I am not sure which port it was...somewhere in Korea where the pier was a long way from the town. So they arranged two buses to run the sailors for the Etai into town...Liberty buses if you will. They must have heard about the cheap souvenirs in town....come ON...it was KOREA ! Anyway, the buses were laid on and the liberty granted and the sailors were allowed to head for town...if a senior CPO rode on each bus to maintain order. There was a rumor of rowdy behavior possible on the return trips. So...there were four chiefs on the Etlah and one had to be on duty on board at all times. So they had to rotate three duties between four chiefs...no problem.
Pre-Zumwalt, the sailors were required to board and unboard in class A uniform...whites or blues, depending on the season. No one legally carried civilian clothes on the ship. If you lived off the ship, like in a house with a family, you travelled to and from the ship in dress uniform and changed into work clothes on board. The Chief was already retired when Zummie became CNO (Chief of Naval Operations, THE top job in the Navy) so he didn't have to bear the grief of watching sailors boarding a ship in civies.
Anyway, the rest of the story is compiled from three different accounts, two pro-Chief and one anti-Chief, with a smattering of fill-in-the-blanks by me...cause I KNOW the Chief. There was already bad blood between the Chief and one of the other chiefs on board...in fact...bad blood between the other two chiefs and ...we'll call him Brad...as well. On the last bus returning from the town, Chief Brad got on the same bus the Chief was on. The Chief explained that one of them should be on the other bus. Brad was loaded, so was the Chief, they had sampled a few Korean beers at each pick up on each trip...Chiefs need liberty, too, ya know. Brad didn't want to be the only chief on the bus because the sailors had started getting agitated and rowdy. The Chief explained that was the VERY reason he was supposed to be on the other bus. But no amount of arguement could persuade Brad that he should do his job, so the Chief waited until the bus was just ready to leave and got off that bus and boarded the bus with no chief on it.
The sailors were not happy with this development...they had expected a chaperone-free trip to the ship. And they were pretty rowdy about it. As his son, I can assure you that the Chief did NOT entertain rowdiness in any form from any subordinate. He was not a big guy, 5'9" and about 160 lbs. But he had a look and a reputation and they were usually enough to settle down the most aggresive young'un, sailor or child. On this particular night, though, they weren't enough... The problem with a reputation is that not everyone knows about it and some just don't believe it. So all hell broke loose. As long as the bus was moving and the Chief held court in the center aisle, things were fairly well controlled. But the Korean bus driver panicked and stopped the bus and soon Chief and sailors spilled out on to the road. Chief Brad was in the second bus, which stopped as soon as they saw what was up. Some of the junior petty officers were on the second bus and immediately jumped into the fray to save the Chief...who would NEVER admit he needed help. Fortunately, most of the sailors on the second bus decided to stay out of it, along with some on the first bus. No telling how long it took to put things in order...but eventually they all boarded the buses again. Two buses pulled up dockside to disembark a crop of new believers. As they came up the gangway, saluted the fantail then the Officer of the Deck, they almost all of the participants proceded to the sick bay for medical attention. Several for stitches, many for a wash and a bandage, and one for splinting a broken wrist. The next to the last up the gangway was Chief Brad...tipsy but otherwise intact...except for a fresh and soon to be remarkable blackeye. By this time, word had reached the Captain and he had come to the gangway just as the Chief made his usual smart and snappy salutes to the fantail and the OD. Captain Nobblet commented that the Chief was out of uniform and should go immediately to the Chief's compartment and correct that... both he and the OD were struggling to control the laughter that was trying to break out . The Chief, a peacock who was manic about his uniform and appearance, could only grit his teeth and reply, "Aye, aye, Skipper." And richocheted down the companionway to his rack. He was livid. He later explained to me that he had been written up for being out of uniform for having his bluebirds displayed...he had a small bluebird tattooed above each nipple.
He had gotten off the bus with both knees out of his uniform pants. They were in summer /tropical uniform so it was long sleeve Khakis with tie. All that was left of his shirt, and T-shirt, was the collar with tie and clasp, and the cuffs with his custom cuff links. All the other material had been ripped off, a flap of the back of his T-shirt was hanging out of the back of his pants, but everything else was gone. He was a mass of swelllings and a few cuts and scratches...and he lost the caps to his front teeth again. He had a gold bridge across the top front, "lost 'em playing football on the steel hatchcover of the Mitchell"...the caps got knocked out a lot. Heheheee...if that doesn't tell you something about the nature of the Chief...tackle football on a steel deck. Anyway, the reputation got another boost...discipline aboard the Etlah got a boost, as well. He still had a bruise or two when they got home, he just gave us his toothless, hillbilly looking smile and said, "You ought to see the other guy"."