Way long ago as an Armory O, once you see seen one; you've seen them all. Only nine different types. At the time privately owned firearms belonging to Marines could be stored there too.
I had credibility with my CO. I don't ever recall anyone in the Medical Bn with a title of Armory Officer, but I guess someone had to be in charge or maybe we were too small a unit for that position. Maybe the Armory was under one of the "S's", S1, S2, etc shops. CO told the armorers I had same access as them and that was that as far as I could see. Armorers were great guys, one white, one black; told me the "secrets" of the armory...as 1st Echelon they said they could only tighten grip screws, but were trained to do more, so we weren't authorized any spare parts, so they kept spare parts hidden in the overhead of the armory so inspectors wouldn't see them...they were prepared to fix what they could if needed and needed right away. The Cpl did take me over to the higher echelon maintenance building/unit (3rd or 4th echelon I think) in case I needed to take something in or pick something up, but never taught me any paperwork, so I don't know how that would have worked out OK. I took the Marine Corps Institute course in small arms repair and maintenance so I could get the manual. Great manual with lots of detail, but I lost it when my house burnt.
I really enjoyed that tour. Won shooting trophies, had my pic taken with the general, shot my Thompson at the 1000" range with USMC supplied ammo.
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