Dale Leroy Owings

"Specs"

Marine Corps Regular | Service Number 834568

Born

February 2, 1923
in Ottumwa, IA

Parents

Samuel Marion Owings
Doll (Darneille) Owings (d. 1936)

School

Rock Island High School (ex-1943)

Pre-War Employment

Minor league baseball catcher
“Richmond Virginia Ball Club”

Entered Service

March 10, 1943
at Chicago, IL

Joined First Battalion

September 1, 1943
from E/2/23rd Marines

Left First Battalion

June 16, 1944
Wounded and evacuated from Saipan

Left Service

December 22, 1944
Discharged by reason of disability

Home Address and Next of Kin

2217½ 3rd Avenue, Rock Island, IL – address of “friend,” Mr. William Lanaghan
When Owings enlisted, he claimed to have no living relatives and declined to designate a beneficiary of his life insurance policy. William Lanaghan was a former Sears Roebuck manager, who worked with Owings several years before the war. Lanaghan had no close relationship with Owings, and appears to have had no idea that he was Owings’ emergency contact.

Service & Campaigns

Before joining battalion

Boot camp at MRCD San Diego with 10th Recruit Battalion. Outposted to Service Company, Camp Elliott on 15 May 1943. Assigned to Company A, Infantry Battalion, Camp Elliott for advanced infantry training, including instruction in 60mm mortars. To E/2/23rd Marines on 27 August 1943.

Joined A/1/24th Marines at Camp Pendleton, California, on 1 September 1943.

Roi-Namur

Outfit: A/1/24th Marines (60mm mortar platoon)
Rank: Private
MOS: 745 (Rifleman) – assigned duty as ammunition carrier

Campaign Narrative

Saipan

Outfit: A/1/24th Marines (60mm mortar platoon)
Rank: Private First Class
MOS: 504 (ammunition carrier)
Important Events:
June 16, 1944 – wounded in action (blast concussion, atmospheric); evacuated to USS Arthur Middleton

Campaign Narrative

After leaving battalion

Admitted to US Naval Hospital #10 (Aiea Heights, Hawaii) on 28 July 1944. Transferred to Puget Sound Navy Yard on 11 August 1944 for additional treatment. To Casual Company, Great Lakes, Illinois on 11 October 1944.

Discharged for reasons of disability (diagnosed “war neurosis” on 22 December 1944.

Individual Decorations

Medal
Purple Heart

Campaign
Saipan (June 16, 1944)

Citation

Owings (a boy in my platoon) has, on the other hand, nothing to look back to. I got some letters from his father a little while ago telling why. He was injured about a year ago, and was told by the doctor that he would be blind by this coming summer, so he broke off with the girl he was to marry in a month without telling her why – joined the Marine Corps, and has been trying to get into action ever since. His father didn’t know it and had just found it out, and wrote a heartbreaking, illiterate letter begging that I keep good care of his boy who is the only thing the father has left in the world

Philip E. Wood, Jr. A/1/24th Marines

Post-War Life

Owings intended to return to baseball after leaving the service, but this never came to pass. He moved to California, was married, divorced, and employed by the Singer Sewing Machine company and a trucking firm. At some point in the 1950s he legally changed his name to Samuel Allen Ford, married again, and started a family. He was killed when a train struck his car near Fort Morgan, Colorado.