ABSTRACT
The first cruise of YMS 59 was a short one. For reasons I have now forgotten, perhaps simply to give us a shakedown, we were ordered to go south along the coast to Savannah and then return to Charleston. I found the naval station at the entrance to the Savannah River on a blacked-out coast in the middle of a moonless night. Although all navigational aids, like the lights ashore, were shut off, and our ship had no radar, this was not really much of a feat. But as I stood on the bridge while we were coming to an anchor I heard a voice from the darkness of the forecastle below me saying, “By God! He made it!” in tones of intense surprise.
