A Gunner Aboard the Yankee | Page 5

idiot as well. That I really passed the examination successfully was no fault of the naval surgeon and his assistants.
After the medical department had finished with us, the enlistment papers were completed, and we became full-fledged "Jackies," as "Stump" termed it. The members of the battalion were rated as landsmen, ordinary seamen, and able-bodied seamen, according to their skill, and a number of men, hastily enlisted for the purpose, were made machinists, firemen, coal-passers, painters, and carpenters. Some of these had seen service in the regular navy, and they were visibly horny-handed sons of toil. One Irishman, whose brogue was painful, looked with something very like contempt on the Naval Reserve sailors.
"Uncle Sam is a queer bird," several of us overheard him remark to a mate. "He do be making a picnic av this war wid his pleasure boats an' his crew av pretty b'yes. If we iver tackle the Spaniards, there'll be many a mama's baby on board this hooker cryin' for home, swate home."
"Hod," a six-footer, who played quarter-back on a famous team not long ago, took out his notebook and made an entry.
"I'll spot that fellow and make him eat his words before we get into deep water," he said, quietly. He was not the only one to make that vow, and it was plain that Burke, the Irishman, had trouble in store for him.
On our return to the "New Hampshire," the battalion was placed under the regular ship's routine. All the men were divided into two watches, starboard and port. The port watch, for instance, goes on duty at eight bells in the morning, stands four hours, and is then relieved by the starboard watch; this routine continues day and night, except from four until eight in the afternoon, when occur the dog watches, two of them, two hours long each, stood by the port and starboard men respectively. The dog watches are necessary to secure a change in the hours of duty for each watch.
From now on we were given a taste of the actual work of the service. Details were made up each morning and sent to the "Yankee" to assist in getting her in readiness for service. One of the first duties was to carry on board and stow away in the hold one hundred kegs of mess pork. As each keg contained one hundred pounds, the task was not easy for men unaccustomed to manual labor. Still there was no complaint. In fact, the only growling heard so far had come from some of the men who had seen service in the regular navy. Burke, the fireman, declaimed loudly against the "shoe leather an' de terrer-cotter hard-tack which they do be tryin' to feed to honest workers. As for the slops they call coffee, Oi wouldn't give it to an Orangeman's pig!"
The food served out on board the "New Hampshire"--being the usual Government ration of salt-horse, coffee, and hard-tack--was vastly different from that to which the majority of the boys were accustomed, but it was accepted with the good grace displayed by the members of the Reserve on every occasion. All these little discomforts are, as the Navigator (a commissioned officer of the regular navy) remarked, "merely incidental to the service."
As the time approached when we were to board the "Yankee" for good, the ordinary watches were abandoned, and only anchor watches kept. An anchor watch is a detail of five or six men, selected from the different parts of the ship, who do duty, really, as watchmen, during the night. Two days before the order arrived to leave the "New Hampshire," it was found necessary to station several men, armed with guns and fixed bayonets, on the dock near the ship, to stop men from taking the "hawser route" ashore. The firemen and coal-passers had been refused shore leave, or liberty, as it is called, because of their habit of getting intoxicated, pawning their uniforms, and loitering ashore. Truth to tell, the guns and bayonets had little effect, as the offenders were old in the business.
The second night after the order was put in force it happened that "Hod," who was rated as an able seaman, was on duty with gun and bayonet on that end of the dock opposite the forecastle. He had just relieved the man whose watch ended at midnight, and he stood thoughtfully watching the twinkling lights on the opposite side of the mighty East River. There was so much to occupy his mind in a situation which was both charming and fascinating that he remained motionless for several minutes. Presently there came a slight, scraping sound, and the end of a rope struck the dock almost at his feet.
Glancing up, "Hod" saw a man's figure, dimly outlined in the gloom, slip from the topgallant forecastle and