Cmdr. Charles William Burlin Jr.

Cmdr. Charles William Burlin Jr. US Navy (Ret.), 102, passed away peacefully on July 25, 2024 with family at his side. He was born December 12, 1921 at Walter Reed U.S. Army Hospital in Washington, D.C. to father Charles W. Burlin, Sr., U.S. Army, of Worcester, MA and Eva J. Harlan, of Wilmington, Delaware. A long life.

He was predeceased by his loving wife Margaret H. Burlin (Peg) in 2012. Peg and he enjoyed 68 years together after marrying at the Naval Academy Chapel, Annapolis, Md, a day after his graduation from the Naval Academy, in 1943. He was also predeceased by two brothers: Col. Robert B. Burlin, U.S. Army (Ret), and Richard H. Burlin.

He is survived by his three sons Charles W. Burlin III, David S. Burlin, and John R. Burlin, his four grandsons, Wil H. Burlin, Carl A. Burlin, Michael A. Burlin, and Matthew D. Burlin, and two great grandchildren, Oswald and Iris Shames-Burlin.

Born an “Army Brat” into an Army family, he answered to William or Bill early on, to discern his name from that of his father, aptly named “Charlie”. Early Brownie camera photos, at three years, however, showed him in sailor togs, perhaps foretelling his future Navy Career.

Bill’s father served in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers with orders that required the family to move frequently, including multi-year stints from Washington, D.C., San Antonio, TX, Denver, CO, Buffalo, NY, and back to Washington, D.C. for his father’s Army graduate school.

New orders sent Bill’s family to live from 1932 to 1935 in the Panama Canal Zone at Corozal Army Engineer Post on the Pacific side near Miraflores Locks. Living beside the world’s greatest engineering marvel in the world was truly a wonderful experience. His mother, during this time period, brought Bill and brother Bob back to U.S. to spent time in Wilmington, Delaware to visit his mother’s family and North Chatham, Cape Cod, to visit his grandfather (Karl T. Burlin). The family returned to the U.S. in 1935, settling outside Philadelphia, PA. where Bill graduated from Upper Darby High School in 1939 and then studied engineering for one year at the University of Pennsylvania.

Bill applied to the United States Naval Academy, having passed the rigorous mental and physical tests, and was finally accepted in August of 1940, with war brewing. An aggressive USNA curricula stressed naval engineering, navigation, seamanship, naval history, English, another language and physical fitness, as well as all the other regular Midshipman requirements. While on a brief leave from the Academy, Bill met his future wife in North Chatham in 1941, purportedly at the old North Chatham Post Office near Cranberry Lane. Shortly thereafter, back at the Academy, one Sunday in December, he would learn about the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Bill’s class of 1944 graduated on June 9th 1943, and he and Peg married the next day. He volunteered and was accepted for Submarine School. First, however, was six weeks of air observational training at Jacksonville, Florida Naval Air Station, flying in all types of Naval aircraft. Afterwards, Bill and Peg spent two weeks in North Chatham, then he reported to Submarine School in New London, Connecticut for three months of submarine training on Long Island Sound. Then, off to California to join the USS-23 in San Diego to train on sonar.

He joined his beloved USS Skate (SS-305) at Hunters Point Naval Base, San Francisco, California, and departed in May 1945 on its seventh war patrol with the famous and dangerous Operation Barney, in the Sea of Japan, with nine submarines penetrating the previously impenetrable Tsushima Straits’ minefields, causing much havoc behind enemy lines. On its eighth war patrol the war ended and Bill returned to Pearl Harbor and back to the States, to visit with wife Peg and one-year old son Bill III.

Bill earned his Lighter Than Air wings after training at NAS Lakehurst, New Jersey in December of 1946 and went on to fly airship patrols over the East Coast and Caribbean. Bill, with family that now included second son David in tow as of 1947, then reported for flight training in NAS Pensacola, Florida and advanced flight training on his favorite plane, the PB4Y Privateer, in Corpus Christi, Texas for before moving onto NAS Whidbey Island in 1950. Then Kodiak, Alaska for active duty patrols over the U.S. West Coast watching out for Soviet submarine activity. Bill would later serve in the Korean War, piloting combat flights in his Privateer across North Korea and along the Chinese Coast.

He attended the US Navy Post Graduate School in Monterey California, in 1953 and spent two years in Operations Research. Son John was born there. On to Key West, Florida and back to airships, in 1955, for three years, then to the Office of Naval Research in Washington, D.C. in 1958 for 2 years, specializing in air warfare and sound surveillance systems and ended up for another 2 years at the Pentagon at the high security JC5 section, working on joint command communications.

In 1962, he was given orders to be stationed at NATO’s Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, Operations Division, then outside of Paris, France, taking the SS United States, fastest liner in the world, at the time, across the Atlantic, in 4 days. The family resided in Le Vesinet and St. Germain-en-Laye, and toured much of Europe.

In 1965, after 25 years of military service and travel around the globe, Bill retired from the Navy and returned with Peg and son John to North Chatham, Massachusetts on Cape Cod, whilst Bill III attended Texas A&M and David became a midshipman at the Naval Academy.

A busy and unique Navy career which encompassed three certifications: in submarines, in lighter than air, and in flight, rare triple qualifications, and much family travel, back and forth across in the United States, Europe and the Pacific Theatre.

Bill’s love for Chatham and life on Cape Cod had deep roots, visiting family every chance he could. His grandfather and first-generation immigrant from Sweden Karl T. Burlin first purchased a property in North Chatham in 1897. Following his lead, Bill’s parents purchased their own house and land in 1935 in North Chatham and he would fondly recall working on the house with his father and brother, in his youth. In 1955, Bill and Peg had built their own house in North Chatham, and again, on grandmother’s hill, a house in 2000. He invited relatives, friends and family to enjoy the Cape on innumerable visits. He greatly enjoyed talking to people, advising them where he could, and helping them out, over the years.

Post military career, Bill worked for United Aircraft Research Labs in Hartford, Connecticut as a Senior Research Engineer. Later he worked on the Cape Cod Economic Development Commission and the Coastal Advisory Board, recommending and implementing aerial photography to monitor Chatham’s shifting sands and coastlines.

Bill remained active and intellectually curious in retirement and his later years. Bill regularly traveled to attend submarine veterans and lighter-than-air reunions across the country. He also traveled to his ancestral home in Sweden, across Australia and New Zealand, and to visit his sons and grandchildren across the U.S. with Peg. Bill was an avid reader, especially of topics related to math, science and medical research. Bill was an accomplished carpenter and handyman, an accomplished boater and fisherman (stripers, blues, and flounder) and shell fisherman, where he scuba dived for scallops. He worked extensively on a book about his submarine and subsequently published a personal memoir titled “A Navy Life”. He was an active member of the First Congregational Church of Chatham.

For many decades, he was a participant in the Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging, where he assisted the National Institute of Aging in learning about health and improving the aging process.

Friends and Family are invited to a service at the First Congregational Church of Chatham,

650 Main Street, on Saturday, September 21, 2024 at 11 AM.

Donations in Bill’s name are welcome to the First Congregational Church at 650 Main Street, Chatham, MA. 02633, as well as Friends of Chatham COA, 193 Stony Hill Road, Chatham, MA 02633.