Another Salty HMCS Grilse Story

Here is another tale about life on board HMCS Grilse, Canada's first submarine in many years. It would have taken place in th 1960's, and is courtesy of retired Chief ERA Hal Zerbin. The daily rum issue was then a fact of life in Canadian navy ships and submarines. The "tot", as it was known, was highly prized by the seamen, some of whom would go to great lengths to get a little extra. 


“TOT” time on HMCS Grilse_-

It was a beautiful Sunday morning and the crew was enjoying a break from their demanding schedule, in their home port of Esquimalt. With only a reduced crew on board, and the rum now packaged in clean glass bottles, un-adulterated with the old wax and camel hair of Royal Navy days, it was not really much of a task to bring up a couple of bottles, with their measures and a little water for dilution purposes. This last being hardly necessary as the crew was now allowed to bring their mug  to the table already pre-filled with coke to enable them to enjoy their “Tot” in a much more civilized manner than in the past.

“Up-spirits" had been piped and myself, as the Duty Chief, and Lt. (Later Admiral), Jim Wood were guarding the rum, ready for issue. As luck would have it, the crew-member approaching the issue table was a well-known “shit-disturber” in navalese, who was always planning and preparing for another try at squeezing some additional rum from the issuing officer. He was never nasty about his efforts, but it was easy enough to see he ‘had a plan’ as his body language was a dead give-a-way.

*A word here about the construction of the Grilse. Built as the USS BURRFISH, one of the many USN ‘Fleet’ boats of the last war, she carried a large amount of diesel fuel when fully loaded, and her external Fuel Ballast tanks were the main storage place. To enable a closer watch on fuel consumption, these Fuel Ballast tanks had been fitted with pads of  small square-spindled valves, arranged in groups of 10, I believe, on the inboard side of the pressure hull, at approximately the centre point of each of the fuel tanks, both port and st’b’d. On the outboard side, inside each tank, small-gauge copper lines were fitted to each valve and led off to a different vertical location in the tank and fastened in place. Thus, if the tank was half full you could open the appropriate  valve inboard and if the tank was indeed at that level, fuel would come out, and, if not, water would come out, giving you a pretty accurate estimate of how much fuel was in that tank. It worked! Now every submariner knows how hard it is to stop diesel fuel from ‘weeping’ from any valve stems, and these little valves were no different and a constant source of diesel drips regardless of how tight you kept the little packing nuts. All submariners also know how short of storage space every submarine is, and the Grilse was no exception. The crew had found that if they kept their rum mugs stored close to the pressure hull they were quite conveniently situated, but, they had not counted on the diesel fuel weeping thru the valve stem packing and dripping into their carefully stowed rum mugs, thereby contaminating the mug, and making any contents, even rum, almost unfit to drink!

Back to the rum table-

Dan approached the issue table, fairly quivering with the thought that he was about to put one over on us, but we were ready for him. I poured him a good tot and poured it into his coke-ready mug and waited. Dan stepped back with his mug, then raised it for a tentative sip, then another, and another as a look of disgust appeared on his face. "It’s contaminated, Chief," he proclaimed loudly, "you try it and see," as he offered me his mug. I took his mug and managed to turn my back on Dan while I caught Lt. Woods’ eye and winked at him, then I raised the mug and had a good sip. Then I tuned to Dan and said, “Tastes all right to me, Dan”. Then I turned to Lt. Wood and passed the mug to him as I said, "You try it, sir!” Which he did, and had a second sip for good measure, then passed it back to me saying, "Tastes fine to me too Chief! You better try it again”. As I reached for the mug, Dan realized he had been caught out and  tore his mug out of my hand, saying “Gimme the G—Da—thing!” as he retired to a safe place to enjoy his contaminated and depleted tot, to the utter enjoyment of  the few onboard duty watch.

A little later , while I was enjoying my own tot in the Goat locker, I sent for Dan and poured him a drink in compensation for his loss! He was, after all, a good shipmate!!

USS Burrfish aka HMCS Grilse--A Two-Navy Warrior (Part 8)

The storied career of the American submarine USS Burfish continued after her sterling World War II patrols. Immediately following the end of hostilities in 1945, she was consigned to the Reserve fleet, but in 1948 she took on new life as a radar picket submarine, and redesignated SSR-312.

Her complement then included 12 officers and 82-90 chief petty officers and crew. Her armament had been reduced to 4 21"torpedo tubes and one 40 mm antiaircraft gun. In addition, she now boasted a snorkel mast, and so able to charge her batteries without surfacing.

From 1950 to 1956, Burrfish performed as a radar picket, often in the Mediterranean, as well as in the waters off the east coast of the US and the Arctic.

Nineteen sixty was a momentous year for Burrfish. She had recently emerged from another extended stay in mothballs with the reserve fleet, Once again undergoing conversion, she reverted from radar picket to fleet-type submarine, at the bargain-basement cost of $900,000. In January 1961 her designation changed form SSR-312 to SS-312, officially becoming once again a diesel-powered attack submarine.

Five months later, on May 11th 1961, USS Burrfish decommissioned and became Her Majesty's Canadian Submarine Grilse, SS-71, in the Royal Canadian Navy.
Great years lay ahead, for her and her Canadian crew.

USS Burrfish aka HMCS Grilse--A Two-Navy Warrior (Part 7)

USS Burrfish continued her hectic wartime activities with her sixth and final patrol from March 25th to May 4th, 1945. She was a member of a wolfpack in the Luzon Straits. She was forced to dive in a hurry by an aircraft, and later was forced down again and strafed, fortunately without incurring damage.
During this eventful patrol she avoided damage from a floating mine, and, finally, attacked a shore radio station on Bataan with gunfire. Burrfish proceeded to Saipan, then to Pearl Habour, arriving there on May 13th.
Sent home to Portsmouth Navy Yard for a major overhaul, she arrived on June 19th, where she remained until the war ended on September 2nd.

USS Burrfish would never again fire a shot in anger, but she had much more history to make.

USS Burrfish aka HMCS Grilse--A Two-Navy Warrior (Part 6)

USS Burrfish's fourth war patrol was from 18 September 1944 until December 2nd. She was part of a picket line with seven other submarines, north of Saipan, where she fired six torpedoes at enemy vessels. They all missed, but shortly after, she and USS Ronquil got into a surface gun battle with a heavily-armed Japanese patrol boat. The submarines won the engagement, but not without damage, as two of Burrfish's crew were wounded.

After a month in Pearl Harbour, Burrfish embarked on her fifth war patrol. She was on lifeguard duty, and on two occasions fired torpedoes at surface targets. Once again she missed, but suffered retaliatory attacks during which she suffered some damage. She was ultimately able to elude the harrying ships and aircraft, in spite of forty depth charges and twenty bombs coming her way. This patrol ended in Guam, on February 24th, 1945

Future posts in this series will cover the battered and bloodied Burrfish's final war patrol, her Cold War career in the US Navy, her time under the White Ensign with the Royal Canadian Navy, and her arrival at her final resting place.