnessed by her escorting aviso, Victor Schoelcher, Jeanne rode the trio of 65-foot waves with her bow at as much as a 35-degree incline.

Not bad for a ship with 33 years on her hull and on her 27th midshipman cruise.

Le croiseur-école Jeanne d’Arc en 1964 au large de Québec.

However, all good things come to an end.

On 20 September 1961, the French Navy christened the 13,000-ton helicopter cruiser La Résolue, but that was just a placeholder name. This new vessel once fitted out, was to be able to take over Jeanne’s mission for a new generation of French officers.

At that, our Jeanne was withdrawn from service and her name struck, and on 16 July 1964, La Résolue became Jeanne d’Arc (R97).

French training cruiser Jeanne d’Arc (R97)

French Helicopter Cruiser Jeanne d’Arc, She served from 1964 to 2010

Epilogue

Jeanne d’Arc (R97) would surpass her namesake’s record, covering 44 midshipmen cruises before she was removed from service in 2010.

While the French have had no less than seven ships to carry the name of the fighting saint going back to 1820, the current naval list does not.

Still, she is remembered in maritime art. 

French cruiser Jeanne d’Arc in the port of Brest by Marin-Marie dated Sept 1931

Ships are more than steel
and wood
And heart of burning coal,
For those who sail upon
them know
That some ships have a
soul.

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Gevechtstank? Ja

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As we have covered before, the Dutch Army had some light mech units before WWII but after the conflict went all-in on combined arms units, first fielding MAP-program M4 Shermans:

Dutch Sherman M4A1E8 76mm HVSS gevechtstank 1955 NIMH AKL064735

And then purchasing 468 new Leopard 1s in the 1960s.

Twee cavaleristen in een Leopard 1V (Verbeterd) tank in een verdekte opstelling tijdens een oefening, vermoedelijk in West-Duitsland, circa 1984 NIMH

Followed by another 445 Leopard 2A4s (NL version which were all German but used Dutch radios, antenna bases, FN MAG machine guns, and smoke mortars) in the 1980s, then upgraded the latter to 2A5 and later 2A6 standard.

Een Leopard 2A5 in opstelling onder winterse omstandigheden. Op de tanktoren is een mondingsvlamnabootsingsinstallatie gemonteerd. November 1998. NIMH AKL052587

This also gave them a modicum of power projection overseas to its few remaining colonies, as seen in the 2006 shot of a Leo 2A6 landing on the beach in Curacao during Joint Caribbean Lion.

Then came a great tank-going-out-of-buisness sale, with the Dutch selling just about everything they had with tracks to five allied countries and in 2012 disbanding its last full-time armored unit. The sole tank unit at the disposal of the Netherlands is 17 leased Leopard 2A6s as part of a joint German/Dutch unit (the German 414th Panzer Battalion).

Now, it seems like the Dutch have seen the error of their ways, and want at least a full-strength tank battalion– which will cost something like $339 million a year, not counting the expense of new armor.

Baa, Baa .45

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While on the ground at the SHOT Show in Las Vegas last month, we came across a Government Issue .45 1911 that looked more at home in the South Pacific in 1943. 

As part of its Air Aces Series, Auto-Ordnance had its new Black Sheep 1911 on display. Crafted by the folks over at Outlaw Ordnance, the artists start with an Auto-Ordnance Stainless 1911 and then apply a carefully researched red, white, and blue Cerakote finish that emulates a World War II aircraft associated with famed Marine air ace Major Gregory “Pappy” Boyington. 

A functional work of art, underneath the custom Cerakote finish, the Black Sheep 1911 is still an Auto-Ordnance Stainless 1911 in .45 ACP. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

Note the “rivet” pattern, the sheet of Rising sun victory stencils, and the correct “Lucybelle” nose art. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

lso, note the “belly” of the gun is left in the white to emulate the aluminum body of an F4U Corsair. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

The aircraft Boyington was photographed with in November 1943, White 86 (BuNo.18086), was an F4U-1A Corsair of the same type he flew with the Black Sheep. Ironically, no records confirm he ever flew it in combat and the bird was made up specifically for the photoshoot. As such, it included 20 Kyokujitsu-ki rising suns, one for each confirmed Japanese aircraft he had shot down by that time, his name, and the nickname (“Lucybelle”) of his then-girlfriend, Lucy Malcomson. He would later fall out with Malcomson, leading to a bitter court case and, when the 1970s TV show “Baa Baa Black Sheep” would recreate this plane, Boyington, then on his fifth wife, advised the producers the plane was named “Lulubelle” instead.

A late model Goodyear FG 1D Corsair (BuNo 92246), one of only about 100 Corsairs left, is painted to emulate White 86 and is on display at the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com) 

It has Boyington’s name stenciled under the cockpit but no “kill” flags or Lulubelle/Lucybelle nose art. I guess NNAM didn’t want to wade into that controversy

x

Gotta be quicker than that…

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“Escort Carrier HMS Nairana Stalked Unsuccessfully by U-Boat 502, 1 February 1944,” by Charles David Cobb via National Museum of the Royal Navy, Portsmouth.

Cobb, Charles David; Escort Carrier HMS ‘Nairana’ Stalked Unsuccessfully by U-Boat 502, 1 February 1944; National Museum of the Royal Navy, Portsmouth; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/escort-carrier-hms-nairana-stalked-unsuccessfully-by-u-boat-502-1-february-1944-25980

While a stirring image, the caption, however, is not correct.

U-502, a Type IXC boat under Kptlt. Jürgen von Rosenstiel, was lost on 6 July 1942 in the Bay of Biscay west of La Rochelle due to a rain of depth charges from a 172 Sqn RAF/H Wellington aircraft, with all hands lost.

The escort carrier HMS Nairana (D05), meanwhile, only entered service on 12 December 1943. While on shakedown,  as part of F. J. “Johnny'” Walker’s famous Support Group 2, using Enigma intelligence, chased down the damaged U-592, a Type VIIC under Oblt. Heinz Jaschke, on 31 January 1944 off Ireland, and sent her to the bottom with all hands.

Nairana, whose air group notably splashed a trio of lumbering Junkers Ju 290 while on convoy duty in May 1944, was transferred post-war to the Royal Netherlands Navy as the HMNLS Karel Doorman (QH1), the first Dutch aircraft carrier, then was later sold for commercial use, only being scrapped in 1971.

Do you have an SCR-300 you can Loan to a Museum Exhibit for a bit?

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Come on guys, I know lots of you have a bunch of old gear on the shelf. You radio nerds take note, there is an exhibit that needs to borrow an SCR-300 for a little while.

The meat and potatoes of it, from a curator friend of mine:

Our big project is a traveling exhibit on Edwin Howard Armstrong, radio pioneer extraordinaire with a side interest in radar. He’s best known for inventing and innovating the wideband FM technique of wireless transmission, most notably in broadcasting, but he also supported the succession of AM walkie-talkies (notably the SCR-536) by an FM version that resisted interference from AM electrical noise sources like engine motors. Incredibly, despite the Galvin Corporation (later Motorola) producing 50,000 of the SCR-300, they’re as rare as hen’s teeth here and abroad; even the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at WPAFB is looking for one.

Our exhibit on Armstrong will spend the next two years at the San Antonio Museum of Science and Technology and the Pavek Museum in Minneapolis, with potential follow-ons tbd. Do you or anyone you know in your substantial milhist networks have an SCR-300 that we could borrow for exhibition? It would be professionally displayed in a case, insured, and credited as desired.

If you have an SCR-300 (it doesn’t need to be functional), reach out to me at egerwriter@gmail.com and I’ll put you in touch.

Thanks

Warship Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2024: Moscow on the Hudson

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Here at LSOZI, we take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1833-1954 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger

Warship Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2024: Moscow on the Hudson

U.S. Navy Photo donated by Charlotte Koch, whose husband, Richard Koch, was a Navy P2V pilot who served in Antarctica in the 1950s, via the National Science Foundation’s U.S. Antarctic Program archives.

Above we see the well-traveled Wind-class “battle icebreaker” USS Staten Island (AGB-5) hanging out with the locals and breaking a channel into McMurdo Sound on 11 February 1959, some 65 years ago this week. Staten Island served in three different fleets across 30 years and had an interesting tale to tell.

How the “Winds” came to blow

When World War II started, the U.S. Navy was up to the proverbial frozen creek as far as icebreaking went. While some foreign powers (the Soviets) really liked the specialized ships, Uncle Sam did not share the same opinion. However, this soon changed in 1941 when the U.S., even before Pearl Harbor, accepted Greenland and Iceland to their list of protected areas. Now, tasked with having to keep the Nazis out of the frozen extreme North Atlantic/Arctic and the Japanese out of the equally chilly North Pac/Arctic region (anyone heard of the Aleutians?), the Navy needed ice-capable ships yesterday.

The old (read= broken down) 6,000-ton British-built Soviet icebreaker Krassin was studied in Bremerton Washington by the Navy and Coast Guard. Although dating back to the Tsar, she was still at the time the most powerful icebreaker in the world.

The 10,000-ton. 323-foot Russian icebreaker Krassin, seen here in the Panama Canal, was studied by the USCG stateside for several months in 1941, with her design teaching the service many lessons

After looking at this ship and the Swedish icebreaker Ymer, the U.S. began work on the Wind-class, the first U.S. ships designed and built specifically as icebreakers.

Set up with an extremely thick (over an inch and a half) steel hull, these ships could endure repeated ramming against hard-pack ice. Just in case the hull did break, there were 15 inches of cork behind it, followed by a second inner hull. Now that is serious business. These ships were so hardy that one, USCGC Westwind (WAGB 281), almost 30 years after she joined the fleet, was heavily damaged by ice in the Antarctic’s Weddell Sea but still made it back. About 120 feet of the port-side hull was gashed when brash ice forced the ship against a 100-foot sheer ice shelf. The gash was two to three feet wide and was six feet above the waterline. The crew patched the side, there were no injuries, and the breaker returned home under her own power.

At over 6,000 tons, these ships were bulky for their short, 269-foot hulls. They were also bathtub-shaped, with a 63-foot beam. For those following along at home, that’s a 1:4 length-to-beam ratio. Power came from a half-dozen mammoth Fairbanks-Morse 10-cylinder diesel engines that both gave the ship a lot of power on demand, but also an almost unmatched 32,000-mile range (not a misprint, that is 32-thousand). For an idea of how much that is, a Wind-class icebreaker could sail at an economical 11 knots from New York to Antarctica, and back, on the same load of diesel…twice.

A photo of USCGC Eastwind, circa 1944. Note how beamy these ships were. The twin 5-inch mounts on such a short hull make her seem extremely well-armed. USCG Photo

To help them break the ice, the ship had a complicated system of water ballasting, capable of moving hundreds of tons of water from one side of the ship to the other in seconds, which could rock the vessel from side to side in addition to her thick hull and powerful engines. A bow-mounted propeller helped chew up loose ice and pull the ship along if needed.

With a war being on, they just weren’t about murdering ice, but being able to take the fight to polar-bound Axis ships and weather detachments as well. For this, they were given a pair of twin 5″/38 turrets, a dozen 40mm Bofors AAA guns, a half dozen 20mm Oerlikons, as well as depth charge racks and various projectors, plus the newfangled Hedgehog device to slay U-boats and His Imperial Japanese Majesty’s I-boats. Weight and space were also reserved for a catapult-launched and crane-recovered seaplane. Space for an extensive small arms locker, to equip landing parties engaged in searching remote frozen islands and fjords for radio stations and observation posts, rounded out the design.

Two of the class, Eastwind and Southwind, operated against teams of German scientists and military personnel who attempted to establish weather stations in remote areas of Greenland late in the war.

As noted by the USCG Historian’s Office in this chapter of “The Weather War,”:

On 4 October 1944 Eastwind captured a German weather station on Little Koldewey Island and 12 German personnel. On 15 October 1944 Eastwind captured the German trawler Externsteine and took 17 prisoners. The trawler was renamed East Breeze and a prize crew sailed her to Boston.

The tender was so specific and intricate that only a single shipbuilder submitted a bid, the Western Pipe & Steel (WPS) Corporation of Los Angeles, the yard that would build all eight members of the class.

Meet Staten Island, or…well, we’ll get to it

Laid down on 9 June 1942 at WPS as Yard No. CG-96 for a contract price of $9,880,037, our icebreaker would be the first Northwind (more on that below) but that was just a placeholder as from the outset it was intended to Lend Lease this first ship of the class to the Soviets, who desperately needed it to keep the country’s chimney at Murmansk and Archangel (Arkhangelsk) open during ice season– and to repay the loan of Krassin, whose design helped influence the Winds.

As such, she shipped out without radar, some of the more sensitive commo gear that her sisters had, and a simplified armament (four 3″/50 singles, 8x40mm Bofors, 6x20mm Oerlikon, and two depth charge racks).

“Hull #96 Launching Dec. 28, 1942 – #63.”; Note her forward screw shaft under a huge overhanging bow, augmenting two shafts on her stern. Photo by “Dick” Whittington Photography, Los Angeles, CA via USCG Historian’s Office.

Hull CR96 [sic, CG96] 3/4 Bow view – San Pedro Harbor; Western Pipe & Steel Co. Shipyard. 10 February 1942. Note her two 3″/50s forward, Bofors singles under her wheelhouse windows, and magazine-less 20mm Orlikons on the roof. Also, note that she has no radar fit. Photo No. 42-69-92 by “Dick” Whittington Photography, Los Angeles, CA via USCG Historian’s Office.

Launched 28 December 1942, she commissioned 26 February 1944– 80 years ago this month– with a placeholder Coast Guard crew and USCG hull number (WAG-278) but was turned over to a waiting Russian crew almost immediately, with the Coasties only riding along as far as Seattle, which the Northwind left on 9 March headed for the Motherland with a red flag flying.

Russki Days

In total, three of the eight Wind-class icebreakers were lent to the Soviets: our Northwind (renamed Severnyy Veter= North Wind), Southwind (Admiral Makarov), and Westwind (Severnyy Polyus= North Pole).

In Soviet service, Northwind/Severnyy Veter was placed under the direction of the state-owned Arkhangelsk Arctic Shipping Company (GUSMP), based in Murmansk, but had to get there first. She was assigned to the Navy List of the list of vessels of the Main Northern Sea Route on 4 March and, leaving Seattle five days later, arrived at Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky on 25 March where she temporarily became part of the Vladivostok Arctic Shipping Company, spending the rest of the year escorting ships and patrolling waters in the Russian Far East before making the trip along the country’s Arctic coast– the Northern Sea Route– arriving in Arkhangelsk in December 1944.

Northwind/Severnyy Veter spent the rest of the Great Patriotic War conducting ice escorts of ships and allied convoys in the White Sea. As for her two sisters that were transferred– Southwind/Admiral Makarov and Westwind/Severnyy Polyus— they were only turned over to the Soviets in February and March 1945, respectively.

When the wartime commander of the GUSMP, Captain 1st Rank Mikhail Prokofievich Belousov, a proper Hero of the Soviet Union, passed away in 1946, Northwind/Severnyy Veter was renamed Kapitan Belousov in his honor.

Belousov, a trained polar navigator who had in the 1930s commanded the old icebreaker Krassin– which the U.S. Navy had studied before designing the Wind class– had crossed the roof of the world several times along the great Northern Sea Route, come to the rescue of the disabled icebreaker Georgy Sedov, and had supervised Soviet maritime transport in the Arctic during WWII.

Repatriation

Her time under the Red Banner over, her Soviet crew sailed Kapitan Belousov to Bremerhaven in West Germany where she was met by a party from the U.S. Navy, and the ship was unceremoniously transferred back to American custody there on 19 December 1951. As with other Allied ships returned from the Russians in this era, she was reportedly in very rough shape and filthy, no doubt done on purpose.

After six weeks of cleaning and repair at Bremerhaven, she was commissioned there as USS Northwind (AGB-5) on 31 January 1952, with CDR John Boynton Davenport, USN (USNA 1941), in command. Arriving at Boston after a slow Atlantic crossing, she needed a further four months to bring her back up to Navy standards.

USN Days

In the eight years that Northwind/Severnyy Veter was loaned to Uncle Joe and the gang, the Coast Guard had picked up a second USCGC Northwind (WAGB-282), which was commissioned in July 1945. Thus, to keep from confusing the two, the original Northwind/Severnyy Veter was renamed USS Staten Island (AGB-5) on 25 February 1952—the only Navy vessel to carry that name.

Her Russian-era armament landed, and she picked up her first 5-incher, a sole 5”/38 DP in a Mark 30 enclosed single mount, as well as an SPS-6 radar set and lots of new commo gear.

Now haze gray and underway, Staten Island‘s first Navy deployment from Boston was to Frobisher Bay, where she conducted ice reconnaissance from July through September. The next year she notably became the first Navy ship to cut through the Davis Strait from Thule Air Base to the Alert station on Ellesmere Island, just 435 miles from the North Pole.

She was a key vessel in Project Mushrat and sortied 14 Rockoons (balloon-assisted stratosphere sounding rockets) carrying instruments for the Naval Research Laboratory and Iowa State University.

An 11-foot long/200-pound Deacon sounding rocket is shown being towed by a Skyhook balloon in a combination known as “Rockoon”. It was launched from the icebreaker USS Staten Island during the Arctic expedition of 1953. The rocket was wrapped in plastic to avoid freezing at altitude. (via Stratocat)

As detailed by the Navy:

This project, known as Project Mushrat, is sponsored by the Office of Naval Research with the assistance of the Bureau of Aeronautics and the Military Sea Transportation Service – Atomic Energy Commission Joint Program of Basic Research in Nuclear Physics, and the Naval Research Laboratory Program of Upper Atmosphere Research. Because of the widespread interest in the project, and particularly in the balloon-rocket technique, several observers from the three military services will accompany the expedition. The Balloon-Rocket Technique, commonly referred to as Balloon Assisted Take-Off (BATO) or Rockoon, was developed by Dr. James A. Van Allen at Iowa State University and used on board the USCGC Eastwind during the summer of 1952. This method makes it possible to reach high altitudes by small, inexpensive rockets. During the summer of 1952, one of the balloon rocket flights launched from Eastwind and achieved a peak altitude of about 295,000 feet.

Mushrat: The U.S. Navy icebreaker USS Staten Island (AGB-5) with a group of civilian and naval scientists onboard left Boston, Massachusetts, on July 18, 1953, for the North Geomagnetic Pole. They will make a comprehensive series of high-altitude observations of the primary cosmic radiation and the pressure, temperature, and density of the atmosphere in the northern latitudes. 330-PS-6008 (USN 483600)

Mushrat: “Navy Testing Cosmic Radiation at North Geomagnetic Pole. USS Staten Island (AGB-5) is shown reflecting in the water. Photograph released June 28, 1953.” 330-PS-6008 (USN 483601)

Coverage of Staten Island and Mushrat in the December 1953 All Hands:

In all, while stationed in Boston, Staten Island conducted six ice-breaking operations in northern waters between 1952 and 15 December 1954.

She then transferred to the Pacific in May 1955 and, joining her classmate icebreakers of Service Squadron 1 at Seattle, would shift to resupplying the new Distant Early Warning (DEW) radar stations in the Arctic, a role that would endure for a decade. It was during these trips that Staten Island was used as a Rockoon platform, launching a further 26 aloft in 1955 and 14 in 1958.

Northwind, I presume? Navy icebreaker Staten Island (AGB-5)/ex-Northwind (WAGB-278) approaching sistership, USCGC Northwind (WAGB-288), off Icy Cape, Alaska. 30 July 1955. Note her 5″/38 forward and her twin Bofors on the bridge wings. She also carries LCVPs. USCG Photo No. 07-30-55 (06) via USCG Historian’s Office.

She also started clocking in on regular Operation Deep Freeze runs to Antarctica’s Byrd Station and the later McMurdo Station.

USS Staten Island (AGB-5) temporarily stalled by pressure ice in the Ross Sea, during Antarctic operations, on 9 December 1958. Note Adelie penguins in the foreground. NH 99297

The above image of USS Staten Island (AGB-5) was used as the cover for the 15 July 1959 edition of Our Navy

Icebreaker USS Staten Island, AGB-5, and transport USS Calvert APA-32

USS Staten Island AGB-5 in the Amundsen Sea, 21 September 1960. Note the stacked LCVPs. U.S. Navy photo via USAP

14 November 1962 Staten Island (AGB-5) follows a lead in the ice of McMurdo Sound. U.S. Navy photo via USAP

25 November 1962. Steaming past Antarctica’s only known active volcano, Mount Erebus, the Seattle-based icebreaker USS Staten Island (AGB-5) widens a channel in McMurdo Sound for trailing cargo ships en route to McMurdo Station Antarctica. U.S. Navy photo via USAP

USNS Chattahoochee off-loads fuel into drums on a sled to be towed to McMurdo Station 13 miles away. The ice breaker Staten Island (AGB-5) is the center ship. The USNS Mirfak (T-AK-271) is a cargo ship to the far left. U.S. Navy Photo

In addition to paving the way to install and resupply Arctic DEW stations and Antarctic bases, Staten Island often embarked scientists directly, such as a 1963 U. S. Antarctic Research Program expedition to the Palmer Peninsula and South Shetland Islands. The expedition, led by Dr. Waldo LaSalle Schmitt from the Smithsonian, directed the icebreaker to call at 26 remote points between 18 January and 5 March, and her botanists and biologists harvested 27,000 specimens.

The U.S. Navy icebreaker USS Staten Island (AGB-5) with a HUL-1 helicopter on board approaches the Palmer Peninsula during Antarctic operations in early 1963.

1964: Navy Icebreaker AGB-5 USS Staten Island at McMurdo Station Antarctica. Note that her 5-incher has been removed

Operation Deep Freeze 1965: Fifty crewmembers of the USS Staten Island haul a damaged LH-34D helicopter across three miles of fast ice to the ship where it will be on-loaded

A USS Staten Island (AGB-5) postcard, seen late in her Navy career

Coast Guard Days

By agreement with the Coast Guard, our girl– and all other Navy icebreakers– was placed out of commission on 1 February 1966, struck from the Navy list, and recommissioned as USCGC Staten Island (W-AGB-278), thus starting her third life.

She was painted white and upgraded, including strengthening her flight deck and hangar to permit her to operate with the new generation of HH-52 helicopters in a telescoping hangar, and her engineering plant was upgraded. By this time, she carried an SPS-10B and SPS-53A radar set in addition to her circa 1956 SPS-6C.

Wind Class Icebreaker USCGC Staten Island pictured c1968 with Navy Sea Sprite 9021 from Guam-based HC-5. 

Meanwhile, in Coast Guard service her main guns had already been removed, and she spent the rest of her career with a few machine guns (four M2 .50 cals) and her small arms locker.

Staten Island at a Navy pier with her hangar fully extended. 31 July 1967; Photographer unknown. Photo No. 073167-49 via USCG Historian’s Office.

Staten Island. 14 August 1967; Note the large ice launch on her davits and telescoping hangar. Photographer unknown. USCG Photo No. 278-081467-63 via USCG Historian’s Office.

USCGC Staten Island (WAGB-278), a United States Coast Guard Wind-class icebreaker, makes its way to McMurdo Station in this undated photo. NSF photo via USAP archives.

Staten Island ice rescue team retrieving mail drop in Bering Sea. 1 March 1969; Photo No. 2780021169-23A; photographer unknown. via USCG Historian’s Office.

In late 1969, she navigated the Northwest Passage, escorting the Esso-chartered oil tanker SS Manhattan eastward from Seattle to New York, in concert while in Canuk waters with the smaller Canadian icebreaker Sir John A. MacDonald.

Original Kodachrome of the Staten Island (lead) and Canadian icebreaker CCGS John A. MacDonald (red hull) escort the tanker SS Manhattan (where the photographer is standing) through the Northwest Passage, September through December of 1969. Via USCG Historian’s Office

As detailed by the USCG Historian’s Office:

She rendezvoused with Manhattan and CCGS John A. MacDonald on 20 September 1969 and departed the next day. The convoy searched out heavy ice on the trip. Manhattan was testing its unique ice-breaking bow and searching for routes that merchant ships might use to transport oil from the oil fields of Alaska’s North Slope to the East Coast. By 1 October 1969, the convoy had broken through the heaviest ice in Prince of Wales Strait and Viscount Melville Sound. Staten Island assisted Manhattan “with evaluation project, photo, and ice helicopter reconnaissance, diving operations, dental treatment of Manhattan personnel and ice-breaking assistance.”

The convoy arrived in New York on 9 November 1969. On 9 December 1969, she returned to Seattle after becoming the fourth American ship in history to make the voyage around the North American continent. The others had been the cutters Storis, Bramble, and Spar in 1957. By the time she arrived back at Seattle, Staten Island had traveled 23,000 miles, stopping at New York City, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Acapulco, Mexico after transiting the Panama Canal.

When in the Arctic, she often tracked Soviet shipping, as noted by Crewman Ronald Lange, from the files of the USCG Historian’s Office of her 1970 Alaska cruise:

Our ship operated west of the Alaskan Straits to identify and track Russian merchant ships moving down towards the Straits bound mostly Vietnam. Our 2 helicopters identified ships and we were on the bridge and CIC group (I was in CIC. an RD3) documented. We identified different types of ships using mixed drinks for keywords (Martini for a freighter, whiskey sour for a tanker, etc.)…There were several Russian corvette-type escort ships and a Russian icebreaker as well. The captain of the Russian vessel came over by helicopter and saluted Captain Putzke, who was on the wing of the bridge…We were generally left alone by the Russians, except when one of our helicopters got into Russian air space near one of their early warning radar stations in the fog.

“269-ft. USCG C Staten Island (WAGB-278) masking trails through ice-paved [sic] for deliveries.”; 29 December 1970; no photo number; photo by PH3 D. H. Walker, USCG. via USCG Historian’s Office.

Deep Freeze ’71 saw Staten Island accomplish the feat of circumnavigating Antarctica, she transported a U.N. inspection mission around to the different international outposts on the continent– including the Russian bases– to ensure weapons-free treaty compliance.

U.S. Navy aerial photo of Hut Point Peninsula taken in February 1971 when the fuel tanker USNS Maumee arrived to off-load fuel (Feb 12-14). The smaller vessel to the outside is the USCGC Staten Island (WAGB-278). A careful examination of the photo will reveal the roof of British explorer Captain Robert Falcon Scott’s 1902 Discovery Hut. The other building and fuel storage tanks have been removed since this photo was taken. Photo via USAP

13 February 1971: McMurdo Station Antarctica. Ships moored in Winter Quarters Bay. Present are USNS Maumee (T-AO-149), USNS Wyandot (T-AK-283), USCGC Staten Island (WAGB-278), and USCGC Burton Island (WAGB-283). National Archives. K-88755

Five ships in Winter Quarters Bay on 13 February 1971. In the foreground is HMNZS Endeavour (A184), across the right is USNS Wyandot (T-AKA-92) and USCGC Burton Island (WAGB-283), across the left, is USNS Maumee (T-AO-149) and USCGC Staten Island (WAGB-278). Along the shoreline, work is underway to repair and install facing an Elliott Quay – a steel-and-timber reinforcement barrier to protect the shoreline from erosion. Photo by Carl Norton, via USAP

On 9 January 1971, one of Staten Island’s embarked HH-52A Sea Guards (#1404) crashed while some 12,000 feet high into the side of Mount Erebus while on a Deep Freeze mission. The crew, uninjured, was rescued and returned to McMurdo. The helo had already suffered a near-catastrophic water landing earlier on the deployment.

As detailed by Lange:

“After the Arctic West trip of 1970, we were assigned to Operation Deepfreeze. Our ports of call on the outward leg of our trip were Hawaii. Suva, Fiji, and Wellington, New Zealand. Our air element came from Mobile, Alabama along with 2 HH-52 helos. Our trip through Fiji was uneventful, but while conducting air operations (SAR) drills, one the helos (#1404) experienced a total electrical failure at approximately 500 feet altitude and autorotated onto the ocean. No one was injured and the helo was hauled aboard with only slight damage to its hull. The copter was repaired, and electrical components were changed out on our way to McMurdo station.

We conducted ice-breaking operations along with the Burton Island in McMurdo Sound while the air element assisted ashore with cargo operations. In January 1971, while transporting base personnel around Mount Erebus, our HH-52 (#1404), experienced a severe downdraft and crashed near the summit of the mountain. It took several hours to find the aircraft as our choppers then were mostly white against a snowy background.

Staten Island also kept up her long-running knack for linking up with the Russkies.

For two weeks in February-March 1973, Staten Island met 475 miles north of Adak Island with the Soviet Far Eastern Shipping Company research vessel Priboy for a series of joint meteorological experiments in the Bering Strait. They were assisted by a NASA flying laboratory aboard an American Conveyor 990 aircraft out of Kodiak and a Soviet Il-18 operating from Cape Schmidt. The joint sea and ice study was code-named “Bering Sea Experiment” or Project BESEX, which surely inspired no shortage of Mad Magazine-level humor among all those involved.

USCGC 278 Staten Island, Pier 91 Seattle, 1972

She then spent a month (7 March to 3 April 1973) under the operational control of COMSUBPAC involved in supporting ICEX 1-73, the long-running U.S. Navy submarine exercise in the Arctic, which led to the ship earning the Coast Guard Unit Commendation with Operational Distinguishing Device. She added it to a CGUC she already picked up in 1969 for the SS Manhattan mission through the Northwest Passage and a Meritorious Unit Commendation she received in 1971 for her circumnavigation around Antarctica.

Then came, what turned out to be, Staten Island’s final Deep Freeze deployment down south.

The red-hulled USCGC Staten Island (WAGB-278) late in her career seen underway departing San Diego Bay, on 16 November 1973 after completing Fleet Readiness Training and was en route to Antarctica for Deep Freeze 74. Marine Photos and Publishing Co. canceled postcard via the NYPL collection (NYPL_b15279351-105169).

Returning to Seattle one final time, Staten Island was decommissioned on 15 November 1974 and soon afterward sold for scrap.

In all, she had counted no less than 22 skippers– 6 Soviet, 10 USN, and 6 USCG– across her 30 years of service.

Further, as far as I can tell, she was the only ship to pull off the polar hattrick of navigating the Northern Sea Route over the top of Asia and Europe (1944), the Northwest Passage over the top of North America (1969) and circumnavigating the continent of Antarctica (1971).

From patrolling for U-boats at Murmansk to supplying Byrd Station and launching Rocktoons into the stratosphere, if it was cold, Northwind I/Severnyy Veter/Station Island got it done.

Epilogue

Her plans and a few logbooks from her time as a Navy icebreaker have been digitized in the National Archives.

Meanwhile, hundreds of preserved scientific specimens in the Smithsonian’s collection were gathered along the Palmer Peninsula and South Shetland in 1963 by the USARP Expedition working from Staten Island’s decks.

HH-52 Sea Guard #1404, lost by Staten Island in 1971, remains on Mt. Erebus and is often visited by NSF staff.

Photo by Michael Carroll and Rosaly Lopes, NSF, 24 December 2016

A second Sea Guard from Staten Island is one of the few of the type that is preserved and on display, donated to Seattle’s Museum of Flight in 1988 and put on display in its standard livery in 2011. 

The Russians still remember her as well. A detailed scale model of Northwind/Severnyy Veter is in a place of honor at the Museum of the Murmansk Shipping Company, the successor to GUSMP.

While the Navy has not commissioned another Staten Island, the Coast Guard perpetuated the name in the 45th 110-foot Island-class patrol cutter, WPB 1345, which joined the fleet in 2000.

21 October 1999. U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Staten Island (WPB 1345) is underway from Washington, DC. The cutter is returning to its homeport in North Carolina. USCG photo by PA3 Bridget Hieronymus.

She served until 2014 and was transferred to the former Russian Republic of Georgia, where she currently patrols the Black Sea as Ochamchire (P 23)-– where she will no doubt continue to cause heartburn to the Russians for years to come.

Ships are more than steel
and wood
And heart of burning coal,
For those who sail upon
them know
That some ships have a
soul.

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80 years ago today: A “Free Belgian” lance corporal of the British Army’s No. 10 (Inter-Allied) Commando inspects his rifle with sniper scope in a village in Italy, 6 February 1944. Note his kit that includes not only an optics-equipped No. 4 Enfield but also Mills bombs, a toggle rope, and a cap comforter, the latter two pieces of gear considered standard issue among Commando units post-Dieppe. Further, take note of his fellow Commandos, many wearing a green beret with Belgian Lion insignia.

Official caption: “Italy. 5th Army. Belgian Commandos. Commando checking over the sniper sights on his rifle with a satisfied look. (La Vaglie) Taken by Sgt Bowman.” IWM NA 11813

The Free Belgian troops, formed in England around a 400-man kernel of the Royal Belgian Army that had escaped from the Continent in June 1940, eventually rose to include the 2,200-man Piron Brigade after its commanding officer, B. Gen. Jean-Baptiste Piron.

Volunteers from the Free Belgians for No. 10 Commando soon numbered enough to man a full Troop (No. 4), which, besides lending small groups for service to support the SOE in Belgium (all members had to be fluent in French, Dutch and English), would ship out to Italy in November 1943 to join the Special Service Brigade there and would continue to fight up the Italian “Boot” for most of the year, switching to Northwest Europe in November 1944 with Operation Infatuate: the liberation of the Dutch island of Walcheren.

Denison smocks, toggle ropes, and green berets with lions: Belgian Commandos in Training in Britain, 1945. “Men of the Belgian Army learn to use a Bren gun as part of their Commando training at a British Commando School. The NCO records to the second the time allowed for firing.” IWM D 23711

There were so many volunteers that a spin-off unit, Capt. Edouard “Eddy” Blondeel’s oversized Belgian Independent Parachute Company, became the 5th SAS in 1944 (and would become the 1er Regiment Parachutiste in the Belgian Army in 1946).

Post-war, No. 4 (Belgian) Troop, No. 10 Cmdo, would form the Belgian Army’s Commando Brigade (now 2e Bataillon de Commandos), in 1945. The organization still wears British-style para wings and its unit badge is a British Commando Fairbairn-Sykes dagger.

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