KOSEKI UMPANSEN
(DAIGO MARU)
DAIGO MARU:
Tabular Record of Movement
© 2011 Bob Hackett
E 1943:
Innoshima. Laid down at Hitachi Zosen K.K. as a 5,244-ton Type 1K
Standard Merchant ore carrier for Osaka Shosen K. K., Osaka.
1944:
Launched and named DAIGO MARU.
March 1944:
Completed.
4 January 1945:
DAIGO MARU departs Wakamatsu, Kyushu unescorted and
heads south for Pukow, China. She carries a cargo of railway sleeper cars.
7 January 1945:
Yellow Sea, off the coast of Korea. At 2325, radar aboard LtCdr (later Captain) Marion R. de Arellano’s (USNA '35) USS BALAO (SS-285) picks up a large, unescorted, target at 17,000 yards. 8 January 1945:
At 0113, BALAO fires her six bow torpedoes at the target and gets three hits, but the target does not sink. Between 0131-0132,
de Arellano fires two more bow torpedoes and gets another hit, but still the target, although dead in the water, does not sink. BALAO circles around the target. At 0143, de Arellano fires another bow torpedo, but misses.
BALAO circles around the target again, and at 0153, de Arellano’ fires all four of his stern torpedoes and gets two hits. The target, by now hit by six torpedoes, still does not sink. BALAO pulls away to the NW and observes the target.
At 0222, the target is observed from 10,000 yards to be making six knots. De Arellano heads BALAO directly for her. At 0308, he fires a bow torpedo, but it misses. At 0311, he fires yet another bow torpedo, and misses again.
Finally, at 0314, de Arellano fires a bow torpedo that hits DAIGO MARU
under the bridge. She sinks in frigid waters at 34-37N, 122-12E.
Forty-nine crewmen and gunners take to the boats and survive the sinking.
They drift for four days. All but 16 die of exposure. When the survivors land on
a Chinese Beach, some 300 Communist soldiers are waiting. All the Japanese, save
one, kill themselves to avoid capture.
Author's Note:
Photo credit goes to Gilbert Casse of France.
- Bob Hackett
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