MM1/c August Michael Demma was born on January 24, 1924, to Marena Demma and Mary Ann Demma and had two sisters and two brothers. The family resided at 220 North Brown Avenue, Forest Park, Illinois. He graduated from the Field Stevenson School and attended Proviso Township High School but left school on January 7, 1942. Five days later, on January 12th, he enlisted in the US Navy.
It is known that he did his basic training at Great Lakes Naval Station and was assigned the serial number 300 73 80. When he completed his training he was sent San Diego, California, and then sailed on the USS Wharton which was a troop transport ship. The ship regularly sailed from San Francisco to Sand Diego, and finally to Hawaii. He simply may have been assigned to the ship as it took him to the aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise in Hawaii. On March 16, 1942, he became a member of the Enterprise’s crew as a Fireman First Class.
During his time on the carrier, the Enterprise took part in Battle of Midway from June 4, 1942 to June 7, 1942, the landings at Guadalcanal from August 7th to 9th, the Battle of Eastern Solomons (part of Guadalcanal) from August 24th to 25th, Battle of Santa Cruz on October 25th to 27th. In the summer of 1943, the ship went into drydock for an overhaul that took months at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, Washington State. On June 19th to 20th, 1944, took part in the Battle of the Philippine Sea. Next, it took part in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, October 15th through 19th and the Battle of Okinawa, April 7th through 12th. Then came the Battle of Kyushu from May 12th to 14th.
It was during the Battle of Kyushu, that a Japanese kamikaze crashed through the hanger’s elevator which was blown into the air when its bomb exploded below deck. What is known is that the compartment that August and twelve other men were in was closed off due to flooding which killed the men in it. These thirteen men, with one man apparently killed by the detonation, were the last members of the Enterprise’s crew to die in World War II. When the dead were recovered, they were buried at sea.
MM1c August Demma’s name was placed on the Honolulu Memorial Courts of the Missing in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, Honolulu, Hawaii.
