Chapter III: Foreword: ❦ (2)

It was a novelty to nearly all of the division, bringing back the old days of heave and haul. The regulars were husky men with legs like barrels and arms like blacksmiths’, nearly every one raw material for a football player or anchor of a tug-of-war team. Bosn’s mates were weather-beaten salts with faces like teakwood, seamed by the suns and snows of the seven seas, tanned tar-mequicks with chests like hair mattresses. One barnacle in the port watch had a voice as rasping as a nutmeg grater. You might have imagined that he was born in Lat. 2, North, Long. 2, West, and that he learned to creep on the lee side of the foc’s’le. When he shrilled out a pipe with a chaser like the growl of distant thunder a nippous rooky from the Tenth Ward asked in blank amazement:

“What in heaven did that fellow say?”

“One man from each part of the ship coal the first steamer,” was the reply.

Some of the best boat work which the division has ever done was performed on this cruise. This is true not only in the line of oarsmanship, but also in the securing of boats for sea and for port.

The duty took the division up Sound to Huntington Bay, then east to Gardiner’s Bay, thence over to New London and finally back to New Haven harbor. The men had a welcome convenience in the line of large lockers. They took much interest in the apprentices, frolicsome little fellows then from the training station who had school each morning at a mess table on the starboard side of the gun deck near a frowning five-inch gun with its glittering brass and its oiled steel.

The boys were poring over their books and papers in very much the same way that lads in the seventh and eighth grades in the Second North or the West Middle schools are poring (perhaps more so), over arithmetic. In the instruction of the class the chaplain was using some of the books which citizens of Hartford gave to the ship’s library in 1899 at the suggestion of Admiral Bunce.

Most important among the events of the early part of the ensuing drill season was the election of Lieutenant Lyman Root to be navigator of the battalion to succeed Lieutenant Robert E. L. Hutchinson, promoted to be lieutenant-commander and in turn succeeding Lieutenant-Commander Frank S. Cornwell, promoted to be commander of the battalion, _vice_ Commander Averill, retired. In his capacity as chief of the division, Mr. Root had shown exceptional versatility, having been successful in the social and athletic lines, as well as in drill and discipline. At the next drill evening he took formal farewell of the division which he had so long and so ably and so considerately commanded, giving generously of his best energy and most faithful loyalty. He had taken the helm when the command was little better than a wreck, had nursed it back to health and prosperity and made it the finest military company in all Hartford. In fair weather and foul weather, in joy and sorrow, on soundings and off soundings, his steadying hand had been at the wheel and had time and again brought the division safe into port. Strong and clear purpose, affection for the command and for salt water,—these were our chief’s dominant traits. The ability to read character was another quality. But of these three characteristics his affection for the division stood ever foremost.

LIEUTENANT HOWARD J. BLOOMER
]

Captain Howard J. Bloomer came over from the infantry to act as next lieutenant of the division, not the least of the prerogatives being the privilege of presiding as toastmaster at the yearly banquet. On the menu card was a huitrain re-rigged from Coxswain John Kendrick Bangs so as to read:

Oh, Navy Plug, Ottoman, Alonzo,
Puritan Boy, Especial, H. Clay,
Invincible, Rosedale, Alphonso,
Soby’s Best, German Lovers, El Rey,
Elegantes, Re-ina, Selectos,
Oh, Two-For, Madura, Grandé,
Shoe Pegs, Oscuro, Perfectos—
You drive all my sorrows away.

A floral bell nearly as large as the foretop was lifted and revealed an elegant silver loving cup presented to Mr. Root as testimony to their high esteem. A little later followed the elevation of Mr. Root to the rank of lieutenant-commander of the battalion.

❦

COURSE TEN
❦
THE COLUMBIA

Sail drill was the feature of the cruise on the Hartford in 1904 and in the following year drill in small boats was the feature. On the training ship the boats usually hung outside the rail, but on the cruiser the boats were frequently kept inside the rail. With the ship’s four funnels and her multitudinous skylights and deckhouses her superstructure was unsuitable for “setting up.”

A series of tug-of-war pulls enlivened the trip. The New Haven division won from Bridgeport and Hartford from New Haven. Thus it was for the Hartford team to pull the ship’s team. This contest came and to the astonishment of all, the Hartford men won. And so it was that when the division returned half of the lads were hoarse.

Bugler L. Wayne Adams was in high feather during the trip. He had memorized the calls and sounded them accurately. By virtue of his high office he was excused from previous service as messman; for much of the cruise he was a man of elegant leisure. On his return to Wethersfield, residents of Jordan Lane and the Nail Keg Club at Hanmer’s grocery heard many a fine yarn, spun in Wayne’s best style.

The old rifle range in the South Meadow was discontinued, owing to the increased range and power of the rifles just introduced into the Connecticut National Guard. In consequence the division’s fall target practice was conducted over the range in South Manchester. Acting as a marker, Landsman Hill was hit by a deflected bullet, which was found later in his shoe. Hill was taken to the Hartford Hospital.

Following the indoor meet, given successfully, of course, the division began to prepare to celebrate its tenth anniversary. The banquet was held in the Hartford Club. In the blue uniform the men of the division attending mustered for entry into the dining room, to the strains of a march. A dismounted signal gun of old-time size from the Dauntless rested at the center of the head table, flanked by two silver cups, trophies won by athletic teams from the division. Knife bayonets of the new kind rested on the cups. Two stacks of rifles afforded resting-place for the division’s colors.

The menu cards contained the following:

“_Such a deal of skimble, skamble stuff
As puts me from my faith._”

HENRY IV.

“_A page where men
May read strange matters._”

MACBETH.

X Home Port Routine X
Call All Hands

Heave Anchor to Short Stay Serve Grog Stand by for a Blow
Up and Down
Port Marine Growth Bleached Starboard
Hot Suds Served Forward on Turtle Deck
Bony Walks the Plank to the Wake
Dutch Sea Apples Sliced Irish Torpedoes
Cascarets
“Damn the Torpedoes! Go Ahead”
Sea Cow off Madeira
Spud Chippies Burnside Bullets

[Sidenote: Bumboat Along Side, Sir]

Lyman Root Punch

Fruit Scouse
Vesuvius Ice “Up all——”

Pass to Leeward
Roquefort and Club
Black Jack

“Divine in hookas, glorious in pipe.
When tipped in amber, mellow, rich, and ripe
Like other charmers, wooing the caress
Most dazzlingly when daring In full dress,
Yet thy true lovers more admire by far
Thy naked beauties—Give me a cigar!”

Boatswain’s Mate BYRON, “The Island,” II.

Two hours were passed “Off Yarnland.” Governor Roberts brought the division men to their feet when he told them that he intended to order out the battalion when the presentation took place of the silver service voted by the General Assembly for the new battleship Connecticut. Senator Bulkeley told the familiar and always stirring story of Admiral Bunce’s splendid work in taking a monitor around Cape Horn.

LIEUTENANT-COMMANDER ROBERT D. CHAPIN
]

In the early spring Lieutenant (Junior Grade) Robert D. Chapin succeeded to the command of the division. In the nine years he had been in the division he had ascended the ladder, round by round, as seaman, coxswain, gunner’s mate, second and first class, and boatswain’s mate, first class. He had served on about every brand of standing committee which the organization had utilized. Later he was appointed naval aide with the rank of lieutenant-commander.

Again in the early summer a racing crew was essayed, with Boatswain’s Mate Hogan in charge of the training, the course extending from an imaginary line off the old pumping station below Riverside Park to a point off the East Hartford bank about a quarter of a mile above the railroad bridge. Training was punctuated by swims and dives from a spring plank in the meadow bank a short distance from the bridge.

❦

COURSE ELEVEN
❦
THE MINNEAPOLIS

Mr. Chapin’s cruise was on the Minneapolis, sister ship to the Columbia, and it started on August 25, 1906, from New Haven harbor. The ship steamed down the Sound and by Race Rock Light and anchored off Block Island in the evening with the port anchor, in seventeen fathoms, sixty fathoms of chain out. A protected cruiser, the Minneapolis did not rate a band, but she carried one till the Dolphin came along and commandeered the musicians. The next day the ship steamed out to sea for a hundred miles and then after a diversity of courses came to anchor in Menemsha Bight. Target practice, while the Minneapolis was steaming at a rate of ten knots, made one afternoon’s work. In it the division’s team struck hard times, but in the signal contest later the division redeemed itself, Quartermaster Palmer being an easy first among the signal force of the battalion in the Ardois branch and Quartermaster Ferris making an especially fine showing with the semaphore work. The division has for several years been strong in the signal branch.

When Governor Woodruff chose a naval aide it was Mr. Chapin who was selected for that high honor, and when the next commanding officer of the Second was nominated, Dr. Beach moved up to a lieutenant’s stripes. Beginning in the ranks Dr. Beach went upon the staff as assistant surgeon and then back to the Second as ensign.

For a number of years the division had combined with other commands in the Elm Street Armory to attend an annual military service in a Hartford church, but in the following December it decided to attend a separate or sailors’ service, and the church of the Rev. Dr. Main was selected. It is a question why this was chosen, but a legend has it that the choice was on account of the nautical hint in the pastor’s name and that in the denomination, the Baptist. In a sermon on intelligent patriotism Dr. Main interspersed a number of sailorlike yarns to illustrate several points. He told the story about Nelson’s disregard of Parker’s signal at the battle of Copenhagen; and that of John Paul Jones’s answer in the fight with the Serapis.

LIEUTENANT CARROLL C. BEACH
]

One of the most loyal and faithful members the division ever included had enlisted a short time before in the United States Navy, Seaman John J. A. Connor, and was now on the battleship Connecticut on the always memorable trip around the world, bombarding friends with welcome post cards.

The eleventh anniversary banquet was enjoyed in the Hotel Garde in conjunction with Admiral Bunce Section, Navy League of the United States. Admiral Caspar F. Goodrich told about his personal interest in the Naval Militia, an adjunct necessary to the Navy, as he declared, and Corporation Counsel Arthur L. Shipman talked as an attorney to the gathering, telling about the influence of the navy in Guam and Samoa, where the Navy was still administering the government.

❦

COURSE TWELVE
❦
AGAIN THE PRAIRIE

Space has been economized for the chronicling of the next cruise, a trip on our old friend the Prairie to Hampton Roads. For several seasons the naval militiamen had prospered with running mates from the regulars, but for a reason to be made evident in the next sentence the pair-off system was not pursued this time. The Prairie had a skeleton crew of 145 and the battalion numbered about fifty above those figures. The start for the run down the coast was made by way of Montauk Point, rounding which the Prairie put her helm over for the first long leg on a course of S. 58 degrees W. Early in the evening the wind began rising and old hands watched the rookies for symptoms of internal disturbance. The journey down was a welcome innovation and the passing of Five-Fathom Bank Lightship and of Winter Quarter Lightship were events. When the Cape Charles Lightship came abeam the Prairie went on various courses until she dropped anchor off the Chamberlin Hotel at Old Point Comfort. During a part of the run soundings were made by the Thompson sounding machine, a method that had been studied in former cruises, but with less interest than on this. The Jamestown ter-centenary was in progress that summer and liberty to an unusual extent was allowed to the battalion. One afternoon about fifty members of the division visited the Connecticut building at the exposition. Most of them signed their names in the register, Boatswain’s Mate Perkins at first directing the writing class and, when he tired, another petty officer relieving him. It was with joy nearly equal to signing the pay roll that the sailors affixed their signatures. Manager Curtis greeted the men with a graceful courtesy rivalled only by Commissioner Barber’s graceful urbanity. Maps of the exposition grounds were served out. By using these and keeping the lead going and working their jaw tackle, the men made shift to reach proper destinations.

LIEUTENANT (JUNIOR GRADE) CHARLES L. HOGAN
]

The same afternoon the men gravitated to a military carnival on the parade. An impression prevailed in the division that the division’s tug-of-war team could have outpulled the team which won in the carnival.

In years gone by cruise clubs had been launched, for instance the Ham-Bone Club at Fort Wright and the Fore-Top on the Hartford. In Jamestown the Kimona Club was organized with Lieutenant Hinckley at its head. It consisted of a president, a vice-president, a secretary and a chancellor of the exchequer, with an understudy for each.

On another afternoon Commissioner Barber made his return call. He witnessed hammock and dunnage bag inspection, a “ceremony” which our men loved as cordially as the devil loves holy water. He saw, also, Underwood typewriters in the paymaster’s office and rejoiced at the use of a Hartford product.

In the fall information came that the Elfrida was to leave Connecticut waters and that the unarmored gunboat Machias was to take her place as the battalion’s practice ship. The new ship was built in Bath, Me., in 1892. She is of steel, has two masts. Her length is 204 feet, her beam 32 feet, her mean draft 12 feet, her displacement 1,777 tons, her net tonnage 398, her speed 15½ knots and her horse power 1,484. She has accommodations for nine officers and about 132 men, or about six times as many men as the Elfrida could sleep.

A Christmas tree in the division parlor brought joy to all hands and astonishment to not a few. It was accompanied by an innocuous punch of pink tea caliber, followed by Mother Carey sandwiches, saltpeter and frozen rating badges (Neapolitan ice cream). Skylights were closed, all glims were doused and current was turned on for small electric lamps in a hemlock, which had been decorated with marlinspikes, rope yarns, and cornucopias. Lieutenant (Junior Grade) James A. Evans, rigged gaily as Santa Claus, served out gifts from the break of the quarter deck, assisted by Boatswain’s Mates Perkins and Wyllie and Gunner’s Mate Dickerman. Mr. Hinckley received a miniature Tillie Hadley. Mr. Hogan was presented with a milk wagon. To Seaman Barnes was given a rake. Gunner’s Mate Dickerman, who held the championship of the fleet at the deck game of bowling, was helped to a children’s set of tenpins. Quartermaster Palmer, impressario of the Banzai orchestra, drew an accordion. A village character in the company received an allowance of jaw tackle. A certain apprentice seaman was the recipient of a “hammock ladder,” which dates back to the berth deck of Father Noah’s Ark.

March 17, 1908, an order was issued from the adjutant-general’s office marking the passing of the “battalion.” The official title of the force was changed to Naval Militia, Connecticut National Guard. Ratings were officially prescribed, those of the first class in the division being the following: Master-at-arms, boatswain’s mate, gunner’s mate, machinist’s mate and water-tender.

May 21 the Tillie Hadley was taken to Saybrook and exchanged for the First Division’s steam cutter. Later the Tillie went to the New York Navy Yard. The departure of the old steam whaleboat marked the passing of one of the company’s time-honored institutions. The boat’s successor is variously known as the Hallie Tidley and the Merry Widow.

The observance of a division memorial day began this year, actives and veterans assembling at noon, May 30th, for a service, and parading in the afternoon as part of the escort to the Grand Army of the Republic.

In midsummer a movement came to reorganize the Veteran Association. A meeting was held July 24th and the project advanced at a second meeting held a week later, when the matter of participating in the approaching dedication of Hartford Bridge was discussed. Former Ensign Fred E. Bosworth was chief oiler of the machinery.

❦

COURSE THIRTEEN
❦
AND AGAIN THE PRAIRIE

Once more it was on the Prairie that the company cruised. It was the fourth time, once to Bar Harbor, once to Penobscot Bay, and once to Hampton Roads. So often has the ship been the company’s floating home, that long-service members are more familiar with her than with any other ship in the Navy, unless it be the Machias.

With the company were men from naval militia in New York City and Brooklyn, congenial companions, with more of naval wardrobe than the Second Division showed. The cruise was mostly in the Sound. The ship was engaged in squadron maneuvers.

A flotilla of six torpedo boats accompanied the squadron, as did also four submarines. Boats of this kind were in 1908 comparatively new to many in the company, and when Ensign Hogan found an opportunity to make a descent in a submarine he embraced it.

Back in Hartford the men grew busy in preparing for the Bridge Dedication, the most important festivity which the city has ever conducted, to which the command voted to invite its old nautical guest, H Company of Springfield, down.

The dedication opened October 6 with the firing of a salute, by the division, of course. In the evening the division paraded in a historical pageant, the men representing men-o’-wars men of the conflict of 1812.

The battalion paraded in the giant military procession of October 8 as a landing party, marching in white hats, and being among the warmest favorites in the long column. In the afternoon it banqueted in the Y. M. C. A. with H Company men, for whom the division’s poet laureate had evolved a lyric, of which the following is a specimen verse:

“When dinner’s o’er, we then will go, then will go, then will go, When dinner’s o’er, we then will go, to East Hartford’s sandy shore.”

While the company was beating up Pearl Street, an automobilist rammed the hospital apprentice, an incident which developed an aftermath in the superior court when with a former Philippine soldier, Sergeant Benedict Holden, as attorney and counselor and proctor in admiralty, McIntyre got a verdict. In his argument Sergeant Holden commended the division as a patriotic command in which the city might well take pride.

ANOTHER CHRISTMAS TREE

Jan’y 4, 1909—Fourth Day Out.

Lat. 41° 49′ N. Long. 71° 36′ W. Bar., rising; Wind, E. S. E.;
Atmos., Smoky. All hands happy. Thus ends this Day.—[Extract from
the Division’s Log.]

At eight bells in the second dog watch all hands were piped to the fo’c’sle. On the forecastle-head two screen cloths were rigged on a sliding gunther brace. Being drawn, these disclosed Master-at-Arms Perkins in the capacity of Neptune disguised as Santa Claus. By the heel of the bowsprit were the crosstrees, which had been sent down and rigged with rope yarns and stores from the canteen. Around the tree and along both rails packages were stowed facing inboard, made fast with marlin and manila. Pipes, matches and tobacco were served out and the smoking lamp was lighted. Then gifts were passed out. Dr. Beach received a box of pills, Coxswain Burns a masthead light, Master-at-Arms Perkins twin dolls, one young Benedict a toy baby carriage, and Watertender Lewis a slice bar. Gifts wise and otherwise were passed till the supply was exhausted.

Skylarking such as this varied the serious work of the drill season. Although the membership of the command from time to time changed to some extent, the majority of the men had been in the division for years and were fairly proficient in seamanship as well as in the ordinary armory routine, and it must not be imagined that their fun interfered with their nautical work.

The diversity of the fun is proved when allusion is made to a game between the division’s new basketball team and the Boston Bloomer Girls’. It was chronicled that not a member of the girls’ team lost a backcomb or displaced a “rat,” although their hair was coiled like the flemished-down end of the Elfrida’s topping lift.

The indoor meet was the last held in the old armory. It was as creditable as any in the long and popular series and went as smoothly as desired.

June 13 was observed as Memorial Sunday, the first which the division formally kept. The company reported at the armory to act as escort to the veteran company in a parade to Spring Grove Cemetery.

❦

COURSE FOURTEEN
❦
THE MACHIAS

So near is the history drawing to the present that merely a bare outline is given here of the next two years. The cruise of the summer of 1909 was on the Machias and took the division to quaint old Provincetown. The Pilgrims’ Tower and the swimming linger in the men’s memory.

ENSIGN FRANK H. BURNS
]

Members of the company enjoyed three days’ duty at the Hudson-Fulton celebration in New York City. In December the company transferred to the new state armory and the indoor meet drew nearly three thousand spectators.

COURSE FIFTEEN
❦
THE LOUISIANA

The cruise of 1910 was on the battleship Louisiana and it carried the division around the Island of Bermuda. April 29 the division’s crackerjack wall-scaling team won the world’s championship, in the Twenty-third Regiment Armory in Brooklyn, N. Y., over three competing teams.

THE FOURTH DIVISION
NAVAL MILITIA CONNECTICUT NATIONAL GUARD

Soon after the forming of the First Division an engineer force was outlined and then established and this in time became known as an engineer division. The organizing of the Second Division had its influence on the so-called engineer division. In time the branch as a separate organization seemed to lapse, although its importance was increasing.

In January, 1908, an artificer division was called for, in an order from the adjutant-general’s office, to have a maximum enlisted strength of forty, and Chief Engineer William G. Hinckley was placed in command. Commander Cornwell directed Mr. Hinckley and Assistant Engineer Osborne A. Day to enlist and organize the division. Warrant Machinists Noble, Rathgeber and Larkin of the staff were to report to Mr. Hinckley for duty. Mr. Noble was a Second Division alumnus. February 4 Mr. Hinckley submitted the rates. Corinth L. LaRock of Hartford was early appointed a chief machinist’s mate.

LIEUTENANT WILLIAM G. HINCKLEY
]

A. J. German and Walter B. Gordon of Hartford have also served in the artificer or engineer division, the former becoming a warrant machinist and the latter a chief machinist’s mate.

❦