Background

Ethnicity: William Halsey, Jr. was of English ancestry, all of his ancestors came to America from England.

William F. Halsey, Jr. was born on October 30, 1882, in Elizabeth, New Jersey, United States. He was the son of William Frederick Halsey, Sr., a naval officer, and Anne Masters Brewster. Halsey also had a sister.

Education

William Frederick Halsey Jr. studied at the Pingry School. Later he attended the University of Virginia from 1899 to 1900 while he sought a presidential appointment "at large" to the Naval Academy. Halsey, Jr. entered the academy in 1900. He had a mediocre academic record, played football on a losing academy team, and graduated in the bottom third of his class on February 2, 1904.

William Halsey Jr. also studied at the Naval War College from 1932 to 1933 and at the United States Army War College from 1933 to 1934.

Career

William Frederick Halsey Jr. started his career in 1904 when he joined USS Missouri and was later transferred to USS Don Juan de Austria in December 1905. Having completed the two years of sea time required by federal law, he received his commission as an ensign on February 2, 1906. Joining the battleship Kansas upon his commissioning in April 1907, Halsey participated in the global cruise of the "Great White Fleet" sent by President Theodore Roosevelt. Upon its return early in 1909, he was promoted concurrently to lieutenant. After that, he began a twenty-three-year career in torpedo warfare and escort duties by taking command of the torpedo boat Dupont for its first six months in commission. Later he spent several months helping to outfit the destroyer Lamson and, after that, he spent two years in charge of training at Norfolk, Virginia, aboard the receiving ship Franklin. Later he was in command of the reserve destroyer Flusser and the First Group, Torpedo Flotilla, Atlantic Fleet. From September 1913 to July 1915, he served as a commander of the destroyer Jarvis.

After that William Halsey went ashore in 1915 for a two-year stint in the Executive Department of the Naval Academy. During this time he was promoted to lieutenant commander. With the United States entry into World War I Halsey's service centered on antisubmarine escort duty out of Queenstown, Ireland, first for several weeks in 1918 aboard the destroyer Duncan, at which time he received a promotion to the temporary rank of commander. He commanded the destroyers Benham from February to May and Shaw until August 1918. After he was ordered home in August 1918, Halsey oversaw the completion and commissioning of USS Yarnell. He remained in destroyers until 1921 and ultimately commanded Destroyer Divisions 32 and 15. Halsey then returned to sea duty, again in destroyers in European waters, in command of USS Dale and USS Osborne. Between 1921 and 1924 he served as naval attaché in Germany and several other countries before returning to command destroyers and serve on battleships. In 1927, he served one year as executive officer of the battleship USS Wyoming and later that year he was promoted to captain. In 1928 assigned to the Naval Academy as commanding officer of the station ship Reina Mercedes, Halsey, Jr. immediately came under the spell of naval aviation, for the local unit was based on board his ship.

Halsey commanded the aircraft carrier Saratoga from mid-1935 until mid-1937, and the naval air station at Pensacola from 1937 to 1938. Marked as one of the U.S. Navy's top carrier commanders, he was promoted to rear admiral on March 1, 1938. After commanding Carrier Division 2 from June 1938 onboard the Enterprise and then the Yorktown, Halsey returned to Saratoga as commander of Carrier Division 1. On June 13, 1940, he became commander of the Aircraft Battle Force with the rank of Vice-Admiral. With the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the United States entry into World War II, Halsey found himself at sea aboard his flagship USS Enterprise. In April 1942, he was designated commander of Task Force Sixteen, in Enterprise, and ordered to escort the carrier USS Hornet (CV-8) to within 800 miles of Tokyo for a bombing raid on Japan. Consistent successes led to his appointment in October 1942 as commander of the South Pacific force and area. During the next two months, he played a vital role in the Battle of Santa Cruz Islands and the naval Battle of Guadalcanal and was promoted to admiral. From 1942 to mid-1944 Halsey directed the U.S. campaign in the Solomon Islands.

In June 1944, Halsey was given command of the United States Third Fleet and led it during campaigns to take Palau and Luzon and on many raids on Japanese bases, including on the shores of Formosa, China, and Vietnam. He also was responsible for covering and supporting United States land operations as well as finding and destroying much of the Japanese fleet in the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Halsey led United States forces in the final naval operations around Okinawa in the Ryukyu Islands from May 28, 1945 to September 2, 1945, when the Japanese surrendered. In December 1945, Halsey was promoted to fleet admiral and was assigned to special duty in the Office of the Secretary of the Navy. Halsey retired from active duty with the United States Navy in March 1947, however, as Fleet Admiral, he was not taken off active duty status. He also wrote his autobiography in 1947. In 1951 he became board director of two subsidiaries of the International Telephone and Telegraph Company, including the American Cable and Radio Corporation, and held this post until 1957. Halsey died on August 16, 1959.

Achievements

• William Frederick Halsey Jr. was an American fleet admiral who played an important role in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the largest naval battle of World War II. He also was known for his daring tactics. Halsey was one of the highest-ranking officers in the United States naval history. He received numerous awards, including the Distinguished Service Medal, the Order of the Redeemer, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, the Order of the Liberator, and the Navy Distinguished Service Medal.
  
  USS Halsey was named in his honor. Halsey was portrayed by James Cagney in the 1960 biopic, The Gallant Hours, and by James Whitmore in the 1970 film, Tora! Tora! Tora! Many streets in the United States are named after him. Halsey also appears as a purchasable general in the Easytech mobile game World Conqueror 4.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Admiral Halsey's Story

    (Admiral Halsey's Story is this admiral's record of his ac...)

    1947

Views

William Halsey Jr. made outrageous and virulently racist remarks about the Japanese enemy in public. Many of his slogans and pronouncements bordered on the advocacy of genocide. Halsey's favorite phrase for the Japanese was "yellow bastards."

Quotations: "There aren't any great men. There are just great challenges that ordinary men like you and me are forced by circumstances to meet."

"All problems become smaller if you don't dodge them, but confront them. Touch a thistle timidly, and it pricks you; grasp it boldly, and its spines crumble."

"The Marine Corps has just been called by the New York Times, "The elite of this country." I think it is the elite of the world."

"When this war is over, the Japanese language will be spoken only in hell!"

"There are no great people in this world, only great challenges which ordinary people rise to meet."

"There are no extraordinary men... just extraordinary circumstances that ordinary men are forced to deal with."

Membership

William Halsey, Jr. joined the Delta Psi fraternity and was also a member of the secretive Seven Society.

Personality

William Halsey Jr. is popularly referred to by the nickname "Bull." According to historian Samuel Eliot Morison, no one who knew Halsey personally ever called him that, and the name arose as a typographic error of "Bill" in a press release and stuck in the popular imagination. Halsey Jr. had no known hobbies or interests other than the sea.

Physical Characteristics: William Halsey, Jr.'s heavy jaw seemed to pull him forward, and his blue eyes peered from below thick eyebrows. He had looked like an old sea dog since Naval Academy days. Halsey's appearance gave an impression of boldness, aggressiveness, dash, dynamism, and toughness.

Quotes from others about the person

• Samuel Eliot Morison: "Halsey, the public's favorite in the Navy, will always remain a controversial figure, but none can deny that he was a great leader; one with the true "Nelson touch." His appointment as commander of the South Pacific Force at the darkest moment of the Guadalcanal campaign lifted the hearts of every officer and bluejacket. He hated the enemy with an unholy wrath, and turned that feeling into a grim determination by all hands to step up to hit hard, again and again, and win. His proposal to step up the Leyte operation by two months was a stroke of strategic genius which undoubtedly shortened the Pacific war. Unfortunately, in his efforts to build public morale in America and Australia, Halsey did what Spruance refused to do - built up an image of himself as an exponent of Danton's famous principle, "Audacity, more audacity, always audacity." That was the real reason for his fumble in the Battle for Leyte Gulf. For his inspiring leadership in 1942-1943, his generosity to others, his capacity for choosing the right men for his staff, Halsey well earned his five stars and his place among the Navy's immortals."
  
  George M. Hall: "Halsey was dubbed "Bull" by the press, but he hated that nickname as much as he hated all pretense and showmanship. What he did not hate, he loved, and chief among the latter was his men."
  
  C. L. Sulzberger: "William F. Halsey was Commander of the South Pacific Fleet and the war's most colorful admiral."

Connections

William Halsey Jr. married Frances Cooke Grandy on December 1, 1909. The marriage produced two children. Frances developed manic depression in the late 1930s and eventually had to live apart from William Halsey.

Father:

William Frederick Halsey Sr.

William Frederick Halsey Sr. (April 11, 1853 – June 11, 1920) was a United States naval officer.

Mother:

Anne Masters (Brewster) Halsey

(February 17, 1859 – May 25, 1947)

Sister:

Deborah G. B. Turnbull

Wife:

Frances Cooke Grandy

Son:

William Fredrick Halsey III

(September 8, 1915 – September 23, 2003)

Daughter:

Margaret Bradford

(October 10, 1910 – December 1979)

Friend:

Thomas C. Hart

Thomas C. Hart (June 12, 1877 – July 4, 1971) was an admiral in the United States Navy.

References

• Operational Leadership: A Case Study of Two Extremes During Operation Watchtower A book by Nancy R. Dillard.
  1997
• Admiral Bill Halsey: A Naval Life William Halsey, the most famous naval officer of World War II, was known for fearlessness, steely resolve, and impulsive errors. In this definitive biography, Thomas Hughes punctures the popular caricature of the fighting admiral to present a revealing human portrait of his personal and professional life as it was lived in times of war and peace.
  2016
• Halsey's Typhoon: The True Story of a Fighting Admiral, an Epic Storm, and an Untold Rescue Halsey's Typhoon is the story of World War II's most unexpected disaster at sea. In the final days of 1944, Admiral William "Bull" Halsey is the Pacific theater's most popular and colorful naval hero. After a string of victories, the "Fighting Admiral" and his thirty-thousand-man Third Fleet are charged with protecting General MacArthur's flank during the invasion of the Philippine island of Mindoro.
  2007
• Sea of Thunder: Four Commanders and the Last Great Naval Campaign 1941-1945 A suspenseful account of the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October 1944 is told through the commands of four naval leaders, including two American commanders and two Japanese admirals, and offers insight into how the war reflected profound cultural differences.
  2006
• Bull Halsey Naval historian E. B. Potter, who established his reputation with an award-winning biography of Chester W. Nimitz, gets behind the stereotype of this national hero and describes Halsey at his best and worst, including his controversial actions at Leyte Gulf. To write this book Potter had full access to Halsey's family and to the admiral's private papers and provides detail of Halsey's youth and career before the war. First published in 1985, it remains the definitive study.
  1985