Rest and Recreation in the South Pacific, Post WWII

The war with Japan was over. Our ship came off Southern Operations and went into the docks at Pearl Harbor. The four 20 mm guns were removed. All the munitions were removed except the 3-inch gun on the fo’c’sle. The depth charges stayed on the fantail. Maybe there would be an errant sub out there that didn’t hear about the peace. The ship was newly equipped with instrumentation to be a weather ship.

We then went south a thousand miles where we would stay for four weeks taking weather readings. After that, we headed for the nearest port and stock up on food and supplies. It was part of our scheduled routine to then find a location for R & R (Shore leave). Hurrah! 

Being the lowest ranking officer on board the ship, I was assigned the job of commissary officer, which (ironically) is the most important job on the ship! I was responsible for food and supplies in the galley, stuff for the ship’s service such as cigarettes and candy, ice cream and beer. 

Beer? How could we have been or a U.S. Navy ship?  We sure couldn’t drink it on board!  I was instructed to have at least one hundred cases of beer on hand.  They would be locked in the old munitions magazines. About every three weeks, the ship would find a desert island which to have a day off and have a picnic.

In the central Pacific, there are thousands of small, flat islands.  Most would have a lagoon and a sandy, grassy surface with a few palm trees. We would carefully take the ship into the lagoon and anchor, then transfer everyone but a small watch to the island in the motorized, whale boats. The cooks would bring food for hamburgers, everything.  The beer and all the cases, which were mostly warm, came along, too. Then the crew would have a full-day party of swimming, eating, drinking beer, playing baseball and volleyball, everything, except any socializing with ladies.  After all these were deserted islands! Then, at the end of the day, the sober crewmembers would load those who’d had too much to drink into the whaleboats and take them to their crew quarters.  The next day, everyone would be bright and ready to go. 

Time went by and we missed our next three-week R & R.  When we were at the next port, it was my job to take inventory so I did just that. It showed that one hundred cases of beer had disappeared somehow!  I knew how.  Someone of the crew and broken in and had their own R & R when no one was watching, of course. Bad, but what do we do now? Investigate? Complain? Blame? Hell, no! We just reordered, one hundred and twenty five cases this time, and made sure that the next R & R was on schedule!

(Note:  If this incident had happened during wartime, I, as an officer in charge, could have been court marshaled!  Since this was peacetime, matters were handled much differently.)