Last updated: July 24, 2020
Person
David Stewart Johnson
Quick Facts
Significance:
US Navy Sailor, World War II, KIA
Place of Birth:
Quincy, Massachusetts
Date of Birth:
March 17, 1924
Place of Death:
Near Okinawa
Date of Death:
July 31, 1945
Place of Burial:
Newbury, Massachusetts
Cemetery Name:
South Byfield Cemetery
David Stewart Johnson, Torpedoman's Mate 1st Class, 3/17/24 (21)
David Johnson was born in Quincy, Massachusetts on March 17, 1921. While he was still an infant, his parents, Arthur and Beatrice, moved to the village of Byfield in the town of Newbury, Massachusetts. Johnson attended the prestigious Governor Dummer Academy in Newbury and then entered Middlebury College in Vermont.
On “Navy Day,” October 28, 1942, Johnson traveled from Middlebury to Springfield, Massachusetts to enlist and then spent several months in boot camp at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center in Lake County, Illinois. In January 1943, Johnson transferred to the Naval Service School, also at Great Lakes, for a 16-week program to qualify as a Torpedoman. On May 3, he was rated as a torpedoman’s mate 3rd class and transferred to the Destroyer Base Fleet Service School at San Diego, California. Johnson began his course in Advanced Torpedo Training later that month and finished it on July 16, graduating third in his class.
Johnson was serving on the Fleet School Staff by the autumn of 1943 and eventually achieved a rating of torpedoman’s mate 1st class. He was transferred to the Navy's Receiving Station in San Pedro, California on February 28, 1944 and boarded the USS Cassin Young (DD-793) the following day. On April 14 of that year, the ship sailed on her first operation to conduct raids on targets in Micronesia. From June through July, the USS Cassin Young was involved in the Marianas Campaign and the capture of Saipan, Guam, and Tinian. By October, the invasion of the Philippines commenced, and the ship saw heavy action off Cape Engaño, Luzon. For the rest of 1944 and into January 1945, the ship participated in strikes on enemy targets throughout the South China and Philippine Seas. Between February and March 1945, the USS Cassin Young assisted in conducting diversionary raids on Japanese targets in support of the invasion of Iwo Jima.
Between April and July 1945, the USS Cassin Young performed various tasks off Okinawa, providing shore bombardment, escorting troop transports, and serving as a radar picket for the fleet. On July 30, 1945, Johnson was at his battle station on the ship’s forward torpedo turret when a kamikaze crashed into the main deck below him. The plane, along with the 100-pound bomb it carried, exploded with a massive concussion and sprayed shrapnel everywhere. Johnson sustained a traumatic brain injury and multiple wounds from bomb fragments to his neck, forehead, right eye, right arm, both wrists, right thigh and knee. He was quickly transferred to the Destroyer Tender USS Hamul (AD-20) for treatment but he succumbed to his injuries later that day.
Johnson was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart. His body was later repatriated and laid to rest in the South Byfield Cemetery in Newbury, Massachusetts.