Gatun Locks at the Panama Canal. This too was never carried through. In June, the super-subs were ordered to the Ulithi Atoll, where the American task force was assembling for the planned invasion of Japan. They then finally turned around and returned to the homeland in August after Japan’s surrender.
With an unheard-of 37,500-nautical-mile intercontinental cruise range, the Sen Toku were more than just another object of curiosity in the Axis arsenal of secret weapons. They were the largest submarines in the world. Their size and speed would be unmatched until modern-day nuclear submarines came onto the scene in the 1960s. With the advent of the atomic bomb, the US naval high command thought that the submarines could be used to launch ballistic missiles at sea. They wanted to see the submarines for themselves. It was up to Stevens and his men to bring them back to the US.
Paine was ordered to report to Commander J. M. McDowell as the executive officer on the I-400.5 Sailing a captured, classified submarine across the Pacific required a good amount of preparation. With no blueprints or instructions to work from, he had to be creative. He ordered the crew to salvage whatever parts and supplies they could scrounge from the remaining warehouses and caves around the shipyard. Since there was no plan to submerge the boat on the voyage back to the US, a lot of work was saved by not having to repair the snorkel and diving system. He made sure the sub was stocked with enough provisions for fourteen days. They had to first get to Guam. The boat would then be resupplied for the next leg of the voyage to the Marshall Islands, before the long voyage to Pearl Harbor. The men filled the cavernous hull with all sorts of war trophies: rifles, bayonets, Japanese uniforms, and even a seaworthy sampan. He kept a shiny, antique samurai sword for himself.
The trio of submarines (the I-14, I-400, and I-401) got underway for Guam on December 11, 1945. Paine managed to get out a quick telegram home before embarking: “CAPT G T PAINE USN 450 OCEAN AVE SEALBEACH CALIF MERRY CHRISTMAS EASTBOUND JAP SUB HOME SOON TOM USS EURYALE”6 They headed southeast out of Japan, slowly at first, to steer well clear of the unswept minefields west of Kyushu. They passed through the Tokara Gunto, a passage south of Kyushu that was often the scene of heavy combat. Upon reaching the open waters of the Pacific, it was full speed ahead.
Up in the conning tower, he no longer scoured the sea for enemy mastheads and periscopes. When he went to the bridge at twilight to get a star sighting, he stifled the urge to douse the running light. The pleasure of peacetime sailing began to sink in. He wrote in his journal in large letters: “WE OWNED THE SEA!”
Nearing Guam, McDowell was nervous about the keel clearance of the massive boat. A new pipeline had just been laid in the shallow channel of Agana Harbor that was not marked on the charts. But earlier in the war Paine had received his Second Class Deep Sea Diver certification there and knew the variances of the muddy terrain. McDowell handed the helm over to him. Twenty minutes later, the I-400 was in port.
After a brief layover for R and R, the squadron continued on. They took an easterly course to the Marshall Islands, two thousand miles away. Christmas Eve saw them carefully navigating the low-lying reefs around Eniwetok Atoll, the site of many future nuclear weapon tests. McDowell did what he could to keep morale up on the long journey home. He posted a poem in the control room that evening after dinner. Paine jotted down the words on a scrap piece of paper that he kept for the next forty-five years:
“Christmas at Sea, 1945”
A Merry Christmas, which I know
is better here than in Sasebo!
Next Christmas, and the ones to come,
I hope all hands will spend at home.
Let’s hope and pray that ne’er again
must we spend Christmas killing men.
That peace will reign beyond our time,
no guns compete with Christmas chimes.
Let’s offer thanks for where we are,
for Christmas time not spent at war,
and honor those who gave their lives,
while we head home toward our wives.
Commander J. M. McDowell, U.S. Navy
Commanding Officer USS Ex-HIJMS I-400
After refueling at Eniwetok, they embarked on the last leg of the journey to Hawaii. On January 6, 1946, they arrived at Oahu and entered Pearl Harbor. As they glided quietly by the sunken hull of the USS Arizona, the crew solemnly dipped the US and Japanese ensigns.
There was immediate curiosity about the colossal aircraft-carrying submarines. But the interest waned considerably after some initial investigation. The twin-hull design was unconventional and impressive, but the Americans did not find the Sen Toku nearly as advanced as they had thought when they first received word of them. Paine, however, was not ready to give up. He thought that the subs were a marvelous feat of maritime engineering. He prepared a highly detailed, classified briefing for his commanders and briefed anyone who would listen. He urged the Navy to refit the submarine so its diving and submerged performance could be evaluated. Paine relished the thought of taking her down and seeing how well she would perform at operational depth.
But after finishing their initial assessment, naval intelligence was no longer interested. After they got all the information they needed, the I-400 was towed out to sea and scuttled unceremoniously with four torpedoes. (The other two boats met the same fate.)7 The Cold War was now on the horizon, and the Navy knew that the Soviet Union would be just as curious about the Japanese secret weapon as the US had been. As far as the Americans were concerned, the wartime relics were best left at the bottom of the ocean.
On their long voyage home, Tom Paine had told McDowell that it would be his last submarine command. He had decided not to reenlist. He could have stayed in the Navy, however, and in fact, had a few different options available. After his fifth war patrol on the Pompon, he had applied for postgraduate studies in naval architecture at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey; he was selected as an alternate for the assignment. At the time, he wrote in his service résumé that, “I am interested in the regular Navy as a career.”8 On his discharge papers, McDowell recommended that Paine be promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Commander. While he would have been in line for his own command, he told McDowell that peacetime training would probably be a big letdown. McDowell understood; he did not disagree.9
Writing to his parents from Oahu while recovering from a reaction to his second cholera shot, Paine said that he was ready to come home. He wanted to go back to school and learn about all the new technologies that had come out of the war. “When I get back to the [S]tates, I’m going to decide, in a general way, the things I want to start at after the war. … It will probably involve more school, perhaps at Cal Tech? We’ll see.”10
In February, he sailed on the USS Boarfish (SS-327) from Pearl Harbor to San Diego. From there, he went home to Seal Beach. On March 24, 1946, Tom Paine was honorably discharged from active military service. During his two years in the Pacific, he had earned the Submarine Combat Insignia with Two Stars and a Pacific Fleet Commendation Ribbon with Combat Clasp for Performance in Action. For the next fifteen years, he remained on inactive duty and served in the Naval Submarine Reserve on the Scientific Reserve Units of San Francisco, Schenectady, and Boston. On December 1, 1961, Lieutenant Paine ended his seven years, two months, and twenty-two days of service in the United States Navy.11
Trained as a secretary, Barbara Helen Taunton Pearse had joined the Royal Australian Air Force when she was just eighteen. The future Mrs. Paine grew
