SK2c William Lewis Allen

William Lewis Allen was born Sept. 30, 1896, in Daviess County, Indiana. His mother, Carrie Damewood Allen, was a homemaker and his father, Van Allen, a farmer.

William, a machinist helper, married Helen Maher married in Washington, Indiana, in 1915. They had two daughters and a son who was one when he died of influenza in 1918. The couple divorced before 1930.

By 1935 William Allen was living in San Antonio, Texas, and by spring 1940 he and his second wife, Beulah, were in Houston. Both worked at an insurance company.

William served 11 months in the US Army during WW1 and was discharged in April of 1918.  He enlisted in the US Naval Reserve on September 15, 1941 in Houston, TX and completed his basic training at the San Diego Naval Training Station.  On November 3, 1941, Richard boarded the U.S.S. Arizona for duty. He was a storekeeper and petty officer 2nd class when he was killed in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.

Sources: the Washington (Indiana) Democrat; the Washington (Indiana) Herald; the Daviess County (Indiana) Democrat; Missouri death certificate; U.S. Department of Defense; California death index; Census; Navy muster rolls, Navy Enlistment Records. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona and Operation 85.