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You are here: Home / Archives for block island

[FEATURE ARTICLE] What Happened to Submarine S-51 Off Block Island?

May 5, 2020 By Brian Wallin

S-51 at sea.
S-51 at sea

Submarines carry both a unique danger and special mystique to their volunteer crews. Although there have been instances of submariners escaping or rescued from their boat when it sank either by accident or in combat, usually, when a submarine ran into trouble, it meant a one-way trip to Davy Jones’ locker. However, it was the sinking of USS S-51 (SS-162)  ninety-five years ago off the coast of Block Island, RI, that started a chain of events leading to modern submarine rescue techniques. This story goes back to the night of 25 September 1925 and brings together several men who would make major contributions to the U.S. Navy in the ensuing decades.

Simon Lake
Simon Lake

S-51, commissioned in 1922, was the fourth boat of her class and was built in Bridgeport, Connecticut. It was one of twenty-six boats built for the U.S. Navy by Simon Lake during and after World War II. He was an innovative naval designer, who also built submarines for Germany, Russia, and the Austro-Hungarian Navy. Lake was a fierce competitor of the larger Electric Boat Company, which eventually emerged as the Navy’s builder of  choice (where it remains to this day). But Lake, who died in 1945, continued to advise the Navy on undersea weaponry right up to the time of his death.

During World War I, the Navy saw the potential of underwater warfare. It ordered thirty-eight, 240-foot-long S-class boats. At 930 tons, 240 feet in length, and capable of 14.5 knots surface speed, they were coastal vessels, smaller and far-less sophisticated forerunners of the Fleet boats of World War II. Five of Lake’s boats survived to serve in World War II, in early combat and later in training crews. The last to be decommissioned — in June 1946 — was S-15 (SS-120). 

‘S-51″ at left alongside ‘S-50’

The new S-51 sailed with the Atlantic Fleet from Navy Base Groton as a member of Submarine Division 4. She was a frequent visitor in New England ports, including Newport and Providence, RI, and also sailing the Caribbean as far as Panama.

SS City of Rome
SS City of Rome

On that chilly, clear night in September, S-51 was riding low on the surface of Block Island Sound under peacetime conditions (with her running lights illuminated). Shortly after 10:00PM (2203), a lookout on the merchant steamer City of Rome, sailing to Boston from New York, spotted a single white masthead light about five miles to starboard and assumed it was a rum runner (a common sight during Prohibition). The brightly lit steamer thought the other vessel could see her and would alter course, especially since rum runners didn’t encourage company.

The City of Rome’s Captain, John H. Diehl had come on the bridge shortly after the light was sighted and (realizing the light shown by the unknown vessel was drawing closer) ordered a course change. S-51 had spotted the larger ship’s masthead and green (starboard) sidelight, but held her course under the maritime Rules of the Road (the Navy crew thought they had been recognized as a military vessel and so expected the right of way). At the last minute, the City of Rome spotted the submarine’s red (port) sidelight and realized the two vessels were on a collision course. The City of Rome sounded a danger signal with her whistle and both ships took evasive action, but too late. 

Twenty-two minutes after first spotting the submarine’s masthead light, the steamer rammed S-51 and tore a thirty-foot hole just forward of the conning tower. The steamer then drove the sub underwater. The ocean poured into S-51. Since it was not under battle conditions, the boat’s watertight compartments were open to the in-rushing sea.

Lt Rodney Dobson, USN
Rodney Dobson

Only three of the submarine’s 36 men (Dewey Kile, Michael Lira, and Alfred Gerier) were able to abandon ship and were picked up by the steamer’s launch. The survivors told investigators there had been no panic aboard and they had seen other crewmen helping each other escape through open hatches. A handful of men, including the commanding officer, Lt. Rodney Dobson, managed to get out but, lightly clad, most quickly drowned in the chilly waters. The S-51 went down in less than a minute (her clocks were found stopped at 2225 hours), coming to rest in 132 feet of water fourteen miles off Block Island. 

The City of Rome was not badly damaged. The captain radioed the ship’s owners for help. A ship’s boat rescued several survivors, but the captain (for some reason) did not realize he had sunk a submarine and there might stll be survivors below. The Navy did not get word of the sinking until they were notified via Western Union telegram at 1:20 am. Ships were dispatched but initially to the wrong location. Air bubbles and an oil slick were spotted by a search aircraft at 10:45am and ships moved quickly to the scene. Arriving on scene, the Navy destroyer USS Putnam, found a makeshift buoy suggesting there might be men still alive in the sunken sub.

A U.S. Navy sailor with a cutting torch during the ‘S-51’ salvage mission.
Navy sailor with cutting torch during S-51 salvage

Divers descended on the wreck some fifteen hours after the collision but, although tapping sounds had been initially heard from within the wreck they soon ceased (when the crew’s air supply would have run out). When the rescue ship USS Falcon and other ships reached the site, their work was confined to salvage. Hard hat divers began working under adverse conditions through the following months. Falcon had served as a minesweeper during World War I and participated in postwar mineclearing operations in the North Sea. Reclassified as a salvage vessel, she began salvage operations on the S-51 using a number of determined and ingenious efforts, sometimes combatting uncooperative seas and weather conditions.

Finally, using large pontoons, S-51 was raised on 5 July 1926 by a team led by Lt Cdr (later Rear Admiral) Edward Ellsberg whose book “On The Bottom” recounts the sinking and salvage operation. Ellsberg, aboard Falcon, worked the operation from the day after the sinking until the S-51 was brought to the surface. He was promoted to Commander and awarded the Navy Distinguished Service Medal for his efforts. Ellsberg left active service shortly after only to be recalled to duty several times, gaining further fame during World War II. He retired in 1951 as the Navy’s principal salvage officer. Over the years, Ellsberg wrote numerous books about his adventures.

  • Edward Ellsberg
  • USS Falcon (AM-28)
    USS Falcon (AM-28)

The S-51 tragedy also included a number of interesting convergences. Responding to the sighting by the search aircraft, the submarine S-1 (SS-105) confirmed the location of the wreck by the oil slick. S-1 was commanded by Charles B. “Swede” Momsen, inventor of the Momsen Lung and co-inventor of the McCann rescue diving chamber used to rescue survivors of the submarine USS Squalus that sank off New Hampshire in 1939. Squalus, was raised, repaired, and re-commissioned as the USS Sailfish (SS-192) serving through World War II.

The S-51 salvage operation was under the overall leadership of Captain (later Fleet Admiral) Ernest J. King, who was commanding officer of the Groton Submarine Base at the time. He would go on to become the Navy’s World War II Commander-in-Chief.

  • S-51 salvage operation
    S-51 salvage operation
  • Raising the S-51
    Raising the S-51

The S-51 hulk, supported by large pontoons, was slowly towed down Long Island Sound to the Brooklyn Navy Yard for dry-docking. Along the way, bad luck continued when it ran aground in the East River, delaying its return by another 24 hours. Eleven bodies had been removed by divers during salvage efforts. The rest of the remains were recovered at the Navy Yard. S-51 went into dry-dock and remained on view until it was decommissioned and sold for scrap in 1930.

  • S-51 in drydock
    S-51 in dry dock
  • Closeup of the damage to the S-51
    Closeup of the damage to the S-51

A court of inquiry was convened by the Navy and it laid the blame on the captain of the merchant vessel. But, the federal courts, hampered by few clues, also sought to determine blame for the sinking. However, Captain Diehl was found ‘not guilty’ on civil charges of negligence and failure to stand by the sunken submarine. Eventually, civil authorities found each vessel partly at fault: City of Rome for not reducing speed when in doubt as to the movement of S-51, and for not signaling her course change; and the S-51 for having improper lights. The Navy argued unsuccessfully that submarines were unique craft and as a special type of warship should not be required to conform to the letter of the law and the maritime rules of the road. But, the courts said if that were to be accepted, then submarines should stay out of sea lanes used by other ships (which sort of goes against the whole idea of a submarine as a naval weapon).

Rhode Island’s waters are known to be exceptionally dangerous places. Nearly three thousand shipwrecks have been documented since records were kept beginning in the 17th century. The S-51 is one more statistic within that tragic number. A reminder of the loss can still be found at the Submarine Force Museum in Groton, CT, where the bell of the S-51 is on exhibit.

Bell of the S-51 (SS-162)
Bell of the S-51 (SS-162)

— END —

Filed Under: Feature Article Tagged With: block island, submarine, world war I, World War II

[FEATURE ARTICLE] Block Island and the Navy in World War I

May 28, 2017 By Brian Wallin

USS Texas in World War I
USS Texas in World War I

As we observe the centennial of America’s entry into World War I, over the next months we’ll share a few stories about the Rhode Island connection to “the war to end all wars”.  When a Rhode Islander thinks of the US Navy in World War I, Newport, RI, immediately comes to mind.  It was home to squadrons of destroyers, the Navy Torpedo Station (which is now the Naval Undersea Warfare Center Division Newport), and the Naval War College (which remains there to this day).  Thousands of Navy enlisted personnel were trained at Coddington Cove.  But did you know that the Navy also maintained a presence on Block Island off the Rhode Island coast? Or that one of the Navy’s largest ships, the battleship USS Texas, made a surprise visit to the island in the fall of 1917?

America officially entered the war on April 6, 1917.  Just two and a half months later, on July 20, the Navy arrived on Block Island and established a base for coastal patrol boats.  Tasked with the job of searching out marauding German U-boats, they took over the Narragansett Inn at New Harbor as their headquarters.  The hotel had been built just a few years earlier.

Over the years, not a great deal has been written about the Block Island base.  Only a few photographs of the Navy’s activities are known to exist.  Most were taken by islanders’ and wound up in family albums.  Navy personnel took some photos and a few were found in the personal album of the base’s second commander, Lt.  Merriam.  A wonderful chronicle of life on the island in the early years of the 20th century can be found in Block Island historian Robert Downie’s two-volume collection titled “The Block Island History of Photography”.  The Navy’s story is in volume 2.  There’s a set of both books in the East Greenwich Library reference room along with several of Downie’s other photo books.  They are well worth a look some time.

Led by a handful of officers, some 350 enlisted served on the island at the peak of the Navy’s presence.  Most of the men lived in a tent city behind the Narragansett Inn, while the officers enjoyed the amenities of the hotel.  Quarters were also rented from islanders in private homes and boarding houses.  A dispensary was set up at the Sullivan House on Indian Point and staffed by Red Cross nurses who became a familiar sight in their uniforms as they traveled around the island.

USS Texas (BB-35)

The Hog Pen Basin (across from the Narragansett Inn) served as homeport for a fleet of 60-foot patrol boats.  The Navy had scrambled to put together enough small, fast coastal vessels for anti-submarine patrols and large private yachts proved a ready resource.  Some had been volunteered by their owners who went along with them into naval service.  The island’s steamship pier was also taken over by the Navy.  Submarines and other craft often called at the base.  Even aircraft from the Navy’s base on Cape Cod would touch down on occasion.

Larger, 104-foot subchaser patrol boats were also a familiar sight.  After the war, some of the speedy subchasers would wind up as rumrunners during prohibition in the United States.  One became the Block Island ferryboat Elizabeth Ann.  Operated by the newly-formed Interstate Navigation Company, she carried passengers to the island until after World War II.  Her small size and narrow 14-foot beam made for an occasional rocky ride during bad weather, but she was beloved by both islanders and visitors.

At any one time, no more than 10 Navy craft were stationed at Hog Basin and Payne’s Dock.  They daily patrolled the waters from Long Island across Rhode Island Sound and out beyond Block Island, hunting for U-boats that might try to enter Narragansett Bay or lurk outside its entrance just beyond the minefield that had been laid (in a previous feature article, we shared the story of how the U-53 that boldly visited the Navy Base in 1916 when America was still a neutral nation).  In a visit that lasted only a few hours, her commander, Lt.  Hans Rose, managed to gather intelligence on ship traffic from the daily newspapers.  He used the information to sink five ships off the coast of Massachusetts the next day.  The Navy obviously didn’t want a repeat of that incident.

WW I Navy personnel and nurses in front of the Block Island headquarters
WW I Navy personnel and nurses in front of the Block Island headquarters

The two summers that the Navy men and nurses spent on the island, of course, were favored duty.  The winter of 1917 was another story.  All in all, however, it wasn’t a bad place to spend the war.  Downie’s book shows enlisted men enjoying various free time activities (the Knights of Columbus had set up a recreation center, one of thousands opened in the US and overseas during the war by the fraternal order).  Numerous sports activities also provided an outlet for youthful energy, if there was any left over after regular drills and sea duty.  The Navy also set up a recreation building at Payne’s Dock (the structure still exists).

The first commander of the base was Lt. Harold S. Vanderbilt, son of the railroad magnate William Vanderbilt.  He served only until November of 1917.  He was succeeded by Lt. H.M. Merriman who commanded the base through the end of the World War I.  Vanderbilt brought along his personal yacht.  It was commissioned by the Navy as the SP 56 (and returned to Vanderbilt after the war).  Other famous names of the time who contributed their pleasure craft as patrol boats were Rhode Island naval architect L. Francis Herreshoff (whose boatyard built also small patrol craft for the Navy) and newspaper publisher Ralph Pulitzer.  One photo shows the SP 56 apparently run up on the shore and efforts underway to free it.  An officer with his back to the camera could well be Vanderbilt, mulling over what to do.  An accomplished yachtsman, Vanderbilt would go on to commission several successful defenders of the America’s Cup yachting trophy in the 1930s.

Harold S. Vanderbilt’s personal yacht, SP 56.
Yacht SP 56 (aground) and Lt. Harold S. Vanderbilt
Yacht SP 56 (aground) and Lt. Harold S. Vanderbilt

The little SP 56 was not the only naval vessel to come into unexpected contact with the Block Island shoreline.  The battleship Texas made a sudden and unexpected call on the island after leaving the New York Navy Yard on her way to join the British fleet in England.  During the mid-watch in clear weather on September 27, 1917, as the ship’s navigator tried to avoid the minefield at the opening to Long Island Sound, he became confused about shore lights.  He turned the ship in the wrong direction and the 580-foot long, 27-thousand ton Texas ran firmly aground on Crescent Beach just below the famous Searles Mansion (the landmark was destroyed in a 1963 fire, but its foundations still can be seen).  Needless to say, Captain Victor Blue was not a happy man that morning.  His ship was stuck from the bow back beyond amidships, more than 200 feet.  The ship drew 28 feet of water and obviously didn’t find it on the shore of Block Island.


We’ve written other feature articles focusing on Block Island!

  • Rhode Island Enters World War II: The Aftermath of Pearl Harbor and Block Island’s Defiant Response
  • The Aircraft Carriers of Block Island

Initial efforts to free the battleship were unsuccessful.  Five thousand tons of coal, munitions, anchor chain and just about everything moveable in the forward part of the ship were painstakingly removed by the crew.  Numerous small craft milled about to help.  Even the USS New York, sister ship of the Texas, showed up to lend moral support.  The New York’s  crew shouted, “Come on Texas!” and the rallying cry later became the ship’s motto.  Finally, on the morning of October 1, the Texas, with the help of tugs, was able to winch herself off the shore.  She returned to New York for extensive repairs to her damaged hull.  Captain Blue was never court-marshaled for the incident and retained his command (not always the case under such circumstances).  His navigator was held solely responsible for the incident.  Oddly, there are no official Navy photographs of the ship aground.  The only picture is a copyrighted photo in Downie’s book, for which this writer could not obtain permission to reproduce.  However, an official Navy photo of the dry-docked Texas showing the extent of the damage to her hull was located in the National Archives.  Following repairs, the Texas went on to a distinguished career in both World Wars and is now a museum ship in its namesake state.  The excitement soon died down and life returned to normal on Block Island.  Residents and the Navy huddled down for a stormy winter.

One other major event highlighted by Block Island historian Robert Downie is the parade of July 4, 1918.  In full dress uniforms with the officers carrying their swords, the Navy contingent along with the Red Cross nurses marched about a mile from the their headquarters in New Harbor down to the Ocean View Hotel in Old Harbor.  The hotel had been decked out in flags and banners for the event.  The Navy band played a concert in front of the hotel.  The festivities attracted most of the island’s residents and, for certain, holiday visitors.

Nurses march in the Block Island parade on July 4, 1918
Hotel decorated for World War I Block Island parade
Hotel decorated for World War I Block Island parade

The parade would be the last public event marking the military’s presence on the island during World War I.  The war, of course, ended the following November 11.  The Navy lost no time in shutting down.  Activities ceased in December and the base was abandoned on January 30, 1919.  A few traces remain.  The concrete mount for a one-inch gun is still visible down by the water’s edge in front of the Ocean View Hotel.  The Knights of Columbus hall is still there as is the restaurant in the marina at Payne’s Dock on the Great Salt Pond.  During the War, 63 Block Islanders (out of a population of 1000) served their country.  Three did not return: Lawrence F. Conley, Arnold R. Milliken, and Milton M. Mitchell.  Their names and those of the other sixty who served appear on a stone War Memorial across the street from the Block Island Historical Society.

World War I Memorial on Block Island, RI.
World War I Memorial on Block Island, RI.

Filed Under: Feature Article Tagged With: block island, Navy, USS Texas, world war I

[FEATURE ARTICLE] Rhode Island Enters World War II: The Aftermath of Pearl Harbor and Block Island’s Defiant Response

December 3, 2016 By Brian Wallin

Providence Journal coverage of the Pearl Harbor attack.
Providence Journal coverage of the Pearl Harbor attack.

By the time the Japanese launched their sneak attack on Pearl Harbor 75 years ago this month, Rhode Island had already been gearing up for America’s potential entry into World War II. At the mouth of Narragansett Bay and along the shoreline facing ocean waters, the Army’s massive coast defense forts were manned primarily by members of the Rhode Island’s National Guard 243rd Coast Artillery Regiment, which had been called up to Federal service in 1940 as part of the Harbor Defense Command (Company I, the Searchlight Battery, had been stationed at the Varnum Memorial Armory). Coast defense installations would soon be operational from Watch Hill to Little Compton, supporting similar installations along the Eastern Seaboard.

The U.S. Navy had maintained a massive presence in Rhode Island for many years, and a beneficiary of President Franklin Roosevelt’s preparedness initiatives was the massive pre-war expansion that included the Quonset Point Naval Air Station, new facilities at the Naval Operating Base in Newport and the Torpedo Station, the Naval Construction Battalion facility at Davisville, the Motor Torpedo Boat Squadrons Training Center at Melville, and auxiliary naval airfields in Charlestown and Westerly. The Navy would train hundreds of thousands of men and women at these facilities during the war.

The U.S. Army Air Force took over Hillsgrove State Airport in April of 1942 and trained fighter pilots there throughout the war. Also early on in the conflict, the Harbor Defense Command completed the construction of Fort Varnum and Fort Greene (the latter one of two sites for massive 16-inch naval gun batteries capable of hurling a 1-ton projectile some 25 miles out to sea. A second 16-inch battery was built at Fort Church in Little Compton). An integrated fire control and observation system along the coast and on Block Island controlled all the state’s coast defenses.

Almost immediately, Rhode Island’s coastline was sealed off to civilians. The military, along with civilian volunteers, patrolled the beaches. Blackouts soon went into effect as far north as Woonsocket and were strictly enforced. Meanwhile, the state’s industries, recovering from the devastating impact of the Great Depression years, continued their rapid changeover from manufacture of peacetime goods to supplying the tools of war from anti-aircraft guns, to Liberty ships and patrol boats, uniforms, rubber products, and so much more. Civilian workers rallied to the cause, including thousands of women who entered the work force in traditionally male jobs.

We’ve shared stories of the Liberty ships built in Providence and the secret listening post at Chopmist Hill in previous editions of the Varnum News. In future columns, we’ll weave a few tales about harbor defenses, PT boats, torpedoes, and other aspects of our state’s contributions to the war effort. But this month, here’s the story of Block Island’s role in the war.

The state’s populace was reeling with the news of Pearl Harbor by the end of the day on Sunday, December 7, 1941. Military bases were under high alert around the state, and the civilian population was worried about sneak attacks by … well, whoever might try (Germany was already sinking ships along our coast and on December 11, would join Italy and Japan in the war against the U.S). There would be instances of sabotage during the war as well. Our own Block Island, 8 miles from the closest point on the mainland, is actually at the greatest distance from the mainland or other islands, than any other town on the Atlantic coast. In the minds of some state and Federal officials, that put the island’s residents in jeopardy.

William Doggett's Cottage on Block Island, RI.
William Doggett’s Cottage on Block Island, RI.

On December 8, an officer from the First Army Command (which covered New England) landed on Block Island and went straight to the home of William Doggett, who in 1928 had built a handsome stone cottage and tower on Beacon Hill, the island’s highest point. Doggett was told to move his family out immediately. The army was taking over the property for the duration. Six years would pass before they were to return home.

The Army wanted Beacon Hill as one of a series of six sites for eight observation towers to support the massive 16-inch gun batteries on the Rhode Island coast. Heavy caliber weapons were also in place on Fishers Island in Connecticut and Montauk Point on Long Island. The huge 16-inch weapons, originally intended for use on battleships that the U.S. Navy never built as a result of the 1922 Washington Naval Treaty, were being brought out of storage for coast defense. The guns could send a shell the size of a small automobile high over Block Island and some 25 miles out to sea well beyond the current site of the wind farm off Mohegan Bluffs (the USS Massachusetts in Fall River is armed with the same size main batteries). Their combined ranges could cover an arc from Martha’s Vineyard across the eastern end of Long Island.

World War II Observation Posts on Block Island, RI.
World War II Observation Posts on Block Island, RI.

The Doggett House with its stone tower was ready made. The Army soon built a concrete observation post disguised as a cottage adjacent to the Doggett house and completed a total of eight structures, all designed to look like summer cottages, at key points ringing the island’s coastline. Similar examples can be found today at the National Guard’s Camp Varnum in Narragansett: wood shingled on one side with 12- inch thick concrete walls facing the ocean. These fire control points were equipped with Depression Position Finders, sophisticated telescopes that could measure the distance and compass angle of any targeted ship. The information would be communicated to the Harbor Entrance Command Post at the tip of Beavertail, the Narragansett Bay Defense Command Headquarters at #Fort Adams#, and ultimately to the Army’s Regional Command Center on Governors Island in New York harbor.

In 1940, the Army had built four 40-foot by 100-foot barracks north of the Weather Bureau at New Harbor. But they were never occupied. After the war, they were sold and the owners converted them into rental apartments and a bait shop. The small numbers of Army personnel assigned to observation duty were housed in the cottages attached to the fire control posts. The Navy converted the Pier 76 Yacht Club near Champlin’s Pier into a barracks and used it during the war.

None of Rhode Island’s coast defenses were ever fired against an enemy. They were test fired several times during the war, including the 16-inch battery at Fort Greene, much to the dismay of people living the vicinity and the Block Islanders who lived under the test shells’ trajectories. (The 16-inch battery located at Fort Church in Sakonnet was never fired.) Eventually, as the threat of invasion disappeared, smaller anti-boat and anti-aircraft weapon were installed along the coastline to replace the large caliber guns.

Disguised observation post on Block Island, RI.
Disguised observation post on Block Island, RI.

In World War I, the Navy had maintained a significant presence on Block Island, with some 350 sailors and nurses. The old Narragansett Inn overlooking the Great Salt Pond served as headquarters. Sailors lived in tent camps, and several other buildings were taken over for various purposes and several small caliber harbor defense batteries were installed. The Navy stationed a squadron of anti-submarine patrol vessels in New Harbor throughout the war.

But when World War II came around, there were no similar plans in place. The Army and Navy’s huge presence on the mainland was considered sufficient. However, the State Defense Council in its wisdom decided that the island’s 671 residents should be evacuated. They came calling in January of 1942 and met with island officials who were adamant in their opposition to evacuation. As far as defenses were concerned, they retorted they were quite capable of enforcing a blackout from the island’s central power station. They had more volunteers for firefighting and beach patrol than needed (besides, the Coast Guard also provided an armed coastal patrol force). If any Germans tried to land on the island, said the residents, the Navy could be there by air in minutes and by sea pretty fast as well.

The mainland bureaucrats were getting more frustrated by the minute with these hard-boiled Yankees. Finally, they tried to convince the residents’ committee they might starve on the island. Not a problem. The islanders could feed themselves and live off the bounty of the surrounding ocean, thank you very much. As one grizzled islander pointed out, “you can’t trap lobsters or dig clams on Westminster Street (in Providence).” In the end, the Block Islanders viewed evacuation as running away, something they hadn’t done since the first settlers arrived in the 1600s.

The meeting ended and the state officials were sent home on the next boat. On January 28, 1942, the General Assembly passed a resolution congratulating the islanders on their bravery and their patriotism. And that was the last said about evacuation.

Providence Journal cartoon depicting the spirit of Block Islanders.
Providence Journal cartoon depicting the spirit of Block Islanders.

A number of fishermen served as volunteer observers, keeping watch for enemy submarines in nearby waters during the war. Ninety-five Block Islanders fought for their country. Only one man, Albert Gooley, was killed in action when his destroyer was sunk in 1944. We’ve told you the story of the two U.S. Navy escort carriers that bore the name USS Block Island. The first was sunk in the Atlantic; the second served through the end of the war in the Pacific. Her ships bell is enshrined in Veteran’s Park near New Harbor.

The closest the island came to the ravages of the war came in May of 1945. Rhode Island’s coast defense facilities were already in caretaker status when, on the day before Germany surrendered, Navy and Coast Guard ships sunk the U-853 7 miles east of Block Island, a well-known piece of local history. Ironically, it was sonar that assisted in the destruction of the U-853, and not the island’s fire control stations.

So what happened to the Block Island observation sites? After the war, the Doggetts returned to their home. Rather than go through a lot of red tape, the Doggetts settled for keeping the observation post and cottage the army had built on their property and restored the old cottage themselves. Of the eight observation posts constructed during the war on the island, only four (including the Doggett’s tower and the Army-built cottage) remain today. All are private homes. The Doggett’s stone cottage still stands proudly on the highest point on the island, its panoramic view now somewhat marred by a McMansion that was built in 2004 right on the coastline in front of it.

Filed Under: Feature Article Tagged With: block island, william doggett, World War II

[DEC. 12 DINNER MEETING] Speaker Greg Banner on The Halifax Disaster

December 3, 2022 By James Mitchell Varnum

In December 1917, a World War I ammunition ship blew up in Halifax Harbour, Nova Scotia. This massive event was listed as the largest man-made explosion in human history prior to atomic weapons and totally devastated the city. Thousands died. Our December speaker, Varnum Member Greg Banner, will describe the background, event, response, and results and discuss aspects of military, nautical, local, and emergency response history.

About the Varnum Continentals

The Varnum Continentals are committed to the preservation of the historic heritage of our community, our state, and our nation. Please take a virtual tour of our museums to learn more about our mission to encourage patriotism. You can participate with us through active membership and/or philanthropic support in our non-profit organization. Donations are tax deductible to the full extent allowed by law. Museum tours are welcomed and our facilities may be rented for suitable events.

Our Mission

The Varnum Continentals are committed to encourage patriotism through the Varnum Armory Museum, the Continental Militia, and the James Mitchell Varnum House and thus to preserve, support, and communicate the military history of our community, our state, and our nation.

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