Ernest Graves Jr.

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Ernest Graves Jr.
Army Commendation Medal (4)
RelationsRogers Birnie (grandfather)
Ernest Graves Sr. (father)

Ernest Graves Jr. (6 July 1924 – 21 May 2019) was a United States Army officer who attained the rank of lieutenant general. A graduate of the United States Military Academy, where he was ranked second in the class of 1944, he commanded troops in Europe during World War II and in Vietnam during the Vietnam War. He served with a bomb assembly team with the Manhattan Project and was present at the Operation Sandstone nuclear tests in 1948. He was the Director of Military Application at the Atomic Energy Commission its successor, the Energy Research and Development Administration, from 1973 to 1975, the Deputy Chief of Engineers from 1977 to 1978, and the director of the Defense Security Assistance Agency from 1978 to 1981.

Early life

Ernest Graves Jr. was born in New York City on 6 July 1924, the only son of Ernest Graves Sr., a retired Army officer, and his wife Lucy.[1][2] Her maiden name was Lucy Birnie, but she had subsequently taken the name of her first husband, Harry Horgan, who died of tuberculosis.[3] The family moved to Washington, D.C., when Graves was two years old, where he spent his childhood,[2] and was educated at St. Albans School.[4]

In 1941, Graves passed the entrance examination for the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York,[5] where his father had graduated second in the class of 1905,[1][6] and his maternal grandfather, Rogers Birnie, first in the class of 1872.[6][7][8] He secured an appointment from Senator John H. Overton, and reported to West Point on 1 July 1941. He was required to wear civilian clothes and pay room and board for the first five days of Beast Barracks until July 6, when he reached his 17th birthday.[9]

World War II

Due to

U.S. Army Engineer School at Fort Belvoir in Virginia, followed by six weeks as a platoon commander at the Engineer Replacement Training Center there.[10]

Lieutenant General

George V Hotel in Paris, and often functioned as an additional aide. When not occupied with such duties, he worked in the Control Section of COMZ Headquarters, where he compiled statistical reports.[11] He was promoted to first lieutenant on 6 December 1944.[6]

On 31 December 1944, Graves joined the 1282nd Engineer Combat Battalion as a platoon commander. The unit had recently been converted from an anti-aircraft artillery battalion, and was training in England. The unit moved to Germany in April 1945, where it worked on construction projects in

Marseilles, whence it sailed to the Philippines via the Panama Canal, Hawaii and Ulithi on the SS Lurline. It arrived in August 1945, just as the war in the Pacific was ending.[12]

Post-war

Graves went to see

Eighth United States Army Headquarters.[13] He was promoted to captain on 3 January 1946.[6]

During the war the military side of the

cub scout with Groves's son Richard, but his selection was based on his West Point class standing.[18]

The 2761st Engineer Battalion (Special) was commanded by Colonel Gilbert M. Dorland, and consisted of a headquarters company, a security company (Company A), a bomb assembly company (Company B) and a radiological monitoring company (Company C), although Company C was never fully formed. For training purposes, Company B was initially divided into command, electrical, mechanical and nuclear groups, but the intention was to create three integrated 36-man bomb assembly teams.

Eniwetok Atoll in the Pacific.[18]

Deciding to pursue a graduate degree in physics, Graves asked Dorland to put him on the list of nominees for graduate school, but was passed over. So he went to see Groves, who ordered Dorland to add him to the list.[21] Because Graves's West Point class had missed out on a year of coursework, the Army first sent him to the Naval Postgraduate School in Annapolis, Maryland, where he took a year of senior undergraduate courses in math, physics and chemistry from 20 July 1948 to 28 May 1949.[6][22]

Graves then entered the

PhD. His father spoke to the new Chief of Engineers, Lieutenant General Lewis A. Pick, who approved it over the objection of the personnel section.[23] He completed his thesis on "The angular distributions of particles emitted from nuclear reactions in gaseous targets" in 1951.[24]

While at MIT, Graves met Nancy Herbert Barclay,[25] a graduate of Wellesley College with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics, who was working for a law firm in Boston. They were married in Paoli, Pennsylvania, where her parents lived,[26] on 12 May 1951. That had four children: Ralph Henry, Robert Barclay, William Hooper and Emily Birnie.[25] Ralph and Emily later became US Army officers,[2] Ralph graduating first in the West Point class of 1974.[27] Graves was promoted to major on 25 July 1951.[25]

Upon graduation from MIT, Graves was supposed to return to the AFSWP, but he spoke to Lieutenant General

Cortlandt V.R. Schuyler, before being posted to Logistics Division, where he worked on the airfield program. His main task was drafting NATO airfield standards in the wake of 1952 meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Lisbon. These detailed what operational facilities had to be provided in order for the airbase to qualify for NATO funding.[28]

Graves returned to the United States in 1954. He completed the Engineer Officer Advanced Course at Fort Belvoir, and then became Chief of the Training Section of the Nuclear Power Branch of

Lawrence Livermore Laboratory to work on Project Plowshare, a proposal to use nuclear weapons to excavate a sea-level canal through Panama or Nicaragua.[29] He was promoted to lieutenant colonel on 29 March 1960.[30]

In 1964 and 1965, Graves attended the

Army Distinguished Service Medal.[32]

In September 1968, Graves assumed command of the 34th Engineer Group, which was based at

Bronze Star, and the Air Medal with an oak leaf cluster.[35]

Graves sits at the control panel of the deactivated SM-1 nuclear reactor in 2017

Graves returned to the United States in September 1969,

Patriot missile system.[39]

In December 1970, Graves became the Division Engineer of North Central Division, based in

Rocky Flats, and testing at the Nevada Test Site.[33][40]

Graves returned to the Office of the Chief of Engineers in September 1975 as the Director of Civil Works. He carried out a review of all the Corps of Engineers' water construction projects after President

Army Commendation Medal with three oak leaf clusters.[37]

Later life

In July 1981, Graves retired from the Army, and became a consultant at the

Arlington, Virginia.[2]

Graves died at his home in Arlington, Virginia, on 21 May 2019. A memorial service was held at the Fort Myer Old Post Chapel, after which he was interred in Arlington National Cemetery.[2]

Dates of rank

Insignia Rank Component Date Reference
Second lieutenant
 Corps of Engineers 6 June 1944 [6]
First lieutenant
 Army of the United States 6 December 1944 [6]
Captain
 Army of the United States 3 January 1946 [6]
First lieutenant
 Corps of Engineers 6 June 1947 [6]
Major Corps of Engineers 25 July 1951 [25]
Lieutenant colonel Corps of Engineers 29 May 1960 [30]
Colonel Corps of Engineers 6 April 1966 [30]
Brigadier general Regular Army 10 October 1969 [37]
Major general Regular Army 1 August 1971 [37]
Lieutenant general Regular Army 1 March 1978 [37]

Notes

  1. ^ a b Cullum 1930, pp. 662–663.
  2. ^ a b c d e "Ernest Graves obituary". The Washington Post. 26 May 2019. Retrieved 30 September 2019 – via Legacy.com.
  3. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 3–4.
  4. ^ Graves 1998, p. 13.
  5. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 13–14.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Cullum 1950, p. 1309.
  7. ^ Cullum 1930, p. 108.
  8. ^ Caldwell 1986, pp. 344–345.
  9. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 14–15.
  10. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 22–23.
  11. ^ a b Graves 1998, pp. 23–24.
  12. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 26–32.
  13. ^ a b Graves 1998, pp. 32–34.
  14. ^ a b Groves 1962, pp. 373–376.
  15. ^ Hewlett & Anderson 1962, pp. 75–76.
  16. ^ Hewlett & Anderson 1962, p. 625.
  17. ^ Brahmstedt 2002, p. 2.
  18. ^ a b c Graves 1998, pp. 35–39.
  19. ^ Brahmstedt 2002, pp. 21–24.
  20. ^ Abrahamson & Carew 2002, pp. 67–68.
  21. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 39–40.
  22. ^ Graves 1998, p. 18.
  23. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 40–41.
  24. ^ "The angular distributions of particles emitted from nuclear reactions in gaseous targets / by Ernest Graves, Jr". Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Retrieved 2 October 2019.
  25. ^ a b c d Graves 1998, p. xi.
  26. ^ Graves 1998, p. 258.
  27. ^ Graves 1998, pp. ix, 275–276.
  28. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 43–48.
  29. ^ Graves 1998, p. viii.
  30. ^ a b c d Graves 1998, p. xii.
  31. ^ Graves 1998, pp. viii–ix.
  32. ^ a b c "Ernest Graves - Recipient". Military Times Hall Of Valor. Retrieved 2 October 2019.
  33. ^ a b c Graves 1998, p. ix.
  34. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 110, 117.
  35. ^ Graves 1998, p. xiv.
  36. ^ Ploger 1974, p. 221.
  37. ^ a b c d e f Graves 1998, p. xiii.
  38. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 119–121.
  39. ^ Graves 1998, pp. 127–129.
  40. ^ Graves 1998, p. 153.
  41. ^ a b Graves 1998, p. x.

References

External links
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