CHAPTER 16 – RUNNING THE GAUNTLET
11:12 (Panama Time)
Tuesday, June 23, 1942
Balboa Harbor, Gulf of Panama
Pacific Ocean
‘’Okay, what’s next, Ronaldo?’’
The Panamean official consulted the list on his clipboard before answering in his accented English the master of the small U.S. Coast Guard armed tugboat.
‘’We have the JOHN F. DICKSON, an American bulk carrier transporting a load of ammonium nitrate destined for Texas City. It arrived in the harbor about one hour ago, coming from Valparaiso.’’
‘’Ammonium nitrate? That’s quite dangerous as cargo goes, no?’’
‘’Indeed! It is used to produce fertilizers and explosives. You don’t want your men to smoke while inspecting that ship, Chief Petty Officer Camden.’’
‘’Right! I will pass the word.’’
The American Coast Guard then used his binoculars to locate the bulk carrier among the dozen or so ships waiting in the harbor to transit the canal locks today. The JOHN F. DICKSON was fairly easy to spot, being nearly the biggest ship present in the harbor. Giving orders to his helmsman, Camden made him approach and then go side-by-side with the big cargo ship, with one of his sailors then tying up a line between the tugboat and the side access ladder, which had been lowered already. Armed with his customary Colt 1911 pistol and followed by three of his sailors armed with either Colt pistols or Springfield 1903 bolt-action rifles, he then climbed the steel ladder just behind the Panamean official. They were met on the open deck of the bulk carrier by a merchant navy officer wearing a captain’s cap and a set of cotton shirt and trousers. Two men in civilian clothes, presumably crewmembers of the ship, were leaning against the side railings near the access ladder, apparently taking in the fresh air and Sun. The captain then surprised the Panamean official by speaking to him in fairly good Spanish.
‘’Welcome aboard the JOHN F. DICKSON, sir! I am Captain Rolph Anderson. You are here to verify my cargo manifest and to collect the toll for passing the locks, I presume?’’
‘’I am! Ronaldo Campeon, of the Panama Canal Administration. Your Spanish is quite good, I must say, Captain.’’
Ulrich von Wittgenstein smiled at the compliment.
‘’I have been plying the seas between Spain, the Caribbean Sea and South America for a few years already. You won’t get nice women in ports if you can’t speak with them, right?’’
Both men then laughed briefly at that joke before ‘Captain Anderson’ handed a clipboard to Campeon.
‘’Here is my cargo manifest, along with the ship’s ownership papers, customs declaration form and sailing permit, Mister Campeon.’’
Ronaldo studied quickly the papers attached on the clipboard, finding them apparently in order.
‘’You have 3,210 tons of ammonium nitrate aboard? That would be enough for a nice bang if you ever caught fire.’’
‘’True! But those nitrates will make nice bangs once turned into explosives and then thrown at the Japanese or the Germans. By the way, we heard on the radio that our navy has won a great victory near Midway Island at the start of this month. Do you know more about this?’’
‘’Uh, let me ask CPO Camden here.’’
Campeon then turned to face Camden, switching to English.
‘’Do you know much about the naval battle recently won at Midway, Mister Camden? Captain Anderson heard a radio report about it and wishes to know more about it.’’
Camden nodded his head, understanding the ship’s captain’s curiosity: the official radio news about the Battle of Midway, while claiming a great naval victory for the USA, had been rather short on specifics and many in the United States undoubtedly wanted to learn more. He then spoke to ‘Anderson’ in English.
‘’It was indeed a great victory for us, Captain. Four Japanese aircraft carriers were sunk off Midway, against the loss of the carrier YORKTOWN. The Japanese fleet trying to capture Midway was then forced to withdraw and we are now in control of the whole Central Pacific area.’’
‘’But, that’s fantastic!’’ Exclaimed Wittgenstein, a false grin on his face. ‘’Did they say how the battle was won?’’
‘’Uh, they didn’t give the details, except that all four Japanese carriers were sunk by airstrikes. By the way, you have a noticeable accent, Captain.’’
‘’I am a first generation Danish immigrant.’’ Explained Wittgenstein, who actually could speak a good Danish. ‘’And what about on the Atlantic side? Are those damn German submarines still active along our East Coast?’’
Camden sighed at that question: he had lost a few good friends to German submarines during the last months.
‘’Unfortunately, yes! Thankfully, German submarine activity in the Caribbean Sea is presently nearly non-existent, so you should be able to safely arrive in Texas City without trouble.’’
‘’A good thing to know, with all that ammonium nitrate aboard.’’ Said ‘Anderson’. ‘’Well, let’s move to the bridge, where I will be able to pay the locks’ toll to Mister Campeon.’’
‘’If you don’t mind, Captain Anderson, me and my men will do a quick inspection tour of your ship: just routine stuff, you know.’’
‘’Go right ahead, CPO Camden. My two men here will be happy to guide you around the ship. Gunnar, James, please help these gentlemen around the ship!’’
The two ‘crewmen’ leaning against the railings straightened up and came to the group near the top of the access ladder.
‘’Yes, Captain?’’
‘’Those gentlemen wish to inspect our ship. Just accompany them and direct them to whatever part of the ship they want to see.’’
‘’Sir!’’ Replied simply the tallest of the sailors, giving a lax salute to ‘Anderson’ before looking at Camden.
‘’Where to?’’
‘’We will start by the cargo holds. I will split my team in two.’’
‘’Understood!’’ Replied ‘Gunnar’. ‘’Follow me!’’
Followed by one of his sailors armed with a rifle, Camden let Gunnar, a big young man with blond hair and Nordic features, show him the way to one of the large cargo holds occupying most of the volume in the ship’s hull. There was little inspecting to be done there, as the hold was positively filled with big bags bearing inscriptions, with ‘AMMONIUM NITRATE’ and ‘PRODUCT OF CHILE’ painted in big letters on the bags. The paper bags were in turn tied down on wooden pallets piled on top of each other, with at least forty big bags per pallets. Since finding anything hidden among those bags would have needed the unloading of the whole cargo, Camden only looked perfunctorily at the top of the piles before speaking to Gunnar.
‘’That will do for this hold, mister. Lead us now to the crew quarters.’’
Gunnar seemed to hesitate very slightly then before he nodded his head and gave a short reply.
‘’No problem! This way!’’
With Gunnar in the lead, the group climbed out of the cargo hold and walked down the weather deck, to then enter the superstructure block situated two-thirds of the way aft. Going down one level via a steep ladder, the group finally entered a large compartment filled with double bunk beds, personal effects lockers and a few tables and chairs. Six men were present in the compartment, four of them apparently asleep in their bunks and two others reading books while sitting on chairs near open portholes that gave some extra light and fresh air. The place had the looks typical of other crew quarters Camden had visited countless times and nothing raised his suspicions at first.
‘’United States Coast Guard inspection! Could you please get out of your bunks for a moment?’’
The sleeping men did so slowly and reluctantly at first, which was quite normal when considering that a typical merchant seaman worked long hours and had too little time to rest or relax, except when in port. Directing his armed sailor to look inside the personal lockers, Camden first inspected the bunks, finding nothing hidden under the mattresses. He next went to one of the bulging duffel bags stored under the bunks and, finding it curiously heavy, started opening it. Camden stiffened at once when his eyes fell on the muzzle of some kind of rifle packed in the duffel bag he had just opened. Next to the rifle was a steel helmet with the unmistakable shape of a German Army Stalhelm. Twisting his head around in a flash while his right hand went for his holstered pistol, the Coast Guard man had only time to see the muzzle of a silencer-equipped pistol pointed at his head before that muzzle erupted in a flash. Eternal darkness then fell on him. The armed American sailor had no more chances to defend himself than his superior, being shot in the head a mere half second after Camden. Franz Stein looked coldly at the two dead Americans now sprawled on the deck of the compartment, a bit pissed at that unwelcome but unavoidable outcome: if the Americans had been less diligent in their search, they would have walked off the ship alive. Now, the team from the U-800 had no choice but to go for Plan ‘B’ before the American forts defending the canal entrances could be alerted or became suspicious about the JOHN F. DICKSON. Stein looked next at Herman Weiss, the other Brandenburg soldier present in the compartment with him and ‘Gunnar’, aka Michel Drücker.
‘’We now have to eliminate every other American presently on board before they could alert the canal defenses. Come with us! Maschinen Obergefreiter Brock, go to the bridge and alert our officers about this…discreetly!’’
As the German mechanic hurried on his way to the bridge, Stein, Weiss and Drücker, hiding back their silenced pistols under their vests, left the crew quarters and went up to the open deck. Looking around and seeing no Americans, save for the handful of men left aboard the tugboat, Stein went back inside, this time heading for the engine room, aft and below of the bridge superstructure block. As they were negotiating the last rung of ladders leading down to the engine room, the trio nearly collided with two armed American sailors who were just exiting the engine room with Gefreiter Otto Lang. Politely stepping out of the way first and letting them pass, the three soldiers then drew out their guns and shot dead both Americans from point-blank range. Stein made a forced smile as the poor Lang, shaken by those sudden executions, looked at the now dead Americans.
‘’We had no choice: another pair of Americans had found our hidden weapons. We are now following Plan ‘B’. Do you know how many Americans boarded the ship?’’
‘’Only four of them did, Unteroffizier. I saw a minimum of three more Americans that stayed aboard the tugboat that accosted us.’’
‘’Then, all the Americans that were aboard are now dead. Excellent! Now, we will have to take out discreetly the rest of the crew of that tugboat.’’
‘’Uh, I may have an idea about this, Unteroffizier, especially if we have to go to Plan ‘B’.’’ Said Michel Drücker. Stein, who knew how intelligent and imaginative his young obergefreiter was, smiled to him in response.
‘’Go on, Drücker.’’
12:27 (Panama Time)
Fort Grant, Naos Island, Bay of Panama
U.S. Army Lieutenant Richard Prendergast was the senior officer present in the command center of Fort Grant, the installation that controlled the coastal artillery guns defending the approaches to the Panama Canal on the Pacific side: all the other officers were at the officers’ mess for lunch. A lookout report was thus transmitted by telephone to Prendergast when it arrived via the telephone switchboard of the command center.
‘’Lieutenant Prendergast speaking! What do you have?’’
‘’Sir, this is Corporal Greenglass, in the main fire control tower. One of the ships waiting to pass through the canal locks is now jumping ahead of the queue. It is led by a Coast Guard tugboat.’’
That left Prendergast nonplussed for a moment as he debated mentally if this was worth his time: while the Panama Canal coastal defenses were the responsibility of the U.S. Army, the Navy and Coast Guard were in charge of controlling the ships waiting to pass through the locks. As for the locks themselves, Panamean workers operated them. This three-tiered arrangement made for a disjointed and uncoordinated chain of command made worse by the fierce traditional rivalry between the Army and the Navy. In this case, if the Coast Guard had decided that this merchant ship could jump the queue of waiting ships, then the Army had no business disputing that decision. On the other hand, Prendergast remembered the warnings issued nearly two months ago about a possible attack against the Panama Canal by a German submarine. He thus decided to lean over the side of caution and spoke in a firm voice in his telephone receiver.
‘’Signal that tugboat by lamp and ask it the reason for making that ship jump the line. What ship is it anyway?’’
‘’The JOHN F. DICKSON, sir. It is an American-flagged bulk carrier and the day’s list of transits says that it has arrived from Valparaiso, Chile, with a load of ammonium nitrate destined for Texas City.’’
‘’Alright, send that message and ring me back at once when you will get an answer. Where exactly is that bulk carrier now?’’
‘’It is now entering Balboa harbor, sir, with the Coast Guard tugboat in the lead. Some of the waiting ships are clearly displeased by this and are blowing their horns.’’
‘’Not our problem! I will be waiting for the tugboat’s response, Corporal.’’
Prendergast then put down his receiver and went to the detailed map of the Panama Canal and of its approaches laid on top of a table and covered by a transparent plastic sheet. From the entrance of the Balboa harbor, there was a distance of over eight miles before a ship arrived at the Miraflores Locks, the first locks of the canal on the Pacific side. There should thus be plenty of time to assess that bulk carrier before it arrived at the first lock gate.
Prendergast’s telephone rang again some seven minutes later. The young lieutenant grabbed the receiver at once.
‘’Lieutenant Prendergast, Fort Grant’s command center!’’
‘’This is Corporal Greenglass, sir: I finally got a response by lamp from the tugboat.’’
‘’Well, it sure took its sweet time to answer us. What did the tugboat say?’’
‘’That the JOHN F. DICKSON is transporting a high priority cargo urgently needed in the States, sir.’’
Prendergast pondered that information for a short moment: that sounded like a legitimate enough reason to make that ship jump the line, especially in view of what that bulk carrier transported. The destruction of the main Navy ammunition depot in Boston last March had been a truly painful blow and had left the Navy scrambling to replace the thousands of tons of ordnance lost in the Boston blast. That in turn meant the need to produce lots of new explosives in a hurry and ammonium nitrate was one of the principal components for producing military grade explosives.
‘’Alright, we will let that ship jump the line, Corporal. Call me if some other ship tries to interfere with that bulk carrier. I will advise the Miraflores Locks’ operators that the order of transits has changed.’’
Putting down his receiver for a moment, the young officer then called the control room of the Miraflores Locks and passed the information about the JOHN F. DICKSON to the Panamean engineer in charge of the locks. Prendergast then went to get himself a cup of coffee.
He was still sipping on his coffee when his telephone rang again some twelve minutes later, making him pick up the receiver.
‘’Lieutenant Prendergast, Fort Grant!’’
‘’Sir, this is Corporal Greenglass again. I am sorry to bother you with this but something funny is happening.’’
‘’About what, Corporal?’’
‘’About that Coast Guard tugboat, sir. The Harbor Master, where the Coast Guard has its command center, has tried repeatedly to signal the tugboat by lamp, but the crew of the tugboat has not responded yet.’’
‘’That sounds like a Coast Guard problem to me, Corporal, and not an Army problem. If these squids can’t talk to each other properly, then that is up to them to deal with it. Where is that tugboat and the bulk carrier now?’’
‘’They are now less than a mile from the first lock gate, sir. It is a bit too distant to see properly, even with binoculars, but a dozen armed men just transferred from the cargo ship to the tugboat, with the tugboat alongside the ship.’’
‘’That is probably an armed inspection party from the tugboat returning to their vessel after having inspected that bulk carrier. Up to now, this sounds quite kosher to me, Corporal. Forget about that bulk carrier and tugboat and resume your watch of the other ships approaching the harbor. Look especially for that damn German submarine that we were told to watch for over two months ago.’’
‘’Uh, could it really come this far from Germany, sir? As far as we know, no German submarine has the range to get to here and then return to Europe.’’
‘’Quite true, Corporal, but the Navy was talking about that submarine as if it was some magical sea monster. Just keep your eyes open, Corporal.’’
‘’Will do, sir!’’
Prendergast then put down his receiver, satisfied that this bulk carrier business was apparently resolved.
12:42 (Panama Time)
Bulk carrier JOHN F. DICKSON
Miraflores Locks, Panama Canal
Ulrich von Wittgenstein felt both excitement and anxiety as he piloted the big bulk carrier, making it enter slowly the first set of locks. Right now, there was only himself, Hugo Margraff and Wolfgang Brock left aboard the JOHN F. DICKSON. All the other German sailors and soldiers had transferred to the captured American tugboat, which was now coming alongside the quay situated just outside of the first lock, its stern turned towards the locks in order to be able to leave as quickly as possible when the time came. The trick now would be to manage to immobilize the bulk carrier inside the first lock, then to evacuate it in time to take enough distance from it before its deadly cargo exploded. Then, they would still have to deal with the response from the American forts protecting the canal. All in all, he would consider himself damn lucky if he managed to stay alive and free through this day. As for Hugo Margraff, he was presently inside the central hold, ready to set the fuse to the charge hidden among the bags of ammonium nitrate, while Wolfgang Brock was in the engine room, ready to shut down the engines on Wittgenstein’s command.
Another four minutes and the bulk carrier was fully inside the first lock, with the thick steel entrance gates closing up. Once they would be closed, the lock operators would start pumping water inside the lock, to raise the ship by some eight meters before it could enter the next lock, to be raised again in order to be able to sail out onto the Miraflores Lake. Now was the time to act! Grabbing the bridge’s ship telephone, Ulrich called the engine room, getting an answer from Brock within seconds.
‘’Engine room!’’
‘’This is Wittgenstein. Shut down the engines, then sabotage them before climbing to the open deck to evacuate the ship. You have three minutes.’’
‘’Understood, Herr Leutnant!’’
Ulrich then spoke into the handheld radio he had kept nearby.
‘’Hugo, this is Ulrich. We are now inside the first lock and Brock is going to take out our engines. Set the fuse to your charge and then come out on the open deck to evacuate the ship.’’
‘’Will do!’’ Was the terse answer on the radio. Now knowing that their mission had attained its critical moment, Ulrich grabbed his handheld radio and his silenced pistol before exiting the bridge and climbing down the steel ladder leading to the open deck.
Down in the engine room, Wolfgang Brock shut down both of the big diesel engines of the bulk carrier, then went to the sea cock valve of the compartment, turning it quickly to the full open position. Sea water then started gushing out of the valve and onto the deck. Next, Brock went to the two small explosive charges that had been placed on the two big diesel engines by one of the Brandenburg soldiers before he had evacuated the ship. Lighting their short fuses, Brock then ran to the exit ladder, climbing towards the open deck in a hurry: those short fuses would burn out and initiate their respective two kilo charges of TNT in only two minutes. Their blasts would be more than enough to severely damage the diesel engines and prevent anyone from using them to take the ship out of the locks.
In the central cargo hold, Hugo Margraff set the timer to his main explosive charge to fifteen minutes before covering the charge and timer, laid inside a pile of ammonium nitrate bags, with two heavy bags. He next ran to another part of the pile of bags and lit the slow fuse of a secondary charge meant to detonate the ammonium nitrate in case the timer of the main charge failed. With the minutes now counting down, Hugo climbed out of the hold in one mighty hurry. He found both Wolfgang Brock and Ulrich von Wittgenstein waiting for him on the open deck, both wearing their Kriegsmarine sea uniforms. Hugo himself was now in full Heer combat attire, complete with MKb 42 assault rifle and steel helmet. They had debated this for a long time aboard the U-800, with the final consensus that, if they were about to be captured or shot in the canal area, they would be dressed as German soldiers and sailors. Two muffled explosions suddenly shook the ship from the inside, making Brock grin devilishly.
‘’The engines are now out. Good luck to the Americans to move this ship out quickly now.’’
‘’Well, I believe that it is time to get the hell out of Dodge, gentlemen, as the Americans would say.’’ Replied Hugo. ‘’We now have less than thirteen minutes before this volcano erupts.’’
Brock and Wittgenstein didn’t argue with him and ran to the starboard side access ladder, then climbed it down at a near run to get to the level of the edge of the lock basin. A number of Panamean workers watched them jump from the ladder and onto the concrete of the lock’s side, utterly confused by that scene. As the three Germans ran for all their worth towards the quay outside the first lock, where the tugboat was waiting, two American soldiers on sentry duty in front of the entrance to the control building of the locks belatedly reacted, starting to take their rifles off their shoulders to aim them while one of them shouted an order.
‘’HALT, OR I SHOOT!’’
Hugo Margraff’s answer to that was to suddenly brake and turn around, his assault rifle pointed. A short burst from his MKb 42 toppled the American soldiers before they could fire their own rifles. With the Panamean workers now dispersing in panic, Hugo resumed his run, quickly reducing the gap between him and his two German comrades. The trio arrived at the quay three minutes later and literally jumped aboard the waiting tugboat, with Ulrich then yelling an order to the sailor manning the wheel inside the small bridge.
‘’GET US OUT OF HERE AT MAXIMUM SPEED!’’
The sailor didn’t need to be told twice and pushed his engine throttles all the way forward. The tugboat soon attained its top speed of eleven knots while racing down the channel linking the locks and the open sea. As Ulrich von Wittgenstein ran to the radio set of the tugboat to send a coded message to the U-800, Hugo Margraff pointed the three inch gun mount on the forward deck and the 20mm cannon on the aft deck to the sailors and soldiers around him.
‘’MAN THOSE PIECES, BUT DON’T POINT OR FIRE THEM UNLESS I SAY SO!’’
With the men scrambling to obey him, Hugo went to join Ulrich in the small superstructure of the tugboat. The latter looked up at him from the radio operator’s station after maybe two minutes.
‘’The U-800 now knows that we positioned and set the bulk carrier inside a lock. I also told it that we are fleeing in a captured tugboat. It acknowledged my message and replied that it would try its best to meet us as close to the harbor as possible.’’
‘’But, it could risk being sunk then by the American coastal guns.’’
The second-in-command of the U-800 then gave him a resolute look.
‘’Hauptmann, Korvettenkapitän Kretschmer never abandons his crewmembers. We will either all survive today or we will all die together.’’
In Fort Grant’s command center, the telephone rang again, to the annoyance of Lieutenant Prendergast, who was trying to eat quickly a sandwich while at his post. Picking up the receiver and announcing himself, he heard an excited voice that spoke Spanish at an infernal rate.
‘’Woah, mister! Speak English and slow down, please! First, who are you?’’
After a short delay, his interlocutor managed to speak at a reasonable speed and in a poor, strongly accented English.
‘’This is the gate locks control. My name is Fernando Martinez. Your soldiers here were shot.’’
‘’Shot?’’ Said Prendergast, jumping out of his chair. ‘’By whom? How?’’
‘’A man shot them. He came from the ship now inside the locks.’’
‘’That man came from the JOHN F. DICKSON? Was he American?’’
‘’I don’t think so, sir.’’
‘’And where is that shooter now?’’
‘’He ran away with two other men.’’
Prendergast swore mentally at the obviously limited English of the Panamean man: at this rate, it was going to take many minutes before learning what the hell was going on.
‘’And where did these men run away?’’
‘’Uh, I am not sure, sir. I went to help your soldiers. I can ask around.’’
‘’Please do, quickly! I will hold the line open.’’
As Prendergast sat back, with the receiver still against his right ear, he saw that the operators inside the command center were all looking at him questioningly, with the most senior NCO present finally asking him a question.
‘’Should we put our gun batteries on top alert, sir?’’
‘’For one shooter on foot? Don’t you think that this would be quite excessive, Master Sergeant Horowitz?’’
‘’What if he tries to escape by boat, sir?’’
Prendergast had to recognize that his master sergeant could be right and nodded his head.
‘’Alright, have our three inch gun battery go to action stations, but leave our bigger batteries at their present state.’’
‘’Yes sir!’’
Four minutes later, and with Prendergast about to run out of patience, the Panamean lock operator finally came back on the line, his English as bad as before.
‘’This is Fernando Martinez again, sir. It was one soldier. He shot your soldiers, then ran away with two other men. They ra…’’
The Panamean’s voice was then buried by an ear-busting roar that was cut halfway through when the line with the locks went dead. Prendergast stiffened in his chair and started nearly shouting in his receiver.
‘’Hello! Hello! Mister Martinez, are you there? Hello!’’
Eighteen seconds later, the whole concrete bunker containing the command center shook as the shockwave of a formidable explosion hit it, deafening temporarily its occupants. Now fearing the worst, Prendergast let drop his telephone receiver and ran to a nearby corkscrew steel stairwell leading up to an observation bunker. Going to an observation slit on the side where the Miraflores Locks were, the young officer was about to raise his binoculars to his eyes to look at the locks but froze in shock instead: a titanic mushroom-shaped cloud of smoke and flames was rising over where the Miraflores Locks had been, while a tidal wave from the destroyed locks was coming down the entrance channel.
‘’My god! The JOHN F. DICKSON: it just blew up inside the Miraflores Locks!’’
He then raised his binoculars to see in what state the locks were after that huge explosion. The smoke and dust were however too thick to allow him to see the locks themselves. While he was trying to see the locks, he nearly missed the Coast Guard tugboat that was just then passing off Naos Island. Catching it by a corner of one eye, Prendergast then examined it with his binoculars, his suspicions about the tugboat now renewed. That was when the tidal wave from the explosion caught up with the tugboat, hitting its stern and nearly swamping it but also giving it as well a marked boost in speed towards the open sea. He was about to order his three inch guns to aim at the tugboat when the telephone in his bunker rang, to be picked up at once by a signaler.
‘’Fire Control Bunker One, Fort Grant, sir!... Yes, he is here! One moment, sir.’’
The signaler then turned his head towards Prendergast while raising the telephone receiver.
‘’Sir, the Coast Guard command center is asking to speak to the officer in charge.’’
Containing his frustration at this interruption, Prendergast went to the telephone and took the receiver from the signaler.