Manasseh's Realm
2024-06-08 14:25:16 UTC
It is a white sauce and should have a lot of black
pepper in it, keeping it from being bland.
SOS is a silly acronym that dates back more than half apepper in it, keeping it from being bland.
century. I'm given to understand it's because creamed
chipped beef does not look very appealing. I have never
had SOS with a lot of black pepper on or in it.
you can expect when you are feeding a bunch of young men a
long way from home and looking for little bits of joy in
their lives.
fact that it was served very frequently all the time. Even
if they liked it the troops called it SOS meaning "same old
shit".
Jill
like it? Pick something else. There will be plenty of options.
Think of the thread on 'gravy swamps' and some people grew up with
that, and want a gravy option with every meal.
I suspect you are thinking just a set meal and no or minimal
options? Nope. Generally 3 mains (pick one), breakfast will have
2 or 3 side meats (pork sausage, bacon, beef sausage links are
typical), 3 choices of bread, 3 or 4 fruit options, 1 or 2 sides
like oatmeal, cream of wheat, boxed cereals are typical.
Dinner and lunch will also have a lot of options from mains to
sides to desserts and soups plus big fruit and salad bar.
Once you get to Carrier size, It's a bit like a cruise liner with 7
galleys. Carriers very a bit on them but ususually the forward one
is a sort of fast food affair (sliders, hot dogs, pizza, nachos,
fries, small salad bar, chili are typical). Chief's mess (we kick
in extra money so have better selections, best food on the ship).
Flag staff officers mess, main galley, one thats 'weird' as its
normally used by just flight deck crew and pilots, Wardroom mess
with worst food on the ship but pretty china.
There's a reason for it's food being worst. See, enlisted in their
contract get fed for no charge. This is done by the ship taking
your 254$ (probably more now) and buying the supplies for the
enlisted galleys with it. (of shore duty you get that money unless
you live on base and opt for free base galley). Officers don't get
that and instead vote how much to pay. Officers are cheap. Hence
crappy (but well prepared) food on pretty china.
Smaller ships don't have that many galleys but the overall system is
the same.
Grin, probably more than you wanted to know but others might find it
interesting.
magicians and a place for the children as well? ;)
I think kids had to be age 10 minimum. Dress rules like no heels
higher than 1 inch and had to be flat, comfortable walking shoes, no
skirts or dresses. Basically dress for a hike and expect a lot of very
steep ladders. Remocal of all rings to a sturdy chain around your neck,
recommended.
claustrophobic. Didn't feel luxurious at all! Hmm... I wonder if it was
Baltimore perhaps? It was several decades ago, so can't remember at the
moment.
decorated submarines of the war. I was a little surprised at the
construction. It's basically a metal tube with a facade of a deck so the
crew would be able to walk on it. The deck had slats that you could see
through. As I recall, they were made out of wood. It was like a roof
purpose built to leak. The battle flag of the USS Bowfin is a hoot.
There's a bus on it - they
torpedoed a bus, as well as a crane, and a dock. This was an
unparalleled feat of the war.
https://www.facebook.com/PacificFleetSubmarineMuseum/photos/a.281621264838/10154119388729839
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Bowfin
"The sinking of Tsushima Maru
Tsushima Maru was an unmarked Japanese cargo ship sunk by Bowfin between
22:00 and 22:30 local time on 22 August 1944 as the ship was carrying
hundreds of schoolchildren from Okinawa to Kagoshima. Attacked while in
convoy, Tsushima Maru sank close to the island of Akusekijima. About
1,484 civilians, including 767 schoolchildren, were killed; 59 children
survived the sinking.[16]
On her sixth patrol, Bowfin destroyed a pier at Minami Daito that
contained a crane and a bus. Thirteen small vessels were sunk by
Bowfin's deck guns."
Diminishes her illustrious battle record through the war:
"Sunken enemy vessels
The passenger-cargo ship Kirishima Maru on 25 September 1943
The tanker Ogurasan Maru and cargo ship Tainan Maru on 26 November 1943[14]
The Vichy France cargo ship Van Vollenhoven on 26 November[15] or 27
November 1943[14]
The passenger-cargo ship Sydney Maru and the 9,866-ton tanker Tonan Maru
on 28 November 1943[14]
A pair of schooners she destroyed with her four-inch gun on 30 November
(1943)
The cargo ship Shoyu Maru on 17 January 1944
The cargo ship Tsukikawa Maru on 10 March 1944
The cargo ships Shinkyo Maru and Bengal Maru on 24 March 1944
The passenger-cargo ship Tsushima Maru on 22 August 1944
Assisted Aspro in the sinking of the 4,500-ton cargo ship Bisan Maru on
14 May 1944
The frigate Coastal Defense Vessel No. 56 on 17 February 1945
The auxiliary patrol boat Chōkai Maru on 2 March 1945
The passenger-cargo ship Chowa Maru on 1 May 1945
The cargo ship Daito Maru No. 3 on 8 May 1945
The cargo ship Shinyō Maru No. 3 on 11 June 1945
The cargo ship Akiura Maru on 13 June 1945
First patrol
Following fitting out, the submarine proceeded via Newport, Rhode
Island, to New London, Connecticut, her base for shakedown training.
Early in July 1943, she got underway for the Pacific war zone, and after
transiting the Panama Canal and crossing the Pacific, reached Australia.
After-voyage repair at Brisbane preceded her getting underway on 19
August to move north and west along the Australian coast to Darwin. She
topped off her fuel tanks at that port and sailed on the morning of 25
August for her first war patrol.
The warship reached the Mindanao Sea on 2 September, but plied its
waters for more than three weeks without encountering any worthwhile
targets. On 24 September, she met with Billfish to conduct coordinated
operations. The next day, the two submarines began tracking a six-ship
convoy and continued the chase for some five hours before Bowfin finally
attained a suitable attack position. She then launched her six bow
torpedoes – four at a freighter and two at a trailing transport. Three
exploded against the side of the first ship and both of those fired at
the second struck home. The submarine immediately turned her fantail
toward the convoy and emptied her stern tubes, sending four torpedoes in
the direction of a tanker. Gunfire at her periscope forced Bowfin to go
deep, so prevented her crew from observing the progress of her last
salvo, but they heard its torpedoes explode. When the submarine rose to
periscope depth about an hour later, the 8,120-ton passenger-cargo ship
Kirishima Maru was slowly sinking, the tanker was on fire, and the
transport seemed to be settling by the stern. However, the two latter
ships apparently were able to limp back to port, for the sinking of
neither was confirmed by postwar study of Japanese records. Later in the
day, members of Bowfin's crew heard distant explosions and inferred that
Billfish was going after the remnants of the convoy, a conclusion that
proved to be correct, for their sister ship managed to damage two
Japanese ships totaling about 12,000 tons. Although the submarines
continued to pursue the remaining enemy vessels as they fled during the
night, the battered group of Japanese ships finally managed to slip away
in the darkness.
The following morning, after Bowfin's radar had picked up an enemy plane
also equipped with radar, the submarine was forced to submerge to avoid
detection. Two days later, she came across a 1,400-ton interisland
steamer and shadowed her until reaching a firing position about three
hours later. She then launched three torpedoes. One stopped before
reaching the target, and the other two missed.
On 30 September, as she left the Mindanao Sea, Bowfin chanced upon a
diesel-propelled barge carrying over 100 Japanese soldiers, and opened
fire on it with her four-inch gun. When the target responded with
machine gun fire, the submarine's 20-mm guns entered the fray. The
battle came to an abrupt end when a four-inch round struck the enemy's
magazine and blew apart the already sinking barge.
On 2 October, as the submarine continued through the Makassar Strait
toward Australia, her crew sighted a schooner off Balikpapan. Willingham
fired two shots across the stranger's bow, but failed to bring her to
and sank her with gunfire.
Bowfin arrived at Fremantle on 10 October, ending a successful patrol.
Rear Admiral Ralph Waldo Christie, who commanded American submarines in
the area, was lavish in his praise of the submarine's performance; he
rewarded her commanding officer with the opportunity of heading a
submarine division. To free him for the new role, Lieutenant Commander
Walter T. Griffith relieved Willingham as commanding officer of Bowfin
on 26 October.
Second patrol
USS Bowfin officers after returning from the second patrol.
Upon completion of refitting, Bowfin got underway on 1 November and
headed for the South China Sea. From time to time during this patrol,
she again cooperated with Billfish. On 8 November, Bowfin picked up the
trail of a group of five schooners. When she pulled within range of
them, she opened fire with her four-inch gun and sank three before bombs
from a Japanese plane forced the submarine to dive, allowing the two
surviving vessels to slip away. After staying down until dark, Bowfin
surfaced and resumed patrolling. Before long, she discovered and opened
fire upon a large sailing ship, which went down after suffering hits by
two four-inch shells. Two days later, she found her next victims, two
small steamers heading for Tawi-Tawi Bay, and set both ablaze with gunfire.
Her luck was even better on the morning of 26 November, while she was
approaching the coast of Indochina during a blinding rainstorm. Without
prior knowledge that any other vessels were near, she unexpectedly found
herself surrounded by Japanese shipping. After barely avoiding a
collision with a tanker by backing all engines, she torpedoed and sank
the 5,069-ton tanker Ogurasan Maru and then dispatched the 5,407-ton
freighter Tainan Maru. A few hours later, her torpedoes ended the career
of Van Vollenhoven, a 691-ton coastal cargo ship that the Japanese had
taken from her French owners when they overran Indochina almost two
years before. On 28 November, after having sent a small passenger-cargo
ship to the bottom with a single torpedo, Bowfin joined Billfish in
attacking a convoy and quickly sank Sydney Maru, a 5,425-ton freighter
and Tonon Maru, a 9,866-ton tanker.
Meanwhile, one of the Japanese ships fired on Bowfin and scored hits,
which opened leaks in her starboard induction line; while serious, they
did not prevent the submarine from getting off her last two torpedoes.
Repair efforts at daylight slowed, but did not completely stop the
flooding, and Bowfin began her voyage back to Australia. En route to her
base on 2 December, she came across a "two-masted yacht...which...," in
Griffith's words, "...looked like it might have been some planter’s
yacht taken over by the Japs." The submarine's deck gun promptly
destroyed this stranger; thereafter, Bowfin enjoyed an uneventful
passage that brought her to Fremantle a week later. There, Rear Admiral
Christie praised her performance as the "classic of all submarine patrols".
Third patrol
RADM Christie (L) and LCDR Griffith (R) on Bowfin during her third patrol.
The submarine got underway on 8 January 1944 for her third war patrol.
She proceeded through the Java, Banda, and Flores Seas to Makassar
Strait, where – on 16 January – she encountered a small schooner,
surfaced, and sank the sailing vessel with her deck gun. The following
day, she came across a cargo ship and two escorts, but her attacks on
these targets were frustrated by malfunctioning torpedoes. One from her
first spread of four bow torpedoes hit and stopped the freighter, but
the other three missed, and two shots from her bow tubes detonated
before reaching the target. After reloading her tubes, she returned to
the convoy the following day and finished off the crippled cargo ship
with four torpedoes, which sent the 4,408-ton Shoyu Maru to the bottom.
She also managed to hit one of the escorts with two "fish", but did not
sink her.
Out of torpedoes, Bowfin returned to Darwin for more, and while in port,
picked up Rear Admiral Christie, who remained on board the submarine for
the rest of the patrol to check on torpedo performance, first hand, and
to learn the secret of Bowfin's remarkable success. The day after she
returned to sea, the submarine put three torpedoes into a small cargo
ship. Lt. Comdr. Griffith claimed the target sank and his distinguished
passenger confirmed the kill, but the sinking was not borne out by
postwar examination of Japanese records – possibly because Bowfin's
alleged victim was too small to be listed. About daybreak on 28 January,
Bowfin began trailing a large tanker, and she continued the chase until
reaching striking range that evening. She then fired all six bow
torpedoes, but since the target simultaneously changed course, none
struck home. After a rapid reload, she sent six more toward the tanker,
and this time, two exploded against the side of the Japanese ship,
sending towers of fire and smoke skyward. Nevertheless, the tanker
remained afloat. As Bowfin closed to administer the coup de grace, the
enemy ship began fighting back with her main battery and machine-gun
fire. Undaunted, the submarine kept up the attack, and during the
ensuing 20 minutes, fired six more torpedoes - two misses, followed by a
pair of hits, then a miss, and finally another hit. At this point, the
tanker's fire was becoming more accurate and forced the submarine to
dive. When she came up, the Japanese vessel was retiring from the scene,
and by dawn had disappeared over the horizon.
The next day, Bowfin laid a minefield in Makassar Strait before
beginning the voyage back to Australia. On 30 January, she came across
two small schooners, which she destroyed with her four-inch gun. The
submarine moored at Fremantle on 5 February and began preparations for
her next mission.
Fourth patrol
Underway on 28 February 1944, the submarine headed for the Celebes Sea.
On 10 March, her crew sighted a convoy of four ships screened by two
escorts. Bowfin fired six bow tubes, but four of the torpedoes exploded
prematurely. Japanese planes forced Griffith to dive, thus preventing
anyone on board from observing the fate of the two other torpedoes.
During the ensuing action, in which the escorts searched for the
submarine, and she, in turn, strove to hide at some 350 ft below the
surface, a chain dragged by one of the Japanese hunters scraped across
Bowfin's hull. Meanwhile, depth charge explosions – more than 20 – shook
the submarine severely, but did no debilitating damage. When Griffith
dared to rise to the surface, he saw a freighter down by the stern being
taken under tow. Despite the efforts of the enemy escorts and of five
circling Japanese aircraft, Bowfin attacked the convoy, but could not
follow the progress of her torpedoes because one of them had boomeranged
and threatened her by running in a circular pattern. She dived to escape
the danger and did not come up again until the next day. She attacked
the freighter again, but the Japanese escorts drove her down once more.
Later that day, she rose to periscope depth, found the damaged ship
alone, and finished the 4,470-ton Tsukikawa Maru off with four
well-aimed torpedoes.
The submarine then began looking for the rest of the convoy, caught up
with it well after dark, and fired her remaining torpedoes, but none
scored. She then headed back to Darwin for more, and stood out to sea
again on 15 March with a fresh supply. Three days later, she emptied her
bow tubes while attacking a small convoy, but all six either ran under
their targets or missed wide of their marks. The inevitable depth charge
barrage followed, but proved to be equally ineffective. When Bowfin
attacked again later that day, she launched four torpedoes – all of
which were wasted.
She did better on the night of 24 March, when at the end of a long
chase, she attacked a five-ship convoy in the Celebes Sea, sinking two
freighters – 5,139-ton Shinkyo Maru and 5,395-ton Bengal Maru. She also
damaged a third ship, but could not finish her off for want of
torpedoes. As a result, she headed back to Darwin, where she arrived on
1 April.
Fifth and sixth patrols
A 40 mm antiaircraft gun
There, Commander John H. Corbus relieved Lt. Commander Griffith in
command of the submarine, which got underway again on 24 April and
headed for the Palaus. Although this sixth patrol proved to be her
longest in both time and distance, she only managed to put two torpedoes
into a freighter on 14 May, and it refused to sink. She performed
lifeguard duty before heading, via Midway, for Pearl Harbor, where she
arrived on 21 June.
On 16 July, Bowfin left Hawaii and headed for the Ryukyu Islands. She
encountered no worthwhile targets until 9 August, when her crew sighted
four ships heading for the harbor at Minami Daito. She trailed them into
port, and after they had moored, fired her bow torpedoes, blowing up two
and damaging a third. A stray torpedo hit a dock, sending a bus
careening into the water, later an incident the Cary Grant comedy film
Operation Petticoat incorporated into its story line in 1959 (Grant
yelling "We sunk a truck!" in the film after an unintentional misfire
caused by a nurse on board). However, no sinkings were confirmed by
Japanese records – again possibly because of the small size of the
alleged victims.
An authenticated kill came off the Tokara Islands on 22 August, when she
attacked a convoy, hit several ships, and claimed several kills,
including two destroyers, but apparently only sank the 6,754-ton
transport Tsushima Maru. According to Tsushima-maru Commemoration
Association data, the ship was carrying 1,661 civilian evacuees,
including 834 schoolchildren (of whom 775 were killed). Shortly after
the sinking, a "gag order" was enforced, and families and survivors
rarely spoke about the incident. The number of victims who have been
identified by name, based on notifications from bereaved families (as of
22 August 2012), include 780 schoolchildren.
On 28 August, Bowfin set a little trawler afire with her four-inch gun.
However, since she had futilely fired her last four torpedoes at this
target before surfacing, the submarine headed via Midway and Pearl
Harbor for the U. S. West Coast. She reached San Francisco, California,
on 21 September and entered the Mare Island Navy Yard for overhaul.
Seventh through ninth patrols
USS Bowfin
At the end of the yard work, Commander Alexander K. Tyree relieved
Commander Corbus on 16 December 1944; later that day, the submarine got
underway westward back across the Pacific. Following training in
Hawaiian waters, she headed for a station near the Japanese home islands
south of Honshū, where she performed lifeguard services for American
planes – both naval and Army – raiding strategic enemy targets in Japan.
On 17 February, Bowfin attacked two Japanese subchasers and sank the
750-ton Coast Defense Vessel No. 56 with torpedoes and then survived a
26-depth-charge attack by her victim's consort, which had herself barely
escaped destruction when some of Bowfin's torpedoes exploded
prematurely. The submarine later sank a Japanese sea truck with one
torpedo. On 19 March about 15 miles south of Shikoku at 09:30, the
submarine was on watch when a lone Navy torpedo bomber with white stars
on its wings and its tail shot up headed in low toward the submarine.
The plane had been hit moments earlier by enemy flak during its bombing
run over the Kure Naval Yard. The plane landed in the water dead ahead,
about 500 yards off the bow. It floated for two minutes and then nosed
down and sank. Both men in the plane jumped out and hung onto an
inflated raft. Eleven minutes later, the crew of Bowfin had them aboard.
She rescued the pilot, Lieutenant R. U. Plant, and gunner, J.
Papazoglakis (Pakis) of the downed Grumman TBF Avenger torpedo bomber of
Torpedo Squadron 83 (VT-83) from the aircraft carrier USS Essex. The two
men were cold and wet from just a few minutes in that water, but
otherwise safe and sound. The captain ordered the life raft sunk and the
dye marker destroyed with small arms fire and then resumed patrol on the
lifeguard station.[10] The submarine soon set a course for the Marianas
and ended the patrol upon her arrival at Guam on 25 March.
Torpedo tubes
Underway on 23 April for her eighth war patrol, the submarine plied the
waters north of Honshū and Hokkaidō. Her first kill came on 1 May, when
two of her torpedoes sank the 2,719-ton transport Chowa Maru. A week
later, she overtook, torpedoed, and destroyed an 880-ton freighter Daito
Maru No. 3, but that proved to be the last score of the patrol. After a
fortnight of futile searching for targets, she arrived at Apra Harbor,
Guam, for refit.
While training for her ninth and final patrol of the war, Bowfin rescued
a Marine Corps pilot whose fighter had crashed. She got underway on 29
May and pointed her bow back toward the enemy homeland. One of 9
submarines protected by newly developed mine-detecting sonar and sent
into the Sea of Japan, she carefully threaded her way through the
dangerous minefields of Tsushima Strait, which guarded this previously
sacrosanct maritime heart of the Japanese Empire, but found little enemy
shipping. Nevertheless, she wasted neither of her two possible contacts:
the first, the 1,898-ton cargo ship Shinyō Maru No. 3 took four
torpedoes before sinking on 11 June; and the second, the 887-ton
freighter Akiura Maru met a similar fate on 13 June.
The submarine left the Sea of Japan by La Pérouse Strait (Soya Misaki)
and headed for Hawaii. She reached Pearl Harbor on Independence Day and
began preparations to return to action. Early in August, Bowfin sailed
for the Marianas, her staging point for her 10th war patrol. However,
while en route, she received word of Japan's capitulation. As a result,
she reversed course and returned to Hawaii and, then, headed for the
Panama Canal on her way to the east coast of the United States. Bowfin
arrived at Tompkinsville, Staten Island, New York, on 21 September 1945.
She served in the Atlantic Fleet until decommissioned at New London on
12 February 1947 and placed in reserve.
Post-war
Bowfin in drydock undergoing restoration, 2004
Reactivated because of the Navy's need to expand the fleet to support
United Nations-led forces during the Korean War, the submarine was
recommissioned on 27 July 1951, and following shakedown training, sailed
for the Pacific. After arriving at San Diego, California, on 6 October,
she worked from that port for the next two years, devoting her time to
training operations and local exercises. The nominal ending of
hostilities in Korea in the summer of 1953 reduced the Navy's need for
active submarines and prompted Bowfin's second inactivation. She arrived
at San Francisco on 8 October 1953, and was placed out of commission, in
reserve, at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard on 22 April 1954. The warship
remained there until moving to Seattle, Washington, on 1 May 1960 to
replace Puffer as the Naval Reserve training submarine there, and to
begin a little over a decade's service. Her name was finally stricken
from the Navy list on 1 December 1971, and she was taken back to Pearl
Harbor, where she now serves as a memorial. Audio tours are available to
the general public at Pearl Harbor. Some areas of the boat are off limits.
Bowfin was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1986.[9][11] In
1987, she was drydocked and refitted to be used as a floating location
to portray three different submarines in the epic miniseries War and
Remembrance.[12] She was drydocked again in 2004, and a third time in 2022."
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