Commander Joseph J. Leonard Jr., U.S. Coast Guard (Retired)
Signalman First Class Douglas Munro at the Second Battle of the Matanikau on 27 September 1942. His courageous actions under intense enemy fire saved countless Marines of the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, including their commander, Lieutenant Colonel Lewis “Chesty” Puller. Munro has set the standard for Coast Guardsmen ever since.
Bruce Molyneux
For me, selfishly, the rescue of my father on 5 February 1942 south of Halifax by the USCGC Campbell (WPG-32) after his ship, the British merchant SS Silveray, was torpedoed by U-751. This rescue allowed me to spend 20 years with a great human being whose war rescue experiences shaped his beautiful character.
Captain Raymond J. Brown, U.S. Coast Guard (Retired)
Coast Guard Rescue Flotilla 1 at Normandy. About 60 83-foot patrol boats deployed to all five amphibious objective areas. Called the “Matchbox Fleet” because they were wooden and had gasoline engines, the boats saved 400 soldiers on 6 June 1944 and 1,438 by December.
Michael Romero, Menchville High School
Launched in 1798, the Pickering was the first brig built for the U.S. Revenue Cutter Service. She and numerous other vessels were lent to the nascent Navy Department to fight the Quasi-War with France. In October 1799, the Pickering defeated the much more heavily armed and manned privateer L’Egypte Conquise.
William Burson, Bucknell University Student
The mission to resupply Fort Sumter on 11 April 1861, when the USRC Harriet Lane fired the first naval shots of the U.S. Civil War at the steamship Nashville in response to her not flying any identifying markings.
Mary Jorgenson
There were significant Coast Guard contributions during Germany’s Operation Paukenschlag (Drumbeat) submarine attacks on the East Coast. One in particular was the USCGC Icarus (WPC-110) sinking U-352 off the North Carolina coast on 9 May 1942.
Commander Kevin Delamer, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The Coast Guard’s most significant wartime mission was providing coxswains for landing craft. The only member of the service awarded the Medal of Honor was one. D-Day in Normandy was only possible because 1 in 15 landing craft were crewed by these men.
Commander Bill Calderwood, U.S. Navy (Retired)
During the 1920s and early 1930s, Coast Guard Unit 387, the service’s official cryptanalytic unit, supported the Coast Guard in its “war” against rum runners during the Prohibition era. It broke and analyzed rum-runner radio communications to stem 60 percent of maritime illicit liquor shipments bound for the United States.
Captain Lawson W. Brigham, U.S. Coast Guard (Retired)
Eighty years ago on D-Day, the Coast Guard participated in its most consequential action in the amphibious Operation Neptune. Cutters and Coast Guard–manned Navy ships included: 60 rescue cutters (83-foot patrol boats); 3 APAs; 11 LSTs; and 24 LCIs. 400 soldiers, sailors, and airmen were rescued that fateful day. Troops were delivered to the targeted beachheads with skill and dedication.
Commander John M. Yunker, U.S. Navy (Retired), Golden Life Member
The transport of British troops on board the USS Wakefield (AP-21), which was crewed by the Coast Guard, from Halifax, Nova Scotia, to Singapore via Trinidad, Cape Town, and Bombay. Five crewmembers were killed when she was bombed by the Japanese on 30 January 1942. The Coast Guard was in the war before 7 December 1941.
Chief Petty Officer Patrick S. Corrie, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The rescue of Marines on Guadalcanal off Lunga Point in September 1942. Signalman First Class Douglas Munro piloted his Higgins Boat as part of an extraction of Marines overrun by the Japanese. He used his craft to shield another boat filled with Marines withdrawing under fire. While withdrawing he was fatally shot. He was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions—to date the only Coast Guardsman to receive this medal.
Lieutenant (junior grade) Jacob Cheeseman, U.S. Coast Guard
The Vietnam War demonstrated the unique applicability of some of the Coast Guard’s 11 statutory missions in a combat environment: port security operations, coastal/riverine patrols, boarding local vessels, aviation combat search and rescue, inspecting hazardous goods on board U.S. ships, and maintenance of aids to navigation.
Chief Petty Officer John Duffy, U.S. Navy (Retired)
The USCGC Icarus (WPC-110), a 165-foot cutter that previously had been a rum runner chaser during Prohibition, sank U-352 on 9 May 1942 off the coast of Cape Lookout, North Carolina, and took 33 prisoners, the first Germans taken in combat by any U.S. force.
Duane Rice-Mason
The Coast Guard provided the primary harbor masters in major amphibious operations in places such as Sicily, which bears directly on operational logistics. Managing the merchant vessels is important, such as determing which unloads first and to which berthings each should go.
Petty Officer First Class Gerard H. Gibault, U.S. Coast Guard (Retired)
When Signalman First Class Douglas A. Munro, the only Coast Guard recipient of the Medal of Honor, saved Chesty Puller and his battalion from being wiped out on Guadalcanal. Douglas Munro is hero to both the Coast Guard and the Marine Corps.
Lieutenant Commander Sankey Blanton, U.S. Navy (Retired)
On 6 December 1917, the USS Jacob Jones (DD-61) became the first U.S. ship sunk in World War I . On 26 September 1918, the last U.S. ship lost was the USCGC Tampa when she was torpedoed by German submarine UB-91 off the British coast.
Frank Lang
Make it or break it time for the Allies in the “Bloody Winter” of 1942–43. Hundreds of ships and thousands of seaman perished in the frigid waters of the North Atlantic. Coast Guard cutters such as USCGC Campbell and Ingham with crews at permanent general quarters kept the thin convoy line from being cut.
