LTJG GEORGE E. HAINES, WWII: Lost at sea, awarded Silver Star
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U.S. Coast Guardsmen tend to the upper body of a rescued crew member of the destroyer USS Lansdale in the Mediterranean Sea on April 21, 1944. He had been rescued in the early morning hours of that day from the floating remains of the Lansdale which had broken in half and sunk off the coast of Algeria at 11:55 p.m. on April 20. Some 49 officers and crew were lost; 232 officers and crew were rescued. Of the 49 lost, only seven bodies were recovered the other 42 were listed as missing and presumed killed in action. (U.S. National Archives photo, courtesy U.S. Coast Guard) |
Lieutenant (junior grade) George Eddison Haines lived a life of privilege in Ardsley Park where his father’s fall-through-spring home included a live-in staff of four Ireland-born female servants — cook, waitress, children’s nurse and maid.
The family — father Franklin Mifflin and mother Mary Elizabeth (Eddison) Haines, eldest son Frank (Franklin Jr.) and George — summered at uber-exclusive Fishers Island, home to Rockefellers, DuPonts, Whitneys and Vanderbilts, 11 miles east of Long Island that could only be reached by ferry from New London, Conn.
His mother, who went by Elizabeth, had deep ties to Irvington and the Strawberry Hill estate off North Broadway owned by her father Charles Eddison from 1886 until his death in 1922. Charles Eddison was an English-born Quaker who grew up on his father Benjamin’s Shireoaks Hall home. Shireoaks entailed 893 acres of farmland in Nottinghamshire, England, home too to the famous Sherwood Forest of Robin Hood fame.
Charles Eddison made his fortune linking himself as a teenager to the American retail empire of Alexander Turner Stewart. He apparently got involved with Turner’s A.T. Turner & Co. store in Nottingham then served as Turner’s Paris-based European representative. The company had major European retail outlets in Paris and Lyons, France; Manchester and Nottingham; Belfast; Glasgow and Berlin.
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| The destroyer USS Lansdale (DD-426) stands off the New York Navy Yard on Oct. 22, 1943. Irvington native Lt. (jg) George Eddison Haines won the Silver Star for his actions to protect the ship and, after it sank off Algeria, his actions to save the survivors. He perished with 48 others, only seven of whose bodies were ever recovered. But his actions helped ave some 232 others. (Photo courtesy U.S. Navy Bureau of Ships, U.S. Navy Naval History and Heritage Command) |
Franklin (Frank) Sr. ran the real estate company Waitt Corp. with brother-in-law Wymer H. Waitt. The company operated the Weylin Hotel at Madison Avenue and East 54th Street in Manhattan from 1920, developed Ardsley Park and operated the Hudson House Co-Op, which opened in 1937 near the Ardsley-on-Hudson train station of the New York Central Railroad, today's Metro North.
He was a commodore of the Fishers Island Yacht Club who competed in yacht races with a series of schooners all named Marita.
Haines Sr., born in Dobbs Ferry, was a senior at Columbia University in Manhattan on Jan. 15, 1910 when he married Elizabeth at St. Barnabas Episcopal Church in Irvington and shortly thereafter entered the real-estate business. Elizabeth gave birth to Franklin (Frank) Jr. in 1917 and George in 1920.
Frank Sr. served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army Quartermaster Corps dealing with supplies and based in Hoboken, N.J., from May 8, 1918 to May 15, 1919.
His children would both go on to serve in the armed forces, but first came high school and college. Frank Jr. paved the way, going to the elite college preparatory Hotchkiss School, a Connecticut boarding school known for the propensity of its students to matriculate at Yale University.
Franklin Mifflin Haines Jr. served in the Navy from 1939 to 1946. He rose competently through the officer ranks to lieutenant commander, the equivalent of major in other services. Most of his service appears to have been as an executive officer on vessels involved with transporting troops, first overseas to Pacific and European theatre destinations, later with returning veterans to the U.S.
Brother George enlisted in the New York National Guard on Oct. 15, 1940 early in his junior year at Yale, and appears to have won service deferment to May 1942 when he graduated. But before graduation, he married Audrey Perot Oakley in a double-wedding service with Audrey’s sister Elaine and her fiance C.W. Howard Jr. in the girls’ hometown of Greenwich, Conn., where she would remain while George was at war. On Aug. 8, 1943, she gave birth to the couple’s only child, George Jr.
George joined the Navy where he served as chief gunnery officer aboard the ill-fated Navy destroyer USS Lansdale. He died on April 20, 1944 trying to help surviving crew members of the Lansdale after leading the crew in an hours-long, post-sunset fight against three waves of attacking Nazi warplanes that ended just before midnight.
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| A Heinkel He 111 bomber is shown being built in 1939. Perhaps the best-recognized German bomber of World War II, it was used as a medium bomber and transport aircraft in the Mediterranean and North African theatres of the war. It was used in the attack against the USS Lansdale in 1944. (Photo by Hanns Hubmann, courtesy German Federal Archives) |
The Ardsley Park resident — his house was at the corner of Washington Avenue and East Ardsley Avenue (it was variously listed as E. Ardsley Ave., Washington Ave., and Ardsley/Washington Ave.) — was awarded the Silver Star and Purple Heart, posthumously, “for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity as gunnery officer for the USS Lansdale in the action in which that ship was sunk and in which he lost his life.”
Veteran Charles C. Wales, a young officer aboard the Lansdale on that fateful night, survived the sinking and told his story to The Berkshire Eagle of Pittsfield, Mass., for its 2008 Veterans Day issue. This is his account, which is abridged for space reasons:
“This is the story of a Navy destroyer, USS Lansdale DD426, which was commissioned 27 September 1940 in the Boston Navy Yard. At the same time this is a story of two other ships which are linked to the story of Lansdale. When I reported for duty in Lansdale, I was a brand new Ensign, U.S. Navy, a recent graduate of the U. S. Naval Academy, and was assigned duties as Torpedo and Commissary Officer. As such I was responsible for the ship's torpedoes, depth charges and the crew's mess.
“But this is not a story about me, but rather the ships.
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The Junkers JU-88 (pictured) was a German World War II Luftwaffe twin-engined multi-role combat aircraft. The Junkers Aircraft and Motor Works designed the plane in the mid-1930s to be too fast for fighters of its era to intercept. It became one of the most versatile combat aircraft of World War II. It served as a bomber, dive bomber, night fighter, torpedo bomber, heavy fighter and, at the end of the war, a flying bomb. It helped sink the USS Lansdale in 1944 off North Africa. (Wikimedia Commons photo, public domain) |
“Lansdale was one of a new class of destroyers built as part of a modernization program just prior to WWII. For readers not familiar with Navy ship types, the mission of a destroyer is to provide in surface warfare, offense using surface launched torpedoes, and in.anti-submarine warfare, defense with its sonar and depth charges. In practice, destroyers were used very little, but to very good effect, in surface warfare in either WWI or WWII. Most never saw any surface warfare, and, like Lansdale, were deployed in anti-submarine screens around convoys of transport ships and around formations of combat ships such as aircraft carriers, battleships and cruisers.
“During WWII, Lansdale was deployed in the Atlantic doing convoy duty. In early 1944, after escorting a convoy to Gibraltar, she was assigned duty in the Mediterranean escorting heavy cruisers during the Anzio (Italy) campaign and convoys from Gibraltar to ports in the Mediterranean.
“USS Lansdale DD426 was sunk on the night of 20 April 1944 by a German aerial torpedo while escorting Convoy UGS38 (i.e. United States-Gibraltar/Slow) from Gibraltar to Bizerte, Tunisia. In that convoy, Lansdale was assigned to a position as the jamming ship on the north flank of the anti-submarine screen of the convoy which was proceeding eastward along the North African coast in the vicinity of Algiers, Algieria. The ‘jamming ship’ was equipped with apparatus for the detection and jamming of radio-controlled glider bombs, the newly designed weapon being deployed by the Germans. …
“During the period before sunset, Army radar in North Africa picked up radar contact with a flight of German warplanes heading south toward the convoy. However, these planes were seen to divert toward Tunisia, well to the east of the convoy. They proceeded on that heading until they were over land where the radar could not track them, but obviously they headed westward toward UGS38. As twilight faded, flying close to shore and low over the water they evaded radar detection until they were almost upon the convoy. Some 18 to 24 Junkers and Heinkel bombers armed with aerial torpedoes struck in three waves.
“The first wave of nine JU-88's attacked from dead ahead about 25 minutes after sunset so it was extremely difficult to see them. Their torpedoes damaged the SS Samite and sank the SS Paul Hamilton, which was carrying 498 men of the Army Air Force, some Armed Guard (Navy personnel who manned the armament which had been installed on most commercial ships) and the crew. Because she was carrying demolition explosives, Paul Hamilton was blown to bits, and every person on board, to the number of 580, was killed.
“The explosion of Paul Hamilton created a huge fireball, actually a mushroom cloud as I remember it, which illuminated the convoy for a number of minutes thus lighting up the area as though it was daylight. The attack happened so quickly that the escorts were unable to take the lead planes under fire, but they put up an effective barrage on the trailing planes.
“The second wave of about seven JU-88's came on the heels of the first, hitting the southern flank of the convoy and sent torpedoes into SS Stephen T. Austin and into SS Royal Star, sinking her.
“The third wave, consisting of about five HE-111's, boredown on the convoy's port bow, Lansdale's station. USS Menges DE320 shot down one of the planes, then rescued its pilot and radioman.
The North Africa American Cemetery and Memorial in Tunisia is the final resting place of more than 2,800 of our military dead. Along the southeast edge of the burial area, the names of 3,724 additional fallen service members, buried at sea or missing in action, including Irvington's LTJG George Eddison Haines, USNR, are engraved on the Wall of the Missing. Bronze rosettes mark the names of those since recovered and identified. Most of those honored here lost their lives during WWII military operations from North Africa to the Persian Gulf. |
“She immediately took on a 12 degree list to port, her rudder jammed 22 degrees right and she steamed in a clockwise circle.
“The attacks continued, and at 2120 the course straightened out, but the list increased steadily. In all, a total of five torpedoes were launched at Lansdale.
“With her vital machinery swamped, with smoke and steam pouring from her breached hull, the order to abandon ship was given at 2122 when Captain Douglas M. Swift, USN, feared she might capsize. Marion Anthony Porter, Stewardsman, third class, USN, the gunner of a 20mm machine gun, was laying on deck, hanging on to his gun when the order came. Although his leg was broken in two places, Porter and crew had remained at their station, continuing to fire. By 2130, the list had increased to 80 degrees and the ship began to break up. Five or so minutes later, she broke in half, and the stern section quickly sank. The forward section sank about 20 minutes later.
“Two destroyer escorts manned by the Coast Guard, USS Menges DE320 and USS Newell DD322 were assigned to search for survivors.
“It was well after dark now and we were in waters with German submarines operating so use of searchlights to locate survivors was out. However, Menges and Newell did a superior job of it, and picked up 234 survivors of a crew of 282 officers and men. Of the 49 casualties, 7 dead were buried at the North Africa American Cemetery and Memorial, Carthage, Tunisia, and 42 missing in action are memorialized there as well.
“The survivors were taken to Algiers, Algeria where we were outfitted with uniforms and eventually returned to the USA at Norfolk, VA.
“When Lansdale sank, the water temperature was estimated to be about 60 degrees, very cold to spend much time in. In addition, the water was covered with fuel oil from Lansdale's bunkers. Combat ships are not equipped with lifeboats in the manner of a passenger ship. Combat ships are equipped with life rafts and floater nets, which are cargo nets with floats incorporated in the weave of the net. They deploy when a ship sinks by merely floating free of their supports. One does not sit on a life raft but hangs on to the ropes around the outside or inside standing on a floor supported about five feet below the raft by netting. The floater net is spread out on the water and one lays on the net or hangs on around the perimeter. In any event, one is in the water, and survival in 60 degree water covered with fuel oil is quite difficult.
“While at Algiers after our rescue, I was assigned the task of trying to determine the fate of each of the missing in action. It was apparent that no one in the forward fire room survived as well as some in the compartment just forward of that. In all, about half of the missing had been killed in the ship. The rest must have perished in the water afterward. In talking to some of my shipmates, I learned that some of the men simply could not handle the situation, the cold, the oil, and the fright, and they apparently simply gave up. It's hard to imagine that a person will simply give up and quit the struggle, but quite apparently that is what happened. I don't remember how many stories like this that I heard, but it was more than a few.
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| Two rescued members of the USS Lansdale crew (2nd from left and 2nd from right) are helped by Coast Guardsmen aboard a rescue ship off the coast of Algeria in the early morning hours of April 21, 1944. |
“I was in the water for about two and one half hours. When I arrived at the side of Newell, the ship which rescued me, I found that they had rigged up a cargo net over the side for us to climb up on. The waves were running maybe three to five feet at the time, so I waited until I was lifted by a wave and grabbed the cargo net, but I was so weakened by the cold that I could not hold on and fell back into the sea. The next time I tried, when the wave lifted me and I grabbed the net, two sailors grabbed me by the seat of my pants and heaved me up on deck. There I was stripped of my wet clothing, wrapped in a blanket, and given a cup of coffee. I was shaking so much from the cold that I slopped the coffee all over my front when I tried to drink it.
“I was escorted to the mess hall where I found that the crew had gotten all of the uniforms and clothing which were in the laundry to be washed, and had dumped them in a pile in the middle of the deck for the survivors to dress in. I selected a pair of 13-button drop front pants and a denim shirt, and was escorted to a bunk in the chief petty officer's quarters.
“I remember watching as the last survivor out of the water was carried below. He had been in the water for over four hours. He was wrapped in blankets and was shivering violently and mumbling, ‘I'm so cold. I'm so cold’ over and over again. He was Lt(jg) Alvin S. Caplan, USNR. Years later, at one of our ship reunions, the first of which was held in 1994, we discovered that he thought he had been rescued by a British frigate. I finally convinced him that there was not a British frigate in that convoy, and that he had been rescued by USS Newell DD322.
“In further conversation, we discovered that he had no recollection of events that night from the time he waded down the side of Lansdale into the water until a couple of days later when he realized that he was standing in a line in the mess hall with a mess tray in his hand. …”
“… Recall that Lansdale was the jamming ship in the convoy UGS38. The jamming equipment was installed by the destroyer tender, USS Vulcan, while in Oran in late March and early April 1944. I believe that our intelligence knew early on that the Germans were developing a radio-controlled glider bomb, and in response we began developing a countermeasure for it. However, as soon as the jamming gear was deployed the Germans would have become aware of it immediately if for no other reason than that some of their bombs were not responding to their control signals and not hitting the intended target. …
“I believe that the Germans were well aware of the jamming ships and that they specifically targeted Lansdale. She was the only destroyer in an anti-submarine screen of 22 destroyer escorts, and she was stationed on the north flank of the convoy in position to jam glider bombs. In all, five torpedoes were directed at Lansdale, and that alone indicates that Lansdale was a specific target rather than merely a target of opportunity. It only took one hit to sink Lansdale. …”
The citation accompanying Lt. (j.g.) Haines’ posthumous Silver Star award was signed for President Franklin Delano Roosevelt by Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal. It reads:
"For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity. as Gunnery Officer of the USS Lansdale in action against enemy aircraft off the Coast of Algeria, April 20, 1944. When his ship was attacked by hostile planes during the night, Lieutenant Haines controlled the main battery skillfully and with aggressive determination, directing accurate, vigorous fire against the enemy aircraft.
“After the Lansdale was hit, all power to the main battery lost and communications severed, he personally coordinated the action of the guns and continued firing, destroying three planes and materially lessening the effectiveness of the hostile attacks on a valuable convoy before a heavy list and rising waters made further defense impossible.
“Abandoning the ship as it sank, he rendered assistance to men struggling in the water and contributed to the probable saving of several lives. Lieutenant Haines' inspiring leadership, indomitable courage and unselfish efforts on behalf of his comrades were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Navy.”
EPILOGUE: LTJG Haines’ remains were never found. He is officially listed as missing and presumed dead. He is memorialized in the Tablets of the Missing at the North Africa American Cemetery in Carthage, Tunisia. ...
... Haines’ widow Audrey remarried in 1947. Her new husband was Robert de Liesseline Johnson, who served more than two years as a Navy lieutenant in the Pacific theatre of World War II.
Links to similar personal stories about Irvington heroes who gave their lives for their country*
◼ Pfc. Cuthbert Powell Sinkking: Class of '42 gave 3 of its own to the ages
◼ Pfc. John Joseph (Joe) Gilchrist: Died after capture of Saint-Lo
◼ Lt. (j.g.) George Eddison Haines: Lost at sea, awarded Silver Star
◼ Pfc. Joseph Thomas Costello: Teen lost life in Battle of Mindanao
◼ MSgt. James Peter Kelley: Survived WW II and Korea; died in fall
◼ S1 Archibald Ronald: Lost on next-to-last Navy ship sunk by U-boat
◼ TSgt. Raffaele R. (Ralph) Reale: A hero's life ended on East Sunnyside Lane
◼ Sgt. Robert F. Morrison: Took fight to the enemy, fell in Alsace
◼ Lt. Col. George W. Beavers Jr.: Re-upped as private; died on war's eve
◼ F2 Claude L. Bronnes: Went down with the Atlanta at Guadalcanal
◼ MMLC William James Downey: Died aboard ship off West Coast
◼ Pvt. Alick Main Ian: Died taking Aachen, first German city to fall in WWII
◼ Pfc. George Mills Hill Jr.: Survived Okinawa, only to fall in South Korea
◼ Pvt. Peter R. Robinson: Lost to shadows of time over Pacific, answers never found
WORLD WAR I
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