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John H. Hoover papers

 Collection — Multiple Containers
Identifier: MSC-308

Scope and Contents

The collection consists of fourteen boxes of manuscript material documenting the admiral’s distinguished naval career, with emphasis on the World War II period.

Series I, Naval Orders, 1902–1952, consists of his appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy, assignments to ships and shore duty, promotions, travel orders, leave of absence requests, temporary duty assignments, additional duty assignments, change of duty assignments, requests for instruction, examinations for promotion, commendations, awards, citations, appointments, and a transfer to the retired list.

Correspondence, 1941–1948, comprises Series II. This is the largest series in the collection and contains letters both sent and received during the World War II period when Hoover was Commander of the Caribbean Sea Frontier, Commander Marianas, and briefly Deputy Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet and Pacific Ocean Areas under Admiral Chester W. Nimitz.

Subseries I contains letters sent and received regarding the administration of the Caribbean Sea Frontier, 1941–1945, with a focus on the Free French Government in Martinique, the administration of Aruba-Curaçao, Guantanamo, Cuba, and Trinidad, as well as some miscellaneous correspondence. Topics discussed in the correspondence include local defense plans, Army-Navy cooperation, the U-boat menace, routing of convoys, supply problems, shipping of oil and bauxite, relations with the British, Dutch, and French, personnel issues, need for more ships, airplanes, and torpedo nets, and the condition of bases on the islands. Major correspondents include Admirals Ernest J. King, Royal Ingersoll, Richmond K. Turner, Harold Stark, Patrick N.C. Bellinger, Richard S. Edwards, Frank J. Horne, Alexander Sharpe, Charles Hartigan, Jonas Ingram, Lee Noyes, Thomas Wilkinson, Alfred Johnson, Adolphus Andrews, Randall Jacobs, Jesse Oldendorf, Arthur G. Robinson, and James L. Kaufmann. There are letters from General Henri Giraud, French Army, Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic, Rexford Tugwell, Governor of Puerto Rico, and SECNAV Frank Knox as well. The miscellaneous correspondence has letters from Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz regarding assignments.

eries II has letters sent and received when Hoover was commander of the Forward Area Pacific, Commander, Marianas, and Deputy Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet and Pacific Ocean Areas, 1943–1945. The organization and location of airfields, command Air Organization, the defense of Saipan, Tinian, the Marshalls and Gilberts, harbor facilities, Fleet Air Wing One, Operations Flintlock and Galvanic, command organization, Japanese POWs, recreation needs, civil affairs, military training, and island natives are issues mentioned in this correspondence. Major correspondents include General Sanderford Jarman, Commander William Quigley, Major General Thomas E. Watson, Commodore John Magruder, Vice Admiral George Murray, Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Lieutenant General Robert Richardson, Vice Admiral John Towers, Rear Admiral Charles H. McMorris, Vice Admiral Willis Lee, and Vice Admiral William W. Smith.

The latter part of Series II consists of letters sent and received, 1945–1948, treating promotions, medals, invitations to speak before groups, the proposed merger of the Armed Forces, creation of the Department of Defense, the Atomic Bomb Tests Evaluation Board of which Hoover was a member, and letters of thanks and appreciation. Correspondents include Rear Admiral Alva Bernhard, Vice Admiral William L. Calhoun, Admiral Edward C. Kalbfus, Rear Admiral Richard W. Bates, Rear Admiral Arthur Radford, and Rear Admiral Thomas Sprague. These letters are unclassified.

Some of the correspondence in Series II, Subseries I and II, is classified and open only to individuals with an appropriate security clearance.

Speeches, Series III, has copies of his Navy Day Address in Butte, Montana, 1945, a Navy Day Memorial Speech in Toledo, Ohio, 1947, and a copy of a transcript of a Mutual Broadcasting Company interview regarding the Battle of Iwo Jima, 1945.

Subject Files, Series IV, houses files on the submarines and a submarine officers conference, 1927, information on torpedoes at the Royal Torpedo Factory, Greenock, Scotland, 1918, and the ships SS Cristobal, USS Wright, and USS Farquhar.

Series V, Journals, contains Hoover’s holograph account of his navy assignments, October 1, 1907–January 17, 1914. Tipped in are programs, drawings, postcards, and reports. Included also are a memoir entitled “Some Navy Years, 1903–1919” by Edward F. Johnson, a Night Order Book from the USS Cushing, 1918, a 50th Anniversary book commemorating Naval Aviation, 1960, and an Administrative History of the Caribbean Sea Frontier, 1948.

Miscellany, Series VI, constitutes a large collection of various documents, including reports to the SECNAV on the visit of Submarine Division 8 to Ecuador, March 14–29, 1925, a report on aviation medical activities and facilities, October 1945, and a report on Hoover’s medical exam, 1951; rosters of officers in USS Curtiss (AV 4), July 1 and September 1, 1942; roster of those killed and wounded, June 21, 1945; roster of officers, January 1, 1944; and addresses of USNR officer who served in Hoover’s wartime commands, September 10, 1941 and May 1, 1957.

Other items in Miscellany are identification badges, certificates of membership, a U.S. Naval Academy graduation program, 1944, citations, a diploma from the Naval War College, programs, news clippings, and an aviation log, Curtiss Hydro Aeroplane, 1913.

Photographs comprise Series VII. Most of the photographs date from Hoover’s wartime commands in the Caribbean and the Central Pacific area, 1942–1945. There are photographs of people and scenes in the Gilbert Islands, the Marshalls, Iwo Jima, Saipan, Tinian, Eniwetok, Guam, Palau, the USS Curtiss (AV 4), the visit of General Henri Giraud to the Caribbean Sea Frontier, Admiral Hoover, the Point Honda wreck, 1923, and an album of the Syrian Army, Beirut, 1915.

The collection has two boxes of folio items that house photographs of ADM Hoover, his U.S. Army War College diploma, 1937, two 78 RPM records of the Mutual Broadcasting interview with Hoover on the Iwo Jima and Guam invasion, 1945, and a 36 mm film of Operation Crossroads, Bikini Island Atom Bomb tests, 1946.

Hoover’s student thesis on Policy, 1914, is listed in the appendix to further research sources.

Dates

  • Creation: 1903-1957

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

Boxes 1-6 contain restricted material; reserachers must have qualifying credentials to view material. For the remainder of the collection, access is open to all researchers, unless otherwise specified.

Conditions Governing Use

Material in this collection is in the public domain, unless otherwise noted.

Biographical Note

Admiral John H. Hoover was born in Seville, Ohio on May 15, 1887, to Benjamin Franklin Hoover and Claudia Crawford Hoover. He entered the U.S. Naval Academy with the class of 1907 from Great Falls, Montana and graduated in September 1906. He first served in the USS Chicago, then reported to the USS Chester in 1908 for two years. While serving in the Chester, he had instruction in torpedoes at the Washington Navy Yard. Next, he reported to the Bath Iron Works for duty fitting out the USS Paulding, where he served as executive officer and engineering officer.

Hoover was assigned to USS North Dakota until the outbreak of World War I in Europe. In 1912, he and his crew manned the Panama Railroad’s steamship Cristobal during a seaman’s strike and traveled between New York and the Canal Zone. For a short time in 1914, he was associated with the Naval War College. In 1915, he was assigned to the Naval Gun Factory in Washington, D.C., where he was involved in torpedo manufacture, experimental projects, and testing. Hoover was sent to Queenstown, Ireland in command of USS Cushing engaged in convoy and anti-submarine duty in 1918.

Once World War I ended, he was sent to London, England, and Greenock, Scotland, where he was involved in torpedo manufacture for the Royal Navy. In 1919–1920, he served in five different destroyers in the Atlantic and Pacific Fleets. He was a Force Gunnery Officer with the Commander, Destroyer Force, Pacific Fleet in 1920–1921. From 1921 to 1923, he was billeted at the Naval Gun Factory, working with torpedo testing and fire control equipment.

Hoover completed Submarine School at the New London Submarine Base in 1924 and took command of Submarine Division Eight and Nineteen in the Canal Zone, followed by two years in the Material Division (Submarine Desk) of the Chief of Naval Operations’ office. He then underwent flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station and was designated a naval aviator in 1929.

From 1929–1931, he was executive officer of USS Lexington. Hoover was a student in the senior class at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island and graduated in June 1932. For the next two years he was Commanding Officer of the Naval Air Station in San Diego, California. Prior to joining the USS Langley in 1935, he was Chief of Staff to Commander Aircraft, Base Force. Following two years in the Langley, he was with the Bureau of Aeronautics in Washington, D.C. He graduated from the Army War College in 1937 and took command of the Naval Air Station, Norfolk, Virginia later that year.

Hoover was commanding officer of the USS Lexington in June 1938 for a year. He served as Chief of Staff and Aide to the Commander Aircraft, Battle Force, Pacific until mid 1941. In July 1941, he became Commandant of the Tenth Naval District, San Juan, Puerto Rico and Commander Caribbean Naval Coastal Frontier. The command was renamed the Caribbean Sea Frontier in late 1941. He continued in that assignment until August 1943 when he was designated Commander Carrier Division Four, Commander Task Force Fifty-Seven, Pacific Fleet. Soon after, he was appointed Commander Aircraft, Central Pacific Force. In April 1944, he became Commander of the Forward Area, Central Pacific and in 1945 Commander, Marianas.

In July 1945, he was selected Deputy Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet and Pacific Ocean Areas, second in command to Admiral Chester W. Nimitz. A month later he became Commander Fleet Air, West Coast. In 1946, he was appointed to the Navy’s General Board and also served on the Staff Evaluation Board for the Bikini bomb tests conducted that year. He was appointed to the Naval Examining and Retiring Board and the Army-Navy Petroleum Board in 1947. He retired from the Navy in 1948 after forty-two years of service.

Admiral Hoover’s medals include the Navy Cross, the Distinguished Service Medal with two Gold Stars, the Victory Medal, Destroyer Clasp, American Defense Service Medal, Fleet Clasp, American Campaign Medal, Asiatic Pacific Campaign Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal.

He was a member of the New York Yacht Club and the Army-Navy Country Club in Washington, D.C.

After retirement, Admiral Hoover made his home in Bethesda, Maryland. He died on December 3, 1970. His survivors included his wife, Helen, his son, William, and daughters, Helen and Jeanne.

Extent

14 boxes

Language of Materials

English

Abstract

Papers: Naval Orders, 1903-1952; Correspondence as CO, Caribbean Sea Frontier, 1941-1943, CO, Forward Area, Central Pacific, and CO, Air Central Pacific, including letters from ADM Chester W. Nimitz, 1943-1945; Miscellaneous Correspondence, 1941-1948; Speeches, 1945-1949; Reports, 1920-1928; Personal Journal, 1907-1914; Subject files on ships, 1912-1935; Roster of officers, 1941-1957; Administrative History of the Caribbean Sea Frontier, 1948; Miscellany, including citations, programs, diplomas and news releases; WWII photographs of the Caribbean and the Pacific, 1941-1945; Night Order Book, 1918; Memoir entitled "Some Navy Years, 1903-1919" by E.F. Johnson; 16 mm film on Operation Crossroads, 1946; 78 LPR of interview with ADM Hoover on the Iwo Jima invasion and Gaum; Folio photographs and newspapers.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

The papers of Admiral John H. Hoover were donated to the Naval War College Foundation in 2010 by the admiral’s grandson and namesake, John H. Hoover of Moorestown, New Jersey, and his daughter-in-law, Mrs. William H. Hoover of Annapolis, Maryland.

Title
John H. Hoover papers
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin

Repository Details

Part of the Naval War College Archives Repository

Contact:
US Naval War College
686 Cushing Rd
Newport RI 02841 US