About a month and a half ago, i began trilogy of posts about acquiring my love of the sea.

i posted the first two stories of my third class midshipman cruise aboard the USS Lloyd Thomas (DD  764).  Then i rested. Those first two posts centered around how i became insulated against sea sickness. Neither the chief petty officer faking blowing lunch with his mixture of crushed graham crackers and milk in a barf bag nor the tricks of the sailors in rough seas could induce seasickness. My resistance allowed me to never have a problem with seasickness again, not even through the roughest seas, for the rest of my time at sea. Those events gave me a one up on being a mariner.

My real love of the sea was precipitated later in that eight-week cruise. We had been to Sydney, Nova Scotia, Bermuda, and were headed back to Newport in late July somewhere in the middle Atlantic. i had spent my time in deck, operations, and was about three weeks into my five-week stint in engineering.

Engineering was on a four-section watch rotation and did not dog the 18-20 — the dog watches were 16-18 and 18-20, splitting the evening mess and allowing three section watches to rotate through different watches each day; a four section watch would rotate watches without splitting the dog watches into two. The midshipmen were in three sections. i began my engineering tour with the morning watch (0400-0800). Consequently, i stood the morning watch, then put in the 0800-1600 work day immediately followed by the 1600-2000 watches. For five weeks plus, i had a 16-hour workday.

Being young and having no sense at all, i went to the evening movie, shown for the enlisted in the DASH (Drone Anti-Submarine Helicopter) hanger aft on the 01 level. Every night. No sense. That gave me about five hours of sleep each day. No sense.

This particular night, the crew’s movie was “The Quiet Man.” i had never seen it, and was entertained and moved by the story. Perhaps that influenced what happened next. The thirty or forty crew members filed out of the hangar deck and headed to their berthing before taps. For a reason long forgotten, i delayed and trailed the exit. i was walking forward across the torpedo deck on the 01 level before heading down the ladder. i was alone. i stopped.

The night was a perfect summer night at sea. The ship was steaming with standard running lights allowing the stars to give off their full glory in the heavens. There was a full moon. It was almost perfectly abeam on the port side. i walked to the life lines and paused.

The Thomas was steaming at 15 knots on a windless night. The roar from the stacks passed over my head and was barely noticeable, but i could hear the swish of the bow waves passing down the port side. The reflection of the moon produced a path of sparkling white from the horizon directly to where i stood.

It likely was no more than a minute or two i stood there. It seemed then, and it seems now it could have been eternity. It was as if the goddess of the sea took her hand from the moon’s path and reached up and grabbed me. There was something deep in my gut, deep in my soul touched by that lady, the sea. She called me. i felt her then. i feel her now.

Oh, i tried to ignore her and the feelings down deep. i spent my obligatory three years after a chequered path to becoming an officer and got out with the intent of being a sports journalist. i only returned because of the financial responsibility of having a wife with a daughter on the way. The need for security. But the feeling from that night on the port side of the Lloyd Thomas never left me.

i spent almost 15 years on sea duty. There were many obligations for a Navy officer, what they eventually marketed as a “Surface Warfare Officer.” Those obligations often distracted from communication with the sea, but the sea never let go, never let go.

i have loved the sea in all of her moods: the calm of the doldrums, the lapping white caps of deep blue at first light, the heat of the water reflecting on a hot summer day in calm seas, the rage of a storm with waves breaking green water on the portholes of the bridge 75-feet from the waterline. And an infinite number of nights with the stars so plentiful, they seemed to run together and the full moon tracing its path to the port side of my ships. And grabbing me deep inside.

If i could go back to sea and drive ships, i would. But technology passing me by and age would not allow such a personal whim.

But the sea. Ahh, the sea goddess. i still love her.

Shortly after the chief petty officer’s sea sick bag trick, sea detail was secured and the regular underway forenoon watch (0800-1200) watch was set. Mostly green-faced midshipmen filed into the wardroom.

The midshipman coordinator explained a bunch of basics about life at sea for enlisted and officers, specific rules and expectations, and of course, possible punishment for not behaving like good midshipmen. We were assigned departments and given a schedule for rotating to other departments. i was to begin in operations, rotate to the weapons department after just over two weeks, and finally be assigned to engineering after another three weeks. Before we were escorted to our berthing, which was on the first deck below the fantail near the stern, i was informed my seabag had been delivered to a ship that departed about an hour after us, and the seabag would be transferred at first opportunity.

Thinking that surely would be a day or two, i felt okay. Little did i realize it would be more than three weeks before the seabag was high-lined from the recipient ship to the oiler escorting the carrier force and then high-lined from the oiler to the Lloyd Thomas. i was given the essential of toothpaste, toothbrush, soap to get through the first day while someone was supposed to be considering what they could do for my uniform.

All i knew was i smelled pretty badly and it wasn’t good for someone’s first day at sea. We settled into our berthing and they pretty much gave us the afternoon off except for watch standers. Our new beds, “racks” in Navy jargon consisted of a canvas cloth tied to aluminum frames stacked three deep above three 3×3 foot lockers. If you had the middle or bottom rack (being one of the shorter midshipmen i was elected to have a bottom rack — if the guy above you was in, the sag in the canvas would not allow you to roll over to a new position: you would have to get out of the rack and enter in the position you wanted. i have always been able to take a nap…anywhere, anytime, and this small obstacle did not deter me. After all, i had had a few pretty rough days and little sleep.

But i did get up for the evening mess. i took my place in line on the main deck port side and in due time passed through the mess line. The crew was intent on initiating the midshipmen to being at sea and the cooks were very much into that. The first evening meal was greasy pork chops, beans, and gravy. There may have been some potatoes and white bread, but i don’t recall. When i sat down at one of the mess deck tables, i was not enthusiastic in eating the fare on the compartmentalized metal tray in front of me, but i knew eating was necessary to keep my condition the way it was rather than reaching the condition of nearly all the other midshipmen in the mess. When all of the midshipmen were settled, the sailors had another delight in store. About a half dozen of them took turns walking among  the tables. When they reached where a midshipman was sitting, the sailor would take a sardine he had tied to a string out of a sardine can. Then making sure the sailor was watching, he would swallow the sardine whole. pause, pose, and the draw the sardine back out of his throat and mouth, letting it dangle before repeating the process. We lost everyone again except for two of us.

After the mess, they opened “C-Stores” for cigarettes. i could not believe it. Out at sea, supply sold a carton of cigarettes for one dollar. i stood in line for mine and when the storekeeper informed me they didn’t have Chesterfield Kings, i asked for a carton of Winstons. i got a bad carton and on my next time to C-stores, i went to Pell-Mell’s (another story). But that night, i just wanted to smoke. i needed it…i thought.

My division assignment was radar. That meant i would be working for the radarmen in Combat Information Center (CIC), then quartermasters, and then signalmen. My first watch was the evening watch (2000-2400). The radarmen were smart and nice guys. But i was a midshipman, and their goal was to get all midshipmen seasick that first day. The fact that i smelled like a wet sock that had been in the gym for about two weeks didn’t help.

When i reported to combat, they immediately put me on a radar scope, showed me how to watch the display and report any surface contacts. The watch coordinator put me on a scope where i was facing athwartship (for the landlubbers, it is more difficult for balance, i.e. imbalance induces seasickness, to adjust to the rolling of the ship when facing athwartship rather than fore or aft). The supervisor promised to check on me. They did. About every five to ten minutes, one of the watch standers would come by my radar repeater to check. Each one was smoking a cheap, foul-smelling cigar and ensured, while they were checking on me, their smoke was blowing into my face as much as possible.

So there i was and would be for almost four hours, certain to be sitting in the wrong position, holding on the radar repeater in a dark room with only a few red lights, staring at the cathode ray tube with green sweeps across a black circular screen while the ship rolled back and forth and cigar smoke completely surrounded me after a day of sailor tactics to get me to join my midshipmen buddies hugging the toilets while i smelled like a small goat herd after a rain in my now four-day old clothes. i felt if i was turning green. i could feel clumps in my stomach rising up. i began looking about for a barf bag. i felt a lump in my throat. i wondered how long it would be before, as they say in the Navy i “upchucked.”

Then, sitting there, i told myself i was not going to let these yahoos get pleasure out of seeing me seasick. i swallowed whatever it was coming up, and it went back down. i certainly wasn’t in the best of shape, but i made it through the watch, drank a lot of water from the nearest scuttlebutt when i was relieved by the mid-watch.  And with the nonparallel capability to sleep anywhere, anytime, i hit my rack and was asleep within seconds.

From that moment on the radar watch until as i write right now, i have never been seasick. i have cleaned up from shipmates on numerous occasions. i have been in seas only slightly less hazardous than those in a perfect storm. My biggest problem with motion is getting my landlubber legs back when i hit shore after long periods at sea, not the other way around.

The second morning underway, things began to get a bit better, thanks to the very sailors who were trying to get me sick the night before.

It was better but i certainly wasn’t in love with the sea yet.

It wasn’t like i always wanted to go to sea. My idea of being on the water was waterskiing with buddy Henry Harding and his family or fishing with my father on Tennessee lakes. That was it for my ambition to be on any water.

In fact the Navy was my third choice in my college choices as i was about two months away from graduating from Castle Heights Military Academy. i really didn’t consider any military to be in my future, except for, of course, the draft.

My first choice for college was Centre College. John Thompson, one of the stars of our senior class was already headed there. My parents and i drove the 150 miles up to Danville to check it out. i loved it, but i really loved it because the football coach had indicated they would like to have me on the football team. i believed i might actually be able to play the sport for four more years, my dream. Unfortunately, Centre did not award athletic scholarships. The coach and my grades (i somehow — i still have no idea how  — finished fourth in academics in our class and even more remarkably had scored high on the SAT’s) allowed the administration to award me a $2500 scholarship.

i knew my parents could not afford to pay the balance, and i sadly declined the invitation.

My second choice was Vanderbilt. Each year, they awarded a four-year scholarship, The TRA Grantland Rice Scholarship to a deserving and promising sports writer. i had been the sports editor of the award winning The Cavalier, the Heights newspaper under the tutelage of one of the best journalists of all time, “Coach” JB Leftwich. It was for $10,000, at the time it would cover a large chunk of tuition and expenses.

Rumor has it i finished second. Bob Thiel, who ended up being one of my closest friends even until today, won it. He deserved it because he had been a superb reporter for the Evansville, Indiana newspaper.

i had also applied for an NROTC scholarship, never thinking i would end up being accepted as i kept thinking ole Grantland’s boys would do me well (i always have been a bit too optimistic). William LeRoy Dowdy, II, the editor of The Cavalier, and a far superior academic to me, was also going for the NROTC scholarship. One afternoon in the newspaper office, he and i decided it would be tougher for us if we both listed Duke as our number one choice of schools. So i opted for Vanderbilt. i wish it had been for my desire to take advantage of their reputation as “the Harvard of the South.” But i conceded Duke to Lee because i was a fan of Vanderbilt and Tennessee football and Vanderbilt basketball.

i got it.

There are many twists and turns of my academic disaster after i matriculated but i made it through the freshman year, which meant i would be going on a third class midshipman cruise.

At the end of April, i was ordered to report to the USS Lloyd Thomas (DD-764) in June for eight weeks of midshipman training.

The travel for my orders gave me two options. i could have the NROTC unit book an airline flight out of Berry Field to Providence and further transportation to Newport, Rhode Island or i could get there on my own and receive travel pay. After checking out the cost of a Trailways bus ticket from Nashville to Newport, i decided i could pocket a significant amount of money if i chose the pay your own way and get the travel pay. Bad idea.

My parents drove me to Union Station, which then was also a Trailways Bus Station. i was in my service dress Khaki midshipman uniform, complete with my combination cover. Around noon, we said our goodbyes and i boarded the bus. It was rather full. i took the aisle seat on the right side about one-third of the way back next to an older lady with a small hat on top of her gray hair.

By then, i smoked Chesterfield Kings. Cy Fraser had introduced me to them. After baseball games in my senior year, i had smoked Winstons when several of our baseball team after games would find a place where they would sell beer to minors (under 21 at the time) and find a country road, sit on the side of the road (along with several other antics of greater legend) in our baseball uniforms where we could smoke cigarettes and drink Country Club Malt Liquor. But that autumn of my matriculation, my fraternity pledge brother and still one of my lifetime friends, Cy introduced me to Chesterfield Kings. i liked the image. i liked the macho aspect of an unfiltered cigarette, and i liked the smoke.

The little old lady was not as enthusiastic. She bewailed the sinners who would smoke cigarettes. She foretold of death shortly after the U.S. government decided, even with the money thrown at them by tobacco interests, the public should be warned.

i lit up. In fact, i was pretty much a chain smoker for the entire five hour ride to Louisville with what seemed like interminable stops. She got off. i ate a woeful Stewart sandwich with chips at the fifteen-minute rest stop, drank a coke and reboarded.

The bus ride, with a stop at every spot in the road, took over forty-three hours with a transfer in Providence for the final hour ride to Newport. The bus arrived at the station in Washington Square at 0730. It was a sunny morning and the quaint little “square” was intriguing.

It was much different than when i was later in Newport. The station was at the point of the triangle to the east. “Washington Square” is not a square at all. Back then, Eisenhower Park was in the middle, and the courthouse stood at the east end, the base of the isosceles triangle they call a “square.” The sides of the triangle held a uniform shop amongst other shops and a diner or two. It seems there were a couple of attorney offices, and if i remember correctly, there was one or two bail outfits. Near the bus station were what we would call today, dive bars. Several more sailor bars were on Thames (pronounced thāmes, not “‘tems” like the street in London), the old, old street which ran north toward the Naval Station.

The waterfront of Newport still had that air of an old and rough seaport area, not the upscale touristy aura there today.

Other midshipmen, who were much smarter than me and had taken the air travel option were bussed from the Providence airport to the Trailways Station. The Navy haze gray buses were waiting for us. i debarked from the bus and went to the baggage hold to retrieve my seabag, which had all of my 3/c midshipman sailor gear in it, working whites and the classic dungarees with the blue chambray shirt — to this day, i am amazed some yahoo thought we should get rid of them and the bell bottom uniforms so our sailors could look like bus drivers and plumbers — and the dixie cup with a navy blue band around the brim — ditto on the Navy ditching them for ball caps, piss cutters, and combination covers.

Regardless, mine were not in any of the cargo holds. The buses were waiting as i frantically queried the bus personnel. As the Navy petty officers were telling me we had to leave because my ship, the Lloyd Thomas would be one of the first to get underway in less than two hours, the bus folks were admitting my seabag was not transferred in Providence as it should have been, that they had located it and it should, hopefully,  be delivered to the ship before the Thomas got underway.

Wondering just what the hell i was going to do if it didn’t make it but a bit placated by the assurance of the bus station manager, i took my bus  seat for the fifteen minute ride to the destroyer piers on the Naval Base.

As we filed off the bus, the chief directed me to Pier 2. My ship was on the north side about three-quarters o f the way down the pier. i had passed by Pier 1 and marveled at the USS Yosemite (AD 19). The flag ship was adorned with all sorts of flags and pennants with an immaculate and large brow to the pier. She was the flagship for Commander, Cruiser-Destroyer Force, Atlantic Fleet and was an impressive sight. She was the first Navy ship i saw for real. Little did i realize i would be her executive officer on my last operational tour twenty years later.

As i walked down Pier 2, i noticed small black particles in the air and settling on my combination cover and my blouse. i tried to brush some of them off, but they not only clung to the fabric, they were making holes. Back in those days, steam ships would “blow tubes” while pier side. This is roughly the equivalent having a chimney sweep clean your chimney. Blowing tubes was shooting forced air through the boiler tubes up the stack, blowing off the acidic residue, those black specks i encountered. If the residue was left on the stacks they could eat into the tube, and destroy the 600 pound boilers, most likely with a disastrous explosion. By the time i was commissioned, doing this pier side was forbidden and usually done on the mid or morning watch. By the time i was CHENG on the Hollister, you could get in real trouble and face fines, if you were caught with any smoke coming from your stacks. But then, there were no such restrictions. That cover and that blouse had little holes in them when i turned them into the unit upon my return.

i walked across the Lloyd Thomas’ brow, stopped, faced aft, saluted the ensign hoisted on the fantail, and asked the OOD on the quarterdeck for permission to come aboard, just as my Navy instructor had taught me to do. About a half-dozen of us were checking on board. The petty officer immediately escorted to the wardroom where the other midshipmen awaited us with the executive officer. There were eighteen third class and three first class midshipmen. The XO welcomed us aboard quickly. When i inquired about my seabag, one of the petty officer escorts informed me it was not delivered.

We were sent to the 01 deck forward of the bridge where Mount 52, the second forward 5″ 34 twin gun mount used to be, now it it had a hedgehog mount, an anti-submarine weapon on each side, but was more of a ceremonial deck than anything else. We fell into a three-rank formation facing the port side as the ship got underway.

In spite of stinking to high heaven and the restrictions of being at parade rest in the ranks, i had an initial feeling of exhilaration as the USS Lloyd Thomas cleared the pier, backed into a turn in Narragansett Bay and headed south by southwest out the channel past Fort Adams, Jackie Kennedy’s family Auchincloss estate and the summer mansions of ten mile drive.

About ten minutes after getting underway, the midshipmen in formation had their attention distracted. Some were already getting a little pale from the rolling of the destroyer through  the channel. A chief had gone down to the chief’s mess and retrieved a “barf bag,” a paper sack hung on rails through the ship’s passageways when getting underway, hopefully being used by some poor seasick dog to keep from puking on the bulkheads and decks. The chief poured some milk into the bag. He then took vanilla wafers, crumbled them up, and added them to the milk before shaking his mixture into a chunky mess.

He emerged from the port side hatch just aft of the midshipmen’s formation and under the port bridge wing where no one on the bridge could see him. He then spoke loudly to ensure all of the midshipmen could hear him, “Damn, every time we go to sea, i have to get sick. Looks like it’s gonna happen again.” He then paused, retched, shook, and pretended to blow lunch into the seasick bag.

The midshipmen were staring at him in disbelief. When he was sure they were watching, he explained as if to himself, “And there’s only one way to cure it.”

With that pronouncement, the chief proceeded to put the bag to his mouth and gulp down the milk and vanilla wafer concoction, making sure a great deal of the contents dribbled down his khaki uniform and onto the steel deck.

That was the final blow. Out of the twenty-one midshipmen, there was one first class, and two third class midshipmen including me,  left in the formation. The other eighteen were at the safety rails, retching their innards away into the sea.

i’m sure the sea detail on the bridge was wondering about the wimps they had just taken on board.

It was not an auspicious beginning of my time at sea. It was about to get worse.

i know i have recounted this story before, many times orally and once or twice on paper, or this poor excuse for paper that shows up on your computer screen. The other day on the  US Navy Gearing Destroyer group on Facebook, there was an entry from someone who had served on the USS Brownson (DD 868). The name generated my recall of the story.  i love it, and now that i’m hooked up with some destroyer men on Facebook, i wanted to share it again.

For those of you who weren’t around the Navy’s Destroyer School in 1973, you may not have heard this story about the USS Brownson (DD 868). Three of the Brownson’s junior officers, including one who was stashed there waiting for department head school in Newport, Rhode Island, related it to me at a late afternoon tea…okay, okay, a couple of pitchers of beer for happy hour at the small annex to the officer’s club up the hill from the destroyer-submarine piers.

CHENG (chief engineer for landlubbers) on the  Brownson had won the respect of the ship’s officers who were with me in the six-month course was just on the south side of daffy and apparently had done several wild and goofy things while aboard . But he was a superb engineer and somehow the captain tolerated all of the shenanigans.

The gang swapped sea stories about CHENG’s antics. The sea stories were surprising, sometime a bit shocking. Then they told me the best one:

The Brownson had been operating for about two weeks with exercises in the Atlantic op areas off of Newport but had been independent steaming for several days. There was not much going on, no shipping to speak of, and relatively calm seas. Those watches, especially at night, are boring where you struggle to stay awake. CHENG had the midwatch on the bridge, nine total bodies on the bridge in the dark. In watches like that when i was OOD, i would query the watch standers about the actual names of the 16 points in the compass, like “one point off the starboard bow” is “nor, nor by nor east.”

But Brownson’s CHENG had a bigger idea. About half-way through his mid-watch, he transferred steering control to after steering. Then he shifted the entire bridge team to the flying bridge on the 04 level directly above the bridge. Finally, he had the Boatswainmate of the watch go to the 1MC (the ship’s loudspeaker system) and pipe attention, followed by the announcement, “Captain to the Bridge!” On old destroyers or for that matter any Navy ship i served during my career, every captain when underway spent his nights in the “sea cabin” immediately aft of the bridge so he could quickly access the bridge in an emergency — apparently, the new age of commanding officers no longer feel required to sleep in the sea cabin but choose the much larger, more comfortable Captain’s Cabin below the bridge for the evening.

So the pipe has called attention and the Boatswainmate has called the captain to the bridge. The captain erupts from his rack, crashes out of the sea cabin in his pajamas with his housecoat dragging behind…and there in the middle of the night on the “darken ship” bridge no one is on the bridge.

The officers telling the story did not explain what happened after that except to say, the captain and CHENG had a meaningful conversation in the wardroom the next morning.

i keep trying to imagine what ran through the captain’s mind those first thirty seconds or so when he ran onto the bridge ready for an incredible emergency and the bridge was empty.