Chase, Borden Salute!

An interesting short story from the late 1930s when the United States was finally coming out of its 1920s isolationism and was beginning the rearmament which would ultimately help win the Second World War. In Chase’s tale, the seemingly cold, martinet commander of a U.S. Navy destroyer displays a surprising emotion when he encounters the rustbucket of a freighter (the fictitious LUNDERMAN) upon which he served as gunnery officer in the Spring of 1917 just after America had entered the First World War. Flashbacks reveal the basis for his nostalgia, and also explain his abiding respect for the merchant captain who had commanded – and still commanded in 1939 – the LUNDERMAN. The story ends with a heart-in-throat tribute to the valiant old freighter skipper and to his ship: a signal-flagged salute by the entire destroyer squadron as it races by the LUNDERMAN en route to war maneuvers.