Category: WESTPAC Deployment

30 May 1969 was Memorial Day. Began the day with my first midwatch (0000-0400). Got skunked — not a single “skunk” (surface contact) found on radar. Then, after a few hours sleep and breakfast, a surprise.

At 0930, the ship held man-overboard drills. A dummy was thrown off to either port or starboard and an officer with the conn, i.e., the only person on the bridge authorized to give speed and course orders to the helmsman, tried to bring the ship around and alongside the target, in a manner that allowed shipboard personnel to retrieve the dummy.

It was our fifth day at sea and, after the regular Officers of the Deck had taken their shot, Captain Olsen decided to let the new Ensigns (two in addition to me) give it a try. As a special duty officer, I was not authorized to be a ship-driver or to qualify as an Officer of the Deck Underway, so I expected just to watch. But noooooo . . . Captain Olsen, for whatever reason, ordered me to take the conn, too. 

This would be the first time I had had control of even a motorboat, let alone one with the motors this one had. Thank goodness I was maybe last to have the conn for the drills, so I had seen and heard several officers before me. I was very nervous. I figured I had been tossed the opportunity to become a funny story for the rest of the deployment. “You shoulda seen what our Intel Officer did in man-overboard. Oh my gawd!”

I remember with awe what happened when I heard “Man overboard, port side!” and gave the order “Left full rudder (to move the ship’s propeller away from the “man overboard”), all ahead flank (top speed).” The stern of the ship lowered, the bow came up, and this man-of-war, nearly two football fields long, just leapt ahead. It was so amazing to me that it took a few seconds to come back to the issue at hand. I had to run to the portside bridge wing and find the dummy using binoculars.

The ship kept turning to port, increasing in speed. The officer with the conn (me), at just the right point, had to slow the turn and the ship’s speed so that the ship would approach the dummy, coming to rest alongside it, if at all possible. During the turn, I would have said something like “Rudder amidships” (put the rudder on the centerline, no angle) or “Meet her” (check but not stop the ship’s swing by putting the rudder to the opposite side). Then “Steady as she goes,” then “All stop.” In what I described in my journal entry that day as “One of the best examples of beginner’s luck I’ve ever seen,” the ship nearly stopped next to the dummy and it was “rescued” easily. It was the best recovery of the day.

Don’t remember for sure, but I think just about everyone on the bridge was in stunned silence.

On this day, we were “somewhere between Jamaica and Panama,” according to my journal. (That’s about a 1,000 mile distance.) We had slowed to arrive at the Panama Canal at the appropriate time on the following day.

Don’t worry. There is not going to be a post about each day of this deployment.

I wrote my first letter home on 27 May 1969. I don’t think I posted it, though, until we arrived in Hawaii two weeks later. It repeated the concerns I had about seasickness and added a little detail.

“Well, just completed my 27th straight hour at sea. It’s not too bad. I haven’t thrown up yet, but I did pass up most of last night’s supper. I hit the rack at 7 p.m., stood a watch from 3 to 7 a.m., hit the rack again from 8:30 to 1130. [Besides CIC watch-standing, I still didn’t really have a job on the ship.] Boy, this motion makes you sleepy. It’s like you’re in a hammock all the time, swinging gently back and forth, back and forth, back and forth gulp. No, today, I’ve felt very well. I ate a big breakfast and a good-sized lunch. Of course, the sea has been quite calm, I understand.”

This image of the beginning of that letter shows one of the examples of Biddle stationery.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In my journal that same day, I noted we had progressed to “N. Florida.”

On this date in 1969 (a Monday then), at about 1000 (10 am to you civilians), USS Biddle eased away from Pier 23, Naval Station, Norfolk, Va., to begin a seven-month deployment to the Western Pacific (WESTPAC).

For those of us undertaking our first deployment, this was a big deal. Looking back, I consider the cruise the greatest single adventure of my life. (I think being a father has been my greatest adventure overall.) Based on part of my journal entry that day, however, my focus seems to have been on my stomach.

“Hadn’t thrown up as of 1830. (Didn’t eat much supper.)  1900 — hit the sack. Beginning to round [Cape] Hatteras. Oh God!”

I had never before been to sea. I had rarely been on a boat and certainly not out of sight of land. My ignorance about what going to sea entailed and my inexperience fueled my concern about becoming seasick and embarrassing myself. One of the most significant differences between being at sea and on land is that, at sea, the deck (floor) is never stable. Below is a short video taken from a wonderful collection of scenes shot on the deployment by GMG2 George Boyles and GMG2 Jerome Kuczmarski, and edited by Boyles. (These were taken on 8mm film, then transferred to video, then digitized, so technical quality has been diminished.) The beginning shows the wake behind the ship and the second shows the ship rolling, i.e., moving side-to-side along its longitudinal axis.

My shipmates and I were now embarking on a voyage of thousands of miles through the Caribbean Sea, into the Pacific Ocean, and on to Hawaii before setting foot on land again. (We had expected to have liberty in Panama City, but, as you’ll learn, that was not to be.)  

Looking again at the picture at the top of this post, it’s interesting to note two of the ships also on that pier. The ship inbound of where Biddle had been was the German destroyer Lütjens (D-185). Across the pier was USS Norfolk (DL-1), the Navy’s first Destroyer Leader. The Norfolk had been launched in 1951 and was decommissioned in January 1970. 

As one of the many unmarried sailors on board, I had no one on the pier saying goodbye. Many others did, however, and I only later came to appreciate the sacrifices they and their family members made during such deployments. While the ship was in radio communication with “the Navy,” individuals then had no personal means of electronic communication. Twelve babies were born while their dads were away at sea during this deployment. One father missed by only about a week, as his child was born on 2 June. The captain authorized him to use the ship’s communications system to connect with his wife in the hospital.

I stood my first watch in CIC that day as well. I’m sure it was in a very secondary role, observing the experienced watchstanders. 

Day 1 — 204 to go!