Lewis Lowell Wagoner comes home
ex-OS2 sends us the news that Seaman Second Class Lewis Lowell Wagoner comes home to Wichita, Kansas today from Pearl Harbor, Hawaii;
Wagoner’s remains are to be flown Friday to Wichita, Kansas, a day before a memorial service and interment with military honors at a family plot in Harvey County’s Whitewater Cemetery. A bronze grave marker — noting the Missouri-born serviceman’s status as a Purple Heart recipient — already awaits him in a row of final resting places for three of his seven brothers. Just one brother, 87-year-old Carl Wagoner of Syracuse, Utah, is still living.
[…]
Japanese planes hit the Oklahoma with a blitz of torpedoes, quickly capsizing the battleship. Thirty-two men were rescued via holes cut through the hull, but 415 sailors and 14 Marines didn’t make it.
[…]
The Pentagon has offered no public account about how Wagoner died, though Guinn said a shipmate friend of Wagoner’s has said the two men dove off the torpedo-ravaged ship into the water ablaze with leaking oil and fuel. The friend survived and since has died; Wagoner was “not a good swimmer” and was never seen alive again, Guinn said.
Category: We Remember
Here’s hoping you can rest in peace at last Seaman Second Class Lewis Lowell Wagoner…it’s long overdue and certainly well deserved.
RIP Young Sailor. You did your part and did it well.
Rest easy now.
Welcome home Sailor.
Rest well.
And thank you.
I have always relished the fact that the unconditional surrender of the Japanese officially occurred aboard a US Navy battleship. It always seemed so right.
Welcome home, Lewis.
Wagoner was accounted for by DPAA in February of this year.
http://valorguardians.com/blog/?p=65665
Welcome home, elder brother-in-arms. Enjoy Valhalla.
Welcome home, shipmate. RIP.
RIP.
Welcome home. Rest in peace now young Seaman. God be with your family.
Welcome home young man. Pearl Harbor … may we never forget.
Reading the article Jonn linked to, they also ID’d one, ” … Navy Lt. j.g.(sic) Aloysius Schmitt of St. Lucas, Iowa, who was also aboard the Oklahoma.”
“Schmitt was among a group of sailors who discovered a small porthole as the ship was filling with water. He had the chance to escape but refused and hoisted others through the porthole and out to safety, according to the newspaper.”
Seems LTJG Schmitt was cut from the same cloth as SFC Alwyn Casche -both putting the well-being of the men above their own.
If only Washington, DC could have the same spirit. Alas …
Carl Wagoner past away yesterday quietly. It’ was such a great blessing to see Grandpa wagoners excitement in seeing his brother finally brought home.
Thank you to all those who have gone the extra mile to bring him home.