Posted by Jim Hathaway
on 12/13/2008, 1:58 am, in reply to "Eternal Patrol Notice of C. M. Hathaway"
68.101.75.34
Mr. Hall,
I am a nephew of Clarence M. "Rabbit" Hathaway and would like to thank you for your kind words regarding my Uncle. I am the son of Arthur Hathaway who was the youngest brother of Uncle Rabbit's five siblings, of which only two remain. I stumbled across this website while looking for USS Triton information and reference material to put together a Christmas gift for my Dad in memory of his late brother. As you may well imagine, he was my favorite Uncle...due mostly to the vivid tales of submarine adventures that he would tell whenever I was so fortunate to spend time with him. His 3 children, Inga, Eduard, Katrina and I were all within a few years of each other in age and were quite close. I spent a couple weeks with them in Homestead during the Summer in the very early 70's, and just saw Eduard and Katrina this past Summer at Eduard's son's wedding in Kings Bay, Ga. It was due to those stories Uncle Rabbit would tell that led me to a 22yr career as a submarine Radioman which concluded with my retirement in 2000 onboard the USS Portsmouth (SSN 707) in San Diego. To me, he was the consummate "NUKE", in that he was SO VERY intelligent, but he also had common sense! Not to mention a keen sense of humor that had me and my cousin Ed in stitches a lot of the time. In signing off, I will leave you with this one vision of my Uncle that will remain with me until it is my time to cast off all lines and station the maneuvering watch for eternal patrol. I was stationed in Charleston, SC on the staff of COMSUBRON 18 and had just put on my khakis & CPO anchors when I received an invitation to my cousin Katrina's wedding in the SW part of the state. After an hour or two of talking, he had to get to the ceremony area to get dressed in his tux. I had decided to wear my choker whites to the wedding, and after I changed into them and then arrived at the event, when Uncle Rabbit walked out and saw me in uniform, he came up to me and gave me a huge congratulatory hug. That was the first and ONLY time I ever saw him cry. Mr. Hall, again I thank you for remembering him with your marvelous words. He is greatly missed. Please feel free to get in touch with me via my email, I would very much like that. Warmest Regards, RMC(SS), USN, Ret James W. Hathaway
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