Page 16 - Georgetown Preparatory School Alumnews Winter 2021

GOLD STAR SONS OF GEORGETOWN PREP
“AT THE PREP, YOU ARE NEVER FORGOTTEN”
By Dr. Stephen J. Ochs, Lawler Chair of History
September 2, 2020, marked
the 75th anniversary of the conclusion of WWII, the most destructive war in human history.
On December 9, 1941, two days after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed the American people in one of his radio “fireside chats.” In
it, he called upon “Every single man, woman and child” to partner “in the most tremendous undertaking of our American history,” in order to defeat forces that had attacked not only the United States, but also civilization itself.
The Georgetown Prep community
responded wholeheartedly to the
President’s call. On Wednesday,
December 17, the beginning of Prep’s Christmas break and nine days after Roosevelt’s speech, the Jesuit house diarist noted that “Since Dec. 7th the boys have been very restless. Nothing but war is the talk.” Indeed,
the war would significantly impact school life for the duration and would draw over 400 Prep alumni into the armed forces.
One of them, Captain Michael J. Daly ’45, received the Medal of Honor for his heroism during the battle for Nuremberg, Germany, in April 1945. Daly later recalled that when President Harry S. Truman draped the medal around his neck at the White House on August 23, 1945, he felt a mixture of pride and humility, as well as grief for those he considered the real heroes – “the guys who didn’t come home.”
Twelve of those guys were fellow alumni of Georgetown Prep, who were drawn from classes that spanned the 15 years from 1928 through 1943. They were among the 407,316 Americans who made the ultimate sacrifice on behalf of the “tremendous undertaking” to which Roosevelt had called them. The two youngest Prep alumni fatalities were only 19 years old; the oldest was 32.
During World War II, families with a member or members serving in the armed forces often displayed Blue Star service banners that featured a white field with a red border and a blue star for each active duty family member. Families that suffered the death of a family member serving in the military replaced the blue star with a gold star. The 12 Prep alumni who lost their lives
during the war were Prep’s Gold Star sons. In light of the recently concluded 75th anniversary of the end of WWII, it is fitting that we again remember and honor them.
Nine of the 12 were officers, while one was a non-commissioned officer (staff sergeant), and two others were privates first class. A disproportionate number were connected to flying. Six were pilots, five of whom flew in the U. S. Army Air Force: the other in the air arm of the U. S. Navy. Another was a staff sergeant in the U. S. Army Air Force, while two served in United States Army airborne infantry units as paratroopers.
The two 19-year-olds, mentioned earlier, served in the Infantry as privates first class, while one of the oldest, a 26-year-old West Point grad and 1st Lieutenant in the Army Field Artillery, operated as a forward observer and was posthumously awarded the Silver Star for gallantry. Seven of the 12 did not attend Prep for the full four years. Four of those 7, however, spent their senior year at Prep, and thus graduated with a Prep diploma, or in one case,
a certificate. Three did not graduate from Prep, with one of them leaving after three years at the end of his junior year. Five attended for only one year with 3 of those 5 completing senior year as graduates. Nine were boarders. Three died in the Pacific Theater; 6 in the European. Accidents claimed the lives of 5 of the men, 3 within the United States, 1 in the Caribbean, and 1 in the Pacific. Fatalities rose yearly from 1 in 1942, and 2 in 1943, to 6 in 1944. They declined to 3 in 1945, though these were in a sense some of the most tragic in that the three men died so close to the end of the war.
In 1943, Headmaster Robert P. Arthur, S. J., addressed an open letter to Prep alumni fighting for their country around the world. In that letter, Father Arthur promised them that “At the Prep, you are never forgotten.” In keeping with Father Arthur’s promise, the following vignettes recount the young lives and untimely deaths of the 12 Gold Star sons of Prep who did not come home. Their stories vary in length depending on the availability of sources.
14 GEORGETOWN PREPARATORY SCHOOL