WILLIAM G. MONTGOMERY, JR., LCDR, USN
William Montgomery, Jr. '42
William Glenn Montgomery, Jr. was admitted to the Naval Academy from Mississippi on June 29, 1938 at age 18 years 1 months.
He resigned on February 10, 1940 because he was “deficient in studies, first term’s work. Recommended to be dropped. Permitted to resign.”
Loss
Bill was lost when his twin-engined aircraft crashed on April 22, 1953 while returning to Naval Air Station Anacostia from a golf trip to the Greenbrier Hotel in West Virginia. The three other officers aboard survived.
Other Information
He is buried in Mississippi.
From Find A Grave:
Mary Ruth Filgo Montgomery Pledger of Lancaster died March 12, [2012,] 18 days after the death of Bill Pledger, her husband of 55 years. She was born in 1922 in Lancaster to Ruby Jo and Joseph Taylor Filgo. She and brothers William, Ray and Roy Lee helped their parents operate Cedar Brook Ranch, a popular children's summer camp. Mary Ruth attended Texas Wesleyan College and graduated from SMU. In 1945 Mary Ruth met and married Lt. Bill Montgomery, a U.S. Navy pilot. They had two children, Glenn and Gail, and were expecting their third child (Julia) when Bill was killed in a plane crash in 1953. Mary Ruth and her children returned to Lancaster to make their home. In 1957, Mary Ruth married Lt. Commander Bill Pledger, whose Navy flight instructor had been Bill Montgomery.
From Find A Grave:
It was in 1945, while doing war work at Love Field, that Mary Ruth met a young, charismatic Mississippian, Bill Montgomery, a Navy pilot stationed in Dallas. Bill fell in love with the beautiful, sweet-natured Texas country girl, and after a whirlwind courtship they were married later that year, at the First Methodist Church in Lancaster. Bill and Mary Ruth had two children, Glenn and Gail, and the couple was expecting their third child, Julia Lee, when Bill died in April 1953 in the crash of a twin-engined aircraft he was co-piloting.
With her two children, Mary Ruth traveled from Arlington, Va., where she and Bill had been living while he was stationed at the Pentagon, back to Lancaster, moving in with her mother and her youngest brother Roy Lee.
Memorial Hall Error
William was returning on a private plane from a weekend golf trip; his loss was in no way operational and he should not be included in Memorial Hall.
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