Josh B. Posted January 26, 2019 Share #1 Posted January 26, 2019 All, Ever wondered how scarce a submarine-qualified, WWII-era enlisted man's uniform is by rating? Since I took the time to look, I figured I might as well share what I've found. Using the USS Dentuda muster roll dated 3/1/44 as a representative example of a submarine on a mid-late war patrol, here's the breakdown from among 70 total enlisted aboard: (yes, other subs/ patrols won't give identical numbers, but the trends will be similar): Radio (4 total) 1 CRM, 2 RM2/c, 1 RT2/c Electrician (11 total) 1 CEM, 2 EM1/c, 2 EM2/c, rest EM3/c Quartermaster (3 total) 3 QM3/c Torpedo (11 total) 1 CTM, 1 TM1/c, 4 TM2/c, rest TM3/c Gunner (2 total) 2 GM3/c Motor Machinists (19 total) 3 CMoMM, 6 MoMM1/c, 7 MoMM2/c, rest MoMM3/c Fire Control (1 total) FCS3/c Commissary (4 total, 2 Officer service, 2 enlisted service) 1 StM1/c 1 CK2/c 2 SC2/c Sound (2 total) CSM, SM2/c Pharmacist (1 total) CPhM Yeoman (1 total) Y3/c Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RustyCanteen Posted January 26, 2019 Share #2 Posted January 26, 2019 When you get down to it, a submarine (especially in those days) was literally just propulsion and weapons. When you consider that the subs relied on a large bank of batteries in addition to that, it makes sense for the main compliment to consist of people who worked in those three ratings; MM/MoMM/EM/TM. Now the bigger surface vessels, could really have a lot of MM/MoMM/EM/GM aboard, especially in the earlier years before they switched to oil fired boilers and you had a ton of non rated Firemen, etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh B. Posted January 26, 2019 Author Share #3 Posted January 26, 2019 Whoops Russ, your comment reminded me to add in all of the non-rated guys into the headcount. Glad you mentioned it, my apologies. For this patrol, unrated group: Unrated (striking not noted in this particular roll, 11 total): 7 F1/c 3 S1/c 1 S2/c Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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