For at least a decade, William C. Goehner, 89, has talked publicly about the four Purple Hearts he received for heroism as a member of a storied Underwater Demolition Team during the Second World War. A television news report aired on Monday says the Morgan Hill man fooled the Library of Congress and journalists into thinking he was a highly decorated war hero.
A television news report aired on Monday says a Morgan Hill man fooled the Library of Congress, a Naval history museum, journalists—and his own son—into thinking he was a highly decorated war hero.
For at least a decade, William C. Goehner, 89, has talked publicly about the four Purple Hearts, three Silver Stars and Navy Cross he received for heroism as a member of a storied Underwater Demolition Team during the Second World War. Morgan Hill Rotary Club issued a presidential citation for valor that he proudly displayed.
The former editors of this newspaper — when it was under different management and ownership — reported Goehner’s detailed accounts under the headline “The original Navy SEAL,” on January 11, 2013.
Current Dispatch editor Jack Foley interviewed Goehner on Sunday night after Goehner’s credibility was called into question by ABC investigative reporter Dan Noyes the evening before at a presentation the Morgan Hill man made at the USS Hornet Museum in Alameda. Wearing a hat adorned with American Legion, VFW and Purple Heart pins, and campaign ribbons, the wheelchair-bound Goehner shared stories with an audience that included Navy veterans.
Impressed attendees sought his autograph afterwards.
In our interview this week, Goehner stood by his stories but was unable to present any convincing documentary evidence to support his claims that he was the war’s second most decorated veteran.
During an hour-long interview on Monday, Goehner’s son, Victor, 60, who is the elder Goehner’s caretaker, said his father has a long history of embellishing, fabricating and boasting of things that are not true, such as being wealthy.
Victor Goehner said he is uncertain if the war stories he has heard all his life are true or false or partly true.
He produced copies of his father’s naval separation document and discharge certificates. The former, dated May 1, 1946 shows the elder Goehner served in the Pacific, European and African theaters of war and was honorably discharged as an S1c, or “Seaman First Class.”
He enlisted in December 1943 and, after leaving active duty, served honorably in the naval reserves until 1954, according to the document.
The document also appears to list his training not in underwater demotion but in the navigation and steering of LSTs, navy lingo for Landing Ship, Tank — large vessels that deliver tanks onto beaches.
The document also indicates he received “Phib” training at Little Creek VA, one of the few training sites at the time for what came to be known as Navy ‘frogmen,’ or underwater demolition teams.
“Phib” in navy training terms mean amphibious — which would be operations directed at a hostile shoreline, including with LSTs.
One of the navy documents has the letters “LC” after Goehner’s rank of S1c. Goehner told the Dispatch this week that the LC stands for Lt. Commander, a rank he said he achieved after several battlefield promotions that came in quick succession but that were temporary.
A search of official navy rankings and acronyms shows the abbreviation for Lt. Commander is LCDR and that LC stands for “littoral combat”.
In naval warfare, littoral combat “refers to operations in and around the littoral zone, within a certain distance of shore, including surveillance, mine-clearing and support for landing operations and other types of combat shifting from water to ground, and back,” according to the online source, Wikipedia.
Some of Goehner’s claims, such as spending time aboard a hospital ship, appear to be plausible. His records indicate he was aboard the USS Repose, a hospital ship, from March 15, 1946 to March 26, 1946, well after the war’s end. The USS Repose at the time was in Asian waters, according to its online history.
Goehner’s official separation papers do not mention any of the medals he claims to have been awarded. The documents indicate he is “entitled” to wear a Bronze Star (one step below the Silver Star), for service in the “European-African-Middle Eastern Area,” the World War Two Victory ribbon and ribbons for service during the post-war occupation of Japan.
The January 2013 Dispatch story was assigned to a freelancer. She says she was given a day to turn the story around about a man a former Dispatch editor described in an email as a “highly decorated” Lt. Commander. Writer Jennifer Wadsworth now works for the weekly Metro Silicon Valley, which is owned by the parent company of the Dispatch and Times.
The Mercury News and Contra Costa Times published an article supporting Goehner’s accounts on its web sites this weekend but removed it without explanation Sunday evening. The Bay Area News Group piece wrote that then-19-year-old Goehner, who grew up in Los Gatos, received “an unprecedented promotion for someone his age to the rank of lieutenant commander” and was hired as a consultant “for the 1951 Oscar-nominated film ‘The Frogmen,’ which depicted the underwater demolition teams that carried out some of the war’s most dangerous missions.”
