I took the mail plane from Tsingtao to Shanghai, where I caught the Cecil on or about Christmas Day, 1947. I found the ship tied up to a long wharf right downtown, and Ensign Kaye Rex Kiddoo welcomed me aboard. All other officers were ashore, and within about five minutes, Ensign Kiddoo went there also. A CPO and a seaman or two stood watch on the quarterdeck, and in all truth, we may well have been the only men on the ship, although, by law, there should have been a full watch crew. Maybe they were all asleep in their bunks.

       I must have sat up until some other officers came back to the ship, but my memory recalls only a few names and faces. I don't know who showed me to a bunk (to be mine for the next three years) in the officers quarters aft, nearest the head. Ensign Dave (or David) Foxwell turned up as my roommate, and I still hold fond memories of him. We were very different, he an Annapolis grad, but we got on well together always, and I've long been sorry that we lost touch. Before leaving Dave, I will share one poignant sea story. Once when we both began experiencing a certain itch, we called the chief hospital corpsman to our room, and he, using a pen light, a sterile stick, and a magnifying glass showed us first hand why they are called "crabs". I guess we shaved ourselves. I don't think we would have asked the chief to do that.

       The other officers I first remember were: F.A.G. Kelly, the commanding officer; Jack Rinker, the exec and my best man nearly three years later; John Lynch, the engineering officer; and Lou Stillwell, damage control officer (a true mustang and a true friend, who did everything better than anybody else). He's long dead, and stories about him--all happy and funny--are best left untold. Also: Jim Gammon and Bob Wellander, both Annapolis side-kicks of Kiddoo. Gammon is a retired captain who lives on Coronado Island, and Wellander made admiral and is alive (and well, I hope) somewhere.

       While naming officers, the following came later and helped make life bearable on some days when things could have gone the other way: Joe Kircher, the commanding officer after Kelly, retired Captain, USN. When last heard of, he was living in the Puget Sound area. Mel Conard, the Supply Officer. Last I heard, he was a commander. Chet Knowles, who relieved John Lynch as engineering officer, and was last heard of in the San Francisco Bay area. Frank Dunham, who, as Captain USN, retired, lives in Virginia Beach, and at age 80+ still plays the piano--paid gigs, I mean. One such: Sunday brunch at Pat Robertson's hotel.

       Then there was Sam Lorenz, who played the accordion. He's dead. And last, but not least, Johnny Matter, a naval aviator, recalled during Korea (1949?) and parked on the Cecil (who knows why, but we got lucky) while awaiting a flying billet. A prince among bullfrogs, Johnny claimed his happiest moment in life came one day when Captain Kircher gave him the con underway and went to his cabin. After the navy, Johnny went with commercial airlines and ended up as VP for Flight Ops with Southwest Airlines. He died a couple of years ago, and I grieve because they don't come any better than that guy.

       Meanwhile, back on board the Cecil, by New Years Eve, 1947, we were anchored in Buckner Bay, Okinawa. So soon after the war, the island seemed devoid of Japanese civilians, and only American army personnel were visible. I recall going ashore with the captain and a three or four other officers, where, in a vacant Quonset hut, we sang Auld Lang Syne and killed a bottle of Scotch. I don't know where that came from. I sure didn't bring it. And I can tell you with absolute certainty that nobody kissed anybody on the passing of the year. I have since experienced much better New Years Eve parties.

       Back on ship, I wrote the first log of the New Year (1948), which traditionally must be a poem (I wonder if it still is). I can recall only the first four lines:

       By the Shores of Okinawa,
      In the Bay that's named for Buckner,
      Stands the good ship, Charles P. Cecil,
      Daughter of the Bath, Maine, Ironworks.

       Soon we were back in Tsingtao harbor, and a life unfolded for me like one I had not before experienced. About my first night, I pulled shore-patrol duty, and such an eye-opener. Imagine my surprise to find that a building I had ridden by countless times was actually a bordello, which could be entered only through a series of secret underground tunnels. Also, what sailors did in Tsingtao bars with bar girls (and vice versa) was very different from what officers did at the O'Club.

       Perhaps the biggest jolt came when I learned that one of the Cecil ensigns, I don't recall which one, had a little Cio-Cio-San (Butterfly) on the beach, and when we were leaving for good, he scurried around among incoming ships trying to find a suitable replacement for himself--someone prepared to pay her rental. I think that's how the Cecil officer got her in the first place. Imagine having something like that set up and waiting for you in far-off China.

       I still scratch my head thinking that I'd been right there in that town for about a year, and neither I nor any of my buddies knew what the ensigns in the "other" navy were doing on shore. Not playing golf, that's for sure.

       We must have stayed around Tsingtao for some weeks after I went on board, because I remember a basketball game in which Cobern Seay played. I became the communications officer with jurisdiction over the radio shack, bridge (quartermasters), ships office, and the post office; thus, Seay, the mailman, reported to me until he left the ship in 1949. After him, confusion. I think he may have been married before he came on board, which helped to set him apart. I remember him as a straight shooter (on court and off him) , and I'll have something else to say about him.

       I remember also a number of radiomen, quartermasters, and yeoman strikers, but cannot be sure who was on board when I got there. A yeoman striker named Burke came along about the time I did, and he was always there--cheerful and dependable. Later in my life, Radar on MASH reminded me a little bit of Burke.

       David Johnson QM must have been on board in Shanghai. I think he too might have been married, because he certainly was (with kids) about a year later, when he drove my car across country from San Diego to Newport. Likewise, the two Dunns (Robert, RM, and Vernon, BM) will remember me. Robert was in my division during all my tour, it seems. I'm pretty sure they weren't brothers, and I remember Robert as being tall, and Vernon a bit shorter, but maybe I've turned them around.

       I must have met Quido Napolitano in Shanghai, and he said goodbye to me three years later. I'll speak more about Quido, but, hey, I liked him. I can say that now. I have good memories of all the radiomen, and especially so of Francis Cullen, who, I think, was very young when he came on board. Weren't we all?

       On the way back to the states, I recall that our division went into the waters where the Bikini bomb tests had been conducted. We passed through the area with a mission to sink an old navy vessel used in the tests. It floated out there in the sea looking strange, and we made one pass after another before finally sending it to the bottom. I remember the Division Commander saying on the radio: "Thank God, the XXXXX (ship's name) couldn't shoot back."

       I endured many a firing run, but always in practice. The incident just described was the closest I ever came to the real thing. The forces of destiny?

       Back in San Diego, we settled into a normal pattern of duty and liberty. Look, right about then, I wanted badly to get married and start making babies, and those forces of destiny had thwarted all such aspirations. In San Diego, I began dating anew, but so did Jim Gammon--both of us with the same girl, and he married her. Better said, she chose him.

       Soon thereafter, we were off to Mare Island. I guess that's where the Cecil became a Radar Picket Destroyer. Again, we were far from home and loved ones (except for the marrieds who had quarters in Quonset huts, I think). San Francisco, an hour away as I recall, was (and still is) a friendly town with much to see and do. I don't know how this came about, but I had a car, which I think a storekeeper drove up from San Diego, and had daily personal and duty conversation with Cobern Seay. We were as close to being buddies as an officer and enlisted man could (or should) be. Whatever. He and Quido Napolitano cooked up a trip, for which I would be the chauffeur, to a football game between the 49ers and Cleveland. I recall the game being played in Oakland in a stadium that cannot be compared to modern-day facilities. Lou ("The Toe") Groza played for Cleveland, and a couple of years ago, when he visited me here in Gainesville, Quido told me his future wife's brother was either Groza or another Italian with the Browns. That destiny (the wife) was yet to play itself out in Quido's life. What I mean to say is Quido knew neither his future wife nor her brother when we were at the game

       Now an aside for a human-interest story. The name "Napolitano" is obviously Italian, but "Quido" is not. In Italy, it's "Guido". When I inquired about this during Quido's visit here in Gainesville, he told me that at his birth, his mother named him "Guido.' But the doctor asked an older sister how to spell it, and she wrote "Quido". With that on his documents, he had it for life. He's been dead now for about two years as most of you know. I'll have another little story about him later.

       In this period of time, we received word that our home port had been changed to Newport, and this presented a major challenge all of us. Like I said, Johnson with wife and kids drove my car across the country, while the ship went around through the Panama Canal. That is another sea story that probably should remain untold. Hot latin night clubs, floor shows, Rape-of-the-Ape--a dancer wearing a body stocking with half of it being an ape's skin and half-head. What she did sure looked real, but I never could figure out who was raping whom. And then there were inflated condoms floating in the air, and the hot red-lipstick kisses all over the whites (in all the old familiar places) of sailors coming back on board.

       Did we go also to Havana? ..I think so. It was even worse (or better!) than Panama. I visited Havana at least twice just before Castro, and I can name the two ships involved; however, I recall a very large Vegas-type casino/night-club with a fabulous show on stage. No cheap, tawdry stuff. That would have been maybe a decade before Castro. Must have been the Cecil. Havana and Panama were always hot-hot--hailed by sailors from everywhere universally feared by wives and mothers.

       Finally we arrived in not-so-hot Newport, sometime in 1949, where I hit the jack pot, although not right away. I did not meet my wife in church, but we were soon there because she sang solos at the big Presbyterian one in the main part of town. We were married in that church on April 3, 1950, and Margaret carried on her singing career in Italy, where she graduated from the Parma Conservatory. More on that later.

       It hardly seems possible that the Cecil, in less than 24 months, squeezed in two trips to the Med and at least one to the Caribbean. In those days, nobody in Washington concerned themselves about keeping husbands and sons at sea for long periods. On the first cruise, we visited North African ports (I had my wedding suit tailor-made in Tripoli). Then came Syria, Istanbul, Athens, and Trieste, where I remember attending a Christmas-Eve ceremony at a local church. Then TRUST territory, many Americans civilians, including young girls, had duty there.

       On this trip or the next, we had some practice firing runs on a range somewhere in the upper Adriatic, and I remember that Dave Foxwell (still my roommate).and a group of Cecil sailors were on the shore directing the fire. A bunch of us (officers and enlisted) also took a bus to the ski resort Cortina. Stories about that weekend, where skiing did not dominate our activities, are best left untold. Dave Foxwell was the only one in the crowd who had ever been on skis. I have vivid recollections of a near panic attack in the cable-car lift that carried us to the top of a snow-covered peak. The idea of skiing down had no appeal for me, even if it had been allowed. That left only the cable car and I must have taken it.

       Back in Newport, I got married (on the date cited above). Very shortly thereafter, we shoved off for a long training cruise in the Caribbean. There, during a midwatch on a starry night, with me the OD, a frightening incident occurred that and now seems hilarious. Years later, to make a point, I wrote a column under my own by-line in which I described what happened on that night. I will attach that sea story for your amusement.

       Sometime in this general period, the Cecil made a courtesy call on some port in Long Island Sound, where we had visitors on board. We also had two or three midshipmen embarked for a summer cruise. Everybody got very chummy with people on the shore (a very rich community), and during the two or three days we were there, one of the midshipmen deflowered a local maiden. Hearing the boy brag about it, Johnny Matter (who had met the girl on board and had some idea of her age) lost his cool. He may well have had a very young daughter at home, but the middy's cavalier attitude provoked Johnny--normally the coolest of the cool.

       We also had liberty in New Haven, CT, but I remember no midshipmen. I do recall, however, that some strange and pretty awful things happened.

       Let me go back to Quido Napolitano and give some background. A few years ago at a Cecil reunion, an old shipmate brought Quido a copy of the Cecil's log for some of our days in New Haven. I signed at least one of the watches on the log. This refreshed my memory.

       I cannot recall any reason for such a big celebration, but some of our officers went ashore and rented a room in a hotel for a big party, which went on for an entire weekend. I hooked up with the group on the first night. I remember an unmade bed and a room full of strange women along with Cecil officers and CPOs. Like some of the others, I drank a bit too much and recall stumbling off to a park bench somewhere in the downtown area. Sometime in the wee hours, a policeman found me and drove me to the landing. Before reveille sounded, I recovered slowly in my own little bunk on board the Charlie P.

       Sometime during this strange night, Quido and friends in the duty section took the punt from the ship and rowed ashore. For this, Quido et al. were court-martialed and maybe reduced in grade. Today, this seems pretty severe punishment, but Quido, I think, came to wear it like a badge of honor. He loved the ship, that guy did, and that set him apart as a special breed.

       Meanwhile, back to the officer/CPO party. In the morning when all hands had to be back on board for duty, the exec (the one after Jack Rinker) did not answer muster. Captain Kircher sent out a shore patrol, which brought the errant one back on board to be placed in hack. Shortly thereafter, he departed and dropped out of sight. Right off the screen. Lost! Gone forever!

       The moral of this story is that officers too can get into big trouble in the Navy. Get a little drunk, and you can land in hack. Miss muster, and you've got a problem. Reverse the flow of the force, and you're history. Across the years, while returning to Newport and passing through New Haven, I would recall the events just described, and I would say to myself: "There but for the grace of God went I."

       Finally in 1950, the Cecil returned to Newport, only to shove off again for the Med. Something worthy of note happened on the morning we departed Newport. Several wives, including mine, drove out to the point to wave goodbye as we sailed out of port. Just as we were departing, however, a bank of thick fog rolled in and lowered visibility to essentially zero. At an inside duty station, I did not see what happened, but the gyro failed as we were steaming out through the narrows toward the open sea. The compass went out, including the one on the radar screen. As told to me, the captain on the ship ahead (the Turner?) started yelling on the radio that we were headed for the rocks (on which our wives were standing). Somehow, Captain Kircher, with innate instincts, gave appropriate commands to the helmsman and followed the fog signals from the ship ahead. We exited safely. The wives never saw us, but heard us tooting away in the fog, so they went home happily, not knowing how close we came to disaster.

       On this visit to the Med, I recall liberty in Venice, where I traded a case of cigarettes over the side (conduct far worse than "unbecoming of an officer") for an accordion, which I could not play and did not need. How could I have been so stupid? But that was nothing compared to Dave Foxwell's Beretta, which he hid in our room, making me an accomplice with that knowledge. Getting it off the ship is yet another story, which I will not tell, although I suppose the statutes have long-since run. Maybe David also.

       Venice is hardly Havana, but sin lurks along those canals. I recall shore-patrol duty that involved sitting and drinking coffee (heavy, Italian) in a whore-house bar, while sailors came and went, so to speak. Somewhere else, on another ship, perhaps, a senior officer ordered me to turn back all sailors at the door, but not in Venice. I don't recall seeing any Cecil officers that night. Gondola coxswains likely took them to higher-priced places.

       Also on this trip, the Cecil visited La Spezia, and I brought back some trinkets that we still have. How could I know then that the forces would bring me back there to live for six years, and how even later the little village of Portovenere (in the Gulf of La Spezia) would, in my second career, become the subject of my master's thesis. And, and . . . that in 1986, at the invitation of the mayor of Portovenere, I would return to his city hall to defend my thesis in Italian. On our first visit to La Spezia, Napolitano was the only Italian word I knew.

       On the way home from Europe, the Cecil headed for Norfolk. I know not why. Did the ship have yet another home-port change? By then, I had orders to the Naval Intelligence School (and later, the Italian Language School) in Anacostia, D.C. That being the case, I needed to go to Newport to transport my new wife (by then seven months pregnant), so I left the Cecil by britches buoy in mid-Atlantic and rode home on a Newport-bound destroyer. Quido, as a member of the deck force, shook my hand as I was being strapped into the harness. At that moment, I had been on board almost three years to the day.

       As the Cecil disappeared over the horizon, I felt like a very large and important part of my life sailed away also. Likewise, a very large load had been lifted off me. In retrospect (50 years later), I think my service on the Cecil was a defining period of my life, and the ship, along with certain crew members, will always have a spot in my heart reserved for good memories. But did I find happiness on the Cecil? No! At that particular time in my life I desperately needed tender loving care by someone of the female persuasion. Also, I knew then, as I understand better now, the authoritarian military system, in which I would give commands daily and expect them to be carried out to the letter, did not fare well with my inner man. My children, and perhaps my wife on occasions, will dispute that I ever changed; however, after another hitch in college (University of Florida) at age 50, I became a different man--a better one, I hope. After that, outside my family, I have given orders to very few people, mostly secretaries. In time, I found I could get along without them, and my kids grew up and got married.

       Today, Margaret and I have ten grandkids. Nine are girls. Several live nearby, and the oldest two are often sleep-overs. For reasons known only to them, they change the wallpaper on my computer screen and move around all those blue blobs, leaving me confused about where to click. Grandpa is also the designated driver for violin lessons, girl scouts, CCD, and the like. We're close. Mean, sometimes, but close.

       Let me return to the Cecil (1950) and the roots of my general discontent. In addition to the endless 24-hour-duty days, cooped up with a tubful of men who were often disagreeable to young officers, one thing in specific gnawed on me like a cancer. A senior quartermaster, whose name is not on our roster today, held me in open contempt until the day I went over the side for the last time. I don't recall what triggered his animosity, but it was ugly. I perceived that he judged me to be weak, and if he confined his evaluation to hostile confrontations between an officer and an insubordinate subordinate, he hit the bulls-eye. That problem began the first time I was placed in charge of somebody. As I said above, at about age 50, I discovered (for me anyway) that the best ratio for leader:assistant is 1:0. Since then, I have been tolerably happy, but even now I must cope with editors--and a wife.

       Despite my inherent dislike for authoritarian systems, I would propose that the falling away of reasonable discipline, such as we knew and lived by on the Cecil, has been detrimental to society as a whole. Now, authority has been diminished for the father, the minister, the cop, and the President, and this has led to lack of civility, inattention to duty and detail, and many, many more serious consequences.

       I'm optimistic, however, because I see signs of hope all around me. In old age, I have become more religious internally-- not argumentive, but seeing the moral structure of the Commandments as the best way to lead ones life. I prefer neighbors and friends who live by "Thy will be done," so long as they don't think their perception of His "will" is the only way to go.

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