I will follow on
@Red Leg post.
Hemingway was nobel price writer. journalist, heavy drinker and smoker, warrior, boxer and shotgun hunter, who used secondarily a rifle as well. Been on safari 2 times. (safari 1933 resulted in - green hills of africa, and short story short happy life of Francis Macomber, safari 1954 resulted in- true at first light and article in life magazine,,)
He was injured in ww1. (farewell to arms)
At the beginning of ww2, he was rejected from army to serve in ww2.
With this character, he had no intention of letting ww2 pass without him.
He had fishing boat "Pillar" in Cuba.
German subs patrolled Caribbean seas, and were known to surface and confiscate food and supplies from lone fishing boats in the area.
He got for crew one man, and one communication officer from navy.
The plan to hunt sub was following.
He will be playing "lone fisherman" in Cuban waters, and let the sub comes alongside to confiscate supplies
When coming alongside, other men will spray the sub crew on conning tower with Thompson submachine gun, he would be punching the holes in submarine hull by using solids from his 577 elephant double rifle, and the third man will drop the satchel charge on the sub before it submerges
.
So, that was the plan. But to all our luck and histories luck he never met the sub, although I think he had one close encounter.
ww2, however did not pass without him.
Later he went to Normandy landing as a journalist, quickly equipping him self with a car, army driver, and weapons, and chased the Germans (following sound of guns), Its known he had trown some grenades in the cellar with hidden Germans
As journalist (non army personnel) he later found a group of french resistance fighters, who were not complaining of him carrying guns and shooting under "PRESS" id.. he had experience of ww1, and Spanish civil war experience, and strong character which soon placed him as a leader of French guerilla group. Being a non army personnel he could not be anything in us army, so he managed to get his action and his "irregulars" in this way.. He spoke French because he spent years in Paris after ww1, as a part of group of writers known as lost generation of that era. (Scott Fitzgerald, FE cummings, Dos passos, few others)
The only thing he missed, was shooting a sub with 577.
WHat I dont know about him is how he got the idea to travel to safari in 1933. Probably through mingling in social circles, as African safari became fashionable by that time, an era known as golden age of safari.