This html article is produced from an uncorrected text file through optical character recognition. Prior to 1940 articles all text has been corrected, but from 1940 to the present most still remain uncorrected. Artifacts of the scans are misspellings, out-of-context footnotes and sidebars, and other inconsistencies. Adjacent to each text file is a PDF of the article, which accurately and fully conveys the content as it appeared in the issue. The uncorrected text files have been included to enhance the searchability of our content, on our site and in search engines, for our membership, the research community and media organizations. We are working now to provide clean text files for the entire collection.
When Congress banned the “spirit ration” at sea in 1862, Paymaster Casper Schenk Wrote this fond farewell. But wardrooms, such as this one in the USS Kansas (BB- 21)> continued to splice the mainbrace for unother half century.
There has been a centuries-old tug-of-war between advocates and opponents of liquor at sea. Of course, until the American Revolution, “our” avy was Britain’s Royal Navy, from which came most of ■^customs and traditions held dear by American sailors, his included, in the days of “wooden ships and iron 01611 >” the authorized consumption on board ship of vari- °Us hquors by the officers, mostly at their own expense, ^nd the daily rationing of spirits, wine, or beer to the en- isted men at government expense.
Brandy was the spirituous drink issued to Royal Navy Crews until 1687, when West Indies rum was substituted °n ships visiting the Caribbean. As of 1731, each member °f a ship’s company was entitled to one-half pint of straight rum per day. Then came the practice of diluting he rum with water in the mixture called “grog.”
Grog was an admiral before it became a drink. In 1740, 11 Was the nickname of eccentric Admiral Edward Vernon, a crusty old Royal Navy flag officer, known affectionately 1o his officers and men as “Old Grog.” Admiral Vernon ad acquired this odd moniker from a peculiar boat cloak, 'htide of a coarse, water-repellant material called grogram which he wore while pacing the decks of his flagship.
. In the late 1730s, after a long and distinguished career ln the navy, Admiral Vernon entered politics and, as a member of Parliament, demanded more energetic military measures against Spain. Repeatedly assailing the government for its failure to face Spain’s challenge in the New ”orld, he finally declared in a blaze of enthusiasm that he c°uld capture Porto Bello, the mighty Spanish stronghold ln Panama, with a squadron of only six ships. The government promptly called his bluff, gave him command of the Slx ships, and sent him off to live up to his word.
Old Grog surprised everybody, including the Spaniards.
Porto Bello was caught unprepared for the attack and surrendered after two days of fighting. When this news reached London, Admiral Vernon was the hero of the day and remained so for years to come. But to the sailors of his small squadron, Old Grog was either a hero or a bluenosed cheat, depending on whether a man liked his rum neat or diluted with water. For it was Vernon, after the capture of Porto Bello, who introduced watered rum to men long used to the straight stuff.
The wily old admiral never dreamed he was starting a tradition, as he opposed strong drink in any form. He would have much preferred to cut it off entirely but condescended to try the weaker mixture for two reasons. First, he believed, as did most other New World adventurers of his era, that strong spirits prevented the fevers that had decimated many previous expeditions to the Caribbean. Second, he knew that rum diluted with water soon becomes sour and unpalatable, discouraging those who would save it up for a binge.
Such stratagems did little to dampen the ardor of the sailors of Vernon’s flagship, HMS Burford, when Porto Bello fell. Flushed with victory, proud of their admiral, and mellowed by the double ration of watered rum doled out to celebrate the triumph, they raised their cups in a toast to Old Grog, and the odd name stuck to the new drink as well.
By 1781, the daily issuance of grog to the Royal Navy’s enlisted men (and officers, until 1881) had become not only a well-established tradition, but was required by regulation. In Admiral Vernon’s day, British tars received a daily ration of one-half pint (eight ounces) of rum, mixed with four times that volume of water. Long before 1970, when the Royal Navy halted the issuance of grog entirely on board ship, the daily ration had been reduced to one- eighth of an imperial pint (about two-and-a-half ounces) of rum, mixed with double that volume of water.
Sailors and Marines serving on board U. S. Navy ships in about 1800 had a choice for their ration: one-half pint of rum mixed with water or a quart of beer. In 1806, the newly established Navy Department tried to replace rum with whiskey, both because whiskey was thought to be a “more wholesome” drink, and because it was cheaper.
For the next half century, rum or whiskey (especially rum) was almost as much a part of a sailor’s life on board a
Farewell to Grog
Come, messmates, pass the bottle round,
Our time is short, remember;
For our grog must stop and our spirits drop, On the first day of September.
Farewell, old rye! ‘Tis a sad, sad word.
But alas, it must be spoken;
The Ruby cup must be given up,
And the demijohn be broken.
Yet memory oft will backward turn,
And dwell with fondness partial;
On the day when gin was not a sin,
Nor cocktails brought court martial.
Jack’s happy days will soon be gone,
To return again, ah, never!
For they’ve raised his pay five cents a day. But stopped his grog forever.
All hands to splice the mainbrace call,
But splice it now in sorrow;
For the spirit room key must be laid away Forever on tomorrow.
|
|
|
| JV sp'j v, ■ 111*' : f/ra |
|
| ||||
|
|
|
| y 1 |
| |||||
| W ' - ’ |
| Be M Y f ' |
| ||||||
|
|
| |g| " t |
| ||||||
NAVAL INSTITUTE PHOTO COLLECTION/INSET NAVAL
Grog entered the Royal Navy when Admiral Edward Vernon (inset), nicknamed “Old Grog,” began watering down the rum ration in 1739. The Royal Navy continued its “grog hour” until 1970.
U. S. warship as food and water. On board the famous frigate the USS Constellation, they used to say “blow up the magazines, throw the bread over the side and sink the salt horse—but handle them spirits gentle-like.”
In 1842, Secretary of the Navy John Branch tried to eliminate liquor entirely from our seagoing Navy but succeeded only in reducing the enlisted man’s ration to one gill (four ounces) of spirits or one-half pint of wine per day. Men under age 21 were allowed no liquor, but received a few cents extra pay per day as compensation.
This peculiar arrangement lasted only until 1 September 1862, when a temperance-minded Congress, acting partly under the guise of coping with Civil War exigencies, ruled that “the spirit ration in the Navy of the United States shall forever cease.” War or no war, the order drew bitter complaints from both inside and outside the Navy.
Throughout the Civil War, however, the Confederate Navy stayed proudly wet. On board secessionist ships, the grog tub not only remained an honored institution, but was also a strong inducement to the enlistment of badly needed foreign seamen. The last U. S. warship ever to issue grog with official sanction was probably the Confederate commerce raider Shenandoah, which, unaware of General Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, was still sinking Yankee whalers in the North Pacific months after the war was over.
The 1862 abolition of the “spirit ration” in the U. S- Navy did not forbid the continued operation of the “wine messes” of flag officers, commanding officers, wardroom, and warrant officers. The officers were still permitted by law to imbibe the Madeira, sherry, port, and other wines to which they long had been accustomed. However, if a few bottles (or cases) of whiskey, gin, or brandy should happen to turn up in a wine mess storeroom labeled “Wine A,” “Wine B,” or “Wine C,” nobody mentioned such doings ashore. The term “wine mess” simply became a euphemism. Hard liquors accompanied the wines but were usually consumed discreetly in the privacy ot officers’ staterooms, while wines were served openly i° their messes.
The subterfuge consisted of an officer sending the ostensibly subtle signal of a broken wooden matchstick on a silver tray, via a Filipino mess attendant, to one or more other officers. On board all U. S. Navy ships after the Civil War, this meant, “Come to my room for a cocktail.” By this charade, even though distilled spirits were forbidden to all hands and enlisted men were allowed no alcohol of any kind on board ship, officers drank whatever they liked.'
This obviously undemocratic practice is more understandable if one takes into account the character of life on
°ard ship during the 50-year era of this tradition. Cruises °ften lasted for months or years at a time, far from the comforts of hearth and loved ones. The wardroom mess and an officer’s stateroom or cabin were at once his home, n>s club, and his citadel. The typical mature officer thought of himself as a gentleman, able to hold his liquor, and he rarely, if ever, displayed “drunk and disorderly conduct.” When his ship was in any of the ports naval Vessels normally visited, the waterfront bars the crew frequented were considered neither pleasant nor entirely safe Places for an officer to venture.
On board ships that were primitive by today’s standards °f creature comforts and amenities, the wine mess and the camaraderie engendered by it were central to an officer’s cvdl-being and contentment. Any threat to end it seemed to impugn—or so many of the officers thought—their integrity and personal honor.
Such was the situation inherited by North Carolina tjewspaper publisher Josephus Daniels when President Woodrow Wilson appointed him Secretary of the Navy in .13. Daniels was a teetotaler and many in the Navy v'cwed him as a pacifist and a country hick. He was a Political appointee with no prior experience in naval af- airs- Any major changes he might seek to invoke were °und to be viewed with suspicion by virtually the entire officer corps.
In his book, The Wilson Era (University of North Caro- ma Press, 1944), Daniels had this to say about liquor on o°ard ship:
‘Though enlisted men were forbidden even a glass of beer, the officers made merry as they indulged their appetite. Enlisted men were ordered to bring intoxicants on board and serve officers, though if they brought a bottle of beer for themselves they were punished. . . . Convinced after a year’s reflection that the cause of both temperance and democracy demanded it, I issued General Order 99.”
That order, promulgated on 1 June 1914 and effective °n 1 July, read in part:
* ‘The use or introduction for drinking purposes of alcoholic liquors on board any naval vessel, or within any navy yard or station, is strictly prohibited, and commanding officers will be held directly responsible for the enforcement of this order.”
Most naval officers found the very idea of a country umpkin like Daniels presuming to regulate the manners °f officers and gentlemen almost intolerable, and sympa- hetic citizens in other walks of life all across the country als° protested the order. Despite growing temperance sentiment that soon led to the Prohibition, many of the eading newspapers joined in criticizing Daniels’s act. The Wevv York Tribune ran a series of cartoons depicting the hlavy Secretary as “Sir Josephus, Admiral of the USS Grape juice Pinafore.”
On the other hand, the Surgeon General of the Navy, •'ear Admiral William Braisted, supported the order, declaring that shipboard liquor impaired the “clear head and steady hand” the Navy needed. A small minority of other
officers agreed, but most were outraged.
Daniels seemed to be unperturbed by the complaints. In his book, he wrote that “naval officers always obey orders, whether they like them or not.” President Wilson, whom Daniels consulted privately about the order in advance of its issuance, tacitly endorsed it. Congress chose not to interfere. Inexorably, as 1 July approached, even the most obdurate opponents of the order began to realize that the final step in the long process of drying up the Navy was about to take place. (Daniels’s prohibition of alcohol “within any navy yard or station” was later rescinded, but the end of liquor at sea was final.)
As the month of June passed, liquor stocks in most Navy wine messes throughout the fleet were gradually reduced. Individual officers bought much of it and took it ashore, the ships gave cases of beer to enlisted men’s recreation parties for consumption at picnics and “smokers” off the ships, and some of the booze was transferred ashore to private clubs to which officers belonged or was simply sold. But on many ships, especially those on long cruises or on foreign station, there were still large quantities of wines and spirits left as July drew near. What could be more fitting than to drink it all up in one last great and glorious farewell salute?
It so happened that in the summer of 1914 an unusually large concentration of U. S. and foreign naval ships lay at anchor in the spacious harbor at Vera Cruz, Mexico. Mexico had been in the throes of revolution, prompting not only the United States, but also Germany, Britain, France, Spain, and the Netherlands, to dispatch squadrons of fleet units there to protect their national interests from possible depredations ashore. Though the outbreak of World War I in Europe lay only a few weeks ahead, the attitudes prevailing among the various naval contingents were most cordial, with a steady interplay of boat races, games, and social events occupying their summer.
U. S. Navy ships present included the battleships Wyoming (BB-32), Connecticut (BB-18), Florida (BB-30), Arkansas (BB-33), Louisiana (BB-19), Vermont (BB-20), Virginia (BB-13), Georgia (BB-15), New Jersey (BB-16), New York (BB-34), and North Dakota (BB-29), along with a host of cruisers, colliers, auxiliaries, and smaller ships. Most had been in Mexican waters prior to the time General Order 99 reached the fleet, so they had had no opportunity to transfer liquor ashore in the United States, and their wine mess storerooms were bulging. All the right ingredients were in place for one of the most generously fueled and duly appreciated blasts in history.
The evening of 30 June proved ideal for the occasion. The sky was clear, the temperature about 80°, and a gentle on-shore breeze cooled the awning-sheltered decks of the great battleships. Most of the scores of men-of-war present rode easily at anchor, within a few hundred yards of one another. Quarterdecks were dressed with colorful bunting. Accommodation ladders were rigged with special lights, both for festivity and precaution. As night fell, moonbeams danced on the flat calm surface of the wide bay.
On board each U. S. ship, the officers’ messes had made the most elaborate preparations possible to lubricate
and feed all comers. The centerpiece of each wardroom was the traditional immense silver punch bowl filled to the brim with a deadly brew. Tables were loaded with roasted turkeys, baked hams, salads, baked beans, sandwiches, cheeses, and fresh tropical fruits. Case after case of choice wines, champagne, scotch, rye, gin, brandy, and beer had been broken out and made ready to serve.
On each quarterdeck, pipes and bugles sounded as boat crews were mustered, instructions given, and the band summoned on deck. Barges, gigs, and launches were called away for the all-night job of ferrying committees of “mourners” who were to call on other ships. Reception committees were also appointed to host visitors.
At eight bells, signal lights flashed from the bridge of the flagship Wyoming, with a cordial invitation addressed to all ships present: ‘ ‘Prepare to bury King John Barleycorn. Burial party of pallbearers and mourners will call.”
Ships’ bands struck up dirges, which they alternated with old barroom favorites. Knots of officers appeared on deck and began filing down the ladders. Soon, the lights from scores of moving boats began to flicker across the water.
As the calling committees boarded each ship, they received strictly nonregulation greetings. Bosun’s pipes and bugles emitted weird calls never heard before or since w any navy. Mess attendants and junior officers served as sideboys and honor guards, with caps on backwards and brooms used to present arms. Both visitors and hosts were “uniformed” in the most outlandish combinations of blues, whites, dungarees, tennis shoes, swords, skivvies, swabs, medals, boat hooks, lifejackets, and cocked hats-
One participant recalled many years later that, “As each ship was visited there was a brief funeral oration, after which the mourners called on the captain first, then the wardroom, and so on to the junior officers’ mess and finally the warrant officers’ mess.” Of course, in each mess all manner of libation was pressed upon every guest.
On board the Connecticut, recalled another participant, “the warrants won the prize for originality. They transformed their mess into an excellent replica of a Wild West saloon with a bar, brass rail, mirror, spittoons, gambling equipment, and an alluring nude behind the bar.”
Mock funeral services were carried out on most of the ships. “Dead soldiers” were loaded into a weighted coffin, a benediction gravely pronounced, and the coffin committed to the deep, with the mournful notes of taps sounded amid the hiccups.
As the evening wore on, the calling committees grew in Slze> blossomed in conviviality, and stood even less on formality. Many of the groups not only called on every °ne of the 11 U. S. battleships, which each had several Besses, but also on some of the cruisers and other smaller ships holding open houses. Thus, the visitors felt compelled by custom and courtesy at least to go through the motions of taking a dram or two at dozens of separate c°cktail parties. Movement by boat and ladder became eyen more precarious.
Upon departing a ship, a cortege was often joined by another boisterous boatload. By midnight, the convoys deluded eight or ten boats in a column. One such column ^as seen to zig-zag around the harbor in a sort of waterborne conga line, leaving echoes of jollity in its wake.
. When another well-oiled group of revelers finally made 11 back to their own ship in the wee hours of that wild n'ght, one fearless member of the party noted through a skylight in the deck that there were still signs of activity in me junior officers’ mess. He shouted, “Stand from under, below,” and leaped through the skylight and came crash- lng down on a transom two decks below. The antic Wrecked the transom and broke both of the poor fellow’s legs, scattering addled junior officers in all directions.
With several similar eruptions of abortive joy and an °ccasional man overboard, the mourners staggered through the night, consumed most of the booze, and fi- na|ly faded sadly into hangovers and history. Elsewhere, other U. S. Navy ships held similar wakes, but none came cl°se to the scale and fervor of the obsequies off Vera Uruz. Josephus Daniels had made his mark.
There were some who agreed with Daniels. A spokesman for this point of view was Rear Admiral Henry T. "^ayo, second in command of the Atlantic Fleet in 1914, who later became Commander-in-Chief and was famous ln the World War I Navy. In The Wilson Era, Daniels quotes Mayo as telling him (around 1920): “My own °Pinion is that the Wine Mess Order is the wisest thing y°u have done as Secretary, and if its future were committed today to the officers of the fleet, the Wine Mess would never be restored.”
Nearly three-quarters of a century now has passed since teat memorable night in 1914, and the seagoing elements °f our Navy, while at sea, remain officially dry to this hay. Not many know that the idea of fully restoring the Pre-1914 wine messes has been at least half-seriously entertained at high levels on more than one occasion, with a reversal of Daniels’s order probably coming closest to realty in 1933.
Franklin D. Roosevelt had just assumed the presidency and Congress had recently repealed the Eighteenth ^niendment, ending Prohibition. At a dinner party hosted by Roosevelt in the White House, guests included top Navy admirals-to-be Ernest J. King, Chester W. Nimitz, ar>d Robert B. Carney. According to the latter, Roosevelt ^a>d to them, “Gentlemen, if you like, I’ll put alcohol back in the Navy.”
After a stunned silence, King replied: “Mr. President, tee only buoy I ever remember missing was after I’d had Seyeral drinks. If you promise not to tell anyone, we’d rather you not put whiskey back in the Navy.”
Meanwhile, another interesting scenario was developing within the Navy Department later in that same year. Roosevelt’s newly appointed Secretary of the Navy, Claude Swanson, was known to have liberal views toward liquor. To a clique of senior captains then serving in Washington—officers old enough to harbor fond memories of the pre-1914 wine mess—the time seemed right to act. They figured that if one Secretary could louse up things, another could straighten them out.
At the same time, they realized that a man with Claude Swanson’s political savvy, who had served as a U. S. senator, would surely know a hot potato when he saw one. They were also well aware that some naval flag officers did not favor bringing back the booze. Therefore, they cooked up a scheme designed merely to broach the delicate subject to Swanson in a jocular and disarming way and sound him out.
One day when the Secretary seemed to be in a particularly receptive mood, the plotters sidled into his office and laid before him for approval the slightly doctored plans for a new cruiser, the USS Portland (CA-33). The “doctoring” consisted of a sticker, labeled “Wine Mess Storeroom,” pasted over a lower-deck compartment. With a chuckle of feigned surprise, as though he had just discovered the ad hoc redesignation, the ring-leader pointed it out to Swanson, as all present waited with baited breath.
The cagey old Secretary grabbed the ball and ran with it—the wrong way. “Sounds to me like a splendid idea, gentlemen,” he said, smiling at each one in turn. “But let’s see what the rest of the Navy thinks about it.” Much to the consternation of the captains, Swanson then and there dictated a letter to be sent to each one of the 63 flag officers then serving afloat in the Navy, asking their views on restoring the wine mess. Out went the queries; back came the replies. The score: “Yes”: one; “No”: 62. Author’s Note: To this day, only an occasional diehard is ever heard advocating the restoration of wine mess privileges at sea; but in the years since World War II a more intelligently reasoned compromise makes a distinction between permitting liquor to be consumed at sea and having it available in moderation for appropriate occasions in port. Naval officers with extensive international experience have long voiced support for the latter course for reasons of courtesy, hospitality, and protocol.
Today, to quote from a Secretary of the Navy Instruction dated 26 July 1986: “When hosting American or foreign visitors, as appropriate, in support of diplomatic and community relations goals, commanding officers of afloat units and embarked flag officers are authorized to serve sherry, wine and beer on board U. S. Navy vessels, when in U. S. and foreign ports.”
A graduate of George Washington University, Captain Blee served as a line officer from 1940 to 1967. He commanded the USS Meredith (DD- 890), Shadwell (LSD-15), and General W. A. Mann (TAP-112). He served on the staffs of CinCNELM, CinCLantFlt, and CinCPacFlt and as the naval attache in Singapore and Malaysia. Captain Blee retired from the Navy in 1967. He is currently the Chairman of the USS North Carolina Battleship Commission.