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| Paul Tulloch served on the USS Canopus, drawn here by a crewmate, and died a POW in Hoten, Manchuria. https://bataancampaign.wordpress.com/2015/01/09/the-lucky-old-lady-of-bataan/ http://battlingbastardsbataan.com/bbbpics6.htm |
Paul Sanford Tulloch never had a chance to reach 100 years old today. Instead, he sacrificed his life for our freedom.
He was born on February 13, 1918 in North Dakota. His mother Enid was born in Ohio and his father Robert was born in New York. His father worked as a trapper. Paul had an older brother. By 1930 Paul was living with his mom's brother. His mother had moved to Minnesota and ten years later identified as a widow living in Montana.
He enlisted in the navy on his 16th birthday in 1934. His final assignment was as a watertender 2nd class on the submarine tender USS Canopus. Canopus was in Manilla Bay when the Japanese attacked the Philippines mere hours after the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. It had a compliment of 314 men. Canopus worked on fitting the submarines of the Submarine Squadron 20 so they were seaworthy to escape to Australia. She was hit by a Japanese bombs on December 29 and again on January 1, after which she was disguised as a wreck but continued to service other ships during the night. Her crew was sent to Corregidor Island in February 1942 where Tulloch and his fellow sailors joined the beach defense there. The island surrendered on May 6, 1942 and the Americans became prisoners of war.
Tulloch was sent to a Philippine POW camp, but was later put on a transport and sent to a POW camp in Manchuria. He died on November 20, 1942. He was one of 212 men from Canopus who never made it home.
His grave is at Mountain View Cemetery in Billings, Montana
Last year on this date I profiled Kwajalein medic Robert Cox. You can read about Robert here.
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!
I created this video to explain why I started this project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXt8QA481lY.
Join the public Facebook group WW2 Fallen 100
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