Daniel V. Gallery

Daniel Vincent Gallery (July 10, 1901 – January 16, 1977) was a rear admiral in the United States Navy. He saw extensive action during World War II, fighting U-boats during the Battle of the Atlantic, where his most notable achievement was the June 4, 1944 capture of the . After the war, Gallery was a prolific author of fiction and non-fiction. During the post-war military cutbacks, he wrote a series of articles criticizing the heavy reductions being made to the US Navy. These articles placed him at odds with the administration during the episode which became known as the Revolt of the Admirals.

Early life and career

Daniel was the son of Daniel Vincent Gallery (born Chicago, July 19, 1865), lawyer, and Mary Onahan Gallery, writer. In 1917, at the age of 16, Gallery entered the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland. He graduated a year early, in 1920, and competed in the 1920 Olympics in Antwerp on the U.S. wrestling team.Short Biography from Arlington National Cemetery
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He had three younger brothers, all of whom had careers in the U.S. Navy. Two brothers, William O. Gallery and Philip D. Gallery, also rose to the rank of rear admiral. The fourth brother, John Ireland Gallery, was a Catholic priest and Navy chaplain. Their grandfather Daniel, born about 1839, emigrated to the U.S. from Ennistymon, County Clare, Ireland, in the mid- to late- 1800s.

Gallery was an early naval aviator. He flew seaplanes, torpedo bombers and amphibians. In the late 1930s, he won at the National Air Races in a race-tuned Douglas TBD Devastator torpedo plane. In 1941, while the U.S. was still neutral, he was assigned as the Naval Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Great Britain. While in Britain, he earned his flight pay by ferrying Supermarine Spitfires from the factory to Royal Air Force aerodromes. He liked to claim that he was the only U.S. Navy aviator who flew Spitfires during the Battle of Britain, but they were unarmed.

World War II

In 1942, Gallery took command of the Fleet Air Base in Reykjavík, Iceland, where he was awarded the Bronze Star for his actions against German submarines. It was there that he conceived his plan to capture a U-boat.

In 1943, Gallery was named captain of the escort carrier , which he commissioned. In January 1944, he commanded antisubmarine Task Group 21.12 (TG 21.12) out of Norfolk, Virginia, with ''Guadalcanal'' as the flagship. TG 21.12 sank the .

In March 1944, Task Group 22.3 was formed with ''Guadalcanal'' as the flagship. On this cruise, Gallery pioneered 24-hour flight operations from escort carriers in order to hunt U-boats, which had begun remaining submerged during daylight to avoid carrier-based aircraft. On April 9, the task group sank , commanded by U-boat ace ''Kapitänleutnant'' Werner Henke. After prolonged depth charging, the submarine was forced to the surface among the attacking ships and the surviving crew abandoned ship. The deserted ''U-515'' was hammered by rockets and gunfire before she finally sank. Gallery saw that this would have been a perfect opportunity to capture the vessel. He decided to be ready the next time such an opportunity presented itself. The next night, aircraft from the task group caught on the surface, in broad moonlight, and sank her with one survivor, a lookout caught on-deck when the U-boat crash dived.

U-505

On the next cruise of TG 22.3, Gallery took the unusual step of forming boarding parties, in case of another chance to capture a U-boat arose. On June 4, 1944, the task group crossed paths with ''U-505'' off the coast of Africa. ''U-505'' was spotted running on the surface by two Grumman F4F Wildcat fighters from ''Guadalcanal''. Her captain, ''Oberleutnant'' Harald Lange, dived the boat to avoid the fighters. But they could see the submerged submarine and vectored destroyers onto her track. The experienced antisubmarine warfare team laid down patterns of depth charges that shook ''U-505'' up badly, popping relief valves and breaking gaskets, resulting in water sprays in her engine room. Based on reports from the engine room, the captain believed his boat to be heavily damaged and ordered the crew to abandon ship, which was done so hastily that full scuttling measures were not completed.

Gallery ordered the boarding party from the destroyer escort to board the foundering submarine and if possible capture her. The destroyers in range used their .50 caliber and 20 mm antiaircraft guns to chase the Germans off the vessel so the boarding party could get onto her. Once on board, the party replaced the cover of the sea strainer, thus keeping the U-boat from sinking immediately. The boarders retrieved the submarine's Enigma coding machine and code books. (This was a primary goal of the mission because it would enable the codebreakers in Tenth Fleet to read German signals immediately, without having to break the codes). They got her under control, and ''U-505'' became the first foreign man-of-war captured in battle on the high seas by the U.S. Navy since the War of 1812.

This incident was the last time that the order "Away All Boarders!" was given by a U.S. Navy captain. Lieutenant Albert David, who led the boarding party, received the Medal of Honor for his courage in boarding a foundering submarine that presumably had scuttling charges set to explode – the only Medal of Honor awarded in the Atlantic Fleet during World War II. For capturing ''U-505'', Task Group 22.3 was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation and Gallery received the Distinguished Service Medal.

He also received a blistering dressing-down from Admiral Ernest J. King, Chief of Naval Operations. King pointed out that unless ''U-505''s capture could be kept an absolute secret, the Germans would change their codes and change out the cipher wheels in the Enigma. Gallery managed to impress his crews with the vital importance of maintaining silence on the best sea story any of them would ever see. His success kept him from getting a court-martial instead of a medal. (Two noted naval historians, Samuel Eliot Morison and Clay Blair, Jr., take opposite views of Gallery's case. Morison saw it as an intrepid act of combat valor in the finest Navy tradition; Blair sided with Admiral King and called it an act of lunacy which could have undone all the work done by the codebreakers on both sides of the Atlantic.) After the war, King personally approved the award of the Presidential Unit Citation to Task Group 22.3 for the capture of the U-boat.

Later war

Gallery was given command of the aircraft carrier in September 1945. He relinquished command of ''Hancock'' on 10 December 1945.

Post-World War II service

After promotion to rear admiral, Gallery became Assistant to the Chief of Naval Operations. He commanded Carrier Division Six during the Korean War.

The "Revolt of the Admirals"

The "Revolt of the Admirals" occurred during Louis Johnson's tenure as Secretary of Defense. Johnson planned to scrap the carrier fleet, merge the Marine Corps into the Army, and reduce the Navy to a convoy-escort force. Gallery wrote a series of articles for ''The Saturday Evening Post'' fiercely criticizing these plans. The final article, "Don't Let Them Scuttle the Navy!" was so inflammatory that Gallery barely escaped court-martial for insubordination. It cost Gallery his third star. It effectively finished his career, though he served 12 more years on active duty. At the time of his retirement, he was second in seniority on the Rear Admirals' List.

Command of the Tenth Naval District

Gallery's final command was the Tenth Naval District in San Juan, Puerto Rico, from December 1956 to July 1960. During this command, with the help of the Rotary and Lions clubs, he established the first Little League

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