On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

Yup us too although there was a precedent for using the leggings too.
It was just more than they wanted to do for a 2 hour fire watch.
If you were on Shore Patrol, later in my career you were wearing white
leggings and a white web belt with a white night stick and the SP arm
band.
On a payroll run you swapped out the night stick for a sidearm.

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 16:26:11 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.

This was a 2 hour fire watch in the barracks. There was a water
fountain in the hall and if we were going to carry anything it
probably should have been a fire extinguisher. ;-)

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 20:22:48 -0400, wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 16:26:11 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.

This was a 2 hour fire watch in the barracks. There was a water
fountain in the hall and if we were going to carry anything it
probably should have been a fire extinguisher. ;-)

I was walking around a PX.

John H. wrote:
On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.


Air Force basic we only handled firearms on two days of 6 weeks. One day
of inside, raining, safety and dry fire. Next day at range. In pouring
rain.

wrote:
On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 16:26:11 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.

This was a 2 hour fire watch in the barracks. There was a water
fountain in the hall and if we were going to carry anything it
probably should have been a fire extinguisher. ;-)



We had too walk around outside for a couple hours watching for fire. They
had lots of fire drills at Lackland, but were told if there was a real fire
to exit fast, very fast, forget boots, etc. The barracks were built in
1921and could burn to the ground in a few minutes.

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 20:41:34 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 20:22:48 -0400, wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 16:26:11 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.

This was a 2 hour fire watch in the barracks. There was a water
fountain in the hall and if we were going to carry anything it
probably should have been a fire extinguisher. ;-)

I was walking around a PX.

We never did that sort of thing. It must an Army thing.
I would think a .45 or a M9 would be a better choice inside a PX.
I guess if you didn't have any ammo the M-14 is a better club. ;-)

On Sun, 30 Sep 2018 02:32:16 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

John H. wrote:
On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.


Air Force basic we only handled firearms on two days of 6 weeks. One day
of inside, raining, safety and dry fire. Next day at range. In pouring
rain.

Our basic had "range week" in week 12. It was M-1 and if you qualified
fast enough, you got .45. I did both. It did not seem that hard
because it was huge targets at 200 yards for the rifle and the
standard GI bullseye at 25 (maybe less) yards for the .45.
I think if you got them all on the paper you qualified. I don't
remember a score. The whole thing seemed to be more about firearm
handling and range safety than marksmanship. I don't think we ever
fired a round until the 3d day. Most of the M-1 stuff was inside with
our non-functional drill rifles. They went through the loading
process, safety, basic marksmanship principles (sighting, positions
etc), safety, cleaning, safety, range rules and then a little more
safety ;-)
It wasn't until I got on my ship that my chief actually taught me how
to shoot a 1911 well. That was his favorite gun and I came out of
there knowing more than I needed to about the 1911. I can still field
strip and reassemble one blind folded in about a minute or two and to
a detail strip (looking) in 3 or 4.

On Sun, 30 Sep 2018 02:32:16 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:
On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 16:26:11 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.

This was a 2 hour fire watch in the barracks. There was a water
fountain in the hall and if we were going to carry anything it
probably should have been a fire extinguisher. ;-)



We had too walk around outside for a couple hours watching for fire. They
had lots of fire drills at Lackland, but were told if there was a real fire
to exit fast, very fast, forget boots, etc. The barracks were built in
1921and could burn to the ground in a few minutes.

That sounds like the ones we had in Bainbridge FT school. They were
WWII tho. It was all wood construction with asbestos siding, similar
to the smaller "temporary" buildings on the DC mall, that were there
until the 60s (Lady Bird had them destroyed). Those are not to be
confused with the larger "tempo" buildings up around 18th street.
In Cape May we had new concrete block barracks that were pretty
fireproof except for contents.
The funny thing was you could smoke inside at Bainbridge but you had
to go outside to smoke in Cape May.

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 22:34:14 -0400, wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 20:41:34 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 20:22:48 -0400, wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 16:26:11 -0400, John H.
wrote:

On Sat, 29 Sep 2018 15:39:06 -0000 (UTC), Bill wrote:

wrote:
On Fri, 28 Sep 2018 20:08:35 -0000 (UTC), Bill
wrote:

wrote:


We didn't really have guard duty, we had fire watch.
I remember my first night there I saw a guy wearing a cartridge belt
walking around and thinking he was a guard. My first thought was "I
could take that guy".
A couple nights later I was wearing the cartridge belt and walking
around ;-)


Same thick with air force. They explained making you wear the cartridge
belt made you under arms and more liable if you screw up.

There were not any live rounds on our side of the base and our drill
rifles did not have firing pins in them. I am not quite sure what arms
we were under. ;-)


We had the belt. That was all.

We wore the belt, canteen, ammo pouches and toted a real M-14...but no ammo.

This was a 2 hour fire watch in the barracks. There was a water
fountain in the hall and if we were going to carry anything it
probably should have been a fire extinguisher. ;-)

I was walking around a PX.

We never did that sort of thing. It must an Army thing.
I would think a .45 or a M9 would be a better choice inside a PX.
I guess if you didn't have any ammo the M-14 is a better club. ;-)

This was 'around' the exterior of the PX, not inside. When it was open there was no guard there.