The U-boat huntersConnolly, James B. (James Brendan)
History
The U-boat hunters
Connolly, James B. (James Brendan)
United States. Navy; World War, 1914-1918 -- Naval operations
Above all, they did away with the old reign of terror, when no man's
life was safe if he happened to be on the wrong side. When the bandits
were running around unchecked, it was not safe for a whole family to go
to market together. Generally the women went to sell their little
produce, while the men stayed behind to guard the little property at
home. Now--the natives speak of the wonder of it--the roads on
market-days are crowded with both men and women.
At first they had distrust of the marine; not altogether because he was
a foreigner (the tropical people probably are less distrustful of us
than we of them)--he was an armed soldier. But they learned to know him,
and now the native salutes and smiles without effort at the marine in
passing. When one particular marine officer left there to come home
recently, crowds of native men, women, and children came down, some to
weep, but all to wish him Godspeed in going.
The marine is sometimes termed soldier and sailor too, which is not
correct. He is not a sailor and does not claim to be. When not in
barracks ashore he lives aboard some war-ship afloat; and on shipboard
he does certain guard work and handles the secondary batteries. But he
does not have to sailorize; the bluejacket takes care of that part, and
takes care of it well. The notion that a marine must qualify as a sailor
aboard ship has probably cost the corps many a prospective recruit.
To call him a seagoing soldier is more nearly correct. When it is not an
act of war to land marines on foreign soil, it is good business to keep
them where landings can be quickly made with them. So his being kept
aboard ship, perhaps. Bluejackets have taken part in landing-parties,
too, but it is not to black the bluejacket's eye to say that it is not
his regular job. The bluejacket's work is aboard ship--on the bridge, in
magazines, in turrets, below decks. Advance shore work is the marine's
specialty, and he goes to it pretty much as a man with a dinner-pail
goes to work in the subway.
He is the first to land, the last to leave, and to name the places where
he has seen service--well, one of them wrote a song once.
"From the hills of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli," it began. But he
has seen more than Mexico or the Mediterranean since. He could now say:
"From the hills of Montezuma to the gates of old Peking
He has heard the shrapnel bursting, he has heard the
Mauser's ping!
He has known Alaskan waters and the coral roads of Guam,
He has----"
But it's like calling a roll--Egypt, Algeria, Tripoli, Abyssinia,
Mexico, China, Japan, Korea, Cuba, Porto Rico, Panama, Nicaragua, Haiti,
Santo Domingo, Alaska, the Philippines, Formosa, Sumatra, Hawaii, Samoa,
Guam--like calling the roll of tropic countries and a few less warm to
say where he has been.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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