Navy destroyer to be named in honor of the Marine Corps first Black aviator

By Frederick H. Lowe
Contributing Writer

(Special from NorthStar-News Today) – U.S. Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus announced on Wednesday that a destroyer will be named in honor of Frank E. Petersen, Jr., the U.S. Marine Corps first African-American aviator and the military-service branch’s first African-American general.

The USS Frank E. Petersen Jr., an Arleigh Burke-guided-missile destroyer, DDG 121, is being built at the Huntington Ingalls Industries shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss. The ship, which will be 509 feet long, is scheduled to enter the Navy fleet in 2020. It will operate at speeds of more than 30 knots.

“The courage and perseverance of Lt. Gen. Petersen throughout his distinguished and ground-breaking career makes him especially deserving of this honor,” Mabus said.

LT. GENERAL FRANK E. PETERSEN, JR.

Persevere he did.

Lt. General Petersen enlisted in the Navy in 1950, two years after President Harry S. Truman desegregated the armed forces. When Petersen took the Navy entrance exam, he was told to take it a second time by a recruiter who assumed he had cheated because he scored well.

In 1952, Petersen was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Marines. He was later arrested in the officers’ club on suspicion of impersonating a lieutenant.

An instructor flunked him in training and predicted he would never fly. Despite these early challenges, he flew 350 combat missions during the Korean and the Vietnam wars. Petersen was the first African American in the Marine Corps to command a fighter squadron, and an air group at a major base. He was commanding General of the Marine Corps Combat Development Command in Quantico, Va., from June 1986 to July 1988.

While in the Marines, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, Defense Superior Service Medal, Distinguished Flying Cross and the Purple Heart.

He retired from the Marine Corps on August 1, 1988, after 38 years in service. A native of Topeka, Kansas, he was born on March 2, 1932. He died last year at his home in Stevensville, Md., near Annapolis. He was 83.

He tells his story in the 1998 autobiography, Into the Tiger’s Jaw.

This article originally published in the November 21, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.