George Edward Berridge was born on 17 April 1923, in Marion, Ohio. His parents are Cornelius W. & Catherine G. (Tedow) Berridge of Marion, Ohio George E. Berridge attended Saint Mary High School. George had two brothers who were also serving in the armed forces; pharmacist’s Mate Third Class Francis W. Berridge, stationed at New River, North Carolina; Apprentice Seaman Donald J. Berridge, Great Lakes Naval Station. George E. Berridge had worked in Arizona for three months, on the Colorado River Dam Project. He was last employed at the Scioto Ordnance Plant.
George E. Berridge enlisted in the Merchant Marines. He took his basic training at Sheepshead Bay, New York. Berridge worked in the engine room as an oiler. United Fruit Company was the company that he shipped from. Different sources state that an accident occurred in 1943 and 1944. 1943 is the date that the Merchant Marines and others use. The Liberty Ship J. Pinckney Henderson had a collision with Tanker J. H. Senior.
“While steaming in Convoy HX-252 and carrying a volatile cargo Liberty Ship J. Pinckney Henderson collided with the tanker J. H. Senior, which was carrying high octane aviation gas, on August 19, 1943, while off Newfoundland. Both ships were immediately drenched in aviation gas and became blazing infernos, the flames spreading so rapidly that there were only nine survivors between them. The Liberty ship J. Pinckney Henderson was towed to Sydney, Nova Scotia where she arrived on August 31, and was beached. She continued to burn for three more weeks until nothing was left but a gutted hull. Later she was refloated and towed to Halifax, then on January 14, 1944, she was towed to New York, where she was declared a constructive total loss. In July of 1944, she was scrapped in Philadelphia. Sixty-one men were lost on the Liberty ship and only three survived.”
from Navy Records
George E. Berridge was reported as missing in action. Also aboard the J. Pinckney Henderson was Jack Sellers born in Delaware, Ohio. The names of both men are listed on the Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery, Lemay, St. Louis County, Missouri.
In September of 1943, the bodies of the men recovered from the collision were buried in a mass grave, in Harwood Hill Cemetery, in Sydney, Nova Scotia. Some of the Canadian sailors who recovered the bodies from the burning ships were also the burial party.
An 800lb. granite marker, in the shape of a Cross, was erected that read: “U. S. Liberty Ship J.P. Henderson, September 3, 1943. Here lie the remains of officers and crew members, naval and merchant, who lost their lives while serving their country. All members buried with full naval honors.” The date, September 3, 1943, may be the date the bodies were recovered and laid to rest or the date the memorial was set.
In 1949, the remains of the Merchant Marines and sailors were returned to the United States and buried in a mass grave at the Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery, in St. Louis, Missouri. A memorial listing their names is also found there.
In the 1960’s, Canada offered the original cross-shaped marker to the United States Merchant Marine Academy, in Kings Point, New York. They had plans to erect it near the waterfront, but before it could be installed a new academy superintendent, who decided he did not like it, stopped the plans. The memorial was sent to storage in a government warehouse. Somehow it was later buried on the grounds of the Merchant Marine Academy. Forty years later, on May 23, 2003, a bulldozer working to widen a road uncovered the marker. It is now, erected on the campus of the Academy, in memory of the men who lost their lives.
George E. Berridge is remembered on the Honor Roll, at the Veterans Memorial Park, in Marion, Ohio; on the west wall of the Marion County Courthouse; and on the World War Two Memorial Wall, at the Marion Cemetery.
Honoring Marion Ohio Veterans 