World War II Honoree

Durrell Wade

Branch of Service

U.S. Navy

Hometown

Calhoun, Mississippi

Honored By

Orville L. Kline

Rank: Machinist’s Mate Second Class. He was inducted into the United States Navy June 2, 1936 at Jackson, Mississippi, with recruit training at the U.S. Naval Training Station Gulfport, Mississippi. Upon his graduation from boot camp and maintenance schooling, he was transferred to the USS Oklahoma Battleship, BB-37 for duty, responsible in maintaining and repairing equipment, and based at Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii. 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 installations on Oahu. The Oklahoma moored on Ford Island along with her shipmates came under attack, and she sustained multiple torpedo strikes, which caused the warship to capsize. The Battle of Pearl Harbor took his life on the day of the attack, and interred as an unknown 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, personnel from an American Graves Registration Company disinterred the unknown remains from the Oahu Cemetery, and laid them to rest in the Punchbowl Cemetery. In June of 2015, personnel from the Defense Prisoners of War/Missing in Action Accounting Agency in Hawaii disinterred an unknown from Punchbowl, and transferred the remains to their Honolulu’s laboratory for analysis, where he was identified. The family of this Seaman received his remains for burial. He was laid to rest with Military Honors, December 7, 2018 at the Mississippi Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Kilmichael, Mississippi. This American Patriot was awarded the Purple Heart posthumously, for his ultimate sacrifice in defense of his country.