,No; Not a typo here:
I wondered after posting something here concerning getting those who served to tell their stories before they passed,and ther history was lost .
So, I have to do this .She was proud and still wore her wartime paint .She wasn't actually old in the sense of a ship,s age .
She was loaded just like she had been that last day fifty years ago . Many sailors trod her decks and holds, taking tokens of both her service and her cargo .No one really cared that much! I wonder what her original cew thought of her?
Sadly , her name slipped my mind.The fact is, her last days on earth are firmly and indelibly marked in my mind . My crew was instucted to remove to our ship, Anything we needed in our various departments that could use the stuff .Other things could be kept as mementos as long as the Captain didn't see what it was .The O.Ds were told to be partially blind !
She was then towed out to the range and prepped for her final days .She was shot at with 5"-38 rifles from our destroyers and the bigger guns from our one cruiser present .Most of our old ammo and six torpedoes later, she decided ,enough was enough .
She gracefully dipped at the bow .Settling almost lengthwise, not showing her petticoats, ( a fine lady would Never show petticoats in public !) she slowly slipped below the surface. Just then, the last forty feet of her stern rose above the waves and the sounds she made then ,still live with me today . I say it now .No one with any kind of romance for ships and the sea ,ever wants the hear the sounds she made in those last moments!Plus no ship should die alone !
In an almost pleading sound she released her soul to the the sailor's version of ship heaven . May she rest in peace is what I thought .Sometime later I thought about her. I was diving a sunken ship for a business venture .Hey! the very colorful fishes sure liked their ship home !
I sure hoped the fishes liked her,I know I did . T.B.