Mark Gray and Terry Fessner’s efforts to document and locate every submariner that ever served on the USS WILLIAM H. BATES (SSN 680) continue to be a genuine encouragement to me. I’ve worked beside these dedicated Missing Shipmate Coordinators, and know what a daunting task it can be.
Every lead has to be pursued, validated, tested, and rarely do you have the satisfaction of picking up the phone and hearing someone say “Yes!” when you ask the question, “Are you the guy that served on the Bates, back in the 70’s?” Usually, it’s “Sorry, wrong number!” or worse, and every day that goes by, the odds of finding a former shipmate diminish as time and our intrinsic mortality take their toll.
Sometimes leads come out of the blue, like the other day. Mark received an email from a gentleman who identified himself as Paul Henry. Turns out, he had purchased a briefcase at an estate sale, and inside the briefcase discovered a name tag for one P. L. Robinson, known as ‘Doc’, who had something to do with the U.S.S Wm. H. Bates (SSN 680) , whatever that was. Would we be interested in having this artifact?
Turns out, along with Paul’s generous contribution of memorabilia, we have a missing shipmate, HMC/SS Phillip L. Robinson, one of the Bates’ corpsman at some time, which we don’t know for sure, and we could use some help finding him.
So take a look at the name tag in the photo. If you have any information regarding the whereabouts or history of Phillip, please get in touch with Mark Gray or Terry Fessner, and help us track him down. Anything helps, dates, places, photos, no clue is too trivial to mention, so either light up Terry and Mark, or get in touch with Phillip himself, and get him connected with his old shipmates here at SSN-680.org.
There’s not a moment to lose!
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