World War II Honoree

Clarence Frederick Haase

Branch of Service

U.S. Navy

Hometown

Denton, Nebraska

Honored By

Orville L. Kline

Rank: Seaman First Class. He was inducted into the United States Navy February 8, 1939 at Omaha, Nebraska, with recruit training at the U.S. Naval Training Station Great Lakes, Illinois. After completing boot camp, he was transferred to the USS Pennsylvania Battleship, BB-38 for duty, and based at Pearl Harbor, Hawaiian Islands. On Sunday Morning, December 7, 1941 the Emperor of Japan’s Naval Aviators launched a devastating, surprise attack on the U.S. Naval Base and other military installation on Oahu. The Battleship was in dry-doc for repairs on three of her propeller shafts, when the warship strafed, and one high altitude bomb penetrated her main deck, detonating in the number nine gun battery. The Battlewagon lost twenty-nine shipmates in the attack. The Battle of Pearl Harbor took his life on the day of the attack, and interred in the Oahu Nuuanu Cemetery, Territory of Hawaii. In remembrance of the brave, his name is permanently inscribed in the tablets of the missing, memorialized at the Honolulu National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific ‘Punchbowl’ Hawaii. After the cessation of hostilities with Japan, the family of this Sailor requested that his remains be buried at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific ‘Punchbowl’, with interment January 31, 1949. In his Memory and Honor, a cenotaph memorial has been places at the Denton Cemetery in Denton Nebraska. This American Patriot was awarded the Purple Heart posthumously, for his ultimate sacrifice in defense of his country.