Lost Subs - USS Pickerel (SS-177)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Compiled July 2, 2008, by David Barth.
USS Pickerel (SS-177), a Porpoise-class submarine, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for the
pickerel, a young or small pike. Her keel was laid on 25 March 1935 by the Electric Boat Company in Groton, Connecticut.
She was launched 7 July 1936 sponsored by Miss Evelyn Standley, and commissioned on 26 January 1937, Lieutenant Leon J.
"Savvy" Huffman in command.
After shakedown, the new boat conducted training exercises out of New London, Connecticut until getting underway 26
October 1937 and heading, via Guantánamo Bay, Cuba to transit the Panama Canal 9 November. Joining the Pacific Fleet,
Pickerel operated out of San Diego, California, along the West Coast, and in Hawaiian waters. Subsequently transferred
to the Asiatic Fleet, she prepared for war with a vigorous training schedule in the Philippines.
First Patrol
Upon receiving word of Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, Pickerel (under Lt. Cdr. Barton E. Bacon, Jr., Class of 1925)
sped to the coast of Indo-China and conducted her first war patrol off Cam Ranh Bay and Tourane Harbor. She tracked a
Japanese submarine and a destroyer but lost them in haze and rain squalls before they came in torpedo range. On 19
December, she also missed a small Japanese patrol craft with five torpedoes, before returning to Manila Bay on 29
December.
Second Patrol
On her second patrol, from 31 December to 29 January 1942, conducted between Manila and Surabaya, the submarine sank
the 2929-ton ex-gunboat Kanko Maru on 10 January 1942.
Third Patrol
On her third war patrol, from 7 February to 19 March, along the Malay Barrier she failed to score.
Fourth Patrol
On her fourth war patrol, from 15 April to 6 June, in the Philippines, she failed to score.
Fifth Patrol
Pickerel's fifth war patrol, from 10 July to 26 August, was a voyage from Brisbane, Australia, to Pearl Harbor for
refit, with a short patrol in the Mariana Islands en route, during which she damaged a freighter.
Sixth Patrol
On her sixth war patrol, from 22 January to 3 March 1943, she searched among the Kurile Islands on the Tokyo-Kiska
traffic lanes. In sixteen attacks, she sank 1,990 ton Japanese cargo ship Tateyama Maru and two 35-ton
sampans.
Seventh Patrol
She departed Pearl Harbor 18 March 1943 and, after topping off with fuel and provisions at Midway Island on 22 March,
headed for the eastern coast of northern Honshu and was never heard from again. Pickerel was the first submarine to be
lost in the Central Pacific area. She was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register 19 August 1943.
Post-war analysis of Japanese records give conflicting suggestions about Pickerel's fate. The Japanese officially
credit her with sinking 440-ton Submarine Chaser Number 13 on 3 April and 1,113-ton cargo ship Fukuei Maru 7 April,
and give no official report of her destruction. Those records also describe an action off Shiramuka Lighthouse on
northern Honshu on 3 April 1943 in which naval aircraft first bombed an unidentified submarine, then directed
minelayer Shiragami and auxiliary submarine chaser Bunzan Maru to the spot, where they dropped twenty-six depth
charges. A large quantity of oil floated to the surface, which was often enough for Japanese ASW ships to believe
their target was sunk. It is likely Pickerel's bunkers leaked. Since there were several other ASW operations in
the area in that period, and Pickerel was the only American submarine in that area, one of these other attacks,
sometime after 7 April, probably claimed her.
Pickerel received three battle stars for World War II service.