"My one year tour aboard the Albacore"

After graduating from Electronics Technician A-school at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center, I was sent to New London, CT for further assignment. While waiting for my next assignment, I was asked if I wanted to serve on a submarine. I said yes and was transferred to the USS Albacore in Portsmouth, NH. This was unusual since I hadn't completed Submarine School in New London. But I did complete all the physical and psychological tests as well as the escape tank training which included the ability to withstand air pressure of 125 feet in a dry chamber followed by escaping twice at 18 feet, twice at 50 feet and once at 100 foot depths in the water tank. It was an experience I'll never forget.

I arrived in Portsmouth during the early evening in February 1954 to find that the Albacore was just returning from sea trials and on it's way to moor at the shipyard in Kittery. As this was my first ship and I was only 20 years old, I was very excited and anxious to see my new home. Once the Albacore was secured to its moorings, I watched as the crew disembarked on to the pier. I was welcomed aboard by the Exacutive officers and several enlisted men. Then I met Charlie Simpson, the Chief-of-the-boat (COB). Every submarine has a COB who is generally a Chief Petty Officer responsible for all deck operations. He wasn't too friendly and just ordered me to go below and report to the chief cook. And then report to the barracks on the base, unpack my seabag get some sleep and report back on board at 0600 for mess cook (chief potato beeler and bottle washer) prior to getting underway for sea trials in the morning. This was to be my job for the next three months.

When the ship was not at sea, the crew lived in a barracks on the base and only worked aboard the ship during the day or when at sea. That's when I learned that this was no conventional submarine, but an experimental boat designed to evaluate a new revolutionary hull design that would make her the fastest submarine in the world.

My first day at sea was a memorable one in that I had never been to sea before, much less to have it be on a submarine. Before going down to the ship that morning I ate a big breakfast of bacon and eggs with home fries. What a mistake. As we cleared the harbor and headed to sea the ship began to rock back and forth and up and down. You guessed it. I was about to lose that big breakfast. I hid in the gally and vomited in the deep sink and flushed it down the drain. No one got to see my embarrasment. And believe it or not that was the first and only time I got seasick in my 12 years in the Navy, later serving aboard aircraft carriers and destroyers.

Rather than continue this discussion of my tour of duty which would only duplicate more detailed information included in "The Early Life of the Albacore" by LT James V. Ferrero, one of the original Plank Owners who served aboard at the time of the Albacore's commissioning in 1953. After 54 years, my memory is not what it used to be.