Donald Ross received the Medal of Honor for heroism in the attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. He was a chief engineer on the USS Nevada. Although it was crippled by bombs, Ross kept the battleship under power, so it wouldn’t block the harbor when it sank. He rose through the ranks and retired as a captain; the Port Orchard resident died in 1992.
A guided missile destroyer, the USS Ross, was named in his honor. Another missing item was linked to that 1996 launching.
“A missing silver coin was struck for the commissioning of the USS Ross,” said Penny Ross, secretary of the local Sons and Daughters of the Pearl Harbor Survivors. “It has a silver likeness of my dad on the front.”
Other missing pieces of Navy memorabilia are a commemorative medal her father got from the USS Pyro, an ammunition ship that was at Pearl Harbor; and a Navy medal given to her mother, Helen, co-author of a history of the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. Other missing keepsakes include an ornate silver tobacco case; gold chains; a clown-face stick pin with a garnet; and a gold watch owned by her grandfather, who died in 1915.
Some material was recovered after Vancouver police executed a search warrant 10 days after the burglary, Penny Ross said. They included her father’s personnel records at the start of World War II.
“They were on the USS Nevada when it went down,” she said.
The advisory was issued June 6, the 70th anniversary of D-Day. It was appropriate, and not just because it was a day to remember World War II veterans, Penny Ross said. After the USS Nevada was repaired, its WWII service included the naval bombardment of Normandy invasion landing sites, so her father was part of D-Day.
