William Carlton Rogers
Boatswain Mate Second Class, US Navy
World War I, USS Besoeki
June 24, 2022 - William Carlton was the oldest of five children born to Susan Belle Wilson and John Carlton Rogers. He entered this world on November 6, 1893, one day before women were granted the right to vote in the state of Colorado. His birthplace Center serves as the county seat of Shelby in far east Texas and was one of the original 13 counties in that state. Carlton’s siblings were James Graves (1896), Edward Neal (1898), Hazel Maude (1905) and Young William “Hap” (1905). His grandfather “Uncle Y” Rogers, born in Alabama served during the Civil War with the Confederate army at the age of seventeen and was wounded at the siege of Vicksburg. His father John moved to Shelby County as a boy, served with the local militia “Shelby Rifles”, owned a well-known drug store and served five terms in the Texas legislature. According to the Marshall News Messenger, January 31, 1937 his parents were married in Center on January 29, 1893 after a romance of seven years.
On June 23, 1913 Carlton or W. C. as he was also known, at the age of nineteen married sixteen year old Myrtle Maud Carriker in Texarkana, Arkansas.(1) They made their home in Center and sadly she died almost four years later on May 16, 1917 at the age of twenty and was buried in the Fairview Cemetery. A month earlier, April 6 the United States had entered the World War that had been raging in Europe since 1914 and the selective service act of 1917 required all men between the ages of twenty-one and thirty to register for the military draft on June 5, 1917. Carlton now twenty-three complied, filling out his registration card (Form 1, draft # 1184), in Center. His card noted: home address as Center; natural born citizen; single; Caucasian; one year prior service in the Texas National Guard; and claimed an exemption to the draft due to “going to apply for Navy”. Physically he was described as tall and stout with brown eyes and black hair (not bald).(2)
True to his word and with his wife deceased less than a month, Carlton took the oath of enlistment at the recruiting station in Dallas, Texas becoming US Navy Seaman Recruit Rogers, serial # 1840436. He and the other enlistees of the day were then sent by train to the Naval Training Station at Newport, Rhode Island. According to his military record he spent 212 days there in the grade of Apprentice Seaman finishing basic and advanced training. On January 5, 1918 Seaman Rogers was sent to the port of New York, N. Y. where he later joined the crew of the freighter, USS Besoeki (ID 2534) on the day it was commissioned, April 2, 1918.(3) The Besoeki had been built in 1901 and acquired by the Navy March 21, 1918. It had a displacement of 8,414 tons, length of 358 feet, two single-ended boilers, one 1,400hp steam engine with one shaft and held a complement of 70 officers and men.(4) Later that month Carlton got his first taste of sea duty as his ship began her first trans-Atlantic voyage as a Naval vessel, steaming in convoy to the British isles with a cargo that included ammunition.(5) During this time Carlton served in the grade of Coxswain (the steersman of a boat). Before the Besoeki began her second trip in August, 1918 he was reassigned to Norfolk, Virginia where he remained past the end of the war November 11, 1918. What Carlton’s naval duties were up to his discharge on December 19, 1919 at Headquarters, Third Naval District, New York is unclear. His rating at discharge was Boatswain Mate Second Class. For his thirty months of military service Carlton was awarded the World War I Victory Medal.
Following the war he returned to his parent’s home on Shelbyville Street in Center and began work in his father’s drug store as a salesman.(6) The Champion Newspaper, September 29, 1920 reported he was hired as the District Salesman for the Texas Company [later Texaco] replacing Mrs. R. M. Gilmore who had resigned after twelve years with the company. He served as a citizen-soldier with the local 144 Infantry of the Texas National Guard as a First Lieutenant for over a year beginning in February 1922.
As reported by The Champion newspaper, September 30, 1925 “W. C. Rogers and Mrs. Katherine [Hodges] Skeeters were married Saturday night [September 26] at the home of the grooms parents, Mr. and Mrs. J. C. Rogers, Rev. Townes Windham officiating. Mr. Rogers is a building contractor and the bride is a former employee of the J. W. Motley Co. The Champion joins their many friends in wishing them much happiness and success”. Katherine had been previously married and brought a four year old son, Dan to the marriage. According to family, Dan developed tuberculosis and for the sake of his health they moved to San Angelo, Tom Green County ,Texas. The 1930 census documented that they were living with Katherine’s brother at 217 Van Buren, San Angelo with employment as a building plasterer.(7) Ownership in the laundry and dry cleaning business followed while Katherine acted as their office manager. On April 27, 1942 Carlton for the second time in his life registered for a military draft and while not called to service at the age of 48, he saw a second world war begin and end in his lifetime.
Katherine died August 2, 1971 at the age of 70 while a patient at the Shannon West Texas Memorial Hospital in San Angelo and was buried in Lawnhaven Memorial Gardens there. Family records state Carlton returned to Center in 1978 for medical care and to be near his family before his death at age 85 on December 14 of that same year. Mangum Funeral Home in Center handled the arrangements that included burial with his second wife Katherine in the Lawnhaven Memorial Gardens. There were no children from either of his marriages. Day is done, God is nigh.
Thanks to Great Niece Leigh Porterfield for her help with this story.
SOURCES:
(1): Ancestry.com. Arkansas, U.S., County Marriages Index, 1837-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
(2): Registration State: Texas; Registration County: Shelby County
(3): Ancestry.com. U.S., Department of Veterans Affairs BIRLS Death File, 1850-2010 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
(4): http://www.navsource.org/archives/12/172534.htm
(5): https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/OnlineLibrary/photos/sh-civil/civsh-b/besoeki.htm
(6): Year: 1920; Census Place: Justice Precinct 1, Shelby, Texas; Roll: T625_1846; Page: 12B; Enumeration District: 185
(7): Year: 1930; Census Place: San Angelo, Tom Green, Texas; Page: 3A; Enumeration District: 0010; FHL microfilm: 2342134
