WWII Naval History

There’s more stuff on the web about variolus squadrons that trained there, including from UK and South Africa.

I thank you for the info on one of the squadrons although I believe there were others, including one flying SB2C’s. The squadron’s history was rather skant about their times at Squantum although much of the flying was at nearby Beverly Airport. Including some of the barracks.
I really would like to talk to some veteran that was there and their possible contact with Major Arthur E. Fisette.

Bethlehem Shipbuilding Company’s “Victory Destroyer Plant” was located at Squantum, Massachusetts, not far from Quincy. This large facility was built during World War I to mass-produce destroyers on indoor shipways.

Quincy, named for Colonel John Quincy, is a city located in Norfolk County, Massachusetts and bears the nickname “The City of Presidents”. Sailing ships were built in Quincy for many years, and the final known clipper ship built was in Germantown in the 1870s. The Fore River area became a shipbuilding center in the 1880s — originally owned by Thomas Watson of telephone fame — and many famous warships were built at the Fore River Shipyard, including the aircraft carrier USS Lexington (CV-2), the battleships USS Massachusetts (BB-59) and USS Nevada (BB-36), and the USS Salem (CA-139), the world’s last all-gun heavy warship, which is still preserved at Fore River as the main exhibit of the United States Naval Ship Building Museum.

Dennison Field in the Squantum section of town was partially developed by Amelia Earhart. In 1910 it was the site of the Harvard Aero Meet, only the second air show in America. It was later leased to the Navy for an airfield, and served as a reserve Squantum Naval Air base into the 1950s.

The Uk’s 849 Naval Air Squadron first formed on 1 August 1943 at Naval Air Station Squantum, Massachusetts with 12 Grumman Avenger torpedo, strike and reconnaissance aircraft but has its origins with the naval Wing of the Royal Flying Corps from 1912. (see: http://www.royal-marines.mod.uk/static/pages/10201.html)