The Destroyer That Threw Potatoes at a Submarine

A true wartime encounter so strange it became U.S. Navy legend

In the vast, black waters of the South Pacific during the Second World War, combat was often brutal, fast, and unforgiving.

Destroyers stalked submarines in endless cat-and-mouse games.

Depth charges thundered.

Steel screamed.

Men vanished without witnesses.

And yet, among all the grim naval clashes of 1943, one encounter stands apart—not because of overwhelming firepower or tactical brilliance, but because, for a brief and surreal moment, the fate of a submarine may have hinged on… potatoes.

This is the story of USS O’Bannon (DD‑450), the Japanese submarine she met in the waters off the Solomon Islands, and how a close-quarters naval fight slipped into legend, debate, and Navy folklore.

A Night Made for Ambush

By early 1943, the Solomon Islands had become one of the most dangerous patches of ocean on Earth.

American and Japanese forces were locked in a grinding campaign of attrition, with islands changing hands inch by inch and sea lanes crawling with submarines hunting for vulnerable targets.

Destroyers like O’Bannon lived a tense existence.

Too small to absorb punishment, yet fast and lethal, they were tasked with escorting convoys, screening larger ships, and hunting enemy submarines that lurked just beneath the waves.

Night operations were especially perilous.

Radar was improving, but visibility was poor.

A surfaced submarine could appear suddenly—too close for comfort.

On one such night in April 1943, O’Bannon was patrolling when radar contacts suggested something was wrong.

Moments later, lookouts spotted the unmistakable shape of a Japanese submarine on the surface—dangerously close.

This was not how submarine encounters were supposed to unfold.

Point-Blank Shock

At standard combat ranges, destroyers held the advantage.

They could maneuver, fire their main guns, and unleash depth charges with calculated precision.

But this encounter collapsed the rulebook.

O’Bannon surged forward and opened fire almost immediately.

Shells slammed into the submarine’s conning tower, showering metal fragments and knocking crewmen off their feet.

The submarine was damaged—but not destroyed.

Then came the moment no training manual had prepared either crew for.

The two vessels ended up so close—nearly alongside one another—that O’Bannon’s main guns could no longer depress far enough to engage the target.

The destroyer’s greatest weapons were suddenly useless.

At the same time, the Japanese submarine crew scrambled topside, attempting to bring small arms into action and possibly ready their deck gun.

In a fight at this range, seconds mattered.

The situation was absurdly intimate for naval warfare.

Steel hulls loomed beside one another.

Men could see faces.

Shouts carried clearly across the water.

And O’Bannon’s crew had no grenades immediately at hand.

The Potatoes Appear

According to the most famous version of the story, sailors aboard O’Bannon grabbed the only throwable objects nearby—potatoes from the galley.

With no time to think, they began hurling them at the Japanese sailors on the submarine’s deck.

In the darkness, under stress, with adrenaline flooding their systems, the Japanese crew reportedly believed the incoming objects were hand grenades.

If true, the reaction would have been instinctive and deadly.

Men dove for cover.

Weapons were dropped.

Some accounts claim crewmen threw rifles and ammunition overboard in panic.

Others say they rushed below decks, abandoning the topside gun.

The submarine, already damaged, attempted to submerge.

It did not survive.

Legend Versus Reality

Like many wartime stories, the truth depends on which account you believe.

One version—the most dramatic—claims the potatoes directly caused the submarine’s doom.

The crew, convinced explosives were landing among them, panicked just long enough to doom their vessel.

Another version, supported by more cautious historians, suggests the potato episode merely bought O’Bannon precious seconds.

Those seconds allowed the destroyer to maneuver clear, set depth charges properly, and destroy the submarine in a more conventional manner.

Even O’Bannon’s commanding officer later acknowledged that the story grew significantly after reaching the press.

He confirmed the submarine surfaced dangerously close and that the encounter was chaotic—but admitted that the “potato barrage” may have been exaggerated by time, retelling, and wartime morale-boosting journalism.

Still, he never denied that something unusual happened.

And that was enough.

How Legends Are Born at Sea

Naval warfare produces few witnesses.

Battles often unfold at night.

Ships sink without survivors.

Reports are written from memory, sometimes hours after combat, sometimes days later, filtered through exhaustion and shock.

In that environment, stories evolve.

The potato incident was irresistible.

It humanized the war.

It made sailors clever rather than merely lethal.

It suggested that improvisation—almost comedy—could defeat steel and torpedoes.

For the U.S. Navy, the tale spread quickly.

It was repeated in mess halls, retold in letters home, and eventually printed in newspapers hungry for stories that broke the monotony of casualty lists.

Soon, O’Bannon was no longer just another destroyer.

She was the ship that defeated a submarine with potatoes.

The Missing Plaque

As the story hardened into legend, O’Bannon reportedly received a commemorative plaque celebrating the bizarre encounter.

At some point after the war, the plaque vanished.

Whether it was lost, removed, or quietly retired remains unclear.

Some suggest it disappeared because the Navy grew uncomfortable with the tale’s accuracy.

Others believe it was simply misplaced during postwar reorganizations.

Its absence only deepened the myth.

A missing artifact invites speculation.

And speculation keeps stories alive.

Why the Story Endures

The potato incident survives not because it is provably true in every detail, but because it captures something essential about wartime reality.

Combat is not always clean.

It is not always dignified.

And it is rarely predictable.

Sailors are human beings first.

They improvise.

They panic.

They adapt.

In the chaos of battle, victory sometimes hinges not on doctrine or technology, but on whoever reacts fastest with whatever is available.

Even if the potatoes did not directly sink the submarine, they symbolize the split-second ingenuity that defined survival in the Pacific.

USS O’Bannon’s Larger War

Beyond this encounter, O’Bannon had a fierce combat record.

She participated in numerous engagements throughout the Pacific, earning multiple battle stars.

She escorted carriers, shelled enemy positions, and survived air attacks that destroyed less fortunate ships.

Her crew was hardened, experienced, and resourceful—qualities that made the potato story believable, even to skeptics.

When sailors laugh at danger, it is often because they have faced worse.

History Between Fact and Folklore

Historians still debate the exact sequence of events that night near the Solomon Islands.

No definitive Japanese survivor account confirms the grenade confusion.

American reports vary in detail.

But history is not only about precise measurements and footnotes.

It is also about memory, meaning, and morale.

The potato story reminds us that war is lived moment by moment, by individuals making impossible decisions under pressure.

Whether exaggerated or not, the encounter reflects the unpredictability of close combat and the thin line between disaster and victory.

A Final Thought

Somewhere in the dark Pacific, steel met steel.

Men shouted.

Weapons jammed.

And in a moment of absurd improvisation, vegetables flew across the water.

The submarine never returned.

The destroyer sailed on.

And decades later, we are still telling the story—not because of the potatoes, but because of what they represent:

human instinct, quick thinking, and the strange, unforgettable moments that turn ordinary ships into legends.

If you’d like, I can expand this into an even more cinematic 2,000-word documentary-style version, add first-person sailor perspectives, or reconstruct the encounter minute-by-minute for maximum dramatic impact.