Inter-war period After
shakedown in the North Atlantic Ocean,
Perch became a unit of the
United States Pacific Fleet when she joined Submarine
Squadron 6 (SubRon 6) in November 1937. The following spring she was engaged in the annual
fleet problem and did some work on a
survey of the
Aleutian Islands, entering the
Bering Sea on 28 February. In the spring of 1939,
Perch operated with the fleet on its cruise to the
United States East Coast. In October 1939,
Perch departed San Diego, California, for
Manila where she became a
division flagship and made a summer cruise in 1940 to
Tsingtao and Shanghai. She spent the year preceding
World War II in operations around the
Philippines. A week before
Japan's
attack on Pearl Harbor,
Perch rendezvoused with two
transports off Shanghai and escorted the
4th Marine Regiment from China to the Philippines.
World War II At the outbreak of hostilities on 8 December 1941 (7 December in Hawaii on the other side of the
International Date Line),
Perch, commanded by
David A. Hurt, was in
Cavite Navy Yard. She took part in the rush to clear the navy yard on 10 December and watched, at close range, the destruction of
Cavite by Japanese
bombers. That night,
Perch slipped through the
Corregidor minefields and scouted between
Luzon and Formosa (now
Taiwan) in search of targets. Failing to detect any, she shifted to an area off Hong Kong, and on the evening of 25 December 1941 launched four
torpedoes at a large
merchant ship, all missing. A few days later, she torpedoed and sank the Japanese cargo ship . Japanese escorts prevented
Perch from observing the kill.
Perch proceeded south to
Darwin, Australia, to repair damage, making several unsuccessful attacks
en route. She next made a patrol to
Kendari, Celebes (now
Sulawesi), where she scouted the harbor and made several attempts to get through the narrow entrance to an attack position. After a week of close contact with the Japanese while obtaining information,
Perch headed south, searching for targets. In a night attack on a large merchant ship off the eastern coast of Celebes,
Perch was hit in the superstructure, forward of the
pressure hull of the
conning tower, by a
high-explosive round which blew away the
bridge deck, punctured the
antenna trunk and temporarily put her radio out of commission. Her crew made repairs on deck at night in waters heavily patrolled by the Japanese, and
Perch headed for the
Java Sea.
Final battle On the evening of 1 March 1942,
Perch surfaced northwest of
Surabaya,
Java, and started in for an attack on a Japanese
convoy landing troops to the west of Surabaya. However, before this could be done,
Perch just so happened to run into a pair of Japanese destroyers, the
Amatsukaze and
Hatsukaze. Spotters on
Amatsukaze located the submarine and fired off 32 5-inch (127 mm) shells, forcing
Perch to crash dive, and seemed to do so successfully, swerving into firing range for a potential kill, observing the enemy destroyers waiting for the right time to unleash the torpedoes, but upon a final inspection through the periscope, the destroyers were preparing a depth charge attack. Hoping to score a kill before the reverse happened,
Perch climbed to around 90 feet deep, but it was too late,
Amatsukaze and
Hatsukaze were right on top of her and together dropped 12 depth charges. The first patterned missed their mark, but a second pattern of four depth charges gouged
Perch and inflicted considerable damage. The entire pressure hull and a section of the conning tower were dented up to 2 feet (61 cm) inwards, likely damaging her hull beyond repair, and several ventilation valves were jammed shut, major leaking occurred through the ship's doors and gaskets, and around 90% of the ship's instruments and gauges were broken or destroyed.
Amatsukaze and
Hatsukaze assumed their target had perished and continued on, but
Perch had enough integrity to remain under water, surfacing after 2 hours in the early morning of the 2nd and began sailing for repairs. Upon surfacing, the crew discovered practically every window was shattered, both periscope tubes were flooded, and only half the main engines were operable.
Perch has survived her encounter, but still suffered critical damage, yet still continued in hopes of attacking Japanese ships. Because of this, two hours later just before sunrise,
Perch was spotted yet again by the Japanese destroyers
Ushio and
Sazanami, prompting the submarine to immediately dive to 200 feet, but it was too late.
Ushio and
Sazanami dropped a depth charge attack, and the damage inflicted to
Perch went from bad to worse.
Perch attempted to maneuver away, but her crew discovered the propulsion system to be completely inoperable as
Ushio and
Sazanami further depth charged their enemy.
Perch lay motionless underwater, and when sunrise broke,
Ushio and
Sazanami launched a final depth charge attack which caused the most critical damage of all before leaving the area, concluding they had sunk their target. ,
the deliverer of Perch's'' final moments
Perch was forced to surface, and if
Amatsukaze and
Hatsukaze had mortally wounded her,
Ushio and
Sazanami had left her bordering on the line of sinking. Upon resurfacing, seawater flooded the pressure hull, leaked in heat and humidity made the ship's interior unbearable, and the ship was completely dead in the water. Damage control efforts eventually got just one of her four engines up and running, limiting
Perch to just 5 knots. An attempt to dive was made, but it almost sank the ship then and there, and meaning the crew found out the hard way
Perch was completely incapable of underwater travel and resurfaced for the last time.
Wreck On 23 November 2006,
Thanksgiving Day in the United States, the wreck of
Perch was unexpectedly located by an international team of divers aboard MV
Empress while searching for the wreck of the British
heavy cruiser northwest of
Bawean Island in the Java Sea. The expedition had hoped to locate and photograph the wreck of
Exeter, sunk in the same area on 1 March 1942. The wreck of
Perch was illegally
salvaged sometime between 2006 and 2016 and no longer exists. Unlike the Dutch and British ships near her, which also were scavenged illegally,
Perch was not a
war grave, as she had been abandoned by her crew without fatalities. ==Awards==