Today is Memorial Day, when we remember the ultimate sacrifices given by the soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen, and coast guard. Many other blogs have videos and tributes today. The American Battle Monuments Commission has some moving tributes to service members who gave their lives overseas. Today is a good day to remember four men who took John 15:13 to heart:
The Four Immortal Chaplains
At 0100 hours on 3 February 1943, the USAT Dorchester troop transport was torpedoed by German submarine U-223 approximately 100 miles west of Greenland. The Dorchester was severely damaged, and eyewitnesses report the ship sinking in the icy waters of the North Atlantic in less than 30 minutes. Hundreds died instantly when the torpedoes exploded, others were trapped below the deck, and many were lost to exposure in the 34 °F (1 °C) seas. A total of 675 persons were lost, with only 229 survivors, making it the third largest loss at sea of its kind for the United States during World War.
Aboard the Dorchester were the four chaplains: Lt. George L. Fox, a Methodist preacher and WWI veteran from Waits, VT; Lt. Alexander D. Goode, a rabbi from York, PA; Lt. Clark V. Poling, a Dutch Reformed minister from Schenectady, NY; and Lt. John P. Washington, a Catholic priest from Elizabeth, NJ. All four volunteered for the Corps of Chaplains after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The four first met in November 1942 while attending Chaplain’s School at Harvard University. Prior to joining the Army, Rabbi Goode, Reverend Poling and Father Washington had all served as leaders in the Boy Scouts of America.
After the torpedoes struck, the four chaplains quickly spread out among the soldiers. They tried to calm the frightened, tend the wounded and guide the disoriented toward safety. The chaplains prayed and encouraged the others.
One witness, Private William B. Bednar, found himself floating in oil-smeared water surrounded by dead bodies and debris. “I could hear men crying, pleading, praying,” Bednar recalls. “I could also hear the chaplains preaching courage. Their voices were the only thing that kept me going.”
When there were no more life jackets in the storage lockers, Engineer Grady Clark saw the chaplains removed theirs and give them to four frightened young men. As the boat sank, survivors in nearby rafts could see the four chaplains together with arms linked and hearing them pray together.
As I swam away from the ship, I looked back. The flares had lighted everything. The bow came up high and she slid under. The last thing I saw, the Four Chaplains were up there praying for the safety of the men. They had done everything they could. I did not see them again. They themselves did not have a chance without their life jackets.
- Grady Clark, survivor
Each chaplain posthumously received the Purple Heart and the Distinguished Service Cross. The Chaplains Award for Heroism was authorized by Congress, and posthumously presented to the families by President Eisenhower on 18 January 1961. It ranks just below the Congressional Medal of Honor, this nation’s highest medal for valor. The Four Chaplains are remembered in stained glass in the Pentagon (top stained glass window), Fort Snelling, MN (middle window) and at West Point (lower window, above).
The chaplains were also honored with a stamp, issued in 1948 and by an act of Congress designating February 3 as “Four Chaplains Day.”
For more on the Four Chaplains, see:
- Wikipedia: The Four Chaplains
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Chaplains - Home of Heroes: The True Story of the Four Chaplains
http://www.homeofheroes.com/brotherhood/chaplains.html - The Four Chaplains Foundation: The Story
http://www.fourchaplains.org/story.html - The Immortal Chaplains Foundation: The Story
http://immortalchaplains.org/Story/story.htm - Four Chaplains Memorial by Dorchester, Wisconsin
http://www.wisconsincentral.net/Culture111605.html - Sound clips on the Four Chaplains from NPR’s Speaking of Faith
http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/memorialday/particulars.shtml
Thanks to all who served and sacrificed.
