DENNY P. PHILLIPS, CDR, USN

Denny Phillips '40

Date of birth: August 30, 1918

Date of death: January 23, 1953

Age: 34

Lucky Bag

From the 1940 Lucky Bag:

DENNY POWELL PHILLIPS

Honolulu, Hawaii

Tiny

Denny has lived a full and carefree life in many corners of the earth, and it is impossible to state whether his character reflects more of California, Boston, or Honolulu. This cosmopolitan training has produced a lad with a perfect nature. If bent on a lively conversation with a bit of laughter, one only need find Denny. His Utopia is a new "Sep" leave and an old roadster, with a rumble full of tweeds and golf sticks. At the Academy, his one all-absorbing interest is crew, which he eats and dreams. The service will find in Denny a real officer and a true gentleman; shipmates will find a friend.

Crew N, 4, 3, 2, 1; N.A.C.A. Council 3, 2, 1; Radio Club; House Committee Chairman; Boat Club, Excellence in Great Guns; 1 Stripe.

DENNY POWELL PHILLIPS

Honolulu, Hawaii

Tiny

Denny has lived a full and carefree life in many corners of the earth, and it is impossible to state whether his character reflects more of California, Boston, or Honolulu. This cosmopolitan training has produced a lad with a perfect nature. If bent on a lively conversation with a bit of laughter, one only need find Denny. His Utopia is a new "Sep" leave and an old roadster, with a rumble full of tweeds and golf sticks. At the Academy, his one all-absorbing interest is crew, which he eats and dreams. The service will find in Denny a real officer and a true gentleman; shipmates will find a friend.

Crew N, 4, 3, 2, 1; N.A.C.A. Council 3, 2, 1; Radio Club; House Committee Chairman; Boat Club, Excellence in Great Guns; 1 Stripe.

Loss

Denny was lost on January 23, 1953 in combat over Korea while flying for Fighter Squadron (VF) 11 from USS Kearsarge (CV 33). He has a memory marker in Arlington National Cemetery.

Robert Schakne, staff correspondent for International News Services, wrote an article about him in the March 1953 newspapers:

Commander Denny Phillips, one of the Navy’s best, is missing in action and probably dead.
An officer with the fleet told me Phillips went down near Wonsan in January when a burst of antiaircraft fire sent his Pantherjet fighter-bomber spinning helplessly out of control to the ground.
Denny Phillips was an Annapolis man from Jacksonville, Fla., who would cram his six foot, six inch body into the cockpit of his jet fighter and lead his squadron from the flight deck of the carrier USS Kearsarge to the flak filled skies over North Korea.
CAN’T WORRY.
I saw Denny Phillips last in the ready room of his squadron, known as the Red Rippers, just before he sailed for what was to be his last tour in Korea.
He told me about catapulting from the deck of a carrier in a high speed jet fighter, about attacking a target, about coming home to the flight deck.
He didn’t talk about the dangers willingly and the dangers seemed not to worry him.
“You can’t worry about flak, because you have too much to do,” he said, “you don’t know about it until after it happens, if you’re hit. We don’t worry about it, but we think about it.”
TOOK DANGER SPOT.
Denny Phillips never led but always followed his flight into the fight. He explained that antiaircraft gunners had their aim zeroed in by the time the last plane in the flight entered its dive bombing run and so he took the final spot.
The men who fly jet fighter-bombers from the decks of flat-tops against the Communists conduct the major portion of the Navy’s air effort. Their sector is the eastern and north-eastern portion of Communist Korea.
They fly, looking for Communist supplies through valleys lined with Communist anti-aircraft guns. They fight few MIGs. Their work is a dirty, daily and dangerous drudge.
“Its important,” Phillips told me, “because they need us. We know that troops on the ground need close support. We know its important. The odds are lousy but its got to be done.”
The odds were lousy for Phillips that day in January. But it had to be done, and he did it.

Biography

From researcher Kathy Franz:

Born in Hawaii, Denny traveled with his parents, Navy Captain Oscar and Marguerite Phillips, several times between the Islands and the mainland. In 1920 the family lived in Portsmouth, Virginia; in 1930 Brookline, Massachusetts; in 1935 Newport, Rhode Island; and in 1940 Annapolis, Maryland. His wife and two daughters Bonnie and Marguerite lived in Jacksonville, Florida.
In 1947 to 1950 he attended and was on the Naval War College staff in Newport. He was on his final mission before returning home when his plane was shot down. Denny was also survived by his grandmother Mrs. Luther Phillips and aunt Mrs. Scott Meekins.

Photographs

From the Lucky Bag
From the Newport Daily News on January 27, 1953

Distinguished Flying Cross

From Hall of Valor:

(Citation Needed) - SYNOPSIS: Commander Denny Powell Phillips (NSN: 0-85286), United States Navy, was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (Posthumously) for extraordinary achievement while participating in aerial flight while serving with Fighter Squadron ELEVEN (VF-11), embarked in U.S.S. KEARSARGE (CV-33), in action against enemy aggressor forces in Korea on 23 January 1953.
General Orders: All Hands (December 1953)
Action Date: January 23, 1953
Rank: Commander
Company: Fighter Squadron 11 (VF-11)
Division: U.S.S. Kearsarge (CV-33)

Bronze Star

His gravestone cites him as recipient of a Bronze Star; unable to find the citation.

Navy Directories & Officer Registers

The "Register of Commissioned and Warrant Officers of the United States Navy and Marine Corps" was published annually from 1815 through at least the 1970s; it provided rank, command or station, and occasionally billet until the beginning of World War II when command/station was no longer included. Scanned copies were reviewed and data entered from the mid-1840s through 1922, when more-frequent Navy Directories were available.

The Navy Directory was a publication that provided information on the command, billet, and rank of every active and retired naval officer. Single editions have been found online from January 1915 and March 1918, and then from three to six editions per year from 1923 through 1940; the final edition is from April 1941.

The entries in both series of documents are sometimes cryptic and confusing. They are often inconsistent, even within an edition, with the name of commands; this is especially true for aviation squadrons in the 1920s and early 1930s.

Alumni listed at the same command may or may not have had significant interactions; they could have shared a stateroom or workspace, stood many hours of watch together… or, especially at the larger commands, they might not have known each other at all. The information provides the opportunity to draw connections that are otherwise invisible, though, and gives a fuller view of the professional experiences of these alumni in Memorial Hall.