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Received from the youngest son
of Harry C. Foss. My
Dad was in the Navy for 18 years and assigned at
Pearl Harbor aboard the USS San Francisco. I
believe at the time he was a CPO in the engine room.
He was assigned to the ship on June 19, 1941 thru
December 31, 1942. My family was at Pearl Harbor on
December 7, 1941. My mom, with my three brothers,
drove my Dad down to the shipyard while the whole
area was under attack. The USS San Francisco was in
for maintenance at this time.
My Dad moved to the USS
Frazier after serving on the San Francisco, but he
served on the USS San Francisco while she earned 6
battle stars and suffered it's worse hits. I know he
was in the engine room, and that is probably one of
the reasons he survived, because top side took some
pretty bad hits. I was told they referred to those
in the engine room as darkies, probably because of
the environment in the engine room.
My dad was 16 years old,
both his parents had died, and he had pneumonia. It
was 1923 when he went into a Navy recruiter office,
in Georgia, and tried to join. He was told that he
was too young but if he came back when he was 18
they would take him. So, my Dad walked around the
block, went back in and stated that he was 18. The
rest is history. His first two weeks were spent in a
hospital recovering from pneumonia, and then he went
to boot camp.
My Dad loved the Navy, it
was his life. After 30 years, he retired in 1953 as a retired
Lieutenant Commander, and as a Mustanger (old Navy),
he was mighty proud of that. Unfortunately, I was 13
when he died and a lot of the information that I was
able to obtain was from his Navy Book, that was a
leather book that folded into three which contained
his Naval history.
After, finding his Naval
medals in a drawer, I decided it was time to honor
my Dad, so I had a shadow box made of him and the
USS San Francisco with his medals, because after all
he was a hero, and he never talked about it. The 7
medals he received seem to be campaign medals for
service in the South Pacific, occupation medal,
victory medal WWII, good conduct, etc.
Doug Foss, Youngest Son of
Harry C Foss Sr.
List of the Men
Stories of the Men |
