The Coxswain (A World War 2 Naval Adventure). J.E. Macdonnell's Royal Australian Navy World War II Fiction, #22

As the Guadalcanal campaign got underway, the new coxswain of the Australian fleet destroyer Wind Rode found himself faced with a twin challenge-to sort out the bad apples who had come aboard as replacements for men lost in a recent action . and to somehow found his way back to the man he had been before being sunk a couple of years earlier. That time he had almost drowned in a cabin that filled frighteningly fast with seawater.
Something in him had changed, he'd lost his pride in himself and the Senior Service for whom he served. And a coxswain like that is no use to anyone. So Commander Peter Bentley made up his mind to throw the 'Swain a metaphorical lifeline . even if he had to take on the entire Japanese Navy to do it!