Updates: Wake Rosters and Oregon memorial
My recent work on the Wake Island rosters for Oregon and Idaho revealed several minor errors and missing information which I am glad to correct for the Wake Island Rosters posted at this website. I reentered two names for men who used an alias on Wake so that the legal name appears alphabetically (with the alias in parentheses) rather than vice versa. They are Charters, Carl C. (alias William McGallister) and Burke, Raymond L. (alias George Moore). I have uploaded a revised CPNAB roster to the Wake Rosters page (accessed via the home page, top task bar).
The information in these website rosters is a fraction of what I have in my master database, so if you have questions or corrections for any individual in the two civilian or three military rosters, please contact me at bonita.gilbert@gmail.com . I also seek photographs for the several hundred Wake men whose families did not submit before publication of the Blue Book in 1945, so would welcome any photos (preferably prewar or near postwar) to fill in the gaps. I have eighteen so far and will share a gallery as it builds.
A few months ago I posted about the state of Oregon passing HCR 23 in the spring of 2025 with both the House and Senate voting unanimously to honor the 134 Wake Island civilians from Oregon in WWII, including 31 who died in the war: two killed in action, eleven among the 98 executed in 1943, and eighteen as POWs. I contacted Oregon families with the news and expectation that a granite memorial would be erected on Capitol grounds this fall. However, major reconstruction of the Capitol in Salem continues and no additions will be approved until the project nears completion. Stay tuned.
Members of the Idaho legislature have expressed interest in following a similar path to honor the Wake Island civilians from the state. My initial work shows 225 Wake Idahoans, of whom thirty-two died in WWII. I expect action to pick up in Boise as we approach the 2026 legislative session.
In the lull between the close of the Oregon legislation and the start of the Idaho project, I have searched for sources to confirm which of the Wake civilians were also military veterans. With birthdates ranging from 1878 to 1924, some were WWI vets, and sources such as Ancestry.com and FindaGrave were helpful in verifying that information. So far, I have found about thirty WWI veterans – and one who was in the Spanish American War in 1898. However, those survivors who were still alive in 1981 became eligible for WWII discharges from the Navy, medals, and full veterans’ benefits for their contribution to the defense of Wake Island. I could find no source through the Veterans Administration or other avenues to search until the BIRLS (Beneficiary Identification Records Locator Subsystem) VA database recently became available, thanks to the persistence of an organization called Reclaim the Records. Of the 104 Oregon survivors, 50 had died before 1981, but 43 of those still living achieved WWII veteran status (the remainder did not apply). I will share progress on the full civilian roster going forward but invite you to visit the BIRLS database for your own searches.
