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The U.S. Coast Guard cutter McLane sank a Japanese submarine during World War II off the west coast of Prince of Wales Island in July 1942.

The 125-foot cutter McLane transferred to the 17th Naval District in Alaska in late 1941 where she performed patrol duty in Chatham Strait. After repairs in Seattle, on June 7, 1942, she returned to patrol Dixon Entrance between Cape Chacon and Barren Island. One day the captain received a report that a submarine was in Hidden Inlet in Portland Canal. The McLane and other U.S. and Canadian vessels searched the area, but neither saw nor heard a sub.

The McLane spent the next week patrolling in the vicinity of Forrester Island and Cape Muzon off Dall Island on the West Coast.

Action began July 7, 1942, when a Royal Canadian Air Force plane spotted a Japanese submarine lurking off the West Coast. The plane dropped a depth charge that damaged the sub. Her skipper reportedly headed for refuge among the bays and inlets. The site of this action is given by the U.S. Coast Guard as 55 degrees, 10 minutes north, 134 degrees, 41 degrees west. The closest Frank and I could determine is that the action took place about 25 miles in the ocean west of the middle of Baker Island.

Bad weather slowed the search the next day. Then on July 9, a passing fisherman reported to the USCG headquarters in Ketchikan that he spotted the sub. The McLane was dispatched to the scene as well as the USS YP-251, the converted 110-foot halibut schooner Foremost. This was one of the tenders and schooners requisitioned by the Navy to patrol Southeast Alaska during the war. Navy or Coast Guard crews manned these boats.

The two vessels searched a grid of up to six miles each side of these bearings with an elaborate plan to circle the Japanese sub and listen for its noisy engines.

Soon the crew of the McLane picked up the sound of the sub's engines, and dropped depth charges to explode at 250 feet and 150 feet. Three minutes later more charges were set at 200 and 300 feet about 200 yards from the first contact. Eleven minutes later numerous air bubbles were sighted in the vicinity of these depth charges. Commanders of the two vessels knew they had to keep the sub below the surface because they would not battle it with their light armament. The McLane carried nothing heavier than three-inch guns and only two racks of depth charges.

As the two boats were maneuvering for another attack, the Japanese skipper fired a torpedo at the McLane at close range. The commanding officer was standing in the bow and saw the torpedo coming, recognizing the yellow head and green body and hearing it hiss. It left a feather of 125 feet as it came toward the cutter. The vessel moved astern, and the excited crewmembers watched the warhead speed by within two feet of the cutter's bow.

Then the McLane cruised full speed ahead in the direction from which the torpedo came, and the Foremost dropped one depth charge. About an hour later as the Foremost swept a pattern, she dropped a smoke bomb over the sub's position about a mile north of the cutter. Two more charges at 100 and 200 feet were dropped in this area. A large oil slick came on the water.

The Foremost sighted a periscope soon after that and dropped a depth charge. She turned right and about one-third around appeared to bump over some object as if going over a sand bar. Later it was reported the Foremost lost part of her keel when she rammed the sub. Two more charges were set. There were no contacts after that, only oil on the water and bubbles. The McLane stayed in the area until the next day with no sign of the submarine.

The Coast Guard speculated that the sunken sub was the one that had been bombed the previous night by the Royal Canadian Air Force stationed at Annette Island. The sub was probably damaged at that time and attempting to reach a safe harbor, then seen by a fishing vessel, who reported it.

On one USCG website there is a theory of why the sub did not leave the area for 30 hours. One marine chart shows a 52-fathom spot ten miles northwest of the position where the submarine was first bombed by the airplane. A larger chart discloses no such shallow spot. The theorist suggests the sub was using the old chart and looked for the shallow spot to sit on the bottom with its engines shut down to prevent detection.

Soon after the attack, the Coast Guard District Officer gave the McLane credit for sinking the submarine. The Joint Army-Navy Assessment Committee in its report also credited Allied "Surface Craft" and "Aircraft" with the sinking.

The Japanese submarine was confirmed after the war to be the RO-32. However, the U.S. Navy determined in 1967 that the RO-32 was still afloat at the end of the war. Additionally the Japanese reported that they had lost no vessels in that area during the time of the attack reported by the McLane, Foremost, and the Royal Canadian Air Force aircraft.

Nevertheless, official credit for the sinking still stands, and the McLane's commanding officer Lt. Ralph Burns, USCG, was awarded the Legion of Merit. Lt. Nils Thomsen of the Foremost also received the same award.

We've seen movies about submarine chases and how sub captains fool surface vessels by dumping oil and air. Was a sub really sunk? Will it ever be possible or does anyone care, with continuing new technology, to examine the site of the supposed sinking? What would be found?

Pat Roppel, a 50-year resident of Southeast Alaska, is the author of numerous books about mining, fishing, and man's use of the land. She lives in Wrangell. She may be reached at patroppel@gmail.com.