Wreaths Across America Honors “The Four Chaplains”

On Friday, Feb. 3, 2023, Wreaths Across America will honor the American heroes known as “The Four Chaplains” with a special live event at 12 p.m. CST from the nondenominational Balsam Valley Chapel and balsam tip lands located in the Downeast Region of Maine. This event is open to the local public and will be streamed on the organization’s Official Facebook Page and Wreaths Across America Radio. 

On Jan. 23, 1943, the U.S.A.T. Dorchester left New York harbor bound for Greenland carrying over 900 officers, servicemen and civilian workers. The ship was a coastal passenger steamship requisitioned and operated by the War Shipping Administration (WSA) for wartime use as a troop ship. The ship was transiting the Labrador Sea when it was torpedoed by a German U-boat (U-233) on Feb. 3, 1943. The ship sank, and 675 people on board lost their lives. Amidst the chaos to save 230 lives, four chaplains guided soldiers trapped below deck to escape hatches and gave away their life jackets to save others on that fateful day. When the chaplains had done all they could, they linked arms to pray and sing hymns as the Dorchester slipped beneath the waves.
 
To Vie Facebook Live event, https://fb.me/e/3kdsMqpvd
 
To learn more about “The Four Chaplains,” view this video.
 
To learn more and to download pictures of the Four Chaplains and the U.S.A.T. Dorchester, follow this link.




Rev. George L. Fox was born in Lewistown, Pennsylvania, assigned to Camp Newton D. Baker in Texas. and embarked from Camp Merritt, New Jersey.

Reform Rabbi Alexander D. Goode (Ph.D.) was born in Brooklyn, New York, on May 10, 1911, the son of Rabbi Hyman Goodekowitz. He was raised in Washington, D.C., schooled in Cincinnati and Massachusetts and served as a rabbi in Indiana and Pennsylvania.

Rev. Clark V. Poling was born in Columbus, Ohio, studied at Yale University's Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut and served first in the First Church of Christ, New London, Connecticut, before becoming pastor of the First Reformed Church, in Schenectady, New York.

Catholic Priest Father John P. Washington was born on July 18, 1908. He was raised and worked in New Jersey.

For more information or to sponsor a wreath, please visit www.wreathsacrossamerica.org.