BarnBuster
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Fireman 3rd Class Harold K. Costill, 18, of Clayton, New Jersey, killed during World War II, was accounted for on April 16. (Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency)
The battleship West Virginia afire forward, immediately after the Japanese air attack on Dec. 7, 1941. The battleship Tennessee is on the sunken warship's opposite side. (U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command
A sailor from New Jersey killed during the attack on Pearl Harbor that launched the United States into World War II will be laid to rest this weekend in his hometown. Family members have issued an open invitation to the Sept. 14 funeral for Fireman 3rd Class Harold Kendall “Bud” Costill, 18, a sailor on the battleship West Virginia who was killed in the Japanese attack on Dec. 7, 1941, the Cherry Hill Courier Post reported.
"We have reserved the performing arts center at Clayton High School for the funeral service because it is the only place in town big enough to hold such a large crowd," said Costill's 93-year old brother Gene, a former Clayton mayor and councilman and the only surviving sibling of the five Costill children.
Costill’s remains had been interred in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in one of nearly three dozen caskets buried as “unknowns” among the 106 killed aboard the West Virginia.
The Department of Defense notified the family in June that Costill had been positively identified through DNA, anthropological and other examinations 78 years after being listed officially as missing in action.
The Elks lodge, Battleship New Jersey Museum and Memorial in Camden and Baseball Old Timers Inc. are among groups planning to attend.
"The Battleship New Jersey crew feels a fraternal bond with all battleship sailors, and we want to be there," said Larry Hennessy, the quarterdeck officer who will head a contingent of museum volunteers.
Costill was in an engine room when the ship, moored at Ford Island, was hit by torpedo and aerial bombs, one of which hit the ship's ammunition and caused a fire.
Thalbert "Pug" Snyder, Harold's best friend and one of the scheduled speakers at the funeral service, remembered his friend as an innovator and problem solver who loved being on Silver Lake in Clayton and eagerly awaited the fall hunting season each year.
“He also loved the sea and his time on the battleship and was in the process of becoming an electrician’s mate,” said Snyder, who served in the South Pacific during the war.
Family members said Costill will be buried next to the high school in the family plot in Cedar Green Cemetery, beside his great-grandfather Elwood Costill, a Civil War soldier.
Costill’s parents are not here to see their son come home. His sister, Joan Costill Burke, until her death in 2015, waged a campaign to have him located and identified, said her daughter, Nancy Eckler of Williamstown.
“If my mom had lived to see this day, she would be elated that her brother was finally coming home to be buried close to his family. I know that my mom is smiling in heaven,” Eckler said.
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USS West Virginia BB-48, 1923-1959
West Virginia's base was moved to Pearl Harbor in 1940, and she was there on 7 December 1941, when the Japanese attacked with an overwhelming force of carrier aircraft. In that raid, the battleship was hit by two bombs and at least seven torpedoes, which blew huge holes in her port side. Skillful damage control saved her from capsizing, but she quickly sank to the harbor bottom. More than a hundred of her crew were lost.In the course of that attack, the battleship's commander, Captain Mervyn S. Bennion, was mortally wounded. He posthumously received the Medal of Honor for his defense of the ship. Salvaged and given temporary repairs at the Pearl Harbor Navy Yard, in April 1943 West Virginia steamed to the West Coast for final repair and modernization at the Puget Sound Navy Yard.
The battleship emerged from the shipyard in July 1944 completely changed in appearance, with a wider hull, and massively improved anti-aircraft gun battery. West Virginia arrived in the Pacific combat zone in October, and soon was participating in pre-invasion bombardment of Leyte, in the Philippines. On 25 October, as a force of Japanese battleships and smaller vessels attempted to make a night attack on the landing area, she was one of the ships that stopped them in the Battle of Surigao Strait, the last time in World history when battleships engaged battleships with their big guns.
Subsequently, West Virginia took part in operations to capture Mindoro, Lingayen Gulf, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, using her sixteen-inch guns to support U.S. ground forces. On 1 April 1945, while off Okinawa, she was hit by a Japanese Kamikaze plane but was able to remain in action, continuing her bombardment duties there into June. After Japan's capitulation, West Virginia supported the occupation effort until mid-September. She participated in Operation "Magic Carpet" during the last part of 1945, bringing home veterans of the Pacific war. Inactive after early 1946, she was decommissioned in January 1947. West Virginia earned five battle stars for World War II service. Following twelve years in the Pacific Reserve Fleet, USS West Virginia was sold for scrapping in August 1959.
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