Phil Riddle, Democrat Editor
Weatherford Democrat
WEATHERFORD —
Jerald Clovis Taylor was just 23 years old in 1944, when the submarine on which he was serving was sunk in the South China Sea after hitting a mine during World War II.
The sub was recently located by a documentary film company and officials are looking for descendants of service men on the craft, including Taylor, who had ties to Weatherford.
According to a Feb. 1 release from the U.S. Navy’s Pacific Fleet Public Affairs Office, the submarine USS Flier was found in the Balabac Strait area of the Phillipines.
“We hope this announcement will provide some closure to the families of the 78 crewmen lost when the Flier struck a mine in 1944,” said Rear Adm. Douglas McAneny, commander Submarine Forces Pacific Fleet.
The Flier had a colorful history, even though it was in service less than a year.
According to the Navy, the submarine, built at Groton, Conn., was commissioned in mid-October 1943. She departed from Pearl Harbor for her first war patrol in January 1944. While entering the harbor at Midway Island during a storm, she went aground and was seriously damaged and was towed back to Pearl Harbor, and finally reached Mare Island Navy Yard in California, where she was repaired.
The Flier made another start on her first war patrol in May 1944, heading from Pearl Harbor to the waters off Luzon. While en route on June 4, she attacked and sank the transport Hakusan Maru. Later that month, the sub attacked a Japanese convoy off Subic Bay, receiving a depth charging in return, and on June 22-23, hit another convoy off Mindoro, apparently damaging one or more ships.
In early August 1944, the Flier left Fremantle, Australia, for her second war patrol. While sailing shallow water to enter the South China Sea, she struck a mine and quickly sank. Fourteen of 86 crewmen escaped, but only eight survived the subsequent long swim to reach shore. After making their way by raft to Palawan and being protected by local people and a group of guerrillas, survivors were evacuated by the submarine USS Redfin (SS-272).
“The last surviving crew member of the Flier, Ensign Al Jacobson, never gave up the search for his lost shipmates,” the Navy reported.
Sadly, Jacobson passed away in 2008, but his family was determined to continue the search. The family provided notes and research to the production company YAP Films, which investigates nautical mysteries, and Jacobson’s son, Steve, and grandson, Nelson, participated in the search.
“After my father retired, he became very active in the quest to understand more of what happened,” Steve Jacobson said. “He put together as much information as he could from naval records of the investigation and put together charts of where he believed the Flier was. We provided YAP Films with everything my father had collected.”
In the spring of 2009, with the aid of the Jacobson family, the team from YAP Films located wreckage of a submarine in the area that USS Flier was lost. Father and son divers Mike and Warren Fletcher of the television show “Dive Detectives” captured the first views of the sunken submarine in more than 64 years and provided the Naval History and Heritage Command with footage taken in the Balabac Strait to aid in the identification.
“The Flier discovery presented the Dive Detectives with one of our most challenging dives,” Warren Fletcher said. “At a depth of 330 feet there is little margin for error. As my father and I descended into the dark blue water, the unmistakable shape of a Gato-class submarine came into view. That moment made all of the hard work and danger pale in comparison with the feeling of pride it gave me to know that the Flier and her crew will not be forgotten.”
The Navy reports by the end of World War II, submarines had made more than 1,600 war patrols. Pacific Fleet submarines like the Flier accounted for more than half of all enemy shipping sunk during the war. The cost of this success was heavy: 52 U.S. Pacific Fleet submarines were lost, and more than 3,500 submariners remain on “eternal patrol.”
According to Mary Bentz of Washington, D.C., part of a search team looking for anyone who might have known Taylor.
“Jerald Clovis Taylor had 11 siblings,” Bentz said, “and we believe they lived in the Weatherford, Odessa and Fort Worth areas.”
The fallen sailor was born in Electra, Texas, and apparently had several siblings who lived in Parker County. A brother, Robert Lafayette Taylor, lived in the area and died here in 1979. Records do not list a married name, but Taylor’s sister, Ovella Iona, died in Weatherford in 1993. Another Sister, Mary Atta Cain lived here at the time of her death in 1995.
Bentz’ research shows Taylor’s parents, John Gilbert Taylor and Beulah Besse Lee Rodgers, lived in Odessa. His father died in 1955 and his mother in 1986.
“Anyone who remembers Jerald Taylor, his parents, family or friends, please contact me at ca.par@hotmail.com or (301) 897-3779,” Bentz said.
