Lieutenant Colonel William T. Melms,
USA (ret.) is the author of How to Stay Afloat Wearing Army Boots. According
to the book description, “In mid World War II Lieutenant William T. Melms was completely "at sea" when, due
to a military goof-up he was given command of a 200 foot Army transport ship. Without marine experience beyond a leaky 16
foot sailboat on Lake Ste Clair, he and an equally untrained crew headed across the Pacific. These were soldiers skilled in
close order drill and KP duty, but without any experience to know "one never spits into the wind." A well-intentioned
voyage became a comedy of errors, from sinking a friendly Ecuadorian banana boat to an encounter with an enemy submarine in
the Gulf of Mexico. Only innocent ignorance saved the day. After years of entertaining service clubs someone said to Melms,
"Why not write a book?" And so he did, and the result is a humorous inside saga of the Army's Navy, warts and
all.
Sadly the ship they much abused
but came to love ended her final assignment in humiliation and defeat when after several years the FS344 was plucked from
mothballs by the Navy and converted to an electronic surveillance vessel, renamed the PUEBLO. Captured by North Koreans off
the coast in international waters, the PUEBLO now rests alongside a pier in Wonsan Harbor as a tourist attraction.”