Look of a Lady

Watch #6

 I do not have any photographs taken from off of the ship and in one of these watches, I'll explain why not, but for the moment, I found this photograph in a US Navy file at this address: http://www.navsource.org/archives/10/12/1231.htm.  So, if it is not a permissible photograph, and I hope it is, I'll have to take it down and find one somewhere else.  In the meantime, just enjoy this one.  In this photograph, we are looking at the bow from the port side of the Point Defiance.  Counting from the main deck going upward, and the main deck is the 1 deck, I worked mostly on the 03 level which was just beneath the signal and flying bridges.  Both bridges, or the bridge for hardcore definitions, was on the 04 level.  My job was in Combat Information Center (CIC) and we were in the Operations Intelligence (OI) Division.  To reach where I worked, you had to walk through the wheel house, past the helm and turn to the stern and walk down a passageway.  As you walked aft, on the port side (right hand walking aft) was a hatch (doorway) which opened into the radio room.  On the opposite side of the passageway was a hatchway that opened into CIC.  CIC had a hatchway on each side and CIC was well lighted; but just beyond and aft a short distance was a small room which held our actual radar repeaters.  The radar units were large and high powered electronic units in their own room aft of us perhaps twenty yards and aft of yet another passageway.  What you see in the movies and what we worked on for our information were small television like units called radar repeaters.  We worked in relative darkness so that we could fully see the ghostly lines and dots that formed on the repeater screen.  The screen was a near black and the sweep hand that made the 360 degree circle was in a green.  Any radar contacts were also in green.  The operator, which Wherry and I were for some time, sat in a low chair with sound powered telephones draped over our ears, and communicated with the watch petty officer sitting just outside.  The reason for the phones was to have precise information exchanged and we also were connected to the lookouts above on the bridge and aft on the stern.  The radar antennae were high above us on the ship's mast and rotated constantly as they searched for returning electronic echoes which we called a contact.  Once the operator saw a contact, he reported it to the watch PO.  "I have a new contact."  The watch PO gave it a designation, say contact "Alpha" and the operator marked it on the screen with an "A" in grease pencil.  After that, it was, "Stand by contact Alpha; mark." and the operator reported it in bearing and range.  The watch PO plotted it and we gathered information about its course and speed.

The mess deck, where we ate, was on the 02 level and ran fully from the port side to the starboard side.  Enlisted men and officers had separate mess sections and Chief Petty Officers had a separate mess. First class petty officers had a small section next to the chow line where they ate, so basically our general mess was from E-1 (if we had any, and it was rare) through E-5 grades.  I recall that an officer had to share in our mess to inspect the food; a morale thing I suppose, but they rotated it so it was not often a given officer ate with us and never really shared anything with us.  Officers weren't missed in the mess, by the way.  We behaved differently when no officers were present, naturally, not badly but more relaxed, with a bit more camaraderie being shared.

More on the next watch.

Stevie Joe Payne