1936
It was the day after this column for February had been written that I received the distressing news about the death of our classmate, Capt. Gil Portmore, and although the announcement of this tragedy did appear in the In Memoriam section in the February issue, I have since received additional information which I would like to pass on, as it indicates Gil's devotion to his country and to Dartmouth. First, let me quote a part of a letter from Gil's dad "The destination of the 824 was Chattanooga and although they had ample gas for most any emergency, they ran into foul weather and a strong head-wind. This storm was general and their attempts to run out of it for a safer place to land were futile. They had three alternatives: (1) to bail out and the evaluation of what that involved; (a) the high cost of the ship, and what was more important, its loss, as delivery is so badly needed on all fronts; (3) there were only three of them and if they parachuted, the plane might cause many casualties. Consequently their decision was to try to make a landing at the Chattanooga airport. Under ordinary conditions the plane would land at a speed of about 120 miles per hour and require a runway o£ about one mile. They planned to come in as low as possible in order to use the whole of the runway, otherwise the landing might result in a crash on the far end of the runway. They were circling the airport for the last time before landing (flying on instruments as the ceiling was so low that they could not see the lights on the field) when they hit the ridges and crashed." These details were given to Mr. Portmore as a brief oral report by one of Gil's fellow flyers, Capt. LaCroix USAAF. Secondly, Pete Fitzherbert, who was one of Gil's closest friends at Hanover, wrote that Gil and his wife were at his house early in December and although they talked a lot about Gil's many experiences, the subject most in Gil's thoughts was to get back to Hanover after the war was over and show Dartmouth to his bride from Australia; and she longed to see it with him. He asked Pete that evening about many '36ers. Just as Pete said, "We will all miss him, yes—but never forget him and the others on our Roll of Honor."
A few months ago I quoted in this column a letter I had received from Steve Smith's widow, whereby she contributed a War Bond to the Memorial Fund in Steve's memory. Dartmouth meant a lot to Steve and it came to mean a lot to his wife; but that feeling and spirit did not stop there as indicated by the following letter I recently received from Steve's father and mother, Mr. and Mrs. Stephen W. Smith: "Enclosed find two $-- War Bonds. Will you please see that these are credited to Class of 1936 in memory of our son Lt. Stephen W. Smith Jr. USNR who, as medical officer, was lost when his ship was sunk in the North Atlantic in August 1942. This is in keeping with bond recently sent by our daughter-in-law, Steve's widow. You may be glad to know that We had our grandson enrolled in Dartmouth before he was three months old." Again the class of 1936 sends its sincere thanks to two other members of Steve's family.
A long letter was recently received from Cpl. Andy Schmidt, in which he went into many interesting tales of his Army life. Andy went in last July and one of his first tastes of the Army was riding a troop train out to Camp Grant in a typical B & M coach (36 hours; remember those trips up to Hanover on that RR?). He was assigned to a Medical Tng. Bn. and after 8 weeks of basic, was among 76 out of about 1000 men chosen to go to OCS "Prep School." After intensive work Andy was one of 16 survivors chosen for OCS, but then came a bad break as just as he was to leave for OCS, the class was cancelled. Andy and the other 15 were then made cadre helping to train new rookies. Hope better luck comes from now on.
A news letter was also received from It. Walt Mosenthal. Mose has seen a good bit of the coun try having been at Camp Barkeley, Texas, OCS at Duke University, Camp McCoy, Wise., a post at New Orleans, and is now Assistant Finance Officer in Puerto Rico. The latter place is much to his liking in all respects Clay Mellor's wife wrote that Rick went overseas in mid-December ancf is a first pilot of a 824 called "Swamp Yankee" . . . . Lt. (jg) Jim A twill writes from North Africa that he is still flying a patrol plane for the Navy after having been in England for awhile
Since the Memorial Fund was established a year and a half ago, there has been received contributions from several wives and families of '36ers now in the Services and one of the most recent was from Mrs. Emil Hokanson and their son, youna Karl, /gam the spirit of Dartmouth and 1936 spreads beyond its laureled sons.
Lt. AI Harrington writes that after being drafted in June, 1942, and having passed through OCS that he is now wearing a silver bar and is located at Office of the Quartermaster General in the Research and Development Branch in Washington CAPF- Red Pounder ls stationed at the same office U'.'; 1 Nilsson was a civilian second looie at a CAP Coastal Patrol Base flying anti-sub patrol for nine months before being drafted as a private It wasn t long, however, before Ed passed OCS at Miami and is now at a Flight Control Center with the expectation that he will end up in Flushing after a temporary assignment in Cleveland Good news has been received of the promotion of Mario Guerneri to lieutenant commander Lt (iel Tom Luey was recently made Fighter Director Officer on the USS (Censored) It. Jim Whipple is with an anti-aircraft battalion in the Med iterranean theater....Capt. Gage Aborn is at the Army Air Base in Gainesville, Fla Cpl John McKernan is up at Bangor, Maine It! (jg) Russ Hurd is on the USS (Censored).
overdue note from Bill Yelverton down in Washington indicates that the '36 group down there is active and large. He reports Boyce Price is in the mam room at the White House and doesn't dare open his mouth for fear he will reveal something that hasn t already been in the papers Bob Eaton writes that Nichols Junior College has swftrh Jw duration and as a result Bob has switched to a position as accountant with the American Optical Co. in Southbridge, Mass.... Co in New York" with the US" Rubber Export Co. in New York
Sgt. Dick Spong recently stopped in to see yours truly for a few minutes during his first furlough in sixteen months. Dick has seen plenty of tough work and is headed back to his tank destroyer unit at Camp Campbell.... Lt. (jg) Harry Horn writes that he has been moving around a great deal but can t give any details, although the work is very interesting He is commanding officer of USS (Censored).... Lt. Stan Ogush USNR is with Carrier Air Group 11 Sgt. Norm Henshaw is at Baxter Genera! Hospital in Spokane, Wash Johnny Ovitz was recently promoted to major and Bob Burr to captain Bob Blake is also now wearing two silver bars Ray Reitman has received a commission as ensign.... Art Lynch, Dan Schwartz, and Joe Handrahan have gone into the Army in recent months.
On Christmas Day in Asbury Park, N. J., GeorgeCole was married to Alma L. Zabel; George is attached to the Army Morale services An announcement was received of the birth on January" 27, 1944, of Graeme Forgaard Proudfoot in Ottawa, Canada, to the Bill Proudfoots'; Bill is a Flight Lieut, with the Royal Canadian Air Force.
AT FORT SCHUYLER, N. Y., these Dartmouth men received final training before going into active service. Front row, i. to r.: Richard Kenny '35, Howard Chivers '39, Robert Reeve '38, back row: Herbert Stearns '35, William Fitzhugh '35, Walter Gless '35.
Acting Secretary and Treasurer, Bank of New York 48 Wall St., New York 5, N. Y.
