When the USS Dorchester was hit by a German torpedo and sunk off the coast of Greenland on February 3, 1943, during World War II, the ship’s four chaplains helped the men aboard find lifejackets, gave away their own, preached courage to those trying to escape, and prayed for the dead, before they too died in the freezing waters of the Atlantic Ocean. Eventually 672 died and there were 230 survivors. Some of the survivors in rafts recalled their last view of the four chaplains, linked arm in arm and praying as the ship went down.

 

Three of the chaplains—George Fox (Methodist), John Washington (Roman Catholic) and Clark Poling (Dutch Reformed)—were later memorialized on Chaplains Hill at Arlington National Cemetery on monuments honoring the service of Protestant and Catholic chaplains killed in the line of duty.

 

But the fourth chaplain, Alexander Goode (Jewish), was not. That oversight has prompted veterans advocates and Jewish organizations to lobby for a monument to honor Goode and other Jewish chaplains who have not been honored at Arlington.

 

Since World War I, 13 Jewish chaplains have died while serving their country. The new monument would recognize them and any others that follow.

 

Two rabbis who served as chaplains are buried at Arlington, Captain Joshua Goldberg and Rear Admiral Bertram W. Korn.

-Noel Brinkerhoff, David Wallechinsky

 

Jewish Group Fights for Chaplain Monument at Arlington (by Eric Marrapodi, CNN)

A Higher Duty (by Barry M. Sax, Reform Judaism)

The Saga of the Four Chaplains (Four Chaplains Memorial Foundation)