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| Seaman Second Class Madison Sullivan served on the cruiser USS Juneau with his four brothers. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/10089/madison-abel-sullivan |
Madison "Matt" Abel Sullivan never had a chance to reach 100 years old today. Instead, he sacrificed his life for our freedom.
He was born on November 8, 1919 in Iowa. His parents Thomas and Alleta were also both born in Iowa. His father worked as a railroad conductor. Madison had three older brothers, an older sister and one younger brother. By 1940 Joseph had completed six years of education and was working as a plant worker while still living at home.
He enlisted in the US Navy along with his brothers, Joseph and Albert on January 3, 1942. His two older brothers George and Francis had served in the Navy before and had reenlisted. Although it was against Navy policy for siblings to serve on the same ship, the Sullivans were able to get this requirement waived. They were all mustered to serve on the light cruiser USS Juneau. Madison became a seaman second class.
Juneau supported the American effort to remove the Japanese from Guadalcanal. During the night of November 12-13, 1942 it participated in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal.
Early in the darkness of Friday, November 13, 1942, a Japanese naval force of two battleships, one light cruiser, and nine destroyers approached Guadalcanal. In contrast, the Americans had two heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, and eight destroyers. In the costly battle, Juneau suffered a torpedo hit that broke her keel and knocked out most of its systems. Having no ability to contribute to the battle, it withdrew out of harm's way.
With many of the surviving American ships heavily damaged, they retreated away from Guadalcanal during the daylight hours of November 13. During the retreat, Juneau was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine and sank with all but 100 of its crew. Fearing additional submarine attacks, the other ships did not remain to pick up survivors. Due to poor communications, the survivors were not picked up for another eight days at which time only ten men were left. Their testimony reported that Joseph, Francis and Madison never made it off the torpedoed ship. Al survived one day after the sinking and George lasted four or five days. The five Sullivan bothers were among the 687 Juneau sailors who were lost at sea.
On January 12, 1943 three navy representatives visited the Sullivan home. The naval officer told Thomas Sullivan, "I have some news about your boys." Mr. Sullivan asked, "Which one?" The officer replied, "All of them."
The destroyer USS The Sullivans was named in the honor of the brothers and was in service from 1943 to 1965.
The wreckage of Juneau was discovered last year by a deep sea exploration team put together by Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen.
Madison's cenotaph grave is at Arlington National Cemetery.
Thank you George and Francis and Joseph and Madison and Albert for your sacrifice. Let's Earn It for the Sullivan brothers.
Distinguished Service Cross hero Eml Pavlovich, Americal Division, was born exactly one year earlier than Madison Sullivan. You can read about Emil 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.
Please consider joining the public Facebook group to increase the exposure of this project. Go to: WW2 Fallen 100
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