NEWBERRY – Since 2003, more than 127,000 Quilts of Valor have been presented to service men and women who have been touched by war. One of those was presented May 31 to George Epting of Newberry.
Standing amid friends and family members, the 92-year-old Epting was presented his Quilt of Valor by members of the American Legion representing the Quilt of Valor Foundation of America.
During the presentation, a procession of 25 members of the Post 6 Legion of Riders drove their motorcycles down Newberry’s Main Street and after circling the Newberry Opera House, they joined a large contingent for the presentation.
Dale Moss, the S.C. Quilt of Valor Ambassador, explained the goals and mission of the Quilt of Valor Foundation, Mayor Foster Senn provided some comments about Epting’s life and military service and then the quilt – a red, white and blue quilt featuring an anchor design to symbolize his service in the U.S. Navy – was presented to George Epting.
Epting served in the U.S. Navy from Feb. 12, 1943, to Jan. 31, 1946. He served on board the SS Nathan Towson from June 1943 to October 1943, the SS James Bayard from November 1943 to February 1944, the SS Virginia Dare from March 1944 to June 1944 and the SS Anna Howard Shaw from July 1944 to November 1944.
He saw action in the Pacific theater of World War II and was on Okinawa when the war ended. He came back to Newberry, married, and had two daughters with his wife, Vivian, before becoming a widower. He raised his two daughters, Kathy Epting Lindsay and Debbie Epting Reynolds, as a single father in the home in which he grew up and still lives.
Epting was born on Aug. 4, 1923, in Lexington County but his family had to move when the Lake Murray dam was built. They relocated to Newberry County and he attended high school in Silverstreet, graduating in 1941. His father died in 1970 and his mother died in 1978.
“We grew up working,” he said. “Back then everything was farmland. People grew cotton, cotton was the main crop. We all had jobs to do and we had to do them.”
Epting had three brothers and two sisters. His youngest sister and he are the only ones still living.
Epting said he was at home when he and his family heard about Pearl Harbor.
“I remember Pearl Harbor. I remember when the English and the French were fighting the Germans,” he said. “I remember the German submarines were sinking ships. They sank two of our ships before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.”
Epting, who was in the Navy, never flew but, as he says, “made many a mile on the water.”
“I traveled to Scotland, to England, to Africa. Sometimes it was nice, sometimes it was cold,” he recalled. “The first trip I made we stopped at Lockheed, Scotland and we were an American escort to Scotland and from there we were escorted into the North Sea, all the way around the English Islands and down to Newcastle. I traveled all the way around the world, just about.”
He also traveled to Liverpool and Bristol, England, Curacao in the Dutch West Indies and Basra, Iraq.
It was in Basra, Iraq, that he lost his ship, meaning the ship he was assigned to left after he landed in the hospital for treatment of dysentery from drinking bad water. He was in Basra for five or six weeks, two of which were spent in the hospital. At the time, the British controlled the Middle East.
Epting traveled to Washington, D.C., a few years ago to see the World War II Memorial.
“It was wonderful to see what they had built,” he said.