On December 7, 1941, the United States suffered a devastating attack on U.S. Military forces in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared war on Japan. A wave of patriotism swelled enlistment in the armed forces as young people sought to do their patriotic duty.
The Greatest Generation
February 8, 1942, Byron Moore and two high school classmates, E.C. Powell and Bobby Futch took the bus from Valdosta, Georgia to a military recruiting station in Macon where they enlisted.
At 17 years,10 months old, Byron was underweight according to Navy regulations. At the recruiting station, he filled his pockets with rocks to add a couple of pounds.2
Shortly after returning home, the trio received their official letters to report for duty. They boarded the Southern Railroad to Portsmouth VA and took the ferry to Norfolk the world's largest Naval Base operating out of the original Jamestown Exposition site.
During the first two weeks of training, the new recruits of Platoon Unit 842 were administered shots, given dental and physical exams had their clothes stenciled and began a rigorous calisthenics program to prepare them for battle.
After Boot Camp, the enlisted men received a three-day leave. Byron traveled to Washington, D.C. to visit his sister, Leila Moore Cartwright, who worked at the Anchor Room in The Annapolis Hotel, a favorite service man's hangout.
As an active duty Apprentice Seaman, he earned $21.00 per month.
He received new orders for Tampa, Florida to serve aboard the Auxiliary Mine Sweeper, the USS Augury when the ship was put into commission after sea trials, making him a plank owner.1 His next assignment as Temporary Prison Chaser Guard included orders for New Orleans with 22 other Military Guards to escort prisoners to Portsmouth NH.
When his new orders assigned him to a ship that had already left port, he hitched a ride on board another ship, a WWI Destroyer heading toward Russia. They traveled to New Jersey to pick up ammunition, then, headed toward Key West and his duty station as “Sound Man.” He completed a five-week course with the last ten days of class practicing their new skills at sea.
As an SoM3c, Sonar Man 3rd class, he earned $78.00 per month. Reenlistment in 1945 for 4 years in the Regular Navy earned him a raise to $119.70 per month.
Family traditions -
Byron's older brother, Harold, enlisted in the Army during World War I. His other older brother, Ervin, also served in the Navy. After a tour of duty overseas, Ervin developed tuberculosis and was not expected to live. After losing a lung to the disease, his brother went on to become a lawyer and later, a judge in Marianna, Florida.
USS Augury AM-149 Minesweeper
Admirable Class Minesweeper, one of the largest and most successful classes of minesweepers ordered by the US Navy during World War II.
They were designed to locate and remove naval mines before the rest of the fleet arrived, thereby ensuring safe passage.
- Built: at the Tampa Shipbuilding Company Inc. December 1942
- Launched: February 23, 1943 and commissioned March 17 1943.
- Displacement: 650 tons
- Length: 184' 6"
- Beam: 33'
- Draft: 9' 9"
- Speed: 14.8 knots
- Complement: 104 (officers, non-commissioned officers and enlisted personnel)
- Armament: one 3"/50 dual purpose gun mount, two twin 40 mm gun mounts, one depth charge thrower (hedgehogs), two depth charge tracks
- Propulsion: two 1,710 shp ALCO 539 diesel engines, Farrel-Birmingham single reduction gear, two shafts.
The Augury’s shake-down cruise took them from Tampa to Norfolk VA, afterward, to the Panama Canal, then San Francisco, then to Hawaii. Nearing the Philippines, a new set of orders changed their destination to Kodiak Alaska for convoy duty. Their job was to escort Merchant ships back and forth from Alaska to Attu in the Aleutian Islands. Between escorts they sailed Picket Duty or steaming in a Picket Square traveling north, east, south, then west, patrolling in each direction for an hour.
He was also on the USS Augury for his 21st birthday, and served aboard until its decommissioning in July of 1945.
After two years on the USS Augury, he served on the USS Sierra (AD18), the USS Rich (DD820), NROTC Unit, Duke University (as an instructor), NTS Norfolk, Virginia, Sound School, Key West, Florida, Naval Pre-Flight Training, Natchitoches, Louisiana, Minecraft Training Center, Little Creek, Virginia before reenlisting in the Regular Navy.
Crew of the USS Augury AM 149
Wartime Romance
Mid 1945, Moore received orders for Okinawa. Taking a troop transport from Seattle WA to Denver, the young Moore boarded a commercial flight to Dallas on a Braniff PBO Hudson with one pilot and one stewardess.
During his thirty-day leave in Texas, he met the woman who would later become my mother. They were married 9 days later in a private ceremony at the bride's family home in Fort Worth, July 15, 1945. Shortly after the marriage, he was deployed overseas.
Mr. Moore set out on a determined program of schooling and enrolled in every class he could get. After completing a five-week Sound Course, he was selected to take a ten-week Sound Maintenance Course detailing how to repair, tune and maintain sonar equipment.
Later he enrolled in Flight School in Dallas, Texas. While he was learning to fly Piper Cubs and N3N Navy Peril craft at this sixteen-week course, the war was raging overseas. When a surprise navigation test caught the student pilots off guard, he washed out of flight school along with 49 of 60 classmates. Soon afterward, he headed back to the danger zone.
USS Rich DDE-820 Gearing Class Destroyer
https://www.hullnumber.com/DD-820
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U.S. Navy Bureau of Ships photo 19-NN - DD-820 Rich - 137766, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
"The second Rich (DD-820) was laid down on 16 May 1944 by the Consolidated Steel Corp. Orange Tex. launched 5 October 1945 and commissioned on 3 July 1946 Comdr. R. C. Houston in command.
After shakedown in the Caribbean, Rich departed Norfolk in late October for a Mediterranean tour most of which December 1946 to March 1947 was spent on patrol in the Atlantic. Returning to the United States in March she was converted to a specialized antisubmarine ship at the New York Naval Shipyard; and in the fall she resumed operations with the 2d Fleet."
- Launched: October 5, 1945
- Commissioned: July 3, 1946
- Length: 391 feet
- Beam: 41 feet
- Draft: 18.7 feet
- Speed: 34 knots
- Moore, Byron O SO1 1946-1947 Plank Owner USS Rich
Officer Candidate School 1954
Reclassified in 1951 as a Destroyer Leader, it was the second Mitscher Class Destroyer in the U S Navy.
- Class: Mitscher Class Destroyer
- Named for: John S. McCain
- Complement: 403 Officers and Enlisted
- Displacement: 3,675 tons
- Length: 493 feet
- Beam: 50 feet
- Flank Speed: 30 plus knots
- Final Disposition: Sold for scrap January 1980
- Laid down: May 7, 1954 as AMS-204 by the Tampa Marine Co., Tampa, FL
- Launched: Jan 5, 1955
- Reclassified: as a Coastal Minesweeper MSC-204, Feb 7,1955
- Commissioned: USS Thrush (MSC 204), November 8, 1955
- Displacement: 320 tons
- Length: 144 feet
- Beam: 28 feet
- Draft: 9 feet
- Speed: 13 knots
- Complement: 39 Officers and Enlisted
- Armament: Two 20 mm Mounts
Suribachi Class Ammunition Carrier deployed in the Mediterranean where Lt. Cmdr. Moore served as Chief Executive Officer 1961 - 1963. The ship traveled from Bayonne NJ to Norfolk VA, to Key West to patrol the Atlantic during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
- Launched: November 1955
- Commissioned: November 1956
- Displacement: 9,758 tons
- Length: 512 feet
- Beam: 72 feet
- Complement: 20 Officers, 324 Enlisted
- Cargo booms to load fully equipped trucks, carried a full war load to outfit an Aircraft Carrier or 3 - 4 Destroyers.
- Armament: 4 twin 3"/50 dual purpose gun mounts
Set in the center of the 6th Fleet in a 50-mile square, it was surrounded by 3 Carriers, 21 Destroyers, 3 Cruisers, 3 Oilers and a second Ammunition Ship, the Yosemite AD-19.
Lt. Commander Byron Moore's life was a collection of roles played out over eighty-one years: brother; student; instructor; fisherman; mariner; beloved father; husband; carpenter; and devoted Christian. He could at times be stern, rigid, disciplined and aloof, yet, there were times his tender side came through.
He lived the motto, "a place for everything and everything in its place." He drew a penciled outline around each tool on the pegboard at his workbench. We learned not to borrow tools without asking and to return them clean and to their designated place.
He was an avid reader and shared the value of books and the importance of good reading skills. He impressed on his children and others the value of discipline and hard work. He stressed the importance of honesty and loyalty and was an example of kindness and compassion to all living creatures.
Duty Stations and Ships
- 1942-Mar 1945, USS Augury AM-149, Plank Owner
- 1945 USS Sierra AD-18 as a Senior Sonarman
- 1946, USS Rich DD-820, Gearing Class Destroyer, Plank Owner
- 1949 NROTC at Duke University, Sonar Instructor
- 1949 Sound School, Key West FL
- 1949 March - Nav Pre Flight Training, Natchitoches, LA
- 1949 March - Minecraft Training Center, Little Creek, VA
- 1950 May - Jan 1951, Fleet Sonar School, Key West, FL, Chief Sonarman
- 1953 Mar 17, Assigned Secondary NJC 3423 "Qualified Instructor"
- 1953 June 27 - Mar 1954, USS Wilkinson DL-5 1947, Ensign, Plank Owner
- 1954 Mar 17- Aug, to Naval Schools Command, Officer Candidate School, Newport, RI
- 1954 Aug - Graduated and Commissioned ENSIGN, USN 4-Jun-1954
- 1954, Aug to Aug 1956, USS John S. McCain DL-3
- 1956, Aug to Mar 1958, USS Thrush MSC-204
- 1958 Apr to Oct 1959, USS Allegheny ATA-179, as Commanding Officer
- 1959 Nov to Jun 1961, Fleet Sonar School Instructor
- 1961 Oct - July 1963 USS Suribachi AE-21 as Chief Executive Officer
- 1963 July to Aug 1964, Fleet Sonar School, Director of Training
- He served separate assignments at the Fleet Sonar School in Key West, FL as Instructor, Assistant Director of Enlisted Training, where he reviewed the training plans of officers who were instructors and later was promoted to Director of Enlisted Training. He worked there until his retirement in 1964.
The bulk of research came from the information packet from the National Personnel Records Center along with notes taken during Mr. Moore's lifetime.
To begin your own research, see this article, How to Find Military Service Records for your relative who served in the Military.
- Plank owner, also called a plank holder, is an individual who was a member of a crew of a US Navy ship or US Coast Guard Cutter when it was put into commission
- NCBI, WWII Height-Weight Standards at 67 inches was 140 pounds with a minimum weight of 125.
- www.Hullnumber.com
- National WWI Museum
- USS Rich DDE-820, Plank Owner
- NavSource online
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