page_title: USS Harder (SS-257)
section_title: Fourth War Patrol
hierarchical_section_title: USS Harder (SS-257) / Operational history / Fourth War Patrol
caption_attribution_description: Ikazuchi (Japanese Destroyer, 1932) underway in Chinese waters, circa 1938. The original photograph was received from the Office of Naval Intelligence. U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph. Removed caption read: Photo # NH 74173 &#160;&#160;&#160; Japanese destroyer Ikazuchi in Chinese waters, circa 1938 Online Image: 65KB; 740 x 560 pixels
context_page_description: USS Harder (SS-257), a Gato-class submarine, was the first ship of the United States Navy to be named for the harder, a fish of the mullet family found off South Africa. One of the most famous submarines of World War II, she received the Presidential Unit Citation. Her skipper throughout her service, the resolute and resourceful Commander Samuel D. Dealey, "a submariner's submariner", was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor, as well as four Navy Crosses during his lifetime.
  Her keel was laid down by the Electric Boat Company in Groton, Connecticut, on 1 December 1941. She was launched on 19 August 1942, and commissioned on 2 December 1942 with Commander Dealey, in command.
context_section_description: Returning to action in the Pacific, Harder reached Pearl Harbor on 27 February 1944 and departed on her fourth war patrol 16 March in company with Seahorse (SS-304).
  She headed for the western Caroline Islands where she was assigned duty as lifeguard ship for downed aviators. During American air strikes against Woleai on 1 April, Harder received word of an injured pilot awaiting rescue from the beach of a small enemy-held island west of Woleai. Protected by air cover, she nosed against a reef, maintained her position with both propellers, and sent a boat ashore through breaking surf. Despite Japanese snipers, boiling shoals, and the precarious position of the submarine, the daring rescue succeeded, and the intrepid submarine returned to the open sea.
  On 13 April an enemy plane sighted Harder north of the western Carolines and reported her position to the patrolling Japanese destroyer Ikazuchi.  As the enemy ship closed to within 900 yards (820 m) Harder fired a spread of torpedoes that sank the attacker within five minutes. Dealey's terse report became famous—"Expended four torpedoes and one Jap destroyer." Four days later Harder spotted a merchant ship escorted by destroyers. Firing four torpedoes, she sank the 7,000 ton Matsue Maru and damaged one of the escorts. Then, adding to the enemy's misery, she returned to Woleai where she surfaced on the morning of 20 April to deliver a shore bombardment under cover of a rain squall. She terminated this highly varied and successful patrol at Fremantle submarine base, Western Australia 3 May.
caption: Ikazuchi underway off China in 1938
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