Open trackbacks….who could ask for anything more?

“Sea stories?” Yep, a sailor always has a few at hand….

Yes, I was politically incorrect, before we knew it was politically incorrect….

In September, 1980, I reported to my first shore based assignment at Fleet Combat Training Center, Atlantic. After two sea tours, I was looking forward to the assignment.

As a Lieutenant, I was put on the Base’s Command Duty Officer (CDO) watchbill, with a rotation of 1 in 30, the time being measured in days, not hours. So, once a month, roughly, I’d have to go to the XO’s office in the morning with the off-going CDO and do our turnover with him. Most of the work day was still spent working, but with a pager on your belt, in case something arose.

After work, you had various duties to attend to, such as sampling the meal at the mess hall, taking a drive around the base to spot check the buildings being locked, checking in the the Quarterdeck watch in Taylor Hall and generally ensuring the calm atmosphere, and being ready to answer the emergency calls.

Considering the sea duty I had come from, as well as most of my peers there,  consisted of inport watch rotation being 1 in three days, and underway watches being port and starboard (a watch period on, then one off, then back to watch) of 4 (hours) on, 8 (hours) off, it was a holiday for us “Fleet Lieutenants.”

The watchbill consisted of all W-2s and -3s, and Ensigns to LTs. W-4s and LCDRs were exempted from the CDO Watch standing duties. Having more than 30 people in that category, after 32 more people of those ranks arrived, you would be freed from the rotation. Depending on the time you arrived, you may be on the watchbill 12 months, or maybe out to 18 months, it was all determined by the “Blind Watchmakers” at the Bureau of Personnel. For Unrestricted Line Officers like myself (those with the path to commanding a vessel or air squadron), that time frame comprised 1/2 to 3/4 of your two year shore duty assignment, normally coming after 3 years in the Fleet. We also had a number of “General Unrestricted Line” (“GURLs”) officers assigned to the base. These officers, with rare exception, were females, not being able to be sent to sea (this was before women were assigned to ships). Their tours, generally beginning at the rank of Ensign, were three year assignments. Their time on the CDO watch bill, at the worst, would span about 1/2 of their time, and no more.

I had been standing the CDO duties for just about a year, and I was due to roll off within about two months, when the command received a new Executive Officer. I don’t recall his name, but he was an aviator, and had been a POW in North Vietnam.  After he had been in the saddle about a month, he asked the Senior Watch Officer why so many fleet experienced Lieutenants came to his office for CDO turnover, when he kept running into masses of Ensigns and Lt JGs who seemingly were all over the base, but off the rotation.  The LCDR told him how the “membership” for the CDO list was set up and the XO apparently uttered some impolite words, indicating his displeasure. He then directed Rich to get out the linela number list (the precedence order of all Naval Officer) and put the 32 most junior qualified people in the rotation. It seemed the XO objected to post sea tour O-3s holding down the fort, when more junior officers were available.

Rich dutifully reworked the list and got it approved, then held a meeting of all officers in the W-2/3/O-1/-2/-3 range. I remember it pretty well. Certainly there was the aspect of “orders is orders” but not without the “happy sailors” doing what “happy” sailors do regarding a wide range of things, in this case, the fact that some people would be returned to standing watches that had “done my time.”

One junior LT, a GURL, commented loudly that “this is unfair!” I turned in my seat, and looked her in the eye and said words to the effect: “When you’ve got three years of sea duty behind you, standing 1 in 3 watch rotation, and I don’t mean days, I mean 4 hours on and 8 off, for months at a time, on the far side of the world, maybe you’ll see how spending the night on a base once every thirty days is pretty much a picnic.”

It got quiet. The meeting resumed, with direction from the Senior Watch Officer on implementation, and I don’t recall any more comments from any of the GURLs in the room before we dismissed.

I rolled off the watch bill after my next watch, not because of someone reported to the base, but because I was senior enough by lineal number to not have to do it any more. Net result: My lineal number saved me one duty day. I think that was the last time (and the first) my lineal number actually came into play in my career.

Back to the days of our “beginnings.”

Thomas TruxtunThomas Truxtun had been a privateer in the Revolutionary war, and a captain of merchantmen. He knew the sea. When we began to build our Navy, not from converted commercial vessels, but from the keel up as warships, Thomas was one of the men chosen to supervise the construction of one of the six frigates. His charge was the USS CONSTELLATION.What was significant about Captain Thomas Truxtun and USS CONSTELLATION? He was the first to engage in a fight with foreign naval vessels, in this case it was the French ship L’insurgente> on February 9th, 1799 in the West Indies. The L’insurgente was captured as a prize and Lt John Rodgers was assigned as the prize crew master. The ship eventually became a US Navy warship.

A little more history of the man Thomas Truxtun from “Six Frigates” by Ian Toll: When first sent to Baltimore to begin construction of the CONSTELLATION, Truxtun took charge and selected the area at David Stoddard’s yard, away from Fell’s Point, where the shipbuilding took place in the area. More secluded, but not so far as to prevent laborers from getting there. Truxtun disdained the southern maritime industry, making a point of letting the War Office know the ship could be built for less in Philadelphia. When he found out David Stoddard, the assigned Ship Constructor didn’t like the Joshua Humphery’s design, and intended to alter the plans, Thomas Truxtun confronted Stoddard and ended that idea.

Further of note in this effort to built the CONSTELLATION, as funding got tight, and the authorization of 1794 to build the six frigates was amended in 1796, CONSTELLATION was one of the three vessels which would continue to be worked on and put to sea, along with UNITED STATES and CONSTITUTION, which, most likely is a credit to Thomas Truxtun’s efforts: “Work on the 36 gun Baltimore frigate progressed under the autocratic supervision of Captain Thomas Truxtun” says Ian Toll of those days.

Not only did Captain Truxtun put his energy into building the ship, he also, through self study of available British books, charts and tables, taught himself the “difficult art of ‘lunars’ – a process requiring precise celestial observations and arduous logarithmic calculations.” As resultant output was a book, “Remarks, Instructions and Examples of Latitude and Longitude,” which was sent to the War Office with a suggestion his peers read it.Maybe the much lamented modern day concepts of using a “business model” to run the Navy had it’s roots with Thomas Truxtun. He said to McHenry “If we are to have a navy, we must make officers manage that navy.” His philosophy was that running the navy was not like running merchant ships. The life of a naval officer was continuous work, attention to detail devotion to excellence in every aspect of duty and deportment. Midshipmen, not ensign, was the first step towards learning the “trade.”

There is more history of the man who not only had our first combat action in blue water, but the one who certainly, by his practice, set the course for some of the very practices that we value as tradition in “Six Frigates.”

One of the more interesting sections in the tale of Captain Truxtun’s service was the great controversy in determining the value of the prize ship, L’insurgente. It sounds like there were some efforts to appraised her, via some influence, at a greater value than she was worth, backed by Captain Truxtun and some of his officers. Why? Each of the crew members received a portion of the value of the vessel as a reward for the captured. In the end,, after many investigations, it was determined no disciplinary action was to be taken and a lesser value assigned to the prize.

But, to put a little interesting humanity to this story of Captain Truxtun, after the success over the French, he began politicking to move, in seniority, from the position of 6 of 6 to a higher “lineal number,” , certainly above those positions of Captains’ Dale and Talbot, who’s ships were halted in construction is 1796 and they were released from their commissions for a time. As a result of the unsuccessful maneuvering, Captain Truxtun resigned his commission in 1799 and later refused a commission for the Barbary Wars.

Ships named for Thomas Truxtun (from WikiPedia):

• The first Truxtun was a brig launched in 1842 and destroyed after running aground off Mexico in 1846.
• The second Truxtun (DD-14) was a destroyer in service from 1902 to 1919.
• The third Truxtun (DD-229) was a destroyer in service commissioned in 1921 and accidentally wrecked in 1942.
• The fourth Truxtun (APD-98) was laid down as a destroyer escort DE-282 in 1943, but completed as a high-speed transport in 1945, later transferred to Taiwan and renamed Fu Shan.
• The fifth Truxtun (CGN-35), originally DLGN-35, was a guided missile cruiser.
• The sixth Truxtun (DDG-103) is an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer that has recently been launched.

The TRUXTUN (DDG-103) is scheduled for commissioning sometime in 2008. She is being built in Pascagoula., MS, and the construction has been delayed by Hurricane Katrina.

USS TRUXTUN (DDG-35), a nuclear powered vessel, now decommissioned, had a long and eventful life in the Pacific Fleet, serving in Vietnam on many deployments, and was one of the first ships to head to try to provide support for the USS PUEBLO (AGER-2).

In 1986, as part of the USS ENTERPRISE Battle Group, she sailed the Suez Canal to assist in Operations in the Vicinity off Libya, chronicled from my view point in this series.

Later, she sailed on support of Operation EARNEST WILL, escorting tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, and was part of DESERT SHIELD/DESERT STORM in 1990/91.

At the USS IOWA Turret Nr 2 Gun Crew Memorial in Norfolk, VAIt seems “Pinch” Paisley was on a road trip and took some time to get pictures and publicity for the ValOUR-IT project the week of the 4th of July, while doing some active duty time…Stay turned for more outstanding naval settings where MEGEN has been showing up at!

Update 07/16/2007: Pinch has posted an entire set of great photos of MEGEN, in the company with ships a and planes and at memorials. Not only are they fun to look at, but they are great to copy and send around to your friends, complete with an explanation of the ValOUR-IT program!

Open trackbacks…well, maybe one day…but in the meantime:

This “sea story” is not my own, but I heard it personally from HM2 Tom McKenney, USN. Now, it being a “sea story,” one always must consider the probability (not just the possibility) of the actual truth of the matter being, well, somewhat “different” from the verbally related tale of the sea:Tom was a crew member onboard the USS PROTEUS (AS-19) in the late 60s, while she was homeported at Naval Station, Guam in Apra Harbor. No, I was not wearing a uniform at the time, but, he was dating my older sister, so he was around a lot.

Anyhow, the PROTEUS generally remained moored med style to well out in the harbor, so she could service two submarines at her side. Sometimes (and it was very occasionally), the ship got underway, transited out of the harbor and steamed about the local ocean areas, so as to show sailors knew the way of the seas.Now to the meat of the story: Tom says one day, while the ship is at sea, hears over the 1MC “Navigator to the Bridge!” Ok, not necessarily a big deal…but a little bit later: “OPS Boss to the Bridge!” Interest level is climbing. Next: “XO to the Bridge!” and then “Captain to the Bridge!”

Just a little bit of khaki overload for a peace time (for them) steaming near your homeport on local ops….

The kicker, subject to historical scrutiny, was the general announcement: “Would anyone who knows where the **** we are report to the Bridge!” Ah, therein lies the rest of the story. Yes, the Bridge watch team had lost track of where they were. Back in those days, GPS wasn’t a twinkle in some engineer’s eye yet. LORAN was electronic navigation, and, I’m not sure, they maybe had Omega, too. Other than that, the tools of the trade were the sextant, a chronometer and someone who could punch the pubs and do math, as well as manage to keep a DR track of the ship’s movement. Oh, and add that the skills required to do this do require a modicum of routine exercise for proficiency’s sake.

So Tom tells me one of the enlisted men showed up on the Bridge, went out on the Bridge Wing and surveyed the horizon. He pointed and said “Over there.” The leadership took that course, as was pointed out, towards a cloud, one of many in the sky, and, after some expenditure of fuel, found the tropical island home called “Home.” Asked later how this man discerned the location so urgently sought by the operational chain of command, he was said to reply: “I just looked for the biggest, darkest rain cloud.”

Some would call it “seaman’s eye,” but I’m sure the CO called it salvation…

If you’re interested, some great history for USS PROTEUS (AS-19) can be found at Tender Tales.

1905. Marine Guard escorts the body of John Paul Jones from France, landing at Annapolis July 23 for interment at the U.S. Naval Academy.

It seems the best bet to keep spares out of the wrong hands is to clip “them” into little bitty pieces.

After all, the only country besides the US to ever fly the F-14 TOMCAT happens to be the guys who like to spread mayhem via the back-channels, hoping they won’t get caught. So, make them into Bud cans and our valiant aviators and missileers won’t lose sleep over splashing an American icon, even if it wears a desert colored paint scheme.

Link: sevenload.com

Lex, I’m sure will be sneaking to his computer late at night, Guinness in hand, to watch this over, and over, and over in the dark…

Update: See, what did I tell you? But to be fair, he went one better…Maybe the F-14 challenges his fighter-pilotness or sumthin’ (not that there’s anything wrong with that…)

I met this imposing figure, as some of my Black Shoe peers about the blogosphere may have. I worked for his son in the later part of my career, and now, there is a ship sailing the oceans named after this incredible man.

Admiral John Bulkeley, USN His nickname? The “Sea Wolf.” John D. Bulkeley didn’t get to Admiral the easy way. He had to go door knocking to get his appointment to the Naval Academy and was successful with a Congressman from Texas, as he couldn’t get a nod from his native state of New Jersey.It appears the salt water in his veins may have been genetic:

John Bulkeley’s destiny may have been cast long before he sought the salt spray of the open ocean. His ancestors, including Richard Bulkeley, brought aboard HMS VICTORY by Lord Nelson just prior to the Battle of Trafalgar in 1804; John Bulkeley of HMS WAGER under Captain Bligh, who sailed with Anson’s Squadron to raid Spanish silver ships of the new world; and Charles Bulkeley, raising the Union Jack for the first time on an American warship, the ALFRED, commanded by John Paul Jones, influenced his intense love of the sea.

USS INDIANAPOLIS (CA-35) in Pearl Harbor c. 1937He made it through the US Naval Academy, Class of 1933 and entered the Army Flying Corps, but…too many hard landings sent him to sea, being assigned as an Ensign to the USS INDIANAPOLIS (CA-35) (the much later stories cruiser that carried the atomic bomb to Tinian). While assigned as Ship’s Company, but traveling on a steamer, he displayed, possibly not the first of many feats, the hallmark of audacity and initiative that labeled him for many years:

As a new ensign in the mid-thirties, he took the initiative to remove the Japanese ambassador’s brief case from a stateroom aboard a Washington-bound steamer, delivering same to Naval Intelligence a short swim later.

Earned him a medal or promotion you ask? Not likely, but the resulting “reward” was not to sit him at the end of the long green table without a coffee cup and ashtray:

This bold feat, of which there were to be many more in his life, didn’t earn him any medals, but it did get him a swift one way ticket out of the country and a new assignment as Chief Engineer of a coal burning gunboat, the SACRAMENTO [PG-19], also known in those parts as “The Galloping Ghost of the China Coast.” Picture in your minds the movie “Sand Pebbles”.

It was on China Station where the CHENG met his future wife. They witnessed the invasion of Shanghai and Swatow, as well as the bombing of the PANAY by the Japanese during their time together in that theater before WWII.

In 1941, Lieutenant Bulkeley was assigned as the Squadron Commander of six motor torpedo boats in the Philippines. It fell to this man to escort General MacArthur, his wife and their son to safety, dodging intense Japanese ship patrols to get the General to southern Mindanao, where a B-17 picked he and his family up. LT Bulkeley and his shipmates were left to find their own way to Australia, which they finally did.

Rewarded? Yes, for that daring escapade, LT John D. Bulkeley was presented with the Congressional Medal of Honor.

By the resources available with some quick searches, John Bulkeley was next present for the momentous Normandy invasion, managing the PT boats and minesweepers, protecting the landing from threats by German E-Boats and waterborne mines.

USS ENDICOTT (DD-495)Shortly after the invasion, he was assigned to the USS ENDICOTT (DD-495) as Commanding Officer, where he was assigned to patrol in the English Channel and had a few scraps with German corvettes. Of his 5 5″/38 cal guns, only one was working, yet he sent both corvettes to become fish reefs. Audacity once more:

[…]
The tale of his WWII exploits would not be complete without the mention of his love for destroyers, of which he would command many in his years to come. As Normandy operations wound up, he got his first large ship command, the destroyer ENDICOTT, and a month after the D-day invasion of Europe he came to the aid of two British gunboats under attack by two German corvettes. Charging in as dawn’s light broke the horizon with his uncanny ability and determined leadership, with only one gun working, but with a band of brothers for a crew, he unhesitantly engaged both enemy vessels at point blank range, sending both to the bottom. When I asked him about this action, he replied, “What else could I do? You engage, you fight, you win. That is the reputation of our Navy, then and in the future.”

The Admiral was a strong believer in standards, some would say, from the old school, as the enemy Captain of one of the corvettes soon learned. Coming up from the sea ladder, he would not salute the colors of the ENDICOTT, and was promptly tossed back into the sea. The third time did the trick, and he was taken prisoner and allowed on deck.
[…]

ADM Bulkeley was a no nonsense man. From Wikipedia:

In the early 1960s, Bulkeley commanded Clarksville Base, Tennessee, then a tri-service command under the aegis of the Defense Atomic Support Agency. Having lost none of his wartime daring, Bulkeley was known to test the alertness of the Marines guarding the base by doning a ninja suit, blackening his face and endeavoring to penetrate the classified area after dark without detection. This was a dangerous endeavor, as the Marines carried loaded weapons. Ever popular with his men, who both respected and admired him, Bulkeley could be seen driving around the base in his fire-engine red Triumph TR-3 sports car with a large silver PT boat as a hood ornament. Promoted to Rear Admiral by President Kennedy, who commanded PT-109 during World War II, Bulkeley was dispatched to command the disputed Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba, where he met Cuba’s threat to sever water supplies in response to the Bay of Pigs invasion and other assaults by ordering the installation of desalinization equipment to make the base self-sufficient. Fidel Castro’s government put out a “wanted-dead-or-alive” poster, offering 50,000 pesos for this “guerrilla of the worst species.”

ADM Bulkeley himself went to the dug up pipeline at GTMO, near the gate into Cuba territory and helped cut the water off himself, in full view of the Cubans.

Later, he went on to be the hard nosed officer who wanted the best for all sailors and headed the Board of Inspection and Survey (INSERV), a group of Naval Officers who actually worked for Congress to determine the viability of each ship on a three year cycle, as to it’s ability to continue in active service. He relentlessly hammered on specific systems, the MK-15 Close in Weapons Systems (CIWS), inflatable life rafts and various ship design features (the famous “no chamber in the deck”). Us poor fleet sailors thought he was after us, but in actuality, he was making a point with the design and procurement side of the Navy. That is where I met the Admiral, on Final Contract Trials (FCT) aboard USS LEFTWICH (DD-984), sometime in late 1979. His Flag Lieutenant was LT Blake Miller, who I relieved years later at another job. ADM Bulkeley was an aloof man, from my perspective, and all business.

The outcome of his seemingly indelicate manner of criticizing our ships was major changes in designs for the ARLEIGH BURKE DDG-51 Class units, which had slight chamber in their decks and positive pressure air systems, both of which are invaluable in staving off chemical, biological and radiological (CBR) attacks, and those are but a few things I know the INSURV was able to force into the design of that class of ship, based on mountains of data collected over many years of inspections.

The paraphrase of his eulogy by his son is here.

“Sea Wolf” is the biography of this fascinating, bemedaled hero.
USS BULKELEY (DDG-84) USS BULKELEY is the first ship to honor VADM John D. Bulkeley, USN. embedded by Embedded Video


USS BULKELEY (DDG-84) At Work

You’re free to post your links…

Last seen about 2100, heading for my stateroom at the end of the second 8 hours of the day behind me.

Step in, close the door (it’s been open since just before breakfast), walk over and turn on the idiot box mounted on the aft bulkhead to see what’s playing on the two channels. Settle on one of them. Bend down, retrieve the plastic bottle of squeeze cheese (courtesy of mother-in-law’s care packages) from the small refrigerator. Grab bag of toastitos, reduced to generally more smaller pieces than large due to handling in shipment, but, a little bit of “the World” in my hands.

Park in the chair at my desk, rest my feet on the surface, just inside the stateroom door and begin to consume the chips garnished with cheese. Watch the movie semi-mindlessly, while still considering what there is left to get done. After a sufficient amount of my snack to slow down for a few minutes, sit properly and begin to sift through the mail and other items in the in box. Read, think, consider, jot a few things on the AW-SHOOT list by hand (will enter them first thing in the morning), and clear the box. File action stuff in the notebook (supporting “linked” information for the tickler), or the desk drawer folders. A few hours of this and it’s taken care of for the night.

About 2300, retrieve the data from star sightings from earlier in the evening. “Reduce” the info by hand (means doing lots of math) until the sighting angle and distance towards or away along that line. Repeat until all 5 or 6 stars are figured. Get out the plotting paper and plot the assumed position, then the lines of position and the distances as computed. Early on, this was then “scratch my head time to figure out what I’d use as the “fix.” Later on, my use of the sextant became more precise and the answer to the point was much easier to determine. “Growl” the Bridge and ask the Quartermaster of the Watch to get me the position from closest to the star time fix. Plot the Ship’s position from other means (electronic usually) and determine how far off I was in my navigation efforts.

By now, it’s right about midnight. The watch has turned over (2345) and the 00-04 (Midwatch) personnel should all be on station. Get up and head by Radio (port side, enroute the Bridge), grab any new traffic, scan the space for anything that seems to be out of the ordinary. Head to the Bridge, then down to CIC, then down and aft to Central Control Station (CCS). Wander about the aft end of the ship below deck in the red lit spaces, then head back to my stateroom, assured it’s just another routine night.

About 0100, climb into the rack. The day is done.

Maybe that wasn’t very exciting, but it was a day in the life of an FFG-7 XO’s day on a deployment to the Middle East when there were no wars going on in the neighborhood.

There was always a delicate balance, sometimes unspoken, between “ETs” (Electronic Technicians) and “users,” which came in all sorts of types: Officers, operations specialists, radiomen comprised most of that category. On a number of occasions, when something wasn’t performing to the expectations of the user, it was not caused by a malfunctioning of the equipment, but rather than from a misunderstanding of the function, or that the operator in question had wrong, leading to the often made remarks, in a derogatory manner, and sprinkled with “salty” language, about some dumb user. And, as luck would have it, once in a while a very frustrated, but knowledgeable petty officer found themselves making not so delicate responses to the tidal wave of derision heaped upon them when a mere mis-positioning of a switch may have been the only problem.I began my Naval career supervising a shop full of ETs, in addition to the OSs, I was the nexus, in good times and bad in the interaction of those two groups, and also the “screen” from the stuff coming down from above when RADAR and radio systems weren’t cutting it at any given moment. I appreciate it all the more because of those 18 months.

With that explanation, the new ET logo makes so much more sense, doesn’t it?

I know you stop by to read the blog once in a while, and I’m working up the email list for ValOUR-IT. I lost your email address in the hosting service move, so please help me update my records. Comment or email works for me.

(Oh, and put some contact info on the carrier page!)

For those of you who haven’t seen it, William has built and maintains The Carrier Page, a history of the US Navy’s aircraft carriers. He was a supporter of ValOUR-IT last year. Stop by his site and see what he has compiled.

Update 6/27/2007: First off, Bill tells me the email info is on his page. Second, so you don’t have to jump to the comments, Rusty Bill reports about “current ops” on his historical website:

Warning to prospective visitors: The Carrier Project is currently undergoing a massive refit – a total reformat and rewrite, in fact.

Many of the general information pages are up and running, but carrier history data has only been entered for CV-1 USS Langley through CV-9 USS Essex. I’m currently rebuilding the Origins of Carrier Names section, which should be posted in a couple of weeks. See the Refit Page for details.

Thanks, Bill!