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NAME Charmning Willie Rowe |
NICKNAME Willie |
SERVICE NUMBER 347368 |
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| UNIT Company A First Battalion 7th Marines |
HOME OF RECORD 20 Country Road, Orlo Vista, FL |
NEXT OF KIN Father, Mr. Lesber T. Rowe |
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| DATE OF BIRTH April 4, 1921 |
ENTERED SERVICE January 20, 1942 |
DATE OF LOSS September 24, 1942 |
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| REGION Solomon Islands |
CAMPAIGN / AREA Guadalcanal |
CASUALTY TYPE Killed In Action |
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| CIRCUMSTANCES OF LOSS Private Charmning W. Rowe served with the weapons platoon of Company A, 7th Marines, during the battle of Guadalcanal. On 24 September 1942, Rowe’s company was leading a combat patrol when they encountered a heavily-armed Japanese rear guard. The Marines were forced to fall back and break contact; in the process, Private Rowe suffered multiple gunshot wounds. He died at the battalion aid station that night, and was buried in the field the following day. |
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| INDIVIDUAL DECORATIONS Purple Heart |
LAST KNOWN RANK Private |
STATUS OF REMAINS Buried in the field. “Hill X, Aerial Mosaic Map, Ref. 1-20,000, Grave 5” |
MEMORIALS Manila American Cemetery |
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Biography:
Coming soon. Contact the webmaster for more information about this Marine.
“After the fight I went around to see who got hurt. They had a sort of little field hospital, a lot of the guys were hurt or dead. There’s this friend of mine, guy by the name of Rowe. He’s laying on his stomach. I said ‘Hey, where’d you get hit?’ He said, ‘I got hit in the butt.’ ‘Oh, that’s good, you’ll get to go home.’ He looked at me kinda funny, quizzically and said ‘Yeah….’ So I went to sleep that night, nothing ever happened, it was quiet after that.
Woke up the next morning to see how Rowe was. Somebody said he died during the night. I said, what did he die from? The corpsman told me he wasn’t only shot in the butt, he had three bullet holes in his stomach and he died. So… friends of mine are beginning to have some problems.”
– Private Charles M. Jacobs, A/1/7
Articles & Records:
Excerpt from the muster roll of A/1/7, September 1942.
Map overlay showing the location of the five graves on “Hill X.” Designated Graves 1-5, they contained Pvt. Randolph Edwards, PFC Morris Canady, PFC Ervin King, PFC James Walters, and Pvt. Charmning “Willie” Rowe
