Army & Navy - Record

• Share

When the Japs struck Pearl Harbor, handsome Willis Manning Thomas had a staff job. More than anything else then he wanted to get into action in his branch of the service—the submarines. Tommy got his wish, became commanding officer of the submarine Pompano, on which he had served before as executive. Tommy said good-by to his wife and two daughters and was off across the Pacific to the hunting grounds around Japan.

The Pompano already had a great record. Commander L. S. Parks, her skipper in the early days of the war, had won the Navy Cross and a gold star (in lieu of a second Cross) for his exploits. The Pompano stood high in the fleet of U.S. submarines that were harrying the enemy's supply line, wrecking his shipping. Aggressive, self-assured Tommy Thomas polished the record.

He won a Navy Cross for "extraordinary heroism . . . during an aggressive and successful submarine war patrol in the immediate vicinity of enemy Japanese coast line." He won the Silver Star Medal for "conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action." But last week the Navy said the Pompano, long overdue from her last patrol, must be presumed missing—iyth U.S. submarine reported lost. Tommy Thomas' record, still bright, had ended.