Joseph H. Wellings papers (MSC-003)

Biographical note

Joseph H. Wellings was born on April 23, 1903, in Boston, Massachusetts, to John A. and Bridget G. Sullivan Wellings. One of four brothers, all of whom became rear admirals in the U.S. Navy, he attended the Samuel Adams School, Boston Latin School, and the English High School, all in Boston, before his appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy in 1921. There he participated in many sports and won the Daughters of the American Revolution sword for excellence in practical seamanship.

After graduating from the Academy in 1925, he first served in the battleship USS Utah(BB 31)and then in USS Florida (BB 30) until 1929. After a tour of duty aboard the destroyers USS King (DD 242) and USS Tillman (DD 135), he was assigned to the Harvard University Reserve Officers Training Corps Unit in Cambridge, Massachusetts. At that time he enrolled as a special student at the Harvard Law School.

In 1935, Admiral William D. Leahy, Commanding Officer, Battleships, Battle Force, selected Wellings as his aide and flag lieutenant. He continued in this capacity when Leahy assumed command of the Battle Force in 1936. Before transferring to USS California (BB 44) as senior watch officer, he returned to Boston, where on January 23, 1937, he married Dorothea K. Bertelsen. Their only child, a daughter, Anne, was born in Washington, D.C., in 1938, when he served on the staff of the Chief of Naval Operations.

By 1940, the war in Europe was already a year old, and Britain stood alone and besieged by Hitler’s war machine. During that summer, Wellings was sent to England as an observer of the British Home Fleet, with additional duty as assistant naval attaché in London. Interested in the operational aspects of the Royal Navy’s forces, he served as operations officer in HMS Rodney during the search for and sinking of the German battleship Bismarck in May 1941. Later he wrote an unpublished manuscript describing those events.

Returning to the United States in June 1941, he served briefly on the staff of the Chief of Naval Operations before a three-month assignment with the Fleet Training Division. Appointed commanding officer of USS Strong (DD 467), he prepared the ship for commissioning at the Bath Iron Works, Bath, Maine, in August 1942. The Strong was involved in convoy operations in the Caribbean and Atlantic before participating in the Casablanca invasion. Assigned to the Pacific, the ship saw action in the Solomon Islands, where she was hit by a Japanese torpedo and sank on the night of July 4–5, 1943, off New Georgia. Wellings courageously stayed with his ship as she went down and was seriously injured when her depth charges exploded. As a result, he spent the next six months in the hospital.

Wellings returned to destroyer commands in March 1944, when he assumed command of Destroyer Division One Hundred and Twenty. Transferred to Destroyer Squadron Two, he again saw action in the Pacific at Lingayen Gulf, the Philippine Islands, in January 1945. Five months before the war’s end, he returned to the United States to an assignment with the Bureau of Personnel. For the next year and one half he was involved in establishing policy for the postwar Naval Reserve and in transferring naval reservists to the regular navy.

From 1946 to 1948 he was a student and a staff member in international relations at the National War College in Washington, D.C. After a year as Assistant Chief of Staff for Plans on the staff of the Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Fleet, he returned to sea as commanding officer of USS Columbus (CA 74), flagship of Commander, Naval Forces, Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean, with duty in the Mediterranean with the Sixth Fleet.

While serving in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Manpower and Personnel, he was promoted to rear admiral on May 1, 1953. He assumed command of the naval base in Newport, RI, in that rank, with additional duty as Commander, First Naval District.

In the autumn of 1955, he was appointed Navy representative to Joint Task Force Seven and Commander, Task Group Seven Point Three. The task forces conducted atomic tests under the code name “Operation Redwing” on Eniwetok and Bikini Atolls in the Marshall Islands. Wellings was commended for his participation by the Secretary of the Navy. A year as Assistant Chief of Naval Operations for Plans and Policy was followed by four years as Vice Director, Joint Staff, Joint Chiefs of Staff. Both of these posts involved him in delicate negotiations with representatives of the West Indies Federation over United States Base Lease Agreements at the naval base in Chaguaramas, Trinidad.

RADM Wellings’ last assignment was Commandant of the First Naval District and commanding officer of the naval bases at Boston, Massachusetts, and Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He suffered a stroke in March 1963, while vacationing in Trinidad, and retired on August 1, 1963. He and Mrs. Wellings resided on Victoria Avenue in Newport, RI. Their daughter, Mrs. F. P. Heffelfinger, Jr., lives in the Dominican Republic. Admiral Wellings died on March 31, 1988.

The admiral’s medals include the Bronze Star, the Silver Star, the Gold Star, the Purple Heart, the American Defense Service Medal, the American Campaign Medal, the European– African–Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, the World War II Victory Medal, the Philippine Liberation Ribbon, and the Expert Pistol Shot Medal. He was a member of the USNA Athletic Association, the USNA Alumni Association, the Navy League, Seaport ’76, the Newport Historical Society, the Preservation Society of Newport County, and Redwood Library, and was an honorary member of Quindecim.

Chronology