William Brooks

William “Billie” Brooks was born July 19, 1922 in Tennessee. Before 1930 his mother, Lillie, had married Maynard Moore and he was living in Cumberland Gap in Claiborne county. His step-father worked as a brick mason. Billie had three step-brothers and one half sister. He had 2 years of high school education.

On August 13, 1940 he entered the Navy at Louisville, Kentucky. October 12, 1940 he reported aboard the USS Oklahoma (BB-37).

On December 7, 1941, the battleship USS Oklahoma was moored at Ford Island, Pearl Harbor, when attacked by Japanese forces. The Oklahoma suffered multiple torpedo hits, causing it to capsize. Four hundred and twenty-nine sailors and Marines were lost, including S1c Brooks. In the days, months, and years following the attack, remains of men lost aboard the Oklahoma were recovered. Those remains that could not be identified were buried at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at Honolulu, Hawaii (NMCP). In 2015, the DPAA received authorization to exhume unknown remains associated with the Oklahoma and reexamine them using advances in forensic technology. From June through November 2015, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) personnel, in cooperation with cemetery officials, exhumed all remaining caskets associated with the USS Oklahoma at the NMCP and transferred the remains to DPAA laboratories. On May 19, 2021, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) identified one set of remains by laboratory analysis and the totality of the circumstantial evidence available, as those of S1c Brooks.

Seaman First Class William Brooks was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart. He is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.

SN: 2874290

Reference:

1930; Census Place: Cumberland Gap, Claiborne, Tennessee; Page: 3B; Enumeration District: 0010

https://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=112556

https://dpaa-mil.sites.crmforce.mil/dpaaProfile?id=a0Jt0000000XeKVEA0

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/56116391/william-brooks

Added by: sgould853