Captain 'Sam' Porter; submarine commander (GREAT)
Hyfler/Rosner
Captain 'Sam' Porter
(Filed: 16/06/2004) Telegraph
Captain 'Sam' Porter, who has died aged 88, went through
harrowing attacks in two submarines, reminding himself that
a fortune-teller had assured him he would live into old age.
On his first patrol in command of Tribune in 1942, Porter
was bombed by a Ju-88 bomber diving out of the sun: as he
crash-dived, a stick of bombs shook the boat so heavily that
it upset the cook preparing Christmas lunch; but an hour
later, he judged it safe to surface again and finish eating
his pudding.
Porter's first attempt to land secret agents on Corsica,
early the following year, had to be abandoned because of
rough weather. When he approached again a few days later,
Lava Bay was lit by a powerful searchlight. Undeterred,
Porter surveyed a third landing site by periscope and found
a beach which, although close to a village, was sheltered
from the north-westerly winds.
While the agents took their equipment, including folding
bicycles, on to Tribune's casing as it silently glided
across the bay, a bell on one bicycle rang out. The noise
sounded like Big Ben, Porter recalled, but there was no
alarm from the shore and he completed his mission.
He finished this patrol sinking a 7,000-ton merchant ship in
the Gulf of Genoa, with a salvo of four torpedoes which all
hit their target. However, there was an immediate aerial
counter-attack when Porter was conscious that Tribune was
visible against the sandy bottom, though he was saved by
worsening weather disturbing the sea's surface.
On a later patrol off Sicily, a red streak of lava running
down Stromboli provided a navigation beacon, enabling him to
penetrate a screen of destroyers and aircraft to sink a
6,000-ton merchantman. The counter-attack was prompt and
accurate: depth charges in patterns of three and five rained
down around Tribune, causing the stern glands (where the
shafts pass through the hull) to leak so that the submarine
plunged stern first to 450 ft, just above the crushing
depth. Porter blew all his high pressure air to keep Tribune
in trim, and crept away after counting more than 90 depth
charges. The boat was too badly damaged for further patrols;
he was awarded the DSC.
The son of a general practitioner, Stewart Armstrong Porter,
known as Sam, was born at Surbiton on November 1 1915. He
went to Clifton before joining the cadet training ship
Frobisher.
He spent his midshipman's time in the battleship Nelson and,
at the fleet review for King George V's silver jubilee in
1935, he sailed round the fleet with a crew of 24 in a
quarter-size model of Nelson's Victory. However, the
"dressing up and bands and protocol of life in big ships"
did not attract him, whereas the danger money for serving in
submarines did.
Porter joined Medway, depot ship of the 8th Submarine
Flotilla in 1938. Eventually he became navigating officer of
the overseas patrol submarine Rover, based in Hong Kong.
There, during the phoney war, he indulged his passion for
motor racing in a hired MG, while listening to news of the
fall of France.
After transferring to the Mediterranean, Rover was attacked
by a destroyer while firing a salvo of torpedoes at a
steamer off Tobruk in January 1941. A torpedo exploded
prematurely; the lights went out; the main battery caught
fire; water and smoke poured into the control room. As Rover
hit the bottom at 180 ft and water lapped around his ankles,
Porter remembered an Egyptian fortune-teller at Port Said
reading his palm and telling him that he would live to old
age.
Rover was sent for repairs to Malta where, after several
weeks' bombing, Porter was glad to be sent on patrol again.
In April 1941 the boat was ordered alongside the cruiser
York, which had been damaged and beached in Suda Bay, Crete,
in order to provide her with power from the submarine's
diesel engines. Rover stayed alongside for three weeks.
Porter counted 66 air-raids, during which he admired the
enemy pilots who pressed home their attacks so low that he
could make eye contact and return gloved salutes. In one
raid he had taken off his tin helmet when a bomb splinter
tore through it.
Rover was badly damaged in these raids with a hole in her
ballast tanks, which "one could drive a baby Austin
through". As second-in-command, Porter evacuated all but 10
of the crew to a tug and organised a tow by the destroyer
Griffin to Alexandria; it was sent back to Singapore for
repairs but never saw service again.
Porter passed the "perisher" course for submarine commanding
officers in 1942, and briefly commanded the training
submarine H44, then was sent to the United States to bring
back the lend-lease submarine S29, renamed P556.
While based in Algiers in Tribune, Porter had made friends
with several SOE officers and noted some visiting First Aid
Nursing Yeomanry, who "looked a bit classier than the usual
WRNS cipher officers". On the spur of the moment he offered
to show them round Tribune and, five days later, proposed to
one, Pamela Nash. When SOE mounted Operation Union in
October 1943, Pamela Nash was sent to deliver dispatches
from North Africa to the head of the French Section in Baker
Street, and to marry Porter.
The following July he was passing through the Mediterranean
in command of the submarine Tudor when SOE mounted Operation
Sampam, and his wife flew from Algiers to Gibraltar in a
USAAF bomber called Shady Lady for a two-day honeymoon at
the Rock Hotel. They did not see each other again until
October 1945.
When Tudor reached the East Indies there were few surface
targets, but Porter was mentioned in dispatches for his part
in several special operations. He finished the war on patrol
in the Lombok Straits a few miles from where he had heard of
the outbreak of war six years before. Porter reckoned that
80 per cent of those with whom he started the war were dead.
On returning to general service, Porter commanded the
frigate Opossum from 1954 to 1956 and made an official visit
to Phnom Penh, navigating the Mekong River, aided by a
French pilot, using charts dated 1870.
Next, he was Captain 2nd Squadron in the depot ship
Maidstone. While hosting the Queen at lunch the
Commander-in-Chief noticed the Royal Yacht making smoke, and
told Porter to tell her to stop. "Don't you dare!" ordered
the Queen.
Porter, who seemed destined for flag rank, retired at 43 to
see more of his family. He became a director of Staines
Linoleum, and took up oil painting. Though self-taught, five
of his pictures were accepted for the Royal Academy Summer
Exhibition; in all, he sold several hundred pictures.
Sam Porter is survived by Pamela "Jackie" Nash, who was
awarded the Medaille de la Reconnaissance for her work in
SOE, and their two children.