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| Lt. Clarence Twiddy was flying an SBD-5 Dauntless similar to this one when he died. https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=113319297 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SBD-5_of_VB-10_over_USS_Enterprise_(CV-6)_1944.jpg |
Clarence Augustus Twiddy, Jr. never had a chance to reach 100 years old today. Instead, he sacrificed his life for our freedom.
He was born on July 5, 1917 in Virginia. His father was also born in Virginia and his mother was born in New York. His father worked as a grocery clerk and later manager. Clarence had one younger brother. By 1940 Clarence was still living at home while attending school at the College of William and Mary where he played on the varsity football team.
He began his active service in the navy on September 10, 1941 after being trained as an aviation cadet. He married his wife Daphne Enid on December 27, 1941.
He became a lieutenant, junior grade and in 1942 he was a dive bomber pilot on the USS Ranger. He took part in the attack on Casablanca in November 1942. At some point after this he transferred to the USS Saratoga and became part of VB-3 flying SBD-5 Dauntless dive bombers. In August of 1943 the Saratoga was on station in the South Pacific. Lt. Twiddy's plane went down near Noumea in a non-combat loss.
His grave is at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu. His widow remarried after his death and she died in 2003.
On behalf of the fallen, if you would like to see more people become aware of this project to honor the WW2 fallen, be sure to share with others on Twitter, Facebook, etc. Thanks for your interest!
To mark having over 100,000 visits to my project to honor the fallen of WW2 on their 100th birthdate, I created this video to share. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXt8QA481lY
Join the public Facebook group WW2 Fallen 100
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