Lost Boats - November
It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died...rather we should thank God that such men lived...
~ George S. Patton
Missing, presumed sunk, on or after 16 NOV 1943 with the loss of 82 men.
USS CORVINA topped off with fuel at Johnston Island and was never heard from again.
She was on her first war patrol and it is likely that she was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine south of Truk.
Sunk by scuttling in the Gilberts Archipelogo with the loss of 43 men following an attack near Truk.
On her ninth war patrol, severely damaged by depth charges after attacking an enemy convoy, USS SCULPIN continued to fight on the surface.
When Commanding Officer CDR Connaway was killed, the crew abandoned ship and scuttled her.
Forty-one survivors were taken prisoner but only twenty-one survived the war.
Among those not abandoning ship was CAPT Cromwell, aboard as a potential wolf-pack commander, and he rode the USS SCULPIN down, fearing that vital information in his possession might be compromised under torture.
For this, CAPT Cromwell was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.
Lost on 07 NOV 1944 with 85 officers and men when she was sunk off northern Hokkaido.
Winner of two Presidential Unit Citations, USS ALBACORE was on her eleventh war patrol and struck a mine while running submerged near a Japanese patrol craft that had detected her.
Until the war ended, USS ALBACORE was missing, presumed lost.
According to Japanese records captured after the war, a submarine assumed to be USS ALBACORE struck a mine very close to the shore off northeastern Hokkaido on 07 NOV 1944,
Sunk on 08 NOV 1944 with the loss of 86 officers and men in the South China Sea.
Winner of two Navy Unit Commendations, USS GROWLER was on her twelfth war patrol as part of a wolf-pack.
The wolf-pack, headed by USS GROWLER, closed a convoy for attack.
The order to commence attacking was the last communication ever received from USS GROWLER.
Lost while attacking the convoy, possibly as a result of a depth charge attack or victim of a circular run by one of her own torpedoes, she was listed as lost in action against the enemy, cause unknown.
Probably sunk on 16 NOV 1944 with the loss of 83 men near Tokyo Bay.
On her eighth war patrol, she was damaged, possibly by a mine and trailing oil, which helped Japanese coast defense vessels locate and destroy her with depth charges.
From records available after the war, it appears that USS SCAMP was sighted by Japanese planes and reported depth charged by a coast defense vessel to the south of Tokyo Bay.