The Shotgun Wedding

In early 1969, our ship, the USS Shangri-La, was scheduled to depart for the Mediterranean for 6 months.  We had spent many months on various intensive drills and exercises.  Our air squadrons had completed carrier qualifications.  Food, fuel, and water were stored aboard.   The entire crew was aboard, watches set, and the ship departed at 0800.

Well, almost the entire crew.  There’s always someone who misses the sailing time, and the Navy doesn’t take lightly to that.  One of the missing crew was Eddie, from my division.  Eventually Eddie made it back to the home port of Mayport, Florida, and the empty pier.  The shore patrol put him on one of the daily mail flights to the carrier, now sailing across the Atlantic.

Within a few days, the Captain scheduled a Captain’s Mast.  That’s a hearing for violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice that don’t require a court martial.  Each sailor is called forward, the charges read, and the Captain asks the sailor for his side of the story.  For each sailor, an officer of the division is present, so I was there at his side.  The typical story for AWOL, Absent Without Leave, is some version of “I overslept” or “my alarm broke.”  Usually, alcohol is involved.

Eddie, however, outdid everyone.  Here’s his version.  “Well sir, the day before the ship sailed, my girlfriend said we had to drive up to Georgia.  She was driving way out in the country and it got dark.  I don’t know where we went.  But we got to this house out in the woods.  There were 3 men on the porch, and one had a shotgun.  He said ‘son, you said you were gonna marry her, and you’re gonna do it right now!’  One of the men brought out a Bible and did the wedding, and I married her right there.  I couldn’t get back to the ship in time.”

I was amazed to hear this story.  The Captain was amazed, too, I think.  He turned to me and asked, “Can I believe this?”  I replied that I thought he could.  The Captain prescribed some modest punishment.  Then he added “Talk to JAG.”  That’s the lawyer with Judge Advocate General.

The lawyer and I heard the story again from Eddie, and now had the chance to ask him some questions.  “Do you have a marriage certificate?”  No.  “Do you know any of the people who performed the ceremony?”  No.  “Are you sure you’re married?”  “Yes, and I love her, and I’m sending her my paycheck while I’m on deployment!”  Tragically, this story is a rather common scam.  We could never talk Eddie out of stopping the transfer of his paycheck to his ‘wife’.  We are pretty sure she was nowhere to be found when the ship returned to Mayport.