H.M.S. Seraph

H.M.S. Seraph had a uniquely distinguished record, and many of her most fascinating exploits involved Americans. She is remembered for her role in the secret entry into North Africa of Gen. Mark W. Clark, when he headed a spy team that made a clandestine rendezvous with Free French leaders there in the critical days of 1942 immediately before Allied landings on the North African coast. During the same year, the submarine also accomplished another secret mission that mystified the German enemy by permitting French Gen. Henri H. Giraud to elude the Germans surrounding him in Southern France and escape to aid the Allied cause. Because Giraud was at odds with the British, he insisted on escaping only on an American submarine, and since no such vessel was then in the Mediterranean, an American naval officer was placed in technical command of Seraph. For a time she had two captains and operated under two flags, the American and Royal Navy ensigns, in an unusual co-operation between two nations. Among Seraph's many other historic missions was a gigantic ruse that saved thousands of Allied soldiers' lives in World War II.

Charleston, South Carolina · United States