The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1898-04-15
JACK As A BRIDEGROOM.
Marriage is Something of a Lottery
Among Men-o'- Warsmen.

only a comparatively small number
of the men who went down in the
Maine wreck were married. The re-
ceving ships do not accept naval re-
Cruits who are married, and most of
the married blueiackets i'm the Ameri-
can naval service embarked on the sea
of matrimony after their enlistments.
Those who did not concealed the fact
from the recruiting officers on the re-
ceiving ships that they were married.
Some men seek a refuge in the navy,
as many do in the army, from stormy
matrimonial lives. and these men,
knowing that they stand no show of
acceptance if they confess to the soft
Impeachment, reply, Not any, not
much" when Are you married." is
asked them. Nothing is done in the
way of punishment to such men when,
a few months after their enlistment,
they begin to forward portions of their
wages to their wives through the pay
masters
The married men, as a general thing,
send most of their monthly money to
their wives through the pay offices.
Probably a majority Of the chief petty
officers in the United States naval SER
vice are married men, and, as their
pay ranges from $50 to $75 u month,
with bonuses for continuous service,
their wives receive comfortable in
comes. There is a chief master-at-
arms on the China station at the pres
ent time who has not seen his wife,
who lives in Brooklyn, for twelve years.
He likes the station and has been en-
deavoring to induce his wife to move
to Japan for years past. But she likes
Brooklyn, and SO there is a good
natured deadlock in the family. During
all of his absence the master-at-arms
has regularly sent his wife $50 month
Of his pay, and his boys have become
men and gone to work for themselves,
and two of his daughters have grown
into young women, got married. and
had children born to them since he last
saw them as tots in short dresses. The
Orient-loVing master-at-arms will prob
ably return to the United States in a
few months and finish his naval career
on the North Atlantic station.
Only chief petty officers or first-rate
petty officers in the American naval
service can afford to maintain wives,
and those who do get married for the
pleasure they derive from the compan-
months at the conclusion of their three
year cruises have to keep their noses
pretty close 10 the grandstone to make
ends meet at home. In the cities con-
tiguous to all American navy yards
there are attractive young women who
have the discernment to regard mar
riage with chief petty officer or first
rate petty officer in the United States
t.1a ,,,...,,t
pecuniary point of view, and many of
Uncle Sans minor naval officers are
badly bitten by adventuresses who
marry them solely for the purpose Of
securing steady income The older
men among the petty officers get the
worst Of it, as a rule, i'm this way.
Like the old pensioners of the civil war
whose very young widows have lately
been the subject of comment in the
newspapers and in congress. the old
time petty officers are invcigled into
matrimOny by scheming young women.
and when they so off on their cruises
they instruct their paymasters to for
ward thrcc-Quarters Of their monthly
money to their wives. In very many
cases when they return to the ports
at which they married these revenue
l'l -'hiS NlNtS, bllcN IlU lilelll MISS
ing
Most Of them apply Immediately for
divorces. Strange as it may seem there
are many chief and tirst-rate petty Off
GERS in the United States navy today
who have been bitten more than once
in this wav, and a few of them are
sufficiently fond to appear to be quite
ready to be bitten a third time i'm the
same manner. There is a pretty but
exceedingly designing young woman,
still under thirty, now living i'm San
Francisco, who has married and been
divorced from three chief petty 0fIi-
GERS in thee American naval service al
ready, and it may be that she is not
yet through She has TO all intents
and purposes been on Uncle Sans pay
roll since her girlhood. She took each
one of her naval husbands at differ
ent navy yard, and the second and