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JULIAN B. JORDAN, LT, USN

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Julian Jordan '25

Date of birth: April 11, 1904

Date of death: December 7, 1941

Age: 37

Lucky Bag

From the 1925 Lucky Bag:

Julian Bethune Jordan

Dawson, Georgia

"Brown" "Jurgen"

ONE bright day in July, 1921, this modest, unassuming lad entered our midst. Thereafter, he proceeded to calm us down. He remained little known to most of us except occupants of certain famous rooms during our Plebe year.

Youngster year, they put Brown in the same room with two vicious young gamblers and as one of the members of that now-famous den of Iniquity, otherwise Ten Downing Street, he first gathered fame. He almost gathered fame throughout the regiment when "eleven out of thirteen vanished" and he was one of the two who remained; but he proved that, even though there was a crap game going on, he wasn't in it—he was reading the paper, and anyway, he was broke.

'Twas during Second Class cruise that he first gathered his newest nickname, Jurgen. His fighting phrase, "What have you got down there?" bids fair to become one of the famous slogans of the Navy. The name was the product of that episode.

"Aw, knock it off, Ryan!"

"What have you got down there?"

Class Baseball (3, 2).

Loss

From Navsource:

Julian Bethune Jordan was born 11 April 1904, and graduated from the Naval Academy in 1925. He served in USS Chester (CA 27), in USS Dobbin (AD 3), and at various shore stations before reporting to USS Oklahoma (BB 37) on 4 August 1938. While serving as assistant engineering officer on board that battleship, he was one of the valiant men who were lost in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor 7 December 1941.

His wife was listed as next of kin.

Namesake

USS Jordan (DE 204) was named for Julian; the ship was sponsored by his widow, Lucy.

Recovery

From Find A Grave:

By Ed Friedrich

The KitsapSun (Tribune News Service)

Published: August 22, 2016

BREMERTON, Wash. (Tribune News Service) — After 75 years, the remains of a Navy lieutenant who died during the attack on Pearl Harbor have been identified and will be buried with full military honors at a Bremerton, Wash. cemetery.

Lt. Julian Jordan, a 1925 Naval Academy graduate, served as assistant engineering officer aboard the USS Oklahoma. The 37-year-old Georgian was likely below deck in the engine room on the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, said Julian "Jay" Remers, who was named after the grandfather he never knew.

Japanese planes delivered several torpedo hits that caused the ship to quickly capsize. Jordan and 428 shipmates died.

While salvaging the Oklahoma, the Navy recovered the remains of "unknown" sailors and Marines and buried them in two cemeteries. They were disinterred in 1947 and 35 were identified. The other 388 were placed in 61 caskets in 46 plots at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.

In 2015, after great improvements in technology, the remains were ordered to be disinterred again for analysis. In nine months, more than 30 men have been identified. Scientists from the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory identified Jordan by matching DNA to three cousins and through circumstantial evidence and laboratory analysis, including dental records.

Jordan's family was notified April 27, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency spokeswoman Staff Sgt. Kristen Duus said.

"I am very happy that we finally have identification and can properly bury him as a family," said Remers, a Cheyenne, Wyoming, police officer.

Though Jordan's family hailed from Georgia and his widow, Lucy, and a daughter, Nancy, are buried in Florida, and another daughter, Ann Jordan Remers, lives in Tucson, he'll be laid to rest at Bremerton's Forest Lawn Cemetery.

Why?

"Because we don't go there anymore," Remers said of the Southeast.

He and others do visit sister Laurel Remers Pardee's home in Poulsbo. Jordan also was stationed in Bremerton during the 1930s.

"We have proximity to family and a little bit of personal connection between him and Bremerton," Remers, 53, said. "If we travel, we go to see my sister in Poulsbo, so we have the opportunity to visit the grave on a regular basis."

Jordan's daughter Ann Jordan Remers says it's hard to remember what happened 75 years ago, when she was 8 years old. She can picture a little Bremerton bungalow the family rented one summer on a hill that sloped down to the bay. She also recalls her father going to sea and the family moving a lot.

Pearl Harbor was hard on them.

"It was this long period of waiting to see what had happened and see who survived and who didn't," the 83-year-old said. "I don't think we got the actual notice for 10 days."

She's glad the Oklahoma victims are being identified.

"I'm very pleased that these personnel have been recognized and are being given memorial services all over the country in various little towns and cities," she said. "It seems like a form of justice that they aren't just cast aside and commingled with other remains."

Though he never met his grandfather, Julian Remers admires him.

"He loved his country, he loved the Navy. I'm sure he was proud of his ship, and he died with his crew," he said. "I consider him to be a hero and a patriot and part of the family's legacy of service."

The service will be Sunday at the Kitsap Way funeral home.

No new information is available about two West Sound residents, Petty Officer 3rd Class Bruce Ellsion, of Poulsbo, and Seaman Ralph Keil, of Port Gamble, who were aboard the Oklahoma, Duus said.

Navy Directories & Officer Registers

The "Register of Commissioned and Warrant Officers of the United States Navy and Marine Corps" was published annually from 1815 through at least the 1970s; it provided rank, command or station, and occasionally billet until the beginning of World War II when command/station was no longer included. Scanned copies were reviewed and data entered from the mid-1840s through 1922, when more-frequent Navy Directories were available.

The Navy Directory was a publication that provided information on the command, billet, and rank of every active and retired naval officer. Single editions have been found online from January 1915 and March 1918, and then from three to six editions per year from 1923 through 1940; the final edition is from April 1941.

The entries in both series of documents are sometimes cryptic and confusing. They are often inconsistent, even within an edition, with the name of commands; this is especially true for aviation squadrons in the 1920s and early 1930s.

Alumni listed at the same command may or may not have had significant interactions; they could have shared a stateroom or workspace, stood many hours of watch together… or, especially at the larger commands, they might not have known each other at all. The information provides the opportunity to draw connections that are otherwise invisible, though, and gives a fuller view of the professional experiences of these alumni in Memorial Hall.

Julian B Jordan