Randolph (CV 15) - Naval Cruise Book

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exploded in a hoT barrel aT Price's Neclc. Two of The Dragon's children, LT. ligls Howe and Messmer, Trom The USS SaraToga, broughT down The 40mm people and The looicouTs llcidnapped by Air DeparTmenT in November and recapTured by Gunnery on January 4l. LT. Herod, ciTed Tor earlier anTi-sub work in The ATlanTic, broughT F Division To Their TirsT Taslc of aligning The baTTery. The TirsT record The Randolph crew broke was on OcTober 3l, when The Gunnery DeparTmenT lwiTh a liTTle aviaTion ordnance helpi, lowered The normal 4 day am- muniTion loading period To 36 hours and puT aboard 1400 Tons oT ammuniTion. Cn November 8, The crew of MounT 8, 5 f38 single, MounT CapTain FiTzgerald. GM 3 c, won a Navy E wiTh iTs TirsT Tiring during shori range pracTice. These evenTs illusTraTe The spiriT and The abiliTy of our gunners even before shalcedown. Bay Trials. November 5-I9, included sTrucTural Tiring, sleeve prac- Tices wiTh all weapons, loTs oT Tracking and drills of all sorTs, and seamanship exercises oT all sorTs. F Division had The mosT imporTanT job-calibraTing The baTTeries day and nighT wiTh incessanT bore sighTing, direcTor checking, Tramming, cam cuH'ing, and all The oTher Tiniclcy deTails oT adiusTing Their equipmenT To The mosT perfecl' level of coordinaTion. The proof oT Their pu'l'Ting Olll' was in The shooTing down. Trinidad on The Spanish Main was The TirsT foreign waTer Tor mosT oT us. STill landlubbers mosTly, we lefl' The Virginia Capes, as blue waTer sailors we plowed OUI' TirsT rough seas oTT HaTTeras and dropped The hooll inside The TeeTh of The Dragon in The Gulf oT Paria- There, Three and a half cenTuries ago, Columbus Tirsf saw The American conTinenT and called iT The Garden of Eden. We noTiced a Tew changes Trom ThaT Time.

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Green and Winburg, and some 50 o+her fechnicians, he had spenl' 'lhe summer direcling +he inslallalion of +he --Rand0lPh'5 weapons. Jusl' before commissioning The depar+men+ go+ +o- geiher for fhe firsl' fime. Cap+. Barry, once of +he Guadalcanal Firsi Division, broughi his seagoing Marines aboard. L+. Cdr. Jordan lformerly Ordnance Officer a+ NAS, and now Gunnery Officer of lhe USS Essex l, broughi ihe Wyoming deiail aboard and look over as Assisfani Gunboss and conscience of ihe depar+- ment Few of 'lhe men of fhis defail had ever heard gun- fire when 'ihey boarded The Chesapeake Raider g aboard her +hey learned +heir +rade and gol' +heir firs+ drone and sleeve. They were now +he Firsi, Second, and Third Divisions. Enihusiasm among ihe Newporl' lasi' difchers was low afier Their nighi in +he aisles on The way down, bu'I' L+. Rosen a+ leasi' fell' ihai' his Hrs? view of 'I'he Randy was wor'rh il. Called P T by us for his Mediferranean service, and FlaH'op by his old mos- quifo flee? ma+es, he had shared ihe honor of being our firsl' casually wifh Breauf, 2 I,'c, when a 20mm shell lxx in-Q

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The Firsf and Second Divisions gol' plenfy of anchor- ing pracfice +here-ai leasi +he Second did affer il' had 90+ ifs porl' anchor in fhe habii' of running. Boa+s, booms, and gangways were shipped and rigged 'Fre- quenfly by 'Phe Fourih and Fifih in fhe Chesapeake and af Pod O'Spain. We were se'H'ling down 'lo our divi- sional deck duiies now. A+ Newporf, R. l., 'lhe ship's organizalion book had forehandedly been wri'H'en far away from acfual chocks and lines, hence every evolu- iion during our firsi' mon'fh underway was a hand-+o- mouih aFiair of assigning differenf divisions 'I'o duiies iusl' before or during lhe job, +rying +o gel' a workable dis- lribuiion. A plan drawn up originally by Reddick, BM of lhe working Second lnow CBMQ, was adopled al' Trini- dad and wilh minor changes has safisfied all hands ever since. Our chief job on shakedown was shooiing, of course. We fired nearly a 'fhousand rounds of 5 inch, nearly eleven ihousand rounds of 40mm, and over 35 lhousand rounds of 2Omm. Much of lhis shooling was al' bursls -sr--S--1 ' Ljf. at A r-V and sleds, so fhe sleeve score is noi significant Bul' lhere were some. Remember December 9? Three sleeves. On lhe 29'rh, il was four sleeves. Allhough fhe Shangri- La beal us all hollow on bond-selling and leave-ge++ing, we did be+'l'er shooling and we never hil' a 'row plane inslead of i+s sleeve. There were a few brighf spois away from work, like ihe Rum and Coca-Cola song and Judd, Cox, iilier- bugging wi+h fhe Calypso beauiy. Up al' Macqueripe in -ul