WWII Ocracoke Island and Hatteras Inlet U.S. Coast Guard Stations
By Matthew M. Peek, Military Collection Archivist, State Archives of North Carolina
In the early twentieth century, Ocracoke Island, off the East Coast of North Carolina, housed or was connected with two U.S. Coast Guard lifesaving stations. These stations — Hatteras Inlet and Ocracoke Station — were staffed by six men, whose job was to patrol the beach looking for ships that were in trouble or needed assistance.
By 1942, the U.S. Navy began operations in the Ocracoke area, establishing the U.S. Naval Section Base at Ocracoke Island. Originally commissioned to oversee the Hatteras Minefield (a ring of contact mines arranged in an irregular arc offshore of Hatteras) to provide an area of protected anchorage for U.S. and foreign merchant ships, the Naval Section Base consisted of a two-story administrative building, barracks, and a hospital. The Ocracoke location was referred to as the “Ocracoke Island U.S. Coast Guard Station,” while the Hatteras location wa termed the “Hatteras Inlet U.S. Coast Guard Lifeboat Station.”
By the time the base was formally commissioned in October 1942, the original purpose for the base was abandoned, with the Navy deeming the minefield too difficult to maintain for official military purposes. Despite this change in mission, the Ocracoke Section Base continued to operate for the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Coast Guard. Ocracoke held a focus on anti-submarine patrol during World War II, working to protect the North Carolina coast from the German U-boat menace that is known as the Battle of the Atlantic.
By 1944, with German U-boat activity diminishing off the coast, Ocracoke Island was transitioned into an Amphibious Training Base, where the U.S. Navy Beach Jumpers (forerunners to the U.S. Navy Seals) were trained. The base changed hands again in 1945, becoming a Combat Information Center. However, the U.S. military would come to eventually decommission Ocracoke Island operations in 1946. On March 31, 1952, by Congressional Act HR 4974, the land at Ocracoke Island containing the original military base was transferred to the National Park Service as part of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore.
William E. Chapline Jr.: Coast Guard Liaison Officer at Ocracoke
During WWII, a man named William E. Chapline Jr. served at Ocracoke Island Coast Guard Station as the Coast Guard Liaison Officer to the U.S. Navy. Little is known about his life prior to his service in the U.S. Coast Guard — not even where he was from. However, we do know that Chapline Jr. graduated from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in 1941, and it is believed that the Coast Guard station at Ocracoke Island was his first military posting.
As the Coast Guard Liaison Officer, Chapline Jr. maintained the office records, personnel pay records, leave of absence requests, supply requests and receipts, and other miscellaneous documents for the Ocracoke Island Station from 1942 to 1944. He also helped to manage the records for the Hatteras Inlet Coast Guard Lifesaving Station. Little is known about William E. Chapline Jr. after 1944.
William E. Chapline Jr. Papers (WWII 34)
What William Chapline Jr. did do, however, was to retain numerous original records from the Ocracoke Island and Hatteras Inlet Coast Guard stations. He would keep together such materials as personnel status reports, leave of absence requests, personnel pay reports, station crew lists, muster rolls, ship assistance reports, supply requests and receipts, boat expense reports, sunken ship reports, civilian salvage operation employees’ lists, duty reports, and miscellaneous operation records. All of these records span the dates 1935 to 1944, with the bulk from 1940 to 1944. Most of the records cover Ocracoke Island Coast Guard Station, though there are some materials for pre-WWII Hatteras Inlet Station — dating from 1935 to 1940.
Why are these important? The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and the U.S. Coast Guard Historian’s Office do not have any original records for any of North Carolina’s U.S. Coast Guard stations during World War II (1938–1946). Per a conversation I had with the NARA Atlanta office — where the Coast Guard records for North Carolina are stored — archivist for Coast Guard records, the Coast Guard historically has been the worst of the U.S. military branches at saving historic records from station operations. Any historical records for North Carolina stations, which changed operational focuses and duties frequently during WWII at the more than eight stations along the Outer Banks and coastal areas of the state, are rare.
Thanks to a local historical group that tracked down Chapline Jr.’s Papers in the 1990s-2000s, his papers came to the Military Collection of the State Archives of North Carolina in 2004. While updating the collection’s description, organization, and preservation in 2016, we discovered a number of significant records that many researchers have overlooked over the past. Here we will focus on some of the significant documents or types of records that are available in the papers.
The most important document in the collection is the original YP-389 Sinking Case Report, which gives a detailed account of the events in military time for the sinking of the USS YP-389 — a U.S. Navy yard patrol boat that served in World War II along the Outer Banks of North Carolina. The YP-389 was sunk by the German U-boat U-701 on June 19, 1942. The case report gives a minute-by-minute report of search and rescue efforts for the crew of the ship.
This report’s time frame differs by minutes to the official record of the sinking held by the U.S. Navy’s archives and the National Archives. This is likely due to the fact that the document in Chapline’s papers was created close to the event at one of the nearest Coast Guard stations to the boat’s sinking. Chapline’s record of events of the sinking is far more accurate. In 2016, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration used this document as part of its application to expand the Battle of the Atlantic underwater national historic site’s area to include the site of the YPP 389.
Another item of note in the series is an insurance report for Elmer V. Midgett of Rodanthe, North Carolina. Elmer Midgett — part of the famous Midgett (or Midgette) family of North Carolina’s Outer Banks — is featured prominently in the records from the Ocracoke Island U.S. Coast Guard Station.
The collection includes a set of ship assistance reports, which not only cover Ocracoke Island and Hatteras Inlet stations, but such other North Carolina Coast Guard stations as Core Bank Station. These reports list the ships, the Coast Guard stations responding, the times and dates of the issues, the names of the ships assisted, the cause of the problems for the ships, details on the crew and cargo of the ships, and locations and weather where the ships were in trouble.
There are also a number of muster rolls for the Ocracoke Island Station in 1943 and 1944, listing all the men, their ranks and job titles, and various remarks on their service (including leave of duty, promotions, etc.).
The Chapine Jr. Papers include leave of absence requests for the Hatteras Inlet Coast Guard Station from 1936 to 1940. Some have fun reasons for leave, such as returning to another N.C. island to care for the person’s home.
And, most interesting for researchers, there are crew lists for Ocracoke Island Station and several of the Coast Guard ships during WWII.
You can view most of the records from the William E. Chapline Jr. Papers (WWII 34) online here in the digital WWII collection of the North Carolina Digital Collections, a joint effort of the State Archives of North Carolina and the State Library of North Carolina. You can also view a number of photographs of the Hatteras Inlet Coast Guard Station and Ocracoke Naval Base through the Outer Banks History Center’s Flickr page here.
Resources
- William E. Chapline Jr. Papers, WWII 34, WWII Papers, Military Collection, State Archives of North Carolina, Raleigh, N.C.
- Aycock Brown Collection, Outer Banks History Center, State Archives of North Carolina.
