World Battlefronts: MEN AT WAR: Five Brothers

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In the Navy there is no family group more famed than the five Crommelin brothers from Alabama (TIME, Jan. 24, 1944).

Captain John survived the Liscome Bay's sinking off Makin Island in late 1943, Captain Henry, only non-flyer among the Annapolis-trained brothers, commanded a destroyer division, participating in many a Pacific raid. Lieut. Commander Quentin, youngest (27) of the five, bosses a fighter squadron aboard a Pacific carrier.

The family's brightest stars were Lieut. Commander Richard and Commander Charles. Charles Crommelin, class of '31, won a D.F.C. over Marcus Island in September 1943, won another by leading the Yorktown's air group during the Gilberts invasion. That was when he brought his plane back despite 200 wounds, then insisted on debarking from the ambulance and visiting the Pearl Harbor Officers' Club "to show those kids it's not so tough to be shot up." Richard Crommelin, '28, had started gathering medals even earlier: a Navy Cross for the Coral Sea, another for Midway.

Charles Crommelin, back at sea as commander of an air group, was shot down off Okinawa last March. Last week, the Navy announced that Richard's plane had crashed at sea off northern Japan.