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Naval History and Heritage Command

Naval History and Heritage Command

Diary of Commander Joseph K. Taussig, Commander, U.S. Destroyer Little

Thursday

June 27.

[Brest, France]

     The convoy arrived safely at one pm.1 Tied up to No 14 buoy. After lunch & bath, went ashore to report my return. Met Capts. Pollock and Hasbrouck – Comdrs. Owens and Hannigan –2 Found my next sailing date was to be am. July 1st- The Great Northern (Preston) and Northern Pacific (Phelps)3 are in port and will sail this evening although they only arrived yesterday. The Sigourney and three other destroyers brought them in and will take them out again.

     The troops have been coming in very fast. A large convoy arrived just before we did on June 9th. I do not know how many troops were in it – But the two convoys that the Little has escorted since then had a total of 50,000 troops – the Leviathan 12000, the Amerika, Mount Vernon, Agamemnon, and Orizaba 18000, and the Great Northern and Northern Pacific 5500- That means 85500 troops here and St Nazaire between June 18 and June 27 – or over 10000 a day- But this is abnormal – the usual rate at present averaging about 6000 a day. If kept up this would mean over 2,000,000 men in a year. One letter received from Lulie – and one from mother.4

Source Note: D, RNW, Joseph K. Taussig Papers, Mss. Coll. 97.

Footnote 1: On the make-up of this convoy, see: Taussig diary entry of 22 June 1918.

Footnote 2: These were: Capt. Edwin T. Pollock, commander of the troop transport George Washington; Capt. Raymond D. Hasbrouck, commander of the troop transport Covington; Cmdr. John J. Hannigan, commander of the troop transport Rijndam; and Cmdr. Charles T. Owens, commander of the troop transport Princess Matoika.

Footnote 3: Troop transports Great Northern, Capt. William W. Phelps, and Northern Pacific, Capt. Charles F. Preston. Obviously, Taussig reversed captain and transport.

Footnote 4: Taussig’s wife, Lulie Johnston Taussig, and mother, Ellen Kneffler Taussig.