How to Hunt Japanese Submarines
How to Hunt Japanese Submarines
Jon Taylor describes a chance encounter that solved a thirty-year-old mystery stretching back to WWII.
Peruse the “Local Reads” section your neighbourhood bookstore or the BC Ferries giftshop and you’ll notice it’s stuffed with memoirs. These personal accounts are often set in coastal BC and framed around two themes: fishing and logging.
Even if you’re someone who feels they’ve read enough about catching salmon and cutting down trees, these memoirs are usually worth picking up. You never know what you might find in them; historical treasures frequently hide in their pages.
Take Jon Taylor’s Fried Eggs & Fish Scales, for example. In 30 or so stories, the long-time fisherman chronicles his 50 years in remote Sointula on Malcolm Island. In one tale, Taylor solves a thirty-year-old mystery that stretches back to WWII. I love little tales like these. This one in particular speaks to much more than just the two men involved.
Harbour Publishing was kind enough to send an excerpt for your reading pleasure:
War Story
My first trolling skipper had spent World War II in the gumboot navy, alternately catching fish to feed the troops and patrolling for Japanese submarines. He said it was a good life most of the time, lots of hunting and fishing, and lots of time to explore every bay on the coast. He said he spent half his time in a skiff.
The problem was that they were always hunting for a rumoured Japanese sub that kept getting reported in the area. Since a sub would definitely outgun their patrol vessel, they had to take it by surprise. This frequently meant stopping on one side of a point and sending a man to the beach in the skiff, so he could look into the bay beyond to be sure the sub wasn’t waiting in ambush. If the day was nice the recon would go on for some time. Naturally, it being wartime, the scout always took his .30-30 along (the fly rod was more difficult to explain). If the scout came upon a few deer or trout while reconnoitring, well, it was just natural to share his good luck with his shipmates.
There were, of course, black nights and horrible gales that threatened to put an end to all the good times. But those times being in the past, it was the good times scouting the bay that remained strong in his mind. Except for the damned “Jap sub.” Over time, they had interviewed dozens of good, reliable people—loggers and fishermen mostly—who swore that they had seen the damned thing. But the skipper and the crew never got a glimpse or whiff of it. They spent the whole war chasing an illusion, and thirty years later it still hurt.
At that time I had five acres of land and a house that was falling down. I decided to clear some land and build a new house. Toward that end I hired a local Cat driver. He brought in a friend. The friend was a school principal by profession, but loved to spend summers up the coast, anywhere away from the city. As we talked, it became apparent that he knew every nook and cranny on the inside coast. I asked him how, and he told me.
Most people don’t know that during World War II, Canada had one submarine on the west coast. High authority decided that rather than send it off to sink the enemy, a duty from which it was very unlikely to return, it would better serve as a means of testing coastal defences.
“It was horrible,” he said. We popped up in every bay and village on the whole coast anywhere there was a log boom or a shack, made all the noise we could; then we’d dive and run elsewhere. We’d cruise back and forth under the gillnet fleet at night with our deck lights on. No one ever saw us. We did everything possible to get reported, but as far as we know, not one single report was ever sent in.
I told each of the men about the other’s story, but it didn’t seem to make any difference. The futility and frustration was too deeply ingrained. I even arranged for them to meet, but it never happened. Even when they were in the same town and knew exactly where the other could be found, they never saw each other.
Excerpt from pages 199-200 of Fried Eggs & Fish Scales by Jon Taylor (Harbour Publishing, 2024). Reprinted with permission from the publisher.
