The boot camp scenes were filmed at the Coast Guard Training Center, Government Island (now Coast Guard Island), Alameda, California.
Andy Griffith stated that this film was such a box-office disaster, that it rerouted his career from film into television.
Walter Matthau had his hair dyed red for his role as Red Wildoe, even though the film is in black-and-white.
This film hoped to capitalize on Griffith's huge success in another "service comedy", No Time for Sergeants (1958). Warner Bros. mistakenly marketed this picture as a pure comedy, despite it containing dark, dramatic themes. Audiences were disappointed and the film flopped badly at the box office.
The two U.S. Coast Guard ships used in this film are the USCGC Yamacraw (WARC-333) and the USCGC Heather (WAGL-331).