Commissioning Class June 30 1943 USS Boston

Of the 1,475 enlisted shipmates who were commissioned with the ship  (USS Boston CA-69) on June 30, 1943, I noticed an interesting split between experienced sailors and new raw recruits.  When I split the sailors into two groups, the Seamen 2nd Class and everyone else, an interesting picture emerges: The older sailors are well distributed across the US from where they enlisted, and the new sailors (the Seamen 2nd class) came primarily from the northeast region (New England, NY, and PA).

As the war progressed the older sailors were rotated off to other ships, and the Seamen 2nd class were promoted quickly and took over the running of the Boston.

On commissioning day, 783 sailors had advanced beyond the rank of Seaman 2nd class; and 692 of the sailors were Seaman 2nd class rank.

Of the more advanced sailors, 11% came from california, 9% came from New York, 9% came from Massachusetts, 6% came from Texas, 6% came from Ohio, 5% came from Missouri, 5% came from Pennsylvania, 3% came from each of Illinois, Virginia, Iowa, Louisiana, Hawaii (probably re-enlistments), Michigan and North Carolina.  Thirty other states gave 1 to 18 sailors to provide leadership and stability.

Of the Seaman 2nd class sailors, 23% came from New York State, 20% from Massachusetts, 15% from Pennsylvania,  10% from Rhode Island, and 9% from Maine, 7% from New Hampshire, 6% from Connecticut, and 5% from New Jersey.  Twelve other states gave between 1 and 6 sailors as raw recruits.

As I entered Data, most of the Seamen 2nd class sailors were on Frank Studenski’s crew list which was compiled late in the war, however, many of the more advanced in rank sailors I added which meant they were not still on the boat at the end of the war.

Current number of sailors in the USS boston Database 2,353.

Click crew list to find a sailor, then click on his name to see his record.

Bill