New Britain herald. [microfilm reel] (New Britain, Conn.) 1890-1976, 1927-01-03
admiral TELLS OF
FRUSTRATING SUBS
Germans Themselves UDWit-
tiDgly Aided Conveys

Washington, Jan. 5 P-The radio
gossiping of German submarines and
their kidding of French radio sta
tons took a positive hand in helping
the American navy to carry the
American expeditionary force across
| the Atlantic without the loss of a
man.
The story of the part, the buzz
Of the enemy radio played in this
undertaking was told by Rear Ad-
miral John Halligan, Jr., during re-
cent hearings on the navy depart
ment appropriation bill reported to-
day to the house His story follows:
Admiral Halligan's Story
1T has caused a great deal of
wonder and I have heard many
people ask the question, how it was
that our transports we're not tor
pedoed, whereas other classes OF YES
sells were torpedoed in these waters,
and some of our empty ships west
bound were torpedoed. but In no
case was a transport carrying troops
successfully attacked by a sub
marine.
During the war the allies built
and established radio-compass sta
tons on the south coast OF Ireland,
the coast OF England and the west
coast of France. The German sub
marines used their radio very free
ly, not knowing that these COM
passes existed. They talked to each
other and talked to German sta
tons and they even poked fun at
the French stations, called up the
French radio stations and joshed
them,
Subs Easily Plotted
every time a submarine used
his radio, his position was cut in
from these radio compass stations
on shore. His position was plotted
on a chart in the operations room
of our headquarters in Brest. Each
message gave the submarines call
letter, so that we were able to plot
successive positions of the same
submarine.
After studying their movements
for some time, We discovered that
they operated in a rectangle which
roughly is shown on this chart ex-
tending approximately 400 miles off
shore but leaving a gap of about a
hundred miles south of them be-
tween the bottom of the rectangle
and the coast of Spain, and also a
gap to the eastward near the coast
of France. They apparently had Sc
lected the crossing of trades routes
in the Bay of Biscay, the east and
west bound ships to the coast of
France and the North and south
bound routes to Gibraltar and the
Azores, and in the beginning OF the
war they had decided to occupy that
rectangle.
ALWAYS in ReCtangle
I'VE never got them outside OF
that rectangle except on routes to
the Azores or coming to and from
the Mediterranean.
Our method was to meet the
conveys 500 miles offshore with our
destroyers. The destroyers, before
leaving BreSt, were given (liee
routes, A, B and CA being the best
route. That generally was to the
southwark of this rectangle. Then
up to the northward would be B and
c through the rectangle.
Our destroyers flashed the word
Contact" as soon as they got the
convoy and thereafter we controll-
ed their movements from Brest.
If this southern route which they
generally used remained clear OF
submarines, we had no further COM
munication with them until they got
to port. But If a submarine APP
peared threatening that route on
the way to the Azores, or the route
to the Mediterranean, we would
simply tell them to use route B or
C"