After one has spent ten years in the navy and then resigned and notices that his liver is not acting as well as it ought to, due to too many courses at lunch and dinner for all those years, there is an inclination to look back over his experience—to see things in perspective, as it were.
I think we sometimes work so close to our daily routine that we lose a sense of the true values and proportions of things. We need to stand off for a space and view our work from a distance, with our own shadows removed from it, before we can really see it. This is a need of the service and inclines me to reflect on how I should behave myself differently if I were to do my service over again.
Although these reflections apply particularly to the supply corps, there may be some food for thought to officers of all corps. They are based on ten years' experience as an officer of the regular service and on the renewed and reminding contacts made through active service with the Naval Reserve Force.
First and most important of all, might be mentioned the subject of our general attitude toward the service, toward both our immediate and distantly connected brother officers and the attitude we inspire in the enlisted men of our departments.
The general attitude of all persons in the service might well be classified under two main headings and all sub-divisions avoided for the purposes of this article. There are, first and most desirable, the cooperators. The title explains itself. There are, second, the prerogators, or those who first, last and always, stand by their prerogatives both in their personal and duty status and relations.
The first class works for the big circle as a whole, subordinating their own interests and those of the men in their department to the greatest good of the ship and the Navy as a whole. The second class works for the little circle within the big one, the little wheel within the big one, unconsciously checking the maximum good that the big unit can mean. The first works for all the movement which makes up the watch; the second, being a cog in the machine, thinks and acts as unto itself, with only a casual interest in the other cogs.
It is the attitude and personality of the head of the department which determines whether the enlisted men of that department fall within the class of coöperators or prerogators in their relation to enlisted men of other departments and the ship as a whole.
A good illustration of the workings of this latter class might be found in the young officer who allows his men to "pull his leg," or whose men inspire in him a feeling that they have special rights and privileges in their work which immunize them to certain accessory duties they might be called upon to perform in the ship's routine, or whose men come with complaints which in turn he feels he must "take up with the executive officer." The men feel that their ratings and duties entitle them to certain prerogatives. Their division officer then absorbs the idea that if he is going to get cooperation from his men in his own department, he must "back them up."
This is where the trouble starts and the officer develops into a kicker and prerogator. It soon develops that he and his men claim more privileges than those to which they are entitled and certainly more than are good for the ship as a whole. It causes trouble all up and down the line. The same attitude of always demanding one's rights, or imagined rights, develops in the ward room. Sour stomachs develop and the chances of a happy ship go glimmering.
On Saturday morning inspections the cooks and bakers and yeomen and what-nots all take a trial at being relieved from quarters because the food will spoil, or the payroll won't be ready, or a dozen other disasters will happen. The same story comes aft at special quarters for ship's drills, and so it goes. Each man, if he thinks he can accomplish it, not the least the commissary steward, has a plausible story for relief from some fancied grievance or duty. This can occur not only in one department; but between individual officers and their departments. The way to cure it is to take it in hand when young.
If I were to do my naval service over again I would have little chats with my petty officers at morning musters. I would tell them on the first day a few things to the following effect: "Men, there are a lot of us gathered together on this ship in a cramped space. We are sent out on a shingle for our lives, to toss about on all the oceans, a thousand men or more to live and work on a few square yards of linoleum. We have important work to do, and to do it well, we must first of all be happy; not only you men in my department, but all the men in all the departments, and not only all the men in all the departments, but all the officers in all the departments.
"To be happy enough to enjoy our chosen life and to accomplish our work well, we must be coöperators. We must pull together, not for our special little group in our department, but for the ship's company and the ship's work as a whole. We are, first of all, a unit preparing to fight an enemy of our country. We must, to prepare right, work and play and pull together. We must, each individual man of us, give up some of the privileges and immunities from possible duties to which we think our rates may entitle us. As long as we are in the Navy we are not entitled to anything but to work and play and pull together happily.
"To do this we must do our daily work as well as we know how, both the work that will be seen, and the work that we think will not be seen. We must spare our seniors foolish questions, petty problems, things which we could think out and do properly without running to ask someone else how we are going to overcome this and that obstacle.
"Moreover no special work is to be ours exclusively. We shall be able and glad to lend a hand with anything that looks like making the ship go or preparing her to fight, whether it is in our own or other departments.
"There is no such thing as being excused from musters, quarters or inspections. It does a man good to dress up and get clean and look over his ditty box once a week. It is a privilege to do it. It keeps the mold off from us. It makes us realize that, if our work makes us dirty most of the time, we still have not forgotten how to get cleaned up.
"Don't come to me and ask how to do any of your work if you know or can find out how. Make a try at it anyway. Relieve me of all the petty details you can, for I have enough to worry me in any case, many things which you do not know about. If you save me, I can save my good humor and always have it with me. In turn, I will treat my superiors in the same fashion.
"If I can possibly work out the problems and snags of my department with your good help and cooperation, without carrying my troubles to the executive or the captain, I am going to do so. They have the burden of every department's troubles to bear and I don't want them to have any additional ones from mine. I want them, after a couple of months, to say to me, 'Pay, your department seems to function very smoothly. Regular oil bath, roller bearing mechanism, I should say. I never hear any kicks or excuses from it.'
"Then there is another thing I like to have the commanding officer say at Saturday inspections. They've said it to me on other ships, and I want them to say it on this: ‘Pay, you have the cleanest, snappiest looking division on the ship. You are to be congratulated.' Boys, it makes a lump of gratitude rise in my throat to get words like that in the hearing of the big family. We can then josh the others into sprucing up a bit and so improve the whole lot.
"All this happiness that we can have is up to you. If you can legally do a favor for a shipmate, do it—never kick—and always do a little more and a little better than is required of you; then life in the Navy will be one sweet song."
The foregoing would be my talk to both the division and the individual in the attempt to make my own little niche on board known as the coöperators.
Looking back in perspective it next occurs how important is food in the Navy. If I were to do my service over again, I would, after my first year of learning and experience, never fail to work out the menus in conjunction with the commissary steward. I would never, unless he were a rare jewel, and there are such occasionally, let him work these out alone, for fear that his idea and mine and the crew's did not agree on the subject of food.
I believe that a man is affected in planning menus all his life by what he has had to eat at home. He has his definite idea of a good meal. He, of course, learns a few things to cut out and to add, by hearing kicks from the crew, but, nevertheless, what his mother gave him to eat, or his wife gives him to eat, influences to a large extent his leanings.
The navy provisions are, now-a-days, of most excellent quality and assortment if properly chosen and used. You cannot find on the market better jams, or cheese, or a dozen other things I might mention. The grading, the quality of packing, the presentation of the article is all that could be desired.
It is true that, along with the economy era, there is a pressure to reduce costs; but, like our other handicaps we, if we are to be coöperators, must swallow this misfortune and smile. With study and a little knowledge of dietetics we can still survive, eat and be happy.
So, I say, the eats are extremely important if we would have a ship full of coöperators; in fact, they are the first essential. I would give them my utmost study in purchase, preparation and service. The assortment is important. There are items available to the Navy which I will wager some ships never see, because the steward hasn't the ingenuity to see where they could fit in, for variety's sake, or how to use them. This is where the supply officer can intervene.
Eats, yes. In the Grand Central Terminal the other day, I happened to stop in at the drug store and take a hurried bite between trains. They had the most delicious assortment of drinks and sandwiches you could imagine. None of the ingredients were expensive, but they were tastefully put up with thoughtfulness. They were attractively served and clean. Each sandwich, and they had a wide assortment, was wrapped in a solid piece of parafined paper. It made you think it was all as clean and wholesome as it looked and no doubt it was so. I was hungry and it tasted good and I bethought me how nice it would be to have a counter aboard every big ship where one could step up betimes, on inclination, and buy those items, or part of them. The sandwiches cost from fifteen to thirty cents apiece at this counter, but I will wager I could have made as good ones for from three to five cents each out of navy ration components.
To continue on the subject of eats, I feel that the men who work in the dark depths of our ships at midnight or on the bridge, as the case may be, while the rest are asleep, rate our best consideration. Too often sour old coffee, left over from morning in an uncleaned urn, is dished up for night rations. I would get after those rations and inspect them and make them good. The ration charge would be negligible. Some of that drug store system would go into them. As most of the men on the ship stand night watches at one time or another, they would all in turn learn to bless my department of coöperators. Any other treatment of the night watches would be sheer laziness on my part and the part of the men in my department. Anything else would be merely getting by, within the law and the regulations, but naval officers "shall not live by regulations alone" if they would be happy.
The drab routine that ships frequently go through for long periods in out-of-the-way locations is conducive to the corroding of our spirits, and a general physical let-down which brings on lethargy and laziness. This is the fault we have hardest to fight. To overcome the circumstances which bring this mental, physical and moral change there must be constantly in mind the thought, "I will keep spruced up whatever happens. I will force myself to exercise enough, to eat properly, to keep my mind bright by acquiring new ideas and things to think and talk about every day. If I do this, my spirit will be contagious. The others will brighten up also."
The respect and good will of brother officers is worth more than any other considerations. Good will is the priceless asset of the civilian business man and it is the same for the naval officer. I have a very dear friend in the service who, during our cruises together and through all the five years since my resignation, has been as close as any brother could be to me. This officer always kept his uniforms and person immaculate. His linen was changed often enough always to be perfect. His clothing perfection was reflected in the accuracy and brilliancy of his own mind and judgment. When he spoke, he had something to say. There might be general gabbling at the mess table, all well enough, at that, but when Bob inserted a few words in the conversations, I noticed that all stopped to listen. His nose was not so close to the grindstone that he forgot that he was an animated human being who should have a few interests and thoughts outside of "shop." He could talk philosophy, occultism, history, could marvel at the stars and the universe, took a lively interest in all sciences, and often we sat till two o'clock in the morning in my stateroom and were never talked out. On many an occasion I stood at midwatch with him on the bridge as the ship lumbered over tropical seas, under skies studded with stars, and we were able to do a lot of thinking, a thing some officers are inclined to forget how to do after many years with Uncle Sam. This officer had my deep respect and that of every other officer and man on the ship.
The qualities of a gentleman as advocated by the honorable John Paul Jones, cannot too often be repeated or recalled if we would be happy coöperators in the Navy. The newcomers to the ward room since the war should be carefully induced by example, instruction and otherwise to respect the King's English and avoid continual slang and profanity. We can't be happy coöperators if we are ashamed of our mates.
Now occurs to me the thought, so often enlarged upon, that it doesn't pay to kick against the pricks. I always determined to make the commanding officer and executive officer (if possible) like me. To accomplish this, I know that I first must like them. How would you deliberately go about developing a liking for another man, a stranger, and perhaps a difficult one at that? It is very simple if you but analyze the requirements of friendship. Your closest, permanent, tried and true friend, cannot see your faults. When you make a break, there is never any pause, or any apparent notice taken of it. This explains the system. When you want to like a person, refuse, from the start, to see or be shown any faults in him. If he is very full of faults, you will have to center your mind exclusively on his few virtues.
On a former ship a new executive officer had been ordered to report. A murmur arose in the ward room, which in the course of time increased to an outspoken demur by nearly every old-timer in the mess. I thought, "My stars, what is this new officer going to be like! A sun-downer! This will be the end of our happy home!" On further consideration, I determined to force myself to like the new executive if it were possible to find any good in him at all. I started with this attitude and it resulted as might be expected, that the new executive officer and myself became fast friends. He wasn't a bad actor at all. He was really a very congenial gentleman if given half a chance, and all the talk had been based on errors in judgment of many years gone by. It is perfectly possible for a man to reform his mode of thought and his outlook after a passage of years and the acquiring of age and a family.
The little focus of friendly attitude which I began and fostered in this case, gradually spread through the ward room and in a short time all was serene. The ship had the choice of pulling together or being burst asunder with unhappiness and the former course was chosen deliberately. A good example of this in civilian life might be recalled as follows: In my office is an elderly Quaker who has a habit of avoiding unpleasantness in a really good fashion. Whenever questionable discussions come up, things that he wouldn't like to know about if he were ever called upon to testify, things he wouldn't like to have influence him to separate himself from some good friendships, he very quietly squirms out of his chair and eases over toward the hatrack, as inconspicuously as possible. There he acquires his hat and stick and starts out on some fancied errand. This happens so invariably that it has become a sort of joke in the office. The wink is now passed around when the old man eases out of his chair and starts for his hat. Often, now, fake conversations are cooked up just to see how long he will last within hearing. But, when you think of it, isn't he right, and wouldn't his reasoning apply with great force in the Navy? It would certainly sweeten up seagoing existence a whole lot if each one of us refused to be present in discussions of what an old cuss the captain or executive officer or Navy Department, or Congress really is. We want to be allowed, if possible, to think how cussed fine they are in every detail. If we have other opinions, it is a crime to force them on our shipmates. Nobody wants "a piece of your mind," anyway. The foregoing is my lesson in loyalty.
Another point that might be well emphasized is that there is a reason based on experience for all the regulations and "red tape" against which we may rebel at times. Some paymaster general once said to a young officer, "Pay, all these requirements of the officers in our corps which you find in the regulations are the result of a hundred years of development in our Navy. Every new kink that is introduced and ordered is the result of a newly discovered need in the protection and promotion of the government interests. Things are always in a state of flux and change; every organization is always moving, it may be forward, it may be backward, but it is always moving just the same. It is not for you or for me to say in haste that this or that annoying regulation or procedure is ridiculous or unnecessary. It may be the result of a need developed in a hundred years of experience." I like both what was said and the way it was said. This paymaster general must have been a leader of great power and inspiration. He said a few things good for the Navy to know.
To summarize my attitude, if I were to do my naval service over again, I would cooperate with all other departments in all their work and see that my men did so; I would seek smooth running and easy functioning in coordination with the rest of the ship organization instead of ease and freedom from worry; I would not spare exertion of my person or private funds, if need be, to give all officers and men the most valuable service my department could render; I would be congenial and loyal, avoiding bad temper and bickerings and backbitings ; I would overcome those who would impose on my men or my department with mild ridicule instead of frowns and "pulling the book"; and, above all else, I would be full of sympathy and interest in the troubles and work of others, realizing that by so doing friends are made and kept friends in a life where a pleasant atmosphere is needed if we would continue to exist. The Navy is a hard enough life with its constant privations and dangers to warrant our honoring and respecting those who have chosen to follow it with us. If we can lighten their burdens, either fancied or real, or add an unexpected or un-called-for-by-regulations sweetmeat, let us by all means do so.