John Pierce (DD 753) - Naval Cruise Book

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beer hall was located. Here they served stout, a pastry of their own brand, and a watery solu- tion called orange squeeze. This was a rather popular place for us, for we were not yet used to the salt water in Aden. The water for Aden comes from the hills outside the city and is collected by aquaducts and a reservoir that is said to have been built by the Queen of Sheba. One experience can typify our whole liberty in Aden. Mel Hill ordered a milk shake, steak and eggs. He got his milk shake with goat ' s milk, his steak was goat meat and the eggs were from a Guinea hen. Liberty ended the second night with a chaos of taxi drivers and boatmen shouting after our men that they had not paid for their rides. After a day at sea underway from Bahrein, we arrived in the city of Aden at the foot of the Red Sea. We pulled into our anchorage after exchanging a few suspicious glances with a Russian ship nearby. As in all the foreign ports we entered, the bum boats were alongside several minutes after we anchored, this time with brightly - colored rugs festooning their bows and draping grace- fully off their sterns into the water. These bum boats were a regular floating small stores, with everything from native knives to Colgate ' s tooth paste. Once ashore, you could see the typical Ara- bian town on the hillside, stone houses and a conglomeration of goats, camels, and children, each with its own particular noise and smell. The lower section of the city was predomin- antly British in its influence. Farther to the west was the military establishment, where the The transiting of the Suez Canal took us from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea through Egypt. The journey lasted about eight hours. The canal is quite narrow, allowing only one ship to pass in one direction. As a convoy, our two divisions were given priority passage. Unlike the Panama Canal, the Suez contains no locks, so we did not have to wait to be raised and lowered. The desert stretches away to the horizon on either side — broken occasionally by an isolated cluster of palm trees. Herds of camels could be seen being driven across the desert wastes. We saw British Tommies stationed along the canal protecting Great Britain ' s interest in the Suez area. Britain ' s long mandate on the Suez Canal was evident in the huge monument — a towering split shaft on the west bank — erected in memory of the men who died defending the canal during World War I. At approximately 2100 that night, we steamed past Port Said into the Mediterranean.

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sell you his watch, or if that didn ' t work, he ' d ask you for a cigarette and let it go at that. At the foot of the city, dominating the harbor, is a great castle built by he Spanish which now serves as city hall and court house. Naples is the center of the cameo trade. A number of the artisans have their shops clustered on the height of the mountain that shelters the city. Across the bay, Vesuvius broods, quietly now. But, deep within, the mountain still rumbles forth its warnings. Pompeii, once the resort center of the ancient Romans, felt the devastation of Vesuvius. Recently NAPOLI! Steaming by the picturesque Isle of Capri, we entered Naples as we had many other ports — in the mists of the morning. After executing the tricky Mediterranean Moor, the liberty party made its way to the beach in some of the local rowboats after considerable hassel as to prices. Once ashore that first day (and every day), there was no shortage of guides. ' ' If the guide couldn ' t take you somewhere, he ' d unearthed, this buried city has remained comparatively intact, with its fountains, houses and baths which were buried under the volcanic ash for centuries. Another neighboring district has become famous in its own way during the last war. Salerno Bay is now considered one of the toughest beachheads of the European war. Ufe ROME TOUR One of the tours available from Naples was to Rome, the Eternal City; which was the capital of the largest empire in the world, and is the capital of the Catholic religion. The old and new stand side by side in