Climb aboard the USS Silversides, a World War II submarine that sank 23 enemy vessels and earned 12 battle stars

Christmas Eve, 1942. The USS Silversides, a US Navy submarine, is surrounded by Japanese warships on a covert patrol in enemy-controlled waters. And George Platter’s appendix is about to burst.

Platter, a crew member on the USS Silversides, will die if he doesn’t get surgery immediately. When the commanding officer gives the order, crew members spring into action. They fashion surgical tools out of utensils from the galley. They find an ironing board to prop up Platter’s feet since the table in the wardroom is too short to lay him flat. They submerge beneath the waves to create more stability for the operation, even though the submarine’s batteries are only partially charged.

The pharmacist’s mate, Thomas Moore, has never performed the surgery before. He keeps a medical textbook open next to him the whole time.

Platter wakes up during the surgery when the local anesthetic wears off, so they sedate him with ether. It leaks into the rest of the submarine and sedates some of the crew, as well.

After four hours, against all odds, the surgery is successful. Platter makes a full recovery and is back on watch six days later.

It’s extraordinary stories like these that are preserved at the USS Silversides Submarine Museum in Muskegon, Michigan. Visitors can climb aboard the historic submarine, which was awarded 12 battle stars for its service in World War II, and explore its battle stations, cramped bunks, and even the operating table where Platter received his appendectomy.

Take a look inside the USS Silversides.

Commissioned in 1941, the USS Silversides sank 23 ships over its 14 war patrols, making it one of the most successful American submarines from World War II.

The Gato-class submarine measures 312 feet long and weighs 2,410 tons while submerged. Its standard crew consisted of eight officers and 72 enlisted men.

After it was decommissioned in 1946, the USS Silversides was used as a teaching submarine and became a National Historic Landmark.

From 1947 to 1969, the USS Silversides was used as a training vessel for the Ninth Naval District in Chicago. It was then moved to the Naval Armory and Navy Pier before arriving in Muskegon to serve as a museum in 1987.

It was also used as a movie set for the 2002 film “Below.”

The submarine is now the star attraction at the USS Silversides Museum in Muskegon, Michigan.

The USS Silversides Submarine Museum is open seven days a week from April through December and operates Thursday through Monday in the winter months of January, February, and March.

An all-inclusive ticket to the museum costs $17.50 for adults, $15 for veterans, and is free of charge for active-duty service members. Tickets can be purchased on the museum’s website.

Like the USS Cobia in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, the museum also offers visitors the chance to spend a night on the submarine.

The USS Silversides is docked outside the museum in the Muskegon Lake Channel, which leads into Lake Michigan.

The Lake Express ferry passes by the USS Silversides Submarine Museum on its route between Muskegon and Milwaukee. As I began my tour of the submarine, the ferry honked its horn as passengers waved at me from the upper deck.

The deck featured weapons such as a 4-inch, 50-caliber deck gun, a 40-millimeter antiaircraft gun, and a 20-millimeter surface-to-surface gun.

The 40-millimeter antiaircraft gun had the longest range, capable of shooting targets up to 22,800 feet away.

A plaque on the deck memorialized crew member Mike Harbin, who was killed by enemy fire while manning the deck gun.

Harbin was 19 years old when he was shot in battle on May 10, 1942. He was buried at sea.

The torpedo loading ramp was made of a wood called lignum vitae, which gets slippery when wet.

Lignum vitae is Latin for “wood of life.”

The rest of the deck was made of teak wood, which is impervious to water, fire, and termites. It also doesn’t float, which was crucial to maintain the submarine’s covert operations if a piece broke off.

Decals on the side of the submarine indicated its many wartime accomplishments.

The USS Silversides featured stickers showing that it sank 30 ships, but that number has since been amended to 23, Bethann Egan, the museum’s executive director, told BI.

The USS Silversides also damaged 14 ships, cleared 16 enemy mines, and rescued two American paratroopers.

The first stop on my tour was the forward torpedo room, where crew members loaded torpedoes into the six torpedo tubes.

The room slept 16 crew members on bunks that unfolded alongside the torpedoes, which measured 22 feet long and weighed 3,000 pounds.

Lockers located above the bunks were used to store personal possessions.

All of a crew member’s personal items had to fit into one small locker.

Colored lights were used to help crew members’ eyes adjust to the dark to prevent night blindness.

If the submarine was too bright inside, crew members wouldn’t be able to see in the dark if they went up onto the deck at night during an attack.

The lights used to be blue and then switched to red, which is why the light fixture said “blue” on it even though the light bulb was red.

The shower and bathroom in the forward torpedo room were used by the officers, whose bunks were located down the hall.

Flushing the toilet on the USS Silversides was a 12-step process. One wrong move would cause the toilet’s contents to shoot back out.

Meals were plated and reheated in the officers’ pantry.

Officers ate the same meals as the rest of the crew, but dined in the privacy of the ward room instead of the crew’s mess.

The pantry also stocked snacks and coffee.

The table on display in the wardroom was the original table where George Platter’s successful appendectomy took place in 1942.

“The pharmacist’s mate who actually performed it did not technically have permission from all the way up, but the commander made the decision that this needed to happen or else the sailor was going to die,” Egan said. “So he stood up for him and made sure that he was not court-martialed after.”

The wardroom also served as the officers’ dining room and lounge.

The higher an officer’s rank, the fewer people he had to share a room with.

Junior and senior officers served as administrators on the submarine, while the executive officer, known as the “XO,” was second-in-command to the commanding officer.

Officers’ quarters included fold-out desks and sinks.

The rooms also came with storage areas where they could hang their uniforms.

The commanding officer enjoyed the only private room on the submarine.

His stateroom featured a depth gauge and a compass above the bed so that he could tell how deep the submarine was and which way it was facing at all times.

Chief petty officers slept in a room nicknamed the “goat locker.”

According to the Naval History and Heritage Command, the nickname dates back to the 1890s, when chief petty officers took care of the goats kept on ships for fresh milk.

Another explanation is that chief petty officers served in the Navy for over a decade to reach their positions and were known as “old goats.”

In the yeoman’s shack, the yeoman handled the submarine’s paperwork.

In addition to managing personnel records, the yeoman also kept logs of the submarine’s changes in direction, speed, and depth.

In the control room, crew members managed the USS Silversides’ vital functions with numerous technical instruments.

The bow and stern plane wheels pictured above controlled the submarine’s depth and angle.

The commanding officer would give commands like “Two degrees right rudder,” which the crew would repeat and execute.

The ship’s inclinometer worked like a carpenter’s level to show if the submarine was tilting to one side or the other.

Keith Gill, the museum’s director of curatorial services, told BI that staff members use this inclinometer “every day” to check on the submarine.

“It’s almost never centered, and that’s because we have some leaks in some tanks that we’re monitoring and adjusting air pressure to keep water out,” Gill said.

The hull opening indicator light panel was known as the “Christmas tree” for its red and green lights.

A green light indicated that a vent or hatch was closed, while red meant it was open. The submarine could only submerge when the board was fully lit up in green.

The helmsman’s wheel steered the submarine.

On some World War II submarines, such as the USS Becuna, the main helm was located in the conning tower above the control room. On the USS Silversides, the main helm was in the control room itself.

The control room also housed the compressed air manifold and trim manifold.

The compressed air manifold distributed compressed air throughout the submarine, which was used to start the engines, fire torpedoes, and surface the vessel.

The trim manifold showed how much weight was located in different tanks on the submarine and moved water between them to maintain the ship’s balance as it used up fuel or fired weapons.

In the radio room, crew members could communicate with vessels up to 12,000 miles away.

Most communications happened in code.

Cooks prepared all of the crew’s meals in the galley.

Cooks were also trained to operate the deck guns and perform other technical tasks around the submarine.

Gill noted that during World War II, Black crew members were often relegated to roles in the kitchen and were not allowed to advance beyond serving as stewards due to the Navy’s segregation policies.

“One of the negative sides of our past is how we treated African-American citizens,” he said. “They were in the military, but they were segregated somewhat. On a Navy ship, on a sub, you really can’t segregate, but you can control what they’re doing.”

The kitchen featured a piece of equipment I’d never seen on a submarine before: a soft-serve ice cream machine.

The kitchen also included a deep fryer.

Crew members ate meals in three shifts in the crew’s mess.

Submarines were known for doing some of the most dangerous work and having some of the most difficult living conditions in the military, but they made up for it by ensuring sailors received the best food.

Submariners also received hazard pay, the highest in the Navy.

The enlisted men also slept in shifts in the crew’s quarters.

Newer crew members slept on the bottom bunks, which could also occasionally be used as food storage early on in a patrol.

“Supposedly, they called this the honeymoon suite on top,” Egan said. “I don’t know if that’s 100% accurate.”

The mattresses in the two middle bunks were placed so close together that they essentially functioned as one bed.

Regular crew members only showered every 13 to 15 days in the crew’s washroom.

Officers showered every three to five days, while the cooks showered every day since they were handling food.

The forward and after engine rooms each contained two 1,600-horsepower diesel engines manufactured by Fairbanks and Morse.

At top speed, the USS Silversides could travel at 21 knots, or about 24 miles per hour.

The forward engine room also contained two evaporators that distilled ocean water into fresh water.

The engines are still operational.

The USS Silversides’ insignia was painted on one of the after engines.

The logo depicts a silverside fish smoking a cigar and holding a torpedo.

The maneuvering room was manned by two electricians who controlled the propulsion of the submarine.

At full power, the USS Silversides used 4 million watts of electricity.

The last stop on the tour was the after torpedo room in the back of the submarine.

The after torpedo room was smaller than the forward torpedo room, with four torpedo tubes and room for eight torpedoes.

The room displayed a real demilitarized Mark 18 electric torpedo.

Electric torpedoes like the Mark 18 didn’t leave a wake, or trail of waves, behind them, making them more difficult to detect.

After I finished my tour of the submarine, I visited the museum itself, which featured photos and artifacts from World War II and beyond.

I particularly enjoyed an exhibit about the appendectomy that took place in the wardroom featuring photos from the procedure.

Preserving the aging submarine is no small task, but the USS Silversides remains a fascinating testament to the dedication of American service members in World War II.

After running its engines in an annual Memorial Day tribute, the museum hopes to give the USS Silversides its first oil change since the 1950s this summer. Eventually, the entire vessel will have to be removed from the water and dry-docked due to leaks in its tanks.

The museum applied for federal funding through the Save America’s Treasures grant program, but Egan said they may not end up receiving it due to sweeping cuts made by the Department of Government Efficiency.

“They have not officially cut that funding source yet, but it’s not looking good,” Egan said.

When the submarine was on active duty, the entire 80-person crew worked tirelessly to maintain the ship, and the Navy financed all necessary repairs and upgrades. The USS Silversides Submarine Museum’s preservation efforts, however, are privately funded and largely volunteer-driven.

“We’re just poor museum people who are trying to honor the commitment that these guys made over 14 war patrols to protect our country,” Gill said.

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