Navy Truisms

• A Sailor will walk 10 miles in a freezing rain to get a beer but complain about standing a 4 hour quarterdeck watch on a beautiful, balmy spring day.

• A Sailor will lie, cheat and scam to get off the ship early and then will have no idea where he wants to go.

• Sailors are territorial. They have their assigned spaces to clean and maintain. Woe betide the shipmate who tracks through a freshly swabbed deck.

• Sailors constantly complain about the food on the mess decks while concurrently going back for second or even third helpings.

• After a cruise, a Sailor will realize how much he misses being at sea. And after retiring from the Navy considers going on a cruise and visiting some of our past favorite ports. Of course we’ll have to pony up better than $5,000 for the privilege. Just to think, Uncle Sam actually use to pay us to visit those same ports years ago.

• You can spend three years on a ship and never visit every nook and cranny or even every major space aboard. Yet, you can name all your shipmates and every liberty port.

• Campari and soda taken in the warm Spanish sun is an excellent hangover remedy.

• PO2 / E-5 is almost the perfect military pay grade. Too senior to catch the crap details, too junior to be blamed if things go awry.

• Never be first, never be last and never volunteer for anything.

• Almost every port has a “gut.” An area teeming with cheap bars, easy women and partiers, which is usually the “Off-limits” area.

• Contrary to popular belief, Master Chief Petty Officers do not walk on water. They walk just above it.

• Sad but true, when visiting even the most exotic ports of call, some Sailors only see the inside of the nearest bars/clubs.

• Also under the category of sad but true, that lithe, sultry Mediterranean or Asian beauty you spent those wonderful three days with and have dreamed about ever since, is almost certainly a grandmother now.

• A Sailor can, and will, sleep anywhere, anytime.

• Yes, it’s true, it does flow downhill.

• In the traditional “crackerjack” uniform you were recognized as a member of United States Navy, no matter what port or part of the world you were in. Damn all who want to eliminate or change that uniform.

• The Marine dress blue uniform is, by far, the sharpest of all the armed forces.

• Most Sailors won’t disrespect a shipmate’s mother. On the other hand, it’s not entirely wise to tell them they have a good looking sister either.

• Sailors and Marines will generally fight one another, and fight together against all comers.

• If you can at all help it, never tell anyone that you are seasick.

• Check the rear dungaree pockets of a Sailor. Right pocket a wallet. Left pocket a wheel book.

• The guys who seemed to get away with doing the least, always seemed to be first in the pay line and the chow line.

• General Quarters drills and the need to evacuate one’s bowels often seem to coincide.

• Speaking of which, when the need arises, the nearest head is always the one which is secured for cleaning.

• Four people you never screw with: the doc, the DK, PC and the ship’s barber.

• In the summer, all deck seamen wanted to be signalmen. In the winter they wanted to be radiomen.

• Do snipes ever get the grease and oil off their hands?

• Never play a drinking game which involves the loser paying for all the drinks.

• There are only two good ships: the one you came from and the one you’re going to.

• Whites, coming from the cleaners, clean, pressed and starched, last that way about 30 microseconds after donning them. The Navy dress white uniform is a natural dirt magnet.

• Sweat pumps operate in direct proportion to the seniority of the official visiting.

• The shrill call of a bosun’s pipe still puts a chill down my spine.

• Three biggest lies in the Navy: We’re happy to be here; this is not an inspection; we’re here to help.

• Everything goes in the log.

• Rule 1: The Chief is always right. Rule 2: When in doubt refer to Rule 1.

• A wet napkin under your tray keeps the tray from sliding on the mess deck table in rough seas, keeping at least one hand free to hold on to your beverage.

• Never walk between the projector and the movie screen after movie call and the flick has started.

• A guy who doesn’t share a care package from home is no shipmate.

• When transiting the ocean, the ship’s chronometer is always advanced at 0200 which makes for a short night. When going in the opposite direction, the chronometer is retarded at 1400 which extends the work day.

• When I sleep, I often dream I am back at sea.

• If I had to do it all over again, I would. TWICE!

GOOD SHIPMATES ARE FRIENDS FOR LIFE!

Breach of Contract

By Charles Knowlton

It’s 1974 and I’m onboard the USS Oklahoma City (CLG-5) and I had just received my orders to CFAY Yokosuka (Ordnance Dept.) after just short of 10 years of sea duty commands (2 tours RVN but sea duty for x-fer regs). I took a deep breath and couldn’t believe that finally some shore duty and I got Yoko.

At that time it was going to be great to spend some time with my wife and 4 year old daughter. As we all know that being on “forward deployed” units we were gone all the time as we performed our mission on the gun line in Vietnam waters earning our pay in brilliant fashion!!! Well first thing that came up was personnel informed me that I had to extend to accept these orders as I didn’t have enough time to qualify for the 3 year accompanied tour. No problem as I was willing to obligate the time in order to accept the assignment. So I signed my extension and later was transferred to CFAY Yokosuka/Ordnance Dept. at the Ikego Ammunition Storage Site.

Was happy as a clam for about a year and even had a part-time job working at the Club Alliance (old one) as Duty Manager. Also drove Base Taxi’s occasionally as well. Let’s face it back then pay was pretty shabby as a GMG2 and I needed a little extra to steam the Honch & visit the PO Club also.

Well like I said above everything is going good when I got a message that due to the shortage of GMG’s at sea commands my tour would be cut short and I would be re-assigned. I went to Personnel and saw CWO Mochette who informed me that I could send a “breach of contract” out as I fulfilled my obligation for the orders to CFAY. So upon his recommendation I did so and off it went as I anxiously awaited the reply from them. About 2 weeks later it came in and I had “won” but they weren’t going to let me stay but offered me an early out or accept the orders to USS Kitty Hawk.

I immediately said “hell no” and again visited CWO Mochette where we talked and he recommended that we throw “our” offer out there which was I would accept orders back to USS Oklahoma City again. So that was sent out and a few days later the message came in with my report date back to the “Okieboat.” I was over elated in one sense and “pissed off” in another. But the bottom line was I was staying in Yoko and my bride was a happy camper too.

So after my short assignment on shore duty I was at least staying in Yoko and WESTPAC and “happy as a clam at high tide once again.”

WESTPAC’rs Rule!!!!!

CHAZ “Bore Clear”

UnRep

By Brion Boyles

Did this for two years straight for one tour of duty aboard USS WHITE PLAINS (AFS-4), homeported out of Yokosuka, Japan…and I mean OUT of Yoko…we were NEVER “home.”

. Running jet engines, hamburger meat and toilet paper to every corner of the Pacific, Indian Oceans and the Gulf(s). There were times when we would UNREP an entire Carrier Battle Group and a few hours later another entire Amphib Battle Group…Clearing our holds and tanks like we were having a Fire Sale.

Then, a race down to that nail’s head of coral reef known as Diego Garcia in the absolute middle of the Indian Ocean for a frantic all-day cargo onload and MAYBE an hour of “Liberty” on a concrete pier or a phone call home. Underway at first light and back out to sea and do it again…The hardest working crew I have EVER had the pleasure of serving with. I often went for days without sleep, with just us two QM’s aboard, myself and QM2 Chuck Fisher.

Alternating between watchstanding, daily work, shooting stars fixes into the night and pre-dawn, attending UNREP meetings, Nav meetings, giving weather briefs, PMS maintenance, chart and pub updating….writing MOVREPS, weather reports, constantly revising our voyage tracks to meet flyspecks of ships in the middle of nowhere, on top of the regular routines of GQ drills or standing as one of two or three Master Helmsmen during 16 hours of UNREP.

No, we were not bristling with fancy missile launchers or 16-inch guns…We had two ancient 3’/50’s on the fo’c’sle, along with 13 shots of Mk 1 Mod 0 Anti-submarine Warfare attached to our anchors….but our kingposts and RAS gear coming over the horizon was our contribution to the fight.

The “shootin’ boys” may rightly congratulate their crew on a safe, efficient UNREP once a month or so, but the WHITE PLAINS would have done 4 of ’em before lunch. Two years, not a scratch or broken bone. Very proud to have served with such professionals and “kids”.

Why We Miss the Navy and the Ships

My take on PTSD

By Garland Davis

When the General Quarters klaxon sounds, whether for fire, taking on water, collision, crash on the flight deck, or preparing to engage the North Vietnamese on a run into Haiphong port, the adrenaline kicks in. They say that when you are faced with a life or death situation, your training takes over and you don’t really think about what you are doing. It all becomes muscle memory. You are on autopilot.

It’s true, to a degree. Training is just a safely repeatable replacement for near death experiences.

I remember a helicopter crash on the flight deck of an FF I was serving in. The flight deck fire party had the situation in hand, but almost by the time the general alarm was finished we were crowding each other running fire hoses through hatches and doors to the flight deck and main deck. Did I stop to think, I will have my galley crew breakout and run a fire hose to help? No, the ship was in danger, my training took over and I reacted automatically.

In his book, “Outliers,” Malcolm Gladwell makes the case that becoming an expert at a skill requires 10,000 hours of practice. Perhaps that is true, but one fire at sea or near death experience has a similar effect to those 10,000 hours, ingraining in your memory every action, no matter how small, that kept you alive.

And when any portion of that experience is recreated, the smell of smoke within the ship, the sound of artillery rounds alongside, the sound of machine gun bullets against the steel, the unthinking responses that save your life are triggered automatically as if they were forged by 10,000 hours of practice.

The hormones released by highly stressful situations instruct the brain to imprint those memories more deeply. We can thank evolution for that trick. The pre-historic man who could best remember how he escaped an attack by a saber-toothed tiger had a better shot at surviving the next one.

Time seems to slow down in a car crash or when you are getting mugged or any casualty situation, at sea, with no one to call for help. The adrenaline boost to your system triggers your brain into hyperactive memory storage. Your mind and senses go into overdrive, absorbing every sensory detail with almost superhuman lucidity.

Because of this, an event that might only last a split second occupies as much mental storage space as a week or a month. Years later you can recall details, feelings, colors, smells, and sounds more vividly than you can remember this morning’s breakfast.

After decades you remember with perfect clarity every aspect of the event. I remember being in the galley baking cinnamon rolls as the shells were exploding in the water and air around the ship. I remember the Super Arboc firing chaff into the air to confuse the enemy fire control radars and the two gun mounts periodically going to “rapid continuous” fire. Forty-four years later I can smell the cinnamon and butter of the baking pastries.

This hyper-alertness often extends for a time after the actual experience. For hours or days after the experience life just seems better. After returning to safety and even after returning home from a hectic and stressful deployment life just seems better.

You want to talk and re-talk it with your shipmates who experienced it with you. You seem to live harder and truer than you ever have before. The liberties were more intense, the drinks colder, the girls lovelier and yes, it felt good. You felt so alive. I remember thinking, “I wish I could live my whole life like this.”

It is the inability to ever match the excitement and stress of living that you achieved at sea and in war. It’s the letdown of having it end, you survived and you worry that a normal civilian life is just a slow letdown and a fade away.

Ask any sailor to tell you the worst experiences of their lives and they will tell you it was life aboard the ships, underway, and the war.

Now here is the confusing part. When you ask them to tell you the best experiences of their lives, they’ll usually tell you it was life aboard the ships, underway, and the war.

This is why it is nearly impossible to talk to someone who wasn’t there, didn’t live it, and cannot understand. That is why we talk among ourselves and rarely try to explain to civilians how we lived our lives and fought our wars.

High school classes schedule reunions about every ten years until there is no one left who cares. Sailors and ships seem to hold reunions almost annually. We go through the time between reunions living in two worlds. One, the world of little excitement, of civilians and, the monotonous, never changing, nine-to-five job. The second world is in our minds and in our memories, once again looking into a westward sunset over a placid sea. With the reunions you meet once again with the best men you will ever know and consider yourself fortunate to just be one of them.

You drink the beer and tell the stories reliving the worst and best experiences of your life. You laugh with them at the stories you don’t remember being so funny at the time, and you shed a tear for those who have sailed over the horizon.

That my friends is PTSD or Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and I am afraid we are all afflicted.

The Non-Rated Mess

By: Garland Davis

Remember the days when you were fresh out of boot camp, a Seaman Apprentice or maybe even a Seaman. It seemed as if everyone with a crow on their arm was convinced that you were the dumbest son of a bitch ever born on the continent of North America. They used you like a tool, abused you, and everyone told you that things got better once you “learned the ropes.”

There was a place where you could meet with your counterparts from other divisions and other ships. It was a place that belonged exclusively to non-rates. It was a place where you could, whine and bitch about the Petty Officers, the Old Bastards, the lifers, the Chiefs and other assholes whose sole entertainment in life seemed to be making your lives hell.

The dumpster area on the pier was the place where we congregated to dump shit cans, smoke cigarettes and compare notes on who worked for the biggest asshole.

“Christ man, what’s it like on your ship. Do you have a bunch of gut heavy old farts who sit around all day drinking coffee and talking about old decommissioned rusty assed Fletcher class tin cans that they used to ride? Old brain dead bastards.”

“Yeah dude, we got ‘em. And a bunch of brown baggers who just try to get you qualified for watches so they can get you to standby for them on duty days so they can go home and poke the Old Lady. They show you pictures of their kids and the cheap bastards only want to pay five bucks for a standby.”

“When you joined the Navy and got orders to a can, did you think it would be like this?”

“Hell no, I was looking for adventure. I expected to be in a gun mount instead I get to drag a fuckin’ 2 ½ fire hose up and down ladders during the day and then I have to stay up all night baking bread, sweet rolls, and cookies. I hate baking fuckin’ cookies. Soon as I get ready to hit my rack, we go to G.Q. and I got that fire hose again. Maybe they’ll let me sleep in one of these days.”

“You ever see a recruiting poster with a smiling sailor holding a chipping hammer and a wire brush? A dirty apron? Hauling heavy-ass shitcans a half mile down the pier to the dumpsters? I don’t think it would hurt them to space the dumpsters out, like one for every couple of berths.”

“Those things always show some First Class Gunner’s Mate buying flowers for some good looking virgin in some exotic port or guys in whites riding Rickshaws in Hong Kong grinning like Cheshire cats.”

“Life on these old cans suck. The AC and ventilation suck. The chow is worse than my step mothers and she couldn’t boil fucking water. No offense Davy. Man, I think they stuck us in the bottom of the barrel.”

“Yeah! When you’re aboard on a non-duty day because you are broke, the Jackasses find shit for you to do. Davis, Johnson, Bennington, and Sparks, the can behind us is getting underway and you got line handlers. Muster on the Quarterdeck at 1615.”

“Fuck man! We’ll miss chow.”

“I’ll tell the cooks to save something for you.”

“Shit, that means Ham and Cheese or Horsecock sandwiches and leftover Brussels Sprouts.”

“Sounds like you been reading my diary.”

“See that new DLG over there? I hear that it is air conditioned, has modern Galley equipment, plenty of storage space. They even have little blue privacy curtains on the racks and a built-in reading light. That way you can read a fuck book and beat off in privacy.”

“You’re shittin’ me?”

“No shit. They are cool and clean. I hear they smell like a high school cheerleader’s skivvy drawer. Everything is bright and new.”

“Anybody going to L.A. Friday? I’m looking for a gas sharing ride.”

“Anybody got a smoke?”

“Damn man, you quit buying them and took up bumming?”

“I’ll pass on the sermon, Davy. I notice you don’t have a problem helping drain beer pitchers when you are short of coin.”

“Screw you!”

“Gimme a cigarette. Man, you need to smoke something besides these strong ass Chesterfields. Got a match?”

“Beggars can’t bitch. What are you a pussy? Can’t handle a man’s cigarette?”

“Good evening gentlemen.”

Good evening sir.”

“What’s going on?”

“Just dumping trash sir, smoking cigarettes, cussing our Petty Officers and swapping Bible stories.”

“Well then, carry on,” the Lieutenant says as he moves on down the pier.

“Aye, Aye sir.”

“You know that guy?”

“Nope, probably off that DLG. I think they are SOPA. Probably inspecting the pier. There’ll more than likely be some shit come down tomorrow about hanging out at the dumpsters.”

***********************************************************************

A year or two later we were all sitting around our respective work centers, drinking coffee and ragging on the non-rated men.

“Hey, tool! Yeah, you kid! I wish you would hurry up and get signed off on Sounding and Security watch. I need a standby. I give you five bucks. I think that new barmaid at the P.O. Club is ready to give me some pussy and I’d like to be there when it happens.

We had become everything that we had bitched about.

Goals and Milestones
July 2017
By: Garland Davis

“How Swift are the feet of the days of the years of youth”— Mark Twain

We each strive to achieve many goals as we move along life’s highway. The Navy and Chief Petty Officer come to mind. When the girl you have fallen in love with accepts your proposal. Earning a Bachelor’s Degree as a member of the Dean’s List. Being chosen as class Valedictorian although I would be at sea off the coast of Viet Nam when graduation was held. Being instrumental in winning the Edward F. Ney Award, not once but twice. Retiring from the Navy. There are many more that make up the entire list.

I will achieve a new milestone this month. A new personal best. I will have lived longer than ever before. I will have completed another year of life. I will become seventy-three years old on the 18th. July 19th, is also another important anniversary. I enlisted in the Navy fifty-six years ago in 1961.

Many people have lived longer and many others died much younger. I always thought I would be among the latter. I have ancestors that lived well into their nineties and, as it turned out, I may have lived that long under different circumstances. Hell, I may still make it but, the Parkinson’s disease will probably take me before I reach my nineties. I leave no progeny to carry on this line of the Davis clan. I am one of those branches of the tree that ceases to grow and drops off.

I cannot say that it has been an exceptional seventy-three years when compared with the lives and accomplishments of others. Some may think that I squandered opportunities or misused the potential to do much more. But as Sinatra said it in his song, “I Did It My Way.” I consider one of my great achievements something that is given to a very few when measured against the entirety of the population. I served for thirty years and became a Chief Petty Officer in the United States Navy. Life in the Navy and as a Chief Petty Officer showed me that two of the paramount achievements of humanity are the twin concepts of “loyalty” and “duty.”

The psychologists say that humans tend to remember successes, happiness, and pleasure. They conveniently forget or repress failures, sadness, and discomfort. Probably a good thing. It would, no doubt, drive me crazy if I only dwelt on the negatives of my life. Am I proud of all that I did during the past seventy-two years? No, I am not! Am I ashamed of some things that I did? Probably should be, but I just can’t find it. I’ve learned to not worry myself when I make a mistake. Just correct it as best I can and learn from it. Don’t lose any sleep over it. Never blame Garland Davis on anyone but Garland Davis!

I have spent my life reading. Fictions, biographies, histories, religious texts, comics, and comments on head bulkheads, the writings of storytellers, scientists, philosophers, clerics, funny page cartoonists, and disgruntled shit house humorists, I have found as much truth in “Calvin and Hobbes” as I did in Plato and Nietzsche. I believe that sin lies only in hurting another person unnecessarily. Other “sins” are invented bovine excrement. Hurting yourself isn’t sinful. It is stupid. In all my reading and discussions with others, I haven’t found any conclusive evidence of life after death, nor have I found evidence of any sort against it. I figure I will know soon enough. I can wait!

Having devoted a large part of the past seventy-three years to an avid interest in history, I have reached the conclusion that any generation which ignores history has no past. Nor does it have a future. College graduates today know less of history than I did as a third-grade student in a 1950’s rural North Carolina country school. It doesn’t bode well for this generation or the country. For some reason, the educational beauracracy equates government directed public schooling and large amounts of tax money lining their pockets as the be all and end all of learning. How’s that working out for the students?

When one reaches my age, that person is considered a wise senior whose advice and insights are valuable. Isn’t it amazing how closely “mature wisdom” resembles tired and lazy? I didn’t pay a lot of attention to the “Old Farts” when I was younger and I doubt today’s younger generation will listen to what I must say. But, what follows is some advice, some insights, and a few things I have learned.

I tell you, it is a great world because there are girls in it! Sex should be loving, warm and friendly. Otherwise, do it yourself. Masturbation is cheap, clean, convenient, and free of any possibility of wrongdoing–and you don’t have to go home in the cold and dark. But it is lonely as hell. I have found that it is better to copulate than not. Flowers sometimes work well as an aphrodisiac, but experience shows that money always works better. “I came, I saw, she conquered.” (The original Latin was garbled and misinterpreted). I have also learned that all men are not created equal.

Marry above yourself! It will motivate you to become a better man. Marry for love and strive to become the best friend of the girl/woman you take as a bride. For without friendship, love can easily become hate and you may reach my point in life as a bitter old man. The other great accomplishment of my life was marrying the woman I did fifty-one years ago (fifty-two next month). She is a good woman, my best friend—And I love her very much.

Get a dog or two! They will love you and in times of loss they can heal your heart and you will never be lonely. You can learn a lot from how dogs interact with people and other dogs. If you have children, remember the quote from Mr. Peabody, “Every dog should have a boy.” And I add “or a girl.” The time will come when the dog’s life must end. Be a man, hold it in your arms and tell it how great a dog it was when the time comes to send it onward. I have had seven dogs in my life and I am a better person for knowing them.

Watch as little TV as possible! It will rot your brain. The television networks spent a large part of the 1950’s developing the TV industry; pioneering programming ideas and techniques. The effluviant they offer today shows that they learned nothing and have actually regressed. “The Howdy Doody Show” was a better program than much of the crap they pass off as inspired television programming today. Television has replaced books and the art of reading and has contributed to the dumbing down of humanity. I treasure the years spent in the South China Sea and Asia away from the inane, brain numbing offerings of the American television industry.

Never say no to beer! Cold beer is always appropriate! The fastest method of chilling a case of beer is four gallons of water, fourteen pounds of ice and about five pounds of salt. Cover the beer with water and ice, stir in the salt and within six minutes you have some perfectly chilled beer. I spent many years as a cook and baker and, believe it or not, this is one of my favorite recipes!

Laugh whenever possible! Look for humor and embrace it. You feel better after a good laugh. The doctors say that laughter is healthy and Reader’s Digest claims that it is the best medicine. Who knows? You too may live to see seventy-three!

Do everything in excess! Take big bites. Drink from the large mug. Enjoy life. Moderation is for clerics, monks, nuns, and the faint of heart. Yield to temptations, you may not get the chance again. Avoid important decisions while tired or hungry. You may regret it.

And you know, in retrospect, my life is, and was, fun. If I had it to live over, I don’t think I would change one thing. Changing it would change me, making me a different person. A person I might not like as well as I do this one.

The Bible says in Psalm 90:10 “The days of our years are threescore years and ten.” Seventy years are all that is promised. I guess that puts the next seventy on me!

I’ll end this diatribe with a quote from another “wise senior” who is no longer with us. “Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.” —George Carlin

How the Royal Navy Fed Its Sailors Over 200 Years Ago

An army marches on its stomach, and while a Navy sails on the sea, its sailors still need feeding. In the 1790s and early 1800s, the Royal Navy had to provide rations for over 100,000 men, with no refrigeration, modern preservatives, or packaging. This proved to be a difficult task, but one which the Victualling Board tackled head on, providing their sailors with a hearty, if not diverse diet.

To better understand how the sailing men ate at the time, let us take a single ship as a case study.

In 1800 HMS Arethusa and her 280 men were sailing out of Portsmouth and had full access to the Admiralty’s stores. As she was so close to home, her crew would likely have eaten by-the-book rations, with very little being substituted due to scarcity.

Of the 280 men, each of the ordinary sailors were formed into messes. This was the necessary administrative grouping of sailors, but functionally, it was with whom they ate. Each week a man from each mess would be made the mess cook. He would assist the ship’s cook, collect and prepare his mess’s rations. His day started early, to produce breakfast.

Each morning, the stoves would be warmed up. The breakfast ration, usually oatmeal, would have been soaking the night before, so it only required warming up. At 8 bells on the morning watch (8 AM) the oatmeal was dished out.

It was often sweetened with molasses, sugar, honey, or whatever else might be on board. Oatmeal was never unpopular, but the men preferred eggs or meat, if available. Oatmeal or whatever else, the men had 45 minutes to eat and then return to their working duties.

Immediately after breakfast, preparations for dinner, the noon meal, began. This usually consisted of meat, which brought its own problems. The only reliable method to preserve meat was heavily salting it. This allowed the meat rations to last for months at a time, but it was inedible straight out of the barrel.

Each man was allocated one pound of pork on Sunday, and Thursday; and two pounds of beef on Tuesday and Saturday. Each time this was to be served, though, it had to be carefully prepared.

Oak barrels like this would have been used to store everything from biskets to salt pork for long sea voyages. They could also be used as soaking vats to desalt their meat. Nillerdk – CC BY-SA 3.0

The meat was soaked in fresh water for hours, with the water being frequently changed. This got it to the point of being edible, but still somewhat salty. The meat would then be boiled, or if a ship’s cook was kind, lightly fried or grilled. It could also be made into a lobscouse, or stew, cooked with potatoes, onions, and anything else the crew could scrounge.

It was served with a pound of ship’s biscuit. Hard, ¼ pound disks of flour, baked 2 or 3 times until all moisture was completely gone. The men would soak these, usually breaking them into their stews, or letting them soak up the juices from their meat ration.

The meal would also be served with a tot (alcohol ration). On Arethusa, the tot was most likely beer, as being so close to home it was easily acquired. Each man was allowed a gallon per day, keeping them happy and full, if a little drunk!

Dinner was expected to last around 1.5 hours, enough time for the men to feel full, and ready to return to their arduous work.

Next came supper; usually a pudding, made of flour, suet or butter, and raisins. The men could add whatever fruit they may have bought in port, or any meat left over from their rations.

The puddings were shaped into balls and then placed in a linen or cotton bag to be boiled. This produced a soft, filling, and often sweet meal, which did not take much effort to make.

Like breakfast, supper would last 45 minutes, after which the men might return to work, or perhaps dance and skylark on the deck.

In all, Royal Navy sailors consumed an average of around 5,000 calories a day, well above today’s suggested average. At the time, their workload required such a high intake. Men were expected to work 12 hour days, including being on watch duty in the middle of the night.

An average day would consist of climbing the rigging to adjust sails, moving vast and heavy equipment around the deck, and long hours of gun drills. More than enough to burn all 5,000 calories.

What is more, the men had no reliable protection against the weather, burning many of the calories just to keep warm!

This diet lasted for most of the 19th century and did not drastically change until steam powered refrigeration allowed for more variety in meals onboard.

Independence Day 2018

Action of Second Continental Congress,

July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America,

WHEN in the Course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation.

WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness—That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security. Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the Necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the present King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid World.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People, unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyrants only.

He has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People.

He has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and the Amount and Payment of their Salaries.

He has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harrass our People, and eat out their Substance.

He has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pre-tended Offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Power to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our Seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.

He is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy of the Head of a civilized Nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic Insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.

Nor have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them from Time to Time of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our Connections and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of Consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES, that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connection between them and the State of Great-Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which INDEPENDENT STATES may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

An old Southern gospel song:

Thank God for the U.S.A.

By: Albert E. Brumley

In a world that is drifting and changing

When the faith of the people is torn

There’s a nation of hope and of freedom

Where the sons of courage are born

It’s the land of the Star Spangle Banner

Tis a nation as fair as the day

Thank God for the land born of freedom

Thank God for the U.S.A.

Thank God for the U.S.A.

Land of the brave and true

Thank God for the true American way

For the stars and the red white and blue

Thank God for the land we love

Life and our liberty

Thank God for the right to be an American

Thank God for the U.S.A.

To our almighty father in heaven

To the One who ranks higher than all

May He lead may He guide us and keep us

By His grace we never shall fall

For the stars and the stripes of Old Glory

Let us humbly earnestly pray

Thank God for the land born of freedom

Thank God for the U.S.A.

Thank God for the U.S.A.

Land of the brave and true

Thank God for the true American way

For the stars and the red white and blue

Thank God for the land we love

Life and our liberty

Thank God for the right to be an American

Thank God for the U.S.A.