David 1982 This is the hopefully brief story of the second gay man I saw hunted by Navy Faggott Hunters. The story is brief because I hardly met him before he was hunted down and life destroyed. It was soon after enlistment, I'd barely gotten through training and assiged to a ship when I met David. It was a repair ship. A mobile shipyard repairing other Navy ships. I was about a week on board, I hadn't yet learned my way around my ship when I was assigned to a team making repairs to the battleship USS New Jersey. That was David's ship.
A bit naive and far too excited to care, I never considered he might be gay and coming on to me. I wouldn't have cared anyway, just tell him I'm straight and move past it. My excitement concerned his offer of a full tour of the most impressive machine I would see in my entire lifetime, AN IOWA CLASS BATTLESHIP! This was a very rare opportunity from my place in the Navy. It was the only operational battleship in the world, soon to be recommissioned. My personal access to the ship was limited to the repair work. Escort by a member of the crew meant almost unlimited exposure, not only to an incredible ship, but a serious history lesson as well. My shipyard clearance came later and I had complete access to all the ships. Eventually I knew every inch.
Four decades later I'm still in awe of the engineering I saw that day. All it cost me was trading a tour of my rusty hulk of a ship. One item in particular still stands out in my memory, that is... 16 inch thick steel all over the ship as armor against enemy shelling. While huge parts of the ship are built with it, a small amount of armor on the bridge is what drives home the seriousness of this war machine. The armored part of the bridge had no chance of protecting the crew from a direct hit.
David left my ship that evening after his tour. He was shocked at the poor condition of it, and the complete lack of defenses. Mine was not a warship. I didn't see David again.
Soon after, I was called to the Master At Arms office (ships police department) for a very odd conversation. The questions made no cents at all until I got back to my work center. One man immediately asked me "Are you a fucking faggott?" The rest of the shop gathered in a circle around me, glaring unbelievable hate while the first man (moron little boy) told me how they had all been quietly taken out and interviewed about me. They were told the details that I was denied... to work their hate against me in an attempt at getting incriminating statements to use at my trial. They were violating orders by telling me, but the hate was so great they couldn't control themselves. They told me all the things they would shove up a faggotts ass to teach him a lesson before tossing overboard at sea. These are the morons brainwashed to hate, by the US Navy. These are not only my shipmates, but much more... they are the people I'm expected to work closely with for years to come. What a way to start a new life in the Navy.
I was only saved by one of the supervisors returning from HIS interview. He tore into the moron little boys, pointing out that in a short time on board I already had a whispered/rumored relationship with two beautiful women on the ship. I was constantly seen with them and never seen speaking to a man. No woman would talk to any of the moron boys, and they'd been aboard a long time by comparison. Thus ended the event, with it decided that I wasn't a "Fucking Godless Commie Faggott." Nobody said what started the jackals hunting me as a faggott. It scared the crap outa me and prevented ever developing a good relationship with most of my coworkers. They were subhuman garbage who never went a day without vehement faggott hate speech.
Perhaps three months passed when I got a letter from David. The faggott hunters came after me because David signed me onto the New Jersey as his guest. My name was in the log book. My ship didn't record such trivial events. David was being faggott hunted at that time, but he didn't know. He was dishonorably discharged. His future destroyed. They drilled him for information about me and he simply told the truth. There was nothing to hide.
So... cute as hell, David's letter included a picture of himself in uniform, hoping I'd want to remember him. In extreme panic I cut the photo and letter into tiny bits and rushed to the head for flushing. I didn't reply to his letter, he wanted to know if I was gay. Discussion with the women in my life brought up the very reasonably paranoid possibility... that the letter didn't come from David.
I'd seen a short faggott hunt in boot camp. That man was taken away from the barracks in the night. Never heard another word about him.
Before my enlistment was done I was subjected to three additional, but VERY SERIOUS faggott hunts. Each believed to be the result of complaints by the moron faggott hunting boys I worked with. Each time claimed that I'd been friends with a victim of a recent/successful faggott hunt. Each time the moron boys made subtle threats to kill me in horrific ways. I slept with one of those canned compressed air horns for safety... to wake up the entire berthing compartment if they attacked in the night. It was the recommendation of gay men on the ship claiming they all had one. The Navy deliberately created an army of faggott hunters.
I advanced through the rates to second class petty officer in less than three years. The moron boys did nothing but get punished for bad behavior.
