Gray, was chief of the Coast Guard base and had the unenviable task of taking charge of bodies that washed up on the shore.” She told Carolina Country, “He helped bury them and made sure they received full military honors.”īlackouts were strictly enforced even though the area was sparsely populated. When a U-boat torpedoed a ship off Caffey’s Inlet while he was sitting on his front porch, he told Coastal Review, “ it felt like the earth was shaking.”įrieda Gray French was just six years old at that time. Stanley Beacham was a child living on Currituck Sound in 1942. But Outer Banks residents who were alive during World War II remember it very well. Few people knew about the Battle of the Atlantic because President Roosevelt didn’t want citizens to panic. The fighting was so intense that the Outer Banks was called Torpedo Junction. Four U-boats never returned to Germany, and the allies suffered 1,657 casualties 1,200 were merchant mariners. The Germans patrolled the Eastern Seaboard, particularly the New York and Florida coasts and Cape Hatteras, to stop merchant vessels bound for England with desperately needed food and military supplies. The Battle of the Atlantic was all about commerce. The Dixie Arrow is one of the many ships that sank off the Outer Banks in 1942 after being torpedoed by U-71. They’d be surprised to know that one of the most violent naval battles was fought off the shores of the Outer Banks.ĭuring the Battle of the Atlantic from January through July 1942, German U-boats sank over 400 ships off the North Carolina coast. Most people think World War II was fought on battlefields across Europe and on islands in the Pacific. By Marni Patterson courtesy Outer Banks Visitor’s Bureau Blog
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