Shadow Divers Dirk Pitt & John Chatterton
Clive Cussler Created a Hero, Robert Kurson Found the Real Ones
Jun 3, 2009 David J. Shestokas
If John Chatterton had opaline eyes it would be impossible to determine he was not Dirk Pitt. The connections between Clive Cussler’s fictional characters and the real life protagonists of Robert Kurson’s Shadow Divers are uncanny.
The Shadow Divers Mystery Submarine
Shadow Divers tells the true story of John Chatterton and Richie Kohler. It was published in 2004 and the best selling non-fiction book that is destined to become a movie is Winston Churchill’s mystery wrapped inside an enigma.
A World War II German submarine is discovered sixty miles off the New Jersey coast in an area where it should not be. There are no records of any submarine going down in that area. Chatterton and Kohler are deep wreck divers who risk life and limb to determine the sub’s identity.
A Six Year Journey From U-Boat Discovery to U-Boat Identity
The search takes six years, many dangerous dives to depths beyond 200 feet, lives lost by divers working with Chatterton and Kohler, and naval records research from Washington to London to Germany. The dangers and research reflect all the elements of Cussler’s Dirk Pitt adventures except for a villain bent on world domination. The real antagonist is the submarine itself that somehow seems almost alive in the way it refuses to give up its secrets.
The Psychology of John Chatterton
In the years since its publication the highlights of the story have been retold. The psychology that the book focuses on regarding Chatterton and Kohler is little mentioned. Chatterton developed some basic life theories while a medic in Vietnam.
These principles formed the driving force behind his quest, and keeping them in mind while reading the book keeps it in perspective. They are:
- “If an undertaking is easy, someone else already would have done it.
- If you following in another’s footsteps, you miss the problems really worth solving.
- Excellence is born of preparation, dedication, focus and tenacity; compromise any of these and you become average.
- Every so often, life presents a great moment of decision, an intersection at which a man must decide to stop or go; a person lives with these decisions forever.
- Examine everything; not all is as it seems or as people tell you.
- It is easiest to live with a decision if it is based on an earnest sense of right and wrong.
- The guy who gets killed is often the guy who got nervous. The guy who doesn’t care anymore, who has said, “I’m already dead – the fact that I live or die is irrelevant and the only thing that matters is the accounting that I give of myself, “ is the most formidable force in the world.
- The worst possible decision is to give up.”
Shadow Divers, pp 82-83
The Driving Force of Richie Kohler
John Chatterton ultimately found a soul mate in Richie Kohler. Kohler was driven to give closure to the families of the German sailors lost in the unidentified submarine. He found his own code of life in the words of a famed German U-boat commander. It is on Kohler’s website:
"Life is a matter of luck, and the odds of success are in no way enhanced by extreme caution."
Kptlt. Erich Topp
The adventure story of the book is compelling, but Kurson's ability to get inside the psyches of these two driven men gives the adventure context. Cussler created Pitt and Giordino. Kurson found them living, breathing and pursuing underwater adventures off the coast of New Jersey and told us what makes them tick. Any fan of Cussler’s will love Shadow Divers.
John & Richie
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