Tilting Up the Bow
“In the afternoon she came, and Barttelot, though he remained responsible, gladly handed over the entire direction of the critical operations to Captain Young. They could not have passed into better hands. No experience in salvage in any part of the world counts beside that of Young and his Ranger. Sunset was approaching, and night would soon overshadow the Gareloch. But this mattered little. The Ranger, accustomed to work at all hours of the night and day, was equipped with arc lights which could shatter any darkness. It was easy now to communicate with K-13 through the tube and to make clear how she was to help herself. She was over three hundred feet long—three hundred and forty feet, to be precise—and did not need to be tilted very steeply to bring her nose and upper bow plates clear of the surface. But to be got up into a working position she must be lightened forward. This was done by blowing all the forward oil tanks. The heavily loaded stern held tight in the Gareloch mud, but the bows were free and, as the tanks were blown, they lifted rapidly. They heaved up through ten degrees, and the salvors who were watching for the movement instantly whipped steel hawsers under the fore-part of the submarine and secured the ends to bollards on tugs alongside. K-13 was up, but would she remain up? It seemed most unlikely, and remained most unlikely until the end.
“The hawsers—six-inch—were too light for the job, but none stronger were at hand. No sooner were the bows of K-13 up and secured than her stern began to slip backwards into the mud. Before she brought up against hard ground she had gone back thirty feet. More hawsers were whipped under her and held, but there was no security that they would continue to hold. There was no security for anything. It was a fight for life against the ruthless chances and devilries of the sea.