Navy had a presence on Ocracoke during World War II

Ocracoke Island, N.C., played a vital role in defending the United States from attack by German U-boats during World War II…in more ways than one.

In May 1942, the Navy activated an antisubmarine defense system that included the installation of a minefield in the Atlantic Ocean between Hatteras and Ocracoke.

Some 2,650 mines were anchored in place along a 35-mile semicircular pattern. Each mine was positioned a few feet below the ocean surface. An explosive charge of 300 pounds of TNT would be triggered when the mine was bumped by an intruding vessel.

Author Kevin Duffus said: “The problem was: a mine did not know the difference between an enemy U-boat or an Allied vessel.”

On June 11, 1942, the Standard Oil tanker F.W. Abrams, carrying 90,000 barrels of crude oil from Aruba to New York City, lost contact with its Coast Guard pilot boat while departing from the protected anchorage area in poor visibility and struck a mine, Duffus said.

The ship’s captain thought that he had been torpedoed. He dropped anchor but the ship began to drift in the heavy rain and fog. In less than an hour, two more explosions rocked the ship, finally sinking it.”

Fortunately, all 36 men aboard survived, having rowed lifeboats 10 miles to shore at Ocracoke.

“Two months later, the Hatteras-Ocracoke minefield sank two more Allied vessels and damaged another,” Duffus said.

To complement the minefield, a Navy net tender arrived from Norfolk, Va., in the summer of 1942 to lay at least two underwater magnetic indicator loops of cable on the ocean floor beneath the approaches to the entrance of the protected anchorage. 

The device was designed to detect the magnetic field of a vessel, either on the surface or submerged, when it crossed over the indicator loops.

On shore, the Navy built a well-guarded complex at Ocracoke surrounded by a barbed wire fence. It contained eight structures including odd-looking radar and sonar towers with high-frequency radio listening capacities. The Navy referred to the installation as a “Loop Receiving Station.” 

Locals called it “Loop Shack Hill.”

Also in the summer of 1942, the Navy began construction of the Ocracoke Section Navy Base. This included dredging the shallow village harbor, known as the Creek and now as Silver Lake, and the installation of three piers to accommodate Navy and Coast Guard patrol boats.

The compound included three power plants, a 30-bed hospital, barracks, commissary, support facilities and an administrative building. The base was commissioned Oct. 9, 1942. As many as 500 sailors and other Navy personnel were stationed at Ocracoke during World War II.

In December 1943, the Ocracoke base was converted to a top-secret, advanced amphibious training site for the Navy “Beach Jumpers,” a tactical cover and deception unit (forerunners of the Navy Seals).

Dr. Richard Walding, a scientist in Brisbane, Australia, said: “The Beach Jumpers’ mission was to create an illusion that one enemy beach would be invaded, when in fact the invasion would take place on a different beach.”

Using 63-foot air-sea rescue (ASR) boats that could carry an officer and six sailors, Beach Jumper units would quickly hit the beach and confuse the enemy with harassment and deception operations. The actual amphibious landing would be conducted at another location.

Navy Cmdr. Harold Burris-Meyer, who was also a professor of sound control and psychoacoustics at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J., once said the goal was “to scare the bejesus out of the enemy.” 

The “BJ” factor led to the naming of “Beach Jumper” units.