Courtesy Photo | Norfolk Naval Shipyard hosted the commissioning ceremony for USS Miller June 30, 1973....... read more read more
USS Doris Miller (CVN-81) is scheduled to be the fourth Ford class aircraft carrier to be built, but this will not be the first U.S. naval ship to bear the name of a man who embodied the words courage and devotion. This time on Heritage Hour, in honor of the 83rd remembrance of the attack on Pearl Harbor, we look back at the commissioning of the first USS Miller (DE-1901) and the man the ships are named for.
Before looking to the Norfolk Naval Shipyard (NNSY) role played in the history of USS Miller, it is important to know who Petty Officer Doris Miller was. Born in Waco, Texas in 1919, he helped on the family farm before enlisting in the Navy in 1939. He received training at the Naval Training Center in Norfolk, then assigned to the ammunition ship USS Pyro (AE-1) before transferring to USS West Virginia (BB-48). He also attended Secondary Battery Gunnery School, training that would aid him only a short time later.
As a mess attendant, Miller had already served breakfast and had moved on to other duties of the day when the first torpedoes struck. He headed to his battle station, a battery magazine, only to find it destroyed in the attack. He then helped move the wounded before he was directed to the Browning .50 caliber anti-aircraft machine guns. Despite being unfamiliar with the weapon, Miller fired the gun until he ran out of ammunition, shooting down at least two enemy aircraft, and then resumed moving injured sailors, saving countless lives. He was presented the Navy Cross by Admiral Chester A Nimitz aboard USS Enterprise (CV-6) May 27, 1942. After a war bond tour, Miller was assigned to USS Liscome Bay (CVE-56), a new construction escort carrier. Tragically, Liscome was struck by an enemy torpedo that caused the ship’s ammunition to explode November 24, 1943. Of the 900 crew, only 272 survived, and Miller was not among them. His parents were informed of his fate on the second anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Thirty years later, NNSY hosted the commissioning ceremony for USS Miller June 30, 1973. 120 members of the media watched as Miller’s mother, Mrs. Henrietta Miller, was presented with a portrait of her son as she looked on to the ship that bore his name. Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Manpower and Reserve Affairs James E. Johnson introduced U.S. Representative Barbara Jordan as the guest speaker. USS Miller’s motto “Courage – Devotion” summarized the man who returned to the fight and paid the ultimate price. USS Miller had a mission to locate and destroy enemy submarines, preventing the fate of USS Liscome Bay from other ships in the Navy, as well as search and rescue, continuing the work Miller did on that December 7th morning.
USS Miller was part of the Atlantic Fleet and was deployed to the Mediterranean, Persian Gulf and Black Sea before decommissioned in 1991 and stricken from the Naval Vessel Registry in 1995. In August 2021, six members of Miller’s family attended the First Cut of Steel ceremony at Newport News Shipbuilding for USS Doris Miller, slated to be commissioned in 2032.
| Date Taken: | 12.02.2024 |
| Date Posted: | 12.20.2024 11:26 |
| Story ID: | 488082 |
| Location: | PORTSMOUTH, VIRGINIA, US |
| Web Views: | 26 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, The Heritage Hour: Log 12-24 - NNSY and Honoring Courage and Devotion, by Victoria Pendleton, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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