By Gerald A. McGill

When the Point Welcome was underway, the crew stood 3 man watches.  Two men were on the bridge and the third man was roving around the ship as a lookout, fire watch, or messenger. Sometimes the third man would have other duties such as bringing coffee to those on the bridge or waking the oncoming watch.

The watches were four hours each around the clock.  The mid-watch began at midnight and ended at 4:00 am (0400).  The next watch was 0400 to 0800 and so on around the clock.  This meant that all men stood watch for eight hours per day.  In addition they had their special duties such as gunner’s mate, boatswain mates, enginemen, and electronics technician.

The officer of the Deck (OOD) on the bridge was usually the executive Officer (XO), the Chief Boatswain Mate (BMC) or the First Class Boatswain Mate (BM1).  The second person on the bridge could be a seaman (SN), Electronics Technician (ET), even an Engineman (EN).  They served primarily as helmsman steering the vessel.

The OODs remained on the bridge throughout their watch, but the helmsman and the “rovers” would switch off from time to time subject to the approval of the OOD on watch.

As Commanding Officer I stood no scheduled watches as I was on call 24/7.  My written STANDING ORDER, night or day was, “If you have any doubt as to whether you should call me, CALL ME!”

In addition, I am somewhat of a night person and would sometimes relieve the OOD an hour or two early on the mid-watch so he could get a couple extra hours of sleep that night.

I guess that was the reason that one night I overheard one of the crew members say to another “Captain Dracula is on the bridge tonight.”

The next morning I told the BMC what I had overheard.  He said, “I’m sorry, Skipper.  I’ll tell the men to knock it off”.

“No need to.” I said, “I think it’s funny.”  But I never heard it again.