Reprint from the Naval Reserves Association Magazine

submitted by Powell Black

June, 2007

Powell Black

This article is selected sections of an article in the NAVAL RESERVE ASSOCIATION (NRA) magazine of July 2006. Hope it brings back many memories you may have forgotten that the EURYALE brought to us when we sailed the Pacific. (The article is shown below and a VADM is the author.) He wrote:

"I liked sailors, officers, and enlisted men from all parts of the land, farms of the Midwest, small towns of New England, from the cities, the mountains, and the prairies, from all walks of life.

I trusted and depended on them as they trusted and depended on me -- for professional competence, for comradeship, for strength and courage. In a word, they were "shipmates," then and forever.

The work was hard and dangerous; the going, rough at times; the parting from loved ones, painful; but the companionship of robust Navy laughter, the "all for one and one for all" philosophy of the sea was ever present.

I liked the serenity of the sea after a day of hard ship's work, as flying fish flitted across the waves ... and sunset gave way to night.

I liked the feel of the Navy in darkness -- the masthead and range lights, the red and green navigation lights and stern light, the pulsating phosphorescence of radar repeaters.

And I liked drifting off to sleep lulled by the myriad noises large and small that told me that my ship was alive and well, and that my shipmates on watches would keep me safe.

I liked quiet midwatches with the aroma of strong coffee -- the lifeblood of the Navy-permeating everywhere.

And I liked hectic watches when the exacting minuet of haze-grey shapes racing at flank speed kept all hands on a razor edge of alertness.

And I liked the sight of space-age equipment manned by youngsters clad in dungarees and sound-powered phones that their grandfathers would still recognize.

In years to come, when sailors are home from the sea, they will still remember with fondness and respect the ocean of all its moods.

Gone ashore for good, they will grow wistful about their Navy days, when the seas belonged to them and a new port of call was ever over the horizon.

Remembering this, they will stand taller and say, "I was a sailor once."

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