USS VIRGO AKA-20 was parked at Pier 91 in Seattle being re-fitted and recommissioned as AE-30, an ammunition ship for use in the Vietnam War. On a beautiful summer day in 1966, her gunner’s mates from the precommissioning detail (“pre-comm”) were on a bus headed to the firing range. The burly bus driver roared at his load of sailors to “can the noise,” but they were too involved in their wager. They were betting in full voice on whether Tiny the Horse Appendage could or could not hold a Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR) steady while shooting a full magazine.
At 6’7″ and 260 pounds, Tiny was the largest man in the pre-comm TAD in Seattle’s Pier 91 Barracks. He was silent, sitting in his bus seat, looking lost in all the hoopla regarding his abilities or lack thereof. He was an E-2 Seaman six months out of boot camp, striking for the rate of gunner’s mate.
I was not a gunner, but Larry, my best buddy in pre-comm in San Diego and then Seattle, was an E-5 gunner. He was interested in my stories of growing up surrounded by guns. My dad was a gunsmith and I intimated familiarity with every weapon dad owned or had access to over the years, from a bb gun to .375 Weatherby Magnum. I think Larry wanted to see if I was for real or it was all hot air, so he arranged for me to join in.
The gun barrels stuck out in all directions as they were unloaded from the bus at the range. As the .30 caliber BAR targets were set-up for the exercise, you could cut the tension in the air with a knife. It was show time. What happened on the range today would carve a place in gunner status for the indefinite future. As I observed my shipmates, in my head I could hear new words to the old Gene Autry song, “I’ve got nerves that jingle, jangle, jingle.”
I was not nervous. Hung over from the previous night out with the boys, I was almost comatose and lay down on a bench to satisfy my languid torpor. Larry woke me, “Hey, T.D., Tiny is about to shoot the BAR.” I strolled over to the exercise area to rejoin the men and watch. When I arrived, Tiny handed me the weapon, “You first.” I could tell he was nervous.
I had shot many weapons in my time, but the BAR surprised me. It kicked like a mule against my shoulder and the barrel would not stay level. Up until that moment I believed Tiny would win the wager and hold the BAR level for a full 20 round magazine. As reality replaced speculation, doubt crept in.
Tiny was not known for his smarts — his reputation was the opposite – so my curiosity was piqued. As I handed the automatic rifle back to him, the conversations on the range ceased. A lot of money was riding on this moment and the air became pregnant with expectation.
For some mysterious reason, instead of leaning into the gun, Tiny decided to lean back as he pulled the trigger. The first ten shots took the barrel skyward. The last ten shots went pretty much straight up, accompanied by a communal gasp from onlookers. Tiny’s forehead grooves deepened as he walked away listening to the chuckles.
Next gun to be fired was the Colt Model 1911a1 .45 semi-automatic pistol. While the BAR was a sideshow, the Colt was the real test of manhood for the assembled gunner’s mates. As they took turns shooting at individual targets, walking the distance to check the shot grouping in the target and discussing the results, I lost interest in the slow-moving contest and went back to nap on my bench.
I woke a second time to Larry’s voice, “Hey, T.D., your turn with the .45.” I sighed as I rose, ambled to the pedestal and picked up the weapon not caring if I hit the target. I pulled the trigger and quickly emptied the 7-shot magazine. It worked. Five shots were within a silver dollar’s circumference and I outshot all the gunners. I shrugged, but their eyes showed a new respect. Later, the chief gunner’s mate asked me, “Are you sure you don’t want to be a gunner’s mate?” The ultimate compliment.
While Tiny’s reputation suffered, mine was made for the upcoming cruise as the stories were retold and embellished by sailors who gossiped like old ladies.
Once onboard ship and underway, my newfound reputation helped. I was assigned as Pointer seated immediately to the left of the barrel on the 3″/50 slow-fire gun mount. It was a ceremonial status – the gun was operated by a GM2 (Gunner’s Mate Second Class) in fire control located on second level above deck. But if fire control was compromised or taken out, the gun would be fired manually, and I would be in control of the trigger and vertical movement of the gun barrel. Horizontal control was by GM3 Smithers, the trainer, sitting to the right of the gun.
A year later, in the fifth month of VIRGO’s first tour of duty in the South China Sea on Yankee Station, an unscheduled call to General Quarters found me in the pointer’s “John Deere” seat so unprepared that I forgot my earplugs. The carrier USS FORRESTAL CV-59 caught fire earlier that day and its crew shoved a great deal of flammable material overboard. Lookouts in the VIRGO’s forecastle spotted floating canisters of AVGAS (aviation fuel). As they were hazardous to navigation, the ship slowed to full stop to sink them with rounds from the 3″/50 slow-fire gun.
As the realization dawned on me the gun was going to be fired, I desperately looked around for something to cover my ears and protect my hearing. I stepped from my seat on the gun mount as the GM2 in fire control above us yelled out, “Fire control offline. Manual operation.” The deck hands making up the gun crew were lined up around the edge of the gun mount railing, each cradling a single 34-pound round to be passed to the first loader, Boatswain’s Mate First Class Johnson. The gun was manually loaded, i.e. slow fire, regardless who pulled the trigger, fire control or me. Johnson’s face grinned broadly at me, “You’re up, Dooley.” I climbed back in the pointer’s seat.
I rotated the handwheel to bring the gun barrel down to sea level, then checked the eyepiece to place the crosshairs on the target. GM3 Smithers placed the vertical y-axis of the crosshairs in the middle of a floating fuel canister about 75 yards off our starboard side.
Johnson shoved the first round all the way into the barrel, and the 22-pound spring-loaded breech block slipped shut with a “whump.” I moved my handwheel, placed the horizontal crosshairs on the canister, and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. The only evidence I pulled the trigger was a loud buzzing for over two seconds. Then, “Whammo,” the gun fired. By the time the firing pin responded to the trigger pull, the roll of the ship had taken the gun barrel a foot higher, and the projectile overshot the canister by about a mile. I worried about the possibilities and that I should be careful as the gun had a range of four miles.
As the recoil reverberated throughout the ship, VIRGO herself reacted with a loud “Whang.” I was physically shaken by the noise and heard nothing out of my right ear but a loud ringing. Johnson loaded another round. I looked back in the eyepiece. For this shot I wanted to time the trigger so when the gun finally went off, it would be pointed at the target. I was happy with my anticipatory maneuver but a wave moved the canister from where it was supposed to be and the anti-aircraft round went cleanly into the sea. After two rounds and two misses, everyone within shouting range of me became an expert on what I should be doing. I could tell that men were shouting, but I could not hear any details. Third round missed again, and there was a flurry of activity in the gun mount itself.
The 21-pound empty shell casings were ejected straight back as the gun fired. Seaman Apprentice Guzman’s job was to hand rounds to the loader. He became a little too efficient, and moved the loaded round into the path of the ejecting shell casing. The casing hit the middle of the live round in his arms, and it began leaking powder. The chant, “Throw it overboard,” came from every direction, “Throw. It. Overboard.” He stood there with the bent round in his arms, not moving. The other ammo handlers could only yell as their hands were full with their own round. Johnson turned around to accept the next round to load, grabbed the bent shell, ran to the edge of the mount, and tossed it into the sea. For a moment, I was relieved the attention was not on me.
The tale continued in the same vein for some time. I fired ten rounds and missed ten times before fire control came back online and I was off the hook. I will say, even with all the modernization including “fire control,” it was still a vintage gun. Fifty more shots resulted in zero hits.
Meanwhile, Tiny had stepped into the gun locker below deck and brought up an M-1 rifle. He put it up to his shoulder while leaning on the starboard gunwale, and sank the canister with three shots. Just as my and Tiny’s scuttlebutt reputation had been made and unmade in one day at the range, they were again made and unmade in one day on a warm summer’s day on Yankee Station off the coast of Vietnam.
