(Sea Story Continued from Page 8)
On one of the trips to Japan we had a shipmate die in his sleep. We were in port, I believe in Japan. The master in arms came by the second time and rattled his bunk and said "I'll be back in five minutes, if you're still in the rack, I'll put you on report." When the master of arms came back, several men in the compartment were watching to see him placed on report. When the MA touched the sailor he said, "This man is dead." He looked around to ask someone to go to sick bay to get a corpsman, and no one was around. They all had vanished.
One time when we were 1000 miles out of Honolulu Hawaii, we had a shipmate jump overboard. Said he was going home to get his wife. Now I was just told this, I didn't see any of this. They put a boat in the water and got him aboard an LCVP. Then he tried to get out again. They said that boatswain-mate Shaky Graham knocked him unconscious so they could get him back aboard. At another time, the captain's gig was damaged. It is an understatement to say it was damaged. The bowl was completely destroyed. Now the captain he had to use an LCVP until it was repaired. We spent a lot of time in Wanson in Korea. We had a detachment of mine-sweeping boats. Every morning, we, the Whetstone crew, would hoist the mine-sweeping boats into the water. They would go into the harbor and clear it of mines if they had found one, they blew it up. After they cleared the harbor of mines the battleship Missouri and some destroyers would go in and bombard the train tracks. The North Koreans would work all night to run a train. One day the train ran a little late. It went into a tunnel into a mountain and the Missouri sealed off one end of the mountain, then went around and sealed off the other end of the mountain. Sealed them in the mountain, but I'm sure they dug out.
We, the Stone, was sitting in the harbor, the Missouri and the destroyers were doing their job, aircraft was flying over us dropping napalm bombs. The armistice went into effect that all stopped. The Whetstone helped move ammo and supplies from Wanson island occupied by the South Koreans. What I'm about to tell you, I hope it's not true. I hope I dreamed it. The ammo and stuff was being loaded into the well deck. A seamen was assigned as a fire watch. That same seamen was caught sitting, on ammo, of all things, playing cards, on a box of hand grenades with a South Korean. And they were both smoking. I don't remember what happened to either the sailor or the South Korean. Being in North Korea when the armistice went in effect was quite an experience for me. We got a new commander and our first inspection we were at muster. For our new captain. He would step in front of each man, look him over, nod his head, go to the next man. A good buddy of mine, the captain started looking him over at his head first, then to his feet. He took a quick back and said, ""My God sailor, what size shoes do you wear?"" My friend said, ""15-D sir"". We all got a laugh out of that.
I was raised in Duke MO until I was 18 and went into the Navy. When I left Duke there was no electricity for the people of Duke. The population of the Stone was about four times that of Duke. I received a letter from my only sister. She said, "Bud, when you come home again, you just flip a switch and the lights will come on." For all of us at Duke that was a big deal.
On the way back to San Diego, ending my first trip to Korea, I submitted a request for 30 day leave. This was Oct 1953. I had not been home since March of 1952. I was on watch and a yeoman got on the phone with some questions. Before he could process my leave request, he said, "Willy, is your real name Buddy?" I assured him that it was. "We need your complete address." Now that was before zip codes. " All you have on your request is Duke, MO. What is your route number?""
I said, ""Don't have one.""
"What is your box number." "I don't have one."
"What is your street number."
"I don't have one."
"What is your house number.""
""I don't have one."
""What is your apartment number.""
"I don't have one."
He asked, "How do you get your mail?"
I told him, I would walk down to the store, ask Mary Lane for my mail and she would hand it to me.
Another time we were entering Tokyo bay, I don't remember when, but we entered Tokyo bay several times. This time we were to drop off a barge. We had, I think, picked up in Korea. At the time, my special sea detail duties was on the focal wearing the sound powered head phones. We dropped anchor, balanced down to off-load the barge, the con told us several times to let out more chain because we were drifting. Finally the con gave us the order to house the anchor. When we hoisted in the chain, the anchor was not at the end of the chain. The boatswain-mate first class said ""Willy, tell the con, we've hoisted the bitter end of the chain no anchor." The next day, the chief wards machinist Mr. Gentry said, "Willy, I had to laugh, the way you calmly reported to the con we had lost the anchor. No excitement in your voice at all." While we're on the subject of anchors, we tied up at a pier or dock at Treasure Island. For some reason or the other, they took one of the anchors off, and laid it on the dock. A day or so later the Stone was moved to another pier or dock, and our chief boatswain-mate set an anchor watch. Starting at 5 pm until 7 am. Yes, I was one assigned to guard the anchor. As if someone would, if we didn't watch it, pick up the anchor, throw the 37,000 pound anchor over his shoulder and walk off with it. A lot of people had a good laugh about having to guard the anchor. It was not so funny for us having to watch the anchor. If my memory is correct, when we arrived in the war zone of Korea, the officer of the con sounded general quarters. As we were racing to our battle stations. Some of the crew was then saying, "This is it, this is it!" About the time we got the covers off our 40 and 20 mm gun, a jet aircraft flying low passed right over us. It didn't come back. We were all glad we didn't have to shoot at the plane going that fast. We also had a 5 inch gun. One time, a tug-boat, I think, pulled a sled with a very long cable may of called it WIRE ROPE. We fired the 5 inch at it. I don't remember if it was hit. What I do remember is it broke a lot of light-bulbs in our sleeping quarters. Someone said firing the 5 inch did more damage to the Stone than it would the enemy.
One time when we fired at a sled behind the tug-boat the concussion from the blast caused a hydrostatic release to drop one of our life-boats into the water. That time the 5 inch broke light bulbs and released the life boat.
