WORLD WAR II MEMORIAL - Petty Officer 3rd Class Frederick Franklin Hammer

 

Petty Officer 3rd Class 

Frederick Franklin Hammer

(Aviation Machinist Mate)

A Defiance native and a graduate of Defiance High School, Fred Hammer was the son of Carrol and Hazel Milicent (Hollabaugh) Hammer. He lived at 1036 South Clinton Street with his parents and two brothers, Leland and Marion, and his sister, Imogene. Born on October 22, 1918, he was just 24 when he enlisted in the Navy in 1942.

Fred trained in Chicago, IL and Jacksonville, FL to attain his specialty certification, Aviation Machinist Mate. After a five-day furlough in November 1942, with his family, Petty Officer Hammer found himself resuming his duties with the Atlantic Fleet out of Norfolk, Va.

His assignment was in Bermuda with the Air Vores, Atlantic Fleet, Air Wing Five, Patrol Squad 52.

A fatal accident happened on January 10, 1943, when he was in a 2 engine Consolidated PBY Catalina aircraft.

A report filed by the Aviation Patrol Squad reported 8 on board and 8 fatalities.

The report read as follows:

"The Catalina was attached to the U.S. Navy Patrol Squadron 52 (VP52), stationed at the Naval Operation Base, King's Point, Bermuda. During an early morning gunnery exercise, while attempting a pass over the target area on the water of Great Sound, the aircraft dove into the water at a high rate of speed five miles bearing 200 (degrees) from Gibbs Hill Lighthouse, Bermuda, causing the plane to crash.

Only one witness saw the complete maneuver leading up to the crash. He states that the aircraft was in level flight about one thousand feet, when it suddenly nosed down in a steep dive and crashed into the water with no apparent effort to recover. Three other witnesses first saw the airplane after it was in a dive at an estimated altitude of 400. They agreed that the aircraft was in a 60-degree dive with the left wing down approximately 45 degrees until the crash."

A memorial service was held in Defiance at Zion Lutheran Church in early February with members of the Herbert Anderson Post attending. The remains were unaccounted for, so Frederick's name was added to the Tablets of the Missing, the East Coast Monument, in Manhattan, NY.  A memorial also exists in Riverside Cemetery, Defiance, OH.

This poem, written by one of his shipmates, was sent by his commanding officer to the family with a letter of condolence:

"In Memoriam - in remembrance of Frederick F Hammer, Aviation Machinist's Mate 3/c, who made the supreme sacrifice for his country one year ago today, Jan 10, 1943-

In Memory

No marble stone adorns their grave

No mound of costly flowers;

Nor deeds heroic could we crave,

To help those bitter hours.

Their end - no glory to behold

Nor fame on which to soar,

But they as heroes are enrolle

In death - on ocean's floor.

No hero's life for these brave men

Who've flown the vast Atlantic

Through rain and storm and fog they've been

Without a trace of panic

And we who fly have great respect,

For courage and devotion;

Since , in our hearts, we too expect

A fate beneath the ocean,

Brave men have died; and in our sorrow

To a man we must proclaim

We shall always, on the morrow,

Prove their efforts not in vain."