I wonder, long ago, if anyone had goin' through his had what sometimes i have going through mine - 27 knots, 33 degrees cold water, bows slicing through, thousands of trained men, @ their posts, concentrating on dials or optics or simply shoveling coal into horrendously hot boilers, twelve miles distant the enemy, slicing as well: and then, fire and smoke belching, the roar of the cannon (rifles so large simply unknown on land cepting freak specimens hinged on trains and coastal batteries), the dense black cordite smoke, water tall as tall trees rejoicing from the artic ocean: eventually ranged, straddled, and then finally hit - the shells slamming into feet thinchk metal plates - some richotcing off, some smashed to pieces - but some penetrating - some deep, some shallow - shatton damage of metal, twisted, the orange of fire, the black of oil smoke, the sudden sheering out of line stricken irrevocably - well, anyone.
Imagery of the Battle of the Denmark Strait - or Jutland, or First Guadacanal, or Dogger Bank, or the Java Sea - whatever it is, that imagery is alays with me.
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