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Artifact of the Month - August, 2005 |
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Merchant Marine Life
Jacket
Troy Norris
Graves served aboard the merchant vessel SS William
J. Salman, a freighter owned by Canadian Gulf
Lines of Houston, Texas.
The William J. Salman was sailing from New Orleans
to Antigua with a cargo of construction materials.
On May 18, 1942, shortly after 4pm, the ship was
125 miles south of Cape Frances, Cuba, when she
was torpedoed by the German submarine U-125, commanded
by Kapitaenleutnant (Lieutenant Commander)
Ulrich Folkers. The torpedo that struck the William
J. Salman nearly broke the ship in half, and within
two minutes the ship sank.
Of her crew of 28, six
perished with the ship, including the Master, Captain
Charles Dudley Bryant. The 22 survivors found their
way to the two life boats that were released before
the ship sank. The crewmembers were rescued 20 hours
later by the Latvian ship SS Kegums and taken to
Key West, Florida.
This is the life jacket,
which along with a whistle and a flashlight, was
all that Graves had in his possession when his ship
went down. When he returned home shortly after,
his children noticed how sunburned he was from being
on the life boat. They had their father go to their
classes, and all the other classes of their school
to show the jacket and tell his harrowing story.
The life jacket was placed
in a family barn for many years, until after Graves'
passing, when his children came across it and decided
to donate it to The National World War II Museum
in December of 2004. This lifejacket is emblematic
of the courage and sacrifice of America’s
Merchant Marines, civilians in war who braved constant
danger to bring troops and supplies to the front.
The Merchant Marines suffered more casualties per
capita than any of the branches of service in WWII.
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