The History Of The Atom Project - Bainbridge Island School: Fill & Download for Free

Sea Duty on a WW II DestroyerUSS Soley DD 707I waited on the Tidewater for my ship, the USS Soley to return from the 1956 Suez War. Finally the day arrived, and with the 2nd fleet band playing Stars and Stripes Forever, destroyer squadron 22, the Carrier Battle Group, and my ship, the USS Soley, returned from Middle East deployment to a great fanfare from thousands of people gathered on the pier. There were dignitaries, military bands, and even the Navy Norfolk city band and wild cheering from ships’ families as their heroes returned home. The ship saw action in the 1956 Arab/Israeli War and the ship’s crew approached the pier wearing Arab Bisht (robes), Keffiyeh (head dresses) and carrying curved swords. With my heart in my throat, and wishing I had been with them in the Middle East, I couldn’t wait for my turn at world adventure. Standing there on the pier, dressed in my class A uniform, shoes spit shined, and looking shiny like a mirror (it would be a long time before I looked that good again what with the limited sea storage for uniforms), my first impression of the Soley is that it's not too big, then you realize it's not that small either. Her lines are sleek, close to the water and five and three inch guns projected everywhere. Towering above were the torpedo tubes and above that 3 inch gun mounts and above that was the bridge and above that the main battery gun director and the halyards for the signal flags. There wasn’t a square inch on the ship that didn’t have some thing to do with weapons or how it was operated at sea. On the stern, nearly level with the pier, were the K guns and depth charges; from there you would have no trouble diving into the water during swim calls. On closer inspection of the hull there is evidence of scrapes and scuffles of days gone by; small collisions, tugboats marked, welded old repairs, and warped plating from the relentless pounding of the waves. There were umbilical cords being attached to the ship for electric power, water, steam, phones, and the necessities of life. I smelled the salt air, but a few other things too, like fresh haze gray paint, diesel oil and the ever-present odor of heavy black navy coffee drifting off the Soley. I heard the ships’ ventilation systems running, which supplied fresh air to the interior of the ship and the clanking of hatches being closed. I was just about there. I hoisted my sea bag over my shoulder and walked smartly over to the USS Soley gang plank and stared at the main deck awash in rivets of rust, guns and tough looking sailors dressed in Arab robes. In my best military manner, with my chest swelling with pride and apprehension, I climbed the gangplank, saluted smartly and beaming with pride, asked permission to come aboard this magnificent warship. I stood at rigid attention while the Quarterdeck watch checked over my orders and called the Lead Petty Officer for Fox Division, A.C. Smith, to square me away. I had finally arrived and I was quickly learning the diesel smell and constant noise of my ship. Smith was dressed in blue dungarees’ and chambray shirt, smelled of sweat and oil, told me to relax and as I carried my Sea Bag, he escorted me aft to the Second Division compartment, a place where I would call home for the next six months; down the Fantail Hatch ladder I went, dragging my gear behind, trying to be US Navy squared away and regulation composed. The berthing compartment smelled of diesel oil and the rancid stink of a hundred men. I entered an unfamiliar looking place with sparkling steel floors, and shiny small lockers and gray canvas bunks stacked three high and side by side. I managed to find an empty bunk that was on the bottom and close to the ladder I had just descended. There was barely room for all my gear as I finished cramming my sea bag into the small 12-inch space called a locker beneath my bunk. I was finally home!“Stand the watch,” “Mail call,” “Jack of the Dust to the Bridge,” “Dignitary on the pier,” belay here, belay there, the messages blared on and kept the ship’s crew informed. The ship smelled strongly of diesel oil and softly vibrated with various diesel engines running, sailors scampered about onto their duties, and the ship felt alive, it felt like I was crawling up the spine of a steel monster covered with big guns. I scrambled up the ladder that I would soon learn to maneuver so well, managed to find my way to the Aft Head on the main deck inside passageway and relieved myself. Not too bad, a stainless steel bowl was the toilet with stainless steel sinks for washing up.My New Guy InitiationAs a 19-year-old fresh from Bainbridge Fire Control School, I had heard about and was well prepared for the standard shipboard initiations such as 50 feet of Chow line, Bucket of Relative Bearing Grease, Snipe Hunt, etc . . . I was the new guy and was not prepared when the leading Petty Office of Fox Division, A.C. Smith, calmly asked me to get a water hammer from the No. 1 engine room. It sounded fishy, but he convinced me that in civilian life they used air hammers because of the abundance of fresh air and power. At sea, we had plenty of water, so a water hammer was used instead of an air hammer. Based on his sincerity, and he was my boss, I was convinced that he was telling me the truth, so off I went, up the starboard hatch across the amidships passageway and forward to the inboard hatch to the No.1 engine room. I can't remember the Petty Officers from that hole, but they of course had been told by A.C. Smith that I was coming to get the water hammer. Well it seems that they had lent it to the crew in the aft fire room. So I went back there and Sidney Magoon Boiler Technician first was the Top Watch. He gave me some static of how the hammer had really been a big help to him and his crew. Howard Singletary, a busted Fireman apprentice agreed with him and the more realistic this hammer became. Finally they confessed that they had lent it to the snipes of the No.2 engine room. So back aft I went where Roy Batts Machinist Mate second told me that in fact that they had borrowed the water hammer from the snipes in the aft fire room. However they had finished the job and had returned it to the Chief Engineer, (LTJG) Jerry Mead. This happened on the 20-2400 watch. I didn’t want to get A.C. Smith angry at me for not returning with the water hammer, so using a little initiative; I went looking for the Chief Engineer.He was in one of the staterooms aft on the main deck. It was after taps and sure enough he was asleep, but he asked me in and listened to my story of how hard I had been searching half the night for the water hammer. He agreed that it was an important tool and a very expensive tool and he could not turn it over to a new guy like me. I was instructed to go back to the hole and have A.C. Smith come to his stateroom for the water hammer, only a First Class Petty Officer could be entrusted with it. I told A.C. Smith the Chief Engineer wanted him in his stateroom to turn the Water Hammer over to him and that was the last time I was ever ask to chase a navy tale including the famous midnight snipe hunt.As a scared duty of being the Leading Petty Officer, AC Smith took me to the Mark 37 Gun Director and showed me a wooden stick with different marks on it, he said this was the Fire Control Gang ‘Dick Stick,’ and I was to lay “Himself” on the stick and mark off the length, with a ‘Hard On’ of course. This would be used for “King Neptune” awards when we became ‘Shell Backs’ when crossing the Equator. Getting a ‘Hard On’ when you are 19 years old was like eating ice cream! “Nothing to it!”After that, a Bosun’s whistle sounded and a whiskey voice announced over the 1MC intercom announcing chow call. Hungry and anxious, I followed other sailors and found a long chow line port side forward near the gunwale break in the Foc'cle. The line inched slowly forward and down a ladder into the mess deck below where Mess Cooks lathered my steel tray with food while I picked up some coffee and bread. After eating some tasty (I was really hungry) ‘Shit on a Shingle’ [chipped beef] with white cream sauce, peas and carrots on the side, I had a little free time so I decided to do some exploring and descended the fantail ladder that led to my second division sleeping compartment and the machine shop, which was a repair facility ‘par excellence’ full of huge machine tools. I was taken by the sight of all the enormous machinery. Not as big as on the Tidewater, but just like any decent machine shop in Milwaukee machine shops. I was so proud and happy I started whistling. It was then I heard "hey boot, stand fast" as the Chief Master of Arms came up to me. He said “Square that rig” in other words, square your hat and button up that shirt. I said “yes sir,” he came right back with the correct reply is “aye aye and do not call me sir this is not boot camp, call me chief.” By the way there are only two people who whistle in the Navy, one is a boatswain mate and the other is a dam fool and I know you are not a boatswain mate, so carry on and be more aware of proper Navy Regs.Getting Settled on the SoleyMy sleeping compartment was in the rear of the ship below the fantail, it accommodated more than a hundred men in a small space, our racks were stacked three high with small lockers on the floor, and bigger standup lockers were available for Petty Officers only. Each rack had a two inch thick cotton mattress which we tilted during rough weather to keep ourselves in the rack and not falling out on the deck. If you were next to the hull, you could tilt your rack toward the hull, other wise you tilted it toward another rack in what was called ‘honeymoon racks.’ Above the sleeping compartment was a large hatch that opened to the fantail. There was an entry from the sleeping compartment to the Aft Steering compartment and to the Machine Shop. The machine shop is really nice; they have three lathes, a milling machine, drill press, and a power hack saw. The shop is about as big as the dining room of my house, and there are 13 machinery repairmen aboard. It was noisy back there, we could hear the whump, whump of the screws all day, and at night, and it kind of put you to sleep. The sea could get noisy, and the wind ferocious, screaming like a banshee, and during stormy weather, we prayed and held on tight, but I don’t think anyone was really afraid. After a while, we didn’t even to that, having got used to being thrown around inside a steel bucket with horrible sounds outside and the seas pounding the hull. The Head was one deck up on the main deck in the indoor passageway, it was fancy, and it had sit down stainless steel toilets and a separate compartments for the showers and wash basins.A Bosun’s whistle sounded and a whiskey voice announced over the 1MC intercom announcing chow call. Hungry and anxious, I followed other sailors and found a long chow line port side forward near the gunwale break in the Foc'cle. The line inched slowly forward and down a ladder into the mess deck below where Mess Cooks lathered my steel tray with food while I picked up some coffee and bread. After eating some tasty (I was really hungry) ‘Shit on a Shingle’ [chipped beef] with white cream sauce, peas and carrots on the side, I had a little free time so I decided to do some exploring and descended the fantail ladder that led to my second division sleeping compartment and the machine shop, which was a repair facility ‘par excellence’ full of huge machine tools. I was taken by the sight of all the enormous machinery, lathes and drills, etc. just like any decent machine shop in Milwaukee machine shops.Sea DutyAfter Boot Camp, there was A-School. There were some of the training things—like marching everywhere, but it was much better, and I had a lot of fun there. Then it was out to the fleet. I was stationed on a WW II Sumner Class Destroyer that had survived many battles and was the last ship Kamikazied in the Okinawa Campaign during WW II. Here are some of the bad things to tell you about being in the fleet.You start at the bottom. So you get all the dirty work that no one else wants to do. There’s “Sweepers”—when you have to sweep up your division’s spaces. This happens multiple times per day. There are field days when you have to do a thorough cleaning—from the overhead to the deck (ceiling to floor).There are working parties, when you have to form a long chain and help bring on supplies, passed from person to person, food in boxes, and sometimes ammunition. At sea, the ship might be rocking. When we were near the equator, we took on rounds for the 5″ gun. They weighed about 70lbs each, were greasy, and they had to be passed along, man-to-man, on a badly rocking deck, hot as hell outside, and then down several levels to the magazine. I don’t know if they would have gone off if we dropped any, but none of us wanted to test that.There are watches and Duty Days. At shore stations, you might have ten section duty if you’re lucky—which means you have a duty day every tenth day. On the ship, when we were in-port, it was four-section duty (Duty every fourth day). When we were at sea, basically every day was a Duty Day.Duty meant you couldn’t go home after “knock off ship’s work”. Instead of an 8–4 work day, you had to stay on the ship in uniform after everyone else went home. Then if there was an emergency, and the ship had to go to sea immediately, it was up to the Duty Section to man her. We also had all the watches and the Damage Control team in case of fire, and the ship’s security force also. If you had Duty, you stayed all night, slept in your assigned bunk (unless you had a watch), and in the morning, you had to be back at work at Muster in the morning, and couldn’t go home until 4 or 5 p.m. after “knock off ship’s work”.If you got in trouble, like didn’t make it in (Unauthorized Absence—UA—same thing as AWOL), you could go to what they call “Captain’s Mast” and the Captain could restrict you to the ship, give you extra work, or bust you down a rank or two. At least when I was in, there were also random urinalysis, and at least on my ship, if you got a positive even one time, you would be discharged. Guys got kicked out all the time for toking. They also used to kick out overt gay guys too.We would go underway, and be gone for days at a time at a minimum, more often weeks at a time, or even months at a time for a deployment. It was hard on the married guys. We single guys, we might loose a girlfriend, or a prospective girlfriend, but for the married family guys, it was really rough. I saw a lot of marriages break up, they were always the young men.When we went on deployment on a “Med Cruise”, we were usually gone for seven months. One fellow came back and found his wife was three months pregnant. Wives, when their husbands were deployed, would go hang out in the bars in Norfolk near the gates of the base, and pick up young horny sailors and take them home when they got lonely. Some fell quickly after only a few weeks, others took months, and some stayed faithful. But many did not. Some of the divorces were BITTER, and I saw guys have major issues and get in a lot of trouble—one guy lost his wife to another guy on the same ship. It worked the other way too. Guys would screw around on their wives all the time. Very few sailors made it out of European ports without having sex with some of the thousands of bar-girls.There were a lot of conventional accidents too. Destroyers are very dangerous, storms took some, guns and explosions took more, occasionally ships have someone just disappear at sea. They discharge sleep-walkers, we caught a guy in his underwear standing along the railing on the fantail at night—a total zombie. He was out the very moment we hit port. But sometimes people get hurt or even die. I understand on the carriers, a guy gets blown clean off of the flight deck by jet exhaust at least once a year, and those powerful jets are like giant vacuum cleaners, and they’ve been known to suck people right in. Disastrous accidents can happen that are not necessarily war-related. Look up the USS Belknap or the Forestall, or the Thresher.There are also sometimes officers or CPOs who are assholes, and you have no recourse—you have to just follow their orders, and you can’t quit, and if you protest, that’s called mutiny. And there are sycophants who kiss their asses, and won’t hesitate to make you look bad to enhance their own position.But also—remember this is just the negative. These were some of the best years of my life, and I had a lot of fun and have a lot of great memories, and there are a lot of benefits and advantages. Free training, college benefits, free health care, a secure job and paycheck, and chance to advance that you might not have in the civilian world, an opportunity to go places and see things you would not other wise see. When we deployed, we visited al the European ports around the Mediterranean, Middle East and Africa.The CrewLike the crew of every ship afloat today, the compliment of a destroyer is a cross section of America itself. A Bosun’s mate is a soda jerk from Detroit, and a Machinist mate is a former factory worker from Pittsburgh and a fire control man, like me, from Milwaukee. There's a farm hand from Kansas who hadn't been more than twenty‑three miles from home until he enlisted. There are Blacks from Southern cotton fields, and wheat farmers from North Dakota. There's a milkman from California and a dental student, a policeman and a night club operator from New York City. The destroyer life has made ex‑civilians real sailors. It was soon after World War II and we had many veterans on the ship. Phil was a career Navy man who was a first class gunner’s mate. He had served during World War II in the Pacific on heavy cruisers and had been in many major battles, including Guadalcanal, the Saipan Turkey Shoot, Leyte Gulf and Okinawa. Phil had several cruisers sunk beneath him one being the Indianapolis, just after they delivered the atomic bomb to a B29 Squadron. I would listen for hours to Phil war recounts in detail, what it was like to live thorough horrific sea battles and the carnage from fires and explosions as your ship takes hits from bombs and torpedoes. Especially horrifying was trying to survive in the water as your ship sinks and you had to battle oil fires and man-eating sharks. His stories of the Indianapolis sinking and resulting long stay in the water with sharks eating survivors were brutally terrorizing. Like all other Tin Can sailors, I always thought the Cans were the best Navy duty a man could want. However, Tin Cans were a rough life, full of thrills and spills and anyone whoever rode Destroyers has earned my everlasting respect as to what navy duty is all about. Ike was a Squid sailor next to the bulkhead; he was a tattooed, well built ladies man who looked really good in his uniform. Across from him was ‘Boston Bob’ ( a sailor) and guess what, yeah, he came from Boston and was a blue blood from the rich section of town and he worried about his appearance. His claim to fame was that he got sea sick even when we were tied up to the pier, and at sea he would throw up into a bucket he carried around with him.My rack was next to Boston Bob’s, and all around me were sailors jammed together, but we were all young teenagers and it didn’t bother us to be living so close to one another. My best buddy, Ted Strauss (sailor) was in second division too along with another friend, John King, a burly (Squid) Damage Control man who worked in the Machine Shop. Ted would get packages from home filled with pepperoni and summer sausage and he would share with us the goodies. All sailors shared their goodies, it was the thing to do, and after all, we backed up each other in combat situations and with packages from home.When I made Third Class and started standing Shore Patrol, I got beat up very bad on East Main Street on my first patrol in an alcoholic bar fight. My friend, Ike, was a great fighter, almost professional, and then taught me how to handle myself in Street and bar fights. I thought I was a good fighter before I entered the Navy, but compared to the men on board ship, I was nothing, and I learned a lot from Ike. We would go to the base gym and practice maneuvers and holds and I got quite good. Once in a while a thief would start stealing things out of our lockers and the Master of Arms was called to investigate. If they caught him, it was the brig, if we caught him, it was a Code Red and a blanket party, and Navy justice was swift and sure either way. With more than 370 men squeezed into a small destroyer, life was good and crime free and that is what we wanted it to be. But malcontents, thieves, and malingers were not tolerated, they could get us killed. The biggest problem we had was with lazy sailors; they just didn’t do their jobs, and often were the cause of disciplinary problems. Southern Whites sometime had racial problems with Blacks, especially the smart - take no shit - ones from the North.NOB to NorfolkAfter my first liberty in Norfolk while I was on the Tidewater, I learned that I didn’t like this broken down dirty segregated city. But I went on Liberty again with some sailors off the Soley. The bus ride on Hampton Blvd. To downtown Norfolk took about 45 minutes and we would get off at Granby and City Hall Avenue which back in the 50's was a busy area of Norfolk. The skimpy night life, basically several dingy restaurants and Pizza Parlors, were open until well after midnight and downtown Granby Street was reasonably safe. Within a few blocks of this same area was the YMCA which also served as the USO (for Whites only) and which provided shelter to many a sailor. There was a large wide tunnel with stores on each side that connected City Hall Avenue with East Main Street, often our nefarious objective. At the end of the tunnel, there was usually an older gentleman who played a guitar for money and he usually made most of his money as the evening wore on.Liberty in Norfolk involved three streets. The Whites went to Granby and the World’s most infamous East Main, and the Blacks went to Church Street.Granby Street: The best Norfolk had to offerAnything from 21st Street to the Waterfront, Granby Street was Norfolk’s downtown section and it wasn’t much. A few restaurants, stores and decrepit hotels lined the street all the way down to the waterfront, and it had no redeeming values. Down by the Elisabeth River waterfront were the sailor bars and the YMCA where the USO was located. One quaint thing, however, strolling through the area, one will encounter cobblestone streets made from the holds of sailing vessels that used them as ballast.Church Street: Harlem of the SouthNorfolk was racially segregated and Church Street was where the Blacks had their hangouts, a place where they could be free to be what they wanted to be. Church was like 125th Street in Harlem, it had a history, from blues singers, to the early Greek, Chinese, Irish and Jewish immigrants, and Church Street was considered the Ellis Island of the South. But now it was Black only!Then there was ‘world’s infamous East Main StreetUpon leaving the tunnel that connected City Hall Avenue with East Main Street and arriving on East Main Street you took a left turn toward the drinking establishments and as you walked down the street, you passed many different stores. There were pawn shops, a Bank, and a Western Union office, which I did use once to get emergency money from my parents. The street open up into a square called Commercial Circle and the beginning of the infamous sailors’ hangout called East Main Street.The world’s infamous section of East Main Street was only (maybe less) three blocks long and lined with Bars on both sides of the street with names such as "Virginian,” "Golden Palomino,” "Rathskeller,” "Ship Ahoy,” "Paddock Lounge,” "Red Rooster" and etc. The Bars served only 25-cent lean draft beer. You did not order brand names in Norfolk and the Bars featured barmaids who would (if you were lonely) sit with you and listen to your sad story, however, the cost of listening was buying them a drink which consisted of ice tea at a cost of $1 which was equivalent to four beers and could those Bar Maids drink fast! Most sailors fell for this little game only once but there were some who never learned!East Main Street, they wrote books about it and it was famous all over the world. You could find every sin covered in every religion in the world, in three or four blocks. The place was a veritable Kasbahs of Carnal Delight. The place was so bad; it didn't even register a blip on the Morale Richter Scale. East Main was right up there with Sodom and Gomorrah. It was the ‘Black Hole of Calcutta' and the lowest level of the largest outhouse ever built.East Main was the K-Mart of whoredom. If you had twenty bucks and you couldn't satisfy any particular lust desire you were hauling down there, you had to be into something involving baby ducks and penguins.East Main was a five-star hell whole where you could buy passion in fifteen minute increments from women whose panties went up and down like a tin can's signal flags, where you could drink cheap beer and pee in the street. Fleet sailors warned us recruits that sooner or later, we would be rolled onEast Main Street. Just hope that she was kind enough to stick your ID and liberty card in your sock before she vanished with what was left of seventy bucks and your wallet? If Guinness had a record for the sleaziest bars per square inch, it would read.'East Main, Norfolk'. They sold enough draft beer on a Saturday night to fill the New London diving tank, and most of it got pissed away in the adjacent alleys on the way to the bus stop up on Granby Street.While on East Main Street, it would often be our goal to drink a few beers at each bar, starting at the upper end of one side of the street, and drink our way down the street, then come up the other side. Needless to say I never successfully accomplished this goal. As a young man not used to alcohol, even though the beer was lean reduced to 3 per cent alcohol, I would get drunk before the round robin tour ended and wind up puking my guts out in an alley. The bus ride back varied in quality depending on the time you left, a late return meant ridding with a large group of sailors in various states of drunkenness with random puking. If you missed the last bus back to NOB which left around 2:00 A.M. In the morning, you had to wait three hours before bus service resumed again at 5:00 A.M. It would get you back to your ship just in time for morning Quarters. After drinking ourselves silly onEast Main Street, we were ready for some coffee and a plate of bacon and eggs. A [White only] Christian Mission offered these amenities if we would listen to their “save my soul” preaching first. One time we tried this and listened to well mannered young men try to convert us to being ‘Born Again’ with sweet talk and using words like “anointed.” But it was for Whites only, anyone one else was going to Hell. I thought - Christians, Huh? To this day whenever I hear that “ANOINTED” word I get a nauseous chill up my backbone!ASW in Jacksonville, Florida - First Voyage on USS SoleyEven though the Soley had just returned from the 1956 war in the Suez, we soon went to sea for two weeks for Flight and Anti submarine warfare (ASW) Operations in Jacksonville. I had received my sea duty assignments and was gung ho and ready for the adventure. The Soley was nested with the other Destroyers of DESRON Two and to my virgin eyes, the ships looked well-used, if not beat up. Some were showing patches of rust. Experience tells me that this was probably the result of one of those long deployments, possibly just returned from the Med. This was my first experience with a Navy flush toilet: a trough with rushing salt water down its length, people perched on the trough sitting on narrow boards. It was sink or swim. At the time scheduled in the plan of the day for getting under way, the boatswain’s pipe whistled over the 1MC and the word would be passed “now set the Special Sea and Anchor Detail’. This would be followed by “Now Set Material Condition Yoke throughout the Ship” followed by “The Officer of the Deck is Shifting his Watch from the Quarterdeck to the Bridge.” Essentially what this meant was for the “first team” to take their assigned stations for getting underway. The CO, XO, Officer of the Deck (OOD), Junior Officer of the Deck (JOOD) and appropriate enlisted personnel would proceed to the bridge. The deck divisions would man the line handling stations with the First Lieutenant and Chief Boatswain’s Mate on the Forecastle and the Gunnery Officer in charge on the fantail. The engine room and fire room supervisors would man their stations. The Chief Engineer would be in the Forward Engine Room and the Main Propulsion Assistant would be in the After Engine Room. The Steering Gear room (“After Steering”) would be manned. The ship operated as a “Team” and I would soon discover that all operations of the ship including “General Quarters” were all a Team effort. There were no single minded heroes on a destroyer. Sailors had to fit into the team concept or they were put ashore and discharged. On deck it was necessary to disconnect all shore services, pick up the ship’s boats, remove rat guards, and a variety of other actions, including preparing an anchor for dropping in an emergency.We left the Destroyer - Submarine Piers while I manned my newly assigned ‘Sea and Anchor Station’ as the ‘Phone Talker’ on the Foc’cle relaying orders from the bridge as the deck crew. “Single up All Lines” I shouted and we pulled out into Hampton Roads while I reported buoys and obstructions to the bridge as the ship steamed out to the open sea. We steamed out of Hampton Roads, past Virginia Beach, entered the Virginia Capes, and after the ship got well out to sea, the Captain secured the Special Sea and Anchor Detail and set the underway watch. The pitch and roll of the ship are more pronounced now and one realizes the power of the sea, it cannot be controlled, so you must learn to live with it and it will take a day or so to regain your sea legs. In the mean time, you teeter down passageways and bounce off bulkheads and watch your shins as you go through the watertight doors. I secured my Special Sea and Anchor Detail watch. I was in Bridge Watch training and my underway duty station was as lookout on the port wing of the bridge. Wide open to the elements, we were protected by a steel bulkhead from the waist down. I learned scanning the horizon for a short distance, stop momentarily, and repeat the process that this was the most effective technique to locate submarine periscopes, ships, or aircraft. It was emphasized repeatedly to not fix your gaze for more than a couple of seconds on any single object. My instructors were battle tested WWII veterans with years of experience, and they told me to continually "keep my eyes moving and my head on a swivel" because this was the best way to survive, not only in combat, but from peacetime hazards like collisions as well. My equipment consisted of binoculars and a binnacle-mounted compass with a gadget called a Pelorus, a moveable brass ring with degrees marked on it. This was how we could report a sighting, by giving a bearing relative to the ships heading. The officer who had the con (control of the ship) used these bearings to quickly locate whatever we sighted. We wore ‘Foul Weather Jackets’ and black wool hats as we scanned the horizon with powerful binoculars for any activity, foreign or domestic. Russian submarines were known to lie in wait for American war ships to exit Hampton Roads and then follow them. Even though the seas were heavy and the ship rocked, pitched and rolled furiously, at night, standing at the helm, with a bright moon lit sky, the stars shining, it was like standing in the presence of God. The noise from the sea and the reverent quiet of the bridge crew would be filled with the smell of coffee impregnating the small space.The USS Soley is steaming in the Atlantic past the Virginia Capes; we are bucking our way through rapid forming 30 foot ground swells, and being tossed around violently as we conduct anti submarine exercises (ASW). You learn to walk with knees bent and legs bowed apart, the sailor walk they call it, and always holding onto something. Your body gets used to the movements of the sea and after awhile there is nothing to it. My day started out with a mid-watch on the port wing of the bridge. We ate supper in the bucking and heaving ship’s mess hall. I had to put bread under my stainless steel tray to keep it from sliding off the mess table. We were sailing for a huge area called the Bermuda Triangle, a legendary triangle of Ocean lies between Bermuda, Puerto Rico and Fort Lauderdale. Ships, people and airplanes have been reported mysteriously disappearing off the face of the earth while traveling inside this mysterious triangle. Some sailors believe it really does contain a mystical vortex that sucks people down into a third dimension of mystical sea creatures. Others believe methane gas erupts and sucks ships down. Whatever it is, it is a fact, people, ships and planes do go missing in the Bermuda Triangle.I had watched a black & white Randolph Scott cowboy movie on the fantail until 2100, hitting the sack at about 2200. At 2330, I am awakened out of a sound sleep by the bridge messenger, who tells me it's time to relieve the midwatch. After drinking hot, black coffee provided by the night cook for mid watch standers, I am relieved at 0400. Hitting the sack again around 0415, hyped up from caffeine, I am unable to get to sleep, when the shrill sound of the Bosun's Pipe call announces reveille at 0530 and the 1MC Speaker broadcasts Reveille throughout the ship. You grab your douche bag and rush up one deck for the head along with dozens of others. You wait your turn to sit on the toilet, flushing your previous day’s meals down the drain directly into the beautiful blue Atlantic Ocean. There is no such thing as privacy as more than 70 men joust in a small space waiting for a vacant metal sink where you can shave and brush your teeth; there are numerous naked bodies showering from the two shower stalls shooting out cold salt water. Looking around, you wonder if that bearded man from Illinois knew what he was taking about when he stated all men are created equal. They aren’t! I guess size does matter.On my Destroyer, bathroom duties were done in a small space where 60 or 70 men fought for the space - asshole to asshole - and buck naked - to brush their teeth, shower or take a crap in a horse trough. I got used to showering in the noisy, smelly bathrooms - with my flip-flops on in case of viruses – but it was an experience devoid of pleasure. I never lingered, always tried to get out before anyone else came in. When it came to crapping I always picked a corner stall, figuring that a person on one side rather than both offered a 50 percent increase in privacy. It was awful, sitting there, to see a pair of heavy black boots beneath the door of the opposite stall or the panel separating me from the stall next door, knowing someone else was engaged in a facing or parallel dump. Living on a thin Destroyer diet, I alternated between manageable diarrhea and stringy little turds. Completing the necessary morning hygiene chores, you wander up to the mess deck where you stand in line with a division or so of half-awake sailors, finally arriving at the food service line where mess-cooks spoon out your ration of baked beans, powered eggs and cornbread.You finally arrive at the spot where the junior mess-cook will give you one patty of butter or two patties . . . if he likes you. For some unknown reason, this mess-cook serving the butter patties always had plenty of ship scuttlebutt to pass on. Sometimes he would start a rumor on the bow of the ship, then run back to the stern and time the rumor's arrival on the fantail. Today he prophesies the next attack of the Phantom Shitter, that mysterious individual who, in secret, defecates in a location other than a head [toilet], for the purpose of creating humor and/or havoc. It could be in a passageway or even on your work station desk. My third day out at sea I had port lookout on the mid‑watch and I was concentrating mostly on not freezing to death. Other than that minor problem I felt full assurance that things were well under control. (You know, just like in the movies.) After a short break within the bridge for coffee and to thaw out while I was waiting to resume my watch station, the ship took a violent roll to starboard and STOPPED! ‑ For what seemed like a lifetime. Slowly the roll reversed and the ship righted itself. With some effort we were able to adjust course and exchanged the terror of capsizing during a roll for the fear of disintegrating during a violent yaw.I had Bridge watch coming up soon and lay in my bunk to get a few winks before reporting to the bridge for my 2000 to 2400 underway sea station as a ‘Bridge Lookout.’ The bridge of a naval ship is its operational command center when the ship is "at sea." The steering is handled by the helmsman who keeps the ship on course by watching the gyro compass repeater. The Lee Helm is manned by the backup Helmsman, who operates the Engine Order Telegraph, a brass column with handles on each side located to send signals to the engine room. Other equipment located in the pilothouse includes the chart tables, control panels for the ship's navigational lights, alarms, radar repeaters, and communications equipment. Located immediately aft of the pilothouse is also the Captain's Sea Cabin where the C.O. (Commanding Officer) would live when the ship was underway. Here, he was close at hand should an emergency arise. A very small and cramped space in comparison to the In‑Port Cabin located two levels below on the Main Deck; the Sea Cabin was just barely wider than the bunk it contained. A small head (bathroom) was also located here. The open area outside of the pilothouse is known as the Captain's Bridge. On the bridge, the Officer of the Deck (OOD) controlled the ship by issuing orders to the men in the pilothouse, engine rooms, and the gun control stations. Communications was accomplished by enlisted men with sound‑powered telephones, the 1‑MC intercom unit, voice tubes, or by yelling through the portholes into the pilothouse. The captain's chair was located on the starboard side bridge wing. During emergencies or battle stations, the captain could take direct control of the ship.Standing Lookout Watch on the BridgeI was in Bridge Watch training, and we were told about getting night eyes and to scan the horizon for a short distance, stop momentarily, and repeat the process that this was the most effective technique to locate submarine periscopes, ships, or aircraft. It was emphasized repeatedly to not fix your gaze for more than a couple of seconds on any single object. The instructors were battle tested WWII veterans with years of experience, and they told me to continually "keep my eyes moving and my head on a swivel" because this was the best way to survive, not only in combat, but from peacetime hazards like collisions as well. Everyone on bridge watch was allowed to have hot coffee to better manage the cold and brisk wind coming off the Virginia Capes . Man, did that hot and black coffee taste good! We wore ‘Foul Weather Jackets’ and black wool hats as we scanned the horizon with powerful binoculars for any activity, foreign or domestic. Russian submarines were known to lie in wait for American war ships to exit Hampton Roads and then follow them. Even though the seas were heavy and the ship rocked, pitched and rolled furiously, at night, standing at the helm, with a bright moon lit sky, the stars shining, it was like standing in the presence of God. It was dark; the noise from the sea and the reverent quiet of the bridge crew would be filled with the smell of coffee impregnating the small space. Conversations would be whispered among the crew as the bridge talker communicated with deck watches and engine room. It was a beautiful way to spend four hours, albeit during the dark hours when all you wanted was sleep from the rigors of the day.My underway duty station was as lookout on the port wing of the bridge. Wide open to the elements, we were protected by a steel bulkhead from the waist down. My equipment consisted of binoculars and a binnacle-mounted compass with a gadget called a Pelorus, a moveable brass ring with degrees marked on it. This was how we could report a sighting, by giving a bearing relative to the ships heading. The officer who had the con (control of the ship) used these bearings to quickly locate whatever we sighted. Standing watch was four hours long, and standing alone at night was tough duty sometimes. Nothing would happen for what seemed hours, and sometimes the weather was pretty crappy, and it would be wet, cold, and a very long watch with no one to talk to. Of course we had radar and a crew on watch in CIC (combat information center), which was where the radar and sonar equipment was located. We were the fail safe, in case something got by them (which was unlikely), but even radar in those days could not spot anything just barely above the surface, and that’s where we came in. My second day out at sea I had port lookout on the mid‑watch and I was concentrating mostly on not freezing to death. Other than that minor problem I felt full assurance that things were well under control. (You know, just like in the movies.)After a short break within the bridge for coffee and to thaw out while I was waiting to resume my watch station, the ship took a violent roll to starboard and STOPPED! ‑ For what seemed like a lifetime. Slowly the roll reversed and the ship righted itself. With some effort we were able to adjust course and exchanged the terror of capsizing during a roll for the fear of disintegrating during a violent yaw. One of the thoughts that passed through my mind was that maybe I should have had a longer discussion with that Air Force Recruiting sergeant.Throughout this period the only thing that really bothered me was the fear of sudden violent death; nevertheless the OD and Captain and the bridge watch appeared "unruffled" bouncing off bulkheads, spilling coffee, and hanging on to whatever one hangs onto. Eventually as dawn broke and the sea settled down, things returned to normal. As we passed out of the storm I asked Duane Tyson BM3, a WW II veteran of a few years in the South Pacific "What was that?" Tyson remarked "Well it couldn't have been a typhoon 'cause they only have typhoons in the Pacific, and it couldn't have been a hurricane because it's not hurricane season, so I guess we'll just call it a typical Atlantic storm". Tyson indicated that if one had the choice between a typhoon, hurricane or and an Atlantic storm, take the typhoon. What ever it was it darn near sank us! I later found out that bridge watch that appeared to be "unruffled" were also scared witless. Tyson went on to explain things like critical roll angles; how if the ship rolls far enough those big grills on the side of the stacks will slurp up sea water instead of inhaling air for the boilers and how all sorts of bad thing could happen. This lecture was to prove of great advantage on future occasions when we encountered rough weather. I was no longer plagued with an irrational fear of the dangers of storms at sea. I now had an excellent, fact based, educated, understanding of precisely how one could encounter sudden violent death at sea. About the fourth day of the cruise one of the other destroyers lost a man overboard. We and three other destroyers dropped out of the formation and attempted a rescue. The man was alive and in a life jacket but after four hours of trying every possible means we lost track of him at dusk and he was gone! (Again thoughts of that Air Force recruiting sergeant came back.)Work DetailsLife at sea is a 24 X 7 work environment filled with drills, General Quarters, gun firing missions, operating with carriers, chasing Soviet submarines and standing watches. We worked 12 hour shifts when Plane Guarding Carrier Flight Operations and where we are essentially saving carrier pilot lives when they ditch in the sea and need to be sharp all the time. Everyone onboard ship had to endure endless work details including replenishing supplies, food, diesel oil, ammo, mail and we all had to chip in to stow this ordnance and supplies. We worked long hours into the nights on such work details only to be followed by a surprise General Quarters drill. There was never any peace, it was all work and duty - and I loved it! A ship begins to die the moment it is launched, sea water hates iron, and actually a ship lives its life in a pool of corrosion. Every storm leaves the ship rust-streaked, battered and bent. In the North Atlantic, when the Soley drove through four days of battering storms, it emerged with its gear smashed, two lifeboats put out of commission, life rails gone, hatches torn off, a bent hull, and great areas from which the paint had been stripped as neatly as if by a blowtorch. Even in the middle of the storm, the Bosun and his crew were on deck, repairing, battening down, and afterwards, they scraped rust, painted, scraped rust again. Did you know that the average deck and bulkhead can be painted over and over hundreds of time during the 20-30 year life span of the ship, without ever having any problem of paint buildups?"If it moves, salute it; if it doesn't, paint it."USS Soley Sea StoriesI got my first taste of life at sea; I saw real, dedicated professionals at work (and play); and I came to understand what drove men to committed service of their country. I knew I had become part of the best service the United States has. That I did not make a career of the Navy is not a reflection on this great service, but due rather to the unforeseeable paths life leads us down. If these lines make someone else think a bit about how lucky they were to be a sailor, I'll be happy.A Tense MomentWe had a kid aboard the Soley who came down with appendicitis and had to be evacuated. They sent a chopper to take him off. We were expecting a big Huey but they sent a small chopper with ski's but no winch. I think it was a army chopper. When it came over us, it flew along side the fan tail for pick up. We tried to pass him over to them but couldn't quite make it. All the poor kid could see was the water boiling from the propeller. You could see the look of terror in his eyes. After several failed tries, the pilot waved us off and flew away to reposition. When he returned, he actually set the chopper on the hand rail of the fantail with the prop just missing the aft five inch gun mount. All of the while, three or four ship fitters and me, who were manning the fire hoses, watched nervously as the transfer were finally made. I will never forget the look on the chief's face, when one of the skis got hung under the hand rail as the chopper tried to lift off. A tense moment, but the pilot handled it well. He calmly waited for the fantail to rise in the waves so he could dip the nose of the chopper forward, freeing him to back out and fly away. It went so well that it looked as if it had been planned that way.Rough SeasWe were on our way to Bloods worth Island for a shoot and getting some five inch shells from the heavy cruiser Canberra. One day while a Cruiser was alongside, the seas were so rough that both ships were being tossed up and down as they rode into and up and over the swells. During the replenishing of 5” projectiles using the forward boom, I saw that one of the cables had started to unravel all of the way back to the drum. Then, just as our ship went down, the cruiser went up and the cable parted letting the skip box loaded with nine projectiles swing into the side of the cruiser. When it hit, it bounced off and then flipped up side down and emptying them into the sea. The skipper passed the word to the cruiser that we are breaking loose and off we went into the white water bucking and bouncing in the heavy seas.Near Ship CollisionWe finished our shoot at Bloods worth Island and were rearming from the Roosevelt. My duty station during replenishment was manning the liens between ships on the 01 deck. I heard a lot of commotion and saw that the Roosevelt had dumped our winch line with bombs attached and was turning to port. At this point I was looking straight up at the Roosevelt’s flight deck hovering over me as both ships were on a collision course. At the same time, when I heard collision alarms sounding I thought my ass was grass and the Roosevelt was the lawnmower as there was nothing I could do. I saw the winch cable & shells running down the side of the ship toward the screw. Luckily, as soon as the Roosevelt cleared us our screw stopped. We had a dirty dangerous job.The Soley’s Fog HornSince when does a Fire Control man work on the ship's Fog Horn I asked? "What do you mean, the horn doesn't sound right?" This was the question I asked my First Class who volunteered me and asked me to remove the Soley's Fog Horn from the Bridge where it bellowed that lonely heart Fog Horn sound. Well, that was next to my battle station and I guess that was how they picked me.The Captain didn't like the way it sounded the last time it was blown. I was dreading working on it because of the limited space in the stack and the slender ladder and small platform under it. It was tight, hot and sweaty work just to get to it, much less remove it. The horn had been there since 1944 when the ship was commissioned and probably had never been removed since it was installed. The excess paint and rust, plus the steam valves being unturned in twenty years made this process slow. Four hours into the job, I had finally pried this bullfrog‑sounding horn from its resting place. With the help of a man with a rope, we carried the horn to the boathouse shop to be disassembled.Begrudgingly it came apart and the fear set in on me. I knew if! I couldn’t repair it we couldn’t get underway again. As the horn tear down proceeded, it was apparent how it worked. It was a high‑pressure steam‑operated horn where steam shot through a nozzle and hit four 12‑inch round plates that vibrated against each other to give that low eerie sound. What had happened was that crud had built up on the plates and the four discs weren't vibrating properly. With the four discs removed, we cleaned and shined each one up, but this wasn't good enough for Chief Ables. He wanted them blued to see if they were touching each other properly. Finding out they wouldn't touch properly, we spent the next four days grinding then against each other with a red grinding compound until they were shiny as new dollars. We cumshaw enough parts to make the thing work. For those not knowing the definition of cumshaw, it is stealing. Well, maybe not that harsh. It is a Navy slang word that means to get something for nothing. In our case, it was to beg, borrow, steal or trade until our mission was accomplished. We reassembled and reinstalled the horn and stood with our fingers crossed. Chief Ables called to the Con for a test to be run on the horn. What a beautiful sound as they blasted it three times! I was very proud after I stopped shaking. How many sailors got a chance to work on the ship's Fog Horn in their lifetime?Explosion"What the hell was that," I thought as the deck shuddered under my feet as I was walking forward by the Number One hole. As GQ started sounding, I thought it felt like an explosion. Sailors were running everywhere to their battle stations. Steam was coming out of the engine room while snipes boiled out of the hatch as fast as their feet would carry them. My station was the Main Battle Gun Director on the bridge, and with the sound powered headphones on, I quickly heard that there was an explosion in the engine room. A JG Engineering officer had just come aboard days before and was down on the lower deck of the engine room studying the piping and machinery. What an initiation for the new guy! Thank God he was on the port side when the explosion happened. Not knowing he was there, sailors had abandoned the lower deck, leaving him there alone. He was lucky enough to remember seeing an escape ladder as he had passed around the starboard side. He located it and was lucky to get out on his own.We had lost a large exhaust valve on the Number One generator as they were switching over to Number Two. Someone had either opened or closed a valve too fast; causing the explosion that had disintegrated the valve in one of the sailors' hands. How he walked away is a mystery to me. It had cut valve stems off like a knife through hot butter. It had lifted deck plates, blown men up the stairways and filled the whole engine room with high‑pressure steam. We immediately swung in to the wave troughs and were rocked back and forth for the next several hours. We were back under way when the blown area was sealed off and steam generated so we could make four knots into the wind. We were really lucky that day that no one ended up in the walk‑in freezer. It took three months to locate another valve and install it so Number One generator could be put back on line. After getting out of the Navy, I was in Memphis, Tennessee and drove by the Tri‑State Valve Company and damned if a valve like ours wasn't on display at their front door!Bosun's MatesThe Bosun’s' mates were always yelling about something. Getting the motor whaleboat in the water was, to my unpracticed eye, a Chinese fire drill. Somehow the davits never wanted to cooperate. It always took a lot of pulling, yelling, pushing, bumbling by the boat crew and line handlers, and finally a great splash. Then imagine this in reverse. One of the few things the gator navy did well was to get the boats, a lot of boats, in the water and recover them smartly, I thought. During one refueling, a loud Bosun’s mate probably saved me from serious injury.We had finished fueling. I, and others, was tending the high line, and the order came to let go. I was standing in a bight and if it hadn't been for a well-directed blast of curses that warned me to jump, I might have been sleeping with the fishes. I had more respect, and less fear, for Bosun’s' mates after that.Mk. 37 Gun Director ClunkingThe main battery fire control director developed a slight problem in that it would shift a small amount on its roller path as the ship would roll. This generated a rather pronounced "clunk" while underway. Being next to the Captains sea cabin, this became a top priority for repair during a stopover at the ship yard. The yard birds were unable to find a problem, so when we went out for sea trials, two mechanical engineers in white shirts and ties were sent out with us to find the problem. They were in the Barbet of the director with thickness gauges in hand when the ship started to roll. I had to leave them and go check on something in the Mk. 34 radar room. When I returned about ten minutes later they both were on all fours over a couple of buckets we kept there to catch small drips of oil. Although a little green around the gills and puking their guts out, they were able to find and fix the problem and the Captain was again able to catch a few winks in his sea cabin.Firing Mission with the USS WisconsinAs a seamen and on one of my first shoots, I was assigned as 1JV talker on the bridge. I was standing on the port wing daydreaming about the tropics we would hit on this voyage. There was no one near me and there was no talk on the circuit. I gazed out to port at the horizon when the guns on number two mount both went off in a port broadside salvo, just under and forward of where I was standing. What saved my hearing was the 1JV head set, but I got peppered by pieces of the burning cork wad from the shell case. As you can guess, everyone on the bridge except me knew those guns were about to fire. I don't want to think anyone would enjoy a laugh at my expense. The Wisconsin had target drones and a launcher on her fantail and every now and then the 40mm guns of the squadron would get a little exercise. The Soley never hit one, but the story was that the fuses (or the fire control directors) were calibrated to avoid killing the drones so they could be used time and again. The Soley usually got the job of fishing the drones out of the sea after a shoot which was given high priority because COMDESRON Two (A full three stripe Commander), embarked on the Soley this time and everyone wanted to make a good impression. The Admiral on the Wisconsin was watching as well. The recoveries had to be a ship-shape, seamanlike operation. Once the exec took the con to bring Soley alongside the drone for the Bosun’s to bring aboard, covering the exec with glory. The exec made a smart, seamanlike approach, except that he ran over the drone; it sank like a stone, and was never seen again.Socializing on the FantailUnder way, a few off-watch crew members would assemble socially on the fantail during the dog watches to tell stories, joke, gripe, and best of all, ridicule the actions of the officers. They took special delight in telling and retelling the imagined and real screw-ups. The incident of the exec sinking the drone was a running joke that went on for days. There was a time when another destroyer missed its turn in the reorientation of the screen and caused all the destroyers to scatter like quail to avoid collisions. The bearers of this tale were the members of the bridge watch, of course. Every man on the fantail could have done a better job at conning the other destroyer and the finer points of ship handling were discussed for days. Even the few pale snipes who wandered up to the fantail in the late afternoon's waning sunlight had an opinion.Destroyers Are NoisyAnd the noise! Of course, in gun fire missions, when all the cannons are firing, that’s noise enough, but, without all that, in a normal sea, a destroyer is a noisy ship. There’s always the whine of the engines, shriek of the wind, and the slap and splashes of the sea along the hull . . . the whump-whump of the screws as they break the surface and their steady rumble as they bite under water and drive the ship …… the thump of twin anchors against the hull as the bows heave and fall even in a moderate sea the slosh of the sea as blue water surges onto the Foc'cle and sluices through the scuppers or slams solidly against the bridge windows 40 feet above the waterline and the whine of the steering engine as the helmsman makes even minor corrections. And of course we humans, in the occasional clatter of tools dropped onto the steel deck and the continual mutter of talk as the sailors go about their duties. Even so, there is a human quietness and dignity about the ship. Sailors, generally a cheery lot, seldom raise their voices as they go about their tasks. They know their duties and perform them without fanfares, there never is any shouting.Rough SeasStorms at sea can be a harrowing experience on a Destroyer and because of the size of the ship, the weather decks are awash much of the time and the crew isn't allowed outside on the weather decks for safety reasons. Violent pitching and rolling cause seasickness in many sailors and getting around the ship is difficult, and you can find yourself walking on the bulkheads at times and this is why stowage for sea is so important. At sea, sailors do constant battle against the elements, storms, gales, hurricanes; against mast-high waves and punishing winds; against seas so rough sailors cannot stand or walk or even stay in their bunks without holding on. Even in a calm sea, destroyer sailors eat with one hand while balancing their food trays with the other, and walking is always a test of balance. Destroyer sailors develop sea legs quickly, and a special roll that, ashore, singles out the destroyer sailor from among other ship crews. In a rough sea, life takes on a new meaning as the ship rolls and pitches and leaps and falls and slings itself about like a thing alive and berserk when normal ships’ work is suspended because it cannot be performed. Ships’ cooks cannot prepare proper meals, producing only beans and coffee as long as the rolling and pitching continue. Some ship’s work cannot be suspended, because the ship must make way, must survive. And General Quarters can be sounded at anytime. Regardless of the difficulties, engineers stand watch in the sweltering heat of the engine rooms and boiler rooms, quartermasters and signalmen stand watch on the sluing bridge, lookouts on the wind- and spray-swept flying bridge remain alert for danger from the sea, from ships, from the enemy, radio operators lock their legs around chair legs set in deck brackets to hold them in place and copy messages that carry life or death information, and gun crews are on standby around the clock. When heading into the wind, the deck rises and falls unpredictably causing you to "fly” off your feet which provides a strange sensation when climbing ladders. In severe storms, regular ships’ work is suspended, and the crew can be confined to their bunks and even tied to them to keep from falling out. In my wild man value system, I looked at these violent sea days as a great adventure and was proud that I survived them with a good attitude. It made me feel like I was a “Sailor.”Plane GuardingWhile the Battle group sailed south toward Jacksonville, we engaged in endless Plane Guarding of the carrier’s aircraft. Plane guarding meant being stationed close in front, on the side, or behind the carrier in case an aircraft had to go down in takeoff or landing. Carriers are faster than our 35 knot (42 MPH) destroyers and must maintain a steady course into the wind and speed during flight operations to allow destroyers to keep up. A destroyer will follow behind a carrier during flight operations to act as lifeboat. In case of a bad cat shot, deck overshoot or man overboard, the plane guard makes the rescue so the carrier can continue launch and recovery of aircraft. Plane guard is a mixture of thrills and boredom. We trailed a few hundred feet behind the huge "huge carrier" as she launched jet fighters and attack bombers; F-4s, F-8s, and A-4s. Practice bombing missions continued around the clock, weather permitting.A twin-engine, 25-ton F-4 fighter hitting the carrier's deck at more than 150 miles per hour, with nothing but wire cables stretched across the deck to catch the plane's "belly-hook," had to be seen to be believed. One day when we were alongside the carrier doing Plane Guard duty and I was in the top side Main Gun Director, my battle station, watching the planes take off and land. I had a clear view of the flight deck and saw a F4 bounce the Davis barrier and take the two AD's off the bow into the sea. We picked up the one F4 pilot. During constant air operations, crippled planes became a common sight. Pilots and planes could at times "limp" back to the carriers, but sometimes missed the cable lines in the dark or, misjudged the carrier's deck completely and plunged the six-story drop into the saline drink. When this happened, our whaleboat was dropped into the sea and headed for the plane, usually in the company of helicopters that were leaving the carrier at the same time. Rescue operations succeeded more often than not, but we all witnessed many pilots dying in the cold waters of the AtlanticOne sunny and calm day, one of the carriers radioed that one of their aircraft was returning with his landing gear fouled up and he was going to ditch. Almost immediately after this message was received, the aircraft appeared, flying low across our bow. The pilot had his canopy open and grinned and waved as he went by. A few hundred yards to our starboard, he dropped his plane in the water, the aircraft went down and the pilot bobbed up, his ditching procedure was faultless. Our motor whale boat went out to pick him up, none the worse for wear.St. Elmo's FireI was standing my Bridge Watch on a very dark and foggy night off the Carolina coast. Suddenly, the O.O.D. spotted a "Light" off the starboard bow approximately five miles away. We thought that it was a Russian trawler playing games with us. The Capt. ordered the ship to turn to port at which the "trawler" seemed to follow. It seemed as though we were closing on this "target" so the Capt. ordered all stop. As we stopped, so did the light. He than ordered "reverse" at which so did the light. After about 15 minutes of trying to figure this target out, one of the officers on watch determined that the light was the tip of one of our own whip antenna's glowing in the dark and its reflection off the sky. This was caused by the atmospheric conditions at the time (fog and rain). All that witnessed this breathed a sigh of relief now knowing that the Soviets weren’t playing chicken with us.Signal BridgeAt the top of the bridge is the Signal Bridge, the center for visual signals to other ships steaming in company with the Soley. My battle station, the main battle director sat on the signal bridge above the bridge. Signals originated by the Captain or the Officer of the Deck and were relayed by signalmen to other ships using one of three means of communication: semaphore, signals flags, or 12‑inch signal lamps. Lookouts constantly checked for other ships that might be signaling the Soley.Call Letter Signal FlagsOne of the first things that you will notice are ships flying signal flags from the mast, the flags are the ship's call letters and can be used to tell other ships what our ship was doing, and for doing things, like “Execute turn to Port.”Blinker Signal LampA signal lamp is a visual signaling device for optical communication using Morse code. The lamps are a focused lamp which can produce a pulse of light; the pulse is achieved by opening and closing shutters mounted in front of the lamp, with a manually-operated pressure switch. Just below my battle station on the signal bridge were a pair, port and starboard, of signal lamps, and once we got to sea the signal men would be talking to each other in Morse code while furiously opening and closing the shutters. Every navy ship, foreign and US Navy understood Morse code, so this was the way we often communicated with the Soviet Navy.Destroyer’s Luxury AccommodationsThe ship's luxury accommodations include the Mess Hall which has a (always empty) Coke Machine and a Bubbler (warm water which tastes like sea water and diesel oil) and turns into a gambling casino on paydays. Two 550‑square‑ft. ‘Premier Suites’ which house the ship’s officers, one in the Foc’cle and one amidships, both on the main deck. The Officer’s Mess with attached kitchen manned by Filipino and Black Stewards. The Chief’s Quarters in the Foc’cle with a dedicated kitchen and toilets. The aft crew’s head which has four real sit-down stainless steel toilets while the forward head’s toilet is just a long trough with wooden slats across for four people to sit and evacuate at a time. The roominess of the forward (first division) berthing compartment holds 65 sailors and the Sonar Room, while the aft (2nd division) berthing compartment holds 100 people, the aft steering compartment and the ship’s machine shop.Work DetailsA ship begins to die the moment it is launched, sea water hates iron, and actually a ship lives its life in a pool of corrosion and rust. Every storm leaves the ship rust-streaked, battered, bent and needing repair. Did you know that the average deck and bulkhead can be painted over and over hundreds of time during the 20-30 year life span of the ship, without ever having any problem of paint buildups? Life at sea is a 24 X 7 work environment filled with drills, General Quarters, gun firing missions, operating with carriers and plane guarding, chasing Soviet submarines and standing watches. There were drills for this and that and we got really good at being sailors ready for any thing, especially confrontations with the Soviets. We worked 12 hour shifts when Plane Guarding Carrier Flight Operations and where we are essentially saving carrier pilot lives when they ditch in the sea and need to be sharp all the time. Everyone onboard ship had to endure endless 24 X 7 work details including replenishing supplies, food, diesel oil, ammo, mail and we all had to chip in to stow this ordnance and supplies. We worked long hours into the nights on such work details only to be followed by a surprise General Quarters drill. There was never any peace, it was all work and duty - and I loved it!Underway ReplenishmentSince a destroyer is small with little Bunkerage, it needs to replenish stores often. Underway replenishment ("UNREP") is required every three of four days when at sea. A rendezvous is set up with a large ship such as a carrier, tanker, supply ship or ammunition ship. At the appointed place and time, the Destroyer falls in place to port or starboard of the larger ship. On a signal from the other ship, the Destroyer pulls alongside matching course and speed exactly. The ships are less than 100 feet apart. The larger ship shoots a small line across the gap using a modified M1 rifle and a spool of line. To that line are linked a larger line, and a sound powered phone cable. These are pulled across by the Destroyers forward line handling team. The ships had to go fast for better stability while water would race and boil between the ships. The phone line is hooked up and manned by phone talkers on each bridge to exchange navigation and pumping instructions. Several more lines are attached and pulled across for aft and amidships stations (if used). A large wire suspension cable is pulled across and attached to the refueling gantry. Next, a large fuel hose, suspended from the cable span, is hauled across. It is important for the line handling team to pull hard and fast as the male coupling tip nears the female receptacle. A halfhearted attempt won't seat the probe, and Fuel cannot be pumped. Mail, parts, ammunition and people are transferred this way too. When refueling and transfers are complete, the breakaway procedure begins. Pumping stops and the hoses are blown through with air pressure. The probe is released, and retracted to the Oiler. Finally, the suspension cable is released along with the phone line. When the ships are completely disconnected, the Destroyer pulls ahead quickly, and then executes a hard turn away from the Oiler. Some poor guy fell overboard while refueling. He was leaning over the flying wing bridge looking at the carrier on the port side, and all of a sudden he wasn’t there anymore. We looked down and there he was, trying to get out of his foul-weather jacket. We threw him a life-line and told the guy on watch to pass the word so the crew would launch a lifeboat. By the time they got to him, he had all his clothes off and was close to being frozen.Typically, the fueled ship will play music over the ships 1MC as a "Breakaway" song, usually a Country or Western song, or something having to do with the ships name or mission. This is a morale builder and a source of pride for the crew. If we were alongside a large capital ship like a carrier, a battleship or cruiser, there would always be a Marine band playing John Phillip Sousa marching music.Believe me, hearing the Washington Post March at sea puts a chill up your backbone!Every Day Ended with . . . A Bosun’s Pipe whistling on the 1MC;"Knock off ships’ work. Sweepers man your brooms. Get a clean sweep-down fore and aft. Clamp down all weather decks. Empty all trash cans”. . . .Sumner Class ArmamentTwin 5' 38 " GunsThe twin Mk 38 Gun Mount was designed specifically for the Sumner-Gearing Class destroyers with three gun mounts, two forward, one on the main deck Foc'cle, the other on the 01 level below the bridge, and one aft on the main deck Fantail. Each barrel was capable of maintaining 15 to 20 rounds per minute and this is how the Soley pays its bills. What that meant was the 5-inch is the weapon of choice when engaging any surface, air, or shore targets. This was unquestionably the finest Dual Purpose gun of World War II. The 5"/38 wound up being used on nearly every major US warship built between 1934 and 1945 and were still being used on new construction as late as the 1960s. These guns were hand-loaded, but power-rammed, which gave them a high rate of fire and a capability of being easily loaded at any angle of elevation, both of which are highly desirable qualities for an anti-aircraft weapon. The introduction of proximity-fuzzed AA shells in 1943 made this weapon an even more potent AAA gun. The basic round for the Mk 12 gun was semi-fixed, with a 54-pound projectile and a 28-pound shell case that included a 15-pound powder charge. The initial velocity of the round was 2,600 feet per second with a maximum range of 18,200 yards at 45 degrees elevation and a ceiling of 37,200 feet at 85 degrees elevation. Projectile fuses were "cut" automatically in the projectile hoist during the hoisting operation by the fuse-setting indicator-regulator attached to the hoist. Setting-setting orders were received -electrically from the gun director or plotting room and mechanically transmitted to the fuse on the projectile. Fuses could also be cut locally by hand-cranking the orders into the indicator-regulator. Automatic fuse setting was available only on base-ring-type mountings. There was a 40 man crew for each five twin gun mount, some were below decks in the lower ammunition or below mount handling rooms and some were in the gun mount itself.Twin 3' 50" GunsWhen multiple hits from Oerlikon 20 mm cannon and Bofors 40 mm guns were unable to prevent kamikaze strikes during the final year of the second world war; the 3"/50 was adapted as a replacement for these weapons. The 3″/50 caliber gun was a semiautomatic anti-aircraft weapon with a power driven automatic loader. On the Sumner class destroyer, they were fitted out as a single for the Port and Starboard side of the ship, and as two twin mounts on the 01 level aft of the Torpedo tubes facing the rear of the ship. They were hand loaded with a brass shell consisting of powder and explosive and capable of a rapid rate of fire. With proximity fuse and fire-control radar, a dual 3″/50 mount firing 50 rounds per minute per barrel was considered more effective than a quad Bofors 40 mm gun against subsonic aircraft, but relatively ineffective against supersonic jets and cruise missiles.Torpedoes01 level, 5 torpedo tubes in quintuple centerline mounts each 2000 lbs with 800 lbs explosive chargeDepth Charges:01 level port & starboard forward, 6 x K-Gun, 30 Hedge Hog rocket depth chargesFantail, 2 x depth charge track, 26 depth chargesMy Battle Station - Weapons ControlJust as the 5‑inch guns could be operated remotely by the Mk‑37 gun director located above the bridge, most other weapons systems aboard ship could be operated remotely. Two Mark 63 remote gun directors for the forward twin 3 inch 50 guns were located on the forward corners of the bridge. On the aft corners of this level are two Mark 27 torpedo directors. On the aft port side bulkhead of the pilothouse, push‑button controls are mounted for remotely firing the six K‑gun depth charge projectors. Located immediately beside the K‑gun firing controls, two long levers can be used to drop depth charges from the fantail tracks using a hydraulic system. Nine men manned the bridge and pilothouse during normal Condition II wartime cruising. Condition I was known as "general quarters," with all weapons manned. Condition II was wartime cruising with some weapons manned and Condition III was peacetime cruising with gun directors manned but no weapons manned.There’s always the whine of the engines, shriek of the wind, and the slap and splashes of the sea along the hull . . . the whump-whump of the screws as they break the surface and their steady rumble as they bite under water and drive the ship …… the thump of twin anchors against the hull as the bows heave and fall even in a moderate sea the slosh of the sea as blue water surges onto the Foc'cle and sluices through the scuppers or slams solidly against the bridge windows 40 feet above the waterline and the whine of the steering engine as the helmsman makes even minor corrections. And of course we humans, in the occasional clatter of tools dropped onto the steel deck and the continual mutter of talk as the sailors go about their duties. Even so, there is a human quietness and dignity about the ship. Sailors, generally a cheery lot, seldom raise their voices as they go about their tasks. They know their duties and perform them without fanfares, there never is any shouting. I learned quickly there was no rest when at sea, it was a constant exercise in standing watches, doing your work (mine was keeping the weapons systems 100 per cent operational), battle training, and maintaining the ship (chipping and painting your work spaces). We would go to General Quarters day and night, week after week, ensuring the ship was manned and ready for battle at a moment notice and usually it took us less than three minutes. Everyone knew that immediate response would enable us to quickly inflict heavy damage on the enemy and save the ship from destruction. I loved it!