Tales of Military Idiots

[besilarius]

about 5:30 on April 9, 1942, PT-59, Lt. Charles A. Mills, Jr., USNR, in command, departed Melville, Rhode Island, for a cruise around Narragansett Bay. The boat skirted Dyer Island, and them changed course southward for some practice torpedo runs. This entailed setting the keys into the firing switches and cranking the launchers so that they pointed a few degrees outboard. All seemed in order, and Mills ducked below for a few minutes to check his charts, to be sure he headed for the proper practice area in Rhode Island Sound, beyond the submarine nets that prevented Hitler's u-boats from entering Narragansett Bay. He was below for hardly a minute or two when he heard a loud noise, felt the boat shudder, and through a porthole espied a trail of smoke and a spinning propeller vanishing over the rail. An officer-in-training on the bridge had turned the firing key for one of the torpedoes the full 90 necessary to fire a torpedo!
Mills ran the few steps up to the bridge, quickly determined the track of the torpedo, and gave chase. Although concerned, neither Mills nor any of his crew were overly worried. The torpedo was a 21-inch Mark 8. Although the World War I vintage 21-foot long Mark 8 carried 320 pounds of high explosives at 35 knots for as much as ten miles, it had a reputation for unreliability. At least half the time, the torpedo rolled erratically, nose dived, went off course, or even began turning in circles.
Alas, PT-59's Mark 8 fired did none of these things. In fact, it ran proverbially "hot, straight, and true." Tension began to rise. One sailor called out, "Come on, screw up. Every other one does!" But the torpedo was a good one.
Mills followed the torpedo at some distance, fearful of getting too close, lest it explode prematurely. He also radioed the Harbor Defense Command, to warn them of the danger. Not surprisingly, personnel at that headquarters thought he was making a very bad joke, and it took several tries before Mills convinced them of the danger. Meanwhile the torpedo headed straight for the anchorage off Jamestown, across the bay from Newport Harbor.
With considerable good luck, the torpedo passed off the southeastern end of Prudence Island, just missing a pier loaded with depth charges. Three miles into its run the torpedo struck the USS Capella (AK-13), a 4,000-ton Navy supply ship that had just anchored off Jamestown on Conanicut Island. The resulting blast sent a column of water into the sky, as cargo and a floatplane were blown into the water. The stricken ship began listing to starboard and settling by the stern.
Reacting quickly, Mills brought his boat up alongside Capella's port side, while his crew passed a 6-inch line over to the stricken vessel. Working together, the two crews fashioned a spring line. Once the two vessels were tied together, Mills revved his engines to 1,400 rpms. By maneuvering the spring lines, PT-59 managed to shift Capella to shoals, where she grounded.
PT-59 had scored her first "victory."

Footnote: Afterward
Capella. Although there was considerable damage to the ship's cargo, only eight men were injured, mostly by sprains and fractures. The ship was refloated a few days later, towed to the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and repaired by mid-May. She continued in service, carrying supplies to installations up and down the East Coast, until the end of the war.
PT-59. Although Lt. Mills's career did not prosper in the aftermath of the incident, PT-59 went on to render excellent service in the South Pacific. In mid-1943 she was converted into a motor gunboat. In that guise, on October 28, 1943, she helped evacuated wounded men from the Marine 1st Parachute Battalion, then engaged in a raid on Choiseul Island. Her commander at the time was LT John F. Kennedy.

[Martok]

An officer-in-training on the bridge had turned the firing key for one of the torpedoes the full 90 necessary to fire a torpedo!

You leave kids alone for only a minute... 

[bob48]

Where was the supervision if he was under training? Sounds like a failure of management to me.

[besilarius]

This brings to mind an old Gunners Mate story.  On the Gearing class destroyers there twin turrets with 5" guns.  The second turret, Mount 52, was right under the bridge.
During the Okinawa campaign a new captain came aboard and right away began changing the organization.  He PO'd the turret captain of Mount 52.  To get some revenge, that worthy would wait for the relief of GQ.  Sitting at the top rear of the turret, no one could see what he was doing.
He would turn a barrel switch to manual control, swing the turret into the stops (so the barrels were right next to the bridge), trip the firing circuit, "BOOM", then turn the switch to be slaved to the fire control radar so the turret swung back.
Well, no one was hurt by the guns going off next to the bridge, but it really shook things up.
Called before the captain " Gee, sir, no one did anything to the turret, must be some kind of electrical short."
Needless to say it was never tracked down. 

[besilarius]

April of 1811, then-Viscount Wellington moved to capture Almeida, a city in eastern Portugal that had been in French hands for nearly a year. Lacking heavy artillery to conduct a proper siege, Wellington blockaded the place, hoping to starve the garrison out. The French holding Almeida, some 1,400 men under General de Brigade Antoine Brennier, resisted stoutly.

Learning that André Massena was concentrating a relief force, Wellington maintained the blockade with about 13,000 troops, while holding the bulk of his army in readiness to counter the French marshal. In the resulting Battle of Fuentes de Oñoro (May 3-5, 1811), Wellington, with about 38,000 troops repeatedly beat off assaults by Massena’s 48,000

Despite his defeat, Massena maintained his army nearby, perhaps in the hope of renewing the fight. 

Then, very early one morning, as Wellington was shaving in his tent, Baron Aylmer, of his staff, told him that Massena had pulled out, and that even as he spoke “the last cavalry [was] mounting to be gone," and thus the fall of Almeida was certain.

Wellington reacted by taking the razor from his face for a moment, to say “Aye, I thought they meant to be off; very well," and then continued his shave, not mentioning the enemy again until he had completed dressing, yet again demonstrating his remarkable tranquility.

As for Almeida, realizing that all was lost, a few days later, on the night of May 10-11, Brennier managed to slip most of his men out of the town, right through the British lines, after having rigged the defenses with explosives, which went off in spectacular fashion, demolishing the fortress.

The incident led Wellington to come close to expressing anger, when he wrote of the officers commanding the blockade, "They had about 13,000 to watch 1,400. There they were all sleeping in their spurs even; but the French got off. I begin to be of the opinion that there is nothing on earth so stupid as a gallant officer."