My father served in the United States Marine Corps for about forty years, enlisting as a private and retiring as a colonel. These 10 linked pages cover the period from 1933 to 1938, when he served aboard the flagship of the Asiatic-Pacific Fleet, the USS Augusta (CA-31).
Special thanks to Mrs. Creighton and Mrs. Patterson of the Nimitz Library. Many of the historical references to the Sino-Japanese incident are based on an unpublished printing of the log entries of the Augusta entitled U.S.S. Augusta Under Fire, Fire Over Pootung by Clad E. Polley and Myron O. Hill, Shanghai, July 4, 1938. Any errors are entirely mine.
It was during this period that my father and mother met, in Tsingtao, China. She was on vacation from her birthplace in Harbin, China, and he was on shore leave. I start with their wedding picture from October of 1938, with my father's family. My mother's parents stayed in Harbin, and disappeared during the war.
Chuck's Parents' Wedding Picture