In the Navy

Written by: Kelly Durham

It is no surprise given Clemson’s long history of Army ROTC that the vast majority, nearly 80%, of the men on the University’s Scroll of Honor served in the Army and the Army Air Force.  Despite the fact that Clemson has administered an Air Force ROTC program since the late 1940s, it is the Navy rather than the Air Force which lays claim to the next largest group of Scroll of Honor heroes.  Joshua Ward Motte Simmons of Newberry is one member of the Navy contingent, which comprises six percent of the Scroll of Honor.

 

Simmons attended Clemson from 1904 to 1906 as an engineering major.  The young campus included few academic buildings. During Simmons’s time at Clemson, Agriculture Hall (now Sikes) was built, joining the Main Building (later Tillman Hall), Chemistry Building (Hardin Hall), Textile Building (Godfrey Hall) and Mechanical Hall. Enrollment was less than 600 cadets, all male, all white, and the majority from South Carolina.

Simmons left Clemson after two years and eventually made his way to Charleston.  When the United States entered World War I, Simmons joined the Navy.  Ensign Simmons served on two vessels, the USS Osceola and the USS Teal.

Osceola was a seagoing tug that steamed to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and remained there as a station ship.  Teal was a minesweeper.  Launched in May 1918, Teal patrolled off the shores of New Jersey, Delaware, and Pennsylvania.  It is likely that Simmons’s service on Teal, operating in and out of northern ports, put him in contact with soldiers returning from the war.  In addition to their gear, many of these soldiers carried the influenza virus that in 1918 swept across much of the United States and the world and was known as the Spanish Flu.

The flu was particularly deadly among young adults whose lungs it would damage and who would then often develop pneumonia.  That may well be what happened to Simmons.  He was admitted to the Portsmouth Naval Hospital in Virginia where he succumbed to pneumonia on March 14, 1919, at the age of 32.

Ensign Joshua Ward Motte Simmons was buried at Rosemont Cemetery in Newberry.  He was survived by his mother.  He was posthumously awarded the World War I Victory Medal.

 

For more information on Joshua Ward Motte Simmons see:

https://soh.alumni.clemson.edu/scroll/joshua-ward-motte-simmons/

For additional information about Clemson University’s Scroll of Honor visit:

https://soh.alumni.clemson.edu/