Carse, Robert "Nitro to Murmansk"
An impressive Murmansk Run convoy yarn in which author Carse focuses on two different types of conflict. The first, naturally taking center stage given the fact that the story appeared in 1943, pits poorly armed — but valiantly defended — Allied merchant vessels against the vastly superior forces (U-boats and warplanes) of Nazi Germany. A more basic conflict, though, occurs between Captain Weddell, skipper of the battered old freighter MOUNT EBRON, and his tough bosun, Joe Lash. Weddell, a veteran of passenger liner service who’d come out of retirement for the war effort, finds Lash to be an outspoken seaman and a man whose actions often border on insubordination. Weddell operates solely “by the book,” while Lash acts impulsively. Their relationship pretty much collapses during the final hours of the MOUNT EBRON’s voyage to Murmansk when, after the ship’s Navy gunners have run out of ammunition, Lash breaks into the ship’s cargo hold to obtain enough ammo to fight off Nazi warplanes. That ammunition was intended for Russian troops, and Captain Weddell is incensed that his cargo has been illegally (or so it seems to him) broached. Only later, during an aerial attack on the ship while in port in Murmansk in which shipmaster and bosun work together to save their ship, does Weddell begin to question his own rigidity. It is on the MOUNT EBRON’s return North Cape voyage, though, that Weddell learns the true worth of his bosun. The freighter is attacked by a German U-boat and sunk, with her few surviving officers and crew members (Weddell and Lash among them) taking to the lifeboats. When the Nazi sub which had attacked them approaches their lifeboat and demands that the MOUNT EBRON’s captain come aboard for interrogation, Lash seizes the opportunity to outwit the Germans and insists on taking Weddell’s place. Before going to what will ultimately be his death when the Nazis find out the ruse, Lash, revealing the sort selfless attitude that contemporary Allied war writers so often celebrated, tells his one-time foe:
“You’re a better sailor than me. You were the best sailor on the ship. There’s plenty of guys who could have gone bosun on her, but only one who could ha’ gone master. You’re him, and you got to deck the Nazis, get back to bring another ship out again.”