Testing Underwater Ordnance in the Patuxent During World War II, by Merle T. Cole

Testing Underwater Ordnance in the Patuxent During World War II

Merle T. Cole

This article is extracted from the author’s monograph, “Solomons Mines”—A History of the U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Test Station, Solomons, Maryland, 1942–1947, published in 1987 by the Calvert Marine Museum, Solomons, Maryland.

From 1942 to 1947, the U.S. Navy operated a research, development, and proof testing facility for mine warfare, countermine warfare, and torpedo warfare including related hardware and methods on a reservation at Point Patience, near Solomons Island, Maryland.

America and Mine Warfare

The United States has been engaged by one aspect or another of mine warfare since before it became a nation.1 Historians generally agree mines in their recognizably modern form first appeared during the American Revolution when David Bushnell tried to break the British blockade of Philadelphia by floating mines in the Delaware River. The so-called “Battle of the Kegs” (1778) was unsuccessful but clearly established a precedent. American inventors such as Colt and Fulton later experimented with mine designs. The Russians used electrically fired, i.e., command detonated, mines for harbor defense during the Crimean War (1853–1856).

Mine warfare came to the fore during the American Civil War, during which period the terms “torpedo” and “mine” were often used interchangeably. When Admiral Farragut ordered, “Damn the torpedoes!,” he was really damning the Confederate minefield in Mobile Bay. Lacking a sizeable navy, the Confederate States were forced to rely on “infernal machines” to fight the Federal naval blockade. More Federal ships fell victim to “torpedo warfare” than to any other form of combat. By the end of the Civil War, the mine had become a firmly established component of naval warfare.

Mines were employed during several European wars of the late nineteenth century and in the Spanish-American War (1898). They reemerged with a vengeance during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905. Two of the czar’s capital ships were lost to mines and six of the emperor’s. Mines served both sides well during World War I. GermanTurkish minefields blunted initial Allied attempts to force the Dardanelles, leading to the disastrous Gallipoli Campaign. Later, the North Sea mine barrage greatly reduced the effectiveness of Germany’s U-boat operations in the Atlantic. The U.S. Navy played a key role in laying and maintaining this extensive minefield.

Mine warfare took a quantum leap during World War II. Aerial delivery of the weapons over long distances enabled their truly offensive use. When in possession of air superiority, mines could be deployed by aircraft

Journal of the Company of Military Historians deep into enemy controlled waters and existing mine belts thickened without the danger of running into one’s own weapons. The U.S. Army Air Force’s aerial mining campaign against Japan during the closing days of the war is the prime example of this technique. Bomber Command committed only about 5.7 percent of total bombload to “mining in” Japanese harbors and the Inland Sea. But the enemy credited Operation STARVATION with throttling seaborne commerce and generating economic impact equivalent to Bomber Command’s bombing and incendiary raids.

Along with more effective delivery techniques came the development of sophisticated activating mechanisms. Earlier mine technology relied on actual contact between the mine and the ship’s hull for detonation. “Influence” mechanisms now appeared. These reacted to changes in magnetic fields generated by a ship’s metal mass, or the noise created by ship’s propellers or machinery (acoustics), or by the reduction of water pressure caused by a ship’s passage. Such devices were often employed together in the form of pressure-acoustic, magnetic-acoustic, and similar multiple triggers. This defeated or reduced the effectiveness of countermeasures, particularly when combined with such “fiendishly clever” devices as ship counters. These waited until a preset number of activations (ship passages) had occurred before detonating the mine. Thus did minefields believed to be “cleared” offer some nasty surprises to mariners.

Although United Nations forces quickly established air and naval dominance during the Korean War, they could not overcome Communist mine warfare. Sovietdirected mining of coastal waters presented a major and unexpected challenge. In fact, all five American Naval vessels lost during the war were destroyed by mines. At Wonsan Harbor, a field of over three thousand mines delayed a planned amphibious interdiction of retreating North Korean forces. Pursuing U.N. forces overran the harbor area before the Marines landed. So effective were Soviet magnetic and contact mines, some American naval officers concluded the U.S. Navy had “lost command of the sea” in mined areas. Although the Navy renewed its emphasis on countermining measures, deteriorated since World War II, its overall approach to mine warfare as a whole has been characterized as ambivalent.

Mine warfare was mainly of nuisance value during the Vietnam War until the very end. In May 1972, the Navy sowed mines in the inland rivers, coastal waters, and harbors of North Vietnam. Seaborne traffic, including several Soviet freighters, was “mined in” at Haiphong Harbor, and vessel movement ceased. This pressure facilitated conclusion of the Kissinger-Le Duc Tho

negotiations in Paris. The January 1973 accord ending America’s direct participation in the war notably included a proviso requiring the U.S. Navy to sweep the minefields. This task was accomplished during February-July 1974.

The United States has experienced its share of problems with mines since Vietnam, notably during the recurrent upheavals in the Middle East. During the Six Day War of 1967, the Egyptians mined the Suez Canal and blocked it with scuttled ships. The U.S. Navy cleared the mines during April-June 1974. “Mystery mines,” probably placed by Libya, appeared in the Red Sea and Gulf of Suez in August 1984. The naval forces of nine countries, including the United States, engaged in countermeasure operations in those waters. (One is reminded of the “unidentified,” i.e., German and Italian, “pirate” submarine attacks during the Spanish Civil War.) Mining during the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988) resulted, inter alia, in severe damage to, and wounding of ten sailors aboard, USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG–58) on 14 April 1988. In the Gulf War, Iraqi minefields severely damaged USS Princeton (CG–59) and USS Tripoli (LPH–10), both on 18 February 1991. Eight countries, again including the United States, cooperated in mine clearing postwar.

Closer to home, mining prompted domestic political conflict. In early 1984, Congress condemned the Central Intelligence Agency for covertly aiding anti-Sandinista forces by mining Nicaraguan waters. The United States thwarted Nicaragua’s claim for damages before the International Court of Justice by an unprecedented disavowal of the court’s jurisdiction. This prompted a very negative United Nations tone regarding this and other American anti-Sandinista activity.

Naval Mine Warfare Test Station, 1942–19472

In the earliest days of World War II, the German Air Force initiated aerial delivery of mines into British waters. A magnetic mine which landed on a mudflat in the Thames Estuary was cautiously retrieved and provided British scientists with the means to develop countermeasures against the German weapon.

In early 1941, the U.S. Navy’s Naval Ordnance Laboratory (NOL) decided to establish a magnetic survey range. Based in the Washington Navy Yard at the time, NOL wanted a site fairly close to Washington which had “sheltered deep water, relatively undisturbed by excessive tidal currents and merchant shipping.” They selected Point Patience, about “one mile upstream from the village of Solomons” in Calvert County, Maryland. The site had been used as a surplus ship lay-up site since 1927. The lay-up anchorage and an adjoining strip of land were leased by the United States Shipping Board and Maritime Commission. The Navy Department assumed and continued the lease.

NOL already operated a number of facilities in the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries: Wolf Trap, Virginia, for measuring ship signatures; anti-torpedo work at Piney Point, Maryland; at Fort Monroe, Virginia, for testing mine firing devices used in harbors and channels; and in the lower bay, mine performance and countermining tests in varying water depths, currents, and bottom conditions.

The NOL Facility was initially designated “Solomons Proving Ground, Naval Experimental Station, Naval Ordnance Research [sic] Laboratory.” It was intended as a temporary project engaged in degaussing, flashing for consistency, and coil design experiments on destroyersized ships. It also tested apparatuses to be used in such larger installations as the Reckoning Point project at Pearl Harbor; the Craney Light, Virginia, Demagnetization and Flashing Station; and numerous other calibration and flashing installations planned by the Bureau of Ordnance (BuOrd).

On 21 June 1941, the Secretary of War established a restricted area in the Patuxent River for station use. New construction was underway at the Solomons range by February 1942 and by March some thirty NOL civilian scientists and technicians were working on “recording … data on the protection of naval ships against magnetic mines.” They also studied locating “metallic objects on a sea floor by electrical and magnetic methods (useful in discovering enemy laid mine fields), explosive countermine testing of U.S. mine designs, and acoustic data on the performance of U.S. and enemy mine designs under service conditions.”3

The true nature of the threat was driven home during the summer of 1942, when for several days “the entrance to the Chesapeake Bay was closed to all traffic because of the presence of [U-boat laid] mines.”

On 25 May 1942, the Vice Chief of Naval Operations (VCNO) urged upon Chief BuOrd the definite need for “an operational research unit to consider problems … connected with mine warfare” identified by BuOrd or the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations (OPNAV). At the same time, the Bureau of Ships (BuShips) Acoustics Section was pressing the urgent need for countermeasures. An area of special concern was the perceived likelihood that the Germans would employ different mines against the American Navy than they had used against Britain, in order to complicate countermeasures efforts. BuShips’ interest in the work injected the perennial complication of interbureau rivalry and competition for resources.

In June 1942, conferences yielded a formal proposal for a joint BuOrd-BuShips “Mine Countermeasure Laboratory,” in which research, development, and testing would be conducted without “distinctions of cognizance” (i.e., responsibility). The NOL countermeasure unit would be moved from the Navy Yard to Solomons and BuShips would also concentrate its countermeasures work in that locale. “The Solomons Proving Ground was considered an ideal site for the proposed laboratory: an isolated locale;

water of depths from two to twenty fathoms; varied salinity, permitting both salt and fresh water sweeping within five miles of the laboratory; [and] splendid conditions for the investigation of harbor defenses and mine watch problems.” BuShips requested authority from OPNAV to establish the proposed joint laboratory 23 June.

But a BuOrd counterproposal on 8 July specified the laboratory be under its command. Mines and countermeasures work should be closely integrated under BuOrd “with separation on a cognizance basis” in the later stages of development and preparation for quantity procurement. The two bureaus submitted a rough joint plan on 13 July and on 1 August the agencies jointly requested VCNO authority some 350 acres of land at Point Patience and to proceed immediately on “urgent tasks” in the area of mine warfare. The request were approved on 8 August 1942.4

Ens. Lawrence T. Hickey was named “Officer in Charge [OIC] of the Mine Warfare Experimental Station” and on 10 October administrative control of the station was transferred from the Navy Yard to the Naval Powder Factory at Indian Head, Maryland. Special Order No. 1031, dated 5 November 1942, established the Naval Mine Warfare Proving Ground at Solomons under BuOrd control as a Fifth Naval District activity. One week later, Capt. Hugh P. LeClair came aboard as commanding officer; Hickey remained as administrative officer. The “proving ground” title quickly proved problematic because of the proximity of Naval Proving Ground, Dahlgren, Virginia. The confusion to visitors and the postal service was alleviated on 8 January 1943, when Special Order No. 1537 redesignated the Solomons facility, “U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Test Station” (NMWTS). At the beginning of 1944, the station was transferred from Fifth Naval District to Commandant, Potomac River Naval Command (PRNC).5

Condemnation proceedings to acquire needed land were begun in October 1942. The United States District Court for Maryland granted the Navy petition and required that all occupied land be vacated by 5 November. A 15 May 1943 declaration of taking filed with the court identified 286.0 acres in 33 tracts, aggregating a fair market value of $174,698.50. The court approved the declaration of taking on 23 May. When the final payment was made on 11 August 1947, the acquisition had cost the Navy $233,769.18.6

Captain LeClair reemphasized that bureau rivalry had to be minimized in research and development (R&D) operations. It would be more “economical not to make [bureau cognizance] distinction” prior to the “production stage.” The bureau chiefs agreed with LeClair in a joint letter to the Chief of Naval Personnel (NAVPERS). This 28 December 1942 letter requested assignment of an initial complement of ten officers and one warrant officer (machine shop supervisor). Key positions would be filled with an officer from one bureau, with the principal assistant being from the other. Thus, for example, the Experimental and Research Officer was to be a BuShips lieutenant commander, assisted by a BuOrd lieutenant, lieutenant j. g., or ensign. The Proof Officer billet would be filled with a BuOrd candidate with a BuShips deputy. This pattern was clearly intended to further defuse bureau rivalry concerns.

Since the chosen area was largely undeveloped, an “extremely rapid construction of facilities” was necessary and achieved. In the last days of September 1942, two warehouses and a large contractor’s office building (later converted for use as a barracks) were underway. The next month a mess hall, two bachelor officer quarters (BOQ), a water pumping station, and a barracks were begun. In December 1942, work began on the administrative building, dispensary, and garage. The furious pace continued in the new year, which saw construction of a countermeasures building, power house, station laboratory, mine assembly building, machine shop, cook’s quarters, a Helmholz shack, recreation building, paint locker, sewage treatment plant, two piers, and an instructional building. (See Map 1.) Temporary barracks and a boat house were underway by May 1943.7

Captain LeClair issued the first formal statement of the station’s mission and organization on 17 February 1943. “The mission of the Mine Warfare Test Station is: (a) to conduct … research and experimental work in underwater warfare materials and methods both offensive and defensive; (b) to make preliminary tests of promising methods and materials; (c) to conduct final acceptance tests of mass produced materials and selected methods; and (d) to train, in special circumstances, a limited number of officers and men in handling special equipment, all to be accomplished with efficiency and dispatch.” To accomplish this mission, the station was structured into experimental, proof, administrative, maintenance, supply, and medical divisions, and “main files.” LeClair consolidated this structure into four departments on 1 July: underwater weapons, countermeasures, intelligence, and services. This organization remained intact until February 1945.8

As the summer of 1943 approached, station construction was nearing completion. The installation was also suffering “acute growing pains.” “In fact, a history of the Mine Warfare Test Station from this date [to the summer of 1945] is a history of rapid development and expansion.” This prompted “eternal pleas for increase in enlisted complement, in technically trained officers, in clerical help, in facilities of every description.” Captain LeClair made an urgent appeal in July 1943 for an Executive Officer (XO or second in command) to relieve him of administrative responsibilities so he could concentrate

on technical problems. But an XO was not assigned until November 1944.

By December 1943, the station was short 734 and possibly even more bunks. A new BOQ and dispensary were also required. Even water was in short supply and a new well was needed in order to prevent shortages and periodic stoppages. LeClair also deplored the absence of adequate recreation facilities, because “it’s pretty sad down here for any human beings to live.”

In large part, shortcomings followed from the Mine Warfare Test Station’s continued designation as a temporary installation. In November 1944, Chief BuOrd urged the secretary of the navy to redesignate the station as permanent. Its mission is “such as to require the continuation of a large part of the work in peacetime in order that the U.S. Navy may be prepared to engage in a war with modern and up-to-date countermeasures against foreign underwater ordnance.” Placing the station in permanent status would also permit “appropriate planning for peacetime.” The secretary of the navy concurred on 7 December 1944.

Meanwhile, continued growth outpaced station resources. For example, the enlisted barracks accommodated 1,170 sailors and Marines, while the total enlisted complement (including students), stood at 1,272. The garage had to contend with five times as many vehicles as it was designed to handle and the boat repair shop could meet only about a third of the demands placed upon it.

Captain LeClair urged the station be permitted to use the facilities of Naval Amphibious Training Base (ATB), Solomons, some two miles to the east by road. The ATB was to be disestablished in March 1945. Resources of particular interest were maintenance equipment and buildings for the Countermeasures Department testing laboratory, an engineering laboratory and shop for the Special Weapons School, supply warehouses, landing craft, messing accommodations, a commissary, a laundry, and four barracks. Eighty officers and one thousand enlisted men could be housed at the ATB. LeClair’s request was granted. On 19 March 1945, the ATB was “disestablished and placed in a caretaker status, for possible reactivation within sixty days as a housing activity, under the cognizance of the Commanding Officer, Mine Warfare Test Station.”

Ironically, by that date LeClair was gone from the scene, having been replaced by Capt. Henry Williams on 12 February 1945. LeClair was awarded the Legion of Merit for his two years and ten months of diligent work in leading the station. Captain Williams continued his predecessor’s “vigorous physical expansion” and restructured the station “to meet tense wartime needs.” There were now ten departments in the organization: executive, underwater weapons, countermeasures, operations, maintenance, supply, medical, intelligence and security, station laboratory, and communications.9

Not surprisingly, the Underwater Weapons Department was a key focus. It evolved from the Proof Division, which was responsible for final acceptance testing of underwater ordnance before release for service use, testing underwater warfare methods, and operating related schools.10 To these tasks were added conducting experimental tests on ordnance developed elsewhere; testing and reporting on novel weapons; and liaising with the Countermeasures Department regarding characteristics of weapons tested. At maximum complexity (February 1944), the department had fifteen divisions: W–1, Operations; W–2, Explosive Test; W–3, Mine Test; W–4, Torpedo Test; W–5, Weapons Laboratory; W–6, Material; W–7, Special Weapons (Project “F” and related projects); W–8, Instrumentation; W–9, Divers and Locators; and W–10 through –15, which were individual ships or support test support vessels. By the end of the war, Underwater Weapons had shrunk to only seven divisions.

Explosive Test Division (W–2) was noteworthy as the Navy’s first “organized facility … for full-scale explosive testing of underwater ordnance.” It inherited tests from the Mine Warfare School at Yorktown dealing with long-term tropical storage effects on torpedo warhead deterioration. In 1944, W–2 performed over 200 tests for NOL and the BuOrd High Explosives Research Group, consuming 971,356 pounds of high explosives in the process. Examples of explosives tested included torpex, tritonol, minol, haleite, ednatol, and DBX. The largest shot fired at Solomons “was a 23-ton TNT charge designed to countermine certain German mines which could not be swept successfully by conventional means.” The massive charge was intended to create such powerful surface waves that the mine’s firing mechanism would be activated.

Mine Test Division (W–3) began service testing of mines in January 1943. Representative studies involved premature explosions, countermining dip action of moored mines, and sea action of mines. It had a central role in recommending whether given types of mines should be accepted for service use and in developing utilization instructions. The mine mechanism testing rooms were air conditioned to provide controlled temperatures and humidity for testing firing mechanisms. Also of interest was the Deep Water Mine Pen, which was “enclosed by wooden pilings and wire cables in which long time life tests may be conducted.” A high pressure tank was available to simulate planting mines “at depths of up to 575 feet.” Next to it was a tank used for testing drift-type mines. Aerial minelaying tests were supported by PBYs and TBMs from NAS Patuxent River. Another interesting test involved radar laying of mines from 25,000 feet above water surface and satisfying an urgent

operational requirement for design and service testing on three mine types in sixty days, During World War II, the station received two commendations from Chief BuOrd as a direct result of W–3’s performance.

Torpedo Test Division (W–4) grew out of early work to test the Mine Mark 27 (Project “G”). This device was “for most practical purposes … a torpedo.” It was the first fullsize torpedo-like weapon developed at the station. The division carried out research on torpedo exploder failures, a problem which had frequently bedeviled American submariners in attacks on Japanese shipping. By war’s end, the division possessed facilities for “the overhaul and servicing of almost every type of torpedo” used by the U.S. Navy. Its capabilities were also employed to test acoustic echo-ranging torpedoes; evaluate homing torpedoes which used photo-electric mechanisms; evaluate the operating characteristics of captured German T–5 torpedoes; test battle noises simulators used to divert attention from the site of actual amphibious landings; and a Submerged Obfuscating Body (SOB) which amplified sonar “pings” and thereby mislead anti-submarine vessels. Many of the projects remained classified for decades and the official Navy history was “sanitized” by deleting related classified materials. Similarly, all work performed by Special Weapons Division (W–7) remained classified and was deleted from the Navy history in its entirety.

Special Weapons School (W–5) trained crews of civilians, Navy and Army officers and enlisted men, and personnel of Allied forces. The school syllabus covered special underwater weapons, electricity, tools, batteries, acoustics, gyroscopes, range equipment, controls, the Project “F” mine, Projects “I” and “J” torpedoes, laboratory work, ranging, and crew handling. Facilities of the disestablished ATB were used for much of the training. Refresher courses were also presented to sailors returning from the war in the Atlantic. From 1943 to 1945, W–5 had formed and trained about 135 crews.

One humorous situation arising in Torpedo Barges Division (W–6) involved barge YTT–2. While serving at Naval Torpedo Testing Range, Montauk, New York, in August 1942, it had been inspected and determined to need $25,000 in repairs. The barge was assigned to PRNC and immediately sent to Curtis Bay Coast Guard Yard at Baltimore. When repairs were eventually completed, the total bill came to $400,000—and YTT–2 was “still in poor condition despite the expensive” repairs. It was finally declared excess on 13 September 1945 and tied up at a pier at the old ATB.

Countermeasures Department evolved from the old Experimental and Research Division.11 It originally functioned under BuShips’ Minesweeping Research Section, testing minesweeping equipment and developing fleet sweep instructions. Its mission was to conduct research in countermeasures to underwater ordnance; conduct and report on experimental and proof tests of countermeasures materials and methods; keep fully informed about all underwater weapons tested at the station or used by allied or enemy navies; operate schools; and liaise with BuShips on new countermeasures for foreign (allied and enemy) underwater weapons.

In August 1945, the department had seven divisions. Moored Mine Division (C–1) naturally focused on sweeping minefields. Much work was done on explosive cutters, used to sever a moored mine’s chain and thereby set it adrift. Typical projects included adapting captured German light sweeping devices for “preinvasion sweep along beaches”; conducting seven weeks of tests on the west coast with high-speed sweeps (conditions could not be replicated in Chesapeake waters); developing a sweep for use against the Japanese type JI drifting mine; and development of bottom-sweeping devices.

Magnetic Division (C–2) conducted test and development work on sea bottom electrical resistivity, magnetic sweep fields and magnetic sweep gear; operated the Helmholtz laboratory, which was used to test the response of magnetic mine mechanisms to controlled magnetic fields; and produced scale model equipment. In early 1941 it undertook an extensive program of sea bottom resistivity measurement. This work was initiated by the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey then transferred to the station. Sea bottom surveys were made in the Patuxent, the bay, the York River, Boston Harbor, and the Rockland, Maine, area. Oceanic sea bottom surveys were made along the east coast from September 1943 to April 1944. The division also developed magnetic sweep gear for shallow waters and for unusually sensitive magnetic mines. Overall, ten major types of sweeps were tested, of which four were released for fleet use.

Acoustic Division (C–3) developed and tested devices for triggering acoustic mines. Many devices generated underwater racket that simulated ship noises and thereby triggered firing mechanisms. The division also developed devices to confuse German acoustic homing torpedoes, which became a significant threat in the late summer of 1943. Other acoustic activation mechanisms included grenade sweeps (chains of grenades and later TNT charges) detonated at precise intervals; hydraulic sirens; modified concrete vibration machines; a towed waterdisplacement device (christened “Loch Ness monster”) designed to trigger German “oyster type” pressure mines; and modulation projects for special control equipment.

Sweep Test Division (C–4) was created in October 1943 to relieve C–2 and –3 of increasingly burdensome sweep testing work. Several types of mines were sweep tested, including sample of captured German acoustic-pressure mines. Some tests were conducted at the Wolf Trap range in the lower bay.

The Photographic Laboratory Division (C–6) documented departmental test operations. It grew continuously and eventually took over all station photographic work. Services encompassed still and motion picture and color or black and white film. High-speed film was available to cover aerial drops and torpedo runs. Coverage was often provided from blimps or, toward the end of the war, helicopters.

The Operations Department, the last large department, was created in February 1945 to centralize control of test support vessels and related resources.12 Its initial mission was to keep boats used for afloat operations in working order. The number of vessels available to the station continued to grow, including by March 1943 a minesweeper (USS Accentor, AMC–36) and a minelayer (USS Wassuc, CMC–3). By January 1944 there were some sixty craft assigned. Boats were either pooled (unassigned) or allotted to the Underwater Weapons Departments for use in areas below Point Patience and off Broomes Island, or to Countermeasures for use above Point Patience, and at station Pier II.

The department’s Officer-Coordinator was in charge of water area allocations, navigation, notices to mariners, and preparing operational orders. An Engineer Officer supervised the boat engine repair shop, hull yard, and overhaul shop. A Yard Craft Officer assigned vessels and controlled their movement, directed the 140 boat operators, and directed minor tow jobs. An executive assistant functioned as administrative officer and assisted the operations officer. Operations Division was structured in five divisions: O–1, Boat House; O–2, Hull Yard; O–3, Diver/Locator; O–4, Lighter-than-Air (LTA) Craft; O–5, Lower River Control. The last three are of particular interest.

Diver/Locator Division (O–3) grew out of NOL field testing of underwater locators which started at Solomons early in 1942. The first development was a 700-pound air-core gradiometer dubbed “King Kong,” which could locate ferrous materials. This device was used to locate torpedoes at the Newport, Rhode Island, and Piney Point ranges. A total of fifteen were built at the station. NOL also built and tested a nonferrous materials detector known as an Electrical Discontinuity Discriminator (or “E.D.D.”). It was first used along the Atlantic Coast to locate German mines, then at Solomons in the fall of 1942 to locate air-dropped Mk 12 mines. Other locators included a permalloy-core gradiometer used by divers to precisely locate buried objects and an acoustic locating device called the “pinger.”

A small complement of divers first came to Solomons in spring 1943. They were assigned to the Mary S., a small fishing boat which proved inadequate. Later, a Landing Craft, Medium (LCM) was acquired and converted by the divers in their spare time. Then the divers received a locator boat, the Sidney R. Riggin, latterly an oyster boat, equipped with the “E.D.D.” and later “King Kong” devices. The number of assigned craft increased, as did the complement. By V–J Day, 2 officers, 54 men, 5 diving boats, 4 locator boats, a recovery boat, and a personnel boat were assigned to O–3. Because of the divers, the station required a medical officer qualified in deep-sea diving and submarine medicine. The station also boasted two recompression chambers—one ashore at Pier III, the diver headquarters, and the other aboard diving ship YDT–7. According to the official Navy history, “Diving accidents and bends have been rare at this station, due to careful timing of men on the bottom, and adequate recompression given them upon reaching topside.” Only two incidents of bends were recorded. Also, in December 1944 “a diver was down when a mine was exploded about a thousand feet away.” He was hospitalized for observation but discharged after “it was definitely determined that he had suffered no injuries.”

The LTA Craft Division (O–4) arose from a September 1944 request by the station commander that a blimp be detailed to NAS Patuxent River for thirty days to assist in test observations. NAS Lakehurst, New Jersey, promptly dispatched an aircraft to meet the need. The LTA proved quite valuable in test work and a permanent assignment was requested. Following construction of a perforated steel runway and a small airship mast, blimp number G–3 was assigned to the station. The unit carried the designation Detachment 1–3 of Airship Utility Squadron 1 (ZJ–1). It was activated 17 November 1944 under command of Lt. Russell D. Freel.

On 6 January 1945, G–3 was “deflated while being docked in front of hanger #5” at NAS Lakehurst, following a “weather escape” from Solomons on the fifth. Airship G–6 was dispatched to Solomons as a replacement on 7 January. In February 1945, Detachment 1–3 was consolidated with other test support resources under Operations Department, and designated LTA Craft Division (O–4). Since October 1944, Detachment 1–2 of Squadron ZJ–1 had operated at Naval Proving Ground, Dahlgren. Its primary mission was supporting torpedo firing tests at Piney Point. On 12 March 1945, the two detachments were consolidated at Solomons, and designated Detachment 1–2. The unit comprised blimps G–6 and G–7, thirteen officers and twenty-two enlisted men, with Lieutenant Freel in command.

On 10-11 May, the blimps were “caught on the mast … in a storm during which winds gusted to 60 knots.” Both ships survived but “took a severe beating on the nose assembly.” On 30 May, flight operations terminated and the blimps were transferred to separate squadrons. Detachment 1–2 was disestablished 6 June 1945. In supporting torpedo recovery, observation, general photography, and special

search operations “the blimp graduated to a position of importance not previously attained.”

Lower River Control Division (O–5) was responsible for coordinating tests between Point Patience and Sandy Point. It granted “clearances for test runs, air drops, diving, locating and recovery operations, and the movement of craft through the area … . A control tower on the YC–758 [an open lighter vessel], overlooking the entire area … operated throughout the working day.” This tower served as the Operations Officer’s “eyes” and as a radio relay. Further, a “radio equipped speed boat serves as a police boat (and in some cases an observation boat) for the safe expedition of air drops and test runs.” Two river control areas were established by the secretary of war on 6 April 1943.

The station’s smaller organizational components can be quickly covered.13 The Station Laboratory was originally an NOL annex. It was later used for various purposes, including shop, storage, and R&D work. Civilian contractor researchers were housed there alongside BuOrd and NOL representatives. A Radio Division operating from there controlled the over 250 transceivers in use on the station. The laboratory also ran an Instrument Division, which pooled expensive but less frequently used equipment. It also provided instrument making and calibration services, a drafting room, and a small machine shop, which fabricated an average of fifty-six new devices per month.

The Maintenance Department was organized into planning, engineering and repairs, electrical, public works, utilities, and transportation divisions. It also had responsibility for “the recently decommissioned Amphibious Training Base.” Station supply, procurement, and disbursing needs were met by the Supply Division. The station’s geographic isolation caused some delays in acquiring critically needed materials. The nearest railroad was at Upper Marlboro, forty-five miles to the north. An inadequate telephone system and lack of fuel storage facilities also presented challenges which were eventually overcome.

Medical support for the station initially came from the ATB. A small dispensary (two two-bed wards) opened in April 1943, where a doctor from the ATB and a pharmacist’s mate held daily sick call. Expanded medical staff arrived in September 1943, consisting of 2 doctors, 2 dentists, 6 nurses, a chief pharmacist’s mate, and 22 corpsmen. A new dispensary was opened in December 1944. Emergency surgery could be performed locally, but major elective surgery cases were sent to Bethesda Naval Hospital. By war’s end, the professional staff had gown to three doctors and three dentists.

Installation security at first consisted of a small civilian guard force patrolling the station’s inner area. The official Navy history records the first civilian guard “used to patrol his area by day in a rowboat.” In January 1944, a Marine detachment assumed the security role. The Intelligence and Security Department had cognizance over the on-shore restricted area, and acted as the station commander’s liaison with the Coast Guard, which was responsible for enforcing regulations concerning prohibited river areas. Security was maintained by colorcoded badges and specific project clearances. Military and civilian personnel and contractor employees were also subject to background screening before assignment to the station.

Fire was a continuing concern. An interesting incident on 29 June 1944 involved fires discovered at 1400 and 2145. The first fire was minor, but the second was on a “barge which was loaded with approximately eight tons of torpex, and was moored only about 40 feet from a fleettype submarine [emphasis in original].” A seventeenyear-old sailor was being commended for his alertness in spotting the fire at the very moment the Security Officer reported the young man’s confession—the sailor was a pyromaniac.

The Intelligence and Security Department was responsible for communications functions until December 1944, when the Communications Department was established. The new entity controlled message traffic records, radio communications, the telephone system, and the post office. The station could not dispatch classified messages until February 1943, when a teletypewriter and coding board were transferred from the ATB. Earlier, all message traffic was handled either by the ATB or special messenger. The station’s first post office opened in July 1943 and guard-mail service became available in April 1944.

Disestablishment

On 31 July 1945, Captain Williams summarized his views on the NMWTS station’s postwar role in a letter to Chief BuOrd. He noted continued need for the former ATB facilities, and the lack of civilian personnel or housing for them “in the isolated town of Solomons.” Postwar plans called for a reduction in officer complement from 259 to 44 and enlisted men from 2,089 to 275. To continue the work, the civilian complement would almost double (from 343 to 667). Additional and improved physical plant was also a necessity, including replacing all temporary war construction with permanent buildings.14

Public works funding for 1946 emphasized construction of on-base housing for civilian employees. Local employees available during the war were already returning to peacetime pursuits, so that “most of the 856 civilian employees will have to be recruited from distant areas.” No facilities were available locally for employees with families. Additional land would also have to be purchased. Housing 302 families was estimated to cost $5.2 million.

Converting barracks into apartments for married naval personnel would require a further $326,000. Other costs involved a new chapel, high explosive magazines, explosives handling pier, an elevated water storage tank, relocating officer quarters threatened by shoreline erosion, and assorted other improvements and additions.15

Such a spending proposal ran directly counter to “budget slashing” following V–J Day. The entire national military establishment suffered, but the Navy mine warfare program was especially hard hit. Most of its vessels were either mothballed or scrapped outright and its personnel complement—heavy with reservists—was allowed to wither away. Within the Navy, there was certainly a “lack of naval interest and emphasis on mine warfare” in the 1945–1950 period. This even included a proposal to eliminate the mineman military specialty rating. Generally, high Navy officials did not consider mine warfare a field that “required a lot of training, experience, or research. Consequently, the mine as a modern naval weapon became more and more neglected as a serious threat to control of the seas.”16

Notwithstanding its recently won permanent installation status, the station could not survive in this environment— never mind expansion or improvement. On 30 June 1947, BuOrd decided to disestablish the Naval Mine Warfare Test Station “to conserve personnel and funds.”17 For installation physical development at this time, see Map 2.

The official Navy history credits Naval Mine Warfare Test Station, Solomons, with five major achievements during World War II:

1. Assisting in development of over twenty new naval mines, several of which were “planted in large quantities, and were a major factor in the successful prosecution of the war in the Pacific theater.” 2. Assisting in development of acoustic homing torpedoes and mobile mines and proof testing production units before issuance to the fleet. 3. Assisting in development of countermeasures for enemy and allied mines and torpedoes, providing a nucleus of countermeasures officers for fleet duty, and “to a large extent [making] possible the issuance of minesweeping gear and instructions” for the U.S. Navy. 4. Achieving a unique position in the field of ordnance education by training the vast majority of “the hundreds of enlisted technicians and officers who maintained acoustical torpedoes and mines aboard carriers and submarine tenders and those who established overhaul shops throughout the world … .” 5. Providing technical knowledge which would prove “invaluable in any future preparedness program.”

The station received the Naval Ordnance Development Award on 16 September 1946 in recognition of distinguished service in developing torpedo design and development, testing of special torpedoes, and design and service testing of mines. A number of civilian employees and associates received individual awards for their contributions to the station’s mission. Interestingly, Dr. Reginald V. Truitt, director of the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory in Solomons, received a Naval Ordnance Development Award “for distinguished work in connection with the underwater noises of marine life.”18

Naval Ordnance Laboratory Test Facility, 1947–1982

After the war, BuShips transferred it minesweeping work to Panama City, Florida, and the entire Solomons station was turned over to BuOrd. Postwar budget cuts meant BuOrd did not have the funds to operate a station designed to accommodate 2,400 people. An initial decision was taken to close the station and move it into caretaker status.

NOL protested that it badly needed access to the station’s natural features and facilities in support of field testing and arranged to retain a large cove and about a half dozen buildings. The remainder of the buildings, including most of the housing, was turned over to NAS Patuxent River.19

On 1 July 1947, the secretary of the navy officially established U.S. Naval Ordnance Laboratory Test Facility (NOLTF). NOL had been relocated from the Navy Yard to new facilities at White Oak, Maryland. It had several field units aside from Solomons: NOL Unit, Fort Story, Virginia—for testing underwater ordnance in rough sea conditions for bottom stability and other characteristics; NOL Unit, Fort Monroe, Virginia—a water test area in the Hampton Roads channel for evaluating mine responses to actual ship traffic; NOL Experimental Facility, Hiwassee Dam, North Carolina—for towing, dropping, projecting, and launching inert-loaded ordnance into still, deep water against simulated targets; and NOLTF, Barcroft, Virginia—waterfront and floating facilities for underwater acoustic calibration and test work.20

The Solomons site was retained largely because NOL already had a core of technical officers and civilians in residence and it was only seventy miles from White Oak. The water areas of Patuxent River and Chesapeake Bay were uniquely suited to NOL’s technical work “both current and contemplated.” They were “one of the very few locations where underwater explosive work could be conducted in sheltered water and close proximity to both an air station [aerial delivery of ordnance was a major test workload] and a suitable ordnance shore facility.”

NOLTF was assigned 18 acres in the so-called “technical area” of the former station, between Second and Home (Third) Coves, along the reservation’s southern shore. A wire security fence and guards separated NOLTF from the rest of the reservation. The initial complement was twenty-two enlisted men, ten civilians, and a chief warrant officer serving as OIC. NOLTF also had access to other small sections of the reservation, including piers, magazines, and observation stations. Sixteen vessels

were inherited from the station, including an acoustic test and barracks barge; a torpedo range tender; an ordnance planter/recovery vessel; and a barge with a 60ton seaplane wrecking derrick which doubled as a diving tender. NOLTF’s original mission was to provide shore equipment, specialized craft, and suitable water areas for torpedo testing, aircraft-laid mine evaluation and countermeasures studies in support of NOL.21

The remainder of the reservation was used for other Navy needs. The U.S. Naval Civil Engineering Laboratory (CEL) was established there on 1 April 1948. Its mission was to conduct basic and applied research on engineering problems and develop “amphibious equipment under cognizance of the Bureau of Yards and Docks.” Much of CEL’s mission had previously been performed under contract to universities and colleges. Projections for some four hundred employees and construction of a $2 million laboratory building dramatically shortened CEL’s tenure at Solomons. The Navy decided the work could be more economically performed by moving the laboratory to Port Hueneme, California, home of the Naval Construction Battalion (“Seabees”) Center. Research and support personnel were transferred and CEL closed out at Solomons on 23 January 1950, barely twenty-two months after activation. The reservation next became an annex to NAS Patuxent River, under Bureau of Aeronautics (BuAer) management. The annex was used “primarily for public quarters for personnel stationed at the NAS and for some NOLTF personnel.”22

As for NOLTF itself, it focused during 1947-1950 on high- and low-altitude aerial delivery of ordnance (mostly mines), “torpedo shots into the river, and explosive work with mines.” From 1951 to 1958 torpedo work “diminished to zero” and the torpedo shop was converted for additional mine and missile assembly. A headthrown weapon, moored mine, and missile test projects increased. Aircraft drops of new mines proved a steady workload. “Underwater explosive shots to measure shock damage and evaluation of new explosives developed by NOL continued active.”23

On 1 April 1965, the Solomons Annex was transferred, yo-yo like, back to the NOLTF. This gave the unit a total land area of 285.1 acres. During the 1960s, the facility experienced a steadily increasing workload in parallel to Navy operations in Southeast Asia. A March 1968 command briefing pamphlet pointed out the addition of a Patrol Boat River (PBR) to the unit fleet as “a platform to evaluate a great variety of items used in riverine warfare.” Expanded capability was evident in the presence of two diving boats and fourteen divers, so “diving support can be furnished at two separate locations at the same time, utilizing either surface-supplied air or SCUBA equipment to the maximum water depths in the test range.”24

By 1965, NOLTF had attained its maximum strength of 2 officers, 29 enlisted men, and 100 civilians. The facility was by then technically under the Bureau of Naval Weapons (BuWeps), a short-lived amalgamation of BuOrd and BuAer. Its official mission was to “conduct field tests and evaluation for the [NOL] in support of complete underwater weapons systems, and their assemblies, components, and materials, and missiles.” A wide range of ordnance items were tested, including mines, depth charges, ahead-thrown weapons, bombs, fuzes, pyrotechnic devices, missiles, and special weapons. Representative special projects were the Submarine Launched Mobile Mine; CAPTOR (encapsulated torpedo) deep-water homing mine; Intermediate Water-Depth Mine (IDM); Quickstrike mine series; Submarine Emergency Communication Transmitter; and Seagoing Platform for Acoustical Research (SPAR), an unmanned vessel used to determine mine error bearings in the antisubmarine warfare program.

NOL was the designated lead laboratory for riverine and coastal craft problems under the Navy’s Vietnam Laboratory Assistance Program (VLAP). At NOLTF, this mission was evidenced by such projects as Small Craft Armament (SCRAM) evaluation of weapons for the PBR craft; swimmer weapons for UDT and SEAL teams (“virtually a new area of warfare”); contraband search devices to assist Operation GAME WARDEN coastal patrols; 60-mm mortar system tests; and conversion of aerial bombs into mines for land and water interdiction of transportation routes.

Beginning in September 1972, NOLTF began working in a totally different area of warfare. Like most combat systems, naval vessels are vulnerable to the electromagnetic pulse (EMP) generated by nuclear explosions. A pulse generating facility dubbed EMPRESS (EMP Radiation Environment Simulator for Ships) was constructed along the eastern shore of Point Patience. A transmission line some 1,300 yards long was suspended from 100-foot high Douglas fir poles. “Hardening” tests directed emissions against destroyer-sized target vessels anchored in the bight just east of the point. Tested periodically were USS Valcour (AVP–55), USS Laffey (DD–724), and USS John King (DDG–3). But fish kills related to the testing caused a public outcry and EMPRESS operations were suspended in late 1987.25

During the mid-1960s, the U.S. Coast Guard developed an interest in the Point Patience area as a possible station location. The Navy eventually agreed to transfer 6.3 acres around Third (Home) Cove for this purpose. Although existing real property maps show the transfer as effective 29 May 1967, it never occurred.26

Rather than the Coast Guard, Naval District Washington (NDW) inherited the lion’s share of the Solomons reservation. NDW, headquartered in the Navy Yard, had been formed on 1 January 1965 by merging PRNC with the Severn River Naval Command. This proved a fortuitous action. During a 1967 tour, the NDW inspector general recognized the possibility of using much of the

land at Solomons Test Facility “in a dual capacity.” An ad hoc committee was appointed to investigate its utility for recreational purposes. The committee recommended hiring a professional recreation planning consultant to develop a more detailed study. Out of this grew Naval Recreation Center, Solomons (NRCS), which opened in May 1970 with limited capacity.

The Navy had sold the idea by carefully pointing out that it would not compete with local civilian businesses and that its presence would “bring social and economic advantages to the local community.” They pointed out naval enlisted personnel found much of the Washington metropolitan area’s recreational venues overcrowded, high-priced, and oriented toward nonmilitary clientele. NRCS deliberately used local contractors and civilian workers to build, maintain, and operate its recreational facilities. Estimated development costs of $2.5 million would initially be funded from ship’s stores and Navy Exchange profits, after which the center would become self-supporting.

NRCS has since grown into a major complex of overnight accommodations, camp sites, cottages, bungalows, food facilities, pools, hiking trails, a golf course, picnic sites, tennis, roller skating, biking, and boat and fishing tackle rentals.27 NOL provided security, safety, fire protection, and public works support to NRCS under an intra-service support agreement. NOL also provided space at Solomons in support of the Naval Electronics Systems Engineering Activity for storage of electronic equipment and to the Naval Aviation Logistics Center for a ground-support equipment fleet support site.28

On 1 September 1974, NOL was combined with Naval Weapons Laboratory, Dahlgren to form the new Naval Surface Weapons Center (NSWC). Then, effective 1 March 1978, “another major reorganization was implemented at NSWC, effectively eliminating the Dahlgren and White Oak Laboratories as separately managed entities.”29 NOLTF had faced three recurring threats to its continued existence. As far back as 1965, proposals had been made to relocate it as a tenant of another activity— most often NAS Patuxent River or Naval Weapons Station, Yorktown, Virginia. Pressure to move was heightened by a declining post-Vietnam workload, general military cutbacks, and a 1975 fire which caused $600,000 damage to several buildings and support craft. A review committee recommended in November 1975 the activity be shifted across the river to the NAS and proposed 1 October 1976 as the completion. Inadequate facilities and delays in approving relocation funds pushed the move back to 1980.30

The second problem was proposed construction of the Thomas Johnson Memorial Bridge, intended to carry Maryland Route 2 across the Patuxent. Navy officials insisted the bridge be sited along the reservation’s southern shoreline to avoid crossing “the principal flight path (164⁰ T)” of aircraft “dropping our stores into the river.” This location was opposed by Maryland highway officials. After prolonged negotiations, the squabble was finally resolved in the Navy’s favor.31

The third and most persistent problem dealt with public complaints of alleged damage to commercial fisheries from underwater explosive tests. Station scientists cooperated in studies undertaken by the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory (1944-1945, and 1973) and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (1948–1953). Finally, NOLF produced its own study in 1969. No study was able to prove that “the annual kill of valuable fish exceeds a fraction of the take of one commercial license.” Popular criticism was not significantly deflected by these scientific findings. The underlying cause of the fish kill was caused by a badly botched test shot carried out in 1978 in the Virginia area of Chesapeake Bay by another Navy activity. The shot produced a massive fish kill during a period when the bay fishing industry was more depressed than normal. The Navy suspended explosives testing in the bay and its tributaries until October 1979. But the level of such testing out of Point Patience never recovered and all such tests were stopped in October 1980.32

This combination of pressures, misfortunes, and intrusions from NRCS, finally doomed the testing facility. A CNO order effective 1 May 1982 deactivated both the NSWC Solomons Facility and its NSWC Detachment, Solomons—thus ending thirty-five years of service to the naval ordnance establishment. Diving operations were transferred to the NSWC Fort Lauderdale site. The Solomons divers had established an outstanding reputation in tasks ranging from ordnance location to salvaging downed aircraft and evaluating experimental diving suits for general Navy application. Because all members of the small civilian staff who desired continued employment could be accommodated, the disestablishment was accomplished without recourse to reduction-in-force.33

Some highlights of post-NOL activities at the reservation are of interest here. The former East German Navy missile corvette Hiddensee, built in Russia in 1985, had operated in the Baltic Sea until the German reunification in 1989. She was declared surplus and sent to America for evaluation. When she arrived at Solomons, she was thoroughly examined by U.S. Navy staff who were experts in Russian technology and equipment. She was then given to the Battleship Massachusetts Memorial in Fall River, Massachusetts. On 28 January 1993, a fire struck, its caused determined to be an electrical short. It destroyed a multi-use, two-story wooden recreation building at NRCS. In 1995, administrative control of the reservation was transferred from NAS Patuxent River to Naval District Washington. The following year, the reservation was redesignated Naval Station Washington, Solomons Complex.34

MAP 1. U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Proving Ground, Solomons, Maryland, 1 January 1943. Adapted from “Map of U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Proving Ground, Solomons, Maryland, Showing Conditions on Jan 1, 1943,” Public Works Division, Potomac River Naval Command, P. W. D. No. 7266. Drawn by Fran Younger of the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons. FIG 1. Aerial ordnance delivery test conducted by Solomons Branch, Naval Ordnance Laboratory, circa 1974. Support is being provided by P–3 Orion aircraft from Patuxent River Naval Air Test Center.

MAP 2. U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Test Station, Solomons, Maryland, June 1947. Adapted from “Map of U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Test Station, Solomons, Maryland, Showing Conditions on June 30, 1947,” Public Works Division, Potomac River Naval Command, PRNC Drawing No. 2521. Note major modifications to Home (Third) Cove area as compared to Map 1. Drawn by Fran Younger of the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, Solomons. FIG 2. Aerial survey photo taken 24 April 1938, showing the “Ghost Fleet,” ex-German vessels confiscated when America entered World War I and laid-up at Point Patience from 1927 until 1941. This photo covers the entire area later acquired for the NMWTS. Courtesy of the National Archives.

FIG 5. Mine test tanks, 13 September 1945. U.S. Navy photograph.

FIG 3. Aerial view of NMWTS, 18 September 1943. Courtesy of the National Archives.

FIG 6. Technician testing Gatling gun during evaluation of PBR for Vietnam deployment, 1970. U.S. Navy photograph.

FIG 4. Aerial view of NMWTS, 2 April 1944. Courtesy of the National Archives. FIG 7. Multi-barrel grenade launcher undergoing evaluation for Navy use, 1969. U.S. Navy photograph.

FIG 8. Station test support vessel IX-307, USS Brier. U.S. Navy photograph.

FIG 11. Diver entering recompression chamber, 1971. U.S. Navy photograph.

FIG 9. Station test support vessel, YSD-72, seaplane wrecking derrick. U.S. Navy photograph.

FIG 12. View of EMPRESS facility and target vessels, 1973 or 1975. U.S. Navy photograph.

FIG 10. Navy divers on ordnance recovery mission, 1974. U.S. Navy photograph.

Notes

1. This section is based on information in Capt. J. S. Cowie, R.N., Mines, Minelayers and Minelaying (London: Oxford U. Press, 1949), 9–167; Gregory K. Hartman, Weapons That Wait: Mine Warfare in the U.S. Navy (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1979); Robert C. Duncan, America’s Use of Sea Mines (Silver Spring, MD: U.S. Naval Ordnance Laboratory, White Oak, 1962); Michael F. Perry, Infernal Machines: The Story of Confederate Submarine and Mine Warfare (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State U. Press, 1965); Ellis A. Johnson and David A. Katcher, Mines Against Japan (Silver Spring, MD: U.S. Naval Ordnance Laboratory, White Oak, 1947); Frederick M. Sallager, Lessons from an Aerial Mining Campaign (Operation “Starvation”), U.S. Air Force Project RAND Report R–1322 (Santa Monica: RAND, 1974); Tentative Instructions for the Navy of the United States Governing Maritime and Aerial Warfare, May 1941 (Washington:

2.

3.

4.

5. GPO, 1941), 34; David F. Trask, The War With Spain in 1898, Macmillian Wars of the United States (New York: Macmillian, 1981), 96–102, 133–136, 200–201, 253–254, 287, 292–293, 307; Read Adm. Daniel P. Mannix III, “The Great North Sea Mine Barrage,” American Heritage, 34 (April-May 1983): 36–47; Lt. Cdr. Buford Roland and Lt. William B. Boyd, U.S. Navy Bureau of Ordnance in World War II (Washington: Dept. of the Navy, BuOrd, 1954), 156–171; Cdr. Malcolm W. Cagle and Cdr. Frank A. Manson, The Sea War in Korea (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1957), 142–151, 164, 218–221, 527–528; Rear Adm. C. F. Horne III, “New Role for Mine Warfare,” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, 108 (November 1982): 34–40 (hereafter Proceedings); Rear Adm. Brian McCauley, “Operation End Sweep,” Proceedings, 100 (March 1974): 19–25; Capt. J. Huntly Boyd, “Nimrod Spar: Clearing the Suez Canal,” Proceedings, 102 (February 1976): 18–20; F. Clifton Berry, Jr., “U.S. Navy Mine Warfare: Small but Not Forgotten,” Armed Forces Journal International, 117 (October 1977): 38–39, 43; Lt. Cdr. Thomas G. Donaldson, “Meandering Mines,” Proceedings, 110 (September 1984): 137; and U.S. Navy Training Publications Center, Naval Ordnance, Vol. I of Naval Ordnance and Gunnery (NavPers 10797–A) (Washington: GPO, 1957): 317–326. In the U.S. Navy, mine activities are centered in the Commander, Mine Warfare Command, headquartered in Charleston, SC. This command is responsible to the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) for mine warfare readiness, training, tactics, and doctrine for active and reserve components. Established 1 July 1975, the command recommends overall policies for mining and mine countermeasures; recommends mission requirements for surface ships, submarines, and aircraft in mine warfare; and monitors R&D programs to introduce new mine warfare developments. J. M. Braeckel, ACOS for Admin., Commander, Mine Warfare Command to author, 12 May 1987. This section is largely based on “A History of the U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Test Station, Solomons, Maryland, 1945,” in Bureau of Ordnance, “Miscellaneous Activities,” Vol. 1 (Washington: n.d.), Guide No. 132a, Navy Department Library, Washington Navy Yard (WNY) (hereafter “Station History”). See also Duncan, America’s Use of Sea Mines, 94. For a history of the Reserve Fleet lay-up site, see Merle T. Cole, The Patuxent “Ghost Fleet,” 1927–1941 (Solomons, MD: Calvert Marine Museum, 1986). “Station History,” 3–8; Bureau of Ordnance, “Underwater Ordnance,” Vol. 9 (Washington: n.d.), Guide No. 78, Navy Department Library (hereafter “Underwater Ordnance”). “Station History,” 10–13. For details of the division of underwater ordnance and countermeasures responsibilities, see “Underwater Ordnance” and Office of the CNO, “Mine Warfare in the Naval Establishment” (Washington: n.d.), Guide No. 15, Navy Department Library (hereafter “Mine Warfare”). Bureau rivalries and organizational evolution are summarized in Norman Friedman, U.S. Naval Weapons (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press),11–12, and Joseph P. Smaldone, History of the White Oak Laboratory, 1945–1975 (Silver Spring, MD: Naval Surface Weapons Center, 1977), 104–105, 182. “Station History,” 13–15, 17–18, 22; Commandant, Potomac River Naval Command, “Narrative History of the Potomac River Naval Command” (Washington: 1975), 52–55, 59–60, Guide No. 135, Navy Department Library; “Command Historical Report, Potomac River Naval Command, 8 December 1941–31 December 1958,” in Naval Historical Center, Operational Archives, WNY (hereafter “PRNC History”); Maryland Historical Society, Manuscript Division, War Records Collection, MS 2010, “Installation History Questionnaire for the Mine Warfare Test Station” (hereafter “MHS Questionnaire”). Data from the questionnaire were used to prepare the society publication Military Participation, Vol. 1 of

Maryland in World War II (Baltimore,MD: Maryland Historical

Society, 1950), 214–215 (hereafter Military Participation).

Dates given in text for establishment and redesignation are from

Navy Department, Admin. Office, Publications Division, Navy

Department Bulletin Cumulative Edition, 31 December 1945 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1945), 6, 9. Date of redesignation differs from that given in “Station History.” First names of officers are not given in sources. Names have been reconstructed by reference to Register of Commissioned and Warrant Officers of the United

States Naval Reserve, 1 July 1944 (Washington, DC: GPO,1944), 573 (hereafter USNR Register). 6. Naval Facilities Engineering Command (NAVFAC), Chesapeake

Division, Real Estate Divivision, WNY, Basic Land File (1), NOLTF

Solomons. For Navy real estate acquisition policy, see U.S. Navy,

Bureau of Yards and Docks, Building the Navy’s Bases in World

War II: History of the Bureau of Yards and Docks and the Civil

Engineering Corps, 1940–1946 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1947), 111–112. 7. “Station History,” 15–19; “MHS Questionnaire.” 8. “Station History,” 19–22, 23–24. 9. Ibid., 223–23, 24–26; Military Participation, 215. “PRNC History” states (60) that the ATB was disestablished 15 March and placed in caretaker status 19 March, as does “Station History.” Commander in Chief, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, “A History of the Amphibious Training

Command, U.S. Atlantic Fleet,” Guide No. 145a, Navy Department

Library, 9, 67–69, gives dates as 6 February (deactivation) and 1 April 1945 (closure). See also Military Participation, 188, and

Merle T. Cole, Cradle of Invasion: A History of the U.S. Naval

Amphibious Training Base, Solomons, Maryland, 1942–1945 (Solomons, MD: Calvert Marine Museum, 1985), 21. 10. “Station History,” 32–114. 11. Ibid., 134–217. 12. 12. Ibid., 218–226, 236–239; USNR Register, 427; War Dept.,

U.S. Engineer Office, “Regulations Governing Navigation in the

Patuxent River at Point Patience and Sandy Point, Maryland,”

Washington, 9 April 1943, in File H-n2, “U.S. Navy—Mine Test (NOL, NSWTC, Pax River),” Calvert Marine Museum, Solomons,

MD (hereafter CMM File H-n2). Most of the material in this section concerning LTA craft is based on information provided to the author by Roy A. Grossnick, Naval Aviation History and Archives, WNY, in a letter dated 26 September 1984. The information was extracted from “Annual Squadron History, Airship Utility Squadron One and Airship Anti-Submarine Training Detachment, Atlantic Fleet” 1945,16–29; Naval Airship Training and Experimental Command,

“They Were Dependable”—Airship Operations in World War II, 7

December 1941 to September 1945 (Lakehurst, NJ: Naval Airship

Tng. and Exp. Cmd: NAS, April 1946), 28; and CNO, Monthly

Status Report of Naval Aircraft, 30 April 1945 (Washington, DC:

OPNAV, 1945), 66. 13. “Station History,” 226–249. 14. Ibid., 27–29. 15. Copies of the 1946 public works projects estimates are in CMM

File Hn–2. The author was unable to locate a document explaining the difference in estimated civilian personnel needs, i.e., 667 vs. 856. 16. Cagle and Manson, The Sea War in Korea, 125–126. 17. Navy Department, Bureau of Ordnance, Annual Report of the

Bureau of Ordnance to the Secretary of the Navy, Fiscal Year 1948 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1948), 35, in Naval Historical

Center, Operational Archives. 18. “Station History,” 251–252; “MHS Questionnaire”; Military

Participation, 215. 19. Naval Ordnance Laboratory Report, 8 (September 1951): 5 (hereafter USNOL Report); Military Participation, 215. Exact date of disestablishment varies in other sources. “PRNC History” gives the date as 1 July 1947. In CMM File H–n2 is a PRNC “Map

of Former U.S. Naval Mine Warfare Station, Solomons, Maryland,

Showing Conditions on June 30, 1947,” which contains the notation, “Disestablished 1 Sept. 1947.” 20. Sources provide disparate dates for NOLTF establishment. Date in text is from “U.S. Naval Ordnance Laboratory Test Facility,

Solomons, Maryland, Command Inspection Briefing Conducted 27 March 1968,” 1, in CMM File H-n2 (hereafter “Command

Briefing”) and NOL Report, 16 (December 1959), 6–7. This date also appears in “NOLTF Solomons Checks into the ‘Why’ of

Ordnance,” in The Tester (9 September 1960), copy in CMM File

H-n2. Date of 2 May 1947 is cited in “Command Historical Report,

NOL, 1959,” 24, Operational Archives (hereafter “NOL Command

History”) and Navy Department, Admin Office, Pubs. Div., Navy

Department Bulletin: All Ships and Stations Letters, January-

June 1947 (Washington, DC: Navy Department Admin. Office, 1947), 90 (hereafter AS&SL). The Naval Shore Activity Summary in CMM File H-n2 gives the date as 27 May 1947. In all probability,

NOLTF Solomons was established 1 July 1947, pursuant to the

AS&SL notice. The other NOL field activities are listed in NOL … 1949, Annual Report (15 February 1950): 12, and Smaldone,

History of the White Oak Laboratory, 21. 21. “Command Briefing,” 1–2; “NOL Command History, 1959,” 24; USNOL Report 16 (December 1959): 6–7; Commander,

NOL to Chief, Bureau of Weapons, 25 February 1960, subj:

Naval Ordnance Laboratory Test Facility, Solomons, Maryland, additional operational areas rquired, in NAVFAC Basic Land File (2), NOLTF Solomons. 22. This section is based on the following materials in CMM File H–n2: AS&SL, January-June 1948, 34–35; “News Release, Solomons

Lab, May 10, 1948” (date handwritten); Washington Evening

Star, 12 January 1950; “Laboratory at Port Hueneme,” Military

Engineer, 42 (March-April 1950); Julie F. Streets, Office of the

Historian, NAVFAC, Naval Construction Battalion Center, Port

Hueneme, CA, to Ralph Eshelman, Director, CMM, 6 August 1974; SecNav to All Ships and Stations, 19 December 1949, subj:

U.S. Naval Civil Engineering Laboratory, Solomons, Maryland, redesignation of; Naval Shore Activity Summary, Annex—Family

Housing. See also Navy Department, Annual Report of the

Secretary of the Navy for FY 1948 (Washington, DC: GPO, 1948), 67, and “Command Briefing,” 1. 23. “Command Briefing,” 2; USNOL Report 16 (December 1959): 6–7. 24. “Command Briefing,” 1, 3; Transmittal and Acceptance of Military

Real Property (DD Form 1354) dated 24 March 1965, in NAVFAC

Basic Land File (2), NOLTF Solomons. 25. “Command Briefing,” 4, 5–7; “NOL Command History, 1966,” 2–4; “1967,” 2; and “1969,” 2; Oak Leaf, NOL installation newsletter (September 1972) 1, 4–5; On the Surface, installation newsletter of Dahlgren Division, Naval Surface Warfare Center, (21 July 1978): 1, 3; (3 November 1968): 1; (15 December 1978): 3; and (4 April 1980): 1; Smaldone, History of the White Oak

Laboratory,181; post-publication update by CMM staff. In the mid-1960s, the Navy completely revised its material organization, replacing the venerable (if not venerated) bureau system with

“systems commands.” Under this realignment, BuWeps was disestablished on 1 May 1966, to be replaced by Naval Air Systems

Command (NAVAIR) and the Naval Ordnance Systems Command (NAVORD). 26. “Metes and Bounds Description of a Parcel of Land to be

Transferred from the U.S. Navy, the Department of Defense, to the

U.S. Coast Guard, the Department of Commerce located at U.S.

Naval Ordnance Laboratory Test Facility, Solomons, Maryland” (undated), and 5th Coast Guard District, Civil Engineering,

“U.S. Coast Guard Station, Solomons, Maryland, Proposed,

Plat,” approved 17 March 1966, in Basic Land File (2), NOLTF,

Solomons, NAVFAC Chesapeake Div. The undated atlas Naval

District Washington Real Estate Maps, published by that office, contains a map of the Solomons reservation with a notation 6.3 acres were transferred to the Coast Guard on 29 May 1967, with a zone around Third Cove (“Area 2”) hatched to indicate the parcel. Chesapeake Division advised the author the map is an old one and has not been updated since 1967. None of the Navy or Coast

Guard offices contacted could clarify the proposed land transfer.

CDR Howard Tawney, Fifth Coast Guard District Planning officer opined in a 24 January 1985 conversation with the author the proposal was related to the need to replace the Piney Point Station.

That station was closed in 1977 and its function transferred to a new station at St. Inigoes in St. Mary’s County. 27. This section is based on the following materials in CMM File H–n2:

“Wecome to NRCS!”, Military Living (July 1977): 22; “Navyman’s

Paradise,” Salvo (December 1969): 5; Planning Associates,

Education and Recreation Consultants, Recreation and Camping

Activity, Naval District Washington, D.C. (West Hempstead, NY:

Planning Assocs, 6 May 1968). 28. From correspondence in NSWC Files, “Solomons, U–46,

Missions, Functions” (hereafter File U–46); “Relocation of

NOLTF, Solomons: Information on” (hereafter Relocation File); and “Solomons Facility—Relocation to NAS, Patuxent River,

Correspondence File” (hereafter Relocation Binder). 29. Smaldone, History of the White Oak Laboratory, vii, 120, 134, 156. 30. From correspondence in File U–46, Relocation File and Relocation

Binder. See esp. Commander, USNOL to OPNAV, 19 September 1969, subj: NOLTF Solomons, Maryland; information on, in

Relocation Binder. See also Oak Leaf (August 1975): 1, 3. 31. Commander, USNOL to OPNAV, 19 September 1969, subj:

NOLTF Solomons, Maryland; information on, in Relocation

Binder; Eugene E. Kluth, Underwater Systems Assessment Div.,

Field Support Br. (Code 445), NSWC, White Oak, 19 October 1984. 32. For fish kill research, see Maryland, Board of Natural Resources,

Dept. of Research and Education, Effects of Underwater

Explosions on Oysters, Crabs and Fish (Solomons Island, MD:

July 1948), Pub. No. 70; U.S., Dept. of the Interior, Fish and

Wildlife Service, Effects of Naval Ordnance Tests on the Patuxent

River Fishery (Washington, January 1955), Special Scientific

Report: Fisheries No. 143; USNOL, Explosive Tests of Underwater

Ordnance by the Naval Ordnance Laboratory in Maryland Tidal

Waters (White Oak, MD: 11 Feb. 1969), NOL TR 69–33; and Oak

Leaf (September 1973): 1, 4–5. The quote is from Commander,

USNOL to OPNAV, 19 September 1969, subj: NOLTF Solomons,

Maryland; information on, in Relocation Binder. Information on the moratorium is from Kluth, 19 October 1984, and NAVMAT

Instruction 8500.1, 12 October 1978, subj: Underwater Explosion

Testing in Navigable Waters of the Chesapeake Bay Region, and

On the Surface (1 August 1980): 4–5. 33. OPNAV to Chief of Naval Material, 13 April 1982, subj: Detachment disestablishment. Regarding accomplishments of facility divers, see Oak Leaf (May 1971): 3; (September 1971): 2; (March 1975): 4–5; (11 June 1976): 8; and On the Surface (12 May 1978): 2; and (1 August 1980): 4–5. 34. Post-publication information update by CMM staff.