White Sea League

The White Sea League

Russian soldiers drilled in short-center field. Outfielders stood ankle-deep in sand. The catcher's mitt was a gunner's asbestos glove (for handling, hot shells) with extra padding. It took four hours to make a baseball--from part of a rubber heel wound with string, covered with leather cut from gloves. Bats were whittled out of soft Russian pine.

Under such handicaps the White Sea League played ball. In Manhattan last week the story of U.S. sports 100 miles below the Arctic Circle was told by a member of the so-called "Forgotten Convoy"--four merchant ships marooned near Archangel from May to November last year.

The Russians lent a playing field next to the docks. Bases were marked with gunny sacks. The four teams, one from each ship, played hard-ball rules, but games lasted only seven innings: by then the ball was too lopsided and the bat was usually split.

Subarctic Series. Brooklyn's left field had nothing on the W.S.L. for enthusiasm. Shouting sailors crowded the foul lines, jeering at umpiring officers. Some afternoons, $500 changed hands--a quarter of all the money in the fleet. The outstanding star was Seaman 1st Class Joe Sienko, a husky twirler who learned baseball in a Catholic Youth league in Massachusetts. Behind his pitching on the Fourth of July, the Navy All-Stars walked away with the W.S.L. World Series, whipping a picked Merchant Marine nine, 19-to-7.

The nearby Russian soldiers ignored the baseball. But when they discovered the sailors practicing basketball with a decrepit volleyball and backboards erected on the dock, they issued a challenge. After the first quarter, the U.S. scorer quit--his team was so far behind he had lost count. The Russians also challenged the sailors at swimming. After one practice in the icy waters, the sport was dropped.

As they must to all sportsmen, poker and craps finally came to the White Sea League.* Three-day games of five-card stud, with table stakes, no limit, became routine. The poker ended abruptly when one ship won $1,992, leaving $8 as total capital among the other three. Craps redistributed the wealth, but not for long. A few days before the convoy finally sailed, the game became the property of two shipmates. One, a Yale alumnus, owned the dice. The other, a Sing Sing alumnus, had all the money.

*Craps is a minor sport on shipboard. Crapshooters lose their balance and their money slides with the ship's roll.

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