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                                       Message sent by: Lthor1141@aol.com

I checked out of the Navy on a Friday but didn't finish until late. The doc had left for the weekend and I couldn't get a physical until Monday. So I was in "X" division over the weekend. The ultimate cyberspace in and out of the Navy simultaneously. Sunday night the NN needed to assign SP to the fleet landing. I was the only Petty Officer around doing nothing. Again waiting to
go home the next day for good. Anyway, I was assigned to SP at the fleet landing I believe it was the mid watch. Weather got really bad couldn't run boats. Hundreds of guys sitting around coming off weekends etc. I took it upon myself to enforce ultimate Navy policy. No sitting on the deck or sleeping or grab assing or anything. Wrote people up, rapped the bottoms of sleeping sailors shoes with my night stick to wake them up, challenged by many people they were short timers and leave them alone ( I was the ultimate short timer) I was agenerally all around jag. To everyone I harassed, I am sorry. But I had a great time my last night in the Navy.
Larry Thorson
BM3 NN  60-63

Didja ever notice that when you send an email to be taken off some SPAMer's email list, that your request always seems to be undeliverable??
Speaking of Shore Patrol memories, I was busted by the SP's in downtown Norfolk for not wearing gloves with my peacoat (!!!???). I was a Seaman Deuce at the time, about 2 weeks out of boot camp. The guy's that picked me up were a pair of SK 2's off some tender who were not in the duty section but had gotten drafted to stand SP. Needless to say they had a woodie for anyone they could find. Besides me they picked up their Chief for drunk and disorderly (not a smooth move even if he was drunk). I was the first guy or so I was told, in Fox Division to go to mast in 5 years. Needless to say with the help of my Fox Division mates, I was lower than the belly of a stepped on snake. (Deservedly so) Them stupid gloves cost me a clean record, 2 weeks restriction and $100.00 fine.
But it was money well spent. That episode taught me a good lesson and made me determined to never get in trouble again. And I never did, at least it went undetected. The day after I got off restriction, NN pulled into Pearl Harbor on the way to VN. FTG 2 Karl (The Kraut) Mueller befriended me and offered to buy me a beer at the brand new enlisted club on the base. His hand no more than touched the handle to the club door when some Marine departed the club thru the plate glass window. Just getting off restriction, I beat a hasty retreat. We ended up at the club on Ford Island. About 10 minutes into the mission, some Kiwi off the HMNZS Blackpool got into a fight with an air dale from the Ticonderoga over politics (this sound familiar??). The Kiwi thought Nixon was a pretty good guy and the Air dale thought Nixon was the Anti-Christ or something. Again we beat a retreat opting for the ship this time. GEEZ, a guy tries to stay out of trouble. . . .
I also purposed within my heart to never do that to someone else if ever I was on SP. But sadly I did screw some dumb squid. Not intentionally, but it sure ended up that way. About 11 years later in 1979, I was stationed at Glakes. I stood SP on duty days and our standing orders were to bust squids who were out of uniform or not wearing it properly. There was a SA who was wearing his peacoat in civvies. A definite no-no. We weren't going to write him up. Remembering what had happened to me. We were going to take his ID and liberty card, walk him back to his barracks and have his chief ream him out. Nothing more. As it turned out he was living in the TPU barracks. He ended up going to the brig until his court martial. I couldn't believe his CPO could be so anal. The guy I was with and I really felt bad for the poor kid. If we'd known what was going to happen to him we'd taken him out behind his barracks, given his ID card back to him, and reamed him ourselves with threats of death and dismemberment if we saw him on the streets again that night.
Any of you Fox Division types from WestPac II remember the SP's who nearly killed Steve Kammerer? Or the time Johnnie Wayne Fairclothe punched out a Chief on SP and beat the rap at court martial. By the way I ran in to Master Chief Fire Controlman J.W. Fairclothe almost 20 years later. He was the Command Master Chief on the USS "Leakin' Larry" Lawrence DDG 4. Hadn't changed a bit.

Steven Grubbs

                        Message sent by: Dennis Cope  dcope@shore.intercom.net

After I got off the Newport News I was assigned to a tin can "Furse DD-214". The Quarter Deck watch was armed with a 45. Again not loaded but we did have a clip what could only be inserted with the watch officer's permission. If anything happened we would both be dead.
Now on this same ship the ASROC watch had a loaded 45 for a time until one of them shot another shipmate who was messing with him on watch.
Which reminds does anyone remember back in 70 when some hand grenades were
missing? The FT's had to stand a import roving watch to check on all the other watches set
up by the Captain to make sure no more grenades were stolen. The roving watch had to report to the Marines. On one of my rounds I couldn't find the watch in T-2 and (to cover my butt) had to report this to the Marines, who really made a big deal out of it. Come to find out the GM's chief had the watch leave his post and do some shit job some where else. To this day I am not sure who's butt got chewed the most, the watch or the GM Chief.
Of course my mane was Shit for a while, they said I should have looked harder...

Dennis

 

                    Message sent by: Joe Mackey  wmackey@access.mountain.net

<< Raymond wrote: The reasons that the weapons were carried unloaded with loaded magazines in the ammo pouch is probably because of the navy' s lousy small arms training >>

This reminds me of something. Around 1970 we were playing Navy off the Carolina coast and the Marines were using old paint cans tossed overboard for target practice. Usually it was one shot to sink the can. I was standing around watching (I was supposed to be swabbing the deck or something) and this jar... uh, Marine, asked if I wanted to give it a try. Now one reason I joined the Navy was so I wouldn't have to carry a rifle or side arm, but thought there wasn't much damage I could do, provided I kept it pointed over the side. I held the gun (don't ask for details, I have no idea. All I know was it was big and heavy) and let go, nearly a full clip. While I didn't hit the can I did make those bullets dance in the water right purdy like (a little Southern lingo there). Naturally the Marine had a good laugh over that. Come to think of it, that was the last time I remember ever having my hands on a gun, loaded anyway...
Joe '69-71
Visit my home page at:
http://members.tripod.com/~HomeSweetHomepage/index.html

                               Message sent by: "rmulero"  rmulero@msn.com

HI Jim:
I got one for you.
During the first Nam cruise and R/R at Olongapo, I decided to head back early by myself at 11:30 P.M. and beat the rush back. I was all the way down the far end of the strip and started walking back. As I crossed one of the side streets, two guys stepped out from the alley, reached up behind me and grabbed my watch off my wrist. I turned and ran after them in hot pursuit screaming and yelling to attract the Shore Patrol. I ran for several blocks off the main strip and was gaining on them when they jumped in the back of a Jitney and sped off. I gave it one more push and jumped on the back of the Jitney too and as I was reaching for the one who had my watch, the other one took out a switch blade and took a swipe at me. I let go and fell off backwards from the Jitney. I guess I blacked out from the fall for a moment, when I opened my eyes, they were almost on top of me when suddenly the Shore Patrol can running up the street to where I was and saved me from God knows what! The local cops came and took me to Police Headquarters. I filled out
more reports for that watch than I did for my enlistment contract. It was years later that I realized how dumb that pursuit was.
Ralph Mulero 66-68 CR Div.

                             Message sent by: Dave Lewis  davel@mmcable.com

One of my better evenings working for the shore patrol at Subic occurred when I was assigned to work with a first class steward. He was from the Islands as were many steward's mates back in those days. We hit the bridge and he says "You come with me - we're going to see my cousin."
We walked through a bunch of back alleys and ended up at the back door to a restaurant. We went in and sat down in a back room. We put our SP stuff under the table, I threw a couple of bucks American down, and we ate and drank all night. We had a couple of rum and cokes as we figured that it wouldn't be as obvious as a San Miguel and I hoped that the rum would kill the typhoid germs in the ice. Don't ask me what I ate but I suspect that it may have barked at one time. It was good though. About 11:30PM we got up, put our SP stuff back on, and headed for the gate. Good duty if you can get it.

   I remember that just before I retired, I was punished by God and assigned to the new Destroyer Tender USS Yellowstone. After spending the preceding 10 years on battleships, you can imagine the humiliation of being assigned to a non combatant. We were conducting a .45, 12 gauge and M-14 qualification shoot on the flight deck. The Yellow Stain had two open fantail decks below the flight deck. I was assigned to keep people off the lowest fantail. As I'm standing there, I thought "This is really stupid. There ain't no way that a bullet is going to ricochet off the water and back on the ship!!" Well about five minutes later as they were blazing away two decks up, I felt a sharp sting in my leg. I had been shot by a .45!!! I looked down and there was the bullet laying on the deck. Fortunately it was well spent. But I had a nice bruise none the less. I tried for the Purple Heart, but the Old Man said no way!!
Finally, I beg everybody's forgiveness if I have cluttered the email. But this is a great way to relive some memories, and relieve some current day stress.
Steven Grubbs

 

Reflecting on the side arms at the pay table issue, and much of what else has been discussed here of late, one thing MUST be remembered. That is: "The NAVY, 225 years of tradition unhampered by progress"
Also, I have been reflecting on the experiences that we have shared and enjoyed reading about at this forum, there is something I thought of last night.
We all have tons of memories of things that we did years ago. Some things were funny, some were sad. Some we like to brag about, some we wish to Heaven never happened and could be forever purged from our memory and the record.
The sad thing is that today's men and women in the military will Not have those memories. Sadly the military has been emasculated so that nobody, anywhere at anytime could be possibly offended. Remember the time you came back drunk and fell down the ladder? Today you would be sent straight to Alcohol Rehab. After you went to mast, fined, reduced in rate, and restricted. Remember that girl you pinched on the butt? Today, you would most likely be kicked out of the Navy. But if you showed enough remorse, and caught the Old Man or Old Lady in a good mood, you might get away with restriction, fines, reduction in rate, and a lengthy stay at "Sensitivity" training. Or if your wife accidentaIy kites a check, your family is subjected to having your finances and spending habits reviewed by the command, and again you get "Counseling". Geez, what did we do before "Counseling"??? In the old days you could and did say pretty much what was on your mind, and at worst get a fat lip out of it. Today it goes into your record that you do not support the command or the government, and are labeled as "Politically Incorrect".
I don't mean to sound cynical. But if I'm lyin', I'm dyin'!! That is the way it was when I retired 7 years ago. I am told that it has gotten far worse since then.
While I'm venting my spleen, It is amazing to think that 56 years ago we won the greatest war man has ever fought, and we did it without Equal Rights, Affirmative Action, Weight Control, Sensitivity training, Political Correctness, Alcohol Rehab., etc, etc. Just think, if we'd have had all that, we could have defeated the Japanese and Germans in maybe 3 or 4 days, who knows?? And did it with a racially and sexually equal of loss of American lives.
Be thankful for your memories, but be careful who you share them with, it may go in your "Permanent Record"!! Also be thankful you served when you did.
signed, cynical Steve

                                  Message sent by: REBEL9622@aol.com

Bos'n Mates had a great stress reliever. Up at O' Dark hundred, cold sea water 1/2 each. Firebrick, sweege handle, sand and soogie 16 licks to a board, all before you got to stand in line for your powdered eggs. Then back to what you thought was a sparkling clean deck and pait work to discover that the snipes had blown tubes or (2) every deck apes favorite sport refueling. Hell guys we didn't have anything to do anyway. Yea right! Ahhh the good ole days! Anybody ever wonder who tubes was an did he enjoy it. LOL guys.
GARY 62/64

                    Message sent by: Gary W Palmer  gary.w.palmer@juno.com

During the '71 NATO Cruise I had an unusual experience that I still talk about to this day.
I was an ETN3 and part of my responsibilities included maintaining the WLR-1 passive Electronics Counter Measures equipment. This was normally not a big deal, mostly just preventive maintenance and usually done with a cup of coffee close by. One cold morning, and I do mean cold, we were 300 or so miles north of the Arctic Circle and participating in a NATO exercise. Sometime during the night a problem had occurred with the WLR-1. At first I thought, "No big deal.", then I found out that the antennae was no longer rotating. As it turned out, me and another guy were "volunteered" to repair the antennae which was located on a platform up near the smoke stack. We got some cold weather gear on, gathered up our tools and headed up to the bridge.
It was standard procedure to leave notification on the bridge whenever someone was going aloft. When we checked in we were told that due to the exercises the NN was doing a Zig Zag pattern. The Captain was on the bridge but it seemed like he wasn't interested in what we were doing
there. Our chief had told us to let the bridge know we would be working above the stack and would not be able to breath if the smoke were to blow in our direction. So we would not succumb to the "stack gas" the maneuvering orders were changed from Zig Zag to "Keep the wind blowing
across the ship from Starboard to Port while men were aloft".
We proceeded aloft and started to work. We didn't really want to stay up there that long but getting the antennae dome off and replacing the belt wasn't the easiest thing we'd ever done. About 30 minutes into our work we felt the mighty NN start a turn to Port. We both looked at each other
and right away we knew we might be in trouble. The turn meant that the stack smoke was heading our way. Not wanting to bet our lives on our breath holding ability we quickly unhooked our safety lines and started a hasty retreat down. We were in the stack gas for only 30 seconds or so
but that was enough to quicken our descent a little more. We made it down safely and immediately ventured into the bridge area to find out what had happened. We got there just in time to see the Captain chewing out the Officer Of the Day that had just came on watch. The new OOD had
looked at the orders to do the Zig  Zag pattern and had completely over looked the rescinding orders. When the Captain saw us standing there he stopped the ass chewing and came over to us. He asked if we were OK and we said we were. He then asked if we had much more work to do and we said about 20 minutes worth. He assured us that the stack gas would be
kept off of us while we finished. He then said he would write out an order for us to pick up when we came down after completing our work.
We'll I gotta tell you, the remainder of the work went pretty quick
because about all we could think about was, "What was the order going to be?". When we got down we checked into the bridge to let them know we
were finished. We were handed the order written by the Captain and it basically said, "Report to sick bay, see the ships doctor, receive two rations each of medicinal brandy and be on light duty for the remainder of the day." We couldn't have been happier at that moment if we had won
the lottery!
That's the way I remember it 29 years ago or at least that's the way I've been telling my only interesting sea story. If you happen to be the other guy that experienced this with me, let me know. Also let me know if that's the way you remember it as well.
Gary Palmer
ETN3 71-72

 

                               Message sent by: Audreyandjoe@aol.com
Hi Mates, My sea story is as follows; When I came aboard "Old Thunder", I was slated for the engine room, with my red apprentise stripes. At the Master-at-arms office, he read my orders. He said,"You play the trumpet, huh?" Take off those stripes and put white ones on. You are now in the Navigation Department. Here's the bugler's manual, the bugle, and practise. You are now our bugler." I didn't know a thing about Navy calls, but I learned. I had the best job on the ship. I just loved playing tattoo and taps. Teed off a lot of people. I played about 1-1/2 years and then I graduated, with the help of Ralph Brandt, to the special sea detail helmsman. Very, very challenging. Been in some tough spots in that job. I did a lot of other jobs in Nan.
Loved 'em all. After October, 1960, I came an officer in the Wisconsin National Guard. Had three Infantry Companies and the hardest thing I had to do was go to the University of Wisconsin
and put down the student protest of the war in Viet Nam. I had 11 Viet Nam veterans in my company at the time. Don't think that I didn't have my hands full with them. They wanted to do some killing. One of my vets actually cried when he saw dumb s---s. As we were relieved, driving past the dorms, a big Viet Cong flag was draped from the windows. This was in 1970 and 1971. I felt sorry those 11 troopers. 10 Infantry and 1 Special Forces Sgt. Several years later, one of those 10 Infantry troopers shot himself. I cryed at his funeral. I retired as an Infantry Captain, which is the same as a Navt LT. That's my story. My Viet Nam Troops were the Best. I talk to
them quite often. I got my start and I'm proud of this, on the News.
Take care Mates.............Joe Wilson (Willie57)

                                 Message sent by: Audreyandjoe@aol.com

Willie57 here. One of the sea stories I have is when we were in the Med, ComCruDiv2. We were called to Lebanon for the crisis 1958. We were out to sea for 59 straight days and zig-zagging. There was evidence of Soviet subs in the area. For the efforts, we were awarded the AFEM, which made us veterans. When the
crisis was over, we ended up on gunnery practice off the coast of Malta. We got the word of the earthquake in Agider, Morocco. The News was detached to assist in the quake. We sailed through the Straits of Gibraltar at approx. 36 to 38 knots. I was at the helm. When we got through, the skipper stuck his head in the porthole of the pilothouse and said, "Wilson, we made history today. First ship to transit the straits at 38 knots, in the world". I felt pretty darn proud to be a part of that history. I stand correct; The year was 1959 and pictures are in the 1960 Cruise book. Great memories. Willie57 (Joe Wilson)

                 Message sent by: "Roy Johnson"  rjohnson8@carolina.rr.com

Well...Here goes shipmates, some stories from my memory of the first days of the Newport News. OK, it's true there were no commodes for the crew members, just for the Chiefs and Officers, no it wasn't 55 gallon drums, but similar to that, each head had two of these, they ran fore and aft, salt water ran continually, they were positioned so that everything ran down hill (so to speak) and out into the ocean.... they were made os stainless steel, and had two boards for each seating position ...these were spaced about 20 inches apart, so that you didn't have to rub butts....  there were about 10 seats to each trough, a favorite prank was to have about 8 of more seated, get a big wad of toilet paper and   set it on fire and throw it in the upper end, gravity took it right under each seater before the water put out the fire... this didn't happen too many times, after the prankster was put on report and was assigned to cleaning the head and shining the stainless steel till you could see your face in it.... the urinals were of stainless steel also, and you get caught throwing a cigarette butt in a urinal, meant (You Guessed It) cleaning the urinals for a week with bright work polish and steel wool. If I can think of some more later I will get back to you.

Roy Johnson SK3 48-51