Les Thompson says he’s no war hero. He was just a seaman 1st class who served aboard the USS Abner Read, a destroyer sunk by a Japanese kamikaze at the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October 1944 during the final months of World War II. The 76-year-old Englewood, Fla. man joined the Navy at 17…
Tagged Fletcher Class
At 75 George Speidell is still a Navy man
George Speidell was a “Snipe” aboard the USS Cushing, DD-797, during the Korean War. He worked as a throttle-man in the aft engine room on the Fletcher Class destroyer. “I was 17 and a disenchanted junior in high school when I convinced my father and mother to let me joint the Navy in 1952,” the former 75-year-old Port Charlotte, Fla. sailor explained. “My grandfather and great-grandfather had been in the Navy and that’s where I wanted to be.”
War Tales 