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Page 20 text:
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fn- .1 . . . -2 'wr J, xx . If N X x Q. .X X . 53- i. 0 f 'nf ' I W 'WV ' iififi 'ii ' 'A r Sf' M Mfd f' I K ' Q 62 fe wiyf-. s XNXXQ V-X N Q' 7 ta NWNKSB XX X X ,, ,.,.... .as..-----.L 'E' E. J'-lil llll ' llllllll 'f '.-:f'?rt Tf-..-in--:.j' , 'H -iQ3f!-f5r f?-':- Q 'tn' J-:az Ist ff: ,l.-l llif.-lllll-..l-L '-' -l . - .ik ' 'fi -Sa-. - L !LiLi-Wh' .fli5'if js gi -351,-arfff-ggi Egllifi? t' -ia A -iii-. senior petty officers, C. F. Keenan, C. Adams and E. G. Gallery, all of them BM1fc, cut the cake and delivered the first piece to Captain Wattles. Later in the evening the decks were cleared for action, and after a wild flurry of flying feet and impossible maneu- vers, the prize for the jitterbug contest was awarded to Paul Lopez, Slfc, dancing with Mrs. Harold Crider, wife of H. D. Crider, BM1fc. Credit of the success of the dance went to the committee in charge-Lt. Partridge, Lt. Bracken, Lt. tjgj Murray, Thomas, BMlfc, Keenan, BMlfc, and Crider, BMlfc, with an assist to Miss Bradley, dance director of the USO, and George Carens, newspaper writer, for their help. The days were running by almost too fast, for there was much to be done. On 18 January, the Topeka shoved off to sea for the first time with her own crew to make a high speed run north of Cape Cod. The first, unpleasant cases of seasickness made their appearance, but the run itself was a success, all things considered. On 21 January the ship left port again, this time for a week of intensive drills in Massachusetts Bay. These readi- ness for sea exercises included general drills, gunnery drills, magnetic compass calibration and radio direction Hnder calibration. The weather was raw and biting, and night watches on deck were even more bitterly cold than they had been in port. On 25 January the ship returned to south Boston for final loading of provisions and ammunition before leaving on the shakedown. It was the last liberty in Boston for nearly six weeks. At 0004 on 27 January the Topeka was under way for Chesapeake Bay, Virginia, on the first leg of the shakedown cruise, with the destroyer Mayrant as screen. The trip to Norfolk will long belremembered by most of the oHicers and men as one of the roughest junkets they ever took. High seas broke over the Topeka's bow in great bursts of green water, and the long sickening swells took a high toll of white-faced boots and salty sailors alike. During the day the ship changed course to answer a merchant's ship's distress call, but other ships were able to reach the mer- chantman before the Topeka and her services were not needed. Some of the men found relief from seasickness only in their sacks, despite admonitions that fresh air was the best cure, and others, of a more playful nature, carried buckets with them as they went to watch. It was little con- solation to the enlisted man to know that in the Junior OHicer's Bunkroom very unhappy and unsalty Ensigns had crawled to what they hoped would be their final resting place. During the two-day run, 5 and 6 structural firing tests were conducted, and on the evening of 28 January the ship anchored in Hampton Roads. The next week was spent in Chesapeake Bay conducting general drills and gunnery drills. By this time nearly ev- eryone aboard recognized the bugle calls for fire drill, fire the rescue drill, prepare to abandon ship, and even more noteworthy, knew what to do when they heard the call over the squawk-box. Gunnery exercises included surface firing at towed sleds and anti-aircraft firing at towed sleeves and at drones, remarkable little miniature, radio-controlled aircraft which can do everything a Jap Betty can do and a lot more besides. On the afternoon of 4 February the ship got underway from Norfolk for the Naval Operating Base at Trinidad, British West Indies, one of the bases which the United States obtained in the famed M50 old destroyersn deal with Great Britain. The ship was scarcely out of Chesapeake Bay before the sea began to act up again and as the Topeka swung south off Cape Hatteras in company with a sister ship, the Oklahoma City, CL9l, and the destroyers Gainard and Purdy, there were men aboard who felt that their des- tiny would have been served much better had they joined the Army and been lying in a dirty foxhole, which, despite its obvious faults, would at least have been immovable. They all survived, however, and within two days a tropi- cal sun was beating down on the ship and the calm blue waters around her. En route to Trinidad, general drills and tactical exercises were conducted daily, sunbathing was per- mitted during the middle of the day, and Joe Doakes, S2fc, was beginning to see where they had gotten the beautiful pictures he had seen in the recruiting station. On 9 Febru- ary the ship arrived in the Gulf of Paria, where she was to spend the next 18 days on as rugged a daily schedule as her crew had ever experienced. Trinidad was by no stretch of the imagination a tropical paradise. The barren, sun-dried hills rose out of the sea to form a dull yellow-and-gray wall around the gulf. Perched on the northern rim of the South American continent, the island itself was a little more than 600 miles north of the equator. The sun hammered down on the ship relentlessly, and there was little relief from the heat below-decks or topside.
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