World War I
On April 6, 1917, the U.S. Congress declared war on Germany and officially entered World War I. At the time, soldiers and sailors with Spanish surnames or Spanish accents were sometimes the objects of ridicule and relegated to menial jobs. However, Hispanics continued to join the military and serve their nation.
Captain Robert F. Lopez retired from the Navy in 1911. During World War I, he was recalled to active duty and given the rank of Commodore (equivalent to a one star admiral rank, typically used during war time) to command the Mare Island Naval Shipyard.
Luis de Florez graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1911 before joining the Navy. During World War I he became a Naval Aviator. Commander de Flores is credited with numerous inventions which made better flight simulators and equipment for flight safety.
Lieutenant Frederick Lois Riefkohl (1889–1969), a native of Maunabo, Puerto Rico, became the first Puerto Rican to graduate from the USNA, and served as Commander of the Armed Guard of the USS Philadelphia. On August 2, 1917, after engaging an enemy submarine, he was awarded the Navy Cross, the second highest medal that can be awarded by the U.S. Navy
George E. Fernandez a Water Tender ( a first-class petty officer in charge in a fireroom) aboard the USS Shaw was awarded the Navy Cross on October 9, 1918, after his actions aboard the USS Shaw on October 9, 1918, when the Shaw collided with the RMS Aquitania and was cut in two and set on fire. Fernandez threw the ammunition that was piled on the deck of the Shaw overboard, saving the lives of many of his fellow crewmen.
Read more about this topic: Hispanics In The United States Navy
Famous quotes containing the words war i, world war, world and/or war:
“Every country we conquer feeds us. And these are just a few of the good things we’ll have when this war is over.... Slaves working for us everywhere while we sit back with a fork in our hands and a whip on our knees.”
—Curtis Siodmak (1902–1988)
“Surely there is not a capitalist or well-informed person in this world today who believes that [World War I] is being fought to make the world safe for democracy. It is being fought to make the world safe for capital.”
—Rose Porter Stokes (1879–1933)
“I have often noticed that after I had bestowed on the characters of my novels some treasured item of my past, it would pine away in the artificial world where I had so abruptly placed it.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“The war was a mirror; it reflected man’s every virtue and every vice, and if you looked closely, like an artist at his drawings, it showed up both with unusual clarity.”
—George Grosz (1893–1959)