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In November 1901, 17- year-old Charles A. Focht ran away from his home in Reading, Pennsylvania, and signed on as a “landsman for training” in the old receiving ship Richmond at Philadelphia. He was to spend the following four years cruising the oceans as a signal boy in the USS Cincinnati, before he would return home and leave the sea forever. More than 60 years have intervened since then, but through the fading photographs in Charles Focht’s albums we are afforded a glimpse into the daily life of a sailor in a long vanished and colorful era of the Navy.
The Cincinnati was a 305-foot protected cruiser that had been completed in 1891*. She had served in the Spanish American War, and in late 1901 was just emerging from a long period of modernization in the New York Navy Yard. For a time after recommissioning she cruised in Caribbean waters, protecting American interests during the “banana wars” that were troubling the area. Then, in 1903, she crossed the Atlantic, and after a short period on the European Station, continued on to the Pacific via the Suez Canal. For four more years the Cincinnati cruised in and out of Amoy,
Cavite, Chefoo, Chemulpo, Guam, Hong Kong, Manila, Shanghai, Woosung, and Yokohama, the fabled ports of the Asiatic Station, before she again returned to American shores.
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'nnati’s elaborate bow ornament was ith real gold leaf.
With her new Babcock and Wilcox boilers, the ship could make 22 knots under forced draft.
The crew of the Cincinnati numbered 20 officers and nearly 350 enlisted men. Some of the officers would later become well known, and Ensign E. J. King of the 1st Division eventually became Fleet Admiral.
Nearly all of the new enlisted men were from the East Coast, but there were a few “slopers”
{West Coast sailors) among the older hands. Some
of the crew members were really just boys;
the “apprentice boys” could enlist at age 15. The
oldest man in the ship was Gunner’s Mate
Jim Brown (below), who had fought in the Civil
War. Although he had been in the Navy
for over 1J) years and was getting stiff and couldn’t
move so fast any more, “Old Jim" still
had no intention of retiring. The Angora goat in
the large photograph, the ship’s mascot,
came from the Cincinnati, Ohio, zoo, and had been
to sea before with the merchant service.
He lasted only a short time in the Cincinnati, however, as one day he drank a bucket of machine oil and died from indigestion. Other favorite mascots in the ship included a small goat, several cats and dogs, and a parrot from Venezuela that was nearly always seasick.
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There was almost always enough work in the Cincinnati to keep “Jack” out of trouble. At sea there was the endless cycle of watches (as a signal boy you could count on spending the greater part of your waking hours on the bridge), and in port everyone had coaling-ship to look forward to. The gunners would be busy “overhauling battery”—taking everything moveable off the ship’s eleven 5-inch gun mounts and then reassembling them—and if the ship’s drinking water started to taste salty, maybe the black gang would be bringing the “vaps” up on deck to clean out the condensers.
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Weren't busy cleaning the ship, there would be your own gear to think of; the dd pipe “scrub hammocks" and you’d have to do a good job with soap and sea water, for you never knew when there would be an inspection. Jheri if everything wasn’t just right you’d be called before Mr. Gilmore,
'Cecutive Officer, and there would be a stern lecture and extra duty to work off.
Walter Shearer and “Gash” Craig sparkplugged the Cincinnati’s football team to win the Asiatic Station’s small-ship trophy.
shows were popular with the crew,
J- Hoelle and H. H. Davis were the hit of ■ ‘^tion that the ship held one July bth in k Bay.
Something new and different was always happening to make life on the Asiatic Station interesting. Perhaps the best times were the liberties, when you’d visit strange places most people had never seen, like the Chinese army barracks at Shanghai (above). Once the Cincinnati even ran aground off Hima Shima, Japan, and had to be drydocked in Yokohama for repairs (below). And there was the day in Manila Bay, when the Russian cruisers Aurora (right), Oleg, and Zemtchug slipped into port after having just barely escaped from the Japanese off Port Arthur, their shell- pocked hulls grim reminders of a war that raged nearby.
Sometimes a steamer would arrive and there would be mail from home; the
Chief Master at Arms would dole it out and if you were lucky enough to get a letter
it didn’t matter so much that it had been written over a month ago and that the
news was old. On Sunday after inspection you could relax; perhaps you’d listen to
the talking machine that the crew had purchased in Europe, or maybe you’d
just want to walk up to the quiet of the fo’c’s’le and dream of the places still to be seen
beyond the horizon, and of the family, so far away, that you’d left behind.