Remembering Captain Karl B. Kohler, USN, (1610/Cryptologist)

Karl Bernard Kohler was born April 18, 1916 in New Haven, CT; one of three children born to Julius and Barbara Kohler.

After graduation from high school circa 1935, he joined the Naval Reserve in 1937 while attending the Junior College of Commerce in New Haven. In 1940 he left junior college to enroll in the Navy’s Midshipman School, and upon graduation he was commissioned as Ensign, USNR on Feb 28, 1941. His first duty was in the battleship USS California (BB-44) stationed at Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii; and he survived the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor December 7, 1941.

On July 10, 1942 Lieutenant (junior grade) Kohler married Mary Jane (Marie) McGorty, also from New Haven. At that time the couple was residing in an apartment on Hyde Street in San Francisco, but the wedding announcement did not specify where he was stationed. Later that year he was promoted to Lieutenant.