Rank and Name, Mess Attendant Third Class David Carter.
Unit/Placed in, USS Little (APD-4) Destroyer, United States Navy.
David is born approx. on 1916 in Alabama.
Father, William Carter.
Mother, Rosie Carter.
David enlisted the service in Alabama with service number # 2728275.
David was KIA when the USS Little was sunk by Japanese destroyers off Guadalcanal on 5 Sep. 1942, he is honored with a Purple Heart, Combat Action Ribbon, Good Conduct Medal, Expeditionary Medal, American Campaign Medal, Navy & Marine Presidential Unit Citation, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, WW II Victory Medal.
David is buried/mentioned at Manila American Cemetery and Memorial Manila, Metro Manila, National Capital Region, Philippines.
Walls of the missing.
Thanks to,
Jean Louis Vijgen, ww2-Pacific.com ww2-europe.com
Air Force Info, Rolland Swank.
ABMC Website, https://abmc.gov
Marines Info, https://missingmarines.com/ Geoffrey Roecker
Seabees History Bob Smith https://seabeehf.org/
Navy Info, http://navylog.navymemorial.org
POW Info, http://www.mansell.com Dwight Rider and Wes injerd.
Philippine Info, http://www.philippine-scouts.org/ Robert Capistrano
National Historian
Navy Seal Memorial, http://www.navysealmemorials.com
Family Info, https://www.familysearch.org
Info, https://www.pacificwrecks.com/
Medals Info, https://www.honorstates.org
Find a Grave, https://www.findagrave.com
Tank Destroyers, http://www.bensavelkoul.nl/
The gun crews on Little were in the process of firing their third round downrange when the first Japanese artillery shells detonated well above the hull and showering everything topside with a rain of shrapnel that killed most of the exposed gun crews and shredded the landing craft on her decks, starting diesel fuel fires that brightly lit the ship as the parachute flares burned out. In short order the number of shells detonating above Little grew to full broadside strength, causing further carnage among Little’s topside crew before Japanese gunners exhausted their ready supply of artillery shells and began hurling AP shells into their precisely ranged adversary. The highly accurate armor piercing shells were easily able to penetrate the Little’s lightly armored hull and after several direct hits the APD’s boilers were knocked out and the Little began to slow to a dead stop. The Japanese kept up their attack as they made a hasty Northward withdrawal from the area, passing close enough to the derelict Little to strafe her decks with machine gun fire before they disappeared into the night, leaving the battered ship to her fate.
Powerless, flooding and with several topside and internal fires growing out of control, Little was ordered abandoned as fears of a magazine detonation grew too great to ignore. Little remained afloat and aflame for a full two hours after her final battle before she finally swamped and sank on an even keel in this general area at approximately 0330hrs on September 5th, 1942. Little’s 93 surviving crew were rescued the following morning by PT Boats, but musters would later reveal that 48 of her crew, including her Captain and Commander Hadley, had gone down with the ship.
