On the occasion of the 75th anniversary of D-Day Dr. Bill Dudley offers this brief appreciation of what the US Navy accomplished that day, on behalf of those who sacrificed their lives.

Midshipman Richard Sutherland Dale served onboard the United States Frigate President, when on 14 January 1815, the President was able to sortie from New York. But in the snowstorm that had blown the Royal Navy’s blockading squadron offshore, the President ran hard onto a sand bar. The damage to the President’s hull was such that she was no longer the excellent sailer that she was on previous voyages. This would prove fatal to the President and to Midshipman Dale, who was the last US Navy officer to die during the War of 1812.

Charles Walter David, Jr., Steward's Mate in the United States Coast Guard, died after rescuing other sailors from the frigid North Atlantic. He was assigned to the USCGC Comanche during World War II, which was assigned to escort a convoy that included the Dorchester, a troop transport, when it was torpedoed by a U-boat off Greenland.

The Naval Order, Hill Center and U.S. Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery commemorated the 150th anniversary of the Old Naval Hospital with a dedication and unveiling of a historical marker, October 1, 2016. The dedication paid tribute to the hospital's historical link to today's modern Navy Medicine.