World War II
On May 16, 1940, he was promoted to Rear-Admiral and on June 13, 1940 on board the light cruiser HNLMS De Ruyter, he took command of the squadron of Rear-Admiral GW Stöve at Surabaya. Early 1942 he commanded the Combined Striking Force of ABDACOM, American British Dutch Australian Command. Doorman was killed in action when his ship HNLMS De Ruyter was sunk in the Battle of the Java Sea. Part of the crew was rescued, but Doorman, following old navy tradition, chose to go down with his ship. On June 5, 1942 he was posthumously made a Knight 3rd class in the Military William Order. The medal was awarded to the Rear-Admiral's eldest son on May 23, 1947 by Lieutenant-Admiral Conrad Emil Lambert Helfrich, on board HNLMS Karel Doorman, attended by Prince Bernhard.
Between 1946 and 2006 the Royal Dutch Navy named three vessels after Karel Doorman, including a former British Colossus class aircraft carrier, the largest ship the Navy ever commissioned.
Read more about this topic: Karel Doorman
Famous quotes containing the words world and/or war:
“The world proceeds from the same spirit as the body of man. It is a remoter and inferior incarnation of God, a projection of God in the unconscious.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Behold now this vast city; a city of refuge, the mansion house of liberty, encompassed and surrounded with his protection; the shop of war hath not there more anvils and hammers waking, to fashion out the plates and instruments of armed justice in defence of beleaguered truth, than there be pens and hands there, sitting by their studious lamps, musing, searching, revolving new notions.”
—John Milton (1608–1674)