Sailing under fire
A World War II history of the American merchant fleet gets an update

By William Gordon THE STAR-LEDGER, Newark, N.J., February 27, 1999

After the crew abandoned the doomed tanker, the SS Patrick J. Hurley - set ablaze in the South Atlantic by shell fire from a surfaced U-Boat - 22-year-old George Goldman of Jersey City watched from a lifeboat as the unmanned ship, engines still operating, steamed away and blew up in a fiery explosion on the horizon.

"There were 23 of us in the boat," said Goldman, recalling that September day 56 years ago in World War II. "We looked for survivors, but the sea was too rough. You could hear whistles that were attached to their lifejackets, long high plaintive notes. We lost our captain, 13 crew members, and four Navy gunners. I can still hear those whistles blowing over the water."

A resident of Teaneck today, Goldman is president of the Dennis A. Roland Chapter (N.J.) of the American Merchant Marine Veterans, a group that meets regularly at the Seamen's Church Institute at Port Newark, amid the sights and sounds of a bustllng port of call, but without the wartime tension once familiar to the veterans.

Aware that the crucial wartime role played by the American Merchant Marine is fading from the public consciousness, the 500-member Roland Chapter, the largest of some 80 units in the AMMV, has spearheaded the printing of a new, greatly expanded, and perhaps final edition of Capt. Arthur R. Moore's classic work, "A Careless Word . . . A Needless Sinking."

Moore's book is the first documented account under one cover of the catastrophic ship and personnel losses suffered by the American flag merchant fleet during the war. It now includes losses of Panamanian flag vessels manned by American crews and U.S. Navy gunners, not previously counted by the government as casualties. Six previous editions, dating back to 1983, are out of print.

The United States lost 6,849 merchant seamen - the second highest toll per capita among the services -and 833 cargo ships. A total of 31 of the ships disappeared with all hands, among them the SS Coamo, a passenger ship with a merchant crew of 133 men, the largest single merchant crew loss of the war.

"Capt. Moore's book is like our Bible," said Goldman, who survived seven days in a lifeboat, subsisting partly on tiny sea urchins clinging to passing seaweed. "It tells our story. Without it, nobody would know what went on. There was no central archive. Civilian steamship companies might keep records for a few years, then dispose of them."

The author, a former master who served on Exxon tankers, spent 20 years working on his own time and at his own expense to research and write the history of each ship lost and the men who died when their ship went down. He also interviewed survivors, located cemeteries of deceased seamen and reproduced hundreds of photographs.

From his home in Hallowell, Maine, Moore recalled that as he researched the book, "I found it hard to believe that this horrible loss of life and destruction of ships ever happened, even though I had sailed as a cadet and ship's officer during the war."

Many members of the Roland Chapter carry searing memories of their struggle to survive enemy sub-marine and air attacks, particularly in the Atlantic where German U-boats, roving in "Wolf Packs," had the upper hand during the war's early stages.

Donald Zubrod of Wyckoff; who survived one of the longest open-boat voyages of the war, was a 17-year-old purser on the SS Roger B. Taney when the ship was torpedoed in a nighttime attack and sank Feb. 7, 1943, in the South Atlantic 700 miles off the African coast.

"The sub fired four torpedoes at us," he said. "The general alarm was sounded when the first missed our bow. The second hit amidships, killed three engine room crew. The third was a dud. The fourth sunk us. It all took an hour from start to finish.

"The Taney's 54-member crew and navy armed guard piled into two life-boats, which soon drifted apart in rough seas. One boat with 26 survivors was picked up in 21 days. Zubrod's boat with 28 on board endured a harrowing 42 days at sea in weather that ranged from dead calm to half gales and a vicious tropic storm.

"Early on we lived on crackers, malted milk balls and baker's chocolate," recalled Zubrod. "After that it was virtually nothing. We started with 20 gallons of water in two 10-gallon casks. When it rained we spread the sails to catch water to refill the casks. For days on end we'd be rationed four ounces a day."

On the 38th day, one of the Navy armed guard sailors tied a sheath knife to a boat pole and speared a 35-pound dolphin, the only catch of the entire voyage.

On the 41st day, having sailed more than 2,500 miles, they sighted the coast of Brazil. The next morning a Brazilian passenger ship picked up the survivors and took them into the port of Santos, where they were hospitalized. Zubrod, whose normal weight was 135 pounds, was down to 85.

Ten years ago, Zubrod, a maritime arbitrator, learned that his ship was torpedoed by the U-160, whose master, George Lassen had sunk 33 ships in 11 months before being transferred off the sub. The American wrote to Lassen and the two met in Hamburg.

"He was a genuinely nice guy," said Zubrod. "We had a nice relationship. He put his arm on my shoulder and said, 'Donald, I think we are both survivors.'"

Ray Mombelardi, 71, of Bricktown, was 15 years old when he altered his birth certificate and joined the Merchant Marine, following in the footsteps of his father, Lawrence, a machinist on the tanker SS Cities Service Missouri.

When his father's ship departed New York in a convoy for the oil refineries of Aruba in the Caribbean, Mombelardi's ship, another tanker, was headed independently for the same destination."We heard that the convoy had been attacked a couple hundred miles from Curacao on March 13 1943, but we didn't know of casualties," said Mombelardi. "My ship picked up a load of gasoline in Aruba and took it to Casablanca."

Nearing New York on the return voyage, the young seafarer's captain took him aside and told him he should go home to his mother in Englewood when the ship docked, that his father had been fatally wounded in the torpedoing of his ship. "He had known about it all the time," said Mombelardi, "but spared telling me until the trip was over."

World War II veterans George Goldman, left, and Donald Zubrod at the memorial to mariners in Battery Park, Manhattan, N.Y.C.

George Goldman of the Roland Chapter noted that the first six months of the war was known as "The Happy Time" by crews of German U-boats patrolling the eastern seaboard of North America, picking off unescorted vessels.

"Hundreds of ships were sunk - many off New Jersey - by Germans who learned to wait offshore and target ships silhouetted against the glow of lights from resorts and amusement parks. There were no blackouts until June 1942." In the preface to his book, Moore said hotel owners and residents along the shore complained about fuel oil washing up on the beaches.

A German U-boat commander, looking toward the blaring lights of New York City from his conning tower, is said to have remarked, "For God's sake, don't these people know there's a war on?"

"A Careless Word ... A Needless Sinking" is published by the American Merchant Marine Museum at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, Kings Point, N.Y.

The 705-page book can be ordered by sending a check for $90, covering shipping and handling, to the Dennis A. Roland Chapter, AMMVNJ, P.O. Box 306, Midland Park, NJ 07432. Checks should be made payable to the AMMV-NJ Book Account. For further information contact George Goldman, chapter president, at (201) 692-9031.

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03/01/99