USS COLE is the first warship named for Sergeant Darrell S. Cole, USMC (1920-1945). Sergeant Cole was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his conspicuous gallantry in the campaign at Iwo Jima. Sergeant Cole was enlisted in to the Marine Corps originally as a Bugler; this proved to be some what a slow pace and demoralizing rating due to him joining a fighting unit to fight. . He had applied for a change in rating, but was refused due to the shortage of buglers. He did get is wish at Guadalcanal for the first American offensive of World War II, where he had an opportunity to fill in as a Machine Gunner in the situation that then a normal gunner is incapacitated.…
