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Nicole Summers, MMFN
to remember
Ball, Louis Dixon, MoMM2c.
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Casualty Info
Home Town McCrory ,AR
Last Address McCrory, AR
Casualty Date Mar 05, 1943
Cause MIA-Finding of Death
Reason Lost At Sea-Unrecovered
Location Pacific Ocean
Conflict World War II
Location of Interment Manila American Cemetery - Taguig City, Philippines
Wall/Plot Coordinates Tablets of the Missing (Cenotaph)
Official Badges
Unofficial Badges
Additional Information
Last Known Activity:
In company with USS Grayback, USS Grampus departed Brisbane on 11 February 1943, for her sixth war patrol from which she failed to return; the manner of her loss still remains a mystery. Japanese seaplanes reported sinking a submarine on 18 February in Grampus' patrol area, but Grayback reported seeing Grampus in that same area 4 March. On 5 March 1943, the Japanese destroyers Minegumo and Murasame conducted an attack preceding the Battle of Blackett Strait, near Kolombangara island. A heavy oil slick was sighted there the following day, indicating that Grampus may have been lost there in a night attack or gun battle against the destroyers. The Japanese destroyers had by then already been sunk in a night action with U.S. cruisers and destroyers.
When repeated attempts failed to contact Grampus, the submarine was declared missing and presumed lost with all hands. Her name was struck from the Naval Vessel Register on 21 June 1943.
World War II/Asiatic-Pacific Theater
From Month/Year
December / 1941
To Month/Year
September / 1945
Description The plan of the Pacific subseries was determined by the geography, strategy, and the military organization of a theater largely oceanic. Two independent, coordinate commands, one in the Southwest Pacific under General of the Army Douglas MacArthur and the other in the Central, South, and North Pacific (Pacific Ocean Areas) under Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, were created early in the war. Except in the South and Southwest Pacific, each conducted its own operations with its own ground, air, and naval forces in widely separated areas. These operations required at first only a relatively small number of troops whose efforts often yielded strategic gains which cannot be measured by the size of the forces involved. Indeed, the nature of the objectivesùsmall islands, coral atolls, and jungle-bound harbors and airstrips, made the employment of large ground forces impossible and highlighted the importance of air and naval operations. Thus, until 1945, the war in the Pacific progressed by a double series of amphibious operations each of which fitted into a strategic pattern developed in Washington.