Several ‘Coast Guard stories’ connect to Carteret County, N.C.

When the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Alexander Hamilton was torpedoed off the coast of Iceland on Jan. 29, 1942, by Germany’s U-132, it was the first Coast Guard casualty of World War II.

Thirty-two Coast Guardsmen were killed during that attack, including Livingston Ward Brooks of Harkers Island, who was the first Carteret County, N.C., resident to die in World War II.

(Generic U-boat painting)

Yet, 81 crew members from the Alexander Hamilton were rescued at sea.

The last three Coasties to abandon ship were Cmdr. Arthur Graham Hall and two of his enlisted men – Down East Carteret County “boys” Hugh Salter of Sea Level and Nathan Robinson of Atlantic.

Hall, a native of Washington, D.C., advanced to become a Rear Admiral in the Coast Guard. His final assignment before retirement in 1954 was as superintendent of the Coast Guard Academy in New London, Conn. (shown below).

 

In 2009, Cheryl Burke of the Carteret County News-Times interviewed veteran Hugh Salter as part of the newspaper’s Independence Day coverage. 

Excerpts from her article follow:

“Mr. Salter was born in 1921 in Sea Level, a small, isolated fishing village. He had no idea he would land 20 years later on a ship that would head to the bottom of the icy North Atlantic waters of Iceland.”

“Mr. Salter, 19, joined the Coast Guard on Aug. 13, 1940. After boot camp training in Baltimore, Seaman 3rd Class Salter was assigned to the Coast Guard Cutter Alexander Hamilton, which was based in Norfolk, Va.”

“His vessel was assigned to weather observation patrol in the mid-Atlantic between the Azores and Bermuda,” Burke wrote. “He continued in that service until war was declared in December 1941 (and the Coast Guard automatically came under the authority of the U.S. Navy).”

“Thus, when the Alexander Hamilton left port on Dec. 21, 1941, Mr. Salter found himself now serving on a ship considered a Naval vessel.”

“The Alexander Hamilton was assigned to escort convoys in the North Atlantic, which was an especially dangerous assignment because German submarines had found convoys easy prey in that region,” Burke reported.

“Mr. Salter and his five-man crew, including Mr. Robinson, were manning a 3-inch deck gun on Jan. 29, 1942, when the U-132’s torpedo hit the Alexander Hamilton’s starboard side just between the fire room and engine room.”

 

Hugh Salter finished his tour of duty with the Coast Guard in 1945 and returned to Carteret County…and to his bride, Blanche “Bob” Daniels Salter of Cedar Island. He got a job working as a truck driver for T.A. Taylor Seafood Co. in Sea Level.

A former Coast Guard chum from Durham told him “there was money to be made in barbering,” Burke wrote. “Mr. Salter decided to attend barber school in Durham during the week, commuting home on weekends. His wife had found a job at the Morehead Garment Factory in Morehead City.”

 

“While in barber school, Mr. Salter broke his arm playing baseball,” Burke said.

“I managed to graduate from barber school without cutting a single head of hair or giving a shave,” Hugh Salter said.”

“He became an apprentice at Jeff’s Barber Shop in Beaufort,” Burke wrote.

 

“In 1948, he was asked if he would be interested in serving as a special deputy sheriff at a newly opened greyhound track near Morehead City.” (Operated by the Carolina Racing Association, the state-of-the-art complex was located in the 4800 block of Arendell Street, where Parker Buick GMC and the shopping center are today.)

 

“That was the first step that led to a long career for Hugh Salter in law enforcement and politics.”