This Military Service Page was created/owned by
Shane Laemmel, MR3
to remember
Bassett, Leonard Flournoy, CAPT.
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Contact Info
Home Town Pine Bluff, AR
Last Address Coronado, CA
Date of Passing Feb 06, 2006
Official Badges
Unofficial Badges
Additional Information
Last Known Activity:
Capt. Bassett passed away Feb. 8 after a long illness, only a few weeks after his 89th birthday.
Leonard Bassett was born in Pine Bluff, Ark. He attended Arkansas State College before receiving a presidential appointment to the United StatesNavalAcademy in Annapolis, Md., where he graduated in 1940. In 1943, he married Catherine Garthwaite of Oakland, a marriage that lasted 62 years.
In his 30-year naval career, Capt. Bassett served on a number of ships in the Pacific Fleet. He saw action during World War II aboard the USS Concord and the USS St. Louis, where he was awarded the Bronze Star for his service as an assistant gunnery officer. He eventually served on the staff of legendary Admiral Arleigh "Knots” Burke. During the Korean conflict, Capt. Bassett served as a gunnery officer aboard the USS Rochester and the USS Iowa, for which he was awarded two additional Bronze Stars, the Korean Presidential Unit Citation and the Korean Service Medal with three combat stars.
Following World War II, Capt. Bassett attended both the NavalPostgraduateSchool and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he earned an master's of science degree in electrical engineering in 1949.
During the 1950s Capt. Bassett developed a reputation as one of the Navy's top weapons experts. He served with the Navy's Bureau of Weapons and Inspector of Ordnance service, assisting in the development of guidance technology for the TALOS missile system. He attained the rank of captain in 1959, and served as commanding officer of both the USS Rowan and USS Union. In 1965, Capt. Bassett was appointed commander of the Naval Ammunition Depot at Oahu, Hawaii. His last tour of duty was assistant chief of staff for administration COM 11.
After his retirement from the Navy in 1970, Capt. Bassett worked for the United Way, where he headed up the Combined Federal Campaign. He left that job in 1977, and devoted his time to playing golf, building a computer, and spending time with his wife, Cathie in Coronado, their home for 45 years. He was a member of the Coronado Men's Golf Club for more than 35 years, and served on its board of governors in 1971. He played to a 12 handicap, and scored two holes-in-one at the Coronado Golf Course, in 1972 and 1974.
Throughout his life, Capt. Bassett was known and loved for his wonderful and mischievous sense of humor. While serving as commander of the Ammunitions Depot in Hawaii, he once, according to legend, showed up dressed as a ballerina, complete with leotard and tutu, at a base Halloween party. At sea, at home, or on the golf course, Capt. Bassett was always making the people around him laugh. The men who served under his command remembered his sense of humor, and also knew him as an inspirational by-the-book leader with an unshakable sense of fair play.
Capt. Bassett was preceded in death by his wife, Cathie, and by his brother, Dr. John W. Bassett of Portland, Ore. He is survived by his two daughters and sons-in-law, Ann and Bob Hite of Basalt, Colo.; and Cee Cee and Emile Barrios of San Diego.
World War II/Asiatic-Pacific Theater/Iwo Jima Operation
From Month/Year
February / 1945
To Month/Year
March / 1945
Description The Battle of Iwo Jima (19 February – 26 March 1945), or Operation Detachment, was a major battle in which the United States Armed Forces fought for and captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Japanese Empire. The American invasion had the goal of capturing the entire island, including its three airfields (including South Field and Central Field), to provide a staging area for attacks on the Japanese main islands. This five-week battle comprised some of the fiercest and bloodiest fighting of the War in the Pacific of World War II.
After the heavy losses incurred in the battle, the strategic value of the island became controversial. It was useless to the U.S. Army as a staging base and useless to the U.S. Navy as a fleet base. However, Navy SEABEES rebuilt the landing strips, which were used as emergency landing strips for USAAF B-29s.
The Imperial Japanese Army positions on the island were heavily fortified, with a dense network of bunkers, hidden artillery positions, and 18 km (11 mi) of underground tunnels. The Americans on the ground were supported by extensive naval artillery and complete air supremacy over Iwo Jima from the beginning of the battle by U.S. Navy and Marine Corps aviators.
Iwo Jima was the only battle by the U.S. Marine Corps in which the Japanese combat deaths were thrice those of the Americans throughout the battle. Of the 22,000 Japanese soldiers on Iwo Jima at the beginning of the battle, only 216 were taken prisoner, some of whom were captured because they had been knocked unconscious or otherwise disabled. The majority of the remainder were killed in action, although it has been estimated that as many as 3,000 continued to resist within the various cave systems for many days afterwards, eventually succumbing to their injuries or surrendering weeks later.
Despite the bloody fighting and severe casualties on both sides, the Japanese defeat was assured from the start. Overwhelming American superiority in arms and numbers as well as complete control of air power — coupled with the impossibility of Japanese retreat or reinforcement — permitted no plausible circumstance in which the Americans could have lost the battle.
The battle was immortalized by Joe Rosenthal's photograph of the raising of the U.S. flag on top of the 166 m (545 ft) Mount Suribachi by five U.S. Marines and one U.S. Navy battlefield Hospital Corpsman. The photograph records the second flag-raising on the mountain, both of which took place on the fifth day of the 35-day battle. Rosenthal's photograph promptly became an indelible icon — of that battle, of that war in the Pacific, and of the Marine Corps itself — and has been widely reproduced.
