Hubert Esterly Paddock Obituary (1901 - 1980)

Born Dec 13, 1901, Hubert Esterly Paddock attended Charlevoix High School in Charlevoix, MI. View the obituary, post a memory, or share a photo about Hubert Esterly Paddock.

Graduation Year	Class of 1911
Date of Birth	Dec 13, 1901
Date of Passing	Aug 03, 1980
About	"Capt. H.E. Paddock, Navy Veteran, 88 CHARLEVOIX - Funeral services for Capt. Hubert E. Paddock, 88, a veteran of 31 years with the U.S. Navy, will be held at the First Congregational Church at 2 p.m. Thursday. The Rev. Raymond Giffin will officiate. Interment will be in Brookside Cemetery. Capt. Paddock died Sunday at Grandvue Medical Facility where he had been a patient for two weeks. He had been hospitalized since July 5 when he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. He was born in Charlevoix April 9, 1892 and received an appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy and was commissioned an Ensign upon graduation in 1915. During World War I he served aboard the USS Dyer and later in the Caribbean where the Navy was dispatched to protect the sugar plantation owners in Cuba. He went to serve as an officer aboard the battleship, USS West Virginia; the heavy cruiser, USS Pensacola and, in 1937, commissioned the destroyer, the USS Lamson. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, he the commanding officer of a tender, the USS Dobbin, flagship of a flotilla of destroyers. The flotilla received comparatively minor damage in the attack and shortly thereafter the entire flotilla was dispatched to Australia. Later in the war, he was returned to activate Port Hueneme, home of the SeaBees on the West Coast and was named its first commandant. He was in command of a flotilla of landing craft in preparation for the invasion of Japan when the war ended in August 1945. He was retired a year later after completing 31 years of active service. His assignments were interspersed with shore duty, among them the War Academy at Newport, R.I. and as officer in charge of the Naval R.O.T.C. at Georgia Tech. After his return to Charlevoix he became active in various organizations. He was a member of the First Congregational Church; a member and past president of the Charlevoix Kiwanis Club; World War I Barracks No. 2710; state vice commander of Retreads, an organization of World War I and II veterans; Charlevoix just of the peace and Charlevoix County veterans administrator. Following his return to Charlevoix, he had married the former Mrs. Mildred Smith who preceded him in death on Dec. 23, 1977. Surviving are three daughters, Mrs. Hugh (Mildred) Richards of Madison, Wis., Mrs. Rudy (Virginia) Scharschmidt of Battle Creek, and Mrs. Roger (Cynthia) Postmus of Ann Arbor; two sons, Vane H. Smith of Charlevoix and Douglas G. Smith of Garden, Mi.; 12 grandchildren; two great-grandchildren and two brothers, William Paddock of Pauma Valley, Calif., and Richard Paddock of Edwardsville, Ill. The family suggests memorials to the First Congregational Church. Friends may call at the Winchester Funeral Home."