Two smugglers are surprised by a harbor policeman, and shoot him down.Baxter gets to him, an old friend, in time to hear his last words, "Camphor Tubes". He soon realizes this is the method of hiding contraband the killers are using.
Baxter discovers that a night watchman was murdered by a bale hook, a tool used by thousands of longshoremen who work in the harbor area.
When Captain Hardesty fires an electrician for constantly picking fights with his fellow crew members, the enraged sailor threatens to blow the vessel into smithereens. Hardesty thought nothing of the threat until he discovered detailed plans to build a time bomb and reports his fears to Harbor Command. Captain Baxter and his men try to locate the crazed sailor before he can complete his bomb full of nitroglycerin.
Baxter and his men are in a race against time when a derelict steals a jar containing a highly combustible chemical that will burst into flame upon contact with air or water.
A protection racket shakes down local fishermen by destroying their day's catch by dousing it with gasoline if they won't or can't pay up.
A well-known gangster and his men pressure watchmen at waterfront warehouses into keeping quiet while they loot various goods being stored there, by threatening them and their families.
After being tipped off that a passenger on a liner docking that day will be shot, Baxter and his plain-clothes men stake out the pier and try to spot the would-be killer in time.
When police break up a craps game, one of the arrested men is found to have two counterfeit $20 bills in his pocket. The Harbor Command and the Treasury Department track the money through seaman slated to leave port that day for Hong Kong to a pawnshop owner who claims to have never met the seaman.
A young ex-con working as a longshoreman is made to look like the perpetrator of a safe cracking and the killer of a night watchman by the man who took him in when he left prison.
A porter on a passenger liner kills a jewel smuggler in his cabin, then tries selling the gems in San Francisco pawn shops, until the smuggler's partner catches up with him.
A shipbuilding company has a truckload of machinery disappear and later receives a request from an anonymous phone caller ordering them to dump $100,000 into the sea as ransom.
A yacht club manager, who is also a diabetic, is kidnapped by two men. Can Baxter rescue him before his time runs out?
A man who was imprisioned for theft still holds a grudge. After he is released he begins a one man crime wave.
Ma Sperling welcomes everyone to her Harbor Mission, but realizes too late that some sinners are too much for her.
Stolen gold is too hard to resistfor a husband and wife team of dentists. They devise a scheme to get it out of the country but a third party discovers their plot.
A Harbor Command officer is stunned when the trail of the leader of an international narcotics syndicate leads to his own father.
A small Mexican Boy witnesses a murder and follows the killer to his hideout
An escaped convict blackmails a former cellmate into providing him with shelter and then begins a reign of terror in the harbor.
Two murders have been comitted and the one thing they both have in common is the victims in both cases were found with a black pearl in their hand
After having a wedding reception on board ship the rest of the wedding party goes ashore, leaving the bride and groom to go on their honeymoon. However they are being held hostage by a desperate gunman.
An unidentified woman's body is found floating amid wreckage of a boat.
An old poverty-stricken harbor bum pays a hoodlum to kill him 'accidentally' so his wife can collect his life insurance.
Captain Baxter and his men respond to report of a disabled fishing boat and discover that old Pop Cates has run out of gas for the third time in a month. Baxter learns that Pop's daughter has canceled her visit and the elderly fisherman is distraught because he has never seen his six-year-old grandson and fears the worst when the leaky vessel is spotted heading for the open ocean.
Captain Baxter and Sergeant Warren investigate the murder of night watchman on one of San Francisco's piers. They discover a map covered with oriental writing and learn that it marked the spot where Japanese smugglers hid $100, 000 worth of gold bars just before World War II. When a merchant seaman is discovered fatally stabbed, the Harbor Command officers find a clue to the killer.
Captain Baxter is asked to go undercover to follow a lead developed by a U.S. Treasury agent who murdered after gaining the information about a counterfeit ring. He travels to Los Angeles and attempts to follow counterfeit plates from one crook to another until they reach the head of the syndicate.
Harbor Command and the San Francisco Fire Department match wits with an arsonist that causes a false alarm at one waterfront location, then sets another conflagration while the fire equipment is concentrated miles away from the real fire. Captain Baxter devises a plan to trap the firebug with fake bags of nitrate.
When 4500 sailors from a U.S. Navy carrier task force return to port with six months of back pay in their pocket, they are ready for shore liberty - and the crooks and con men are waiting for them. The Harbor Patrol request assistance from the Navy's shore patrol when a sailor is stabbed in a bungled robbery and it appears that the crook are planning to dispose of the wounded man in the Pacific Ocean.
The Harbor Patrol searches the waterfront for a seaman who is suffering from smallpox before he can inflect anyone else.
Harbor Command investigates the report of a derelict fishing boat floating in the middle of San Francisco Harbor. They quickly discard their initial theory of insurance fraud when they discover human blood in the cockpit and a check for $10,000 missing from the captain's cabin. Captain Baxter and Sergeant Warren's investigation focuses on the individual crew members and learn the first mate was new to the vessel.
A waterfront bum spots a young couple throwing a young man into the San Francisco harbor, but is afraid to report it to the police because he was supposed to be covering for the night watchman who was playing poker. When the tycoon's death is reported in the newspaper, the watchman and the bum use the couple's license plate to trace the murderers and blackmail them. Meanwhile the harbor command investigates the murder.
A teenage girl sneaks out of her father's house for an assignation with an older man. While the couple are making out, an armed robber sneaks up beside their car and kills the young man when he refuses to give the crook his wallet. Fearing her father will punish her for seeing the young man over his objections, the teenager refuses to assist the Harbor Command with their investigation. Listening to the police radio band, the crooks learn the girl's identity and determine to eliminate the witness before she changes her mind.
Captain Baxter receives a tip that a gang of lobster smugglers might be behind the murder of an ex-convict found floating in San Francisco Bay. After discussing the matter with state fishing personnel, Baxter decides he's searching for bigger game - a deported criminal seeking to reenter the country illegally on board a small fishing boat.
A recently released convict won't forget that it was Baxter that had him sent up, and now determined to exact revenge with a high powered rifle he steals from a gunsmith's shop. He taunts Captain Baxter with phone calls to his office, takes a shot at him at his apartment, and follows him to a highly public meeting, concealing the gun in a brief case.
Captain Baxter and Sergeant Warren respond to a call from a hotel clerk who states he was beaten by a boarder, who had also ruined his bed with repeated knife thrusts. The Harbor Patrol learns that the perpetrator was Leon Faulkner, a former convict recently released from prison who harbored a grudge against the psychiatrist who testified against him at the convict's trial ten years earlier.
When Captain Baxter learns a freighter from a communist country that docks in San Francisco to make emergency repairs he decides to pay the ship's captain a visit. He discovers that a famous scientist used the visit to seek asylum in the United States. Fearing the police and the communist operatives who are pursuing him, the scientist desperately tries to reach a street mission where he had been advised to seek sanctuary. Baxter and his men try to reach the scientist before he comes to harm.
Two armed robbers, one of whom was wounded during a shootout with a watchman, hijack a San Francisco Bay water taxi and force the passengers to hide them on a yacht in the marina. Fearing for the safety of the hostages, Captain Baxter masquerades as the vessels owner so he can climb aboard to affect a rescue.