Dont fall overboard

An old soldier told me years ago that when he was on the Queen Mary en route to the Middle East in WW2, several MP's were no longer on board when they reached port. Apparently some among the thousands of soldiers on board resented the disciplinary regime, and threw them into the Indian Ocean.

 

I think I read somewhere that cruise ships are now required to have camera coverage along the entire perimeter of the vessel. Those private balcony suits were getting a reputation for being dangerous.

The book on how not to do it- http://www.carlhiaasen.com/books/books-skinny.html

 

Robert Maxwell was a famous case of man overboard intrigue. Did the Mossad get him ?

 

Barney Barnato, diamond tycoon was another famous mystery case as well - verdict suicide but his remains were found and buried...

 

Somethinng not quite right here , In cant put my finger on it but I smell a rat.

MPs never go to war --its a shame they dont then we wouldnt have the war in the first place. QM was a hospital ship.

 

The bloke who told me that was one of the "rats" of Tobruk, if I remember correctly. The Queen Mary was employed as a troop carrier, and the MP's were "military police" (provosts), not parliamentarians ! I believe there could have been as many as 15,000 troops on board, needless to say there would been quite a few MP's accompanying. Naturally, the official histories would be unlikely to have recorded this episode, and I wonder if their families would ever have known the truth. I don't think he made up the story.

 

There are lots of stories like this, in every military. I can remember hearing one in the late 60's about the young Coast Guard LTJG who was C.O. of a Loran station on an tiny island in the Pacific being found dead. So the story goes every man on the island (about 20) claimed to have done it.

I have heard others from Vietnam and korea, and I'm sure plenty will come from Iraq and Afghanistan. I don't give them a lot of credence. i think the are "sea stories".

 

When I was in military, there were two types of MP or SP (shore patrol). Permanent and temporary. All petty officers were assigned as temporary MP-SP at one time or another and we hated it. Permanent duty military police was volunteer and attracted "police" personality types. "HASP" in Oahu Hawaii were roundly and universally hated. "HASP" = Hawaiian Armed Service Police, permanent duty detachment.

 

Every man on the island claimed to have done it That I can't give any credence to ! I know the sun is very hot on some of those tropical islands, and heatstroke does funny things to people, but still.....

 

LMAO!

 

What the hell is LMOA will you Americans stop abbreviating . Its abbreviating MP that got us in this mess in the first place.

 

That stands for "Leave Marsupials On Australia".

 

Yes and YAAWOFS

 

Exactly, whatever that means.

 

What credence? I said it was a "sea story". Sea stories by definition have no credence. The point is people tell these wild tales, that may have originally had some basis in fact, but by the time they have been told a thousand times they are in the realm of fantasy and science fiction. We all do it, especially when we've had a few too many nips.

As for abbreviations my favorite is TANSTAAFL.

Ps; Ok Ok, it means: "there are no such things as a free lunch. "