Captain Herbert Irving Mandel, U.S. Navy (Retired) passed away on February 4, 2016, at Kimball Farms, the community in Lenox, Mass., where he resided since 2001. Born on June 14, 1917, he was the eldest of three children of Jacob J. and Frieda Silber Mandel.
He attended James Madison High School in Brooklyn, where he received a Congressional Appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. His first duty assignments were to the aircraft carriers LEXINGTON and WASP. In 1941, he entered the submarine school in Groton, Conn. He served on the submarines R13, FINBACK, CROAKER, and as Commanding Officer of the USS PERMIT and MEDREGAL. For his service in WWII, he was awarded a second Gold Star in lieu of his third Silver Star medal.
He served as Associate Professor of Naval Science at the University of Pennsylvania from 1950 to 1952, and while there, attended the Wharton School of Finance. He held an M.B.A. In 1953-1954, he served as Operation Officer on the staff of Commander Amphibious IV, which planned and conducted OPERATION WELDFAST in the Mediterranean. This was the first large scale, five-nation exercise conducted by NATO forces. In 1954, he was ordered to command U.S.S. DOUGLAS H. FOX (Norfolk, Va.) and in 1956, when promoted to Captain, was ordered to the Seventh Fleet in Asian waters as Commander Destroyer Division 252, homeported in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
He was then, in 1957, ordered to the newly formed Joint Staff of the Commander in Chief of Pacific Ocean Areas, largest of the unified commands, and served as Chief of Navy-Maritime Military Assistance plans of East and Southeast Asia. After three years, he was ordered to command USS MAURY, the Navy’s largest hydrographic ship. In 1961, after serving as Assistant Chief of Staff at Capital Western Sea Frontier headquarters in San Francisco, he requested voluntary retirement, and joined the Electric Boat Division of the General Dynamics Corporation in Groton, Conn. He lived in New London, Conn., for 40 years.
He was married to Gloria Kaufman Mandel from 1941 until her death in 1962. In 1963, he married Mrs. Ann Richman and became stepfather to her two sons, Stephen Richman, M.D., and David Richman. While in New London, he was elected twice to the New London City Council, where he served for four years. He was President of the Connecticut Chapter of the U.S. Naval Academy Alumni Association. He also served as President of Congregation Beth El. In 2005, he authored the book, “Submarine Captain and Command at Sea.”
While wintering in Naples and Marco Island, Fla., he served as a member of the Collier County Catholic-Jewish Dialogue Committee. He was active in the business community until he was 80, maintaining an active role with ADVEST, a stockbrokerage firm in New London, Conn. In 2001, after the death of his second wife, he moved to Kimball Farms, a life care community in Lenox, Mass., and wintered in Florida.
Herb is survived by his son, Matthew B. Mandel, M.D., of Stockbridge, Mass., and his wife, Catherine. He is also survived by two grandchildren, Laure Mandel Friedman of Wilton, Conn., and Gregory T. Mandel of Los Angeles, Calif.,, their spouses, David Friedman and Kristen Mandel, and four great-grandchildren, Aaron and Lia Friedman, and Juliette and Vivienne Mandel.
His funeral with full military honors will take place at Arlington National Cemetery in the spring.
