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Contact Info
Last Address Annapolis, MD
Date of Passing Jul 19, 1971
Location of Interment U.S. Naval Academy Cemetery and Columbarium (VLM) - Annapolis, Maryland
In September 1943, Admiral Hill became Commander Amphibious Group Two, Fifth Amphibious Force, and in that capacity participated in the capture of Tarawa, and later in operations against the Gilberts, Marshalls, Marianas, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa.
He relieved the Commander Fifth Amphibious Force at Okinawa in April 1945, and commanded the amphibious and support operations of that force until that island was secured at the end of June.
At the close of the war in August 1945, he commanded the Amphibious Force, which landed the Sixth Army in Southwestern Japan for occupation duty. On 1 November 1945, he assumed duty as Commandant of the Army-Navy Staff College, and in June 1946, Vice Admiral Hill established and served as Commandant of the National War College, the highest-level educational institution of the Armed Forces and the State Department.
In September 1949, he reported as Chairman of the General Board, Navy Department, and on 28 April 1950 became Superintendent of the Naval Academy and Commandant, Severn River Naval Command. He continued to serve as such after his retirement on 1 May 1952, until August 1952.
Independence Day dawned, foggy, windless and cold. The temperature was now three degrees below zero, and still the convoy had farther north to go. On the American merchant ships, the tattered Stars and Stripes were hauled down and clean new Ensigns were run up in their place. From the bridge of the British cruiser Norfolk, the daylight signaling lantern was flashing a Fourth of July greeting across the American cruiser Wichita: “Many happy returns of the day. The United States is the only country with a known birthday.”
Captain H. W. Hill, USN, made the reply, “Thank you. I think England should celebrate Mother’s Day.”
World War II/Asiatic-Pacific Theater/Mariana and Palau Islands Campaign (1944)
From Month/Year
June / 1944
To Month/Year
November / 1944
Description The Mariana and Palau Islands campaign, also known as Operation Forager, was an offensive launched by United States forces against Imperial Japanese forces in the Mariana Islands and Palau in the Pacific Ocean between June and November, 1944 during the Pacific War. The United States offensive, under the overall command of Chester Nimitz, followed the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign and was intended to neutralize Japanese bases in the central Pacific, support the Allied drive to retake the Philippines, and provide bases for a strategic bombing campaign against Japan.
Beginning the offensive, United States Marine Corps and United States Army forces, with support from the United States Navy, executed landings on Saipan in June, 1944. In response, the Imperial Japanese Navy's combined fleet sortied to attack the U.S. Navy fleet supporting the landings. In the resulting aircraft carrier Battle of the Philippine Sea (the so-called “Great Marianas Turkey Shoot”) on 19–20 June, the Japanese naval forces were decisively defeated with heavy and irreplaceable losses to their carrier-borne and land-based aircraft.
Thereafter, U.S. forces executed landings on Guam and Tinian in July, 1944. After heavy fighting, Saipan was secured in July and Guam and Tinian in August, 1944. The U.S. then constructed airfields on Saipan and Tinian where B-29s were based to conduct strategic bombing missions against the Japanese mainland until the end of World War II, including the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
In the meantime, in order to secure the flank for U.S. forces preparing to attack Japanese forces in the Philippines, in September, 1944, U.S. Marine and Army forces landed on the islands of Peleliu and Angaur in Palau. After heavy and intense combat on Peleliu, the island was finally secured by U.S. forces in November, 1944.
Following their landings in the Mariana and Palau Islands, Allied forces continued their ultimately successful campaign against Japan by landing in the Philippines in October, 1944 and the Volcano and Ryukyu Islands beginning in January, 1945.