Small Arms Locker on Battleship New Jersey 

I was ships armorer when I left in 1987. The last room you were in was our gun room. If I remember correctly we had 40 m14 in the rifle rack to Ryan left. A few had the shot line kits attached. The small rack you were looking at had m-79 ‘s. We also had m-60’s. I think we had 10. We also had 4 .50 cal stored in there. Had Mossberg 500 shotguns. We had a couple of civilian shotguns that were purchased by mwr so crew members can check out. But no one ever did when I was onboard. The middle room was used as an office. The workroom locker had 1911’s. 28 I think. Also had .38 cal revolvers for flight crew if they needed. Do not remember ever issuing any of them. Had a few personal handguns stored in the armory. Only enough ammo for watch standing, shot line blanks, and rifle for shark watch was stored in the armory. We had a paintball team. I was part of it but we did not have mwr purchased paintball guns. We bought our own. There is a picture in the 1986 cruise book of four of us inside the gun room hamming it up for camera. I will let you know the page number when I get a chance.

When my dad was on DDG-22 the new officers were throwing trash bags and shooting them like clay pigeons to practice leading a target. None of them could hit a single bag so the xo grabbed a random enlisted nearby and gave him the shotgun to show that anyone could do it, well he hit every bag, handed the gun back, and told them he had been the national youth trap champion for the past 3 years before joining.

I was an Army Armorer. I held private firearms. There isn’t fixtures in the military supply system for any arms that wasn’t standard. Besides a 500lbs cage. So you store things anyway you can. I used M4 caged racks to separate pistols and anything that fit in one cause I had more of those on hand than a 500lbs cage. DoD regs are specific for storing weapons. Anything less than 500lbs has to be chained to the wall. All storage racks or lockers must lock. So even if it don’t fit. You’d still use the securing method you have that you can make work. Also. If I was in charge of an armory with multiple people working in it. I’d want a space like that only I would have access too. And I would call it whatever. Than stash anything else there I didn’t want anyone to have access too. As armorer. You get stuck with random high value items for the unit. Specifically because you’re typically the most trust worthy person with the highest security storage. With the most accountability. As per regs a 10% monthly inventory of everything on your book. Minimum yearly 100% inventory. But in reality every time officers change command. Before any operational/ training deployment and return. And every time an officer that’s realm of responsibility feels like it. I am a voodoo master of layouts. That skill didn’t transfer to civilian life. But the organization skills did.

My grandfather had a few stories about doing the alcohol inventory when he was in the Navy. One of the ship’s safes had a large amount of “airline bottles” of rum, whisky, etc, to be dispensed by the medical officer as needed. Ship’s doctor plus two officers to witness the counting, once a month.

It's nice to see that the old girl now has very well stocked bar available. The Royal Navy solved the alcohol question by never banning it😁

I never knew how much I want a Battleship USS New Jersey rum, till right now.

My uncle served as a radar officer on USS John F. Kennedy in the Med during the late 60's. He bought a Beretta shotgun in Italy and I've always wondered how he was able to bring it home aboard a warship. I guess the Kennedy had a similar secure area for personal weapons.

Converting any piece of military equipment into a bar or a instrument for drinking is the best way to honor it. Well done 😎. I'll definitely be visiting and donating sometime soon

Recreational Guns......shooting skeet off the fantail for fun! We kept ours in the Landing Force Locker.

The largest most secure and heavily armed and armored bar in New Jersey.

When I was stationed aboard the USS Ranger CV-61, I was a member of the Security Augmentation Forces (SAF) from 1987 to 1990 when the SAF was disbanded. I was was qualified with the M-14, M1911-A1, M970, M-60 and M2, and was a M-2 Sponson mount gunner for security alerts! This was all in addition to my regular job (supervisor in the GSE shop - AIMD IM-4 Div.). Now days, I shoot in several military rifle competitions including the National Matches at Camp Perry, and I have several antique military rifles and pistols, including a 1911-A1, M1 Garand, 1903A3 Springfield, Model 1898 US Krag, and M1 Carbine, as well as an SMLE Mk3, K-31 and Type 99 Arisaka!

I served on USS Buchanan DDG-14 and was the ship's armorer for a while. We had two storage spaces for small arms, the pistol locker and the landing force locker. The pistol locker stored all the weapons necessary for the ship's reaction force. The landing force locker was the ship's workshop for small arms and kept the rest of our small arms except for our 50 calls which were stored in lockers affixed to the superstructure where they would have been mounted. We carried M-14s and no M16s. My ship was contemporary with the USS New Jersey 80s commissioning as we escorted her from the Far East to the Panama Canal in 1984. I suspect that New Jersey's rifles were also M14s. The MarDet probably had M16s. My ship purchased two bird shotguns and related equipment for skeet shooting - recreational guns. We made a stop in Cebu City in the Philippines and there many of the crew bought swords and knives from vendors on the pier. Yes, swords and knives. I had to store and inventory those weapons in the landing force locker until we arrived back in San Diego.

Come on Ryan, of course tossing grenades of the fantail is recreational! 🤣

A close friend of mine was a RADAR maintenance tech on USS Missouri during the Korean War. He was a member of the ships competition pistol team. He still owns the Colt GI 1911 that was "accurized" and has a custom grip. It's a beautiful piece. Oh, pistol competition was single handed only. Try hitting a bullseye at 25 yards on an outdoor range using a 1911 single handed. It's not as easy as it looks.

😂 promise it's not bilge water flavoured Shows how massive NJ is, that there's still spaces Ryan hasn't been into yet.

When I was in the Army, if you lived in the barracks or on post and owned a firearm you were supposed to store it in the arms room. For a lot of reasons this effectively translated into an effective ban but largely because even if you did own a firearm and store it in the arms room as directed you could only check it out during business hours and during business hours you were at work so unless you were going on leave, you were just never going to be able to check it out.

LPL would have words about that MasterLock 'lock', especially since there's liquor behind it. :)) Cool episode!

Recreational arms typically covers skeet & trap shotguns kept for those competing in those activities.

Thanks for covering a space I was curious about. I worked in several arms rooms on shore, but didn't see shipboard arms rooms before. I got to see some small arms storage racks in the Marine area aboard the USS Alabama/BB-60 last month--mostly. Even with crew sizes of 2500 Sailors and Marines, the amount of small arms carried wasn't sufficient to arm everybody. It wasn't necessary to arm everybody with a personal weapon on modern warships. The 2017 John D. McAulay book titled "Rifles of the United States Navy & Marine Corps" lists the small arms carried and how much ammunition was provided for a number of warships. For example, in 1916 the USS Arizona/BB-39 had 350 M1903 rifles, 38 1898 rifles, and 125 M1911 pistols for a crew of 48 officers and 1100 enlisted men. I am uncertain if the Marine detachment used those weapons or brought their own small arms aboard. Ammunition included 199,200 rounds of .30-06 ball, 9600 rounds of .30-40 ball and 20,000 rounds of .45 caliber pistol ammunition. There were also blank and dummy rounds for training. I wasn't able to determine if line throwing was performed by special purpose launchers using the .45-70 cartridge or if the Springfields were used. When the United States entered World War One there was a severe shortage of rifles, and so many warships turned in their M1903 Springfields in exchange for the obsolete M1898 Krags and the .45 pistols were probably exchanged for obsolete Colt .38 caliber revolvers or the M1909 Colt .45 revolvers. That information is mostly lost even though the table given was for weapons issued about a century ago. It seems that naval records are not all that historians desire. Thanks for shedding light on this minor but interesting part of Battleship New Jersey.

even though my drinking days are long past me, i have to admire your current use of the room lol. cheers!

In the late 1980's my FFG still had M-14s since we did anti-drug smuggler patrols. We had one Coast Guard person for the 3 teams for most boarding actions in the Caribbean. One team only had one sailor who's job was to go (with a shotgun and pistol) up to the ship's bridge with the senior Coast Guardsman (back then no women in potential combat situations) while the other 2 teams were a pair of Squids each (1 shotgun & 1 M-14 (Only AP in the M-14s just in case someone wanted to engage in a firefight and duck behind a (mild) steel bulkhead that at max. a quarter of an inch thick and often half of that if it wasn't a watertight bulkhead with a watertight door in it and a Coastie.... Never had any trouble. I guess with a 76mm Cannon, and a 25mm Bushmaster machine cannon, Plus a pair of M-2 heavy machineguns pointed at the ship no one was stupid enough to start a gunfight, especially when the ship's captain had a shotgunner right next to him.....

Wow! I haven't checked your subcriber count stat in a while. 116K? That is fantastic! I have subscribed since you were less than 2k. With the quality of your video's, I am not surprised. Well done!

When I was in the Army, the ROTC unit at East Tenn. State U. had an arms room with all sorts of weapons you could sign out. I had a Remington 700 ADL .30-06 signed out for some time. ETSU had the number one collegiate marksmanship team in the country with multiple Olympic medal winners on the staff and on the team.

First gun I qualified on in the Navy was a 1911 A1 and today I own a 1911 A1. In the 90s my ship still had M14s as the ships rifle.

One item of note, sailors that receive permission from the chain of command were allowed to bring private weapons onboard and could be drawn for clay pigeon shoots. Many ships mwr funds were used to purchase handguns and shotguns and hunting rifles. The hardest part about private weapons onboard ship was getting permits to transport said weapons to and from the ship. The 2 DDs that I was on had as ship security weapons were 22cal pistons for range training and security forces, 45cal for security patrols and missile mag sentry, m14, m16, 12ga shotguns for security forces during alerts, also for ship protection in foreign areas were the 50cal and m60. Ship also had 4 grenade launchers to help protect against small boat attack. All this was stored in 4 rsl (ready service lockers) and in main and secondary armories. The DDG 51 class after receiving force protection upgrade would carry 15 50cal guns for force protection duties.

The most important takeaway from this video is that it is possible to share a drink with Ryan aboard the battleship.

On my 2 ships all of our small arms were in the armory, which was usually adjacent to the marine detachment. In those days we had M14's, M16's, M1911's, shotguns and Thompson machine guns. We were allowed 50 rounds a month for practice, you could check out a weapon and take it to the range, some people didn't shoot so you could get ammo from them to.

The 2 ships I served on in the 70's, U.S.S.. Oklahoma city and U.S.S. Agerholm had trap and skeet shotguns for shooting clay pigeons off the fantail. We also had a few target grade M1911s in case there was a ships pistol team (which we didn't).

When I was Army, I only ever qualified as Marksman with minimum passing scores with my M16. Th year they gave me an M203 grenade launcher, I qualified Expert with it. I am more accurate with the indirect fire weapon that I only need to get close with, than I am with the point weapon. Always blew my mind.

In today's Navy it depends on the ship whether crew can check personally owned weapons into the armory. Some captains allow it, some don't, and it is up to them if the let crew do it or not. I never checked mine into the ships armory when I deployed, I left them in my apartment. During the New Jersey's last stint being commissioned the Navy had a different attitude towards small arms. I think some COs today would love to just lock the armory up and throw away the key. Some of the most anti-gun people I ever met in uniform were senior officers.

Lots of shots and unassembled Molotov cocktails there 😁

You had me at biggest bar!

I love that there is a case of yengling in the small arms locker

Nice that you could bring your personal firearms to store on the ship if you served. Had a friend who joined the Navy at 22 and amassed a few firearms and several thousands of rounds of ammo by then but since he didn't have a "home" (just a place he was crashing at for college), he asked if I could hold on to his collection for him during his deployment. I accepted but had no idea how much room his stuff would take up along with mine in the safe. I was playing 3D Tetris with our rifles and ammo to get them to all fit. We made it work but I told him in the future he should keep less ammo on hand as that was a PITA to fit in empty space.

Well since you asked about firearms.I have a real love of antique firearms. And am a big collector mostly of civil war and cowboy area pistols. Mostly colts And have some extremely rare Confederate pistols. And am lucky enough to own a few Flintlock pistols and muskets from the Revolutionary War. a British flintlock pistol that was a battlefield pickup from the Battle of New Orleans. during the War of 1812. And i shoot every gun i own.

PARTY AT RYAN'S PLACE! WOOO!! "You're not recreationally lobbing grenades off the fantail." If it's offered, you can bet your rear-end I am.

"The largest bar in the state of New Jersey." Mr. Scimansky, my wife definitely has no interest in ships, but that part was as funny as it gets. She will see it shortly.

In 1987 we were still using m-14’s on LSTs when I was in active duty for security as well as line throwing.

"Small Arms Locker" Ryan: This is where I hide the booze from the interns.

Your videos are always the best💯 I do receive a notification each time you post a new video.. We'll have regrets for things we did not participate in...Investment should always be on any creative man's heart for success in life.

Largest bar, a new life for a sailing ship.

I was on the last two WestPac cruises of the heavy cruiser USS Saint Paul CA-73. At sea they used to have skeet shooting contests. I took a picture off Vietman of a match with land in the direction they were fireing although Vietnam was way out of range for a 12ga. I could have signed up, but I had never done that before, and did not try it for many years later.

I need to hear more about those paintball games!

"Battleship _New Jersey_ is the largest bar in the State of New Jersey" is a _slammin'_ trivia question answer.

About 7 years ago I qualified in San Diego with the M-14 locked in semi auto at the MSC training center. So as of then the Navy MSC civilians ships were still using M-14’s. I also qualified to shoot warning shots which required a higher score…

Damn! That’s enough liquor to put the Royal Navy to shame. Well done!

Excellent repurpose of the space. 😊

Weapons locker next to the ladies bathroom? Yes please! No boys allowed! 🤣

"I promise it is not bilge water flavored" Absolutely hilarious joke and delivery.

Oh my, I love historical military small arms. If I were assigned to the ship, they would have to open an additional such room just for me.

Another great video from the battleship. Thanks

If it's Recreational Guns, they might be double barreled shotguns for shooting clay pigeons off the fantail. That would be roughly bloop tube width.

Great video as always. Thanks, Ryan.

Ryan, you stated that the New Jersey would not have been issued the M-14 rifle except as a line throwing gun. I think they probably were, both for the Vietnam era activation and later in the 1980s. M-14 was the standard rifle that we (Ship's Self Defense Force) were issued from our small arms armory during my time in USS Caron (DD 970,) 1984 - 87, about the same time that New Jersey was back on active duty. The M-14 rifle and (I forget the make/model) 12 gauge shotgun were the standard long guns that the Navy carried shipboard at the time. My old shipmate the M1911A1 was the standard duty sidearm both for sentries and Quick Reaction forces. The battleship's Marines would probably have been issued their M-16 / M-4 rifles with the Quick Reaction Force sailors being issued a mix of M-14s / M1911A1/ 12 Gauge shotgun as we were. Destroyers normally DON'T have Marines assigned, even tincans with nuclear weapons possibly in the magazines.

I am glad to see you and the battleship are doing well. Discovering new spaces is neat to see you go through and sharing with us. Your presentations, prepared or spontaneous, are much smoother, always expertly informed. Please keep them coming. Bravo Zulu

Thank you.

Not sure how it was for Navy armories but liquor in the armory is almost SOP for Marines. I agree with others on the 40mm racks in that they were probably leftover from an earlier commission (probably Vietnam) when they had some onboard. While it makes better sense for sailors to keep personal firearms onboard (especially when at sea) I would have never trusted mine to an ashore armory. I heard way too many stories of personal arms being messed with/used/going missing from the supposedly secure storage.

ln the 60s or 70s, the navy had dedicated line throwing guns that were intended to replace the M-14s with the grenade cups that they had used before. They were a disappointment. Shorter ranged, broke a lot, and nobody really liked them. I never laid eyes on one myself, only saw pictures of them. As these got damaged beyond repair, they got disposed of and everyone went back to using M-14s. The grenade cups were simply old WW2 /korean war vintage grenade launcher adapters that the army had phased out when they adopted the 40mm grenades. The blank cartridges used to fire the lines from the M-14s were considerably more powerful than the standard ball rounds. The needed to launch a much larger and heavier line weight than a .30 caliber bullet. I think they still use those M-14s today. The DoD has tens of thousands of them in the warehouses still. Recreational guns would have been personally owned weapons, or MWR owned weapons. Admiral "ching" Lee was an Olympic medalist target shooter, and would bring his own rifle with him. When he was bored, he would do target shooting off the fantail, and invite shooters on the crew to join him in this recreation. During the war, access to weapons was a lot more common. It was during and after Vietnam when all of the military was much closer to mass mutinies and race war that access to small arms by enlisted men was greatly tightened up. My ship (FF-1098) in the 80s had a two primary small arms lockers. One in officers country with all the security force weapons. The other was a small compartment adjacent to the 5 inch gun magazine. When we were at sea, there were a variety of lockers and racks topside of the superstructure for the M2-HB and M60 machine guns, and a variety of rifles and shotguns on the bridge when we were underway for man overboard and abandon ship needs. Shark watch mostly. In theory we were equipped with stinger antiaircraft missiles, but I never saw the inside of that locker to say yea or nay.

Great video. Your desk for the parties look awsome.

I'm gonna start calling booze "small arms"

Like usual Ryan, you create a good video.to teach people good stuff.

I know a corpsman who served on the jfk during Vietnam. He said they had ship owned over under shotguns they would use to shoot skeet off the fantail

Largest bar in the state ☺️ who would have thought?

i would really do a bit better than a master lock on that, unless you want to have to throw a drunken lockpicking lawyer in the brig

I think the wider rack clips were designed to hold double-barrel "side by side" shotguns. They tend to be shorter than manually operated shotguns, and are common sporting arms.

Note proximity to the wardroom. That is so that the Officers can obtain weapons quickly in the event of crew issues...

standard small arms on ships in the 80's, and early 90's would have been the M14, M79, 1911, and pump shotguns either 870's, or mossberg 500's. newly commissioned ships got M9's, those that had 1911's kept the 1911's. i would almost guarantee the Jersey had M14's for the ships SAT teams. whether they armed the SAT teams or used them as BAF teams only, and relied upon the marines i dont know, but likely in port duty sections armed the SAT team.

I find it funny that alcohol was not allowed on NJ while in service. On the Oberon class submarines, the 2 aft torpedo tubes were made redundant so the Australian submariners would store beer in there.

Begs the question. Where did they store the slightly larger arms like M60's and M2 - .50 cal's? On the various FF's I was on, I remember there being a small arms locker, didn't notice were they kept the bigger stuff at.

Also. The armory was the only place the Navy stored the weapons. I know the Marines stored some weapons in their guard shack. I do not know if they stored weapons elsewhere. The was a gear locker in the wardroom that had helmets. Nvg’s. Flak vests. Web belts canteens. Watches and other stuff. It was enough to equip a small landing force.

It actually is legal for civilians to own a 40mm grenade launcher in most states. They are classified as a 'Destructive Device' and are controlled by the National Firearms Act of 1934. However high explosive rounds are not available on the civilian market.

When I was stationed at Submarine Base Pearl Harbor the Sub crews could store personal firearms at the subase armory when they were deployed.

In the inner lock up area, perhaps the racks with the wide upper indents were for side by side double barrel shotguns. That would also fit with the recreational labeling of that locker. Did the officers ever get to skeet shoot off the fantail? If so, that would explain a lot.

I used to go to a special facility maintained by the Army and you were allowed to bring personal firearms on to the property. You had to check them with security at the front gate. I never did but it was an option if you were there during deer season.

The M14 was still available back in the early 90's on the USS Fredrick LST1182 when I was deployed on it in 94. They was used for mine overwatch when we went to the Persian Gulf so it would be safe to say the M14 was still on the New Jersey in the 80's for the Navy to use

Maybe the "Recreational Firearms" room was a late repurpose. That room may have been originally intended for Grenade Launchers and other higher caliber firearms. That would make sense, as you would want a little extra security for those weapons especially inside the ship where a misfire or mishandle could cause much more damage to persons and materials. I don't imagine during WWII that the ship, which had a much larger draft crew, would carry personal firearms from Enlisted crew, so I doubt there was a space originally designed into the ship for those kinds of "recreational firearms." Also, attitudes about gun safety were probably more lax in the '40s and given most of the crew were fresh out of high school, it would be assumed that personal firearms would be left with fathers and parents. Just a theory anyways

The Air Force bases I served at had something very similar; all personal weapons had to be stored at the base armory.

In the early 70s my ATF stored personal shot guns and rifles (skeet) practice in the mid-Pacific and recreation for those who owned in our only armory below,forward.

In 1988 I earned my ribbons with a 1911 and an M14. I believe that we actually had a few M9s and M16/M4's....like 2 or 3 each. The Armory was filled with 1911s, m14s, and pump shotguns. QD watch, SAT, and BAF all got 1911s and M14s as required. I do know that hitting the range for qualification and hitting the range for ribbons were different events held separately. Is it possible that "recreational guns" were simply kept separate from "duty weapons" for records keeping purposes or due to age/condition?

I wish the small arms locker still had m14s in gun racks encased in plexiglas like the m1 garands aboard the uss Texas. If I was on uss new Jersey on a 3 month cruise I would be bring my privately owned m1 garand.

Based on the width of the brackets and the short overall length of the space allocated, I think the racks to Ryan's right would be for M79 grenade launchers. Having them separate from more conventional firearms would make sense from a safety and security standpoint. In the event of the armoury being captured or robbed, the readily available firearms wouldn't include 40mm grenades.

7:05 Civilians can and do own M79s. It's not common, but it does happen.

My firearms locker currently sports a Springfield XDs Mod 2, a Ruger 57, a Ruger PC Carbine, and a Henry H003T pump-action .22.

Are those spaces equipped with dehumidifiers? I know our arms vault had that and a sophisticated security system and ammo was never stored in the same vault. We also stored other sensitive items there too, like encryption devices for our comm gear.

I love guns got a bunch of ars my favorite is my first one a 7.5 in barrel pistol in 556 with a binary trigger it rips hard but im starting g to love my new AR9 since training with 9mm dosnt cost as bad as 556

My Destroyer in the 1980s had M14s in the armory

A 90 story office building... On it's side, in the water...

I wouldn't be surprised if thise larger brackets were for m79 bloop tubes with a selection of flare rounds, bean bags and CS for signaling at longer ranges than a regular 20mm flare gun can and for less lethal purposes.

Came for ship armory, stayed for battleship alcohol

The brackets are the right size for the CO2 canister. As far as storage given they're still considered firearms and thus for safety and secured. Given the paintball gun use would be at ports storing it in the recreational firearms section would make sense

the short racks could be for M-1 carbine or CAR-15's storage.

What's the muzzle velocity on that bottle of New Jersey rum?

I’ve taken up historical fire arm collecting myself. I’ve got a 1942 mosin from the ishevek plant, a 1944 m1903a3 from smith and corona, I’ve got a bastardized 1944 type 99 arisaka from nagoya, a smle mk3 from 1953 with a bayonet, a browning auto 5 from the 30’s, and my crown jewel a first year of production Winchester 1907 SL rifle.

I thought of recreational guns as shooting a piece of steel off the fantail with the aircraft catapult and blasting it with one of the 5" mounts.

I have a 1917 Springfield, Savage .308, and Stevens side-by-side 12 guage. Unfortunately, my right shoulder reconstruction leaves me quite wary of ever firing any of them again.

Oh great, Ryan just found out where they keep the beer :P

You absolutely can own 40mm grenade launchers as a citizen.

The m 79 had many many different rounds that it can fire beside grenades for example flares perfect for battle ships smoke rounds and probably some anti riot rounds probably CS gas rounds and some salute rounds

Why did the door frame he started out in have that blue bead or trim?

Have no idea if there is a correlation, but this video has been up for less than 24 Hours and the BB 62 Rum is out of stock.