USS PUFFER (SS 268) OUR COMBAT HERITAGE
Photo courtesy of Craig McDonald [email protected]
Craig wrote: Puffer crew from around November 1944.
My dad is the second from the right of those men standing
(just to the left of the man squatting on the gang plank).
USS PUFFER SHIPS PARTY
PEARL HARBOR
MARCH 1946
There are many cameo photos without captions. Can any of you salty old 268 sailors help identify them?
PUFFER (SS-268) was launched 22 November 1942 by Manitowoc Shipbuilding Co., Manitowoc, Wisconsin; sponsored by Mrs. Ruth B. Lyons; and commissioned 27 April 1943, Lieutenant Commander M. J. JENSEN in command.
click on this photo to view original full size image
After trials in Lake Michigan, PUFFER departed for the Pacific via the Mississippi River and Panama Canal, arriving at Darwin, Australia, 6 September 1943. She departed the following day for her first war patrol in the Makassar Strait and Celebes Sea area. On 17 September she torpedoed and sank an enemy freighter and damaged a transport. On 9 October she fired two torpedoes into the side of a large merchantman and, for her efforts, received an extensive 31 -hour counter-attack by angry escorts. PUFFER returned to Darwin on 17 October 1943, and then steamed to Fremantle, Australia, for refit and repairs.
On 24 November PUFFER sailed on her second war patrol, in the Sulu Sea and the approaches to Manila. On 20 December she sank Japanese destroyer Fuyo, and on 1 January 1944, freighter Ryuyo Maru. She also sank a picket trawler by gunfire and took the skipper prisoner. Two additional freighters and one auxiliary naval tender were damaged. PUFFER returned to Fremantle on 12 January 1944 for refit.
PUFFER departed for her third war patrol on 4 February, which was conducted in the South China Sea. On 22 February an enemy transport was sighted off the Natoena Islands on the lane between Singapore and Brunei, Borneo. PUFFER fired a spread of torpedoes that sent transport Teikyo Maru to the bottom. No more contacts were made on the patrol and PUFFER returned to Fremantle 4 April 1944.
On 30 April, PUFFER departed for her fourth war patrol in Madoera Straits, Makassar Straits, and the Sulu Sea. She acted as life guard for the first Allied carrier strike on Soerabaja, sank freighter Shinryu Maru 18 May, then on 5 June, attacked three tankers, sinking Ashizuri and Takasaki and damaging the other. She returned to Fremantle 21 June.
On 14 July 1944, PUFFER departed for her fifth war patrol, in Makassar Straits, the Celebes, Sulu, and South China Seas. In the northern approaches to Makassar Strait she contacted and sank an enemy submarine tender. The thwarted escorts subjected PUFFER to a barrage of 30 depth charges. On 12 August she sank tanker Teikon Maru, a freighter, and damaged another tanker which was already beached. She terminated her patrol at Pearl Harbor, then she continued on to Mare Island for overhaul.
Following refresher training at Pearl Harbor, PUFFER got underway on her sixth war patrol 16 December. Operating in the Nansei Shoto area, she sank Coast Defense Vessel No. 42 on 10 January 1945, and damaged a destroyer, three freighters, and a tanker, all prior to her arrival at Guam, 17 January. By 11 February, PUFFER was underway again and following patrol in Luzon Straits and the South China Sea where she bombarded Pratas Island, she made an anti-shipping sweep of the Wake Island area, returning to Midway Island to complete her seventh patrol.
Refitted at Midway, she departed 20 May enroute to the South China and Java Seas to conduct her eighth war patrol. In a surface sweep of the northern Bali coast on 5 July, PUFFER destroyed, by gunfire, two sea trucks and six landing craft, and inflicted extensive damage to harbor installations at Chelukan Bawang and Buleng, Bali. Following a brief stop at Fremantle, she headed north for her ninth and final war patrol in the Java Sea.
Completing that patrol with the cessation of hostilities, PUFFER headed for Subic Bay, then to the United States, reaching San Francisco 15 October 1945. PUFFER decommissioned 28 June 1946 and was berthed at Mare Island as a unit of the Pacific Reserve Fleet.
In addition to the Navy Unit Commendation, PUFFER received nine battle stars for her World War II service.