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Adapted from "Lieutenant Commander Jennings Pemble Field, Jr., United States Navy" [biography, dated 16 May 1951] in Modern Biographical Files collection, Navy Department Library.

Topic
  • Ordnance and Weapons
Document Type
  • Biography
Wars & Conflicts
  • World War II 1939-1945
File Formats
Location of Archival Materials
  • NHHC-Library

Jennings Pemble Field Jr.

28 Decmber 1920-17 April 1986

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Jennings Pemble Field, Jr. was born on December 28, 1920 in Merigold, Mississippi, son of Jennings P. and Catherine Byrne Field. He received the degree of Bachelor of Science from Millsaps College, Jackson, Mississippi, and enlisted in the US Naval Reserve on July 31, 1940. Appointed Midshipman on December 16, 1940, he was commissioned Ensign on March 14, 1941, and subsequently attained the rank of Lieutenant Commander, USNR, to date from July 20, 1945. He transferred to the US Navy on July 24, 1946, and on August 7, 1947 was appointed Lieutenant Commander to date from July 20, 1945.

Following instruction at the Midshipman’s Training School, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, and acceptance of his commission as Ensign on March 1941, he reported in May to USS Arizona, in which he served until that battleship was sunk by the Japanese on December 7, 1941. He was hospitalized at Pearl Harbor, and later at the Naval Hospital, Bethesda, Maryland, until August 1942, when he reported to USS Knight (DD-633), for duty as Gunnery Officer, and from February to December 1944 served as Executive and Navigator of that destroyer. The Knight participated during his service aboard, in the North African and Sicilian Occupation, in November 1942 and July- September 1943.

In December 1944 he assumed command of USS Greer (DD-145) and continued in command of that destroyer until July 1945, while that destroyer participated IN Carrier Qualification Operations as Plane Guard in the Quonset Point, Rhode Island area, and along the east coast of Florida. He took her from Port Everglades to Philadelphia in June 1945, and was detached in July, shortly before she was stricken from the Navy List in August of that year.

He reported to the Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland, for the postgraduate course in General Line, and from December of that year until June 1946 had instructions in Jet Propulsion. After detachment from the Naval Academy he had brief assignments, covering a three year period in the Bureau of Ordnance, Navy Department; California Institute of Technology: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; Naval Proving Grounds, Dahlgren, Virginia; and the Applied Physics Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University.

He assumed command of USS Burdo (APD-133 in July 1949, and in now under to report in August 1951 to the Naval War College, Newport, Rhode Island, for the Command and Staff course.

Lieutenant Commander Field has the American Defense Service Medal; Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal; European-African-Middle Campaign Medal with two stars; the American Campaign Medal; the World War II Victory Medal; and the Philippine Defense Ribbon.

END

Published: Tue May 11 11:44:53 EDT 2021