Small Victories

I started this site a while ago because I was finding really cool stuff in the National Archives and it seemed a shame that no one else could see it. Naturally, there's some stuff that I come across I need to sit on for a bit, but I still enjoy getting information out there that wasn't available before. Such is this tale.

Last year, which scanning in photos of aircraft carriers, I came across this photo of a corvette:

No idea what it was at the time, but I like Corvettes, so I scanned it in. I came back across it a couple of weeks ago and finally researched the pennant number to try and find out what ship it was. I was able to match it to HMCS Riviere du Loup, but there were absolutely no other photos of her that I could find on the internet.

So, I created a Wikimedia commons account and uploaded that baby.. it's now on her Wikimedia page, the first and so far only photo of this quiet ship on the internet. Hopefully it will be of use to someone.... a small advancement at best, but one nonetheless.

Random Photo - PBM Mariner Rescue, 1942

NARA 80-G-188415

VP-74 PBM Mariner piloted by Lt Joseph A. Jaap delivering survivors of the S.S. San Arcadio to Bermuda on Valentines Day, 1942. Jaap was awarded the DFC for the open-sea landing that rescued nine sailors of the British tanker, sunk by U-boat at 38-19 N, 63- 50 W.

According to War Diaries in Record Group 38, "Oh 26 January the S S SAN ARCADIO, a seven thousand ton British tanker with fifty officers and men, put out from Houston, Texas, loaded with oil and bound for Halifax, Nova Scotia Five days out, in position 38-19N and 63-50 W, at about 2200 LZT, they were torpedoed first aft and then forward on the starboard side After fifteen minutes of effort to make radio contact the ship was in such condition that it had to be abandoned 74-P-7, Lieutenant J. A JAAP commanding found nine survivors in position 34-28N and 62-50W The plane landed at sea, took the personnel aboard and returned them to Bermuda. As a result of this action Lieutenant Joseph Abraham Jaap, USN, was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross."

Using NARA's OPA

For a few years, NARA had their "Archival Research Catalog" system online for researchers to use. This allowed some limited searching for information before a visit - not all finding aids were (or are) online, and even those that are may be incomplete. ARC was shut down and replaced with OPA - Online Public Access earlier this month, and the transition for me has been lackluster.

On the plus side, results are now persistent and you can link to or bookmark them. Previously,results were temporary based on a live database query that would close out after 30 minutes of activity, so you could never send results to a friend and say "hey, check this out!" I took to saving each interesting result as a Word Document for quick reference later.

This new one changes that, but it also really doesn't work well if you don't already know what you're looking for. If you didn't know that records are generally separated into titles such as "general correspondence," or "classified correspondence," when what would you search for?

I can, at least search for EVERYTHING in a record group at a specific location, but if I search for all of record group 19 at NARA II "textual records" I get over 15,000 results. I'm having some luck - I tried searching for "naval" in Record Group 181 at NARA San Bruno and then hit the "refine by series" link, which listed all 58 of the listed accessions they have information posted about, including one for the 14th Naval District (Hawaii, essentially):
Fourteenth Naval District. Office of the Commandant. General Correspondence, 1925 - 1957 

So... learning by stumbling about.

4th of July - Lake Kathleen 2013

My third annual sojourn to the north end of the lake to watch a noisy celebration of the birth of the United States.

USS Indianapolis

I've long been fascinated with tragic ships - I'm not into tragedies in general, but for some reason a ship that had a major tragedy just feels more like a human story than one where the ship and her crew sailed the seas in relative obscurity and peace.

Indianapolis is an interesting ship for many reason; the aesthetics of  her lines, the story of her war-time service and final, top-secret mission, also for her loss. Outfitted with the latest radar and sensors, she was torpedoed and sunk in the closing days of the war. The world's most powerful and advanced Navy didn't notice.

A great many American sailors perished horribly because of bureaucracy and lack of caring. The most advanced weapons in the world will not protect you from the harm of human limitations. 

Under the Wire Random Photo

Below we have a couple of random photos from my last trip to NARA II. The first is Langley and some battleships near Puerto Rico in March of 1926. This is a great view of the between-wars battle fleet - the Big Five plus the dawn of American Naval airpower.



Next is a reminder that even great navies and good ships lose, DE-143 USS Fiske sinking after her back was broken by a torpedo from U-804 on August 2nd, 1944. 33 sailors were lost, and U-804 was herself later lost with all hands.

Random Photos - Dunkeswell Aerodrome, England 1944

A couple of photos I stumbled across during my last trip to NARA II in 80-G; Dunkeswell Aerodrome, October, 1944. This was originally meant as a fighter base, but with the stopping of Germany's aerial assault, it was turned over to the Royal Navy and Royal Navy for use in patrolling for u-boats.

The first shot is of a couple of Royal Navy SeaFires (I presume) in front of a temporary hangar.

A crop-in of the planes:

The second shot is of a supply hangar under construction, with several smaller, camouflaged buildings nearby. This shot is looking east-southeast, towards the Dunkeswell Methodist church (in the upper right), which still exists.

http://www.dsft.co.uk/
http://www.controltowers.co.uk/d/dunkeswell.htm
http://www.southwestairfields.co.uk/?page_id=53