Japanese surrender

[Seascamp]

The HMS Victory is in a Portsmouth dry-dock and there are tours. The original cannon line the dry-dock and wooden cannon are on the gun decks. Too much weight and the poor old Gal was beginning to sag at the keel. The tour guides are Royal Navy Sailors in 1805 uniform and know their stuff, fascinating tour.

One day I would like to go to our east coast and tour ?Old Iron Sides? but credible rumor has it that they have turned cannibalistic back yonner and it?s said to be prudent to never accept a lunch invitation.

Scamp

[Jerry D]

I've been on the HMS Belfast tour on the Thames River dock. The tour guides give two types of tours one for Tourist and one for Military types. The Tourguide we had took us into the belly of the Ship and we got the grand tour climbing up and down ladders sometimes its gr8t to have a Mil ID

[sn-e3]

Just a little History lesson a couple of hours after the ciese fire on August 15th 1945 my Ship the USS Black DD666 shot down a japanese suicide plane. Admiral Bull Hulsay said the Black either shot down the last plane of WW2 or the first plane of WW3

[Boats]

If I'm not mistaken many Japanese found on for months after that as they officially never got the word.

[Seascamp]

No doubt that by August 1945, USN Destroyer AAA Gunners had developed a mighty quick and keen shootin eye. One more Son of the Rising Sun lookin to give all and go out in a blaze, was probably in for a big disappointment as the flack bursts were right on him from the get-go and the only blaze was his own plane and himself falling out of the sky in bits of this and that.

Oh well, someone always to be last I reckon. Curious if the USS Black was the target or if they were screening a more inviting target like a Carrier or BB, great shootin either way.

Scamp

[Boats]

Check out this web site for the hold outs

http://www.wanpela.com/holdouts/list.html

[Robert Ryan]

Visited the MO when she came into Pearl During one her portcalls when she was still an active ship. What an awesome sight she was. When in Vietnam the USS BOSTON fired some of her 8 inch shells for us in Tuy Hoa when we couldn't get an artillelry battery that was already engaged in a fire mission.

[Boats]

I went on board the USS Alabama in Mobile, AL Seen only the BB from a distance. The old wood decks took me back a little. Gun turrets are so thick its hard to believe they could ever be taken out - until you get a good look at a 16" shell then you know why big things can be hurt by other big things.

2000 lbs. always looked impressive too. But the Sandy's used to carry two groups of 3) 500 pounders and two rocket pods and boy did they look mean when they took off.

Watched the VN special last night on aircraft in VN and it was pretty shocking how much ordiance was dropped and how many planes were shot down. One model aircraft had 50% losses during the war. Many flights (and I can recall this from back during my days) the pilots hit the same targets 31 times and were restricted from hitting hard targets because of presidential restrictions on targets.