CAPTAIN ELI REICH

A good example of leadership, and how effective the boss can be, was the absence of profanity and pornography within the boat.  Most other boats that I chanced to see had the bulkheads covered with pictures of young women, nude and semi-nude. Profanity was the common language.

Eli Reich, our skipper and a Catholic, was the son of a New York City detective. He spoke in gentle tones, as a rule, and "gee whiz" was a strong expression.  He didn't approve of pornography or profanity and there was almost none in SEALION.  The exact device or mechanism he used to convey his ideas escapes me today, but it worked.

I recall an exception when he did swear a bit. We had picked up a Japanese task force on the radar out there in the darkness.  Protocol was to send a contact report back to Pearl Harbor before an attack on a major force so they would know what happened in case the boat was destroyed and to alert other forces to the presence of the Japanese ships.  As the communications officer, it was my job to write and send the message.  Radar only provided "pips" and we were not sure just what the ships out there were, but we knew they were big from the size of the pips.  One proved to be IJNS KONGO.  

I went down to the radio shack to write and called the Captain on the bridge and asked, "What shall I say we've got here, Captain?"  I shall never forget his reply. "God dammit, Shorty, send a contact report, not an affidavit!!" He was very busy on the bridge and in a high state of excitement at the prospect before him, the chance to sink some big men-o-war!  I forget exactly what my message said, but it must have sufficed.

On another occasion I used profanity in addressing him.  This simply WAS NOT DONE!  It was after midnight and we were on the surface in the Yellow Sea making three or four knots when my quartermaster, known as Colonel Thornton because of his heavy southern accent, called out a floating mine dead ahead.  He had excellent night vision and pretty soon I was able to pick up the mine in my binoculars.  It was too late to swing the boat to avoid it.  Ships don't respond immediately when you put the rudder over.  It looked as if it would go down the starboard side and it did.  Thornton and I watched breathlessly as it bobbed up and down very close aboard.  If one of those horns touched the hull we were all dead.

Eli had a speaker in his stateroom and could hear anything said on the bridge.  He was there in a flash in his blue pajamas.  By this time the mine was out of sight astern and Thornton and I and the lookouts were all breathing again.

Eli said, "How do you know it was a mine, Shorty?"  I looked him in the eye and said (approximately), "Oh, (expletive) Captain, IT WAS A MINE!!"  He turned away with a slight grin and asked no more questions.

He then proceeded to back us down and put a couple of riflemen on the stern to sink it if we could find it.  These mines contained 1200 pounds of TNT and had four glass horns containing acid which, when broken, set off a chain reaction ending in an explosion.  I was quite happy when we failed to sight it again.

Later, in the daytime, we found and sank many mines.  Most of the time the rifle bullets would pierce the air space and when it filled with water the mine would sink.  Once in a while, however, the rifleman would hit a horn and the mine would explode and frighten all hands below who could not see what was going on.  In one instance shrapnel from the spherical case rained down on us with no injuries.

The influence of the head man or woman in any enterprise is hard to over- estimate.  I saw it with Eli and I saw it many times in the corporate world.