lack participation in the Navy remained severely
restricted during the rest of the inter-war period. In June 1940 the
Navy had 4,007 black personnel, 2.3 percent of its nearly 170,000-man
total.[3-1] All were enlisted men, and with the exception of six regular
rated seamen, lone survivors of the exclusion clause, all were
steward's mates, labeled by the black press "seagoing bellhops."

[Footnote 3-1: All statistics in this chapter are
taken from the files of the U.S. Navy, Bureau of
Naval Personnel (hereafter cited as BuPers).]

The Steward's Branch, composed entirely of enlisted Negroes and
oriental aliens, mostly Filipinos, was organized outside the Navy's
general service. Its members carried ratings up to chief petty
officer, but wore distinctive uniforms and insignia, and even chief
stewards never exercised authority over men rated in the general naval
service. Stewards manned the officers' mess and maintained the
officers' billets on board ship, and, in some instances, took care of
the quarters of high officials in the shore establishment. Some were
also engaged in mess management, menu planning, and the purchase of
supplies. Despite the fact that their enlistment contracts restricted
their training and duties, stewards, like everyone else aboard ship,
were assigned battle stations, including positions at the guns and on
the bridge. One of these stewards, Dorie (Doris) Miller, became a hero
on the first day of the war when he manned a machine gun on the
burning deck of the USS _Arizona_ and destroyed two enemy planes.[3-2]

[Footnote 3-2: After some delay and considerable
pressure from civil rights sources, the Navy
identified Miller, awarded him the Navy Cross, and
promoted him to mess attendant, first class. Miller
was later lost at sea. See Dennis D. Nelson, _The
Integration of the Negro Into the U.S. Navy_ (New
York: Farrar, Straus and Young, 1951), pp. 23-25.
The Navy further honored Miller in 1973 by naming a
destroyer escort (DE 1091) after him.]

By the end of December 1941 the number of Negroes in the Navy had
increased by slightly more than a thousand men to 5,026, or 2.4
percent of the whole, but they continued to be excluded from all
positions except that of steward.[3-3] It