New York Chapter Commemorates 75th Anniversary of Battle of Midway
On 3 June 2022, 21 NIP members, family, and friends met at the City Island Yacht Club in the Bronx to commemorate the Battle of Midway. Significantly, this event also marked more than four score years of a Naval Intelligence presence in the New York metropolitan area. Those attending made toasts to the Navy, and particularly to the heroes of Midway. The chapter used the occasion to fly Admiral Milton Miles’ famous "What the Hell" pennant from the yardarm in front of the club for likely the first time in 75 years. Chapter president Jim Carter summarized the event nicely: "Friendships made and renewed, memories rekindled, sea stories embellished and recounted. All in all, a good day."
(In 1934, when VADM Miles was executive officer of the USS Wickes, he asked his wife to help design a pennant to be used in response to occasional minor lapses in following orders during maneuvering drills. What fast became known as the “What the Hell” pennant quickly became familiar throughout the division and would later become (in)famous throughout the fleet. Admiral Miles' twilight tour was as Commandant, Third Naval District, where he renewed contact with those men who served under him in China during World War II. When he retired, he gifted the pennant to what, by then, had become Naval Reserve Intelligence Division 3-1, most of whose members are also members of NIP New York.)
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