First day cover honoring the Four Chaplains, 1948 (1).

That Others Might Live: The Four Chaplains

Father John Washington (Catholic), Rev. Clark Poling (Dutch Reformed), Rabbi Alexander Goode (Jewish) and Rev. George Fox (Methodist) were on their way to the European theater of operations when their ship, the U.S.S. Dorchester, was torpedoed 100 miles off the coast of Greenland during the early hours of February 3, 1943. The chaplains took charge of distributing life jackets to the soldiers as they abandoned ship. When the life jacket supply was exhausted the chaplains gave their own, saving the lives of fellow soldiers. Survivors reported that the four chaplains were last seen standing together on the deck of the ship as it went under. Issued on May 28, 1948 and designed by Louis Schwimmer, this was the first postage stamp that was both designed by a Jew and featured a Jew. The image of the four chaplains became an icon of the postwar interfaith movement.