In 1940, Larry Ponder’s father and uncle had been kicked out of the Navy after signing onto a letter to a Black newspaper detailing racist therapy they’d acquired whereas serving on a warship.
The lads, James and John Ponder, had been a part of a gaggle later dubbed the Philadelphia 15, for the 15 Black sailors on the USS Philadelphia who signed the letter. Although they had been from Alabama, they later moved to Chattanooga, the place Larry Ponder and others of their household had been born and raised.
The brothers had been round 20 years outdated on the time of the letter, Larry Ponder mentioned in an interview Tuesday.
On Friday, Ponder and three different members of the family attended a ceremony on the Pentagon, the place Navy officers formally apologized for expelling the sailors and issued honorable discharges for the sailors, all of whom have died.
“We had been informed that what they did began a motion all through the service,” Ponder mentioned. “However they had been the primary ones to be disciplined and kicked out.”
The Pentagon’s correction was the decision to Ponder’s decadeslong try to right the report.
After his father, John, died in 1997, Ponder mentioned he discovered paperwork detailing his “undesirable” discharge. Now referred to as an “apart from honorable” discharge, the motion barred the 15 sailors from accessing veterans’ advantages. Although his father did not discuss a lot about his time within the Navy, Ponder mentioned he by no means disparaged the army and inspired a number of members of the family to enlist — together with Ponder, who served within the Vietnam Battle.
“It bothered me, as a result of I knew the kind of particular person my dad and my uncle was,” he mentioned. “So I began inquiring about it.”
Years later, a Wikipedia article referred Ponder to a e book by historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, which talked about the Philadelphia 15. He then went down the rabbit gap, monitoring down the letter and associated articles revealed within the Pittsburgh Courier, a number one Black newspaper on the time.
The letter detailed how the 18 Black troopers on the USS Philadelphia, who had been promised possibilities to maneuver up within the Navy, had been shut out of job alternatives and denied pay raises. Whereas white sailors had been despatched into fight, Black sailors had been relegated to the “messman department,” Ponder mentioned, tasked with cleansing and serving different sailors.
“They went by way of the chain of command and nothing occurred,” Ponder mentioned.
Years after his father’s dying, Ponder noticed information of one other Black veteran granted an honorable discharge 75 years after being kicked out. He contacted the legal professional who carried that case, and he or she agreed to assist him freed from cost, Ponder mentioned.
Their first software for exoneration was rejected, he mentioned, as a result of the Navy mentioned it did not have sufficient information to again up a reversal. Ponder and his legal professional, with the assistance of one other legislation agency, equipped the photographs and paperwork he’d discovered and tried once more.
Every week earlier than Friday’s ceremony on the Pentagon, Ponder received on a convention name with Navy officers. They informed him to collect members of the family, particularly those that have served within the army, and despatched him a flight affirmation the night time earlier than he flew out to Washington, D.C.
As soon as the members of the family arrived, Ponder mentioned Navy officers “rolled out the purple carpet” for them, together with a tour of the Pentagon. The Ponders had been the one descendants of the Philadelphia 15 current on the ceremony, held within the Pentagon’s Corridor of Heroes, although Ponder mentioned officers are within the technique of monitoring down different members of the family.
Ponder mentioned studying concerning the Philadelphia 15 has made him respect his father and uncle much more.
“He did not begrudge the Navy,” Ponder mentioned. “He did not speak about them, he did not put the Navy down … my dad, he was hardworking, by no means did complain about something.”
Ponder is a longtime member of the Unity Group of Chattanooga, Eric Atkins, the group’s co-chair, mentioned in an interview Tuesday. The Unity Group and the Chattanooga-Hamilton County NAACP, supported Ponder’s efforts to exonerate his father and uncle.
“African Individuals have served each main fight on this nation from the start,” Atkins mentioned. “They proceed to serve now. That is kind of what this correction represents, that every one troopers ought to be valued…. we do not at all times get it proper, however we will at all times make it proper.”
Together with the Ponder brothers, the letter was signed by Black troopers Ernest Bosley, Arval Perry Cooper, Shannon H. Goodwin, Theodore L. Hansbrough, Byron C. Johnson, Floyd C. Owens, James Porter, George Elbert Rice, Otto Robinson, Floyd C. St. Clair, Fred Louis Tucker, Robert Turner and Jesse Willard Watford, the New York Occasions reported.
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