January 1

January 1

We are on the water in the Chesapeak bay (Shakedown.) It is misserably cold but the boats still go in the water. Ice formed on all the boats & men. They most froze to death. My hand is still in a cast so I am aboard ship where it is warm.

Mary Ellen was borned yesterday Dec 31 - 44 (details latter.)

hand . . . in a cast: He broke his right hand in a fall at a roller-skating rink early in his Naval service.

In 1966, when I was in Army Officer Basic training at Fort Benjamin Harrison in Indianapolis, I happened to be looking through the diary and came across the name of Leonard Loutner, one of WWM’s shipmates, with an address and phone number in Indianapolis. I ventured to phone the number and ended up having a pleasant half-hour conversation with Mr. Loutner, still at the same address 21 years later, who told me that WWM had been drinking and was doing some daredevil speed skating—a big grin on his face, skating faster and faster with each turn round the rink—when he fell and broke the hand. Other details of date, place, circumstances, have, sadly, been lost.

Mary Ellen: Mary Ellen Morgan May, his daughter.