WITH THE U-BOAT WAR IN SPATE BY 7 DECEMBER, 1941

     With the U-Boat war in spate by 7 December, 1941, Nazi submarines rampaged along the East Coast with almost total impunity.  Torpedo death came without warning and was everywhere; shipping losses mounted precipitously.  In January, some 270,000 tons of Allied merchant shipping were lost to the U-boats; next month the figure soared to 427,000 tons; and three months later it exceeded 600,000 tons, despite the best efforts of the United States Navy.
     The ordeal of our merchant service is ably described in the following excerpt by the prolific Felix Riesenberg, Jr., author of several books about the sea and a reporter for the now defunct San Francisco News at the conclusion of the war.

--S.E. Smith
The United States Navy in World War II