Albert L. Becker

Albert Lilly Becker (December 3, 1911 - December 24, 1992) was an American naval officer during World War II who served as the first commander of the USS Cobia (SS-245), a Gato-class submarine, during its initial five wartime patrols in the Pacific Ocean.

Becker was born in Brookhaven, MS in 1911, the second child of William Henry Becker and Verna Lilly. He was educated in the parochial and public schools in Brookhaven and entered Mississippi A&M in 1928. He was appointed to the United States Naval Academy in 1930 and commissioned as an Ensign in 1934. On a midshipmen's cruise, his ship stopped in Gloucester, Massachusetts, where he met Marjorie Tarr at a dance. They were married in Charleston, SC in 1936.

Becker attended Submarine School and was transferred to Pearl Harbor in 1936 where he served on the USS Argonaut (SM-1), and where his daughter Gail Becker Coolidge was born. He was transferred back to the mainland early in 1941 and was stationed at the New London Submarine Base when the US entered World War II.

During the war, he was Executive Officer of the USS Blackfish (SS-221) in the Atlantic and captain of the USS Cobia in the Pacific. His son Joseph Whitney Becker was born in New London in 1943. Becker was awarded the Navy Cross, the Silver Star, two Navy Commendation Medal with Combat V, the Submarine Combat Patrol Insignia and the Command at Sea insignia. In addition to sinking eight enemy ships, Cobia rescued seven US aviators, whose plane had been shot down in a raid on Saigon [1], [2].

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