S1c Walter Pershing Brock

Walter Pershing Brock was born Sept. 30, 1921, in Laurel County in southeast Kentucky. His mother, Julia Crook Brock, taught school for a few years before she married and became a homemaker. His father, Foster Brock, was a farmer.

Walter, the third of four children, had completed one year of high school by the time of the spring 1940 Census. He enlisted in the Navy on Oct. 15, 1940, and went aboard the U.S.S. Arizona on Dec. 9 while the battleship was docked at the Puget Sound Navy Yard in Bremerton, Washington.

Mr. Brock was a seaman first class when he was killed in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.

There is a cenotaph in his memory at A. R. Dyche Memorial Park in London, Kentucky. His parents are buried there.

His brother Curt, who was four years younger, also served in the Navy during World War II.

Sources: Census; Navy muster roll; family obituaries; grave markers and cenotaph. Findagrave photograph. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.