Slade Cutter Slade Deville Cutter ( born November 1 , 1911 – June 9 , 2005 ) was a career U . S . naval officer who was awarded four Navy Cross es and tied for second place for Japanese ships sunk in World War II . He graduated from the United States Naval Academy as an All - American American football player . Naval Academy and early naval career . Originally intending to become a professional flutist , Cutter instead went to Severn School , at the time a prep school for aspiring Naval Academy applicants , and was noticed in their athletic program . Not only a football star , he was an intercollegiate boxing champion . " An all - American football player , he achieved instant fame as a first classman when he won the 1934 Army - Navy game with a first - quarter field goal . On the basis of his Academy football career , he was later inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame . Cutter graduated in 1935 , served on the battleship USS Idaho ( BB - 42 ) , where he coached another winning football team . " Submarine duty . He entered Submarine School in June 1938 . By the Attack on Pearl Harbor , he had advanced to Executive Officer . First wartime assignment , first " down - the - throat " shot . " Cutter was the Executive Officer of under LCDR Lew Parks when she left Pearl Harbor on her first war patrol on 18 December 1941 , just 11 days after the Japanese attack . Only two days out of Pearl Harbor , " Pompano " was sighted by a U . S . patrol plane , which attacked the friendly submarine and called in dive bombers from the nearby . Three additional near - misses ruptured " Pompano " ' s fuel tanks and left the ship trailing an oil slick . Parks shook off his friendly pursuers and pressed on to confirm the presence of Japanese troops on Wake Island . " Pompano " then continued to the Marshall Islands , where she found a 16 , 000 - ton Japanese transport at Wotje , which was attacked with four torpedoes and presumably sunk . Parks remained off Wotje for five more days and eventually attacked a destroyer , but his first two torpedoes detonated early . " The next two , the first " down the throat " attempted by a United States submarine , missed . After an inevitable depth - charge attack and with fuel draining relentlessly from the oil leak , " Pompano " returned to home base on 31 January 1942 . Unfortunately , postwar analysis credited Parks with no more than possible damage to the Wotje transport . Cutter made two more war patrols as Executive Officer of " Pompano " , operating in the vicinity of Okinawa and Honshū , respectively . The boat narrowly escaped destruction on 9 August 1942 , when a Japanese depth charge unseated an engine exhaust valve , causing major flooding and driving her into the bottom near the Japanese coast . Fortunately , the crew managed to surface the boat and creep away . USS " Seahorse " . After the third patrol on " Pompano " , Cutter was assigned as Executive Officer on , then under construction . Initially commanded by CDR Don McGregor ; " Seahorse " took a shakedown cruise , and reached the Pacific in summer 1943 . Seahorse ' s first war patrol began on 3 August 1943 . " It was not successful . Stationed off the Palaus , McGregor made only two attacks and allowed a number of convoys pass by unscathed . After the boat returned to port , an investigation of her poor performance " by Vice Admiral Charles A . Lockwood , [ Commander , Submarines , Pacific Fleet : COMSUBPAC ] and his staff led to McGregor ' s removal for not being aggressive enough . " Cutter was named Commanding Officer of " Seahorse " in October 1943 . Cutter took his new charge out of Pearl Harbor on 20 October for her second war patrol and his first as Commanding Officer . Heading for the East China Sea , he drew first blood on the 29th , 30th , and 31st , when " Seahorse " sank three trawlers with gunfire south of Japan . " Subsequently , " Seahorse " , working with , coincidentally assigned to the same area , attacked a large convoy that had already been fingered by the day before . Surprised by the sudden evidence of Trigger ' s torpedoes , Cutter shot nine of his own and sank two freighters . " Moving northward in the East China Sea toward the Korea Strait , Cutter sank two more ships . " Seahorse returned to Pearl Harbor on 12 December boasting a total kill of 4 ships and 19 , 570 tons , not even counting the trawlers . " His next patrol left Pearl Harbor on 6 January 1944 , headed for a patrol area near the Palau Islands , near the Philippines . En route , he sank an escorted freighter . Arriving in the patrol area , he received a communications intelligence intercept alerting him to a convoy , which he located visually on 21 January : two freighters and three escorts . He sank both freighters . " Seahorse " then moved directly to Palau itself , and on 28 January , Cutter discovered three freighters emerging from the harbor under heavy escort . He tracked the convoy for 32 hours waiting for an opening and at 0200 on the 30th was finally able to put three torpedoes into " Toku Maru " ( 2 , 747 tons ) . One of these blew the stern off , and she went down directly , taking over 450 troops with her . Harassed by the escorts and accompanying aircraft , Cutter nonetheless kept " Seahorse " in trail of the remaining Japanese for another 48 hours and attempted another attack just after midnight on 1 February . Eight torpedoes missed . Under heavy pressure from a charging escort , he shot two last torpedoes from his stern tubes just before going deep . Amid the violence of the ensuing depth charge attack , the " Seahorse " crew heard both torpedoes strike home and the now - familiar sound of exploding gasoline drums . Indeed , it was later confirmed that they had sunk the Japanese steamer " Toei Maru " ( 4 , 004 tons ) . After this 80 - hour chase - nearly a record . " Seahorse " returned to Pearl Harbor on 16 February with another five ships and 13 , 716 tons to her credit . " " Seahorse " ' s fourth war patrol took her to the Marianas , specifically to prevent the Japanese from reinforcing Guam and Saipan . She departed Pearl Harbor on 16 March 1944 , and near Guam on 8 April came across a Japanese supply convoy , damaging two vessels that were subsequently lost . " Seahorse " moved on , and the very next day found a 15 - 20 ship convoy that had already been attacked by Trigger as it neared Saipan , sinking another cargo ship . On lifeguard [ aircrew rescue ] duty in support of carrier air strikes on Saipan , " Seahorse " next sighted and sank the Japanese submarine I - 174 . This was one of the few submarine attacks on another submarine in World War Two . Inadvertently losing depth control and leaving periscope depth , " A week later , " Seahorse " found another convoy 45 miles west of Saipan and sank another freighter , refueling in New Guinea and making port in Brisbane , Australia , on the 11th . " With the U . S . invasion of the Marianas ( Saipan , Guam , and Tinian ) approaching in mid - June 1944 , VADM Lockwood sent more than a dozen submarines westward to interdict possible Japanese reinforcements . Accordingly , " Seahorse " left Brisbane on 3 June for her 5th war patrol and took station with off the Surigao Strait between Mindinao and Leyte ten days later . " " Seahorse ' s " greatest contribution to the upcoming Battle of the Philippine Sea was locating a Japanese battle group centered around the Japanese battleships " Yamato " and " Musashi " , the heaviest - gunned ships in the Second World War . Cutter described this achievement as " The U . S . hadn ' t known where that task force was for two weeks , " he told a reporter in 1997 . " It was far ahead of us and we couldn ' t catch up , but we radioed its position , course and speed to headquarters . " After the battle , " Seahorse " joined a wolfpack in the Luzon Strait , and sank five more ships . Assigned to new construction . After the fourth patrol of the " Seahorse " and a rest leave , he was assigned as Commanding Officer of the new - construction . His wife , Fran , sponsored the ship when it was commissioned on 28 April 1945 . " Requin " left Portsmouth for the Pacific theater in early June and arrived at Pearl Harbor at the end of July , but the war ended shortly after she departed on her first war patrol . World War 2 Summary . Command style . " In addition to the fighting spirit and relentless persistence he showed on patrol in seeking out and destroying the enemy , Slade Cutter was revered for his natural amiability and abiding concern for the well - being of his crew . To him , they were just like the football teams he had coached , and he trained and practiced with them the same way , starting with the fundamentals and working up to an integrated " game plan " for approach and attack . After every engagement or depth - charging , he would drop by the crew ' s mess to offer his own account to the " team " of what had happened and why . As a result of this and other examples of his generous humanity , the affection and respect he received then from his Sailors is still alive among a new generation of submariners today . " His biographer , Carl Lavo , described Cutter as having an abrasive style with superior officers , which may well have cost him selection for promotion to rear admiral . Especially controversial was his effective challenge to Adm . Hyman Rickover , claiming that the first nuclear submarine , , was " strictly a test vehicle . I doubt if she will ever fire a shot in anger . " Postwar Naval service . " After the war , Cutter achieved the rank of Captain and subsequently commanded the oiler , , and the converted heavy cruiser while the latter served as flagship of the United States Second Fleet . " In the late 1950s , Capt . Cutter was made the Naval Academy ' s athletic director to encourage popular football coach Eddie Erdelatz to resign . LaVO said that Erdelatz was running a " professional - style football program " but that too few players were opting to remain in the Navy after graduation because of his reputed disparaging of the service . Capt . Cutter ' s knowledge of the sports program and his feeling that Erdelatz was " disloyal to the Navy " led to Erdelatz ' s departure . Much of the task was helped by Capt . Cutter ' s stature as an athletic and wartime hero . " " His final active - duty assignment , in 1965 , was head of the Naval Historical Display Center in Washington . " Retirement & Death . He retired from active duty in 1965 and was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1967 . He later became headmaster of a boys ' school in Tucson , where he moved to care for his first wife ' s asthma condition . Frances Leffler Cutter died in 1981 . After her death , he moved back to Annapolis , MD . In 1982 , he married Ruth McCracken Buek . Slade D . Cutter , 93 , died June 9 , 2005 at Ginger Cove retirement community in Annapolis . He had Parkinson ' s disease . Survivors include his wife of 23 years , Ruth McCracken Buek Cutter of Annapolis ; two children from the first marriage , Slade D . Cutter Jr . of Austin and Anne McCarthy of Santa Fe , N . M . ; three stepchildren , Scott Buek of Delran , N . J . , Harvey Buek of Conshohocken , Pa . , and Pamela Sullivan of Sparks , Nev . ; a sister ; nine grandchildren ; and five great - grandchildren . Memorials . A 40 - acre athletic field in Hampton Roads , Virginia was dedicated as the " Captain Slade Cutter Athletic Park " on 14 October 2011 . Ruth Cutter ( widow ) was in attendance to hear the dedication remarks : " They say the name makes a man — and what a name . Slade Cutter — he was destined for greatness . "