Honor Pages Index

Honor Pages

QMCS(SS) Edward 'Ed' Charles O'Brien • 1937 – 2000

Per the Social Security Death Index (SSDI), Ed O'Brien was born on October 24, 1937 and died on April 9, 2000.  The cause of death is not known to the editor at this time.  Ed's last place of residence was Rice Lake Barron Wisconsin.

 

I knew Chief O'Brien (Edward Charles O'Brien) very well and kept in touch with him for a few years after we both left the Navy. He built a house in Rice Lake, Wisconsin and retired there.

I was saddened to learn that he passed away. Unfortunately, I cannot confirm this or provide further details.

Chief O'Brien was a mentor to me in many ways, as I am sure many CPO's were and continue to be to young sailors - more of an uncle figure rather than a military supervisor. Navy Chief's seemed so old when they were twice our age. Now, on occasion, I run into one and they seem so young.

Jerry Hopkins

Former Shipmate
USS WILLIAM H. BATES (SSN 680) 1974-1977

 

 

 

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Our shipmate has passed on before us.

Whether by enemy action, the remorseless sea, or the ravages of time and age,
we must accept that God has called you to where we cannot yet follow.

We commend your body to the deep, and your soul to God Almighty.

May God grant you fair winds and following seas.

 

Godspeed, shipmate.

 

We will miss you...

 

 

 

"All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated. God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another...

"No man is an island, entire of itself, every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.

"Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."

John Donne

Meditation XVII
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions
Nunc lento sonitu dicunt, morieris.
Now this bell tolling softly for another, says to me, Thou must die.
1572 - 1631

 

 

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