THOMAS E. BASS, III REAR ADMIRAL, U.S.NAVY, RETIRED

Rear Admiral Thomas E. Bass, III, U.S. Navy, Retired, was born in Richmond, Virginia and reared in Eastern North Carolina. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of North Carolina in 1938. Following graduate work at the University, Admiral Bass served as a teacher, an athletic coach and then as a District Principal in the Public School System of North Carolina.

He entered the U.S.Navy as an Ensign in August of 1942. During World War II, Admiral Bass commanded a Submarine Chaser (SC676) in the Mediterranean Sea. He participated in the North African campaign and in the Allied invasion of Sicily at Gela, Italy at Salerno and Anzio and Southern France at St.Tropez. He also campaigned with the Yugoslav partisans in the German occupied areas of Yugoslavia.

Admiral Bass has held seven commands at sea, the aforementioned Sub Chaser, a Fleet Minesweeper, and a Gearing Class Destroyer, the USS Harold J. Ellison (DD864), which was awarded the Battle Efficiency "E". He also commanded Destroyer Division 102, the Navy’s first guided missile Destroyer Squadron, Twenty Six and Cruiser-Destroyer Flotillas. During the Viet Nam conflict, he commanded the Cruiser-Destroyer Nine and Three Group of the Seventh Fleet in the Western Pacific.

Admiral Bass has also served as AIDE AND Flag Secretary to Commander of the Sixth Fleet and Deputy Chief of Staff for Commander of the Pacific Fleet. He was Director of Officer Distribution for the Bureau Of Naval Personnel, and a Branch Head in Strategic Plans (OP-60) in the office of the Chief of Naval Operations.

He is a graduate of the Navy’s Mine Warfare School, the Armed Forces Staff College, the Senior Course of the Naval War College and the NATO Defense College in Paris, France. Admiral Bass was the acting Commanding Officer and Commissioning Executive Officer of the U.S. Navy’s Destroyers School in Newport, Rhode Island, now known as the Surface Warfare School.

On the completion of a tour of duty in 1974 as Commandant of the Thirteenth Naval District, with Headquarters in Seattle, Washington, Admiral Bass retired from active Naval service and accepted the position of Executive Director of the Robert E. Lee Memorial Association and Stratford Hall Plantation in Westmoreland County, Virginia. Stratford Hall is the ancestral home of the Lees of Virginia and the home of the only two brothers to sign the Declaration of Independence, Richard Henry and Francis Lightfoot Lee. It is even more notably the birthplace of Robert E. Lee, Commanding General of the Confederate Armies in the War between the States.

Admiral Bass retired from Stratford Hall in 1988, and settled in the Charlottesville area. He was asked to return to Stratford in 1996 for one year, retiring again with the title of Executive Director Emeritus.

Admiral Bass is a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, a Trustee of the U.S. Naval Historical Foundation and a former President of the James Monroe Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution (SAR). He is former historian for the Thomas Jefferson Chapter of the SAR and Past President of the Charlottesville Council of the Navy League of the United States. He is a Senior Warden and member of the Vestry of Christ Episcopal Church in Charlottesville where he now serves as a lay Euchalistic Minister. He is a former President of the Historical Society of the Northern Neck and of the Charlottesville Branch Of the Speaking Union. Admiral Bass is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Charlottesville Albemarle Community Foundation and the Executive Committee of the Lee Jackson Foundation. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of the United Way-Thomas Jefferson area.

Admiral Bass is married to the former Sophia Redwood of Asheville, North Carolina. They have three Children, Thomas E.IV, a businessman in Greensboro, North Carolina, Robert R., a physician directing Emergency Medicine and Services for the State of Maryland and Catherine Carter, who manages the families Kirkford Farm, a sports horse breeding and training farm in Albemarle County..

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